CHAPTER XL
ἠξίουν—‘expected’, lit. ‘thought it worthy of them’:
i. 136,
οὐκ ἁξιοῖ φεὐγοντα τιμωρεῖσθαι, ‘he calls on him not to avenge himself on an exile’:
iii. 44,
οὐκ ἀξιῶ ὑμᾶς τὸ χρήσιμον ἀπώσασθαι, ‘I would not have you reject’. In such instances the negative is placed as with
οὔ φημι = I deny or refuse:
i. 28,
πόλεμον δὲ οὐκ εἴων ποιεῖν, ‘they urged them not to make war’
ἀπιστοῦντές τε—this nominative has no verb, the construction being altered after the introduction of the clause with gen. abs.
τινός ἐρομένου.
δι᾽ ἀχθηδόνα—‘for the sake of annoyance’, i.e. in order to insult or mortify.
διά with acc. usually means ‘in consequence of’; sometimes however it is used, like
ἕνεκα, of the object or purpose;
ii. 89,
διὰ τὴν σφετέραν δόξαν, ‘for the sake of their honour’: ch. 102, 20,
διὰ τὸ περιέχειν αὐτήν, ‘for the sake of enclosing it’:
v. 53,
διὰ τοῦ θύματος τὴν ἔσπραξιν, ‘for the sake of exacting payment of the sacrifice’: so
Plat. Rep. 524 c,
διὰ τὴν τούτου σαφήνειαν, ‘for the sake of making this clear’: Dem. Boeot. 1004,
δι᾽ ἐπήρειαν, ‘for spite’: Ar. Eth. Nic. iv. 3 (8), 31,
δι᾽ ὔβριν.
καλοὶ κἀγαθοί—‘A title’, says Arnold, ‘corresponding, in the union which is expressed of personal qualities with a certain superiority of birth and condition more nearly with our word gentleman than with any other. The Spartans prided themselves on being all
καλοὶ κἀγαθοί; and the question, put probably by a democratical seaman, was intended to sneer at once at the pretension and the name’. The term is only found here and
viii. 48 (also as a quotation): see Neil, Ar. Eq. Ap. ii.
ἄτρακτος—a word meaning some kind of reed, or thorn, and thence applied to anything made thereof. In prose it means a spindle, and is used by the poets for an arrow. Probably the Laconians used the word in the latter sense; though some suppose that the heavy-armed soldier called darts and arrows spindles in contempt.
ὁ ἐντυγχάνων—διεφθείρετο—Classen takes
ἐντυγχάνων absolutely, ‘he who came in the way, he who chanced’, governing
τοῖς τε λίθοις καὶ τοξεύμασι by
διεφθείρετο. For this use of
ἐντυγλάνω cf. ch. 132, 20,
τοῖς ἐντυχοῦσιν ἐπιτρέπειν. Here however the run of the words seems to connect
ἐντυγχάνων with what follows. Thucydides in fact often adopts such an order that the intermediate words may be governed either by what precedes or what follows, or may indeed depend upon both; cf. ch. 17, 10. Note the force of the imperfect tense in
ἐντυγχάνων and
διεφθείρετο, ‘he who (from time to time) came in the way was slain (on each occasion)’.
