History of the Peloponnesian War, Thucydides [best free ebook reader TXT] 📗

earthquake threw down part of the wall,

the town hall, and a few other buildings. The cause, in my opinion, of

this phenomenon must be sought in the earthquake. At the point where

its shock has been the most violent, the sea is driven back and,

suddenly recoiling with redoubled force, causes the inundation.

Without an earthquake I do not see how such an accident could happen.

 

During the same summer different operations were carried on by the

different beligerents in Sicily; by the Siceliots themselves against

each other, and by the Athenians and their allies: I shall however

confine myself to the actions in which the Athenians took part,

choosing the most important. The death of the Athenian general

Charoeades, killed by the Syracusans in battle, left Laches in the

sole command of the fleet, which he now directed in concert with the

allies against Mylae, a place belonging to the Messinese. Two

Messinese battalions in garrison at Mylae laid an ambush for the party

landing from the ships, but were routed with great slaughter by the

Athenians and their allies, who thereupon assaulted the

fortification and compelled them to surrender the Acropolis and to

march with them upon Messina. This town afterwards also submitted upon

the approach of the Athenians and their allies, and gave hostages

and all other securities required.

 

The same summer the Athenians sent thirty ships round Peloponnese

under Demosthenes, son of Alcisthenes, and Procles, son of

Theodorus, and sixty others, with two thousand heavy infantry, against

Melos, under Nicias, son of Niceratus; wishing to reduce the

Melians, who, although islanders, refused to be subjects of Athens

or even to join her confederacy. The devastation of their land not

procuring their submission, the fleet, weighing from Melos, sailed

to Oropus in the territory of Graea, and landing at nightfall, the

heavy infantry started at once from the ships by land for Tanagra in

Boeotia, where they were met by the whole levy from Athens,

agreeably to a concerted signal, under the command of Hipponicus,

son of Callias, and Eurymedon, son of Thucles. They encamped, and

passing that day in ravaging the Tanagraean territory, remained

there for the night; and next day, after defeating those of the

Tanagraeans who sailed out against them and some Thebans who had

come up to help the Tanagraeans, took some arms, set up a trophy,

and retired, the troops to the city and the others to the ships.

Nicias with his sixty ships coasted alongshore and ravaged the Locrian

seaboard, and so returned home.

 

About this time the Lacedaemonians founded their colony of

Heraclea in Trachis, their object being the following: the Malians

form in all three tribes, the Paralians, the Hiereans, and the

Trachinians. The last of these having suffered severely in a war

with their neighbours the Oetaeans, at first intended to give

themselves up to Athens; but afterwards fearing not to find in her the

security that they sought, sent to Lacedaemon, having chosen Tisamenus

for their ambassador. In this embassy joined also the Dorians from the

mother country of the Lacedaemonians, with the same request, as they

themselves also suffered from the same enemy. After hearing them,

the Lacedaemonians determined to send out the colony, wishing to

assist the Trachinians and Dorians, and also because they thought that

the proposed town would lie conveniently for the purposes of the war

against the Athenians. A fleet might be got ready there against

Euboea, with the advantage of a short passage to the island; and the

town would also be useful as a station on the road to Thrace. In

short, everything made the Lacedaemonians eager to found the place.

After first consulting the god at Delphi and receiving a favourable

answer, they sent off the colonists, Spartans, and Perioeci,

inviting also any of the rest of the Hellenes who might wish to

accompany them, except Ionians, Achaeans, and certain other

nationalities; three Lacedaemonians leading as founders of the colony,

Leon, Alcidas, and Damagon. The settlement effected, they fortified

anew the city, now called Heraclea, distant about four miles and a

half from Thermopylae and two miles and a quarter from the sea, and

commenced building docks, closing the side towards Thermopylae just by

the pass itself, in order that they might be easily defended.

 

The foundation of this town, evidently meant to annoy Euboea (the

passage across to Cenaeum in that island being a short one), at

first caused some alarm at Athens, which the event however did nothing

to justify, the town never giving them any trouble. The reason of this

was as follows. The Thessalians, who were sovereign in those parts,

and whose territory was menaced by its foundation, were afraid that it

might prove a very powerful neighbour, and accordingly continually

harassed and made war upon the new settlers, until they at last wore

them out in spite of their originally considerable numbers, people

flocking from all quarters to a place founded by the Lacedaemonians,

and thus thought secure of prosperity. On the other hand the

Lacedaemonians themselves, in the persons of their governors, did

their full share towards ruining its prosperity and reducing its

population, as they frightened away the greater part of the

inhabitants by governing harshly and in some cases not fairly, and

thus made it easier for their neighbours to prevail against them.

 

The same summer, about the same time that the Athenians were

detained at Melos, their fellow citizens in the thirty ships

cruising round Peloponnese, after cutting off some guards in an ambush

at Ellomenus in Leucadia, subsequently went against Leucas itself with

a large armament, having been reinforced by the whole levy of the

Acarnanians except Oeniadae, and by the Zacynthians and

Cephallenians and fifteen ships from Corcyra. While the Leucadians

witnessed the devastation of their land, without and within the

isthmus upon which the town of Leucas and the temple of Apollo

stand, without making any movement on account of the overwhelming

numbers of the enemy, the Acarnanians urged Demosthenes, the

Athenian general, to build a wall so as to cut off the town from the

continent, a measure which they were convinced would secure its

capture and rid them once and for all of a most troublesome enemy.

 

Demosthenes however had in the meanwhile been persuaded by the

Messenians that it was a fine opportunity for him, having so large

an army assembled, to attack the Aetolians, who were not only the

enemies of Naupactus, but whose reduction would further make it easy

to gain the rest of that part of the continent for the Athenians.

The Aetolian nation, although numerous and warlike, yet dwelt in

unwalled villages scattered far apart, and had nothing but light

armour, and might, according to the Messenians, be subdued without

much difficulty before succours could arrive. The plan which they

recommended was to attack first the Apodotians, next the Ophionians,

and after these the Eurytanians, who are the largest tribe in Aetolia,

and speak, as is said, a language exceedingly difficult to understand,

and eat their flesh raw. These once subdued, the rest would easily

come in.

 

To this plan Demosthenes consented, not only to please the

Messenians, but also in the belief that by adding the Aetolians to his

other continental allies he would be able, without aid from home, to

march against the Boeotians by way of Ozolian Locris to Kytinium in

Doris, keeping Parnassus on his right until he descended to the

Phocians, whom he could force to join him if their ancient

friendship for Athens did not, as he anticipated, at once decide

them to do so. Arrived in Phocis he was already upon the frontier of

Boeotia. He accordingly weighed from Leucas, against the wish of the

Acarnanians, and with his whole armament sailed along the coast to

Sollium, where he communicated to them his intention; and upon their

refusing to agree to it on account of the non-investment of Leucas,

himself with the rest of the forces, the Cephallenians, the

Messenians, and Zacynthians, and three hundred Athenian marines from

his own ships (the fifteen Corcyraean vessels having departed),

started on his expedition against the Aetolians. His base he

established at Oeneon in Locris, as the Ozolian Locrians were allies

of Athens and were to meet him with all their forces in the

interior. Being neighbours of the Aetolians and armed in the same way,

it was thought that they would be of great service upon the

expedition, from their acquaintance with the localities and the

warfare of the inhabitants.

 

After bivouacking with the army in the precinct of Nemean Zeus, in

which the poet Hesiod is said to have been killed by the people of the

country, according to an oracle which had foretold that he should

die in Nemea, Demosthenes set out at daybreak to invade Aetolia. The

first day he took Potidania, the next Krokyle, and the third

Tichium, where he halted and sent back the booty to Eupalium in

Locris, having determined to pursue his conquests as far as the

Ophionians, and, in the event of their refusing to submit, to return

to Naupactus and make them the objects of a second expedition.

Meanwhile the Aetolians had been aware of his design from the moment

of its formation, and as soon as the army invaded their country came

up in great force with all their tribes; even the most remote

Ophionians, the Bomiensians, and Calliensians, who extend towards

the Malian Gulf, being among the number.

 

The Messenians, however, adhered to their original advice.

Assuring Demosthenes that the Aetolians were an easy conquest, they

urged him to push on as rapidly as possible, and to try to take the

villages as fast as he came up to them, without waiting until the

whole nation should be in arms against him. Led on by his advisers and

trusting in his fortune, as he had met with no opposition, without

waiting for his Locrian reinforcements, who were to have supplied

him with the light-armed darters in which he was most deficient, he

advanced and stormed Aegitium, the inhabitants flying before him and

posting themselves upon the hills above the town, which stood on

high ground about nine miles from the sea. Meanwhile the Aetolians had

gathered to the rescue, and now attacked the Athenians and their

allies, running down from the hills on every side and darting their

javelins, falling back when the Athenian army advanced, and coming

on as it retired; and for a long while the battle was of this

character, alternate advance and retreat, in both which operations the

Athenians had the worst.

 

Still as long as their archers had arrows left and were able to

use them, they held out, the light-armed Aetolians retiring before the

arrows; but after the captain of the archers had been killed and his

men scattered, the soldiers, wearied out with the constant

repetition of the same exertions and hard pressed by the Aetolians

with their javelins, at last turned and fled, and falling into

pathless gullies and places that they were unacquainted with, thus

perished, the Messenian Chromon, their guide, having also

unfortunately been killed. A great many were overtaken in the

pursuit by the swift-footed and light-armed Aetolians, and fell

beneath their javelins; the greater number however missed their road

and rushed into the wood, which had no ways out, and which was soon

fired and burnt round them by the enemy. Indeed the Athenian army fell

victims to death in every form, and suffered all the vicissitudes of

flight; the survivors escaped with difficulty to the sea and Oeneon in

Locris, whence they had set out. Many of the allies were killed, and

about one hundred and twenty Athenian heavy infantry, not a man

less, and all in the prime of life. These were by far the best men

in the city of Athens that fell during this war. Among the