Reginald Walter Macan, Herodotus, The Seventh, Eighth, & Ninth Books with Introduction and Commentary

---

---

οἱ Ἕλληνες: sc. οἱ στρατηγοὶ τῶν Ἑλλήνων. On learning the despatch of a squadron round Euboia the Greek admirals held a council of war (λόγον σφίσι αὐτοῖσι ἐδίδοσαν). So far the statement may be historical; what follows is inconsistent with itself, and unintelligible. The Greeks debate various alternatives (not stated); they decide upon one, and that one an absurdity, a strategic inconceivability; and they proceed to act in defiance of their decision. For obvious reasons the Greeks at Artemision could not abandon that position, so long as Thermopylai was held by Leonidas; they cannot have determined at this point to retreat. Nor was any such move demanded by the Persian periplous of Euboia; a few ships would be sufficient to hold the narrow channel at Chalkis, and, if that were held, the fleet at Artemision, the army at Thermopylai, had little to fear from the periplous. But a real source of anxiety may have lain in a doubt as to the true objective of the Persian flying squadron. What if the 200 vessels were making, not for Chalkis, but for Oropos, for Phaleron, for the Isthmos? The storm may have reassured the Greeks, convinced that a squadron on the high sea could not weather it, even if Skyllias had reported only the despatch of the Persian vessels. The actual resolution taken by the Greeks is to be inferred from their action; they must have decided to remain, and to attack the Persian fleet, or perhaps the rear-guard thereof. Possibly the account here of the fighting on the ‘first’ day, resulting in the capture of thirty ships, is an unconscious doublet of the account given in 7. 194 of the capture of the fifteen ships, that being from an Asianic, this from a European source; Kypriotes are concerned in both stories, and it is extremely hard to find room otherwise, in the narrative here, for the episode there recorded; cp. Appendix V. § 4.

---

ἐνίκα: of a deliberative decision, 6. 101. This decision might be identical with the one reported in c. 4 supra; cp. next note.

τὴν ἡμέρην ἐκείνην: prima facie this day witnesses (1) the arrival of the Persian fleet at Aphetai, (2) the arrival of Skyllias at Artemision, (3) the council of war, (4) the first engagement at sea, whether this be, or be not, identical with (5) the capture of the fifteen ships described in 7. 194; to these items must apparently be added (6) the first day's fighting at Thermopylai, and, as Hdt. would have us believe, (7) the despatch of the squadron to circumnavigate Euboia. It is, however, possible that these events are unduly accumulated. The despatch of the squadron to circumnavigate Euboia is, as above shown, to be dated before the Persian fleet passed Skiathos and the myrmex, that is, before the storm. The interval (ἐν δὲ τούτῳ τῷ χρόνῳ c. 8 supra) between the despatch of the squadron and the arrival of Skylhas at Artemision may have comprised not hours, but days; or again, his arrival at Artemision may have anticipated the Persian arrival at Aphetai by some days, and not, as apparently implied by Hdt. here, have succeeded it by some hours. Again, the further chronological indication just below (μετὰ δὲ τοῦτο) is of little or no value, the interval being entirely vague. If Skyllias arrived in the Greek camp before the storm, before the Persians had passed Skiathos, in fact days before the capture of the fifteen Persian vessels, or the first engagements at Artemision and Thermopylai, then, indeed, the Greek admirals may have decided, on the strength of his information, to detach a portion of their own fleet (cp. c. 14 infra) to guard, or to reinforce the ships guarding, the Euripos channel, while themselves remaining on the spot (αὐτοῦ), as a matter of course, with the larger part, to cover Thermopylai and the northern channel (of Oreos) from the advance of the Persian navy.

---

δείλην ὀψίην γινομένην τῆς ἡμέρης: prima facie this chronological reference carries back not merely to τὴν ἡμέρην ἐκείνην just above, but to the δείλην πρωίην γινομένην of c. 6 supra, the hour of the arrival of the Persians at Aphetai. It is, however, possible that these early and late afternoons are not on the same day. The arrival of the Persian fleet at Aphetai, to say nothing of the subsequent numbering, was not to be accomplished in the twinkling of an eye; the only synchronism to which we may cling with desperate tenacity is the coincidence of the three days' fightings at Artemision and at Thermopylai, this being grounded, though not absolutely, in the strategic and tactical necessities of the case. The use of φυλάξαντες is made clear in c. 14 infra.

Blakesley suggests that the Greeks timed their attack so as to have the sinking sun full in the eyes of the enemy's steersmen; if so, Hdt.'s account will require further revision, for Aphetai is, if anything, west of Artemision.

---

ἀπόπειραν αὐτῶν ποιήσασθαι βουλόμενοι: verily a laudable curiosity! That Hdt. should solemnly record a decision to retreat (and this the third, cp c. 4 supra, 7. 182) and immediately thereupon an assumption of the offensive by the would-be fugitives, and that out of experimental curiosity, is fatally symptomatic of his military motivation, and must be taken to set the modern reader free to enforce the Sach-Kritik, or standard of physical and psychological probability, with considerable boldness.

---

τῆς τε μάχης καὶ τοῦ διεκπλόου: with μάχη, manner of fighting, cp. 5. 49, 7. 9. The διέκπλοος was, perhaps, an Ionian device; cp. my note to 6. 12, and c. 11 infra.