Reginald Walter Macan, Herodotus, The Seventh, Eighth, & Ninth Books with Introduction and Commentary

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ὁ Ξέρξης: the article unusual. Cp. c. 45 supra.

τὴν εἰρημένην might be referred to τὴν μεσόγαιαν, c. 110 supra: or more generally, to χώραν or ὁδόν, understood.

δεὐτερα του<*>των, ‘next’; cp. c. 80 supra.

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τείχεα τα<*> Πιέρων. Pieria is the district between the Haliakmon and the Peneros, c. 131 infra. Pierians had gone eastwards, under pressure from the Makedonians, Thuc. 2. 99. 3. The two strongholds were named Φάγρης (see App. Crit.) and Πέργαμος. Phagres was evidently the more important; and Steph. B. quotes Hekataios and Thucydides for it. For ‘Pergamos’ cp. c. 43 supra.

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ταύτῃ: locative. He had not inarched παρὰ αὐτὰς τὰς πόλιας τὰς παραθαλασσίας, c. 110 supra.

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τὸ Πάγγαιον ὄρος. Xerxes leaves the Mons Pangaeus (Pliny 4. 18. 1; mod. Despoto Dagh）—here apparently mentioned for the first time—well on his right: i.e. he passes between the mountain and the sea. Perhaps one column of the Persian army took that route; but could it have been the centre one, with which the king himself was moving? cp. c. 121 infra. (Rawlinson too sees that some of the army must have marched north of Pangaens, iii.3 93.) There is no reference back to the mention of the failure of Megabazos to reduce the tribes on Mount Pangaeus in 5. 16; the two passages are of course quite independent, and this one probably of earlier composition. Lake Prasias has not yet made its appearance in the Thrace of Hdt.

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μέταλλα τὰ νέμονται. These mines drew every one to Thrace. Hdt. allows the Pierians, Odomanti (who here drop from the skies), and ‘chiefly the Satrai’ to work, or run them (νέμονται): this passage is plainly written before the successful colonization of Amphipolis. Cp. next c.

Ὀδόμαντοι are described by Thuc. 2. 101. 3 as ‘plain-men,’ and 5. 6. 2 ‘under monarchy.’ Leake, N. G. iii. 210, 465, puts them on Mount Orbelus. On the ‘Satrai’ cp. c. 110 supra.