Note 744 — Chapter LIV · TRUCE FOR ONE YEAR.—RENEWAL OF WAR AND BATTLE OF AMPHIPOLIS.—PEACE OF NIKIAS.

Thucyd. v, 10. Καὶ ὁ μὲν, κατὰ τὰς ἐπὶ τὸ σταύρωμα πύλας, καὶ τὰς πρώτας τοῦ μακροῦ τείχους τότε ὄντος ἐξελθὼν, ἔθει δρόμῳ τὴν ὁδὸν ταύτην εὐθεῖαν, ᾗπερ νῦν κατὰ τὸ καρτερώτατον τοῦ χωρίου ἰόντι τὸ τροπαῖον ἕστηκε.

Brasidas and his men sallied forth by two different gates at the same time. One was the first gate in the Long Wall, which would be the first gate in order, to a person coming from the southward. The other was the gate upon the palisade (αἱ ἐπὶ τὸ σταύρωμα πύλαι), that is, the gate in the Long Wall which opened from the town upon the palisade. The persons who sallied out by this gate would get out to attack the enemy by the gate in the palisade itself.

The gate in the Long Wall which opened from the town upon the palisade, would be that by which Brasidas himself with his army entered Amphipolis from Mount Kerdylium. It probably stood open at this moment when he directed the sally forth: that which had to be opened at the moment, was the gate in the palisade, together with the first gate in the Long Wall.

The last words cited in Thucydidês—ᾗπερ νῦν κατὰ τὸ καρτερώτατον τοῦ χωρίου ἰόντι τὸ τροπαῖον ἕστηκε—are not intelligible without better knowledge of the topography than we possess. What Thucydidês means by “the strongest point in the place,” we cannot tell. We only understand that the trophy was erected in the road by which a person went up to that point. We must recollect that the expressions of Thucydidês here refer to the ground as it stood sometime afterwards, not as it stood at the time of the battle between Kleon and Brasidas.