Stories from Thucydides

by Thucydides

The fall of Amphipolis, which occurred shortly after the crushing defeat at Delium, caused great consternation among the Athenians. Apart from the wound to their pride, they were deprived by this loss of a large portion of their revenue, and cut off from the principal source of their timber supply. And there were still further grounds for alarm. For Amphipolis was now an open door, through which the Spartans could send troops into eastern Thrace, and carry the war to the entrance of the Euxine. For a moment it seemed as if all their fears would be realized. The gentle manners of Brasidas—his fairness, modesty, and strict regard for the rights of all men—had won the hearts of the Athenian allies in Thrace, and secret agents were constantly arriving at his head-quarters on the Strymon, inviting him to come and help them to recover their liberty. He had skilfully appealed to the most deeply-rooted instinct of the Greek, the desire for unfettered action in his own city, free from all interference from outside. This instinct, long held in abeyance, first by the necessity for protection from Persia, and when that danger was removed, by the habits acquired under the mild rule of Athens, was now awakened into new life by the influence of the great warrior and accomplished statesman, whose watchword was "Liberty for Greeks!" The recent reverses of Athens had excited a feeling of contempt among her subjects, and led them greatly to under-estimate her real power; and Brasidas himself, by a not over-scrupulous perversion of facts, had been careful to encourage this belief. All these causes produced a burst of enthusiasm throughout Thrace, and if the Spartans had supported Brasidas with vigour, a general insurrection would have followed among the Athenian allies. But the authorities of Sparta were jealous of their brilliant officer, and their chief anxiety was to recover the prisoners taken at Sphacteria.

In the same winter the indefatigable Spartan effected the capture of Torone, a town situated on the second of the three headlands which project, like the prongs of a fork, from the peninsula of Chalcidice. As in the case of Amphipolis, Torone fell into his hands by treachery; but he had now made good his title as the champion of Greek independence, and early in the following spring the citizens of Scione, on the first or westernmost headland, invited him to come over and take command of their town. On receiving this welcome summons Brasidas lost no time, and crossed over by night in a skiff, which was convoyed by a trireme, so that if any hostile vessel appeared in sight, it might be engaged by the trireme, and leave him free to escape. He reached Scione in safety, and having convened a general assembly of the citizens, addressed them in flattering terms, praising their high courage and patriotic spirit. "You," he said, "have set a noble example to your oppressed brethren: isolated as you are, and cut off from all succour from the mainland, you have defied all perils, and thrown in your lot, for better or for worse, with the friends of liberty. Your gallantry and self-devotion has given you a just claim to the gratitude of Sparta and of all Greece." The revolt of Scione was indeed a daring defiance of the Athenian power, for since the capitulation of Potidaea, which occurred seven years before, the inhabitants had been in the position of islanders, exposed to the whole maritime power of Athens. For the moment, however, the people were carried away by a transport of enthusiasm, and little dreaming of the terrible vengeance which was to overtake them two years later, they greeted Brasidas as a deliverer, and vied with one another who should honour him most. He was publicly presented with a crown of gold, as the liberator of Greece; and in private houses he was wreathed with garlands, and surrounded with worship, like a victorious athlete.

But a few days before the defection of Scione all the ambitious schemes of Brasidas had been checkmated by the action of his own countrymen at home. For some time past negotiations had been in progress between Athens and Sparta; and since the battle of Delium, and the rapid successes of their great enemy in Thrace, the Athenians had been more disposed to come to terms. In this altered mood they agreed to make a truce for one year with Sparta, which would give time to arrange the conditions of a lasting peace, and leave them at leisure to repair the shattered fabric of their empire. Two commissioners, an Athenian and a Spartan, were at once despatched to announce the conclusion of the truce to Brasidas. They found him at Torone, preparing to set out a second time for the western peninsula, and continue his intrigues against the subjects of Athens. In the interview which followed a dispute arose between Brasidas and the commissioners, as to whether Scione should be admitted into the truce. Brasidas asserted that the city had joined the Spartan alliance before the truce was signed; but the Athenian commissioner loudly protested that the revolt occurred after the conclusion of the truce,—and such, indeed, was the fact. Brasidas, however, was bound in honour to defend the hapless community which had been drawn by his fatal influence into so fearful a peril; and in the existing confusion of the Greek calendar it was not easy to establish a date with perfect exactitude. Accordingly Brasidas refused to surrender Scione to the vengeance of Athens, and placed the town in a state of defence. Not content with this, he extended the same measures of protection to Mende, which revolted after the arrival of the commissioners. This was an open violation of the truce, and the Athenians, in great fury, immediately prepared to send a fleet against these audacious rebels, and passed a savage decree, condemning the whole adult male population of Scione to death.

III

During the following summer Mende was recovered by Nicias for the Athenians, Scione was closely invested, and Perdiccas, who had quarrelled with Brasidas, once more became an ally of Athens, and gave proof of his sincerity by preventing the passage of Spartan reinforcements to Thrace. The Athenians were thus left free to turn their attention to Amphipolis, and at the beginning of the tenth year of the war, the truce having now expired, Cleon was sent with a fleet of thirty ships to conduct the siege of this important place. That so weighty a charge should have been entrusted to hands so incompetent argues a degree of infatuation in the Athenians which is very hard to understand. On his voyage Cleon succeeded in retaking Torone by a sudden assault, and then proceeding northwards dropped anchor at Eion, where he remained inactive, after despatching messengers to Perdiccas, and to a friendly Thracian prince, to ask for reinforcements.

Meanwhile Brasidas, who some time before had returned to Amphipolis, was waiting to strike a blow at his unwarlike enemy. His own troops, though about equal in numbers to the force under Cleon, were far inferior in equipment and discipline; but he counted on some incautious movement on the part of the Athenian general, which would throw the picked infantry of Athens into disorder, and place them at a disadvantage. So he left Clearidas, a young Spartan, whom he had appointed governor of Amphipolis, in charge of the garrison, and taking with him fifteen hundred men occupied a position on the right bank of the river, where the ground rises abruptly to a considerable height, affording a wide view over the city to the country beyond, as far as Eion. From this point, which is called Cerdylium, he could watch the proceedings of the enemy, and still have ample time to rejoin Clearidas in Amphipolis, if, as he expected, Cleon should leave his defences and advance upon the town.

He had not long to wait. The Athenian soldiers stationed at Eion were chafing at their inaction, and mutinous speeches were heard on all sides. What a man was this Cleon, this cowardly braggart, under whom they were to take the field against the most daring and skilful leader in Greece! They had known what to expect from such a general, since the day when they sailed for Thrace. These murmurs reached the ears of Cleon, and he saw that something must be attempted, or his men would be totally demoralized. So he gave the order to march, and led his troops up the ridge of hills which slope down towards Amphipolis on the eastern side, where the town was defended by a single line of wall, reaching from the northern to the southern bend of the river. He was far from supposing that anyone would come out to attack him; he only wanted, he said, to take a good view of the place, and when his reinforcements arrived, he would surround the city on all sides, and carry it by assault. For his wonderful good fortune at Pylos had given him unbounded confidence in his powers as a strategist, and he thought that Amphipolis would prove a second Pylos, forgetting that here he had a Brasidas to deal with, and no Demosthenes to do the work for him. When he reached the top of the ascent, he called a halt, and took a leisurely survey of the wide sweep of country spread below him,—to the north, the broad, marshy waters of Lake Cercynitis, from which the river issues just above the town,—eastwards, the towering summit of Mount Pangaeus,—and on the other side, just beneath his feet, the devoted city, which now seemed cowering, silent and deserted, as if conscious of Cleon's eagle glance. The gates were closed, and not a man was to be seen on the battlements. "What a pity," remarked Cleon, "that we brought no siege-engines with us! We might have battered down the wall, and marched in at once,—there is none to oppose us."

So readily did this holiday general fall into the trap which Brasidas, with a just estimate of his capacity, had set for him. As soon as he saw that Cleon had started from Eion, the Spartan general left his post in Cerdylium, and led his men back into Amphipolis. Here he made such a disposition of his forces as to give the place that peaceful and innocent appearance which deceived Cleon's unpractised eye. Then he took up his station with a picked troop of a hundred and fifty hoplites at the southern gate of Amphipolis, leaving Clearidas in charge of the main body, and awaited a favourable moment to attack.

But these preparations could not be made without exciting some attention among the more experienced of the Athenian officers. They had seen Brasidas entering the city, and observed him offering sacrifice, as for battle, before the temple of Athene; and Cleon, who was standing, lost in his contemplations, some distance in advance of his forces, suddenly received the alarming intelligence that the enemy were on the point of making a sally. "The whole garrison is in motion," said the messenger, "and we have caught sight of the feet of many horses and men under the gates: evidently they mean to attack us." Thus rudely startled from his meditations, Cleon went to look for himself, and seeing that the messenger had spoken the truth he gave the order for a retreat in the direction of Eion. This movement should have begun from the left wing, but there was some delay in executing the order, and Cleon, who was in a great hurry to reach a place of safety, led the way with his own division, which, being on the right, ought to have closed the retreat. The consequence was that the whole Athenian army was thrown into confusion, and Brasidas, who was watching from his station at the gate, saw by the irregular motion of their spears and helmets that all discipline was at an end. "Now is our time," he cried to his men: "Open the gates! The day is ours." With these words he rushed out with his troops, and fell upon the Athenian centre; and at the same moment the main body under Clearidas poured out from the northern gate, and attacked them in the rear.

The effect of this sudden assault was to cut the Athenian army in half: the left wing, which was nearest to Eion, fled without striking a blow, but the right made a vigorous resistance, though abandoned by their cowardly general, who was cut down by a Thracian spearman as he tried to make good his escape. A far nobler name was also added to the death-roll of that fatal day: Brasidas, fighting at the head of his troop, received a mortal wound, and was carried, unobserved by the Athenians, into the city. He lived long enough to hear that his men had gained a decisive victory, and then passed away, the purest and the most heroic spirit among all those who played their part in this unhappy war. After his death he received divine honours at Amphipolis, and was worshipped as the second founder of the city.