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Some Observations on the Persian Wars: 3. The Campaign of Plataea1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 December 2013

J. A. R. Munro
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Extract

Mardonius reoccupied Athens, Herodotus tells us (ix. 3), in the tenth month after Xerxes had taken it, that is to say not earlier than June of the next year. The pause in the war lasted therefore far beyond the winter. Both parties were no doubt anxious to gather the new harvest, but there were also other reasons for their delay.

Mardonius had been left in a difficult situation. The forces at his disposal were, it is true, still formidable. First, he had his own division, which we have seen reason to suppose was one of the six Persian corps ď armée, 60,000 strong. In confirmation of that estimate it may be noted that Herodotus assigns to him one sixth of Xerxes' army, which he conceives to have been the levy of the whole empire; and that if we compare the details of Mardonius' division (viii. 113, ix. 31.) with the catalogue of Xerxes' host (vii. 61–5), and reckon a myriad for each contingent of infantry (Immortals: θωρηκοφόροι: Medes: Sacae and Bactrians: Indians), we get 50,000 infantry, which with 10,000 cavalry gives the exact composition conjectured for a Persian army corps. The small drafts incorporated according to Herodotus from other contingents may be assumed, to have filled up the gaps made in the ranks by the first campaign. Second, Mardonius had his Greek auxiliaries, say 20,000 men, including the valuable Thessalian and Boeotian cavalry. Herodotus (ix. 32) estimates the Greek contingents at 50,000 men, but he expressly says that he has no authority for their numbers, and both probability and analogy (e.g. vii. 185, viii. 66) are against so high a computation.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Hellenic Studies , Volume 24 , November 1904 , pp. 144 - 165
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1904

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References

2 It is pretty clear from Thueydides that 20,000 men were far more than enough to besiege Potidaea. Was it the entry of Aristeus through the sea (Thuc. i. 63) that revived the memory of Artabazus' attempt?

3 Cf. Wilamowitz, , Aus Kydathen, p. 57Google Scholarseqq.

4 Hdt. viii. 131–2. The comments of the historian, especially the often quoted words τὴν δὲ Σάμον ἐπιστέατο δόξῃ καὶ ῾ Ηρακλέας στή λας ἴσον ἀπέχειν merely echo the disgust of the conspirators, and in particular of his name sake from whom he probably derived the in formation, at the failure of their mission.

5 Hdt. ix. 77. The significance of the passage was, I think, first suggested to me by a remark of Mr. E. M. Walker's.

6 On Orestheum, or Oresthasium, and the road see Mr.Loring, W.'s excellent discussion in this Journal vol. xv. (1895) pp. 26–31 and 47–52Google Scholar. It was a route not infrequently used by the Spartans when the Arcadians were hostile.

7 On the date see Busolt, 's argument, Griech. Gesch. 2 vol. ii. p. 722Google Scholar, note 2. But he makes too much of the story of the embassy to Sparta.

8 Hdt. ix. 14–15, cf. Paus. i. 44, 4. Herodotus does not see the point of the cavalry demonstration. For the site of Sphendale v. Milchhoefer, Karten von Attika, Text, ix. pp. 27–28Google Scholar. As Hauvette, , Hérodote pp. 453–4Google Scholar, justly contends against Delbrück, we need not take Herodotus to imply that all Mardonius' movements were crowded into a single day.

9 The redundancy of 800 has already been explained above.

10 Notably by Beloch and Delbrück. If Beloch's ingenious suggestion, that Παλέες in Hdt. ix. 28 is a misreading of ϝαλεῖοι could be accepted, it would much enforce the argument that the figures are conjectural, for 200 hoplites would be a natural contingent from Pale but not from Elis. But it is too venturesome.

11 Grundy, , The topography of the battle of Plataca, 1894Google Scholar, The great Persian War, 1901. Woodhouse, , The Greeks at Plataiai in this Journal, xviii, 1898, pp. 33–59Google Scholar.

12 Leake, , Northern Greece, ii. p. 324Google Scholar, Grundy, , Topography, pp. 24, 50Google Scholar.

13 On the Electran gate cf. Frazer, 's Pausanias, vol. v. p. 36Google Scholar.

14 Leake, , N. Greece, ii. pp. 330–1Google Scholar. Karten von Attika, No. 10.

15 Leake, N.Greece, ii. pp. 327, 333Google Scholar. Hunt, W. Irving in the Amer. Journ. of Archae. vi. 1890, p. 472Google Scholar, note 39. Grundy, , Topography, p. 9Google Scholar, Gt. Pers. War, p. 458 note.

16 I am not convinced that the Eleutherae pass has any exclusive right to the name Dryos-cephalae. Herodotus, ix. 39, seems to apply it to the whole group of passes, and Thucydides, iii. 24, is quite consistent with this interpretation.

17 In the text to Karten von Attika, ix. § iv, especially pp. 35, 38–40.

18 Leake, N.Greece, ii. pp. 327–30Google Scholar. Hauvette, , Rapport. (Nouv. arch. d. missions scient, et littér. 1892) p. 369Google Scholar.

19 The words ἐς ᾿Ερυθρὰς in Hdt. ix. 22 qualify παρεὁντων not ταχθέντες

20 Much where Dr. Grundy puts it. The words ὡς οὐ κατέβαινον οἰ ᾿´ Ελληνες ἐς τὸ πεδίον (Hdt. ix. 20) are no objection, and Hysiae is not too far west of Erythrae if we remember how long the Greek front must have been.

21 Cf. Hunt, W. I., Amer. Journ. of Archae. vi. 1890, p. 473Google Scholar.

22 Hauvette, Rapport pp. 370–1Google Scholar. Woodhouse, , J.H.S. xviii. 1898, pp. 38–40Google Scholar.

23 Similarly Pausanias in a passage already quoted (ix. 1, 6) is at pains to distinguish from the direct road the still more roundabout route through Hysiae.

24 Plutarch probably knew the ground at least as well as Herodotus or Thucydides. Objection has been taken (e.g. N., LeakeGreece, ii. p. 366Google Scholar. note; Grundy, , Topography, p. 35Google Scholar, note, Gt. Persian War, pp. 496–8) to his grouping together Hysiae, the temple of Demeter, and the chapel of Androcrates. But it ought to be remembered that he is preoccupied with the oracle and inclined to stretch a point in its favour, and that he is describing the scene on a panoramic scale. Dr.Grundy, (Topography, p. 3)Google Scholar notes how the mass of Cithaeron falsifies impressions of distance at Plataea.

25 J.H.S. xviii. 1898, p. 57, note B.

26 It does not affect my point that the termination of these and similar words may prove to have nothing to do with νῆσος but to be the -assos or -essos so common in Anatolian names, for the Greeks certainly took it for νῆσος

27 Washington, H. S., Amer. Journ. of Archae. vii. 1891, pp. 392—404Google Scholar. Grundy, , Topography, pp. 54—61Google Scholar.

28 Gt. Pers. War, p. 495.

29 Amer. Journ. of Archae. vi. 1890, p. 110.

30 C.I.G. vii. 1670, 1671. Grundy, , Topography, p. 9Google Scholar; Gt. Pers. War, p. 458, note. Frazer, , Pausanius, vol. v. p. 5Google Scholar.

31 If the left wing was indeed a coveted post of honour (Hdt. ix. 26—28) the Athenians may also have resented being ordered out of it, however richly they deserved the degradation.

32 Busolt, , Griech. Gesch. II.2, p. 713Google Scholar, note 1, conjectures that Herodotus may have had relations with the family of Artabazus.