History of the Peloponnesian War by Thucydides (free ebooks for android .txt) 📕

dashed at the enemy, who, embarrassed by his mistakes and the disorder

in which he found himself, only stood for an instant, and then fled

for Panormus, whence he had put out. The Athenians following on his

heels took the six vessels nearest them, and recovered those of

their own which had been disabled close inshore and taken in tow at

the beginning of the action; they killed some of the crews and took

some prisoners. On board the Leucadian which went down off the

merchantman, was the Lacedaemonian Timocrates, who killed himself when

the ship was sunk, and was cast up in the harbour of Naupactus. The

Athenians on their return set up a trophy on the spot from which

they had put out and turned the day, and picking up the wrecks and

dead that were on their shore, gave back to the enemy their dead under

truce. The Peloponnesians also set up a trophy as victors for the

defeat inflicted upon the ships they had disabled in shore, and

dedicated the vessel which they had taken at Achaean Rhium, side by

side with the trophy. After this, apprehensive of the reinforcement

expected from Athens, all except the Leucadians sailed into the

Crissaean Gulf for Corinth. Not long after their retreat, the twenty

Athenian ships, which were to have joined Phormio before the battle,

arrived at Naupactus.

Thus the summer ended. Winter was now at hand; but dispersing the

fleet, which had retired to Corinth and the Crissaean Gulf, Cnemus,

Brasidas, and the other Peloponnesian captains allowed themselves to

be persuaded by the Megarians to make an attempt upon Piraeus, the

port of Athens, which from her decided superiority at sea had been

naturally left unguarded and open. Their plan was as follows: The

men were each to take their oar, cushion, and rowlock thong, and,

going overland from Corinth to the sea on the Athenian side, to get to

Megara as quickly as they could, and launching forty vessels, which

happened to be in the docks at Nisaea, to sail at once to Piraeus.

There was no fleet on the lookout in the harbour, and no one had

the least idea of the enemy attempting a surprise; while an open

attack would, it was thought, never be deliberately ventured on, or,

if in contemplation, would be speedily known at Athens. Their plan

formed, the next step was to put it in execution. Arriving by night

and launching the vessels from Nisaea, they sailed, not to Piraeus

as they had originally intended, being afraid of the risk, besides

which there was some talk of a wind having stopped them, but to the

point of Salamis that looks towards Megara; where there was a fort and

a squadron of three ships to prevent anything sailing in or out of

Megara. This fort they assaulted, and towed off the galleys empty, and

surprising the inhabitants began to lay waste the rest of the island.

Meanwhile fire signals were raised to alarm Athens, and a panic

ensued there as serious as any that occurred during the war. The

idea in the city was that the enemy had already sailed into Piraeus:

in Piraeus it was thought that they had taken Salamis and might at any

moment arrive in the port; as indeed might easily have been done if

their hearts had been a little firmer: certainly no wind would have

prevented them. As soon as day broke, the Athenians assembled in

full force, launched their ships, and embarking in haste and uproar

went with the fleet to Salamis, while their soldiery mounted guard

in Piraeus. The Peloponnesians, on becoming aware of the coming

relief, after they had overrun most of Salamis, hastily sailed off

with their plunder and captives and the three ships from Fort

Budorum to Nisaea; the state of their ships also causing them some

anxiety, as it was a long while since they had been launched, and they

were not water-tight. Arrived at Megara, they returned back on foot to

Corinth. The Athenians finding them no longer at Salamis, sailed

back themselves; and after this made arrangements for guarding Piraeus

more diligently in future, by closing the harbours, and by other

suitable precautions.

About the same time, at the beginning of this winter, Sitalces,

son of Teres, the Odrysian king of Thrace, made an expedition

against Perdiccas, son of Alexander, king of Macedonia, and the

Chalcidians in the neighbourhood of Thrace; his object being to

enforce one promise and fulfil another. On the one hand Perdiccas

had made him a promise, when hard pressed at the commencement of the

war, upon condition that Sitalces should reconcile the Athenians to

him and not attempt to restore his brother and enemy, the pretender

Philip, but had not offered to fulfil his engagement; on the other he,

Sitalces, on entering into alliance with the Athenians, had agreed

to put an end to the Chalcidian war in Thrace. These were the two

objects of his invasion. With him he brought Amyntas, the son of

Philip, whom he destined for the throne of Macedonia, and some

Athenian envoys then at his court on this business, and Hagnon as

general; for the Athenians were to join him against the Chalcidians

with a fleet and as many soldiers as they could get together.

Beginning with the Odrysians, he first called out the Thracian

tribes subject to him between Mounts Haemus and Rhodope and the Euxine

and Hellespont; next the Getae beyond Haemus, and the other hordes

settled south of the Danube in the neighbourhood of the Euxine, who,

like the Getae, border on the Scythians and are armed in the same

manner, being all mounted archers. Besides these he summoned many of

the hill Thracian independent swordsmen, called Dii and mostly

inhabiting Mount Rhodope, some of whom came as mercenaries, others

as volunteers; also the Agrianes and Laeaeans, and the rest of the

Paeonian tribes in his empire, at the confines of which these lay,

extending up to the Laeaean Paeonians and the river Strymon, which

flows from Mount Scombrus through the country of the Agrianes and

Laeaeans; there the empire of Sitalces ends and the territory of the

independent Paeonians begins. Bordering on the Triballi, also

independent, were the Treres and Tilataeans, who dwell to the north of

Mount Scombrus and extend towards the setting sun as far as the

river Oskius. This river rises in the same mountains as the Nestus and

Hebrus, a wild and extensive range connected with Rhodope.

The empire of the Odrysians extended along the seaboard from

Abdera to the mouth of the Danube in the Euxine. The navigation of

this coast by the shortest route takes a merchantman four days and

four nights with a wind astern the whole way: by land an active man,

travelling by the shortest road, can get from Abdera to the Danube

in eleven days. Such was the length of its coast line. Inland from

Byzantium to the Laeaeans and the Strymon, the farthest limit of its

extension into the interior, it is a journey of thirteen days for an

active man. The tribute from all the barbarian districts and the

Hellenic cities, taking what they brought in under Seuthes, the

successor of Sitalces, who raised it to its greatest height,

amounted to about four hundred talents in gold and silver. There

were also presents in gold and silver to a no less amount, besides

stuff, plain and embroidered, and other articles, made not only for

the king, but also for the Odrysian lords and nobles. For there was

here established a custom opposite to that prevailing in the Persian

kingdom, namely, of taking rather than giving; more disgrace being

attached to not giving when asked than to asking and being refused;

and although this prevailed elsewhere in Thrace, it was practised most

extensively among the powerful Odrysians, it being impossible to get

anything done without a present. It was thus a very powerful

kingdom; in revenue and general prosperity surpassing all in Europe

between the Ionian Gulf and the Euxine, and in numbers and military

resources coming decidedly next to the Scythians, with whom indeed

no people in Europe can bear comparison, there not being even in

Asia any nation singly a match for them if unanimous, though of course

they are not on a level with other races in general intelligence and

the arts of civilized life.

It was the master of this empire that now prepared to take the

field. When everything was ready, he set out on his march for

Macedonia, first through his own dominions, next over the desolate

range of Cercine that divides the Sintians and Paeonians, crossing

by a road which he had made by felling the timber on a former campaign

against the latter people. Passing over these mountains, with the

Paeonians on his right and the Sintians and Maedians on the left, he

finally arrived at Doberus, in Paeonia, losing none of his army on the

march, except perhaps by sickness, but receiving some augmentations,

many of the independent Thracians volunteering to join him in the hope

of plunder; so that the whole is said to have formed a grand total

of a hundred and fifty thousand. Most of this was infantry, though

there was about a third cavalry, furnished principally by the

Odrysians themselves and next to them by the Getae. The most warlike

of the infantry were the independent swordsmen who came down from

Rhodope; the rest of the mixed multitude that followed him being

chiefly formidable by their numbers.

Assembling in Doberus, they prepared for descending from the heights

upon Lower Macedonia, where the dominions of Perdiccas lay; for the

Lyncestae, Elimiots, and other tribes more inland, though

Macedonians by blood, and allies and dependants of their kindred,

still have their own separate governments. The country on the sea

coast, now called Macedonia, was first acquired by Alexander, the

father of Perdiccas, and his ancestors, originally Temenids from

Argos. This was effected by the expulsion from Pieria of the Pierians,

who afterwards inhabited Phagres and other places under Mount

Pangaeus, beyond the Strymon (indeed the country between Pangaeus

and the sea is still called the Pierian Gulf); of the Bottiaeans, at

present neighbours of the Chalcidians, from Bottia, and by the

acquisition in Paeonia of a narrow strip along the river Axius

extending to Pella and the sea; the district of Mygdonia, between

the Axius and the Strymon, being also added by the expulsion of the

Edonians. From Eordia also were driven the Eordians, most of whom

perished, though a few of them still live round Physca, and the

Almopians from Almopia. These Macedonians also conquered places

belonging to the other tribes, which are still theirs—Anthemus,

Crestonia, Bisaltia, and much of Macedonia proper. The whole is now

called Macedonia, and at the time of the invasion of Sitalces,

Perdiccas, Alexander’s son, was the reigning king.

These Macedonians, unable to take the field against so numerous an

invader, shut themselves up in such strong places and fortresses as

the country possessed. Of these there was no great number, most of

those now found in the country having been erected subsequently by

Archelaus, the son of Perdiccas, on his accession, who also cut

straight roads, and otherwise put the kingdom on a better footing as

regards horses, heavy infantry, and other war material than had been

done by all the eight kings that preceded him. Advancing from Doberus,

the Thracian host first invaded what had been once Philip’s

government, and took Idomene by assault, Gortynia, Atalanta, and

some other places by negotiation, these last coming over for love of

Philip’s son, Amyntas, then with Sitalces. Laying siege to Europus,

and failing to take it, he next advanced into the rest of Macedonia to

the left of Pella and Cyrrhus, not proceeding beyond this into

Bottiaea and Pieria, but staying