E.C. Marchant, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 2

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Αἵ τε ... ὅ τε ... καὶ ἄλλα τε ... καί τινες—there are two members to this sentence, united by the first καί: each of these two is bisected, the first by τε ... τε, the second by τε ... καί τινες. οὐδὲν μ. ἀπανίστασαν—‘did not force the Athenians to raise the siege,’ any more than the embassies sent by Sparta to Athens before the war demanding that the army should be withdrawn from Potidaea. Intr. p. lxviii. ἀπανίστημι is not found in any other Attic writer. Herod. III. 156.

ἐπεγεγένητο—cf. c. 4, 2.

ἀναγκαίας—‘in their straits for food.’ ‘Non pas nécessaire à la vie, mais imposée par la nécessité.’ Cr. Livy, XXI. 14 pacem magis necessariam quam aequam.

ἀλλήλων ἐγέγευντο—Josephus, VI. 3, 3 wrongly calls such cannibalism a horror unheard of among Greeks. With the austere brevity of Thuc.'s description contrast Macaulay's account of the sufferings in Londonderry, Hist. Eng. c. 12, but the propriety of the close of the picture, where the story of ‘the fat man’ is introduced, may be questioned.

οὕτω δὴ—c. 12, 4.

ἐπὶ σφίσι τ.— ‘against’; contrast c. 90, 2. Cf. III. 13 αἱ δ᾽ ἐφ᾽ ἡμῖν τετάχαται. Χενοφῶντι—c. 79.

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Ὁρῶντες μὲν ... ἀνηλωκυίας τε—μὲν is answered by τε in I. 144, 2; III. 46, 2; IV. 32, 2. Cf. c. 65, 12.

ἐν —belongs to τὴν ταλαιπωρίαν; for the use cf. c. 3, 1.

ἐς τὴν π.—Intr. p. lxxvii.

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Ἐπὶ τοῖσδε ξυνέβησαν, ἐξελθεῖν—cf. IV. 16 ναῦς παρα- δοῦναι κομίσαντας Ἀθηναίοις ... αἱ μὲν σπονδαὶ ἐπὶ τούτοις ἐγένοντο. In VIII. 18 the imperative is used throughout the terms. ‘The men ... to go out.’ The inf. is not for ἐπὶ τῷ ἐξελθεῖν, but is the use noticed in c. 13, 1.

ξὺν ἑνὶ—cum singulis vestimentis, Livy, XXI. 12.

γυναῖκας δὲ—probably Thuc. is quoting the actual terms; so he is not responsible for what seems at first an odd correction of γυναῖκας above, but is quite suited to the cumbrous diction of officials. ‘With one garment, except the women.’

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Ἄνευ αὐτῶν—injussu suo or privato consilio.

ξυνέ- βησαν—might have been ξυμβαῖεν, as in 21, 3. M. T. 713, 714.

ᾗ ἐβούλοντο—Recta, ἐκρατήσαμεν ἂν ᾗ ὲβουλόμεθα, whereas ᾖ βούλοιντο would represent ᾗ ἂν βουλώμεθα. The sentence is equivalent to κρατήσαντες ἂν ἐχρησάμεθα τῇ πόλει ᾗ ἐβουλόμεθα. Cf. c. 4, 7.

ἐποίκους—c. 27, 1. See on c. 101, 6.

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Ταῦτα μὲν ... καὶ—the break between μὲν and τοῦ δ᾽, c. 71, is certainly not violent enough to warrant the supposition that καὶ δεύτερον ἔτος κ.τ.λ. is spurious. In a well-marked antithesis like ταῦτα μὲν ... χειμῶνι, τοῦ δὲ ... θέρους, an author could insert any parenthesis he chose between the μὲν and δὲ clauses. (So Andoc. 1, 29 περὶ μὲν τῶν μυστηρίων summarises what has preceded: then follows a parenthesis of five sections: then in 34 περὶ δὲ τῶν ἀναθημάτων introduces what follows.)