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The History of the Peloponnesian War
Book 1 - Chapter IV
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From the end of the Persian to the beginning of the
Peloponnesian War - The Progress from Supremacy to Empire
The way in which Athens came to be placed in the circumstances
under which her power grew was this. After the Medes had returned
from Europe, defeated by sea and land by the Hellenes, and after
those of them who had fled with their ships to Mycale had been
destroyed, Leotychides, king of the Lacedaemonians, the commander of
the Hellenes at Mycale, departed home with the allies from
Peloponnese. But the Athenians and the allies from Ionia and
Hellespont, who had now revolted from the King, remained and laid
siege to Sestos, which was still held by the Medes. After wintering
before it, they became masters of the place on its evacuation by the
barbarians; and after this they sailed away from Hellespont to their
respective cities. Meanwhile the Athenian people, after the departure
of the barbarian from their country, at once proceeded to carry over
their children and wives, and such property as they had left, from
the places where they had deposited them, and prepared to rebuild
their city and their walls. For only isolated portions of the
circumference had been left standing, and most of the houses were in
ruins; though a few remained, in which the Persian grandees had taken
up their quarters.
Perceiving what they were going to do, the Lacedaemonians sent an
embassy to Athens. They would have themselves preferred to see neither
her nor any other city in possession of a wall; though here they acted
principally at the instigation of their allies, who were alarmed at
the strength of her newly acquired navy and the valour which she had
displayed in the war with the Medes. They begged her not only to
abstain from building walls for herself, but also to join them in
throwing down the walls that still held together of the
ultra-Peloponnesian cities.
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The real meaning of their advice, the suspicion that it contained
against the Athenians, was not proclaimed; it was urged that so the
barbarian, in the event of a third invasion, would not have any
strong place, such as he now had in Thebes, for his base of
operations; and that Peloponnese would suffice for all as a base
both for retreat and offence. After the Lacedaemonians had thus spoken, they were, on the advice of
Themistocles, immediately dismissed by the Athenians, with the
answer that ambassadors should be sent to Sparta to discuss the
question. Themistocles told the Athenians to send him off with all
speed to Lacedaemon, but not to dispatch his colleagues as soon as
they had selected them, but to wait until they had raised their wall
to the height from which defence was possible. Meanwhile the whole
population in the city was to labour at the wall, the Athenians, their
wives, and their children, sparing no edifice, private or public,
which might be of any use to the work, but throwing all down. After
giving these instructions, and adding that he would be responsible for
all other matters there, he departed. Arrived at Lacedaemon he did not
seek an audience with the authorities, but tried to gain time and made
excuses. When any of the government asked him why he did not appear in
the assembly, he would say that he was waiting for his colleagues, who
had been detained in Athens by some engagement; however, that he
expected their speedy arrival, and wondered that they were not yet
there. At first the Lacedaemonians trusted the words of
Themistocles, through their friendship for him; but when others
arrived, all distinctly declaring that the work was going on and
already attaining some elevation, they did not know how to
disbelieve it. Aware of this, he told them that rumours are deceptive,
and should not be trusted; they should send some reputable persons
from Sparta to inspect, whose report might be trusted. They dispatched
them accordingly. Concerning these Themistocles secretly sent word
to the Athenians to detain them as far as possible without putting
them under open constraint, and not to let them go until they had
themselves returned. For his colleagues had now joined him,
Abronichus, son of Lysicles, and Aristides, son of Lysimachus, with
the news that the wall was sufficiently advanced; and he feared that
when the Lacedaemonians heard the facts, they might refuse to let them
go. So the Athenians detained the envoys according to his message, and
Themistocles had an audience with the Lacedaemonians, and at last
openly told them that Athens was now fortified sufficiently to protect
its inhabitants; that any embassy which the Lacedaemonians or their
allies might wish to send to them should in future proceed on the
assumption that the people to whom they were going was able to
distinguish both its own and the general interests. That when the
Athenians thought fit to abandon their city and to embark in their
ships, they ventured on that perilous step without consulting them;
and that on the other hand, wherever they had deliberated with the
Lacedaemonians, they had proved themselves to be in judgment second to
none. That they now thought it fit that their city should have a wall,
and that this would be more for the advantage of both the citizens
of Athens and the Hellenic confederacy; for without equal military
strength it was impossible to contribute equal or fair counsel to
the common interest. It followed, he observed, either that all the
members of the confederacy should be without walls, or that the
present step should be considered a right one.
The Lacedaemonians did not betray any open signs of anger against
the Athenians at what they heard. The embassy, it seems, was
prompted not by a desire to obstruct, but to guide the counsels of
their government: besides, Spartan feeling was at that time very
friendly towards Athens on account of the patriotism which she had
displayed in the struggle with the Mede. Still the defeat of their
wishes could not but cause them secret annoyance. The envoys of each
state departed home without complaint.
In this way the Athenians walled their city in a little while. To
this day the building shows signs of the haste of its execution; the
foundations are laid of stones of all kinds, and in some places not
wrought or fitted, but placed just in the order in which they were
brought by the different hands; and many columns, too, from tombs, and
sculptured stones were put in with the rest. For the bounds of the
city were extended at every point of the circumference; and so they
laid hands on everything without exception in their haste.
Themistocles also persuaded them to finish the walls of Piraeus, which
had been begun before, in his year of office as archon; being
influenced alike by the fineness of a locality that has three
natural harbours, and by the great start which the Athenians would
gain in the acquisition of power by becoming a naval people. For he
first ventured to tell them to stick to the sea and forthwith began to
lay the foundations of the empire. It was by his advice, too, that
they built the walls of that thickness which can still be discerned
round Piraeus, the stones being brought up by two wagons meeting
each other. Between the walls thus formed there was neither rubble nor
mortar, but great stones hewn square and fitted together, cramped to
each other on the outside with iron and lead. About half the height
that he intended was finished. His idea was by their size and
thickness to keep off the attacks of an enemy; he thought that they
might be adequately defended by a small garrison of invalids, and
the rest be freed for service in the fleet. For the fleet claimed most
of his attention. He saw, as I think, that the approach by sea was
easier for the king's army than that by land: he also thought
Piraeus more valuable than the upper city; indeed, he was always
advising the Athenians, if a day should come when they were hard
pressed by land, to go down into Piraeus, and defy the world with
their fleet. Thus, therefore, the Athenians completed their wall,
and commenced their other buildings immediately after the retreat of
the Mede.
Meanwhile Pausanias, son of Cleombrotus, was sent out from
Lacedaemon as commander-in-chief of the Hellenes, with twenty ships
from Peloponnese. With him sailed the Athenians with thirty ships, and
a number of the other allies. They made an expedition against Cyprus
and subdued most of the island, and afterwards against Byzantium,
which was in the hands of the Medes, and compelled it to surrender.
This event took place while the Spartans were still supreme. But the
violence of Pausanias had already begun to be disagreeable to the
Hellenes, particularly to the Ionians and the newly liberated
populations. These resorted to the Athenians and requested them as
their kinsmen to become their leaders, and to stop any attempt at
violence on the part of Pausanias. The Athenians accepted their
overtures, and determined to put down any attempt of the kind and to
settle everything else as their interests might seem to demand. In the
meantime the Lacedaemonians recalled Pausanias for an investigation of
the reports which had reached them. Manifold and grave accusations had
been brought against him by Hellenes arriving in Sparta; and, to all
appearance, there had been in him more of the mimicry of a despot than
of the attitude of a general. As it happened, his recall came just
at the time when the hatred which he had inspired had induced the
allies to desert him, the soldiers from Peloponnese excepted, and to
range themselves by the side of the Athenians. On his arrival at
Lacedaemon, he was censured for his private acts of oppression, but
was acquitted on the heaviest counts and pronounced not guilty; it
must be known that the charge of Medism formed one of the principal,
and to all appearance one of the best founded, articles against him.
The Lacedaemonians did not, however, restore him to his command, but
sent out Dorkis and certain others with a small force; who found the
allies no longer inclined to concede to them the supremacy. Perceiving
this they departed, and the Lacedaemonians did not send out any to
succeed them. They feared for those who went out a deterioration
similar to that observable in Pausanias; besides, they desired to be
rid of the Median War, and were satisfied of the competency of the
Athenians for the position, and of their friendship at the time
towards themselves.
The Athenians, having thus succeeded to the supremacy by the
voluntary act of the allies through their hatred of Pausanias, fixed
which cities were to contribute money against the barbarian, which
ships; their professed object being to retaliate for their
sufferings by ravaging the King's country. Now was the time that the
office of "Treasurers for Hellas" was first instituted by the
Athenians. These officers received the tribute, as the money
contributed was called. The tribute was first fixed at four hundred
and sixty talents. The common treasury was at Delos, and the
congresses were held in the temple. Their supremacy commenced with
independent allies who acted on the resolutions of a common
congress. It was marked by the following undertakings in war and in
administration during the interval between the Median and the
present war, against the barbarian, against their own rebel allies,
and against the Peloponnesian powers which would come in contact
with them on various occasions. My excuse for relating these events,
and for venturing on this digression, is that this passage of
history has been omitted by all my predecessors, who have confined
themselves either to Hellenic history before the Median War, or the
Median War itself. Hellanicus, it is true, did touch on these events
in his Athenian history; but he is somewhat concise and not accurate
in his dates. Besides, the history of these events contains an
explanation of the growth of the Athenian empire.
First the Athenians besieged and captured Eion on the Strymon from
the Medes, and made slaves of the inhabitants, being under the command
of Cimon, son of Miltiades. Next they enslaved Scyros, the island in
the Aegean, containing a Dolopian population, and colonized it
themselves. This was followed by a war against Carystus, in which
the rest of Euboea remained neutral, and which was ended by
surrender on conditions. After this Naxos left the confederacy, and
a war ensued, and she had to return after a siege; this was the
first instance of the engagement being broken by the subjugation of an
allied city, a precedent which was followed by that of the rest in the
order which circumstances prescribed. Of all the causes of
defection, that connected with arrears of tribute and vessels, and
with failure of service, was the chief; for the Athenians were very
severe and exacting, and made themselves offensive by applying the
screw of necessity to men who were not used to and in fact not
disposed for any continuous labour. In some other respects the
Athenians were not the old popular rulers they had been at first;
and if they had more than their fair share of service, it was
correspondingly easy for them to reduce any that tried to leave the
confederacy. For this the allies had themselves to blame; the wish
to get off service making most of them arrange to pay their share of
the expense in money instead of in ships, and so to avoid having to
leave their homes. Thus while Athens was increasing her navy with
the funds which they contributed, a revolt always found them without
resources or experience for war.
Next we come to the actions by land and by sea at the river
Eurymedon, between the Athenians with their allies, and the Medes,
when the Athenians won both battles on the same day under the
conduct of Cimon, son of Miltiades, and captured and destroyed the
whole Phoenician fleet, consisting of two hundred vessels. Some time
afterwards occurred the defection of the Thasians, caused by
disagreements about the marts on the opposite coast of Thrace, and
about the mine in their possession. Sailing with a fleet to Thasos,
the Athenians defeated them at sea and effected a landing on the
island. About the same time they sent ten thousand settlers of their
own citizens and the allies to settle the place then called Ennea
Hodoi or Nine Ways, now Amphipolis. They succeeded in gaining
possession of Ennea Hodoi from the Edonians, but on advancing into the
interior of Thrace were cut off in Drabescus, a town of the
Edonians, by the assembled Thracians, who regarded the settlement of
the place Ennea Hodoi as an act of hostility. Meanwhile the Thasians
being defeated in the field and suffering siege, appealed to
Lacedaemon, and desired her to assist them by an invasion of Attica.
Without informing Athens, she promised and intended to do so, but
was prevented by the occurrence of the earthquake, accompanied by
the secession of the Helots and the Thuriats and Aethaeans of the
Perioeci to Ithome. Most of the Helots were the descendants of the old
Messenians that were enslaved in the famous war; and so all of them
came to be called Messenians. So the Lacedaemonians being engaged in a
war with the rebels in Ithome, the Thasians in the third year of the
siege obtained terms from the Athenians by razing their walls,
delivering up their ships, and arranging to pay the moneys demanded at
once, and tribute in future; giving up their possessions on the
continent together with the mine.
The Lacedaemonians, meanwhile, finding the war against the rebels in
Ithome likely to last, invoked the aid of their allies, and especially
of the Athenians, who came in some force under the command of Cimon.
The reason for this pressing summons lay in their reputed skill in
siege operations; a long siege had taught the Lacedaemonians their own
deficiency in this art, else they would have taken the place by
assault. The first open quarrel between the Lacedaemonians and
Athenians arose out of this expedition. The Lacedaemonians, when
assault failed to take the place, apprehensive of the enterprising and
revolutionary character of the Athenians, and further looking upon
them as of alien extraction, began to fear that, if they remained,
they might be tempted by the besieged in Ithome to attempt some
political changes. They accordingly dismissed them alone of the
allies, without declaring their suspicions, but merely saying that
they had now no need of them. But the Athenians, aware that their
dismissal did not proceed from the more honourable reason of the
two, but from suspicions which had been conceived, went away deeply
offended, and conscious of having done nothing to merit such treatment
from the Lacedaemonians; and the instant that they returned home
they broke off the alliance which had been made against the Mede,
and allied themselves with Sparta's enemy Argos; each of the
contracting parties taking the same oaths and making the same alliance
with the Thessalians.
Meanwhile the rebels in Ithome, unable to prolong further a ten
years' resistance, surrendered to Lacedaemon; the conditions being
that they should depart from Peloponnese under safe conduct, and
should never set foot in it again: any one who might hereafter be
found there was to be the slave of his captor. It must be known that
the Lacedaemonians had an old oracle from Delphi, to the effect that
they should let go the suppliant of Zeus at Ithome. So they went forth
with their children and their wives, and being received by Athens from
the hatred that she now felt for the Lacedaemonians, were located at
Naupactus, which she had lately taken from the Ozolian Locrians. The
Athenians received another addition to their confederacy in the
Megarians; who left the Lacedaemonian alliance, annoyed by a war about
boundaries forced on them by Corinth. The Athenians occupied Megara
and Pegae, and built the Megarians their long walls from the city to
Nisaea, in which they placed an Athenian garrison. This was the
principal cause of the Corinthians conceiving such a deadly hatred
against Athens.
Meanwhile Inaros, son of Psammetichus, a Libyan king of the
Libyans on the Egyptian border, having his headquarters at Marea,
the town above Pharos, caused a revolt of almost the whole of Egypt
from King Artaxerxes and, placing himself at its head, invited the
Athenians to his assistance. Abandoning a Cyprian expedition upon
which they happened to be engaged with two hundred ships of their
own and their allies, they arrived in Egypt and sailed from the sea
into the Nile, and making themselves masters of the river and
two-thirds of Memphis, addressed themselves to the attack of the
remaining third, which is called White Castle. Within it were Persians
and Medes who had taken refuge there, and Egyptians who had not joined
the rebellion.
Meanwhile the Athenians, making a descent from their fleet upon
Haliae, were engaged by a force of Corinthians and Epidaurians; and
the Corinthians were victorious. Afterwards the Athenians engaged
the Peloponnesian fleet off Cecruphalia; and the Athenians were
victorious. Subsequently war broke out between Aegina and Athens,
and there was a great battle at sea off Aegina between the Athenians
and Aeginetans, each being aided by their allies; in which victory
remained with the Athenians, who took seventy of the enemy's ships,
and landed in the country and commenced a siege under the command of
Leocrates, son of Stroebus. Upon this the Peloponnesians, desirous
of aiding the Aeginetans, threw into Aegina a force of three hundred
heavy infantry, who had before been serving with the Corinthians and
Epidaurians. Meanwhile the Corinthians and their allies occupied the
heights of Geraneia, and marched down into the Megarid, in the
belief that, with a large force absent in Aegina and Egypt, Athens
would be unable to help the Megarians without raising the siege of
Aegina. But the Athenians, instead of moving the army of Aegina,
raised a force of the old and young men that had been left in the
city, and marched into the Megarid under the command of Myronides.
After a drawn battle with the Corinthians, the rival hosts parted,
each with the impression that they had gained the victory. The
Athenians, however, if anything, had rather the advantage, and on
the departure of the Corinthians set up a trophy. Urged by the
taunts of the elders in their city, the Corinthians made their
preparations, and about twelve days afterwards came and set up their
trophy as victors. Sallying out from Megara, the Athenians cut off the
party that was employed in erecting the trophy, and engaged and
defeated the rest. In the retreat of the vanquished army, a
considerable division, pressed by the pursuers and mistaking the road,
dashed into a field on some private property, with a deep trench all
round it, and no way out. Being acquainted with the place, the
Athenians hemmed their front with heavy infantry and, placing the
light troops round in a circle, stoned all who had gone in. Corinth
here suffered a severe blow. The bulk of her army continued its
retreat home.
About this time the Athenians began to build the long walls to the
sea, that towards Phalerum and that towards Piraeus. Meanwhile the
Phocians made an expedition against Doris, the old home of the
Lacedaemonians, containing the towns of Boeum, Kitinium, and
Erineum. They had taken one of these towns, when the Lacedaemonians
under Nicomedes, son of Cleombrotus, commanding for King
Pleistoanax, son of Pausanias, who was still a minor, came to the
aid of the Dorians with fifteen hundred heavy infantry of their own,
and ten thousand of their allies. After compelling the Phocians to
restore the town on conditions, they began their retreat. The route by
sea, across the Crissaean Gulf, exposed them to the risk of being
stopped by the Athenian fleet; that across Geraneia seemed scarcely
safe, the Athenians holding Megara and Pegae. For the pass was a
difficult one, and was always guarded by the Athenians; and, in the
present instance, the Lacedaemonians had information that they meant
to dispute their passage. So they resolved to remain in Boeotia, and
to consider which would be the safest line of march. They had also
another reason for this resolve. Secret encouragement had been given
them by a party in Athens, who hoped to put an end to the reign of
democracy and the building of the Long Walls. Meanwhile the
Athenians marched against them with their whole levy and a thousand
Argives and the respective contingents of the rest of their allies.
Altogether they were fourteen thousand strong. The march was
prompted by the notion that the Lacedaemonians were at a loss how to
effect their passage, and also by suspicions of an attempt to
overthrow the democracy. Some cavalry also joined the Athenians from
their Thessalian allies; but these went over to the Lacedaemonians
during the battle.
The battle was fought at Tanagra in Boeotia. After heavy loss on
both sides, victory declared for the Lacedaemonians and their
allies. After entering the Megarid and cutting down the fruit trees,
the Lacedaemonians returned home across Geraneia and the isthmus.
Sixty-two days after the battle the Athenians marched into Boeotia
under the command of Myronides, defeated the Boeotians in battle at
Oenophyta, and became masters of Boeotia and Phocis. They dismantled
the walls of the Tanagraeans, took a hundred of the richest men of the
Opuntian Locrians as hostages, and finished their own long walls. This
was followed by the surrender of the Aeginetans to Athens on
conditions; they pulled down their walls, gave up their ships, and
agreed to pay tribute in future. The Athenians sailed round
Peloponnese under Tolmides, son of Tolmaeus, burnt the arsenal of
Lacedaemon, took Chalcis, a town of the Corinthians, and in a
descent upon Sicyon defeated the Sicyonians in battle.
Meanwhile the Athenians in Egypt and their allies were still
there, and encountered all the vicissitudes of war. First the
Athenians were masters of Egypt, and the King sent Megabazus a Persian
to Lacedaemon with money to bribe the Peloponnesians to invade
Attica and so draw off the Athenians from Egypt. Finding that the
matter made no progress, and that the money was only being wasted,
he recalled Megabazus with the remainder of the money, and sent
Megabuzus, son of Zopyrus, a Persian, with a large army to Egypt.
Arriving by land he defeated the Egyptians and their allies in a
battle, and drove the Hellenes out of Memphis, and at length shut them
up in the island of Prosopitis, where he besieged them for a year
and six months. At last, draining the canal of its waters, which he
diverted into another channel, he left their ships high and dry and
joined most of the island to the mainland, and then marched over on
foot and captured it. Thus the enterprise of the Hellenes came to ruin
after six years of war. Of all that large host a few travelling
through Libya reached Cyrene in safety, but most of them perished. And
thus Egypt returned to its subjection to the King, except Amyrtaeus,
the king in the marshes, whom they were unable to capture from the
extent of the marsh; the marshmen being also the most warlike of the
Egyptians. Inaros, the Libyan king, the sole author of the Egyptian
revolt, was betrayed, taken, and crucified. Meanwhile a relieving
squadron of fifty vessels had sailed from Athens and the rest of the
confederacy for Egypt. They put in to shore at the Mendesian mouth
of the Nile, in total ignorance of what had occurred. Attacked on
the land side by the troops, and from the sea by the Phoenician
navy, most of the ships were destroyed; the few remaining being
saved by retreat. Such was the end of the great expedition of the
Athenians and their allies to Egypt.
Meanwhile Orestes, son of Echecratidas, the Thessalian king, being
an exile from Thessaly, persuaded the Athenians to restore him. Taking
with them the Boeotians and Phocians their allies, the Athenians
marched to Pharsalus in Thessaly. They became masters of the
country, though only in the immediate vicinity of the camp; beyond
which they could not go for fear of the Thessalian cavalry. But they
failed to take the city or to attain any of the other objects of their
expedition, and returned home with Orestes without having effected
anything. Not long after this a thousand of the Athenians embarked
in the vessels that were at Pegae (Pegae, it must be remembered, was
now theirs), and sailed along the coast to Sicyon under the command of
Pericles, son of Xanthippus. Landing in Sicyon and defeating the
Sicyonians who engaged them, they immediately took with them the
Achaeans and, sailing across, marched against and laid siege to
Oeniadae in Acarnania. Failing however to take it, they returned home.
Three years afterwards a truce was made between the Peloponnesians
and Athenians for five years. Released from Hellenic war, the
Athenians made an expedition to Cyprus with two hundred vessels of
their own and their allies, under the command of Cimon. Sixty of these
were detached to Egypt at the instance of Amyrtaeus, the king in the
marshes; the rest laid siege to Kitium, from which, however, they were
compelled to retire by the death of Cimon and by scarcity of
provisions. Sailing off Salamis in Cyprus, they fought with the
Phoenicians, Cyprians, and Cilicians by land and sea, and, being
victorious on both elements departed home, and with them the
returned squadron from Egypt. After this the Lacedaemonians marched
out on a sacred war, and, becoming masters of the temple at Delphi, it
in the hands of the Delphians. Immediately after their retreat, the
Athenians marched out, became masters of the temple, and placed it
in the hands of the Phocians.
Some time after this, Orchomenus, Chaeronea, and some other places
in Boeotia being in the hands of the Boeotian exiles, the Athenians
marched against the above-mentioned hostile places with a thousand
Athenian heavy infantry and the allied contingents, under the
command of Tolmides, son of Tolmaeus. They took Chaeronea, and made
slaves of the inhabitants, and, leaving a garrison, commenced their
return. On their road they were attacked at Coronea by the Boeotian
exiles from Orchomenus, with some Locrians and Euboean exiles, and
others who were of the same way of thinking, were defeated in
battle, and some killed, others taken captive. The Athenians evacuated
all Boeotia by a treaty providing for the recovery of the men; and the
exiled Boeotians returned, and with all the rest regained their
independence.
This was soon afterwards followed by the revolt of Euboea from
Athens. Pericles had already crossed over with an army of Athenians to
the island, when news was brought to him that Megara had revolted,
that the Peloponnesians were on the point of invading Attica, and that
the Athenian garrison had been cut off by the Megarians, with the
exception of a few who had taken refuge in Nisaea. The Megarians had
introduced the Corinthians, Sicyonians, and Epidaurians into the
town before they revolted. Meanwhile Pericles brought his army back in
all haste from Euboea. After this the Peloponnesians marched into
Attica as far as Eleusis and Thrius, ravaging the country under the
conduct of King Pleistoanax, the son of Pausanias, and without
advancing further returned home. The Athenians then crossed over again
to Euboea under the command of Pericles, and subdued the whole of
the island: all but Histiaea was settled by convention; the Histiaeans
they expelled from their homes, and occupied their territory
themselves.
Not long after their return from Euboea, they made a truce with
the Lacedaemonians and their allies for thirty years, giving up the
posts which they occupied in Peloponnese--Nisaea, Pegae, Troezen, and
Achaia. In the sixth year of the truce, war broke out between the
Samians and Milesians about Priene. Worsted in the war, the
Milesians came to Athens with loud complaints against the Samians.
In this they were joined by certain private persons from Samos itself,
who wished to revolutionize the government. Accordingly the
Athenians sailed to Samos with forty ships and set up a democracy;
took hostages from the Samians, fifty boys and as many men, lodged
them in Lemnos, and after leaving a garrison in the island returned
home. But some of the Samians had not remained in the island, but
had fled to the continent. Making an agreement with the most
powerful of those in the city, and an alliance with Pissuthnes, son of
Hystaspes, the then satrap of Sardis, they got together a force of
seven hundred mercenaries, and under cover of night crossed over to
Samos. Their first step was to rise on the commons, most of whom
they secured; their next to steal their hostages from Lemnos; after
which they revolted, gave up the Athenian garrison left with them
and its commanders to Pissuthnes, and instantly prepared for an
expedition against Miletus. The Byzantines also revolted with them.
As soon as the Athenians heard the news, they sailed with sixty
ships against Samos. Sixteen of these went to Caria to look out for
the Phoenician fleet, and to Chios and Lesbos carrying round orders
for reinforcements, and so never engaged; but forty-four ships under
the command of Pericles with nine colleagues gave battle, off the
island of Tragia, to seventy Samian vessels, of which twenty were
transports, as they were sailing from Miletus. Victory remained with
the Athenians. Reinforced afterwards by forty ships from Athens, and
twenty-five Chian and Lesbian vessels, the Athenians landed, and
having the superiority by land invested the city with three walls;
it was also invested from the sea. Meanwhile Pericles took sixty ships
from the blockading squadron, and departed in haste for Caunus and
Caria, intelligence having been brought in of the approach of the
Phoenician fleet to the aid of the Samians; indeed Stesagoras and
others had left the island with five ships to bring them. But in the
meantime the Samians made a sudden sally, and fell on the camp,
which they found unfortified. Destroying the look-out vessels, and
engaging and defeating such as were being launched to meet them,
they remained masters of their own seas for fourteen days, and carried
in and carried out what they pleased. But on the arrival of
Pericles, they were once more shut up. Fresh reinforcements afterwards
arrived--forty ships from Athens with Thucydides, Hagnon, and
Phormio; twenty with Tlepolemus and Anticles, and thirty vessels
from Chios and Lesbos. After a brief attempt at fighting, the Samians,
unable to hold out, were reduced after a nine months' siege and
surrendered on conditions; they razed their walls, gave hostages,
delivered up their ships, and arranged to pay the expenses of the
war by instalments. The Byzantines also agreed to be subject as
before.
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