thucydides i loeb intro

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INTRODUCTION

Three ancient biographies 1 of Thucydides havecome down to us, but they are of little value. Theyare derived from ancient commentaries, and the bio-graphical details which they contain, wherever theydo not rest upon inference from the text of the

history itself, are often confused and contradictory.These are supplemented by scattered statements ofseveral ancient writers Dionysius of Halicarnassus,who wrote two treatises on Thucydides (Z)


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judgment, following it with close attention, that he

might acquire accurate information (v. xxvi. 5). Hesuffered from the plague of 429 b.c. (ii. xlviii. 3), of

which he wrote his famous account (ii. xlvii-liv).

Elected one of the ten generals in 424 b.c, he was

sent to the coast of Thrace (where he enjoyed the

right of working certain gold mines) to operate

against Brasidas. Failing to relieve Amphipolis, he

was exiled in 424 b.c, and remained in banishment

for twenty years, and thus was able to become ac-

quainted with affairs on both sides (v. xxvi. 5).

For other facts we are dependent largely uponinference ; some are reasonably certain, others less

so. The name of his father was identical with thatof the Thracian prince Olorus, whose daughter He-

gesipyle was married to Miltiades, and his tomb,

having the inscription ovkvSiS^s 'OAopov 'AkifxovaLos,

was in the suburb of Athens known as K01A.17 MeAe-

TtScs, adjoining those of Cimon and Miltiades (Plut.

Cim. iv). We may therefore assume that Olorus,the father of Thucydides, was a near kinsman of the

Thracian prince Olorus. If, as Marcellinus says ( 2),

Thucydides' mother was named Hegesipyle, like

Cimon's mother, that would be confirmation of the

relationship ; butPlutarch makes no mention of this.

It seems likely, then, that Thucydides was of near

kin to Cimon, younger perhaps by one generation.

His father Olorus was probably a full citizen of

Athens, as is indicated by the fact that, mentioning

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himself as o-rpaTrjyos (iv. civ. 4), he writes ovKv fir)v

rbv 'OAdpov ; for only as an Athenian citizen could

his father be mentioned in this official style.

As to the date of Thucydides' birth, the only

ancient statement that seems worthy of credence

was made by Pamphila, a woman writer who in thetime of Nero made a great compilation of the results

of learning. Aulus Gellius (N.A. xv. 23) quotes

from Pamphila that, at the beginning of the Pelo-

ponnesian War, Hellanicus was sixty-five years of

age, Herodotus fifty-three, Thucydides forty. Pam-

phila's dates were probably taken from the chrono-

logical handbook of Apollodorus (second century B.C.),

which was generally accepted among the Greeks andRomans. The term forty years used by Pamphila

doubtless meant the d/c/x^ or prime of Thucydides,

and may have been fixed on the basis of his ownassertion that he began to collect material at the

opening of the war (i. i. 1) and was then in full

maturity of mind (v. xxvi. 5). At any rate his ownstatement, taken with Pamphila's date, has led to

the general assumption that the historian was born

somewhere about 472 b.c

It is indicated by Marcellinus ( 46), and is prob-

able in itself, that the decree for Thucydides' ban-ishment was adopted on the motion of Cleon, whowas then at the height of his power ; and it is

probable that the charge brought against him was

treachery (Ttpo ocria), as stated by Marcellinus ( 55)

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and the anonymous biographer ( 2), and apparentlyimplied by Aristophanes (Vesp. 288). His own words,wefir) fjLOL favyeiv, admit of this interpretation ; andthe statement of Pausanias (i. xxiii. 9) that he was

later recalled from exile on the motion of Oenobiusis best understood on this basis. If he had been

banished by a simple decree of the people, the

general amnesty that followed the capture of Athensby Lysander would have been sufficient for him asfor other exiles ; if the sentence was more severe,a special decree would be necessary. But it ispossible, of course, that the motion of Oenobius

antedated the amnesty of Lysander's peace by a

few months. ^As to Thucydides' death, there was a persistent

tradition thatjie was assassinated, and the fact thatthe History breaks off suddenly in the midst of ex-citing events of the Decelean War seems to supportthe tradition. Plutarch (Cim. iv. 3) says that it was

commonly reported that he died a violent death atScapte Hyle ; Pausanias (i. xxiii. 9), that he wasmurdered on his journey home from exile ; Marcel-linus ( 10), that after his return from exile he diedand was buried in Athens. But whether he died in

1 The name, which is a rare one in the fifth century, isfound as that of a general commanding in the neighbourhoodof Thasos in 410-9 b.o. and we hear somewhat later of oneEucles, son of Oenobius ; hence it has been conjectured thatthe father of Oenobius was Eucles, who was Thucydidea'colleague in Thrace in 424 b.o. (lv. civ).


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Thrace or in Athens, it seems clear from his ownwords that he outlived the term of his banishment(v. xxvi. 5, vvitirj fxot evyeiv rrjv ifxavrov errj iko


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we hold to Pamphila's testimony. But if he did

not as a boy hear Herodotus recite at Olympia, he

must have known him later as a man at Athens.The period of his youth and early manhood fell in

the time when Athens was most prolific in great

men. It is clear that he had heard and admired Pe-

ricles, and he must have seen Aeschylus and known

Sophocles, Euripides, Aristophanes, Anaxagoras, So-

crates, Gorgias, Antiphon, Pheidias, Polygnotus,

Mnesicles, Ictinus, Callicrates, and Hippocrates.

Association with such men and the atmosphere ofAthens at such a time best explain the development

of his genius ; but the limits of his subject, as he

conceived it, precluded any mention of any of theseexcept Pericles, so that for any personal influence ot

theirs upon him we are left to inference. The firstseven years of the war, before his banishment, were

doubtless spent in large part at Athens, where he

must have heard the speeches of Pericles, the dis-

cussions about Mytilene and about Pylos, as well as

about other matters of which we have accounts in

this History. But the twenty years of his exile he

probably passed largely on his properties in Thrace, 1

engaged in the task of compiling materials for his

work about the war, as indeed we are told that he1 It was his family connection with Thrace which led to

his acquiring the right of working gold mines in that region(iv. cv. 1), which is all that he himself says, though hisbiographers state that he was the owner of gold mines atScapte Hyle.

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did by Plutarch (De Exil. xiv.) and Marcellinus ( 25

and 47).

From Thucydides' opening statement, that hebegan the composition of his History at the out-

break of the war, expecting it to be a great one

and more noteworthy than any that had gone before,

we should naturally infer that he continued thecompilation and composition throughout the war,

and in fact as it is clearly unfinished until hisdeath. Again, as it was never completed, so it was

never completely revised, and it is natural that one

can find traces of the different dates at which the

several portions were composed. Evidence of this

kind has been brought forward in support of differ-ent hypotheses as to the composition of the work.

The most famous of these was that put forth byF. W. Ullrich in his Beitr'dge zur Erklarung des Thu-kydides, Hamburg, 1845, in which it is maintainedthat Books I-V. xxvi, which contain the history of

the Archidamian War (432-421 b.c), formed a sepa-rate treatise composed between the Peace of Nicias

and the Sicilian Expedition, and that the phrase

this war in the earlier books refers to the TenYears' War only.

In v. xxvi Thucydides does make a fresh start withthe words, The same Thucydides recorded theevents in order, reckoning by summers and winters, 1

1 His division of the year corresponds to the actual con-ditions of the carrying on of war in ancient times : summer

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until the fall of Athens. But he adds, Thewar lasted for twenty -seven years, and anyone

who declines to count the interval of truce as waris mistaken

;

which sounds very much like theopening of a second volume of a work that fallsinto natural divisions. It is quite likely, as Ullrich

maintains, that the account of the Archidamian War(i.-v. xxvi.) was composed mainly in the intervalbetween 421 and 416 b.c. ; but that it received im-portant additions after the fall of Athens seemscertain, e.g. 11. lxv. on the career of Pericles. Somuch may well be admitted for Ullrich's hypothesis,but it is not necessary to admit more. Even the

story of the Sicilian expedition, the finest part ofthe whole work, need not be considered to havebeen originally a separate treatise, but only to havereceived especial care. As for the rest, a paragraphfrom Classen's introduction to Book V outlines aprobable order for the growth of the history whichseems reasonable : Though I am convinced thaithe whole work was written in the shape in whichwe have it after the conclusion of the PeloponnesianWar, and that Thucydides was called away from lifewhen engaged in the last revision and combinationof the portions which he had noted

down andsketched in outline from the beginning of the war,

the larger half, including both spring and autumn cover-ing the time approximately from March to October, winterfrom November to February.

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is it not the finest thing you ever read in your life? ;

and still again, He is the greatest historian thatever lived. John Stuart Mill said, The mostpowerful and affecting piece of narrative perhaps

in all literature is the account of the Sicilian cata-

strophe in his Seventh Book. The Earl of Chatham,

on sending his son William Pitt to Cambridge, left

to professional teachersthe legitimate routine in the

classic authors, but made it his particular desire that

Thucydides, the eternal manual of statesmen, should

be the first Greek which his son read after coming

to college. And the Earl of Chatham's estimate is

well supported by Sir G. Cornwall Lewis : For

close, cogent, and appropriate reasoning on politicalquestions, the speeches of Thucydides have never

been surpassed ; and indeed they may be considered

as having reached the highest excellence of which

the human mind is capable in that department.

In the ordinary narration of events the style of

Thucydides is clear, direct, graphic. In strong con-

trast with this generally simple and lucid form of

statement is his style in describing battles and other

critical events, in generalizations, and especially in

the speeches ; here the statement is often so concise

and condensed as to becomevery difficult. Thucy-

dides was not the first to use speeches as a means

of vivid presentation of important crises and the

actors in them ; for that he had the precedent of

Homer and the Attic drama. But he used this

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means with such impressive effect and success as to

induce frequent imitation in later historical writing

in ancient times. He does not pretend to give theexact words of the speakers, but says frankly in the

Introduction (i. xxii. 1): As to the speeches thatwere made by different men, either when they wereabout to begin the war or when they were already

engaged therein, it has been difficult to recall withstrict accuracy the words actually spoken, both for

me as regards that which I myself heard, and forthose who from various other sources have broughtme reports. Therefore the speeches are given in thelanguage in which, as it seemed to me, the several

speakers would express, on the subjects under con-

sideration, the sentiments most befitting the occasion,

though at the same time 1 have adhered as closely as

possible to the general sense of what was actually

said. As a natural result the language of the

speeches has a uniform character, both in the struc-ture of the sentences and in particular expressions

in other words it is that of Thucydides himself; but

at the same time the character and mode of thought

of the assumed speaker are clearly manifest in each

speech. In the hands of Thucydides such a means

of presenting to us a critical situation is extraordin-

arily effective ; here, as in his most striking narra-

tions, his readers become spectators, as Plutarch

expressed it. Or as Classen said, Without our ownchoice we find ourselves involved in the conflict of

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interests, and are put in the position to form judg-

ment for ourselves from the situation and the feelingof parties. Very seldom does the historian himselfadd a word of comment.

We are accustomed to admire among Thucydides'great qualities as historian, his impartiality, his

trustworthiness, vivid description, sense of contrast,

conciseness, epigrammatic sententiousness, reserve,

pathos. We come to approve heartily his way ofleaving facts clearly stated and skilfully grouped to

carry their own judgments. He is never a partisan,and the unsophisticated reader might at times wonder

what his nationality was did he not frequently sub-

scribe himself Thucydides the Athenian. Histo-rians sometimes criticise his attitude, but they all

accept his statements of fact. His descriptions of

battles read as if he himself had been present. Hedramatises history by placing events in such juxta-

position that a world of moral is conveyed without

a word of comment ; for example, when the funeraloration with its splendid eulogy of Athens is followed

by the description of the plague, the disgraceful

Melian episode is succeeded by the Sicilian disaster,

the holiday-like departure from Athens is set over

against the distressful flight from Syracuse. Hepacks his language so full of meaning that at times

a sentence does duty for a paragraph, a word for a

sentence. Of all manifestations of power, restraintimpresses men most, and however much we regret


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his reserve, since for much that he might have toldus we have no other witnesses, we come more andmore to regard this as great art. As for pathos, nohistorian ever excelled such passages as those wherethe utter defeat of a hitherto invincible navy is por-

trayed (vn. lxxi), or the misery and dejection of thedeparting Athenian host is described (vn. lxxv), orwhere the final catastrophe in the river Assinarusseems to occur before our eyes, preparing us for thefinal sentence : Fleet and army perished from theface of the earth, nothing was saved, and of themany who went forth few returned home.

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thucydides i loeb intro

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