The History of the Peloponnesian War, Volume I (60 page)

[“But rather daily contemplating
in its reality
the power of the city.”]

[“For having
in common
given their bodies to their country, they receive
individually
in return praise that dieth not, and a most distinguished tomb: not that in which they now lie, but that rather in which” c. The word ἰδίᾳ,
individually,
refers to the inscribing upon the monument the name and tribe of each individual buried on these occasions. Arn. “Their (
i. e.
famous men’s) virtues
are
testified” c.]

[But “also in foreign lands”.]

[“As the misery that accompanies cowardice”. Göll. Arn.]

[“But happy are they that obtain, as these men have, the most honourable death; and as you, the most becoming subject of grief.” Goeller, Arnold.]

[That are
advanced in years.
]

[To put “the greater part of your life, which has been prosperous”, to the account c.]

[“But that which is no longer in their way (the dead), men honour with a good will void of jealousy”.]

[“Not to be inferior to the ordinary nature of woman”. That is, they do enough if they act up to the standard of their sex, without striving to surpass it. Arnold.]

The children of such as were the first slain in any war, were kept at the charge of the city till they came to man’s estate. [That is, till the age of sixteen, μέχρι ἥβης. At this age, that of puberty, the Athenian youth entered the Gymnasium, where they passed two years in learning the use of their arms: continuing at the same time their other studies of grammar, music, c. This was called ἐπὶ διετὲς ἡβῆσαι. On completing their eighteenth year, on proof of their title, called δοκιμασθῆναι, they were received amongst the Ephebi; and in the grove Agraulus took the citizen’s oath, “not to pollute the sacred instruments, not to desert their ranks, to fight for their country in all things, both sacred and profane, and to deliver it unimpaired to their posterity”. Thereupon they received their arms, and were inscribed in the book, πίναξ ληξιαρχικὸς, of their δῆμος. They thereby became
sui juris,
might marry, sue and be sued, c. The two following years they served as περίπολοι, (see iv. 67): at the end of which time they were admitted to the public assemblies, and to the full exercise of all political rights: and became liable to foreign military service. Hermann, Gr. Antiq. § 123.]

[“Thus
in word
have I c.: and
in deed
have these men been honoured,
partly
in this ceremony, and
partly
in that their children” c.]

[To these and
their posterity,
a garland in matches
such as these.
]

[ἐγκατασκῆψαι, proprie de fulmine usurpatur; transfertur autem ad mala quævis graviora cum impetu irrumpentia. Gottleber.]

[“For the physicians brought no aid, when at first through ignorance they attempted to cure it.” Goeller. At
no
time were they found to be of any use: see ch. 51. Krauss, in his disquisition on this disease, has pronounced it to bear an affinity to the contagious putrid typhus: shown mainly by the dejection and loss of the mental powers, the catarrhous–plegmonous symptoms, the bilious vomit, the termination of the disease on the days of crisis, the external and internal gangrene. He mentions three other diseases like this, also originating in Æthiopia or Egypt; the first of which (A.D. 165–168) described by Galen, and the second (252–267) by Eusebius and Cyprian, were much the same in species as this disease.]

[ϕρέατα. Reservoirs or tanks for catching the rain–water. Arnold.]

[ἐς τοῦτο πάντα ἀπεκρίθη: “his disease, whatever it might be, at its
crisis
turned to this.” Goeller.]

[
Heat
in the head.]

[ἀποκαθάρσεις: properly, evacuations
downwards.
Here meaning evacuations generally, but principally by vomit. Poppo, Krauss.]

[κενὴ: “
empty
hiccough”: that is, not the
full.
It was an opinion of the ancient physicians, (Hippocrates amongst the rest), that spasms and hiccough, (λύγξ), were the effect of either repletion or emptiness. The words, therefore, here signify the attempt of the stomach to throw more off it, when all has been already thrown off. Krauss.]

[ἕλκεσιν: ulcers.]

[But rather most willingly to have cast themselves into the cold water: “and many of them that were not looked to, did so into the tanks, possessed with an insatiate thirst. And to drink much or little was the same thing. And restlessness and sleeplessness pervaded the entire disease.” The outward coldness and inward heat and thirst here described, are symptoms set down by Hippocrates as θανάσιμον,
mortal.
Goeller.]

[That is, of mortification consequent thereon. Krauss.]

[ἀκράτου is supposed by Goeller and Arnold, to be used in its technical sense; in which, as explained by Hippocrates and Galen, it seems to signify the final purgings, consisting of either yellow or black bile,
unmixed
with any watery mixture. “Or if they escaped that, then the inflammation taking hold of the mucous membrane of the intestines, and violent ulceration arising there, and at the same time a
pure bilious
diarrhœa accompanying it, they afterwards died many of them
of it
(the diarrhœa) through weakness.” Krauss.]

[“Yet the disease (that is, the consequent gangrene) seizing the extremities,
left there its mark.
For it struck” c. ἐπισήμαινε, a word applied to the mark or signature of the auditors of the public accounts at Athens, signifying that the account was duly passed. Arnold.]

[In the plague at Rome, A. C. 174, Livy says: “Cadavera, intacta a canibus ac vulturibus, tabes absumebat: satisque constabat, nec illo nec priore anno in tanta strage boum hominumque vulturium usquam visum. xli. 21.]

[“This disease then, to pass over many varieties of morbid affection, (each case having in it something different from another), was in its
outward form
such as I have shown.” Thucydides proposed to say nothing of the internal nature of the disease. Krauss.]

[“But whatever it might be, it ended in this.”]

[“Nor was there any one remedy, which it was of use to apply.”]

[“Those assuming something of virtue.”]

[
Still more
compassion: more, that is, than those venturing their lives as just mentioned.]

[ὥρᾳ ἔτους: at
the
time, that is, the
best
time of the year: the
summer.
ἐν καλύβαις, in
cellars.
The ordinary population of Athens and the Piræus did not exceed 180,000: and the number of houses was somewhat above 10,000. And here was at this time crowded the entire population of Attica, computed by Boeckh at 500,000.]

[“And they died one upon another, and so lay: and they lay halfdead rolling in the streets and about every conduit, c. And the sacred grounds, where c.”]

[“And every one buried as he best might. And many, for want c. after so many deaths amongst their own friends, betook themselves to shameless burials.” That is, they buried or burned them in the sepulchres or funeral piles of other
gentes
than their own. Poppo, Goeller.]

[“Has become prevalent”.]

[
Suddenly
dying.]

[“And doing all for their pleasure.”]

[“And whatsoever was pleasant
for the present moment,
and every way conducive to that, that was” c. Vulgo ᾔδει. Bekker, ἤδη.]

λοιμός, plague. λιμός, famine.

[
The
answer.]

Apollo, to whom the heathen attributed the immission of all epidemic or ordinary diseases. [Apollo was the god of the Doric race, and of the Athenians he was Ἀπόλλων πατρῷος (see chap. 71). By them he was looked upon as the
averter of evil,
ἀλεξίκακος, and the
avenger of guilt:
sickness, pestilence, and sudden death, unexpected and the cause unknown, were his ordinary instruments of punishment, as in Il. i. and Soph. Œd. Tyr , or for averting evil as in Od. iii. 280. His aim was unerring, and the blow unforeseen: hence his name, “the fardarting”. But he was not otherwise considered to be the author of disease: and to many heathen nations he was wholly unknown.]

By the sea–coast. [This was the hilly country extending from the city to the west, about the promontory of Sunium: barren, and suited only to the purposes of commerce. Muell.]

[ἔτι δε. “
But
whilst” c. He would not let the Athenians go out to fight by land; but nevertheless made incursions by sea.]

[The Persians had before this transported horses by sea, though the Greeks had not. See Herod. vi. 48.]

[There was also Epidaurus in Dalmatia.]

[“Took and
sacked
” c. The town appears to have existed yet in viii. 18.]

[θάπτοντας: “burning” their dead. Hoc verbum et sepulturam omnino, et combustionem significat. Vide Herodotum, v. 8. Hæc igitur verba recte intelligere videntur, qui dicunt Atheniensium sepulturas ex igne et fumo rogorum a Peloponnesiis cognitas esse. Goeller.]

[“And this invasion was the longest stay they
ever
made”. “
About
forty days.”]

[“As having instigated them to the war”, and by his means c.]

[Besides the ordinary assemblies, which were four during each prytaneia, extraordinary assemblies might be called by the Prytaneis, or by the Strategi. The mode of summons was by the cryer, κῆρυξ: the place of assembly, which at first was the Pnyx, on the side of a hill opposite to the Areiopagus, was in latter times the Theatre. Every citizen that attended the assembly, whether ordinary or extraordinary, received an obolus: which was afterwards, as some say by Cleon, increased to three.]

[
But each singly
cannot c.]

[Will not
in like manner
(as if he were well affected) give c.]

[ταπεινὴ: are
too
abject to maintain. See i. 50, note.]

[“Often enough assuredly.”]

[Now, “as having somewhat too much the appearance of boasting”, but that c.]

[“And there is none, neither
the
king nor any nation besides c. can impeach your navigation with your present navy.”]

[Show not yourselves inferior c., “but that you hold it” more dishonour c.]

[“And courage, though fortune be only equal, if seconded by contempt of the enemy, is fortified by prudence: which trusts not to hope, of use only where other help is wanting, but to counsel founded upon the means actually at hand, the foresight of which is more to be relied on.” Goeller.]

[
From
her dominion.]

[If any in present fear “would virtuously forsooth persuade us to this too, without trouble to give up our dominion”. Goeller.]

[“And know that this city has gotten a very great name amongst all men
by
not yielding to adversity; and that by having expended very many lives and vast labours in war, it has possessed the greatest power hitherto”: the memory whereof c.]

[“Having regard then in your decision” both to what is honourable c.]

[But “applied themselves more” to the war.]

[That is, they made him supreme over the other nine στρατηγοὶ. Arnold. Cleon is said to have been the author of the fine.]

[“During
the
peace”: viz., the thirty years’ treaty. Göll. Arn.]

He died of the plague. Plut. [The justice of the character here given of him cannot be disputed. Whether in feeding the rapacity of the people with taxes extorted from the allies, he was not preparing the certain downfall of the state, by corrupting the one and alienating the other, is another question.]

[Thucydides alludes to such measures, as sending the squadron to Crete to make an attempt on Cydonia (ii. 85.), which should have sailed without loss of time to reinforce Phormion: wasting their force in petty expeditions in Sicily before the great invasion, whereby no object was gained, and the Dorian states were wholly alienated from Athens: the outrage upon Melos (v. 84), which excited the indignation of all Greece. Arnold. To these might be added the affair of the Mercuries (vi. 27, 53); to their folly wherein, by making Alcibiades their enemy, may perhaps in a measure be attributed the failure of the Sicilian expedition.]

[“Betook themselves to giving up to the people according to their humours even the public affairs.”]

[Which was not so much c., “as that they who sent out the expedition, by not afterwards in due time voting reinforcements for those who went, but caballing amongst themselves for power with the people,” abated the vigour of the army; and then c.]