History of the Peloponnesian War - Thucydides (classic literature books .TXT) 📗
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King of the Thracians. Teres, the father of Sitalces, was the first to
establish the great kingdom of the Odrysians on a scale quite
unknown to the rest of Thrace, a large portion of the Thracians
being independent. This Teres is in no way related to Tereus who
married Pandion’s daughter Procne from Athens; nor indeed did they
belong to the same part of Thrace. Tereus lived in Daulis, part of
what is now called Phocis, but which at that time was inhabited by
Thracians. It was in this land that the women perpetrated the
outrage upon Itys; and many of the poets when they mention the
nightingale call it the Daulian bird. Besides, Pandion in
contracting an alliance for his daughter would consider the advantages
of mutual assistance, and would naturally prefer a match at the
above moderate distance to the journey of many days which separates
Athens from the Odrysians. Again the names are different; and this
Teres was king of the Odrysians, the first by the way who attained
to any power. Sitalces, his son, was now sought as an ally by the
Athenians, who desired his aid in the reduction of the Thracian
towns and of Perdiccas. Coming to Athens, Nymphodorus concluded the
alliance with Sitalces and made his son Sadocus an Athenian citizen,
and promised to finish the war in Thrace by persuading Sitalces to
send the Athenians a force of Thracian horse and targeteers. He also
reconciled them with Perdiccas, and induced them to restore Therme
to him; upon which Perdiccas at once joined the Athenians and
Phormio in an expedition against the Chalcidians. Thus Sitalces, son
of Teres, King of the Thracians, and Perdiccas, son of Alexander, King
of the Macedonians, became allies of Athens.
Meanwhile the Athenians in the hundred vessels were still cruising
round Peloponnese. After taking Sollium, a town belonging to
Corinth, and presenting the city and territory to the Acarnanians of
Palaira, they stormed Astacus, expelled its tyrant Evarchus, and
gained the place for their confederacy. Next they sailed to the island
of Cephallenia and brought it over without using force. Cephallenia
lies off Acarnania and Leucas, and consists of four states, the
Paleans, Cranians, Samaeans, and Pronaeans. Not long afterwards the
fleet returned to Athens. Towards the autumn of this year the
Athenians invaded the Megarid with their whole levy, resident aliens
included, under the command of Pericles, son of Xanthippus. The
Athenians in the hundred ships round Peloponnese on their journey home
had just reached Aegina, and hearing that the citizens at home were in
full force at Megara, now sailed over and joined them. This was
without doubt the largest army of Athenians ever assembled, the
state being still in the flower of her strength and yet unvisited by
the plague. Full ten thousand heavy infantry were in the field, all
Athenian citizens, besides the three thousand before Potidaea. Then
the resident aliens who joined in the incursion were at least three
thousand strong; besides which there was a multitude of light
troops. They ravaged the greater part of the territory, and then
retired. Other incursions into the Megarid were afterwards made by the
Athenians annually during the war, sometimes only with cavalry,
sometimes with all their forces. This went on until the capture of
Nisaea. Atalanta also, the desert island off the Opuntian coast, was
towards the end of this summer converted into a fortified post by
the Athenians, in order to prevent privateers issuing from Opus and
the rest of Locris and plundering Euboea. Such were the events of this
summer after the return of the Peloponnesians from Attica.
In the ensuing winter the Acarnanian Evarchus, wishing to return
to Astacus, persuaded the Corinthians to sail over with forty ships
and fifteen hundred heavy infantry and restore him; himself also
hiring some mercenaries. In command of the force were Euphamidas,
son of Aristonymus, Timoxenus, son of Timocrates, and Eumachus, son of
Chrysis, who sailed over and restored him and, after failing in an
attempt on some places on the Acarnanian coast which they were
desirous of gaining, began their voyage home. Coasting along shore
they touched at Cephallenia and made a descent on the Cranian
territory, and losing some men by the treachery of the Cranians, who
fell suddenly upon them after having agreed to treat, put to sea
somewhat hurriedly and returned home.
In the same winter the Athenians gave a funeral at the public cost
to those who had first fallen in this war. It was a custom of their
ancestors, and the manner of it is as follows. Three days before the
ceremony, the bones of the dead are laid out in a tent which has
been erected; and their friends bring to their relatives such
offerings as they please. In the funeral procession cypress coffins
are borne in cars, one for each tribe; the bones of the deceased being
placed in the coffin of their tribe. Among these is carried one
empty bier decked for the missing, that is, for those whose bodies
could not be recovered. Any citizen or stranger who pleases, joins
in the procession: and the female relatives are there to wail at the
burial. The dead are laid in the public sepulchre in the Beautiful
suburb of the city, in which those who fall in war are always
buried; with the exception of those slain at Marathon, who for their
singular and extraordinary valour were interred on the spot where they
fell. After the bodies have been laid in the earth, a man chosen by
the state, of approved wisdom and eminent reputation, pronounces
over them an appropriate panegyric; after which all retire. Such is
the manner of the burying; and throughout the whole of the war,
whenever the occasion arose, the established custom was observed.
Meanwhile these were the first that had fallen, and Pericles, son of
Xanthippus, was chosen to pronounce their eulogium. When the proper
time arrived, he advanced from the sepulchre to an elevated platform
in order to be heard by as many of the crowd as possible, and spoke as
follows:
“Most of my predecessors in this place have commended him who made
this speech part of the law, telling us that it is well that it should
be delivered at the burial of those who fall in battle. For myself,
I should have thought that the worth which had displayed itself in
deeds would be sufficiently rewarded by honours also shown by deeds;
such as you now see in this funeral prepared at the people’s cost. And
I could have wished that the reputations of many brave men were not to
be imperilled in the mouth of a single individual, to stand or fall
according as he spoke well or ill. For it is hard to speak properly
upon a subject where it is even difficult to convince your hearers
that you are speaking the truth. On the one hand, the friend who is
familiar with every fact of the story may think that some point has
not been set forth with that fullness which he wishes and knows it
to deserve; on the other, he who is a stranger to the matter may be
led by envy to suspect exaggeration if he hears anything above his own
nature. For men can endure to hear others praised only so long as they
can severally persuade themselves of their own ability to equal the
actions recounted: when this point is passed, envy comes in and with
it incredulity. However, since our ancestors have stamped this
custom with their approval, it becomes my duty to obey the law and
to try to satisfy your several wishes and opinions as best I may.
“I shall begin with our ancestors: it is both just and proper that
they should have the honour of the first mention on an occasion like
the present. They dwelt in the country without break in the succession
from generation to generation, and handed it down free to the
present time by their valour. And if our more remote ancestors deserve
praise, much more do our own fathers, who added to their inheritance
the empire which we now possess, and spared no pains to be able to
leave their acquisitions to us of the present generation. Lastly,
there are few parts of our dominions that have not been augmented by
those of us here, who are still more or less in the vigour of life;
while the mother country has been furnished by us with everything that
can enable her to depend on her own resources whether for war or for
peace. That part of our history which tells of the military
achievements which gave us our several possessions, or of the ready
valour with which either we or our fathers stemmed the tide of
Hellenic or foreign aggression, is a theme too familiar to my
hearers for me to dilate on, and I shall therefore pass it by. But
what was the road by which we reached our position, what the form of
government under which our greatness grew, what the national habits
out of which it sprang; these are questions which I may try to solve
before I proceed to my panegyric upon these men; since I think this to
be a subject upon which on the present occasion a speaker may properly
dwell, and to which the whole assemblage, whether citizens or
foreigners, may listen with advantage.
“Our constitution does not copy the laws of neighbouring states;
we are rather a pattern to others than imitators ourselves. Its
administration favours the many instead of the few; this is why it
is called a democracy. If we look to the laws, they afford equal
justice to all in their private differences; if no social standing,
advancement in public life falls to reputation for capacity, class
considerations not being allowed to interfere with merit; nor again
does poverty bar the way, if a man is able to serve the state, he is
not hindered by the obscurity of his condition. The freedom which we
enjoy in our government extends also to our ordinary life. There,
far from exercising a jealous surveillance over each other, we do
not feel called upon to be angry with our neighbour for doing what
he likes, or even to indulge in those injurious looks which cannot
fail to be offensive, although they inflict no positive penalty. But
all this ease in our private relations does not make us lawless as
citizens. Against this fear is our chief safeguard, teaching us to
obey the magistrates and the laws, particularly such as regard the
protection of the injured, whether they are actually on the statute
book, or belong to that code which, although unwritten, yet cannot
be broken without acknowledged disgrace.
“Further, we provide plenty of means for the mind to refresh
itself from business. We celebrate games and sacrifices all the year
round, and the elegance of our private establishments forms a daily
source of pleasure and helps to banish the spleen; while the magnitude
of our city draws the produce of the world into our harbour, so that
to the Athenian the fruits of other countries are as familiar a luxury
as those of his own.
“If we turn to our military policy, there also we differ from our
antagonists. We throw open our city to the world, and never by alien
acts exclude foreigners from any opportunity of learning or observing,
although the eyes of an enemy may occasionally profit by our
liberality; trusting less in system and policy than to the native
spirit of our citizens; while in education, where our rivals from
their very cradles by a painful discipline seek after manliness, at
Athens we live exactly as we please, and yet are just as ready to
encounter every legitimate
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