demagogic type, this superficial imitation of Pericles, are traits in which the Cleon of Thucydides is historical.
This closes the series of those seven speeches, delivered at Athens, for which Thucydides probably derived the "general sense" either from his own recollection or from the sources accessible to a resident citizen. The only one of these which exhibits distinct traces of artificial dealing with subject-matter is the first speech of Pericles. And in this the only traces are, first, a certain adjustment of the language to that of the Corinthian speech made earlier in the same year[1]; and, secondly, a phrase by which the composer prepares the reader for a subsequent speech of Pericles.
§ 6. We now come to the speeches made elsewhere than at Athens from 432 B.C. onwards, or made at Athens later than 424 B.C. In regard to all or most of these, Thucydides must have relied on reports of the "general sense" brought to him by others (τοῖς ἄλλοθέν ποθεν ἐμοὶ ἀπαγγέλουσιν)[2]. The
- ↑ As the Corinthian speech contains a prophecy (after the event) of the occupation of Deceleia (ἐπιτειχισμός, i. 122 § 1), so the corresponding passage of Pericles contains what may be a reference to the Athenian occupation of Pylos and of Cythera (i. 140 § 3, ἐπιτειχίζειν . . . πλεύσαντας ἐς τὴν ἐκείνων).
- ↑ Thuc. v. 26: "It befell me to live in exile for twenty years [423–403 B.C., or nearly so] after my command at Amphipolis. I thus became conversant with both parties—indeed, as an exile, I saw most of the Peloponnesians—and was enabled to study the events more at my leisure." The phrase here—καὶ γενομένῳ παρ' ἀμφοτέροις τοῖς πράγμασι—certainly implies more than thatThucydides was in the countries which were the theatre of the war. It imphes that he was in intercourse with the actors. The words καθ' ἡσυχίαν denote the "ease" or "leisure" of one who had no official status, political or military. Hitherto Thucydides had been himself an actor in the war (in the Ecclesia or as στρατηγός); now he was only a thoughtful spectator. During his exile Thucydides certainly spent some time in Italy and Sicily. Marcellinus quotes (§ 25) the statement ὡς φυγὼν ᾤκησεν ἐν Ἰταλίᾳ, and there was even a tradition of his burial there (§ 33). There are traces, I think, of Thucydides' personal knowledge of Sicily in the speech of Alcibiades (vi. 17 § 3). Niebuhr conjectured, and E. Wölfflin has shown (Antiochus v. Syrakus u. Coelius Antipater, Winterthur, 1872), that Thucydides (vi. 2 ff.) used the Σικελιῶτις συγγραφή which Antiochus of Syracuse brought down to 424 B.C. These are the chief data for conjecturing the general nature of the materials which Thucydides may have had for the speeches subsequent to 425 B.C. In many cases, probably, he had good sources of information, though it is hardly likely that the words ὧν αὐτὸς ἤκουσα can include any speeches except those made at Athens before his exile.
