T. G. Tucker, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 8

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ἀσφαλῶς, etc., i.e. he did not wish to begin by creating a prejudice against himself in their minds.

ἀφεὶς τὸ ἐς τὴν Χίον ‘abandoning the expedition to Chios.’ We should not supply πλεῖν, nor indeed any Greek word. Thucydides might have written τὸ τῆς Χίου, ‘the matter of Chios’; but, as the matter was an expedition thither, ἐς τὴν Χίον takes the place of the genitive.

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Κῶν τὴν Μεροπίδα, which lay directly in his way. As the scholiast says, τὴν Μ. is superfluous, as no other Cos is known. Cos, now Stancho (ἐς τὰν Κῶ). The name is a contraction of Κόως and is declined accordingly (Κῶ, gen. § 3). Merops was a legendary king of the island.

ἀτείχιστον οὖσαν c. 31, § 3; c. 35, § 3.

τὴν χώραν . . . λείαν ἐποεῖτο = ἐλεηλάτει τὴν χώραν. Hdt. iv. 202, τοὺς λοιποὺς τῶν Βαρκαίων ληίην ἐκέλευσε θέσθαι. Cf. inf. c. 62, § 2, ἀνδράποδα ἁρπαγὴν ποησάμενος. From the next words, τὴν χώραν obviously includes the inhabitants.

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ἀναγκάζεται ὑπὸ . . . παραινούντων, i.e. they importuned him till he could not refuse.

προσπλεούσας either (1) ‘as they were sailing up,’ or (2) attributive (despite its position) as in c. 35, § 2, προσβαλλούσας; c. 36, § 1, διαρπασθέντα.

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ἐκ τῆς Μήλου. They learned of the expedition from the ships which had escaped at Melos (c. 39, § 3), but they would not therefore naturally look for it about Rhodes. The fact that they did so look is explained by the following words, ἤδη γὰρ ᾐσθάνετο κ.τ.λ.

περὶ τὴν . . . καὶ περὶ τὴν . . . The first three places form one terminus (hence also the one article only) and Lycia the other. From Chalce to the coast of Lycia is about 100 miles.

Σύμην καὶ Χάλκην islands near to, and N. and W.N.W. respectively of, Rhodes. The latter was also called Χαλκεία, which fact suggests the accentuation Χαλκῆν.