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Nikias, Epimenides and the Question of Omissions in Thucydides

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

Gabriel Herman
Gabriel Herman
Affiliation:
The Hebrew University, Jerusalem
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Extract

Our starting point is a somewhat obscure incident which has lately attracted some attention. The year is 429 B.C., and the place is Athens in the third year of the Peloponnesian war. The plague, which had broken out only a year before, was still claiming its victims. Yet military operations were in full swing, and the general Phormio operating in the Corinthian gulf against a Peloponnesian fleet was able to score an impressive victory. The Lacedaemonians were deeply dissatisfied. This was the first sea-fight they had been engaged in, and they found it hard to believe that their fleet was so much inferior to that of the Athenians. They dispatched three advisers to Knemos, the admiral in charge, instructing them to make better preparations for another sea-fight. Additional ships were solicited from the allies, and those already at hand were prepared for battle. It is at this point that the incident in question occurred. Not to prejudge the issue, I quote the text in full leaving the controversial phrases untranslated:

4. And Phormio on his part sent messengers to Athens to give information of the enemy's preparations and to tell about the battle which they had won, urging them also to send to him speedily (δι⋯ τ⋯χους) as many ships as possible, since there was always a prospect that a battle might be fought any day.

5. So they sent him twenty ships, but gave τῷ δ⋯ κυμ⋯ξοντι special orders to sail first to Crete. Nικ⋯ας γ⋯ρ Kρ⋯ς Γορτ⋯νιος πρ⋯ξενος ⋯ν persuaded them (αὺτο⋯ς) to sail against Cydonia, a hostile town, promising to bring it over to the Athenians; but he was really asking them to intervene to gratify the people of Polichne, who are neighbours of the Cydonians.

6. So ⋯ μ⋯ν λαβὼν τ⋯ς να⋯ς. went to Crete, and helped the Polichnitans to ravage the lands of the Cydonians, and by reason of winds and stress of weather wasted not a little time.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 39 , Issue 1 , May 1989 , pp. 83 - 93
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1989

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References

1 Connor, W. R., ‘Nicias the Cretan?’, AJAH 1 (1976), 61–4Google Scholar.

2 Cobet, G. C., Variae Lectiones (Lugduni-Batavorum. 1873). p. 441Google Scholar: ‘Interpolatum est Kρ⋯ς: etiam si non praecederet ⋯ς Kρ⋯την satis erat Γορτ⋯νιος. Praeterea veteres non dicebant κρ⋯ς Γορτ⋯νιος, sed K⋯ρτυνος, ut Ἀρκ⋯δες ⋯κ φενεο⋯, et sim.’ This has now been refuted by a host of counter-examples, cf. Daux (below, n. 4). p. 94. and Gerolymatos (below, n. 6). p. 83.

3 Walbank, M. B., Athenian Proxenies of the Fifth Century B.C. (Toronto and Sarasota, 1978). no. 32Google Scholar.

4 Daux, G., ‘Thucydide et l'événement’, CRAI (1979), 89–103Google Scholar. Cf. p. 98: ‘Ce n est pas sérieux, ni psychologiquement, ni historiquement.’

5 Karavites, P., ‘The Enduring Mystery of Nicias (Thuc. 2.85.5)’, Klio 62 (1980), 307–10CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

6 Gerolymatos, A., ‘Nicias of Gortyn’, Chiron 17 (1987), 81–5Google Scholar. Gerolymatos does not seem to be aware of Daux, op. cit. (n. 4) and Karavites, op. cit. (n. 5).

7 Gerolymatos, A., Espionage and Treason. A Study of the Proxenia in Political and Military Intelligence Gathering in Classical Greece (Amsterdam, 1986), pp. 61–4 and 109Google Scholar.

8 Connor, W. R., Thucydides (Princeton, 1984), p. 77 n. 62Google Scholar.

9 Note that if τῷ δ⋯ κομ⋯ξοντι is equated with Nikias the Athenian, the text is purged of the unnamed actor.

10 Where the narrative of the Cretan expedition is resumed: ‘The twenty Athenian ships from Crete, which were to have joined Phormio in time for the battle, arrived at Naupactus’ (my italics). Again, the name of the commander in charge is omitted.

11 Cf. Huxley, G., ‘Nicias, Crete and the Plague’, GRBS 10 (1969), 235–9, at 239Google Scholar: ‘The name is, presumably, coincidental unless there was some tie of guest-friendship with the Athenian's family.’ I myself have tentatively adopted this interpretation in Ritualised Friendship and the Greek City (Cambridge, 1987). pp. 141 n. 66. 177Google Scholar.

12 Thuc. 8.6.3 with J. K. Davies, APF, Table I. My forthcoming article ‘Patterns of Name Diffusion within the Greek World and Beyond’ contains numerous further examples of name migration.

13 See Herman, , op. cit. (n. 11), pp. 130–42Google Scholar.

14 Thuc. 5.43, 6.89; Plut, . Alcib. 14Google Scholar. Cf. Wallace, M. B., ‘Early Greek Proxenoi’, Phoenix 24 (1970), 189–208CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

15 See Herman, , op. cit. (n. 11), pp. 140–2Google Scholar, with Appendix B, and ‘Patterns of Name Diffusion…’ (n. 12).

16 Busolt, G., Griechische Geschichte (Gotha, 1895), ii 2. 212 n. 1Google Scholar, Jacoby, F.FGrHist 457 introduction, p. 313Google Scholar, and Davies, J. K., APF, p. 403Google Scholar tend to regard the story as a later invention. possibly dating from the period of the Peloponnesian war. Huxley, op. cit. (n. 11), tends to accept it as historical. Dodds, E. R., The Greeks and the Irrutional (Berkeley, Los Angeles, London. 1951). pp. 141–6Google Scholar goes so far as to suspect the value of all the evidence for Epimenides, with the implication that his very existence might have been fabricated.

17 An Athenian tombstone from the Roman period (IG ii2. 6220) also bears this combination of name and patronymic: Epimenides N[ei]kiou Thorikios. In IG ii2.8463. an Athenian inscription from the Roman period as well, the deceased is styled Nikias Nikiou Gortynios, which fits in with both the obligation of a xenos to bury and commemorate a dead partner (cf. Herman, , op. cit. (n. 11), pp. 26 and 136Google Scholar) and with the occasional change of the A-B-A-B pattern of name-inheritance into A-A-A-A; cf. IG ii2.237, where an Acarnanian xenos of the Athenian general Phormio has his son and grandson named Phormio. These inscriptions might indicate a further extension of the relationship in time. I have no comment to make on [M]ounychos Epimenid[ou] in IG ii2.2271, line 21, from the period of the late Roman empire.

18 It is unclear to me at what stage in life the children were given the name of their father's xenos. In Hdt. 3.55.2. the son of the Spartan Archias is said to have adopted the name Samios ‘because he was the son of that Archias who was slain fighting gallantly at Samos’, and this seems to suggest that the adoption of the name occurred at a time when he was old enough to grasp the symbolism of such an act. The implication might be that names were not necessarily given at birth.

19 In actuality this succession of names did not take place since Lysander only fathered daughters, cf. Poralla, P. and Bradford, A. S., A Prosopography of Lacedaemonians (Chicago, 1985), no. 504Google Scholar.

20 Cf. Davies, , APF, pp. 403–7Google Scholarand Table 1.

21 Other examples of two people of different cities having the same names and the same patronymics are Lichas (or Liches), son of Arkesilaos (or Arkesileos), in both Sparta and Thasos (see Herman, , op. cit. (n. 11), p. 20Google Scholar), and Menestheus, son of Iphikrates, in both Athens and Miletus (cf. Davies, J. K., APF, pp. 250ffGoogle Scholar. with Kawerau, G. and Rehm, A., Das Delphinion in Milei iii.1 (Berlin, 1914), no. 138, line 67)Google Scholar. I am indebted to Professor D. M. Lewis for the latter example.

22 See Demoulin, H., Épiménide de Crète (Brussels, 1901), pp. 89ffGoogle Scholar. for a detailed, but inconclusive, analysis of the sources relating to Epimenides' city of origin.

23 Fornara, C. W., The Athenian Board of Generals from 501 to 404 (Wiesbaden, 1979)Google Scholar[Historia, Einzelschriften, Heft 16].

24 Plut, . Nicias 23Google Scholar= Jacoby, F., FGrHist 328Google Scholar(Philochorus) F 135 (cf. Schol. Aristoph. Peace 1031). and cf. Pritchett, W. K., The Greek Stale at War iii (Berkeley, Los Angeles, London, 1979), p. 62Google Scholar: ‘Whether Stilbidas was the same mantis as the one who lived with Nikias in Athens (Nikias 4), we do not know’. The data on manteis are assembled in Kett, P., Prosopogruphie der historischen griechischen Manteis bis auf die Zeit Alexanders des Grossen (Diss. Erlangen, 1966)Google Scholar, cited hereafter as Kett: Stilbidas = Kett, no. 63.

25 Pritchett, . op. cit., p. 62Google Scholar.

26 Pritchett, , op. cit., pp. 49–56Google Scholar. These seers were sometimes granted citizenships and proxenies in the cities they served, but that is another matter.

27 Hdt. 7.228.4. with Kett. no. 50; cf. Herman, , op. cit. (n. 11), p. 26Google Scholar.

28 IG ii2. 17 + SEG 15.84+ SEG 16.42, with Osborne, M. J., Naturalization in Athens (Brussels, 1981)Google Scholar[4 vols. in 3] D8.

29 Theainetos' city of origin is unknown, and Judeich, W., Topographic von Alhen (Munich, 1905), i.254Google Scholar took the Theainetos described by Pausanias and the one mentioned by Thucydides to refer to the same man: the seer who accompanied Tolmides on his campaigns and had his statue erected next to Tolmides' was none other than Tolmides' son, an Athenian. This is unlikely, since Pausanias regards Theainetos' being a seer to Tolmides (ὃς ⋯μαντε⋯ετο Tολμ⋯δῃ). rather than his being Tolmides' son, as the most characteristic feature of their relationship. Furthermore, as observed above (p. 8), military manteis came regularly from communities other than the ones in which they exercised their trade. If Theainetos were an Athenian, this would be a unique departure from this regularity. Pritchett did not think Paus. 1.27.5 and Thuc. 3.20.1 referred to the same man: ‘It is an odd coincidence that the mantis of the Plataians in 428 B.C. was likewise named Theainetos and was the son of a Tolmides: Thuc. 3.20.1’, op. cit. (n. 22), p. 54. Gomme, , HCT ii.280Google Scholar, suspected Theainetos son of Tolmides was a Plataean. Kett (no. 31) was unaware of Paus. 1.27.5 and therefore denied any connection between Theainetos, the seer in Thucydides. and Tolmides, the Athenian general.

30 Cf. Herman, , op. cit. (n. 11). pp. 146–52Google Scholar.

31 The reputation of healers and purifiers enjoyed by Epimenides' family – the seer's profession tended to be handed down from one generation to the next – might have played some role in persuading the assembly to comply with his demands. The plague at Athens reached its climax at that time.

32 Cf. Herman, op. cit. (n. 11), passim.

33 Examples: Lysias 14 (Against Alkibiades); 18 (Properly of Nikias' Brother); 19 (On the Property of Aristophanes).

34 Cf. Gomme, , HCT ii.221Google Scholar: ‘In iii.52.2 the Spartan commander at the siege of Plataia has no name: but, though even this is unusual in Thucydides, and some Plataians are known by name (iii.52.5). it is more easily explicable.’

35 The reading ‘Arimnestos’ in the standard editions of Herodotus and Plutarch (Hdt. 9.64.2 and Plut, . Arisl. 19.1Google Scholar) should, in view of this, be emended into ‘Aeimnestos’, a version which on palaeographical grounds seemed to be inferior. The reading ‘Aeimnestos’ in Thuc. 3.52.5 is unproblematic.