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

neighbourhood, under

the command of Nicias, son of Niceratus, and Nicostratus, son of

Diitrephes. Weighing from Potidaea, the fleet came to land opposite

the temple of Poseidon, and proceeded against Mende; the men of

which town, reinforced by three hundred Scionaeans, with their

Peloponnesian auxiliaries, seven hundred heavy infantry in all,

under Polydamidas, they found encamped upon a strong hill outside

the city. These Nicias, with one hundred and twenty light-armed

Methonaeans, sixty picked men from the Athenian heavy infantry, and

all the archers, tried to reach by a path running up the hill, but

received a wound and found himself unable to force the position; while

Nicostratus, with all the rest of the army, advancing upon the hill,

which was naturally difficult, by a different approach further off,

was thrown into utter disorder; and the whole Athenian army narrowly

escaped being defeated. For that day, as the Mendaeans and their

allies showed no signs of yielding, the Athenians retreated and

encamped, and the Mendaeans at nightfall returned into the town.

 

The next day the Athenians sailed round to the Scione side, and took

the suburb, and all day plundered the country, without any one

coming out against them, partly because of intestine disturbances in

the town; and the following night the three hundred Scionaeans

returned home. On the morrow Nicias advanced with half the army to the

frontier of Scione and laid waste the country; while Nicostratus

with the remainder sat down before the town near the upper gate on the

road to Potidaea. The arms of the Mendaeans and of their Peloponnesian

auxiliaries within the wall happened to be piled in that quarter,

where Polydamidas accordingly began to draw them up for battle,

encouraging the Mendaeans to make a sortie. At this moment one of

the popular party answered him factiously that they would not go out

and did not want a war, and for thus answering was dragged by the

arm and knocked about by Polydamidas. Hereupon the infuriated

commons at once seized their arms and rushed at the Peloponnesians and

at their allies of the opposite faction. The troops thus assaulted

were at once routed, partly from the suddenness of the conflict and

partly through fear of the gates being opened to the Athenians, with

whom they imagined that the attack had been concerted. As many as were

not killed on the spot took refuge in the citadel, which they had held

from the first; and the whole, Athenian army, Nicias having by this

time returned and being close to the city, now burst into Mende, which

had opened its gates without any convention, and sacked it just as

if they had taken it by storm, the generals even finding some

difficulty in restraining them from also massacring the inhabitants.

After this the Athenians told the Mendaeans that they might retain

their civil rights, and themselves judge the supposed authors of the

revolt; and cut off the party in the citadel by a wall built down to

the sea on either side, appointing troops to maintain the blockade.

Having thus secured Mende, they proceeded against Scione.

 

The Scionaeans and Peloponnesians marched out against them,

occupying a strong hill in front of the town, which had to be captured

by the enemy before they could invest the place. The Athenians stormed

the hill, defeated and dislodged its occupants, and, having encamped

and set up a trophy, prepared for the work of circumvallation. Not

long after they had begun their operations, the auxiliaries besieged

in the citadel of Mende forced the guard by the sea-side and arrived

by night at Scione, into which most of them succeeded in entering,

passing through the besieging army.

 

While the investment of Scione was in progress, Perdiccas sent a

herald to the Athenian generals and made peace with the Athenians,

through spite against Brasidas for the retreat from Lyncus, from which

moment indeed he had begun to negotiate. The Lacedaemonian

Ischagoras was just then upon the point of starting with an army

overland to join Brasidas; and Perdiccas, being now required by Nicias

to give some proof of the sincerity of his reconciliation to the

Athenians, and being himself no longer disposed to let the

Peloponnesians into his country, put in motion his friends in

Thessaly, with whose chief men he always took care to have

relations, and so effectually stopped the army and its preparation

that they did not even try the Thessalians. Ischagoras himself,

however, with Ameinias and Aristeus, succeeded in reaching Brasidas;

they had been commissioned by the Lacedaemonians to inspect the

state of affairs, and brought out from Sparta (in violation of all

precedent) some of their young men to put in command of the towns,

to guard against their being entrusted to the persons upon the spot.

Brasidas accordingly placed Clearidas, son of Cleonymus, in

Amphipolis, and Pasitelidas, son of Hegesander, in Torone.

 

The same summer the Thebans dismantled the wall of the Thespians

on the charge of Atticism, having always wished to do so, and now

finding it an easy matter, as the flower of the Thespian youth had

perished in the battle with the Athenians. The same summer also the

temple of Hera at Argos was burnt down, through Chrysis, the

priestess, placing a lighted torch near the garlands and then

falling asleep, so that they all caught fire and were in a blaze

before she observed it. Chrysis that very night fled to Phlius for

fear of the Argives, who, agreeably to the law in such a case,

appointed another priestess named Phaeinis. Chrysis at the time of her

flight had been priestess for eight years of the present war and

half the ninth. At the close of the summer the investment of Scione

was completed, and the Athenians, leaving a detachment to maintain the

blockade, returned with the rest of their army.

 

During the winter following, the Athenians and Lacedaemonians were

kept quiet by the armistice; but the Mantineans and Tegeans, and their

respective allies, fought a battle at Laodicium, in the Oresthid.

The victory remained doubtful, as each side routed one of the wings

opposed to them, and both set up trophies and sent spoils to Delphi.

After heavy loss on both sides the battle was undecided, and night

interrupted the action; yet the Tegeans passed the night on the

field and set up a trophy at once, while the Mantineans withdrew to

Bucolion and set up theirs afterwards.

 

At the close of the same winter, in fact almost in spring,

Brasidas made an attempt upon Potidaea. He arrived by night, and

succeeded in planting a ladder against the wall without being

discovered, the ladder being planted just in the interval between

the passing round of the bell and the return of the man who brought it

back. Upon the garrison, however, taking the alarm immediately

afterwards, before his men came up, he quickly led off his troops,

without waiting until it was day. So ended the winter and the ninth

year of this war of which Thucydides is the historian.