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

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οἱ δ᾽ ἀμφὶ Ξέρξην. The scene shifts back to the Persian camp (cc. 113-120). It may be true that Attica was not evaeuated for some days after the naval engagement and the retreat of the Persian fleet; but if so, the Greek fleet must have remained at Salamis. (Is it even quite certain that the Persian fleet sped across the Aegean, the day after the battle?) Hdt. has now several series of synch ronous movements to co-ordinate (Persian fleet, Persian army, Greek fleet, perhaps Greek army): small wouder if he fail to adjust them convincingly.

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τὴν αὐτὴν ὁδόν as that by which they had come. Hdt. assumes that the whole Persian force came and went by one and the same road: unfortunately he does not specify which of the two or three possible alternatives (Eleutherai Eleusis, Panakton - Phyle, TanagraDekeleia). Unless the land-force was very small, no doubt more than one route was followed, but Xerxes and his suite may, of course, have come and gone by the same route, probably the best, via Eleusis (cp. c. 65 supra).

ἔδοξε ... ἅμα μὲν ... ἄμα δέ . .: the verb is used in two senses: ‘appeared good’ and simply ‘appeared,’ or ‘thought right’ and ‘thought.’ Mardonios might have remained in occupation of Attiea, but the season was late for campaigning, supplies probably were difficult to procure so far south, and he wished to see the king well out of Greece. How far Hdt. had any definite information about the motives of Mardonios it is not easy to say; the intention πειρᾶσθαι τῆς Πελοποννήσου (cp. c. 100 supra) was never realized, and the retreat into winter quarters in Thessaly was hardly the best prognostic of it. Attica seems to have been really evaeuated; but it is searcely likely that Boiotia, Thermopylar, and Central Greece were wholly denuded of Persian troops. At the same time, the naval superiority of the Greeks after Salamis might (had they known how to use it) have made the oceupation of Central Greece impractieable. Cp. Appendix VII. § 4.

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ἀνωρίη appears to be a ἅπαξ λεγόμενον.

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χειμερίσαι: Hdt. employs χειμερίζειν as = χειμάζειν (to winter) 6. 31, 7. 37, c. 126 infra, 9. 1 <*>. He has χειμάζειν in its primary ense 7. 191 supra. Cp. also χειμαίνειν -εσθαι (to be tempest-tossed) c. 118 infra

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ἅμα τῷ ἔαρι just after the ἅμα μέν and ἅμα δέ above is not quite happy (‘unconseious iteration’).

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ἀπίκατο is a full temporal pl.p.

Μαρδόνιος ἐξελέγετο. The process of selection would take some time: did the king remain in Thessaly, while Mardonios performed it, and not rather go on immediately, under the escort of Artabazos (cp. cc. 115, 126 infra)? Hdt.'s account of the sclection, and of the component elements in the grand army of Mardonios when selected, is far from clear. It is neither quite selfeonsistent, nor quite consistent with the corresponding lists previously given in Bk. 7, which are apparently here referred to; and it is searcely verified in the battle-roll of Plataia, 9. 31, 32 infra. Hdt. gives the sum total as 300,000, infantry and cavalry combined. He does not clearly indicate the proportion of the two arms, but the corps d'armée under Artabazos is apparently to be included, c. 126 infra. Nor does Hdt. treat the thirty myriads as a cadre fixed by the commander, to be filled up by the levies on selection, but as a result, more or less accidental, of the selection of the picked troops (just as at Doriskos the sum total of infantry, 1,700,000, is only diseovered as a result of the levée en masse, when its numerical aspect is tested and proved!). Mardonios pursues two methods in his selection: certain nations, to wit, Persians, Medes, Scyths, Baktrians, Indians, he selects in full, as they stand; but of the remaining (42) nations he only takes such individuals as are of obvious value or of made reputation. Probably the five nations named supplied the bulk of the army of Mardonios. The omission of the Kissians, however, is remarkable (were they chiefly in the corps d'armée of Artabazos?).

But we may safely assert that if the total forces left with Mardonios comprised, even nommally, thirty myriads, then there was no selection, he retained the army of Xerxes in full: if there was a real selection, then his forces amounted to nothing like thirty myriads; cp. further Appendix II. § 5.

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τοὺς Πέρσας πάντας τοὺς ἀθανάτουσκαλεομένους: these are identical with the corps deseribed in 7. 83, and apparently in 7. 41, and have been twiee seen in action, 7. 211, and 7. 215. (Whether they were all strictly speaking ‘Persians’ is doubtful, in view of the frieze from the Apadana now in the Louvre, which suggests that even the negrito population of Kissia was admitted to the ranks of the Immortals. But the heads are ‘restored.’）

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Ὑδάρνεος τοῦ στρατηγοῦ: cp. 7. 83. His devotion to the king's person on this occasion was, perhaps, in part dictated by an unwillingness to serve under Mardonios; but for the captain, stratege, or myriarch of the Immortals to depart and leave his men behind him is a strange proceeding. Would the guards not have seen the king further than Thessaly? Were the Immortals not among the king's escort, even if they returned to take part in the campaign of 479?

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τῶν ἄλλων Περσέων τοὺς θωρηκοφόρους: this designation is not quite clear, as all the Persian infantry appear to have been θωρηκοφόροι, cp. 7. 61, and there is nothing in 7. 40 and 54 f. to explain the use of the term here, apparently for a special body of men.

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τὴν ἵππον τὴν χιλίην: which chiliad of cavalry is this? The ἱππόται χίλιοι ἐκ Περσέων πάντων ἀπολελεγμένοι who headed the procession out of Sardes 7. 40, or the ἵππος ἄλλη χιλίη ἐκ Περσέων ἀπολελεγμένη who followed the Immortals on that occasion?

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καὶ τὸν πεζὸν καὶ τὴν ἄλλην ἵππον, ‘as well infantry, as all the rest of the cavalry.’ The phrase applies to all the ethnic contingents just previously named, all of whom figure in the cavalrylist (7. 84-86). ἄλλην, if not deleted, may be taken to mean that Mardonios not only retained the cavalry of these nations in addition to the chiliad speeified, but all the cavalry. Or is ἄλλην merely idiomatic, like ἄλλων just below? Or is it dittographed from ἄλλων? But cp. App. Crit.

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ταῦτα: assimilated by ἔθνεα. τούτων or τούτους might be expected.

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κατ᾽ ὀλίγους: as in Thuc. 3. 111. 1 “ὑπαπῇσαν κατ᾽ ὀλίγους”, 4. 11. 3 κατ̓ ὀλίγας ναῦς διελόμενοι (Wesseling). The preposition is distributive in force: ‘by small lots,’ in small bodies.

τοῖσι εἴδεά τε ὑπῆρχε διαλέγων: the copula is not in its strictly correct place. The plural substantive is observable, but suggests that there was a plurality, a variety, of good forms; Stein cps. μεγάθεα 3. 102 — where certainly the ‘ants’ need not all be just the same size. διαλέγων, as in c. 107 supra.

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ἓν δὲ πλεῖστον ἔθνος Πέρσας αἱρέετο seems to mean that the Pcrsians were the largest unit, the most numerous national contingent, among those he was selecting, though Hdt. immediately adds that the Medes were equally numerous. There is a parallelism between this sentence and ταῦτα μὲν ἔθνεα ὅλα εἵλετο (in spite of the difference of tense), and πλεῖστον seems to be attracted to ἔθνος (for πλείστους). ἐν δέ would of course be an adverbial use of the preposition, like ἐπὶ δέ just below; Stein supports ἓν by Thucyd. 3. 39. 1 “μάλιστα δὴ μίαν πόλιν ἠδικηκότας ὑμᾶς”: 3. 113. 6 πάθος γὰρ τοῦτο μιᾷ πόλει . . μέγιστον δὴ ... ἐγένετο: 8. 40. 2 οἰ γἀρ οἰκέται ... μιᾷ γε πόλει ... πλεῖστοι γενόμενοι.

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ἄνδρας στρεπτοφόρους τε καὶ ψελιοφόρους: curious gear for men! Cp. 9. 80. The Immortals, par exemple, χρυσύν τε πολλὸν καὶ ἄφθονον ἔχοντες ἐνέπρεπον (7. 83).

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ῥώμῃ: cp. 7. 103.