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

---

---

οἱ δὲ στρατηγοὶ τῶν Ἀθηναίων: i.e. Aristeides and his colleagues—or so many of them as were present—went to the right wing, the army bivouacking in order of battle. They have cut a very poor figure in the previous interview, acting the part of mere dummies.

---

Παυσανίῃ. no account being taken of Euryanax, in spite of c. 10 supra. Pausanias is terror-struck at the report! Not a Laconian touch. His speech, like that of Alexander just before, is given in orat. recta.

---

ἐς ἠῶ ἡ συμβολὴ γίνεται: cp. 3. 85 τῆς ἐπιούσης ἡμέρης ὁ ἀγὼν ἡμῖν ἐστί. The present is rhetorical. In this case the argument is double: that the battle is to take place (at dawn) is a reason for the tactical move; that it is not to take place until dawn gives time to execute the proposed manœuvre.

---

τοὺς ... Ἑλλήνων: including the Makedonians, whose medism throughout is minimized as much as possible.

---

τῶνδε εἵνεκα: the reasons given for the change of front, or exchange of positions, are incredible. The experience of the Μαραθωνομάχαι, as a taunt, might have come very well from a Spartan after the vainglorious boasting of the Athenians in c. 27 supra (cp. notes ad l.), but as a serious argument by a Spartan commander for such a manœuvre as proposed here, it is virtually inconceivable. Nor, on the other hand, could a Spartan have practically ignored the Spartan achievement at Thermopylai as Pausanias here does. True, the Spartans at Thermopylai had all perished (Aristodemos who is at Plataia, alone excepted, c. 71 infra), but in so doing had shown how immensely superior they were to the best Persian troops. The story here is pure Atticism. Not content with having bested the Arkadians, the Athenians must make Sparta too confess her inferiority. There may have been some tactical manœuvre on which this fable was hung (cp. next c.), but as it stands it is a transparent fiction.

The main contrast throughout the speech is between the Athenians (ὑμέας μὲν ... ὑμεῖς ... ὑμέας μέν) and the Spartans (ἡμέας δὲ ... ἡμεῖς δὲ (bis) . . ἡμέας δέ).

τοὺς Μήδους καὶ τὴν μάχην αὐτῶν: ‘Medes’ here equals or covers ‘Persians.’ μάχη, ‘style of fighting’; cp. 5. 49.

---

ἐν Μαραθῶνι: this homage to Marathon, beside which Thermopylai is not worth mentioning, comes with double effect from a Spartan's lips!

---

ἀδαής with gen. rei, 2. 49, 5. 90; cp. ἀδαήμων 8. 65; the gen. pers. is apparently unique. Pausanias uses ἀνδρῶν, not ἀνθρώπων. The speaker becomes a little involved in his anxiety to make the utter inferiority of the Spartans clear; the second ἡμεῖς δέ is virtually the δέ with resumed subject, a false antithesis (the real being Μήδων μὲν ἄπειροι Βοιωτῶν δὲ ἔμπειροι); but the running antithesis between ὑμεῖς and ἡμεῖς helps to determine the phraseology.

Σπαρτιητέων ... Μήδων: this statement not only ignores the story of Thermopylai, but implies that any fighting so far in Boiotia has not been done by the Spartans; and moreover that their observation has taught them nothing of the Persian warfare. How, then, has their experience of Boiotians and Thessalians been gained? What fighting had any dead or living Spartan done with Boiotians? The only recorded engagement with Thessalians (5. 63, 64) was rather an unfortunate precedent! Of course, if Pausanias really said all this, it might show how desperately hard up he was for an excuse.

---

αὐτοῖσι ἡμῖν ... ἐν νόῳ ἐγένετο εἰπεῖν ταῦτα: i.e. to make the proposál you have just made. (The formula carries further, and may serve to hint that the story stands, almost selfconfessed, an Attic fabrication.) φθάντες προφέρετε, ‘have anticipated us in proposing.’

πάλαι ἀπ᾽ ἀρχῆς, rather redundant; and the date only goes back at most ten days.

---

ἀρρωδέομεν μὴ ... οὐκ ἡδέες γένωνται is not a true case of the double negative idiom μὴ οὐ, the οὐ in this case simply coalescing with ἡδέες into a single idea = ἀηδέες (cp. οὐ φιλίας c. 4 supra). δ᾽ ὦν, much as in c. 45 supra. καὶ . . καί, the strong co-ordination, cp. c. 26 supra. ἡδομένοισι ἡμῖν, cp. 8. 101. 10 supra.