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Ἀθηναῖοι δέ. The Atheuian reply is judieious and tactful, and exhibits many merits (not including modesty) which were conspicuous by their absence iu the speech of ‘the Tegean.’ The Athenian speaker might have been Aristeides (c. 29 infra); Plutarch (Aristeid. 12) says it was, but puts a differeut, a shorter and a still more tactful, speech into his mouth, without any Herakleids, Argives, Amazons, or Marathon in it.
σύνοδον ... συλλεγῆναι: a σύνοδος may be a political and formal assembly, a periodic meeting; cp. Thuc. 1. 96, etc. In c. 43 infra Ἑλλήνων σύνοδον appears to be polemical; here there is a play on both senses. In the following autithesis ἕργων might have been more delicate than μάχης and καὶ οὐ thau ἀλλ: οὐ. The Athenian orator is a plain - spoken man. The emphasis placed on μάχη is significant. The Athenians are there not to baudy words with the brethren but to do battle with the barbarian. That is the Athenian cue all along; cp. c. 7 supra.
ἀναγκαίως ... ἔχει: cp. 8. 140.
μᾶλλον ἢ Ἀρκάσι: the meaning is obvious, yet the phrase is ambiguous, added perhaps because without it the Athenian would be advancing a claim even against the Spartau. Taken strictly the phrase leaves the primacy of the Athenians arguable even against the Spartans. The Spartans may, however, treat the question as purely one between Arkadians and Athenians, ἡμῖν μᾶλλον ἢ Ἀρκάσι πατρώιον ἐστὶ πρώτοισι εἶναι, even though the Athenians, little more thau a year before, had been claiming the lead at sea; 8. 3. Ἡρακλείδας: cp. previous c. The Athenian service to the Herakleids is a service to the ancestors of Pausanias and Euryauax, and to the leaders of the Dorians. ‘All Hellenes’—for Hellenes were already Hellenes in those days— drove them out (cp. Diodor. 4. 57, Pausau. 1. 32. 6 etc.). But the speaker eau hardly mean to impugn the Hellenism of Atheuians or of Herakleids. ἐς τοὺς ἀπικοίατο is in any case a saving clause, though, strictly speaking, it covers Athens.
Μυκηναίων: Eurystheus being lord of Mykenai (cp. Thuc. 1. 9. 2), τὴν Εὐρυσθέος ὕβριν κατείλομεν: cp. notes to previous chapter. According to Diodoros l.c. Theseus, Hyllos, and Iolaos were in command and Eurystheus fell by the hand of Hyllos; all his sons also perished in the battle. (This would leave Atreus in undisturbed possession of Mykenai.) Iolaos is the son of Iphikles, twin brother to Hcrakles; cp. Pindar Pyth. 11. 60 etc. In Pyth. 9. 80 f. it is Iolaos who deals Eurystheus the death-blow.
τοὺς τότε ἔχοντας Π. leaves the withers of Spartan Dorians unwrung, for ex hypothcsi they were later comers. τοῦτο δέ, ‘in the second place,’ corresponding with τοῦτο μέν supra; cp. 7. 6. 5 supra. Ἀργείους τοὺς μετὰ Πολυνείκεος ἐπὶ Θήβας. This expedition (ἔλασις) of Polyneikes and the Argives against Thebes is the story of the Septem contra Thebas which Aischylos had popularized in 472 B.C. at Athens and Sophokles assumes in the action of the Antigone, produced in 440 B.C. (?), in which, however, the heroine anticipates, so far as her brother is concerned, the pious act here ascribed to the Athenians. Amphiaraos was under ground in Boiotia; cp. 8. 134. Tydeus too was duly buried in Thebes according to the Iliad 14. 114, which places the event in the generation before the Trojan war, 4. 376 ff. Pindar (Ol. 6. 15) erects, indeed, funeral pyres to all the Seven in Thebes. The doctrine that it was the Athenians who performed the last rites for the Argive heroes, and that too by force of arms, supplies the argument to the Suppliants of Euripides. An improved versiou represented the same end as effected without violence, Plutarch, Theseus 29 συνέπραξε δὲ καἱ Ἀδράστῳ τὴν ἀναίρεσιν τῶν ὑπὸ τῇ Καδμείᾳ πεσόντων, οὐχ ὡς Εὐριπίδης ἐποίησεν ἐν τραγωδίᾳ μάχῃ τῶν Θηβαίων κρατἡσας, ἀλλὰ πείσας καὶ σπεισάμενος: οὕτω γὰρ οἱ πλεῖστοι λέγουσι: Φιλόχορος δὲ καὶ σπονδὰς περὶ νεκρῶν ἀναιρέσεως γενέσθαι πρώτας ἐκείνας. The rank and file were buried at Eleutherai, the leaders at Eleusis, ibid. Aischylos had apparently in his Eleusinioi represented Theseus as effecting the arrangement peacefully, ibid., but Pausan. 1. 39. 2 appears to prove Athenian the view here followed by Hdt., while the peaceful solution was a Theban hypothesis; none doubted by that time the burial at Eleusis, where the tombs were on view. These Eleusinian tombs are here referred to, and must be part of the fifth-century argument; they must have been graves of the ‘Mykenaian’ type and age, such as have been discovered at Eleusis; cp. Ephemeris Archaiologike, 1898, pp. 29 ff. It would have been too much to expect the Athenian orator to admit that in the Mykenaian age Eleusis (to say nothing of Eleutherai) was quite independent of Athens. The Atheniau claims in regard to the Argive heroes may (I suppose) be regarded as part of the Theseian legend, which was cultivated assiduously in Athens from the days of Peisistratos ouwards. The conflict between this passage and the Antigone, compared with the notorious agreement between Ant. 905 ff. and Hdt. 3. 119, might support the theory of the prior composition of Bks. 7-9, even if the exact date of the production of the Antigone is not fully ascertained; cp. Introduction, §§ 7, 8.
τὸν αἰῶνα = βίον: cp. 7. 46 supra.
Καδμείους: i.e. the prae-Boiotian inhabitants of Thebes; cp. Thuc. 1. 12. 3, elsewhere by Hdt. (e.g. 5. 57) identified with ‘Phoenicians,’ and supposed to have been driven out by the Argive Epigonoi (cp. 5. 61).
ἔστι δὲ ἡμῖν ἔργον εὖ ἔχον: the third heroic achievement of the Athenians is their victory over the Amazons who had invaded Attica from the Thermodon. εὖ ἔχον, cp. c. 26 supra. The connexion of Attica with the Amazon myth, or legend, is post-Homeric, or non-Homeric (Il. 3. 184 ff., 6. 186), but is fully established in the fifth century, and like the legend of the Seven incorporated with the Acts of Theseus. Aischylos, Eumenid. 655 ff., treats the case as notorious (458 B. C.), and connects the name of the Areropagos with the Amazonian cult of Ares: πάγον δ᾽ Ἄρειον τόνδ᾽ Ἀμαζόνων ἕδραν σκηνάς θ᾽ ὅτ᾽ ἦλθον Θησέως κατὰ φθόνον στρατηλατοῦσαι, καὶ πόλιν νεόπτολιν τήν δ᾽ ὑψίπυργον ἀντεπύργωσαν τότε, Ἄρει δ᾽ ἔθυον, ἔνθεν ἔστ᾽ ἐπώνυμος πέτρα πάγος τ᾽ Ἄρειος. Pindar had celebrated the wedding of Theseus and the Amazonian Queen (cp. Plutarch, Theseus c. 78; Pausan. 1. 2 1). The archaeological evidence (ceramic) tends, however, to show that the connexion with Theseus is not really ancient: Herakles, not Theseus, appears on black figured vases with the Amazons, and his place is taken by Theseus on the red figured (cp. Graef ap. PaulyWissowa, I. 1773, 1777). The growing importance and expansion of the Theseus legend dates from about the middle of the sixth century. Plutarch, Thes. 27, shows that the Atthidographers (Hellanikos, Kleidemos, and others) were busy on the subject, as probably the Logographers, Mythographers, before them had been; and the epic of Theseus (Θησηίς, Aristot. Poet. 8 = 1451 A, Plut. op. c. 28) was perhaps an earlier work (cp. Bergk, Gr. Lit. ii. (1883) 72): the Amazonis, or Amazonia, ascribed to Homer by Suidas sub v. Ὅμηρος, Bergk l.c., perhaps too sceptically, regards as a literary hypothesis (might not the Amazonia be a section of the Theseis?). The battle of the Amazons was represented in the great fresco by Mikon in the Poikile Stoa (cp. Aristoph. Lysistr. 678, Pausan. 1. 15. 2), and Pheidias placed the same subject in relief upon the shield of the Virgin (E. Gardner, Anc. Ath. 349), and again on the metopes on the west front of her temple (ibid. 282). There is nothing surprising in Hdt., or even an Athenian orator of 479 B.C., taking the story of the Amazonian war for granted Hdt.'s other story of the Amazons (4. 110-117) involves a war of the Greeks on the Thermodon, and may be connected with the cycle of Herakleslegends at least in the first instance (cp. Pausan. 2. 1. 1): at any rate in this place no hint occurs that the Amazons in Attica were other than the aggressors. The form Ἀμαζονίδες here compared with Ἀμάζονες there emphasizes the independence both of the sources and of the composition of the two passages, but leaves the question of priority open. (In the Proem 1. 1-4 the war with the Amazons does not rank with the causes célèbres of wars between Europe and Asia)
ἀπὸ Θερμώδοντος ποταμοῦ: the river here named is the Thermodon by Themiskyra on the Pontos, 4. 86, cp. 2. 104, albeit there was a stream of the same name in Boiotia, near Tanagra; c. 43 infra. The Asianic Thermodon, or its neighbourhood, is in all ancient authorities from Aischylos to Ammianus (22. 8. 17) closely associated with the Amazons, though some authorities (e.g. Aischylos, Prom. 743 cp. 422) regarded them originally as immigrants thither, while others (e.g. Ammianus) regarded the Thermodon as their birth-place.
ἐν τοῖσι Τρωικοῖσι πόνοισι. The curtness of this reference to Troy is, indeed, significant. As a matter of fact the remarkable thing is what a poor figure Athens cuts in the Trojan war; cp. 7. 161.
προέχει: nihil proficit, Schweig haeuser; haud praestat, Stein. Cp. cc. 4, 22 supra, etc.
καὶ γὰρ ἂν ... ἀμείνονες: the sen timent anticipates any criticism based on the obscurity of the Athenian record in the Trojan war. Converted into a maxim by the historian himself it becomes a reason for embracing all cities and societies whether great or small in his review; cp. 1. 5.
εἰ μηδὲν ἄλλο ἐστὶ ἀποδεδεγμένον: ἐστί is grammatically impossible and should be ἦν or εἴη (Stein). With ἐστί just below (the source of the corruptela?) subaud. ἀποδεδεγμένα (brachylogy).
τοῦ ἐν Μαραθῶνι ἔργου If this speech were authentic, we should have to ad<*>t that ten years had been enough to start the Marathonian legend on a colossal scale: like the infant Herakles it strangles snakes in its cradle. The formula here has three notable points fully developed. (1) The omission of the Plataians from the muster-roll of Marathon, the ‘aloneness’ of the Athenians in their hour of need: not a very graceful, or probable, touch on the battlefield of Plataia, even if the Spartans could bear to be reminded that they had been conspicuous by their absence at Marathon: μουνομαχήσαντες τῷ Πέρσῃ is meant to emphasize the μοῦνοι, not to represent the battle as a duel between Athens and the Persian; for ‘the Persian’ is but one of forty-six nations. τῷ Μήδῳ might have been expected here. But cp. App. Crit. (2) The Athenian initiative and forwardness (ἔργῳ τοσούτῳ ἐπιχειρήσαντες): the note which grows into the fiction: πρῶτοι μὲν γὰρ Ἑλλήνων πάντων τῶν ἡμεῖς ἴδμεν δρόμῳ ἐς πολεμίους ἐχρἡσαντο, πρῶτοι δὲ ἀνέσχοντο έσθῆτά τε Μηδικὴν ὁρέοντες καὶ τοὺς ἄνδρας ταύτην ἐσθημένους, 6. 112. (3) “We defeated six-and-forty nations.” The Athenian orator on the field of Plataia in 479 B.C. is already in possession of the army-list of Xerxes 7. 60-80, which enumerates just forty-six ἔθνεα κατ̓ ἤπειρον στρατευόμενα. The first alternative that presents itself is to choose between the authenticity of the speech and that of the list, as a list of what it professes to be: either the speech is not genuine, or the list was made long before 480 B.C. But the list may be made older than 480 B.C. without guaranteeing the authenticity of the speech. Are we in the presence of an Athenian development and gross exaggeration intended to elevate Marathon above Plataia, and the defeat of the army of Dareios under Datis and Artaphrenes at Marathon above the defeat of the army of Xerxes under Mardonios and Artabazos at Plataia? How came Hdt. by such a stroke as this? He certainly did not mean it as a satire upon Athenian braggartness. Had he previously written the story of Marathon, he might have been saved from such an inconsequence: this point supports the hypothesis of the prior composition of Bks. 7-9; cp. Introduction, §§ 7, 8. This view of Marathon throws Salamis also completely into the shade: that too was a part of the anti-Themistoclean tendency which had long been at work when Hdt. first composed his history of the war.
ἆρα asks the question with some surprise and indignation (cp. 7. 17 supra): ‘is it not right, we should like to know, for us to have this privileged position on the strength of this one achievement even if it stood alone?’— But why is no allusion whatever made to the splendid services of Olympiodoros and his 300 (cc. 21, 22 supra)? Is the sequence of events correctly reproduced by Hdt.? Did this dispute succeed that service? Did the Athenians make such a speech as is here put into their mouths? In any case Hdt. can hardly be acquitted of inconsequence.
ἀλλ᾽ οὐ γὰρ κτλ. Who would not be glad to believe that the Athenian spokesman uttered these words, or words to just this effect, instinct with the spirit of loyalty, discipline, practical wisdom, sweet reasonahleness, the εἱωθυῖα πραότης τοῦ δήμου? Spoken, or unspoken, they represent the better temper which governed the policy and action of Athens during the whole crisis; cp. 7. 145, 8. 3, 79, 144, c. 7 supra; but 7. 161 is conceived in a less happy vein, like the earlier passages of this very speech, or the ultima ratio in c. 11 supra. The end is in better keeping with the practical result. The moral of the previous boast might have been to assign not ‘the other wing’ but the whole duty of quelling the foe to the Athenians. If they had once already all by themselves defeated the six and forty nations of Asia, why should they not do it again? Why had they worried the Peloponnesians to come to their aid? Why even threatened to make terms with the enemy?
στασιάζειν: cp. 8. 79. ἄρτιοι: cp. c. 48 infra.
ἵνα: ubi, cp. 8. 115.
ἐξηγέεσθε δὲ ὡς πεισομένων. The imperative is a little ambiguous: (1) give your interpretation, explanation, decision, verdict; or (2) give your orders, as leaders, cp. cc. 11 supra, 66 infra.
Λακεδαιμονίων ἀνέβωσε κτλ. The Lakedaimonians κρίνουσι (sic) βοῇ καὶ οὐ ψήφῳ, Thuc. 1. 87. 2. Blakesley thinks the Spartiates were not sorry to snub the Tegeatai; but this view (a） takes the story too much au pied de la lettre; (b) is hardly consistent with the marked preference shown to the Tegeatai a little later, c. 28 infra. Such inconsistencies are frequent in Hdt. and arise from the insouciance with which he uses various sources not in complete harmony with one another. The ingenious harmonist might indeed prove his ingenuity on the present case: here ἅπαν τὸ στρατόπεδον Λακεδαιμονίων votes the other wing to the Athenians; there οἱ Σπαρτιῆται—outvoted on this occasion —take the Tegeatai to themselves—a graceful consolation! Such harmony is worse than silence. Hdt. is unconscious of the dissonance: the Spartiates no more admitted the Perioikoi and Helots to vote in the field than ‘between Babyka and Knakion.’
ὑπερεβἀλοντο: cp. 7. 163, 8. 140.
1. μετὰ δὲ ταῦτα ἐτάσσοντο. For reasons above given it is not credible that the Greek forces were ἄτακτοι (6. 93, cp. Thuc. 8. 105. 2—of ships) in the first position. They had reached Erythrai undonbtedly in some order, but necessarily in a marching order (agmen). Before descending to the position marked by the Androkrateion and Gargaphia (‘second position’) the column had presumably extended itself into line by a deployment westwards (cp. c. 25. 4 supra), and so developed the ‘first position’ fully along the ὑπωρέη, from Erythrai past Hysiai into the Plataiis (cp. c. 15 supra). In this first position there must have been an order, with a centre (or double centre) and two wings; but whether the Lakedaimonians were as yet on the right or on the left is a disputable problem (cp. c. 21. 1 supra). The words which here follow, in making a distinction between οἱ ἐπιφοιτῶντες and οἱ ἀρχὴν ἐλθόντες on the Greek side, suggest that in the second position, or just before reaching the second position, the Greeks received considerable reinforcements. It may have been the advent of these reinforcements, in successive contingents (ἐπιφοιτῶντες), that in part emboldened the Greeks to advance to the second position. These reinforcements, or some of them, may have reached the Greek Laager by the direct route from Megara, and may have comprised a large part of the Greek centre. The only divisions of which express mention has been made so far are (1) the Megarians, (2) the Athenians, (3) the Lakedaimonians, (4) the Tegeatai. These are the only ones who fignre clearly in the first position, at Erythrai. There are, however, other motifs available for the explanation of the advance of the Greeks from the ὑπωρέη to the Asopos-ridge: had the Persian cavalry, on the Dryoskephalai road, nothing to say to it? cp. c. 39 infra, and Appendix VIII. § 5 (7).
τὸ μὲν δεξιὸν κέρας: the right wing consists of 11,500 Hoplites (nominal), viz. 10,000 Lakedaimonians (5000 Spartiatai, 5000 Perioikoi) plus 1500 Tegeatai. To these Hdt. would have us add 40,000 helot ψιλοί (35,000 in attendance on the Spartiates, 7 helots to each citizen, with 5000 more, one for each ‘Lakedaimonian’). Stein treats this proportion as the normal levy, and opines that one of the seven was special body-servant (θεράπων) of the Spartiate hophte, and the six others members of a regiment under the king's command. Bnt (1) where is there any other evidence of snch a proportion as the normal one? (2) When were Spartan armies so well supplied with ψιλοί? (3) What record is there of the services of these ψιλοί in the actual fighting? (4) The request of Pausanias for the Athenian τοξόται, c. 60 infra—no doubt from a tainted source — still emphasizes the defect of the Spartan contingent in light troops, and exploits it, if you like. (5) The phraseology here does not suggest a closed or organized corps of 20,000-30,000 helot ψιλοί, but a distributive number of 35,000 ψιλοὶ θερἀποντες. (6) Politically, the idea of an organization of a helot corps of 30,000 ψιλοί at Sparta is well-nigh inconceivable: such a corps would have effected a revolution! Even Pausanias, in his subsequent tampering with the helots, has not got such a basis as that to work on, or we should have heard of it; cp. Thuc. 1. 132. 4. (7) The normal allowance of θεράποντες appears rather to have been one per hoplite, cp 7. 229 (and 186): the emphasis which is here laid on the number 7 suggests that it is abnormal. (8) If the numerical figures in the text are to stand, other employment must be found for the huge number of helots, and may be found, as an Army Service, engaged in forwarding supplies, cp. c. 39 infra. These reasons are sufficient to disprove the fact and figures here; but they leave Hdt. responsible for an egregious blunder. The only rescue for him would be to challenge the text: are the figures corrupt? The testimonia carry them back to Plutarch (Aristeid. 10) (but neither Diodoros nor Trogus recorded them). This assertion that there were seven helots for every Spartan is made not less than five times in this Book (cc. 10, 28, 29 (bis), 61 implicite): this very iteration rouses suspicion of the fact, if not of the text. Few critics will be so hardy as to expose a five-fold systematic and consistent corruptela! Otherwise, either καὶ τρισμύριοι ... τεταγμένοι might go, or rather, in view of c. 10 supra, πεντακισχίλιοι καὶ τρισ-, ἑπτὰ being reduced to δύο, i.e. ψιλοὶ τῶν εἱλώτων μύριοι, περὶ ἄνδρα ἕκαστον δύο τεταγμένοι. There may have been 10,000 or 15,000 Helots on the field at Plataia; there will hardly have been 35,000-40,000. The use of φυλάσσειν here is remarkable; cp. 6. 75 ὁ φύλακος, ἦν γὰρ τῶν τις εἱλωτέων (sic), διδοῖ οἱ μάχαιραν.
προσεχέας δὲ σφίσι εἵλοντο. This statement that the Spartiatai chose the Tegeatai to stand next them in line of battle καὶ τιμῆς εἵνεκα καὶ ἀρετῆς, to do them honour, and because they were brave men, reads curiously in the light of the last chapter. The two passages, though in immediate juxtaposition, are evidently from wholly different sources. As σφίσι refers expressly to Σπαρτιῆται, of whom there were but 5000, Hdt. appears to say that the 1500 Tegeatai were posted next the Spartiatai, i.e. between them and the 5000 Perioikoi; but σφίσι may perhaps be generalized so as to cover the whole force from Laconia.
μετὰ δὲ τούτους. Hdt. is reviewing the line (acies) from right to left. The contingents from the Korinthian to the Megarian next enumerated, and comprising 18,600 Hoplites, form the centre of the army (= οἱ πολλοί, c. 52 infra); and this centre is again divided, incidentally, into the right centre, οἱ ἀμφὶ Κορινθίους, c. 69 infra, comprising 11,300 Hoplites, and the left centre, οἱ ἁμφὶ Μεγαρέας τε καὶ Φλειασίους, ibid., comprising 7300 Hoplites, according to the muster-roll. (To them succeeds the left wing, consisting of the Athenians with the Plataians, 8600 men in all.) Κορινθίων πεντακισχίλιοι: 5000 Hoplites is an unusually large muster for Korinth. In 435 B.C. Korinth had 3000 Hoplites ready to send to Korkyra, Thuc. 1. 27. 2, but only embarked 2000, ib. 29. 1. In 418 B.C. they contributed only 2000 to the great muster at Phleiûs, Thuc. 5. 57. 2. In the battle of Korinth, 394 B.C., 3000 Hoplites from Korinth took part, Xen. Hell. 4. 2. 17.
εὕροντο is used in an unusual sense; cp. c. 26 supra. ἑστάναι is the syncopated perfect infin., cp. 1. 17, Soph. Ant. 640, preceded by τοὺς π. τριηκοσίους. Pausanias has apparently, at least within certain limits, the right to determine the order of battle, and assign the various contingents their stations. This might square very well with the selection by ‘the Spartiates’ of the Tegeatai as their next neighbours, less well with the story of the Atheno-Tegeatan dispute. Ποτειδαιητέων. The Korinthians obtained the grace from Pausanias to have the 300 Poteidaiatai, who were on the spot, to stand, or laager, next them. This is another valiant 300: how they came to be at Plataia is not clear. Poteidaia was, of course, a colony of Korinth's (Thuc. 1. 56. 2), albeit Hdt. nowhere happens to say so. The town has had its own reckoning with the Persian, cp. 8. 126 ff., and how this gallant 300 got to Plataia is far from clear: presumably by sea. The addition of the words τῶν ἐκ Παλλήνης (cp. 7. 123) makes it clear what Poteidaia is meant.
ἐχόμενοι, quasi-geographical rather than military or tactical; cp. 7. 108. 8. Ἀρκάδες Ὀρχομένιοι ἑξακόσιοι. The men of Orchomenos are the only other Arkadians, besides the Tegeatai, present on the field, the Mantineians not having arrived in time; cp. c. 77 infra. In the previous year Ἀρκάδες πάντες had been at the Isthmos under Kleombrotos, 8. 72; and besides Tegeatai, Mantineans, Orchomenians, there had been 1000 Hoplites ἐκ τῆς λοιπῆς Ἀρκαδίης in the army of Leonidas, 7. 202. Ἀρκάδες is here introduced to distinguish Arkadian Orchomenos from Boiotian; cp. c. 16 supra. So in Thucyd. 5. 61. 3 “Ὀρχομενὸν τὸν Ἀρκαδικόν”. (In the Catalogue Boiotian O. is Μινύειος, Il. 2. 511, Arkadian simply πολύμηλος, ib. 605.) Six hundred seems a small contingent from the third city of Arkadia: perhaps the tardy exit of the Mantineians kept some of the Orchomenians and other Arkadians at home. It is not clear what the constitution of Orchomenos was at this time. Plutarch Mor. 313 cites Theophilos Πελοποννησιακὰ β́ in a way which might seem to imply that the βασιλεία lasted into the Peloponnesian war, but the term βασιλεύς is not quite conclusive (cp. 7. 149): the constitution was certainly aristocratic, or oligarchic, in 418 B.C. (cp. Thuc. 5. 61. 4). The name appears as Erchomenos (Ἐρχομενίων) on the cornage of the fourth century. Orchomenos asserts, or reasserts, itself in later times; cp. Head, H.N. 377 f., and c. 16 supra. The only contingent here for which a commander's name is preserved, besides the Spartan, is the Athenian.
Σικυώνιοι τρισχίλιοι. Sikyon had supplied but 15 ships to the navylist of Salamis, 8. 43, and had apparently been unrepresented in the army of Leonidas (7. 202), and even in that of Kleombrotos (8. 72); but Sikyonians were serving under Leotychidas, cc. 102, 105 infra. Sikyon's contingents are not as a rule numerically specified (cp. Thuc. 5. 57. 2), but in 394 B.C. it sent 1500 Hoplites to the support of Sparta, Xenoph. Hell. 4. 2. 16. (The better form of the name is probably Σεκυών, cp. Head, H.N. 345 ff.) Ἐπιδαυρίων ὀκτακόσιοι. Epidauros had been unrepresented at Thermopylai (7. 202), but had sent a contingent to the army of Kleombrotos (8. 72) as well as to the fleet under Eurybiades (8. 43), and was probably represented in the fleet of Leotychidas; the men ranked as Dorians, cp. 8. 43.
Τροιζηνίων χίλιοι. Troizen had sent men to the army under Kleombrotos (8. 72) and a small contingent to the fleet in 480 B.C. (8. 43); in 479 B.C. they were allowed to have distinguished themselves at Mykale, c. 105 infra. They, too, now counted as Dorians (8. 43), and in 479 B.C. were presumably, like Korinth, Sikyon, Epidauros, under oligarchic government; but cp. 8. 41 supra. (The form of the name is Τροζάνιοι on the Plataian monument; cp. coinage, Head, p. 371. Τροιζήν appears later, e.g. Dittenberger1 372.)
Λεπρεητέων διηκόσιοι. In 4. 148 Lepreon appears as but one city, or township of an Hexapolis in the west Peloponnesos, of ‘Minyan,’ or at any rate non-Dorian extraction; cp. 8. 73 Λημνίων δὲ Παρωρεῆται πάντες. The Lepreatis is the territory of the leading township, but possibly the 200 Hoplites exhibit the levy for the whole district. It was, of course, a bone of contention between Sparta and Elis; cp. Thuc. 5. 31. 2 etc. The occurrence recorded by Hdt. in 4. 148 had presnmably not taken place, or was not known to him, when he first drafted Bk. 9, but Ed. Meyer (G. d. Alterth. iv. (1901) p. 413) can hardly be right in referring that passage to the same occasion as Thuc. l.c. and dating both well into the ‘Attic (i.e. Archidamian) war’; Thuc. records merely an Eleian raid into Lepreatis, which is thereupon occupied by a Lakedaimonian garrison; cp. my note ad l.c. If Meyer is right that reference would be the latest, or all but the latest, in Hdt.'s work, and would confirm the argument for the priority of Bks. 7-9; in any case, however, it is prima facie of later composition than this passage; cp. Introduction, §§ 7, 8.
Μυκηναίων καὶ Τιρυνθίων τετρακόσιοι. These ancients, a poor remnant of the ‘Perseid’ and ‘Pelopid’ ages, might have ‘medized’ with a better grace than the Dorian Argives. Their hostility to Argos would seal them to the side of Sparta and of Hellas, of which they might fairly consider themselves the oldest representatives. ‘Tiryns’ here appears for the first time in the war; ‘Mykenai’ had sent 80 men to Thermopylai, 7. 202, unless, indeed, those and these alike are ‘exiles’? It is hard to see how with Argos neutral, or malevolent, Tiryns and Mykenai could have afforded to send their fighting men to Plataia; but cp. c. 12 supra. The ruin of Mykenai was still to come or was unknown to Hdt. when he first drafted this passage; cp. 6. 83. (An obiter dictum in J. P. Mahaffy's Survey of Gk. Civilization, 1897, p. 31, to which Hall's Oldest Civilization, 1901, p. 291, directed my attention, treats these Mykenaians and Tirynthians as ‘of course exiles’ in view of Mahaffy's theory that the destruction (final?) of Mykenai and Tiryns by Argos ‘happened in the eighth or early seventh century B.C.’ But the names occur upon the Plataian (and Olympian) monuments, and it is not likely that those lists included ‘cityless men.’ This observation cuts out my own suggestion up above, that these men were exiles from the still existing Mykenai and Tiryns. Mahaffy's prochronism for the destruction of the two cities appears to be partly mixed up with the view that Perseids and Pelopids ‘possessed neither the art of writing nor the art of coining,’ plus the complementary view that Mykenaians and Tirynthians of the sixth and fifth centuries would have possessed both. Perhaps they did, even though no specimens have come down to us. As to the Perseids and Pelopids, we now know that they could write, and it is hardly safe to assume that they had no coinage or currency. On the whole I should adhere to the dates given in note ad l.c. for the destruction of Tiryns and Mykenai. Meyer, G. d. Alt. iii. (1901) p. 516, well remarks that a ‘Tirynthian’ is victor at Olympia Ol. 78 = 468 B.C. (Olymp. List in Oxyrhynchos Papyri, ii. p. 89): kurz nachher muss die Zerstorung fallen.
Φλειάσιοι χίλιοι. The Chiliad from Phleiûs forms the first section of the left centre, which embraees nine distinct contingents, as against eight in the right centre, but numbers only 7300 men as against 11,300. The right wing and right centre are, if the figures be at all trustworthy, very much stronger than the left centre and left wing (22,800 as compared with 15,900). Men of Phleiûs (200) had served under Leonidas (7. 202) and again at the Isthmos in 480 B.C. (8. 72). Phleiûs was accounted a Dorian city (Pausan. 2. 13. 1 f.), and in the fifth century was anti-Argive and a loyal adherent of Sparta's (cp. Thne. 4. 70. 1, 133. 3, 5. 57. 2 etc.); hence, perhaps, in part the enthusiasm of Xenophon for the men of Phleiûs, though they were conspicuous by their absence in the battle of Korinth in 394 B.C. (Hell. 4. 2. 16); but that is to be explained by inner dissensions at the time. The city is described as one of more than 5000 men in 380 B.C., ib. 5. 3. 16. Ἑρμιονέες τριηκόσιοι: men of Hermion (cp. 8. 73) who were ‘Dryopians’ (ib.) had served under Kleombrotos (ib. 72) and furnished a small contingent to the fleet at Salamis, 8. 44. These particular 300 do not distinguish themselves. With this contingent the Peloponnesian portion of the forces comes to an end; but the divisions in the army do not follow strictly geographical order, and the two last Peloponnesian items act with the left centre and left wing, which is otherwise all drawn from exo-Peloponnesian states.
Ἐρετριέωντεκαὶ Στυρέων ἑξακόσιοι. Eretria had sent seven and Styra two ships to the fleet at Salamis, 8. 46. The Eretrians were ‘Ionians’ (ib.), and as such are one of the two Ionian contingents in the army (excluding the Athenians); Styra was ‘Dryopian’ (ib.): so this third division in the left centre might have been expected to stand well beside the second. The names here are perhaps given in the order of their importance; the Dryopians may have stood next to each other (Styreans and Hermionians), and so too the Ionians from Eretria and Chalkis.
Χαλκιδέες τετρακόσιοι: the men of Chalkis had supplied, or rather manned, twenty ships in 480 B C. (8. 1, 46). At the rate allowed by Hdt. for Epibatai that might run to 600 men; but some may have been serving under Leotychidas, or they may have suffered in the war. These men of Chalkis must be natives, not Athenian kleruchs, who, if serving in the army, would surely be with the citizens, on the left wing, either as a distinct corps, or fighting each man in the ranks of his own tribe (φυλή); cp. provision in the Salaminian case: [παρὰ δὲ Ἀθηναίοι]σι τε[λ]εῖν καὶ στρατ[εύεσθ]αι, Hicks' Manual2 No. 4. (It is rather difficult to believe that kleruchs accustomed to act together as a garrison in loco would be distributed among the phylic regiments on the battle-field. If the ‘Chalkidians’ here were Athenian kleruchs they would amount to 1/20 of the nominal total of the Attic force.)
Ἀμπρακιητέων πεντακόσιοι. The contingent is a considerable one, as coming ἐξ ἐσχατέων χωρέων, cp. 8. 47, and with the next might be put down in part to the credit of Korinth, of which Amprakia, Leukas, Anaktorion were colonies; cp. 8 45. It is the more remarkable that these two contingents (v., VI. in the left centre) are not favoured like the Poteidaiatai above, but placed among the outsiders. Λευκαδίων καὶ Ἀνακτορίων ὀκτακόσιοι: probably the contingent from each state was not equal, but that from Leukas the larger, or they would have been separately enumerated. The combination may represent a section, or division, under one command. For Leukas cp. 8. 45, 47 and c. 38 infra. Anaktorion, not elsewhere mentioned by Hdt. (except c. 31 infra), was a joint foundation from Korkyra and Korinth at the mouth of the Amprakian Gulf (cp. Thuc. 1. 55. 1), and a considerable bone of contention in the first period of the Peloponnesian war (of which there is no hint here).
Παλέες οἱ ἐκ Κεφαλληνίης διηκόσιοι. Kephallenia is not elsewhere mentioned by Hdt. Thucydides 2. 30. 2 makes its position clear: κεῖται δὲ ἡ Κεφαλληνία κατὰ Ἀκαρνανίαν καὶ Λευκάδα τετράπολις οὖσα, Παλῆς, Κράνιοι, Σαμαῖοι, Προνναῖοι. Paleis was obviously the most important member of the Tetrapolis (cp. Thuc. 1. 27. 2), but were the 200 men here mentioned all from the one township? Kephallenia was annexed by Athens in 431 B.C. (Thuc. l.c.), a fact which Hdt. was in no way bound to notice, but of which anyway he shows no consciousness. It is Stein's suggestion that Hdt. read ΠΑΛΕΕΣ instead of ϝΑΛΕΙΟΙ on the inscription at Olympia, described by Pausanias 5. 23. 1, as the name of the Eleians is given by Pausanias and that of the Paleis is not given. This is simply an inversion of the old suggestion of P. O. Broendsted (Bursian, G. d. class. Philol. 1048; cp. Grote, iv. 256 n. and Rawlinson iv.3 395, each spelling the name differently, and both wrongly) that Pausanias read ϝΑΛΕΙΟΙ for ΠΑΛΕΕΣ. The old suggestion is much the better of the two. In Hdt.'s time the inscription was new and cleat; in the time of Pausanias it was 600 years old. The name of the Eleians was to be expected, especially at Olympia, rather than that of the small Kephallenian township. Grote adds that the Eleians might have altered the name, and that Plutarch de m. Hdti = Mor. 873 seems to have read the same inscription as Pausanias. It remains, however, still to be proved that Hdt had read the inscription at Olympia before writing down this list. Doubtless an official document of some kind underlies the list here, but it need not have been the precise inscription at Olympia, nor again need Hdt. have copied that document himself. The list of Hdt. differs from the list of Pausanias not merely by the point above specified, but in others: Pausanias omits Eretrians and Leukadians, and inserts five names from the Nesiote region. Again, Hdt. gives the numbers of the contingents, which were certainly not on the inscription. There is not the slightest reason to suppose that Hdt. compiled his armylist for Plataia at Olympia; it is even less likely than that he compiled his navy-list for Salamis at Delphi (cp. 8. 82). The army-list was probably part of the original draft of the work, not an addition; cp. further, Introduction, § 10. Αἰγινητέων πεντακόσιοι: the contingent is not large for Aigina, a state which had held its own, and something more, in the recent war with Athens (cp. 7. 145); but the Aiginetans were no doubt serving on the fleet, and in any case the island would not have put a large force on the mainland.
Μεγαρέων τρισχίλιοι: the 3000 Megarians (a contingent six times as large as the Aiginetan) had already given a good account of themselves c. 21 supra; and besides this goodly contingent, ἐν παιδίω Βοιωτίω οἵτινες ἔτλαν χεῖρας ἐπ᾽ ἀνθρώπους ἱππομάχους ἱένε: there were, if we may trust the same epigram, Megarians at Mykale (cp. Hicks' Manual2 No. 17, where the services of the Megarians against the cavalry are erroneonsly restricted to their disaster, c. 69 infra). Like the Aiginetans (8. 46) the Megarians were Dorians; cp. 5. 76. Πλαταιέες ἑξακόσιοι. The Plataians would certainly have put every man they could into the field. The traditional number of the Plataians at Marathon is 1000 (cp. Hdt. IV.-VI. ii. 204, 206); fifty years after 479 B.C. they are minished to 400, Thuc. 2. 78. 3. Hdt. might here seem to class them with the Megarians as belonging to the left centre; but the title of that section in c. 69 infra and the probabilities of the case alike point to the Plataian contingent being reekoned, with the Athenian, on the left wing. Was there none on the right? Cp. c. 72 infra.
τελευταῖοι δὲ καὶ πρῶτοι Ἀθηναῖοι, ‘last,’ in reckoning from the right wing, all along the line to the left; but ‘first’ as the army moved westwards, or forwards; or head of the column, which had moved to Erythrai, and then out on to the ὑπωρέη, before descending into the second position. This assertion of the πρωτεῖον of the Athenians comes from an Atticizing source, and would hardly have been emphasized at the Spartan headquarters; the double description τελευταῖοι ... πρῶτοι prepares the way for the chassé in c. 46 below, by which the last become first and the first last! 8000 Hoplites, besides some lightarmed troops, is a large contingent, especially considering the contemporary service of the fleet, in which the Athenians were doubtless more largely represented than any other single state (cp. 8. 131); but the figure is not ineredibly large for Athens, even in 479 B.C. requiring about 800 men to each phylic regiment, or τάξις. Cp. the estimate for 431 B.C. in Thuc. 2. 13. No doubt all ten tribes were represented in the field; and there may have been 2000 Athenian Hoplites at Mykale, or nearly so (50 x 30 = 1500), as well.
Ἀριστείδης ὁ Λυσιμάχου: cp. 8. 79. The occurrence of this name here, with the patronymic, suggests that the nomination of this sole Strategos was an integral part of the document, or the source, from which Hdt. drew his list, and also that the source was an ‘Atticizing’ one. Aristeides is the only general named: the captains or leaders of all the contingents would have been inclnded in a doeument framed at headqnarters. If the name were introduced as a bit of free narrative by Hdt. it might have been expected above, in c. 21, when the service of Olympiodoros must have been mediated through the Strategos, or in c. 27, where the Strategos was presumably the spokesman, or else reserved for c 44 infra, where the Strategos appears in action. If Aristeides alone is named it is presumably because he was Strategos ἠγεμών if not αὐτοκράτωρ, and had a constitutional and permanent lead; the whole college of Strategoi was not present; cp. 8. 131, and Appendix VII. § 4.
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