E.C. Marchant, Commentary on Thucydides Book 1

τῶν παλαιῶν—neut., like τὰ πρὸ αὐτῶν καὶ τὰ ἔτι παλαίτερα in c. 2. Here τὰ παλαιά is explained to mean τὰ πρὸ τῶν τρωικῶν The lit. trans, is insignificance in our early history.

11. πρότερον—this merely repeats the sense of πρό, as in οὐ πρότερον ... πρίν κτλ.

[2] 12. δοκεῖ δέ μοι—(1) at first parenthetical, afterwards (2) δοκεῖ ἡ ἐπίκλησις οὐδὲ εἶναι, (3) δοκεῖ ἄλλα (nom.) ... παρέχεσθαι, (4) δοκεῖ Ἔλληνας καλεῖσθαι, (5) ? parenthetical, before ἐδύνατο. When a verb can take more than one construction, Thuc. sometimes combines alternative constructions in the same sentence without repeating the verb.

13. τὰ πρὸ Ἕλληνος—adv. accus., as τὰ πρότερα c. 2, τὰ ἐν τῇ εἰρήνῃ 54.3. Hellen was son of Deucalion and Pyrrha; and Hellenes from Phthiotis accompanied Achilles to Troy. How the name came to be be extended to all the Greeks is unknown.

14. καὶ πάνυ—emphasised by being separated from εἶναι. Cf. Xen. Anab. 1.5.8 καὶ μάλα κατὰ πρανοῦς γηλόφου, Dem. 5. 15 καὶ πάνυ φησί τις αὐτοὺς ἀναισθήτους εἶναι, and so with οὐ （μή） πάνυ not unfrequently. We should rather expect οὐ πάνυ μοι δοκεῖ οὐδ᾽ εἶναι.

εἶναι—this and the infins, that follow are imperfect.

15. κατὰ ἔθνη—distributive. This forms the subject to παρέχεσθαι = ‘various tribes,’ ἄλλα τε καὶ τὸ π., among others the Pelasgian tribe, being in apposition to κ. ἔθνη. Adverbial phrases are frequent in Thuc. as equivalent of a case of a subst.: as in 6.39 ταῦτα καὶ κατὰ μέρη καὶ ξύμπαντα.

16. τὸ Πελασγικόν—a tribe of aborigines, whom Homer speaks of as dwelling in Asia Minor and Crete as well as in Greece. For the facts and theories about them see Abbott. Hist. Greece i. p. 27 fol. “When the Pelasgi became established [in literature] as an ancient tribe, those nations which laid claim to great antiquity, as the Athenians and Arcadians, became Pelasgians” (This is enough to know.)

ἐπὶ πλεῖστον—this belongs to τὸ Πελασγικόν, meaning that the name of the P. was more widely extended than that of any other tribe.

17. παρέχεσθαι—sc. to the country.

τῶν παίδων—Aeolus, Dorus, and Xuthus.

18. ἰσχυσάντων—ingressive aor., ‘having become mighty.’

19. ἐπαγομένων—sc. τινῶν.

ἐπ᾽ ὠφελίᾳ—to aid them. ὠφελία often = βοήθεια; cf. 1.73.2 ἐπ᾽ ὠφελίᾳ.

20. καθ᾽ ἑκάστους—subject of καλεῖσθαι: the several tribes more and more (ἤδη μᾶλλον) began to be called Hellenes in consequence of their intercourse (with the Hellenes).

21. πολλοῦ χρόνου—time within which (partitive), less commonly found in positive sentences.

22. ἐδύνατο—sc. τὸ καλεῖσθαι Ἕλληνας. Shil. quotes Eur. Phoen. 12-13 “καλοῦσι δ᾽ Ἰοκάστην με, τοῦτο γὰρ πατὴρ
ἔθετο”. The ἐδύνατο is probably spurious, because, though the constrn. of δοκεῖ shifts (see on 1. 12), the two clauses καθ᾽ ἑκάστους μὲν ... οὐ μέντοι should have the same form, just as τὰ μὲν . κατὰ ἔθνη δέ have. Even if the constrn. were again changed here, we should probably have ἐξενίκησε.

[3] 25. ὠνόμασεν—sc. Ἕλληνας.

οὐδ᾽ ἄλλους—i.e. Hellas in Homer is Phthiotis, B 684. It has been pointed out that in α 344, δ 726, 816, ο 80 Ἑλλάς with Ἄργος denotes Greece in general. The lines are perhaps spurious.

27. τὰ ἔπη—the poems.

28. ἀνακαλεῖ—distinguishes them as. ἀνακαλῶ is call by a distinctive, official name.

οὐ μὴν οὐδέ—nor even; οὐ μὴν ἀλλά = ‘not but what.’

1. βαρβάρους εἴρηκε—mentioned barbarians, because not yet had the Hellenes either been distinguished under one name in opposition (to them). There is a difficulty as to the construction of ἀντίπαλον. (1) Eustathius, followed by Stahl and Steup, made it agree with ὄνομα, despite the order; and the adj. is occasionally separated by a prep. from its subst.; (2) Classen thought it an adverb like τοὐναντίον: the absence of the article is one reason against this; (3) Böhme made it internal accus. to ἀποκεκρίσθαι, to have undergone an opposing separation, and Krüger favours this; (4) Mr. Forbes says it is in apposition to Ἕλληνας, which means the word Greeks. But should we not even so require ἀντιπάλους or Ἕλληνες?

The edd. note that Thuc. neglects the epithet βαρβαρόφωνοι, of the Carians, in Hom. Il. 2.867. But this simply means speaking an unknown tongue, and the statement of Thuc. is substantially correct. The Greeks could not be conscious that they were a separate people before they were conscious that they were one people.

[4] 3. δ᾽ οὖν—resuming after the digression of which 3.3 consists.

οἱ ... ὡς ἕκαστοι ... κληθέντες—the main subject is οἱ Ἕλληνες κληθέντες, those who came to be called H. This is divided into (a) ὡς ἕκαστοι κατὰ πόλεις τε ὅσοι ἀλλήλων ξυνίεσαν, referring to καθ᾽ ἑκάστους μὲν ἤδη ... Ἕλληνας 3.2; (b) καὶ ξύμπαντες ὕστερον, referring to οὐ μέντοι ... ἅπασιν ἐκνικῆσαι. In (a) τε = both is misplaced, the irregularity being explained by the fact that κατὰ ... ξυνιέσαν is added to ὡς ἕκαστοι as an afterthought. Possibly, however, τε = and, but it is hard to see any distinction between ὡς ἕκαστοι and κατὰ π. The sentence is overloaded, since ὕστερον, i e. long after the Trojan War (cf. 3.3), is combined with a statement of what happened πρὸ τῶν Τρωικῶν. Observe also that this apparent recapitulation (οἱ δ᾽ οὖν κτλ.) does not agree entirely with the statements made in 3.2, where nothing is said about a common language. Thuc., as others have noticed, does not seem to have a clear view of the matter.

8. The MS. ξυνῆλθον will not do: ἐξέρχομαι, ἔξειμι with accus, are not rare in Attic prose in a military sense; but ἔρχομαι, εἶμι are not used so.