Note 304 — Chapter LVIII · FROM THE RESOLUTION OF THE ATHENIANS TO ATTACK SYRACUSE, DOWN TO THE FIRST WINTER AFTER THEIR ARRIVAL IN SICILY.

Thucyd. vi, 60. ἐνταῦθα ἀναπείθεται εἷς τῶν δεδεμένων, ὅσπερ ἐδόκει αἰτιώτατος εἶναι, ὑπὸ τῶν ξυνδεσμωτῶν τινὸς, εἴτε ἄρα καὶ τὰ ὄντα μηνῦσαι, εἴτε καὶ οὔ· ἐπ’ ἀμφότερα γὰρ εἰκάζεται· τὸ δὲ σαφὲς οὐδεὶς οὔτε τότε οὔτε ὕστερον ἔχει εἰπεῖν περὶ τῶν δρασάντων τὸ ἔργον.

If the statement of Andokidês in the Oratio de Mysteriis is correct, the deposition previously given by Teukrus the metic must have been a true one; though this man is commonly denounced among the lying witnesses (see the words of the comic writer Phrynichus ap. Plutarch, Alkib. c. 20).

Thucydidês refuses even to mention the name of Andokidês, and expresses himself with more than usual reserve about this dark transaction, as if he were afraid of giving offence to great Athenian families. The bitter feuds which it left behind at Athens, for years afterwards, are shown in the two orations of Lysias and of Andokidês. If the story of Didymus be true, that Thucydidês after his return from exile to Athens died by a violent death (see Biogr. Thucyd. p. xvii. ed. Arnold), it would seem probable that all his reserve did not protect him against private enmities arising out of his historical assertions.