Thucydides History of the Peloponnesian War 3.21

θέρους —Thuc. divides the year into θέρος, consisting of about eight months (Elaphebohon to Pyanepsion) and χειμών, consisting of about four (Maimacterion to Anthesterion).

ἅμα τῷ σίτῳ ἀκμάζοντι —‘just when the corn was ripening’; about the middle of May, 428 B.C., before the harvest ( καρποῦ ξυγκομιδή).

ἐγκαθεζόμενοι —the form serves as an aorist as well as a present.

ὥσπερ εἰώθεσαν —sc. γίγνεσθαι, in the two previous invasions. The plan had been started by Pericles.

ὅπῃ παρείκοι —impers., though strictly ὁ θεός is the subject implied.

τὸν πλεῖστον ὅμιλον —cf. II. 31 ὁ ἄλλος ὅμιλος ψιλῶν, ‘the main body.’ Outside Thuc. ὅμιλος is found only in Herod., in tragedy, and in late authors.—The wasting of the country was a tedious task that would devolve naturally on the light-armed troops.

εἶργον τὸ μή —for the constr., which is common with verbs and phrases signifying prevention ( Aesch. PV. 252 ἐξελυσάμην βροτοὺς | τὸ μὴ . . μολεῖν, and often in Aesch.) cf. VI. 1 διείργεται τὸ μὴ ἤπειρος εἶναι (where the MS. οὖσα is shown by many imitations of the sentence by later authors to be a mistake).

τῶν ὅπλων = τοῦ στρατοπέδου, strictly the space in front of the quarters where the arms were stacked; here the word marks the fact that the light-armed could not with safety be withdrawn from the hoplites. 10. τὰ ἐγγὺς τῆς πόλεως—i.e. houses, trees, vineyards: we are not to suppose that the Athenians cropped their lands annually for the benefit of the Peloponnesian invaders.

οὗ —the gen. as in μισθὸς τριῶν μηνῶν. The enemy remained in Attica about thirty days: the longest invasion, that of 430 B.C., lasted forty days, the shortest, in 425 B.C., fifteen days.

Λέσβος ἀπέστη —the gravity of this event lay in the fact that Lesbos and Chios were the only two islands in the Aegean that retained the position of independent allies of Athens. These furnished manned ships, but not infantry or money. For the narrative see Introd. p. xiii.

Μηθύμνης —Methymna, the second town in Lesbos, was under a democracy, Mytilene under an oligarchy.

βουληθέντες agrees κατὰ σύνεσιν with Λέσβος: this change, in the case of peoples, is especially common in Thuc.; and cf. c. 67, 3 ἠλικία . . ῶν. So with στρατιά, στράτευμα.

τῶν . . τήν serve for all three pairs of nouns.

χῶσιν —the harbours were to be turned into λιμένες κλῃστοί ( II. 94, 4): walls were carried across the mouth on artificial moles, and the narrow opening left could be closed with a chain.

ἐπέμενον —showing why they had put off the revolt. The constr. with ἐπιμένειν is here double: (1) τὴν . . ποίησιν τελεσθῆναι, as in VII. 20 περιέμενε τὸν Χαρικλέα . . παραλαβεῖν: (2) ὅσα . . ἔδει ἀφικέσθαι, an accusative clause. (It is objected that Thuc. elsewhere uses ἐπιμένειν only as intrans., but he uses e.g. μένω and ὑπο‐ in both ways; and why not ἐπι‐?)

τοξότας —as mercenaries.

μεταπεμπόμενοι ἦσαν —cf. I. 99 ἦσαν . . ἄρχοντες, II. 80 ἦσαν . . ξυμπροθυμούμενοι. Of course, the periphrasis with pres partic. is much less common than with perf., but it is not different in principle. Passages like II. 67 οὗ ἦν στράτευμα πολιορκοῦν ‘where there was a blockading army’ are quite different, the partic. not belonging to the verb. In yet another case, like I. 38 τοῖς πλείοσιν άρέσκοντές ἐσμεν, the partic. is a predicative adj.

ἰδίᾳ —in contrast with what the government was doing κοινῇ.

κατά —often of the motive or reason, e.g. II. 87 ξυμπαραγενομένων κατὰ φιλίαν.

πρόξενοι —the fact that there were more representatives of Athens than one at Mytilene might show that the office was hereditary in a family, but more probably the title of πρόξενος καὶ εὐεργέτης had been granted by Athens to members of different Mytilenean families. Aristotle in Pol. 1304 a says that Dexander ἦρξε τῆς στάσεως καὶ τοὺς Ἀθηναίους παρώξυνε πρόξενος ὤν: he had a private quarrel with a member of the aristocratic party; from this small matter πολλῶν ἐγένετο ἀρχὴ κακῶν. In any case it would have been the duty of the Proxenus to inform Athens of movements in Mytilene unfavourable to her interests even before the war; but doubtless the quarrel was now an exasperating motive to him, and led directly to the outbreak of stasis, for it was a dispute about property and intermarriage between families of the opposed parties.

ξυνοικίζουσι —i.e. attempting to make the island into a single πόλις under one government, and in this case, an oligarchy.

ξυγγενῶν — Lesbos being of Boeotian (Aeolic) origin. To intervene on behalf of kinsmen was under all circumstances deemed justifiable among Greek states.

εἰ μή τις —‘unless they mean to,’ the fut. indic. marking the urgency; cf. VIII. 91 εἰ μή τις ἤδη φυλάξεται.

νόσου —during 430 and 429 B.C.

ἄρτι καθισταμένου —‘just becoming established’ (i.e. settled, chronic). Cf. I. 1 ἀρξάμενος ( ξυγγράψαι) εὐθὺς καθισταμένου. If we render thus, it makes no difference whether Thuc. means the ten years' or the twenty-seven years' war. In either case, ἀκμάζοντος shows that ‘in its infancy’ is wrong. But Classen's ‘in the middle period’ seems impossible: for it is inconceivable that καθισταμένου τοῦ πολέμοι should mean either ‘just beginning,’ as he understands I 1, or ‘in the middle’ at will. In V. 25 εὐθὺς ἄλλη ταραχὴ καθίστατο the verb means not merely ‘arose,’ but ‘tended to become permanent,’ applying to a period, not to a moment. ἀκμάζοντος—ἄρτι does not extend to this. A period of ἀκμή is of course meant. Athens was now beginning to feel the strain on her finances (see c. 19 ); and her position in Chalcidice was very precarious. (Vollgraff proposes to add ἤδη before ἀκμάζοντος, but this is not necessary.)

μεῖζον μέρος νέμοντες —‘attaching greater importance to their wish that it was not true’ (than to the allegations). For ἀληθῆ cf. I. 8 πλωιμώτερα ἐγένετο νἐμειν μέρος or μοῖραν several times in tragedy: Aesch. PV. 294 , Soph. Trachin. 1238 , Eur. Supp. 241 ; cf. τὸ ἴσον νέμειν I. 71, ἔλασσον νἐμειν VI. 88, πλέον ν. Eur. Hec. 868 , c. 48, 1.

παρασκευήν refers of course to the preparations of c. 2, 2 (cf. c. 2, 3).

δείσαντες —ingressive.

ἐξαπιναίως —like ἐξαπίνης, found only in Thuc. and Xen. among Attic prose writers (for ἐξαίφνης or αἰφνιδίως).

περὶ Πελοπόννησον πλεῖν —both in 431 and 430 B.C. when the Pel. invaded Attica (II. 23, 56), a fleet had been sent out to make descents on the coast of the Peloponnese, as a counter-move. For the operations of this year see c. 16, 1; for those of 426 B.C. see cc. 91, 94.

Μαλόεις was a local name of Apollo in Lesbos; its origin is unknown.

πανδημεί —the whole people together, not by families or clans.

ἐλπίδα εἶναι like εἰκός ἐστι, is commonly followed by pres. or aor. infin.

ἐπειχθέντας is conditional.

ἢν μὲν ξυμβῇ . . εἰ δὲ μή —a common idiom, found already in Homer; cf. e.g. Plato, Prot. 325B ἐὰν μὲν ἑκὼν πείθηται· εἰ δὲ μή.

εἰπεῖν —this depends on the sense of ‘order’ implied in the passage; cf. Andoc. de Myst. 20 ὁ γὰρ νόμος οὕτως εἷχεν· εἰ μὲν τἀληθῆ μηνύσειέ τις, εἶναι τὴν ἄδειαν, εἰ δὲ τὰ ψευδῆ, τεθνάναι. Of course εἰπεῖν = κελεῦσαι. (This passage is brief and peremptory in tone: its dramatic manner is quite characteristic, and there is no ground for suspecting the text.)

παρὰ σφᾶς —put briefly for παρὰ σφᾶς παραγενόμεναι καὶ παροῦσαι: similarly παρεῖναι is often found with εἰς or ἐπί with accus.; but there is no precise parallel to the present case.

ἐς φυλακὴν ἐποιήσαντο —so VIII. 1 ἐς άσφάλειαν ποιεῖσθαι. Cf. Andoc. de Myst. 117 θυγατέρες αἳ ἐγίγνοντο ἔς τε ἐμέ καὶ Λέαγρον.

διαβάς .—the sentence, containing five participles, is an example of what Dionysius calls τὸ πυκνόν of Thucydides; Cicero speaks of him as pressus, Quintilian as densus. The participles that denote closely connected parts of the same action are joined by καί.

ἐπιτυχών = ὡς ἐπέτυχε.

πλῷ χρησάμενος —‘after a good passage.’ πλῷ = εὐπλοίᾳ, as in I. 137 . (Some make πλῷ χρησάμενος merely = πλεύσας, but Antiphon V. 24 πλοῦς ἡμῖν ἐγίγνετο καὶ ἀνήγετο πλοῖα ἄπαντα seems decisive.)

οὔτε . . τε —a common idiom (cf. neque . . que or et), by which emphasis is thrown on the second clause.

τά τε ἄλλα . . ἐφύλασσον —‘and besides ( τὰ ἄλλα, adverbial) having protected with rapidly constructed defences all round the half-finished (works) of the walls and docks they guarded them.’ This is the best way of taking this puzzling sentence. None of the changes in the text that have been proposed is an improvement.

περί is an adverb = πέριξ, as in Homer (Wilamowitz on Eur. HF. 1035 ).

οἱ Ἀθηναῖοι —the subject of the subord. verb is put at the head of the sentence to contrast the action of Athenians and Lesbians sharply; a good parallel occurs at VII. 32 οἱ δὲ . . πρέσβεις . . ἐπειδὴ . . ἔμελλον ἄξειν τὸν στρατόν, ὁ Νικίας . . πέμπει. The imperf.,

ἑώρων (sc. τὰ γιγνόμενα), is used because the action overlaps that of ἀπήγγειλαν.

ἀπαράσκευοι qualifies πολεμεῖν, and is therefore co-ordinate with ἐξαίφνης: cf. e.g. I. 39 προύχοντα καὶ ἐκ τοῦ ἀσφαλοῦς, and c. 13, 2 θᾶσσον γεγένηται καὶ ἀπαράσκευος .

ἔκπλουν τινα —for the use of τις cf. II. 22 ἱππομαχία τις βράχεια ἐγένετο.

ναυμαχίαν —both dat. and accus. seem to occur with ὡς ἐπί of intention; but the MSS. often vary, as here.

πρὸ τοῦ λιμένος —i.e. that harbour which was used by the fleet (cc. 3 , 6; 6, 1), in which their ships had lam. (Steup's suggestion that τοῦ ἑτέρου λ. should be read is unnecessary.) Presently they were driven back into this same harbour. The northern harbour is meant. See Introd. P. xiv.

ὀλίγον is accus. of space (cf. 104, 2); of time II. 8 ὀλίγον πρὸ τούτων.

τὸ παραυτίκα . . ἀποπέμψασθαι —‘get the ships withdrawn for the time being,’ i.e. in order to gain time.

καί ‘accordingly.’

τῶν διαβαλλόντων —see c. 2, 3. The partic. becomes a subst, as in οἱ ἐπαγόμενοι II. 2, οἱ προδιδόντες II. 5.

τὰς ναῦς is not object of πείσειαν, but only subject of ἀπελθεῖν, τὰς ναῦς ἀπελθεῖν being an exact citation of the proposal they would make in the Ecclesia, which was to be for a permanent withdrawal. The constr. is strange, however, and ποιήσειαν has been proposed.

ἐν τῇ Μαλέᾳ πρὸς β. πῆς πόλεως —the Malea that is known is the SE. point of Lesbos, 70 stadia from the city. A solution of the difficulty has been found, Introd. p. XV. (Those who suppose that the SE. point of the island is meant, take πρὸς β. τῆς πόλεως with ἀποστέλλουσι. But from the narrative that follows, it is clear the A. were lying to the north of the city (esp. c. 6, 1); and it is not likely they were so far distant as 70 stades. Some are driven to suspect that ἐν τῇ Μαλέᾳ may be corrupt or spurious.)

τοῖς is neut., and

προχωρήσειν is epexegetic.

διὰ τοῦ πελάγους —crossing the Aegean directly instead of sailing down the coast of Asia Minor, between Chios and Erythrae, before crossing among the islands. The alternative routes are clearly explained in Odyssey III. 170 f. and the risks of that across the μέσον πέλαγος are indicated. (Cf. Tozer, Islands of the Aegean, p. 170.)

αὐτοῖς prob. = the Lesbians, and is dat. commodi with ἔπρασσον, as in V. 76, where those acting for Sparta at Argos are called οἱ τοῖς Λακεδαιμονίοις πράσσοντες. (Others take αὐτοῖς with ἥξει, or refer it to the Lacedaemonians.)