Listed 2 sub titles with search on: Ancient literary sources for wider area of: "ACHARNES Municipality ATTICA, EAST" .
PARNITHA (Mountain) ATTIKI
Attic mountain, image and altars of Zeus on.
DEKELIA (Ancient demos) ACHARNES
...The Corinthians, Syracusans, and Alcibiades, pressing all the same request
in the assembly of the Lacedaemonians, succeeded in persuading them; but as the
Ephors and the authorities, although resolved to send envoys to Syracuse to prevent
their surrendering to the Athenians, showed no disposition to send them any assistance,
Alcibiades now came forward and inflamed and stirred the Lacedaemonians by speaking
as follows: (Thuc. 6.88.10)
'... Meanwhile you must carry on the war here more openly, that the Syracusans
seeing that you do not forget them, may put heart into their resistance, and that
the Athenians may be less able to reinforce their armament. You must fortify Decelea
in Attica, the blow of which the Athenians are always most afraid and the only
one that they think they have not experienced in the present war; the surest method
of harming an enemy being to find out what he most fears, and to choose this means
of attacking him, since every one naturally knows best his own weak points and
fears accordingly. The fortification in question, while it benefits you, will
create difficulties for your adversaries, of which I shall pass over many, and
shall only mention the chief. Whatever property there is in the country will most
of it become yours, either by capture or surrender; and the Athenians will at
once be deprived of their revenues from the silver mines at Laurium, of their
present gains from their land and from the law courts, and above all of the revenue
from their allies, which will be paid less regularly, as they lose their awe of
Athens, and see you addressing yourselves with vigour to the war. (Thuc.+6.91.5-7)
'The zeal and speed with which all this shall be done depends, Lacedaemonians,
upon yourselves; as to its possibility, I am quite confident, and I have little
fear of being mistaken. Meanwhile I hope that none of you will think any the worse
of me if after having hitherto passed as a lover of my country, I now actively
join its worst enemies in attacking it, or will suspect what I say as the fruit
of an outlaw's enthusiasm. I am an outlaw from the iniquity of those who drove
me forth, not, if you will be guided by me, from your service: my worst enemies
are not you who only harmed your foes, but they who forced their friends to become
enemies; and love of country is what I do not feel when I am wronged, but what
I felt when secure in my rights as a citizen. Indeed I do not consider that I
am now attacking a country that is still mine; I am rather trying to recover one
that is mine no longer; and the true lover of his country is not he who consents
to lose it unjustly rather than attack it, but he who longs for it so much that
he will go all lengths to recover it. For myself, therefore, Lacedaemonians, I
beg you to use me without scruple for danger and trouble of every kind, and to
remember the argument in every one's mouth, that if I did you great harm as an
enemy, I could likewise do you good service as a friend, inasmuch as I know the
plans of the Athenians, while I only guessed yours. For yourselves I entreat you
to believe that your most capital interests are now under deliberation; and I
urge you to send without hesitation the expeditions to Sicily and Attica; by the
presence of a small part of your forces you will save important cities in that
island, and you will destroy the power of Athens both present and prospective;
after this you will dwell in security and enjoy the supremacy over all Hellas,
resting not on force but upon consent and affection.' (Thuc. 6.92.1-5)
Such were the words of Alcibiades. The Lacedaemonians, who had themselves before
intended to march against Athens, but were still waiting and looking about them,
at once became much more in earnest when they received this particular information
from Alcibiades, and considered that they had heard it from the man who best knew
the truth of the matter. (Thuc.+6.93.1-3)
...In the meantime the Lacedaemonians prepared for their invasion of Attica, in
accordance with their own previous resolve, and at the instigation of the Syracusans
and Corinthians, who wished for an invasion to arrest the reinforcements which
they heard that Athens was about to send to Sicily. Alcibiades also urgently advised
the fortification of Decelea, and a vigorous prosecution of the war. (Thuc. 7.18.1)
...In the first days of the spring following, at an earlier period than usual,
the Lacedaemonians and their allies invaded Attica, under the command of Agis,
son of Archidamus, king of the Lacedaemonians. They began by devastating the parts
bordering upon the plain, and next proceeded to fortify Decelea, dividing the
work among the different cities. Decelea is about thirteen or fourteen miles from
the city of Athens, and the same distance or not much further from Boeotia; and
the fort was meant to annoy the plain and the richest parts of the country, being
in sight of Athens. (Thuc. 7.19.1-2)
...This same summer arrived at Athens thirteen hundred targeteers, Thracian swordsmen
of the tribe of the Dii, who were to have sailed to Sicily with Demosthenes. Since
they had come too late, the Athenians determined to send them back to Thrace,
whence they had come; to keep them for the Decelean war appearing too expensive,
as the pay of each man was a drachma a day. Indeed since Decelea had been first
fortified by the whole Peloponnesian army during this summer, and then occupied
for the annoyance of the country by the garrisons from the cities relieving each
other at stated intervals, it had been doing great mischief to the Athenians;
in fact this occupation, by the destruction of property and loss of men which
resulted from it, was one of the principal causes of their ruin. Previously the
invasions were short, and did not prevent their enjoying their land during the
rest of the time: the enemy was now permanently fixed in Attica; at one time it
was an attack in force, at another it was the regular garrison overrunning the
country and making forays for its subsistence, and the Lacedaemonian king, Agis,
was in the field and diligently prosecuting the war; great mischief was therefore
done to the Athenians. They were deprived of their whole country: more than twenty
thousand slaves had deserted, a great part of them artisans, and all their sheep
and beasts of burden were lost; and as the cavalry rode out daily upon excursions
to Decelea and to guard the country, their horses were either lamed by being constantly
worked upon rocky ground, or wounded by the enemy. (Thuc. 7.27.1-5)
Besides, the transport of provisions from Euboea, which had before
been carried on so much more quickly over land by Decelea from Oropus, was now
effected at great cost by sea round Sunium; everything the city required had to
be imported from abroad, and instead of a city it became a fortress. Summer and
winter the Athenians were worn out by having to keep guard on the fortifications,
during the day by turns, by night all together, the cavalry excepted, at the different
military posts or upon the wall. But what most oppressed them was that they had
two wars at once, and had thus reached a pitch of frenzy which no one would have
believed possible if he had heard of it before it had come to pass. For could
any one have imagined that even when besieged by the Peloponnesians entrenched
in Attica, they would still, instead of withdrawing from Sicily, stay on there
besieging in like manner Syracuse, a town (taken as a town) in no way inferior
to Athens, or would so thoroughly upset the Hellenic estimate of their strength
and audacity, as to give the spectacle of a people which, at the beginning of
the war, some thought might hold out one year, some two, none more than three,
if the Peloponnesians invaded their country, now seventeen years after the first
invasion, after having already suffered from all the evils of war, going to Sicily
and undertaking a new war nothing inferior to that which they already had with
the Peloponnesians? These causes, the great losses from Decelea, and the other
heavy charges that fell upon them, produced their financial embarrassment; and
it was at this time that they imposed upon their subjects, instead of the tribute,
the tax of a twentieth upon all imports and exports by sea, which they thought
would bring them in more money; their expenditure being now not the same as at
first, but having grown with the war while their revenues decayed. (Thuc.7.28.1-4)
...While both parties were thus engaged, and were as intent upon preparing for
the war as they had been at the outset, the Euboeans first of all sent envoys
during this winter to Agis to treat of their revolting from Athens. Agis accepted
their proposals, and sent for Alcamenes, son of Sthenelaidas, and Melanthus from
Lacedaemon, to take the command in Euboea. These accordingly arrived with some
three hundred Neodamodes, and Agis began to arrange for their crossing over. But
in the meanwhile arrived some Lesbians, who also wished to revolt; and these being
supported by the Boeotians, Agis was persuaded to defer acting in the matter of
Euboea, and made arrangements for the revolt of the Lesbians, giving them Alcamenes,
who was to have sailed to Euboea, as governor, and himself promising them ten
ships, and the Boeotians the same number. All this was done without instructions
from home, as Agis while at Decelea with the army that he commanded had power
to send troops to whatever quarter he pleased, and to levy men and money. During
this period, one might say, the allies obeyed him much more than they did the
Lacedaemonians in the city, as the force he had with him made him feared at once
wherever he went. (Thuc. 8.5.1-3)
...Upon the Council withdrawing in this way without venturing any objection, and
the rest of the citizens making no movement, the Four Hundred entered the council
chamber, and for the present contented themselves with drawing lots for their
Prytanes, and making their prayers and sacrifices to the gods upon entering office,
but afterwards departed widely from the democratic system of government, and except
that on account of Alcibiades they did not recall the exiles, ruled the city by
force; putting to death some men, though not many, whom they though it convenient
to remove, and imprisoning and banishing others. They also sent to Agis, the Lacedaemonian
king, at Decelea, to say that they desired to make peace, and that he might reasonably
be more disposed to treat now that he had them to deal with instead of the inconstant
commons.
Agis, however, did not believe in the tranquillity of the city, or
that the commons would thus in a moment give up their ancient liberty, but thought
that the sight of a large Lacedaemonian force would be sufficient to excite them
if they were not already in commotion, of which he was by no means certain. He
accordingly gave to the envoys of the Four Hundred an answer which held out no
hopes of an accommodation, and sending for large reinforcements from Peloponnese,
not long afterwards, with these and his garrison from Decelea, descended to the
very walls of Athens; hoping either that civil disturbances might help to subdue
them to his terms, or that, in the confusion to be expected within and without
the city, they might even surrender without a blow being struck; at all events
he thought he would succeed in seizing the Long Walls, bared of their defenders.
However, the Athenians saw him come close up, without making the least disturbance
within the city; and sending out their cavalry, and a number of their heavy infantry,
light troops, and archers shot down some of his soldiers who approached too near,
and got possession of some arms and dead. Upon this Agis, at last convinced, led
his army back again, and remaining with his own troops in the old position at
Decelea, sent the reinforcement back home, after a few days' stay in Attica. After
this the Four Hundred persevering sent another embassy to Agis, and now meeting
with a better reception, at his suggestion despatched envoys to Lacedaemon to
negotiate a treaty, being desirous of making peace. (Thuc. 8.70.1-71.3)
This extract is from: Thucydides. The Peloponnesian War (ed. Richard Crawley, 1910). Cited July 2005 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains comments & interesting hyperlinks.
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