The great Persian War and its preliminaries

by G. B. Grundy

5. Kynosura.

[To face page [392].

It is unfortunate that Æschylus makes no mention of the positions of the various contingents in either fleet. Evidence on this point by one present in the battle would have been of the utmost value. On turning to Herodotus and Diodorus it is remarkable to find that in so far as their information overlaps, they are in accord with regard to such details as they give of the Persian array, but not altogether so with regard to the order of the Greek line. With respect to the Persian fleet, they agree in placing the Greek contingent on the left wing, and the Phœnicians on the right of the line. Diodorus further mentions that the Cyprians were with the Phœnicians on the right wing, with the Cilicians, Pamphylians, and Lycians next to them.

In the Greek fleet the Athenians were on the left wing. According to Herodotus, the Lacedæmonians were on the right; but according to Diodorus they were on the left, with the Athenians; while the Æginetans and Megareans were on the right. In this conflict of evidence, it is almost certain that Herodotus is correct. The fact that the Lacedæmonian admiral was in command renders it extremely unlikely that his contingent occupied any but a prominent place in the line; and certain details of the fight indicate that the Æginetans were in the immediate neighbourhood of the Athenians. It will thus be seen that the most prominent contingents on either side were severally opposed to one another in the battle, the Phœnicians on the Persian right facing the Athenians on the Greek left, and the Ionian Greeks on the Persian left facing the Lacedæmonians on the Greek right.

The two fleets seem to have moved forward almost simultaneously. As the evidence with regard to the nature of their movements is somewhat complicated, it may be well for the sake of clearness to deal with them separately.

Before beginning the advance the Persian fleet was drawn up in three lines; but a totally different formation was adopted when the movement developed. Describing its appearance as it entered into the narrow part of the strait, Æschylus speaks of it as coming forward in a “stream” (ῥεῦμα) which can only refer to some formation in column, or in something resembling a column. Diodorus supplies the connecting link between the two formations, when he says that the Persians when they came into the strait were compelled to withdraw some ships from the line.

If the chart of the strait at this point be examined it will be seen that, after passing Psyttaleia and Kynosura, it not only narrows but turns westward at right angles. The Persian fleet had consequently to accomplish a difficult manœuvre of a double kind, namely, (1) to reduce the length of their front; (2) to execute a wheeling movement to the left, of which their extreme left wing would form the pivot. In so far as can be judged, what took place is this: their right, and possibly their centre, having reduced their front, passed through the strait east of Psyttaleia in some sort of column formation, and then wheeled to the left, in order to turn the corner of the strait, while their left wing marked time, as it were, in the strait west of Psyttaleia. This wing would be hidden from the Greek fleet by the somewhat lofty rock promontory of Kynosura. But the right wing passing east of Psyttaleia would come almost immediately into sight of the Greeks, and would present to them the appearance of the “stream,” which Æschylus describes.[167]

THE BATTLE SCENE.

The scene, as the two great fleets advanced towards one another, must have been one of the most magnificent that the world has ever beheld. History can hardly present a parallel of a naval battle on such a scale as Salamis, and none in which fleets so large have operated in so comparatively confined a space. More than 2000 years later the neighbouring Corinthian gulf was destined to be the scene of a sea-fight which in respect to grandeur and picturesqueness most nearly compared with Salamis, when Don John of Austria defeated the great Turkish fleet in those waters which, later on in this very century, were to be rendered famous by the exploits of the great Athenian admiral, Phormio. In both these battles East and West met in one momentous struggle for the command of the Mediterranean—it may perhaps be said, without exaggeration, for the command of the world; and in both the East succumbed so completely that the loser never recovered from his defeat. Impossible as it is fully to realize the scenic effect of a battle of such ancient date, the records of which are imperfect, yet the area in which it was fought is so comparatively limited and so well defined, that the traveller who visits the spot can bring the scene before his imagination in a way that is impossible in the case of most of the great fights of ancient history. Would that the description of it had come down to the modern world from the pen of him who described the last fight in the great harbour of Syracuse! It was indeed a theme for that consummate artist in language. The impression of magnitude which it conveyed to those who were present at it is evident from the pages of Æschylus, where it is described with the grand breadth of description due to a battle of giants. But the historian wants more than he finds therein, and cannot but feel that Thucydides was born half a century too late.

The evolution which the Persian fleet had to carry out in turning the corner of the strait would have been difficult under any circumstances. It was further complicated by the contraction of the sea-room after the corner was turned, and by the necessity of performing it in face of a powerful hostile fleet within comparatively short striking-distance. The result was that the fleet fell into considerable confusion. Both Æschylus and Diodorus testify to this fact. Diodorus’ account is peculiarly consistent with the topographical circumstances. He says, as has been already noticed, that the Persians in their advance at first retained their order, having plenty of sea-room; but when they came to the strait, they were compelled to withdraw some ships from the line, and fell into much confusion.