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

but that

once effected, pursuing for a short time and not far.

 

Such was the battle, as nearly as possible as I have described it;

the greatest that had occurred for a very long while among the

Hellenes, and joined by the most considerable states. The

Lacedaemonians took up a position in front of the enemy’s dead, and

immediately set up a trophy and stripped the slain; they took up their

own dead and carried them back to Tegea, where they buried them, and

restored those of the enemy under truce. The Argives, Orneans, and

Cleonaeans had seven hundred killed; the Mantineans two hundred, and

the Athenians and Aeginetans also two hundred, with both their

generals. On the side of the Lacedaemonians, the allies did not suffer

any loss worth speaking of: as to the Lacedaemonians themselves it was

difficult to learn the truth; it is said, however, that there were

slain about three hundred of them.

 

While the battle was impending, Pleistoanax, the other king, set out

with a reinforcement composed of the oldest and youngest men, and

got as far as Tegea, where he heard of the victory and went back

again. The Lacedaemonians also sent and turned back the allies from

Corinth and from beyond the Isthmus, and returning themselves

dismissed their allies, and kept the Carnean holidays, which

happened to be at that time. The imputations cast upon them by the

Hellenes at the time, whether of cowardice on account of the

disaster in the island, or of mismanagement and slowness generally,

were all wiped out by this single action: fortune, it was thought,

might have humbled them, but the men themselves were the same as ever.

 

The day before this battle, the Epidaurians with all their forces

invaded the deserted Argive territory, and cut off many of the

guards left there in the absence of the Argive army. After the

battle three thousand Elean heavy infantry arriving to aid the

Mantineans, and a reinforcement of one thousand Athenians, all these

allies marched at once against Epidaurus, while the Lacedaemonians

were keeping the Carnea, and dividing the work among them began to

build a wall round the city. The rest left off; but the Athenians

finished at once the part assigned to them round Cape Heraeum; and

having all joined in leaving a garrison in the fortification in

question, they returned to their respective cities.

 

Summer now came to an end. In the first days of the next winter,

when the Carnean holidays were over, the Lacedaemonians took the

field, and arriving at Tegea sent on to Argos proposals of

accommodation. They had before had a party in the town desirous of

overthrowing the democracy; and after the battle that had been fought,

these were now far more in a position to persuade the people to listen

to terms. Their plan was first to make a treaty with the

Lacedaemonians, to be followed by an alliance, and after this to

fall upon the commons. Lichas, son of Arcesilaus, the Argive proxenus,

accordingly arrived at Argos with two proposals from Lacedaemon, to

regulate the conditions of war or peace, according as they preferred

the one or the other. After much discussion, Alcibiades happening to

be in the town, the Lacedaemonian party, who now ventured to act

openly, persuaded the Argives to accept the proposal for

accommodation; which ran as follows:

 

The assembly of the Lacedaemonians agrees to treat with the

Argives upon the terms following:

 

1. The Argives shall restore to the Orchomenians their children,

and to the Maenalians their men, and shall restore the men they have

in Mantinea to the Lacedaemonians.

 

2. They shall evacuate Epidaurus, and raze the fortification

there. If the Athenians refuse to withdraw from Epidaurus, they

shall be declared enemies of the Argives and of the Lacedaemonians,

and of the allies of the Lacedaemonians and the allies of the Argives.

 

3. If the Lacedaemonians have any children in their custody,

they shall restore them every one to his city.

 

4. As to the offering to the god, the Argives, if they wish, shall

impose an oath upon the Epidaurians, but, if not, they shall swear

it themselves.

 

5. All the cities in Peloponnese, both small and great, shall be

independent according to the customs of their country.

 

6. If any of the powers outside Peloponnese invade Peloponnesian

territory, the parties contracting shall unite to repel them, on

such terms as they may agree upon, as being most fair for the

Peloponnesians.

 

7. All allies of the Lacedaemonians outside Peloponnese shall be

on the same footing as the Lacedaemonians, and the allies of the

Argives shall be on the same footing as the Argives, being left in

enjoyment of their own possessions.

 

8. This treaty shall be shown to the allies, and shall be concluded,

if they approve; if the allies think fit, they may send the treaty

to be considered at home.

 

The Argives began by accepting this proposal, and the

Lacedaemonian army returned home from Tegea. After this intercourse

was renewed between them, and not long afterwards the same party

contrived that the Argives should give up the league with the

Mantineans, Eleans, and Athenians, and should make a treaty and

alliance with the Lacedaemonians; which was consequently done upon the

terms following:

 

The Lacedaemonians and Argives agree to a treaty and alliance

for fifty years upon the terms following:

 

1. All disputes shall be decided by fair and impartial

arbitration, agreeably to the customs of the two countries.

 

2. The rest of the cities in Peloponnese may be included in this

treaty and alliance, as independent and sovereign, in full enjoyment

of what they possess, all disputes being decided by fair and impartial

arbitration, agreeably to the customs of the said cities.

 

3. All allies of the Lacedaemonians outside Peloponnese shall be

upon the same footing as the Lacedaemonians themselves, and the allies

of the Argives shall be upon the same footing as the Argives

themselves, continuing to enjoy what they possess.

 

4. If it shall be anywhere necessary to make an expedition in

common, the Lacedaemonians and Argives shall consult upon it and

decide, as may be most fair for the allies.

 

5. If any of the cities, whether inside or outside Peloponnese,

have a question whether of frontiers or otherwise, it must be settled,

but if one allied city should have a quarrel with another allied city,

it must be referred to some third city thought impartial by both

parties. Private citizens shall have their disputes decided

according to the laws of their several countries.

 

The treaty and above alliance concluded, each party at once released

everything whether acquired by war or otherwise, and thenceforth

acting in common voted to receive neither herald nor embassy from

the Athenians unless they evacuated their forts and withdrew from

Peloponnese, and also to make neither peace nor war with any, except

jointly. Zeal was not wanting: both parties sent envoys to the

Thracian places and to Perdiccas, and persuaded the latter to join

their league. Still he did not at once break off from Athens, although

minded to do so upon seeing the way shown him by Argos, the original

home of his family. They also renewed their old oaths with the

Chalcidians and took new ones: the Argives, besides, sent

ambassadors to the Athenians, bidding them evacuate the fort at

Epidaurus. The Athenians, seeing their own men outnumbered by the rest

of the garrison, sent Demosthenes to bring them out. This general,

under colour of a gymnastic contest which he arranged on his

arrival, got the rest of the garrison out of the place, and shut the

gates behind them. Afterwards the Athenians renewed their treaty

with the Epidaurians, and by themselves gave up the fortress.

 

After the defection of Argos from the league, the Mantineans, though

they held out at first, in the end finding themselves powerless

without the Argives, themselves too came to terms with Lacedaemon, and

gave up their sovereignty over the towns. The Lacedaemonians and

Argives, each a thousand strong, now took the field together, and

the former first went by themselves to Sicyon and made the

government there more oligarchical than before, and then both,

uniting, put down the democracy at Argos and set up an oligarchy

favourable to Lacedaemon. These events occurred at the close of the

winter, just before spring; and the fourteenth year of the war

ended. The next summer the people of Dium, in Athos, revolted from the

Athenians to the Chalcidians, and the Lacedaemonians settled affairs

in Achaea in a way more agreeable to the interests of their country.

Meanwhile the popular party at Argos little by little gathered new

consistency and courage, and waited for the moment of the

Gymnopaedic festival at Lacedaemon, and then fell upon the

oligarchs. After a fight in the city, victory declared for the

commons, who slew some of their opponents and banished others. The

Lacedaemonians for a long while let the messages of their friends at

Argos remain without effect. At last they put off the Gymnopaediae and

marched to their succour, but learning at Tegea the defeat of the

oligarchs, refused to go any further in spite of the entreaties of

those who had escaped, and returned home and kept the festival.

Later on, envoys arrived with messages from the Argives in the town

and from the exiles, when the allies were also at Sparta; and after

much had been said on both sides, the Lacedaemonians decided that

the party in the town had done wrong, and resolved to march against

Argos, but kept delaying and putting off the matter. Meanwhile the

commons at Argos, in fear of the Lacedaemonians, began again to

court the Athenian alliance, which they were convinced would be of the

greatest service to them; and accordingly proceeded to build long

walls to the sea, in order that in case of a blockade by land; with

the help of the Athenians they might have the advantage of importing

what they wanted by sea. Some of the cities in Peloponnese were also

privy to the building of these walls; and the Argives with all their

people, women and slaves not excepted, addressed themselves to the

work, while carpenters and masons came to them from Athens.

 

Summer was now over. The winter following the Lacedaemonians,

hearing of the walls that were building, marched against Argos with

their allies, the Corinthians excepted, being also not without

intelligence in the city itself; Agis, son of Archidamus, their

king, was in command. The intelligence which they counted upon

within the town came to nothing; they however took and razed the walls

which were being built, and after capturing the Argive town Hysiae and

killing all the freemen that fell into their hands, went back and

dispersed every man to his city. After this the Argives marched into

Phlius and plundered it for harbouring their exiles, most of whom

had settled there, and so returned home. The same winter the Athenians

blockaded Macedonia, on the score of the league entered into by

Perdiccas with the Argives and Lacedaemonians, and also of his

breach of his engagements on the occasion of the expedition prepared

by Athens against the Chalcidians in the direction of Thrace and

against Amphipolis, under the command of Nicias, son of Niceratus,

which had to be broken up mainly because of his desertion. He was

therefore proclaimed an enemy. And thus the winter ended, and the

fifteenth year of the war ended with it.