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

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ἥ τε δίκη τοῦ Λεωνίδεω. At this point Hdt. treats the battle as over, the victory as won, and goes off on a number of side issues, oracular, portentous, biographic, anecdotal, to wit, the fulfilment of a Delphicutterance; the providential preservation of the Demetrion from defilement; the fate of Mardonios, and that of the man who slew him; the glory of Pausanias.

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κατὰ τὸ χρηστήριον: the reference is clear, though not explicit, to the anecdote 8. 114 supra, which of course was an anachronism; given the death of Mardonios at Plataia by the hands of a Spartan (?), and the ‘prediction’ was inevitable. This whole chapter (with the possible exception of a couple of sentences) reads like an insertion by Hdt. into the first draft of his history, and may perhaps be put down to his ‘second hand’; cp. Introduction, § 9.

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νίκην ἀναιρέεται κτλ. Hdt. treats the victory as a fait accompli, as though the whole battle had been simply between Mardonios with his Persians on the one side and Pausanias with his Spartans or Lakedaimonians on the other; the centre, the left wing, are treated here as negligible quantities: this treatment can hardly be Attic, or phil-Attic tradition, or theory, but it might very well be ‘Delphic,’ cp. Thucyd. 1. 132. 2, or picked up at Delphi by Hdt. himself, or his authorities. On the formula καλλίστην ... τῶν ἡμεῖς ἵδμεν cp. 8 105. 3. Is it not a metrical tag? (τῶν ἡμέες ἴδμεν).

νίκην ἀναιρέεσθαι reportare victoriam 6. 103, cp. c. 33 supra (ἀγῶνας), Ὀλυμπιάδα 6. 70 etc. The express recognition of the personal merits or service of Pausanias (to the exclusion of Euryanax) in this passage is remarkable: Plataia is his victory, the most ideal (καλλίστην） victory on record—Marathon, Salamis not excepted! The use of the patronymic, here raised to the third power, ἐκ τριγονίας, is also remarkable: plainly and purely for rhetorical effect.

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τῶν δὲ ... ἐόντες is, however, an addition with somewhat an unfortunate effect; if genuine, it is a very clear reference back to 7. 186: such a bathos can hardly belong to the first draft of the description of the great battle; the language reads, however, like authentic Hdt. κατύπερθε, cp. 5. 28. οἱ, possessive, or perhaps ‘ethical’ dat. ἐς Λεωνίδην, either ‘down to Leonidas,’ or ‘with reference to Leonidas,’ à propos of Leonidas. (As Leonidas could not be included, the latter seems the preferable rendering.)

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ὡυτοὶ ... ἐόντες, not ταὐτὰ . . ἐόντα. Rawlinson, doubtless feeling the literary and stylistic flaw of this passage, translates it very loosely: ‘I omit to recount his other ancestors, since they are the same with those of Leonidas.’

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ἀποθνῄσκει ... ὑπό: cp. c. 37 supra.

Ἀειμνήστου ἀνδρὸς ἐν Σπάρτῃ λογίμου. It is unfortunate that there is any uncertainty in the exact form of the proper name, though ‘Aeimnestos’ and ‘Arimnestos’ come to much the same sense; cp. c. 72 infra. (Some persons with an inability to give value to the rho would pronounce the two forms indistinguishably.) Blakesley very acutely suggested that this ἀνὴρ ἐν Σπάρτῃ λόγιμος was not himself a Spartiate; for (i.) Plntarch (de or. def. 5, Mor. 412) says Mardonios was killed by a stone, and a Spartiate would not be throwing stones (but cp. c. 55 supra!); (ii.) Thucydides (3. 52. 5) has a Plataian, one ‘Lakon, son of Aeimnestos,’ and an ἀνὴρ ἐν Σπάρτῃ λόγιμος would be very likely to have a son named Λάκων. (But what, then, of his service in the Messenian war? see below.)

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ὃς χρόνῳ ὕστερον κτλ. is certainly a reference to events in the Pentekontaeteris, and appears to be a reference to the ‘third’ Messenian war (464-454 B.C.). The reference is obscure. Hdt. does not clearly indieate that the war is between the Lakedaimonians and Messenians; he does not describe the character or nature of the corps of 300 men under Aeimnestos; he does not say on which side Aeimnestos was fighting; he gives no details or circumstances in regard to the engagement. This is, in short, one of the obscurest references to contemporary events in the whole work. Hdt., however, does not say that Aeimnestos was a Spartan, nor that the men under his command were Spartans. Blakesley says: “no doubt Aeimnestos commanded the garrison which was intended to maintain military possession of the country.” But that seems to me very doubtful: how came a Plataian by such an appointment? Rather we might suppose that the Plataian, with a contingent of his fellow-citizens, 300 strong, was (pace ἰδίᾳ in the following) with the Athenian contingent in the Messenian war; cp. Thuc. 3. 54. 5 “καὶ ὑμῖν, ὦ Λακεδαιμόνιοι, ἰδίᾳ, ὅτεπερ δὴ μέγιστος φόβος περιέστη τὴν Σπάρτην μετὰ τὸν σεισμὸν τῶν ἐς Ἰθώμην Εἱλώτων ἀποστάντων τὸ τρίτον μέρος ἡμῶν αὐτῶν ἐξεπέμψαμεν ἐς ἐπικουρίαν: ὦν οὐκ εἰκὸς ἀμνημονεῖν” (Λάκων son of Αἰείμνηστος is speaking, 427 B.C.).

ἔχων, ‘commanding.’

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τριηκοσίους: if this was τὸ τρίτον μέρος the full number of Plataians at that time would be 900. In c. 28 supra there are 600 with the Athenians on the left; that may be 2/3 (and 1/3 may be with the Spartans, cp. c. 72 infra, or the number of Plataians in 464 B C. may somewhat have risen. In 429 B.C. it had fallen again, cp. l.c.).

συνέβαλε: i.e. συμβολὴν ἐποίησε, ep. c. 41 supra.

Στενυκλήρῳ: the old Dorian, or quasi-Dorian, capital of Messenia (cp. Strabo 361), where Kresphontes had built his palace, and established a residence (cp. Pausan. 4. 3. 7), situate on a plain (Pausan. 4. 33. 4) in the midst of the land, a natural meeting-place for the Messenians (Paus. 4. 6. 6）—in fact, the centre of the upper of the two plains into which hollow Messenia naturally divides; ep. Curtius, Peloponnesos ii. 125 f. It was an unwalled place, however, and has left no remains in situ, ib. 136.