The Athenian Expedition to Melos in 416 B.C.

The Athenian Expedition to Melos in 416 B.C.Author(s): Michael G. SeamanReviewed work(s):Source: Historia: Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte, Bd. 46, H. 4 (4th Qtr., 1997), pp. 385-418Published by: Franz Steiner VerlagStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4436483 .Accessed: 10/10/2012 21:36

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THE ATHENIAN EXPEDITION TO MELOS IN 416 B.C.*

Taking the proceedings of the Athenians toward Melos from the beginning to the end, they form one of the grossest and most inexcusable pieces of cruelty combined with injustice which Grecian history presents to us [...J But the treatment of the Melians goes beyond all rigor of the laws of war; for they had never been at war with Athens, nor had they done anything to incur her enmity [...] Far from tending to strengthen her entire empire, by sweeping in this small insular population who had hitherto been neutral and harmless, it raised nothing but odium against her, and was treasured up in after times as among the first of her misdeeds. 1

In 1947 Felix Wassermann observed that "there is hardly any article or book on Thucydides which does not mention the Melian Dialogue."2 That remark holds true today, for the drama of the Melian Dialogue elicits an emotional response from us, not unlike that of George Grote's, and a discussion of it still constitutes a chapter in nearly every book on Thucydides.3 Given that this passage has been, in Wassermann's words, "much praised and discussed," it is remarkable that only a few scholars have investigated the historical circumstances which may have led to the siege of Melos. With few exceptions, modern scholars of the Melian Dialogue have preferred to address the various literary questions inherent in the dialogue, such as the structure and form of the passage or the date of its composition.4 The dramatic narration of the Melian Dialogue and eventual fate of the island are presented in great detail by Thucydides but the

* I am grateful to M. H. Chambers, A. R. Dyck, M. Haslam, J. H. Kroll, S. Lattimore, P. G. Naiditch, K. A. Raaflaub, F. S. Russell, and D. Sanborn who have given me the benefit of their advice and criticism.

I George Grote, A History of Greece (London 1850) VII, 114. Titles cited only by author's name are listed in the bibliography at the end. ML = Meiggs-Lewis.

2 F. M. Wassermann, "The Melian Dialogue," TAPA 78 (1947) 18 n. 1. 3 In his recent book The Humanity of Thucydides (Princeton 1994) Charles Orwin devotes

the better part of two chapters to the Melian Dialogue. A. Andrewes noted accurately, in A. W. Gomme, A. Andrewes and K. J. Dover, A Historical Commentary on Thucydides (= HCT), 5 vols. (Oxford 1945-81) IV, 182, that "there is no keeping up with the bibliography."

4 Cf. Orwin's recent comment (ibid. 97): "In reading the dialogue, we must ask above all what happens in it" (emphasis in original).

Historia, Band XLVI/4 (1997) C Franz Steiner Verlag Wiesbaden GmbH, Sitz Stuttgart

386 MICHAEL G. SEAMAN

affair remains obscure nonetheless and one is justified in complaining that the account supplies "insufficient" historical information.5

For in introducing the Athenian expedition to Melos in 416 B.C., Thucyd- ides does not give an explanation for it: in the speech of the Athenians, he seems to imply that imperial policy was the reason for the Athenian aggression. Some modern scholars have found this interpretation in varying degrees unaccepta- ble. Thucydides' failure to provide a full historical account of the Melian affair has led some scholars to seek an Athenian motivation from other sources. This essay is concerned with the Melian Dialogue in its historical context and will focus on the historical sources, both literary and epigraphic, relevant to the fate of Melos. Its purpose is to discern the reasons why the Athenians found it necessary to suppress the island in 416 B.C.6

I: The Melian Dialogue

Melos was a Dorian colony that actively participated in the Hellenic alliance against Persia.7 At the outset of the Peloponnesian War they were apparently allied to neither side.8 But Thucydides relates that in 426 the Athenians sent to Melos 60 ships and 2,000 hoplites under the command of Nicias for the purpose of bringing over the island to the alliance:

5 Andrewes, HCT (as in n. 3) IV, 156. 6 All subsequent dates are B.C. unless indicated otherwise. 7 Melos was thought to have been settled by Dorians in the age of the migrations (Thuc.

5.112.2) and it claimed to be a colony of Sparta (Hdt. 8.48; Thuc. 5.84.2, 89, 106; Xen. Hell. 2.2.3). Most scholars now consider Thucydides' date of colonization too early. For a discussion, cf. I. Malkin, Myth and territory in the Spartan Mediterranean (Cambridge 1994) 74-78. Herodotus recounts (8.46, 48) how Melos sent two fifty-oared ships (revvE- KOvtepot) to the battle of Salamis. All subsequent text citations refer to Thucydides unless indicated otherwise.

8 [oi kv5iiaxotj 'A&rivaiov [.I vijaot 6oiat &vrot Flekonovviaou icai Kpinn; np6; ijXtov cviaXovra, n&czat ai Kuicka5e; icXnv MiiXou icai ei3pa; (2.9.4). Cf. also 5.84.2: T6 R?v ipd.tOV Oi)SETEpOV OVXE; #oi5XaCov. Thera appears on the tribute list for 429/8, can be restored in the lists of 430/29 (paying three talents), 422/1 and 416/5, is mentioned in a decree concerning the tribute moved by Cleonymus in 426 as paying in installments money owed to Athens (IG I3 68.22 = ML 68.21), and was assessed five talents in the tribute reassessment decree of 425/4. That Thucydides omitted Thera's incorporation into the empire may indicate that it was brought into the fold peacefully; he may have been ignorant of this fact or, more likely, considered it insignificant. It was probably coerced to join in 431 or 430. Thucydides is not likely to have erred in his catalogue of the two alliances in 431 and, though he neglects to discuss the status of minor Aegean islands (cf. n. 107 below), it is safe to assume that, prior to 431, Melos had never joined the Peloponnesian League.

The Athenian Expedition to Melos in 416 B.C. 387

For they wished to draw in the Melians since they were islanders and yet were unwilling to submit or to join their alliance. But when they would not give way, even when their land was being ravaged, the Athenians left Melos and sailed to Oropos in the region of Graia (3.91.2-3).9

Thucydides states that Melos had been unwilling to join the Athenian alliance voluntarily; and so the Athenians undertook an expedition in 426 with the expectation that threats backed by a strong show of force would persuade Melos to abandon her neutrality. When this strategy proved unsuccessful, the Athenians ravaged the land around the main settlement, harboring the hope that the Melians would be induced to submit to them and join the alliance if they saw their territory being laid waste.10 When these tactics failed, rather than risk a prolonged siege to force them into the alliance, the Athenians withdrew.11

A decade later, in the sixteenth year of the war, while officially at peace with Sparta, the Athenians sent a second expedition to the island. According to Thucydides, the latter expedition had the same purpose as the former: to compel the Melians to join the alliance.12 In their second attempt to bring over the Melians, the Athenians at first employed the same tactics they had used in the previous expedition. For a second time, intimidation and a multitude of armed forces failed to win them over and the Athenians likely ravaged the territory

9 Cf. also 5.84.2. The expedition is related in brief by a confused Diodorus (12.65.1-3; cf. n. 83 below).

10 This may be deduced from 5.84.2: ezeta o aroub; flvcyKalov oi 'A&vatot Slo vrE niv yiv. The fact that by 426 the Melians were "unwilling to join the [Athenian] alliance" might indicate that they were previously "invited" to join the empire, perhaps, as R. Meiggs conjectures in The Athenian Empire (Oxford 1972) 321f., at the time their neighboring island Thera was.

11 The siege could conceivably have gone on for nearly a year since Thucydides relates that the expedition was sent in the summer of 416 and that the city was taken in the winter of 416/5. Andrewes, HCT (as in n. 3) IV, 156-157, n. X, holds that Nicias did not lay siege in 426 because taking the forces to Melos was "no more than an excuse to take out a force whose real (and necessarily secret) use was to be against the Boeotians" (for which cf. 3.91.3-6). D. M. Lewis, "The Archidamian War" in D. M. Lewis et. al. (eds.), CAH V (2nd ed. Cambridge 1992) 409, concurred. But we need not assume that the rendez-vous in Boeotia precluded a siege since we know that the investment of the island required only a small part of the combined forces (5.114.2). M. Pi6rart, "Deux notes sur la politique d'Ath6nes en mer Eg6e (428-425)," BCH 108 (1984) 165f., has argued forcefully that, after the menacing endeavors of Alcidas, the Athenians decided to strengthen their control of the southern Cyclades. Perhaps the Athenian expedition to Melos in 426 was punishment for certain assistance that the Melians had provided Alcidas or perhaps it was merely to reassert authority over the Aegean which the Athenians considered their private dominion. The motive may simply have been, as Thucydides relates, pure imperialism.

12 cKi o6wc dirpEin; VoiElTE n6kXe tEX?; ieyiatT; radaiaOat gkpta npOKaxOxuJivr5;,

tvlicixoV; yev6a6a. 9XovTa; vrv igeT?pav akCov mo'reX0 i; (5.111.4).


again in an effort to pressure the Melians to join the alliance.13 When these tactics failed to coerce the Melians to join the alliance, the Athenians did not retire from the island, as in the previous expedition, but besieged the city until it capitulated.

In his narration of the events on Melos in 426 Thucydides maintains that the Melians were never members of the Athenian alliance (3.91.2) and he later states that they maintained their neutrality for at least the first six years of the war (5.84.2). But it is in this latter passage, which forms part of the prelude to the Melian Dialogue, that we learn of a change in the state of affairs between the two poleis in the year 426:

Now the Melians are colonists of the Lacedaemonians and were unwilling to obey the Athenians like the rest of the islanders. At first they kept quiet as neutrals, then, when the Athenians tried to force them [to join the alliance] by ravaging their land, they came into open war (5.84.2).

Thucydides' use of the words "they came into open war" (e5; nroxqiov cavepov Kat?o-r1cFav) has often been taken to mean that the Melians renounced their neutrality and began to engage in war with the Athenians in 426 but such a conclusion should be resisted for several reasons. 14 First, there is no supporting evidence which suggests that the Melians ever went to war with the Athenians (not to mention that doing so would have been quite foolish). Second, if the Melians had decided on war with the Athenians (and their allies) they would likely have concluded a treaty with the Spartans, an alliance for which there is again no evidence. If the Melians had in fact joined the Spartan alliance or had injured the Athenians in any way, we might expect Thucydides at some point to have said as much.15 In fact Melos emerges from the Melian Dialogue as a neutral state never having injured Athens. In the dialogue the Melians do not actually say that they are currently neutral but they allude to their status on two occassions. Early on they purport to ask the Athenians:

13 That the Athenians and their allies ravaged the Melian territory before laying siege in 416 might be inferred from 5.84.3: ctpaTonE6eIac4tEvoI oUv ?S Trv yiV aivr&v ri itapa- UKEl 'ra6rM oi ctparryoi KkEop,6n TE O AuKOA0o10; Kai Tetcxia4 6 T-taigiXotv, lpiv a6&KCtv Ti kn,6you; irpdov no jaogtO vou; gi ?eg? av np?aPet;. Such pressure tactics were standard practice (cf. 4.87.2-88.1 where Brasidas threatens to ravage the land of the Acanthians to compel them to revolt from Athens and succeeds in inducing their revolt in part by arousing their "fears for the harvest").

14 R. Meiggs, Empire (as in n. 10) 386: "From that point there was a state of war between Athens and Melos." Cf. also M. Amit, "The Melian Dialogue and History," Athenaeum 46 (1968) 220; C. W. Macleod, "Form and Meaning in the Melian Dialogue," Historia 23 (1974) 399.

15 We certainly would have expected the Melians to have mentioned such an alliance in the dialogue with the Athenians.


Qote [6e] 'cncuXiav dayovra; 1]g&; axiou; ji?v eivat adv+t nokxgicov, tuggdXouq5; 6e p.in6et?p(ov, oV'ic dv 6?taaoO; (5.94).

And so you would not agree to our remaining at peace, being friends instead of enemies but allies of neither side?

Again, in their concluding words to the Athenians the Melians make their final and desperate proposal:

lpoKcakolIE0a 6e gaS; oikot gEv dIvat, EoXegot &? gET8pOt;, Kat ?K

t; yfj; ?uv &vaXxopiatual cov&ax; nroti.aatcvout atTtv; 601coioatv it t-

t*6&tot dlvat adRuoT-pot; (5.112.3).

But we propose to you that we be friends, and enemies to neither side, and that you withdraw from our territory after making a treaty that both sides deem suitable.

In both passages the Melians want to be (i.e. to go on being) neutral friends - at peace - neither allies nor enemies of both sides. Their neutral status, though not stated outright, is certainly implied - the verb employed is eivat not ycvEaOa. The only difficulty is in reconciling or accounting for the apparent inconsisten- cy between what Thucydides says in 5.84 of the change in the state of affairs in 426 and the Melians' (implicit but uncontested) claim of neutrality still in 416.

After the Athenians plundered Melian land in 426 relations between the two states were no doubt severely strained.16 But if the Melians at that point had decided to engage in war with the Athenians, whether or not they had concluded a treaty with the Spartan alliance, they would not have been able to profess such impartiality as they do in the Melian Dialogue by continually asserting their neutrality, even when allowing for elementary rhetoric. Such a blatant change in their position vis-a-vis the Athenians would have violated their neutral status.17 It is rather more likely that what Thucydides means when he writes that the Melians "went to war openly" is that they engaged in acts of open hostility with the Athenians but did not escalate the hostilities to the extent that they invalidated their neutral status. Such unfriendly acts, which we would expect to have occurred during the events of 426, would have prompted Thucyd- ides to declare that the Melians had "taken a stand toward open war" but will have still allowed the Melians to claim neutral status.18

16 R. Meiggs, Empire (as in n. 10) 322: After the Melian land had been ravaged in 426 "there can have been little doubt where her sympathy lay."

17 Cf. R. A. Bauslaugh, The Concept of Neutrality in Classical Greece (Berkeley/Los Angeles 1991) 142-151. Bauslaugh provides a detailed discussion of Melian neutrality and what the subjugation of an unallied Melos meant to Thucydides.

18 Though the two states "came into open war" following the Athenian expedition of 426, this does not necessitate that the state of war continued to 416; hence a possibility that


As Thucydides tells the story, Athens is guilty of unprovoked aggression against a harmless neutral. While Thucydides may have believed that the conquest of Melos was an inevitable consequence of the desire to dominate inherent in human nature, he nonetheless does have the Athenians speak of two immediate reasons for the expedition, both of which are revealed in the same sentence:

(OtS ?w xa' oi5 lskeovow dptat icaKti TO acToa?5cX i'jitv 6ta To ataa,tpaoivat &v iapacXotts, dXkkui re cait viOuC5rat vaxmcparopov,

Kcat da0evea-Tepot ?Ee'pov 0vre sqi ?i neptcyevota0s (5.97).19

So that, to say nothing of our ruling even more subjects, you would also afford us security through your submission, especially if you, being islanders, and even weaker than others, should fail to prove superior to the masters of the sea.

The Athenians speak of enlarging their empire but the use of i`w ("to say nothing of") implies that this is not the underlying motive for the expedition but that it is subsidiary to the one that follows; namely, that an independent Melos is a threat to Athenian interests.20 The clear import of the (admittedly very obscurely expressed) 6"XX(; TE Kat clause is that successful resistence by a weak island would be especially dangerous. The idea is repeated when the

official policy toward Athens and Sparta was not changed even as a result of the earlier expedition. A parallel might be Sphodrias' abortive march on the Piraeus in 378: an unsuccessful act of violence which did not cause Athens to declare war on Sparta, though it certainly affected her attitude (Xen. Hell. 5.4.19-25). There may have been additional acts of open hostility on the part of the Melians. Perhaps after the expedition of 426 Melos refused to allow Athenian ships to put in at her port, while still allowing those of Sparta and her allies to land there. Thucydides tells us that immediately before the outbreak of the war, the Spartans instructed their allies in Italy and Sicily to refuse their ports to the Athenians if they came with more than a single ship until certain preparations had been completed (2.7.2). When the Athenians in 415 sailed along the coast of Italy, some of the cities refused to receive them (6.44.2). An identical proposal is ratified by the Corcyrae- ans at the instigation of the oligarchs during their revolution (3.71.1). This behavior echoes the tenor of what we know of the Megarian Decree (1.144.2).

19 For the view that Thucydides considered the destruction of the island an inescapable consequence resulting from "the escalating violence under pressure of war," see P. R. Pouncey, The Necessities of War: A Study of Thucydides' Pessimism (New York 1980) 93. Although Thucydides may have viewed as inevitable the events at Melos in 416, this essay explores why the Athenians might have felt the need to attack Melos.

20 The Athenians may have been motivated in part because the Melians were "unwilling to submit" to them (3.91.2; 5.84.2: OOkK ij6sXov '6naKoi3etv). Early in the Melian Dialogue (5.91.2), the Athenians speak of a "benefit" (d4ekia) to be derived from the conquest of

the Melians and admit that they themselves "desire to rule [the Melians]" (PouAx6gevot [...] vigCv dp4ai). They later (5.111.4) outline their "moderate" terms: that the Melians "be their allies, keeping their own territory but paying tribute."


Athenians inform the Melians of the identity of those whom they consider more dangerous than the independent cities on the mainland:

[For we reckon as more dangerous] both the islanders, whoever they may be, who, like you, have not submitted and those who are already irritated by the necessity of submission to our rule. For it is they who are most inclined to succumb to recklessness and to bring to both them themselves and to us manifest danger (5.99).

The concern that the Athenians have is with the islanders, both free and tributary, and with the danger of revolt against the empire. The attack on Melos, then, would be a preemptive strike to remove the potential risk of revolt of the Athenian allies. This appears to be the motive for the Athenian expedition which Thucydides makes the Athenians admit. For various reasons, this explanation for the attack has proved unsatisfactory to many modern scholars.

From epigraphic evidence we know that Melos had contributed to the Spartan war fund21 and that it had been included in the Athenian assessment of 425/4.22 This evidence might suggest a more complex pattern in the relations between Athens and Melos than can be gathered from Thucydides alone, since one inscription, the Spartan War Fund which lists the Melians among the contributors, suggests support for Sparta, and another, the Athenian Reassess- ment Decree which includes the island among states assessed for tribute, suggests submission to Athens. In addition to the epigraphic evidence, some later literary sources, Diodorus and the scholia to Aristophanes, mention the Athenian expedition to Melos in 416 and may provide additional clues to uncover a motive for it. Since these sources have been used to "correct" Thucydides, an analysis of them and of several modern arguments which rely on them will here follow, in an effort to ascertain the credibility of the version of events given by Thucydides. I conclude with a summary of the events leading up to and following the Athenian expedition to Melos in 416.

II: The Spartan War Fund

The inscription commonly known as the Spartan War Fund lists contributions "for the war" given to the Spartans both by specific individuals and by states. Of the states, four can be positively identified: the Aeginetans, the exiles of the Chians, the Ephesians and the Melians, who alone are recorded as having

21 IG V 1,1 + = SEG 39.370*. For a detailed treatment of the inscription, cf. W. T. Loomis, The Spartan War Fund, IG V 1, I and a New Fragment, Historia Einzelschriften 74 (Stuttgart 1992).

22 IG 13 71 = ML 69.


contributed twice. Unfortunately, of the two Melian contributions only the first, 20 mnas of silver, can be read. The date of the inscription has been the subject of much debate, with most scholars dating it to the Archidamian War, between the years 431 and 421. If the contributions of the Melians to the Spartan war fund were made at some point during this period, they might have prompted either (or both) of the Athenian expeditions to Melos. F. E. Adcock, followed by many others, believed that the Melian contributions were made in 427 and hence provoked the Athenian attack of 426.23 Nearly all scholars of the inscription have argued that the Melians made their contributions sometime before the conquest of Melos in 416. A. Andrewes found support for this date in Thucyd- ides who, in the Melian Dialogue, has the Athenians allude to an "injury" committed against them by the Melians:24

ATH: Now then, we on our part will neither use fine phrases, for example, either to the effect that we rule justly, having destroyed the Mede, or that we now proceed against you because we have been injured, offering a long speech that no one would believe, nor will we recommend that you think that you will persuade us by declaring either that, even though you are colonists from Sparta, you did not campaign with them or that you have not injured us (5.89).25

The fact that the Athenians seemingly twice accuse the Melians of wrongdoing has prompted some historians to find in this passage evidence for "an immedi-

23 F. E. Adcock, "Alcidas dpyupoX6yoq" in Melanges Gustave Glotz I (Paris 1932) Sf. Adcock dated the inscription to "the latter part of the year 427" and argued that the expedition of Alcidas to Ionia in 427 was actually a mission to solicit contributions which were subsequently inscribed (p. 6). Adcock was followed by M. N. Tod, Greek Historical Inscriptions I (2nd ed. Oxford 1946) 134; G. E. M. de Ste. Croix, "The Character of the Athenian Empire," Historia 3 (1954) 9, 13; Gomme, HCT (as in n. 3) 11, 12; but cf. II, 294 where he prefers the year 428; A. H. M. Jones, Athenian Democracy (Oxford 1957) 71; L. H. Jeffery, The Local Scripts of Archaic Greece (Oxford 1961) 197, 201; R. Meiggs in R. Meiggs/D. M. Lewis (eds.), A Selection of Greek Historical Inscriptions (Oxford 1969) 184; cf. also Meiggs, Empire (as in n. 10) 314 n. 3; Loomis, SWF (as in n. 21) 81. D. M. Lewis, ibid. 184, originally dated the inscription to 396/5 finding the three contributions in darics "unlikely to have been so widespread during the Archidamian War." Jeffery afterward in a book review, JHS 101 (1981) 191, adopted Lewis' late date but Lewis himself subsequently accepted Adcock's. In correspondence with M. H. Chambers the year before his death, Lewis wrote of the inscription: "I agree it seems to take us back to the 420s." Loomis (pp. 56-76) provides a concise summary of earlier arguments used for dating the inscription.

24 Andrewes, HCT (as in n. 3) IV, 157. 25 So scholiast, de Romilly, Kriiger, Poppo-Stahl, Jowett (2nd. ed. 1900), Dale, Gomme,

Warner, and Crawley. Against Boehme-Widman, Smith in the Loeb, Classen-Steup, and Andrewes who read "since you are colonists from Sparta, you did not march with us."


ate antecedent quarrel" to the expedition of 416.26 But this interpretation of the Athenian assertions takes their words out of the context of the discussion which is essentially about the relevance of justice. Thucydides has the Athenians say that they will not use "fine phrases" (i.e. false pretexts) such as saying that they come against the Melians "having been injured." Again, the Athenians ask the Melians to reciprocate and not to plead with the Athenians to spare them simply because they have done them no harm.27 In other words, the Athenians tell the Melians not to use the excuse "we have done you no wrong" not because they actually have injured the Athenians but because the subject of justice is not open for discussion at this conference. This is what Thucydides means when he next has the Athenians tell the Melians that they should not strive for what is just but for what is possible:

Rather, we recommend that you try to accomplish that which is possible out of that which we both truly consider possible, since you know as well as we do that in human negotiations justice is taken into account when there is equal power to compel, while the powerful exact what they can and the weak suffer what they must (5.89).

By having the Athenians tell the Melians that justice is possible only among equal powers, Thucydides implies the innocence of the Melians.28 This be- comes even clearer later in the dialogue when the Melians denounce the unjust actions of the Athenians:

Nonetheless, we trust that, so far as fortune is concerned, we shall through divine favor be at no disadvantage because we are god-fearing men stand- ing our ground against unjust men (5.104).

Here the Melians proclaim that the Athenians are less likely to enjoy divine favor because they are o' 5iiaiot, unjust men, while the Melians themselves are just.29 Elsewhere in the dialogue, the Melians refer to their "just cause" (Tco

26 Andrewes, HCT(as in n. 3) IV, 157. Again, at 5.104, the Melians tell the Athenians np6; ov 6KxaiolU; ictjAie6a.

27 It should be stressed that the Athenians make two references to hypothetical wrongdoing on the part of the Melians and each time the reference to punitive Melian wrongdoing is preceded by a parallel clause. In the notes of his forthcoming translation of Thucydides (Hackett 1998), Steven Lattimore has unpacked the logic of this sentence: "The Atheni- ans state that they will not claim (a) that they deserve their empire because they defeated the Persians, and (b) that the Melians have injured them, provided the Melians do not claim that (c) they did not join the Spartans against Athens [...1 and (d) they have done the Athenians no injury. Since (c) is true, (d) should be also. (b) is then false, implying that (a) is also false."

28 Dionysius of Halicarnassus (Thuc. 38) concluded as much: "This [statement] is identical to an admission that the expedition is against innocent victims."

29 Andrewes, HCT (as in n. 3) IV, 172.


6ticatc), accuse the Athenians of ignoring justice (UVpt; oivro nap'a -or &itcat- ov) and ask them not to rule out the principle of the common good (vogiiogv YE [...] 1caaKaEaXuetv v d; t6 icotvov dyaO6v), further evidence which suggests that Thucydides believed the Athenian attack to be without provocation (5.86, 90). The Melian Dialogue, then, can be seen to emphasize the Melian innocence at the time of the Athenian expedition rather than to question it. If we therefore take the text at face value and concede that the Melians are guilty of no injury, Thucydides might then be evidence for a Melian contribution to the Spartan war fund after the Athenian expedition of 416.

In an effort to date the inscription, scholars have searched for a year when all the inscribed groups were pro-Spartan at a time when Sparta was fighting a war.30 This condition, however, does not necessarily apply to a search for an acceptable date for the Melian contributions. Several features of the inscription appear to suggest that the entries were inscribed over an extended period. First, the overall spacing, both horizontally and vertically, is disorderly. Neither the horizontal spacing of lines nor the vertical spacing of letters is uniform.31 Second, the fact that the Melians make two appearances on the stone, with one entry from a certain Molokros in between, suggests two separate contributions given over time. (Otherwise, why not combine the two contributions in one entry?)32 A third feature which indicates that the stone was not inscribed at one sitting is the appearance of two dividing lines on the side of the stone. The first of these two inscribed lines divides the first Melian entry from that of Molokros and the second divides the entry of Molokros from the second Melian entry.33 If

30 Several attempts have been made to determine a date from letter forms but these dates have varied from the early fifth century to the early fourth. I am inclined to agree with Lewis, Selection (as in n. 23) 184, who found "the argument from lettering indecisive." For a discussion of the arguments, cf. Loomis, SWF (as in n. 21) 60-62.

31 Moreover, there are two vacats on the front of the stone. Loomis, ibid. 28, comments that the general disorganization suggests "prima facie that this inscription was not inscribed at one time, but rather that contributions were entered as and when received."

32 The words i8ov roi Mcitot toliq Aamce8aioviot;, with their corresponding contributions, are inscribed twice. It cannot be that the two separate Melian entries merely reflect two different forms of a single contribution (i.e. twenty mnas of silver on the one hand and ten staters on the other) since a few of the other contributors made multiple contributions (one seems to combine raisins with talents and two other unknown gifts) but were only given one entry. Anyway, we would not expect to see an entry between the two Melian entries if they were both given (and inscribed) at once.

33 Some scholars have identified the unknown Molokros, who contributed one silver talent, with the Spartan Molobros, the father of Epitadas, commander at Sphacteria (4.8.9). The manuscripts are unanimous in transmitting Molobros and Thucydides tells us through the speeches of Archidamus (1.80.4), the Corinthians (1.121.3), and Pericles (1. 141.3; 142. 1) that the Spartans did not possess much wealth, either publicly or privately. While this seems to be true on the whole, Thucydides probably intended in these passages to point


the side of the inscription was in fact inscribed later than the front and the contributions which are divided by inscribed lines were made over time, then it follows that the Melian contributions, the third to last and the last to be inscribed, were given at a later date than all other contributions (with the exception of that of Molokros) and they therefore can be dated relatively independently of the historical criteria which govern the dating of the those on the front of the stele.34

The Melians are not likely to have desired Spartan assistance in a war until some time after 431.35 Though Sparta remained essentially at war from 431 until the Peace of Antalcidas in 387/6, notwithstanding the Peace of Nicias, two periods of years when the Melians would not likely have contributed to the fund may be eliminated from consideration. First, a Chian faction could not have contributed between 409/8 and 394, effectively eliminating those years for the front of the stele.36 Loomis has convincingly argued that the gifts recorded on this stele are so small in comparison with the sums which were raised and spent in the 390s "that it is difficult to see how amounts so insignificant would have been given special recognition in these years."37 These conditions leave open two periods of time during which the Melians are likely to have contributed to

out the relative ease with which Athens could finance the war compared to Sparta; and evidence from Herodotus (6.61.2; 7.134) might suggest that in fact some Spartan families were wealthy. A. H. M. Jones, Sparta (Oxford 1967) 36f., suggests on the evidence from Pausanias (6.2.1-2; 6.1.7) that some Spartans were apparently rich enough to breed horses. Because of the missing ethnic following his name it can probably be inferred that the donor was a Spartan. B. Bleckmann, "Sparta und seine Freunde im dekeleischen Krieg," ZPE 96 (1993) 307f., makes a solid case for reading Molokros.

34 The Melian contributions may be dated independently of the historical criteria for the other contributions insofar as these criteria (e.g. the use of rciv Xtov toi 'ixot rather than soi X-ot indicates that the government of Chios was still loyal to Athens) be taken into account by the time the Melians made their contribution (which must have been for the same war). A. P. Matthaiou and G. A. Pikoulas, "'ESov rot; AaKE:atpoviot1 norr6v ?x0Exov," Horos 7 (1989) 80-1 11, have argued on historical grounds that the stone was inscribed over a period extending from 427 to 424/3, when in their opinion the Melians made their contributions, to sometime after 415/4, when the Ephesian entry was regis- tered back on the front of the stone.

35 A gift from rcov Xiov roi tiXot renders impossible a date immediately following the Persian Wars since the Chians were then allied to the Hellenic league (cf. Hdt. 9.106). In the "first" Peloponnesian War, it is unlikely that the Ephesians, the Chians or the Melians would have looked to Sparta for protection (let alone all three) since that war seems to have been fought only on the mainland.

36 In 409/8 the Spartan general Cratesippidas seized the Chian acropolis and restored exiles, presumably pro-Spartan, who then governed until the battle of Cnidos in 394 (Xen. Hell. I.1 .32; 3.2.1 1; Diod. 13.65.3-4; 14.84.3). A discussion is provided by Loomis, SWF (as in n. 21) 66.

37 Loomis, ibid. 68f. Moreover, the contribution by the Aeginetans, fourteen mnas and ten staters, the smallest of those legible, does not make sense 15 years after their restoration.


the fund: during the Archidamian War, between the years 431 and 421, or during the Decelean War, from 413 to 404.38

It has been taken for granted by most scholars that the Melians could not have made their contributions in the period from 416 to 405 since, it is assumed, after the Athenian expedition of 416, the Melians, whoever and wherever they were, would not have had the means to contribute.39 This assumption, however, depends a great deal on one line in Thucydides. After narrating the siege and unconditional surrender of the Melians he sums up their fate:

oi &iieictEtvav MiXiwv 6ovot tpoivraq `XaIov, aic&ta; &' xa' ydvatca;

ivppano6Eiaav (5.116.4).

The Athenians thereupon slew as many adult males as they captured and enslaved the children and women.

It should not be assumed that the Athenians killed all adult Melian men.40 Thucydides is specific in writing that the Athenians killed 6aot; iP36vta; tkXa4ov, "as many adult men as they captured." This limiting clause affords two conclusions: not all Melian adult men were captured; hence not all were slain. If in fact they were all slain why does Thucydides not write "the Athenians slew all the adult males," as he does when describing the Spartan execution of the Plataeans in 427?41 Nor does he write simply "they slew the adult males," as he does when narrating the Athenian execution of the adult males at Scione in 421.42 The use of the limiting clause may indeed imply that some of the Melians

38 The Melians may have contributed to the Spartan cause between the years 425-421 (i.e. to contribute to the rebuilding of the Spartan fleet) but their two donations were not likely given at this time both because "we hear of no naval activity by or on behalf of the Spartans" in the years following the loss of the Spartan fleet at Pylos in 425 (Loomis, ibid. 69f.) and because the two Melian contributions are too modest to have been given at this time (for which arguments see below).

39 Cf. Meiggs and Lewis, Selection (as in n. 23) 184: "The appearance of Melos rules out a date between 416 and 404;" Loomis, SWF (as in n. 21) 65: "It would have been almost impossible for the Melians to make two contributions (or even one!) between 416 and 405." The sole exceptions are Bleckmann, Freunde (as in n. 33) 298-300; and recently M. Pi6rart, "Chios entre Ath6nes et Sparte: La contribution des exiles de Chios a 1'effort de guerre lac6d6monien pendant la guerre du P6loponn6se," BCH 119 (1995) 261. Both date the inscription to 409.

40 Many historians have made the assumption. Cf. especially J. B. Bury, The Ancient Greek Historians (New York 1909) 139; J. H. Finley, Thucydides (Cambridge, MA 1942) 211. More recent is J. V. A. Fine, The Ancient Greeks: A Critical History (Cambridge, MA

1983) 490. 41 3.6.8.1: "Leading [the Plataeans] away, they slew them, no one excepted" (didyovxe?

adreKretvov cait iaipexov vnotvaavTo o-&Uva). 42 5.32.1: "About the same time during this summer, the Athenians reduced the Scionaeans

by siege, slew the adult males and made slaves of the children and women" (itepi 5e Tub5

aoi)'o; XpOvoV5 toiV- 0?pOo; tOI[TOu 1K1vaiovi ?v 'AOnvaiot cti oXtopXcKWavtc;


escaped the executions. Thucydides states that the Athenian garrisons were not heavily manned (5.116.2) and that during the siege the Melians twice overpow- ered them and brought in supplies (5.115.4; 1 16.2). We might expect that some Melians made their way to Sparta to plead for assistance, just as the Plataeans who broke free from the Spartan siege made their way to Athens, presumably for the same reason (3.24.2). Additionally, it is conceivable that some of the Melians were absent or in exile when the Athenian expedition arrived or that they subsequently fled. Moreover, Thucydides is clear in stating that it is the

(v,ra;, or men of military age, whom the Athenians capture and kill; thus, older men would presumably have been spared.43 Other evidence too suggests that not all adult Melian men perished at the hands of the Athenians. Both Xenophon (Hell. 2.2.9) and Plutarch (Lys. 14.3) mention that in 405 the Spartan general Lysander restored the Melians to their islands.44 Many scholars have argued that the Melians who escaped execution "could not have reconstituted themselves sufficiently to make two contributions to the Spartan war fund"45 but this argument is far from convincing.

Resettlements of exiled populations, especially by Sparta, were not uncom- mon during the Peloponnesian War. When the Aeginetans were expelled en masse in 431 by the Athenians who afterward colonized the island, some of them were subsequently resettled by the Spartans in Thyrea (2.27).46 The Melians, who claimed to be colonists of the Spartans, would likely have been given equal treatment. Both Aegina and Melos were ethnically Dorian but only Melos professed to be a colony of Sparta.47 When Plataea fell to the Spartans in

a1ucKxetvav toib 3d6vzac, ntda1a & K.ai yxvatica; rv8pair6taav). When relating the Spartan capture of the city of Hysiae in 417/6, Thucydides (5.83.2) is again explicit: "they slew all those free men whom they caught" (?oiS; ?XF?Uofpou; naiv'ta; oi5; cXa1ov alo?t6ivacvt). Cf. also 1.30.1. Pouncey, Necessities (as in n. 19) 94, may be right in suggesting that the slaughter may have been prompted by the Melian slaying of Athenians following their night sortie and breach of the wall (5.115.4).

43 Note that the Athenian executions at Scione were likewise restricted to the adult males. The Spartans execute all the Plataeans ("no one excepted") since the women, children and older men had earlier been evacuated to Athens (2.78.3).

44 These references to a resettlement most likely refer to adult men since it was a mere eleven years after the slayings, hardly enough time for many enslaved children to grow up and be freed. Here we might recall the words of the fourth century general and author of several military treatises, Aeneas Tacticus (proem), who, in his treatise on defense preparations against a siege, gives the following consolation to those poleis who may suffer defeat: "But if after all a reverse should befall them, yet at all events the survivors may be able later on to restore their affairs to the former condition, like certain of the Hellenes who have been reduced to worst extremes and yet have reestablished themselves."

45 Loomis, SWF (as in n. 21) 65. 46 The rest eandpiraav Mxar& Tiv dXr1v 'EXX6&a. 47 Cf. n. 7 above.


427 the city was initially given over to a group of exiled Megarians while the land was leased to the Thebans (3.68.3).48 It is entirely possible that the surviving Melians, who presumably numbered fewer than the expelled Aegi- netans, were resettled by the Spartans and that they subsequently donated to the Spartan war fund, along with the resettled Aeginetans and the exiled Chians, whatever money they could muster.49 It is not difficult to imagine a more or less unified and reconstituted Melian population, a group which was hoping desper- ately to be restored to their island by a victorious Spartan military.

Adcock, followed by Jones, Loomis and many others, suggested that when Alcidas advanced covertly across the Aegean with his squadron of triremes in 427 he not only twice put in at Melos but twice solicited and accepted contributions for the Spartan cause.50 Adcock went on to suggest that this "harbouring and comforting of Alcidas was a cause" of the Athenian expedition against the island in 426. Adcock's conjecture has surprisingly been accepted by many scholars despite its inherent weaknesses. It assumes that Thucydides, though at this time well placed to obtain this information and already at work on his history, was ignorant (or negligent) of the facts. First, it should be said that the purpose of the expedition was not to solicit funds but to relieve Mytilene, then under Athenian siege (3.26.1). Second, it is significant that Thucydides, though he seems to know a great deal about the Spartan admiral's expedition (i.e. that he touched at Delos, Icaros, Myconos and Embatum in Erythraea before learning of the fate of Mytilene, and at Myonnesos, Clarus and Ephesus before returning post haste through open sea to the Peloponnese), supplies no evidence that Alcidas put in at Melos, much less that he did so twice, soliciting and accepting contributions on both occasions. One might well ask why Alcidas did not succeed in soliciting gifts from some of these other ports he visited (and later record them in our inscription).51 But perhaps the most compelling reason to accept a date for a Melian contribution after 427 is the fact that Thucydides is quite clear in stating that the Melians did not change their attitude toward the war until after the Athenians "tried to force them by ravaging their lands" in

48 The surviving Plataeans who had been evacuated to Athens were in 421 resettled by the Athenians in recently conquered Scione (5.32.1). They subsequently were resettled at Plataea by the Spartans following the Peace of Antalcidas, expelled once again by the Thebans before the battle of Leuctra and resettled once more at Plataea by Philip after the battle of Chaeronea (Xen. Hell. 6.3.1; Paus. 9. 1; Diod. 15.46.4-6).

49 As Loomis rightly points out, SWF (as in n. 21) 63f., there is no technical hindrance to a contribution by them as toi MdXtot rather than toi OEiryovue; MaXtot if they in fact

constitute the main body of citizens and not merely a political faction. The Aeginetans, who were expelled en masse, are simply referred to as oi AiytvVrat.

50 Adcock, Alcidas (as in n. 23) 5f. 51 Cf. 3.69, 76 where he later put in at Cyllene and Corcyra. It is unclear whether a Spartan

nauarch in the Archidamian War even had the authority to levy the states he called upon.


426 (5.84.2). Such contributions in 427 might have provided sufficient reason for an Athenian attack on Melos in 426 but if this were the case Thucydides would likely have learned of them. He in fact informs us that the purpose of the first Athenian expedition to the island was to "bring them over to the alliance" (3.91.2). From the evidence we have, it would seem that Melos, neutral since the Persian Wars, had no compelling reason to fear the Athenians until 426.52

That the Melians at some point made two contributions to the Spartan war effort is sufficient evidence to suggest an alliance of some sort. It cannot be that the Melians intended to keep their contributions secret, since it would make no sense to have them inscribed subsequently in stone. The stone itself is a concrete acknowledgment of a Melian alliance with Sparta. Such an alliance during the Archidamian War is not consistent with the Melians' professed neutrality in the Melian Dialogue.53 Though the second Melian contribution remains unknown, the first payment by them amounted to a modest 20 mnas of silver and it is likely that the second was of similar value.54 The two contribu-

52 Loomis (per coll.) feels that Alcidas may have pressured some or all of the Melians to contribute to the Spartan cause involuntarily but this argument, though rational enough, is equally problematic. First, the inscription does not read like a list of contributions given by only a part of the Melian citizenry, in which case the inscription might record a donation from Spartan "friends among the Melians" as is the case with the Chian entry. Neither does it have the tenor as stemming from Spartan extortion but speaks of appreci- ation for its donors, listing not only various minor monetary gifts but also contributions in kind: two or three thousand medimnoi of an as yet unidentified grain as well as an unknown quantity of raisins. Furthermore, it is unlikely that any state would set up an inscription to record involuntary contributions of nontraditional allies which would only "turn friends into enemies" (3.32.2). Loomis further observes that we might expect from the surviving, resettled Melians a smaller contribution than that of the exiled Aeginetans but we might recall that only some of the Aegenetans, the presumed contributors, were resettled by the Spartans (cf. n. 46 above). Moreover, the amounts given by both groups, while differing a little, are on the whole relatively insignificant.

53 Although Thucydides has the Melians assert repeatedly (5.104, 106, 108, 112) and rather confidently that the Spartans will aid them (cf. 5.104 where they state dvayKrlv iXoouaav [...] foio0eiv), he does not write that this is so because the two are allies. Cf. Gomme, HCT (as in n. 3) IV, 172: Though the Melians say that the Spartan "alliance" will come to their aid, "the mere occurrence of the word here does not prove the existence of a formal alliance." The Melians are made to give another plausible reason for their confidence: their kinship with Sparta and the shame its betrayal would bring (5.104, 106). Thucydides underlines that fact immediately before the dialogue when he reminds his reader that the Melians are colonists of the Spartans (5.84.2).

54 Given that all of the preserved contributions are relatively low (the combined total of the Attic equivalent of the preserved monetary gifts is just over thirteen talents), it is highly unlikely that the second contribution given by the Melians was much larger than the first. Loomis, SWF (as in n. 21) 77-80, gives a succinct discussion of the economic significance of the inscription.


tions represent some sort of an alliance but if they had been given in the Archidamian War, it is difficult to see exactly what the Melians thought they might gain by making such paltry contributions. If they were meant to seek Spartan protection from an Athenian invasion one might expect larger contributions. At one point in the Melian Dialogue Thucydides has the Athenians warn the Melians of what was true for most of the war: "it is not likely that [the Spartans] will ever cross over to an island while we are masters of the sea" (5.109).55 Could the Melians really have renounced their neutrality and counted on Spartan protection for so meager a payment?

In the Archidamian War, the Melians probably could have afforded to make a healthier investment in their safety if this had been their intention. The Athenians in 425/4 demanded that they muster up 15 talents for the empire.56 Though there is no evidence that they ever paid it, and even if this figure was unrealistic, it is nonetheless forty-five times 20 mnas, the known amount inscribed on the Spartan stele.57 It is worth recalling that Aegina, though it was certainly much wealthier than Melos, was continually assessed by the Atheni- ans (and presumably paid) 30 talents per annum. It is these Aeginetans who, after being expelled by Athens and resettled by Sparta, contribute to the Spartan war fund fourteen mnas and ten staters, a contribution more or less the same size as that of the Melians.58

55 Athenian naval superiority was a well known fact from the beginning of the Archidamian War (cf. 1.141-142; 3.32.3 for similar comments). Later in the dialogue the Athenians speak another truth but the words would have rung just as true throughout the Archidami- an War: ititv Kcai ov6ic dvricrtiioatv &ri oinS' di6 gtd; xnoKroe noLtopKia; 'A0Ivaciot &t' aXXcov 46oov 6eX0p7ioav (5.111.1). Surely, after the affairs of Naxos, Thasos, Aegina, Euboea and Samos, the inhabitants of neutral Melos would have realized the vulnerability of their position and would not have been willing during the Archidamian War to risk a contribution to the Spartan war effort.

56 IG 13 71.65 = ML 69.65. 57 20 mnas = 2,000 drachmas = one-third of one talent. To get an idea of the purchasing

power of 20 mnas, we might recall that in Athens in 415, the pay of a rower was one drachma per day (6.31.3), the upkeep of a trireme with a crew of c. 200 rowers was one talent per month, assuming they were paid for each day of the month (6.8.1).

58 The Attic equivalent of the Aeginetan contribution is 1428 drachmas, or about 15 mnas. Perhaps more useful in determining the value of the assessment of Melos would be a comparison to the other places which were assessed 15 talents in 425/4. Of these, the assessment of the Naxians was raised from 6.4 talents, the Andrians from six and the Eretrians from three. We might reasonably conclude that before the new assessment Melos might have been assessed by the Athenians only three to six talents, values still nine to eighteen times the known Melian contribution to the Spartan war fund. Using population figures from 1961, C. Renfrew, "Polity and Power: Interaction, Intensification and Exploitation," in C. Renfrew/M. Wagstaff (eds.), An Island Polity: The Archaeology of Exploitation in Melos (Cambridge 1982) 277-28 1, calculated that, if modern numbers of inhabitants on the island reflect those in antiquity, Melos was assessed by Athens 2.7


The stone is thought to have been used as a propaganda device to reveal widespread support for the Spartan war effort.59 Such an inscription, however, with donors and contributions that pale in comparison to those inscribed on the Athenian tribute quota lists, would not likely have had such an effect. Contribu- tions of this size would have been taken seriously (and inscribed) only if they were an adequate reflection of what the contributors could afford. Matthaiou and Pikoulas make the accurate observation that none of the donors whose names can be positively identified was a formal ally of Sparta.60 The stone, listing the support of two or three exiled populations, might rather have been used as a propaganda device to remind the Hellenes and the Spartans themselves that they were fighting not only as the "liberators of the Greeks" but also as the "restorers of the Greeks."61

Therefore, the Melians who made the contributions to the Spartan war fund must be those who survived the Athenian expedition of 416, who resettled and reconstituted themselves somewhere in Greece, and at least some of whom after the war were "restored to their homes" by Lysander. These "refugee" Melians, like their Dorian kin, the exiled Aeginetans, might have been resettled by the Spartans somewhere in the Peloponnese and would have had ample time (twelve years at the most) to raise 20 mnas and a similar second contribution.62 It is these "refugee" Melians who proclaimed their support for Sparta and had

talents per thousand population ( 15 talents for a population of c. 5,000 in 1961 ), a figure nearly double the average of 1.5 for the Cycladic islands. He estimates that 15 talents is about twice what might be expected, based on payments by islands of other sizes and population densities, and concludes (p. 277) that the Athenian assessment likely reflects "a maximum estimate for the Melian production beyond subsistence for the population of the time." M. Wagstaff and J. F. Cherry, "Settlement and Population Change," in C. Renfrew/M. Wagstaff (eds.), An Island Polity (as above) 140, rightly point out that the relatively high assessment may be an indication of "a densely settled island with corre- spondingly high levels of productivity and surplus." Two late sources (Plut. Mul. virt. 7.246d, 247a; Polyaen. Strateg. 8.64.1) relate how Melos "being in need of land" founded a colony in Caria and, as we know, the founding of colonies was usually accompanied by an exploding population growth.

59 Loomis, SWF (as in n. 21) 83. 60 Matthaiou and Pikoulas, 'E6ov (as in n. 34) 112-113. 61 Xenophon (Hell. 2.2.9) narrates how, after restoring the Aeginetans and Melians to their

islands, Lysander did the same co!; &XXot; 6oto rA; awx6Tv 6aorpovTo. Plutarch reports (Lys. 14.3) how Lysander's actions delighted "the whole of Hellas," identifying in addition the Scionaeans as among those repatriated, a fact not incredible since only their adult males had been slain (cf. n. 42 above). Bleckmann, Freunde (as in n. 33) 299, rightly infers that "die vollstandige Restituierung beider Staaten [Melos und Aegina] ein Thema der spartanischen Propaganda im Dekeleischen Krieg gewesen sein muB." For the Spar- tans as "the liberators of the Hellenes," cf. 1.69.1; 2.8.4, 72.1; 3.13.1, 13.7, 32.2, 59.4, 63.3; 4.85-6, 108.2; 5.9.9; 8.43.3, 46.3, 52.

62 Bleckmann (ibid. 299-300) offers the suggestion that those Melians who chanced to survive the attack might have secured their contributions by falling back on presumed


nothing to lose by it but their insignificant contributions, which they must have made sometime after the Spartans renewed the war in 413 but no later than 405 when they returned, triumphantly, to Melos. Therefore, the Melian contributions to the Spartan war fund were not what induced either of the Athenian expeditions to Melos.63

III: Additional Epigraphic Evidence

In the year 425/4 the Athenians carried out an ambitious new assessment of tribute for the empire which included many cities not otherwise known to have paid tribute for many years before and still others which are not known to have paid at all. Melos, assessed 15 talents in the new assessment, is among the places assessed in 425 and is one of the assessed cities for which there is no evidence of any payment ever having been made. The editors of the tribute lists concluded that this assessment was not only ambitious but unrealistic and that it

financial deposits at Delphi or on booty won fighting either on the side of the Spartans or on their own as pirates. For public funds stored up at temples used as war resources, cf. 1.121.3, 2.13.4-5. We know from an inscription at Delphi (ML 95) recording a thank- offering for the Spartan victory at Aegospotami that e9e6nonoq Aax6pnov Mdkto; participated in that sea battle. Bleckmann (p. 300 n. 22) tries to link him with the Milesian pirate Theopompos mentioned by Xenophon Hell. 2.1.30.

63 M. Frankel, "Epigraphische Beitrage, 1. Corpus Inscriptionum Graecarum 151 1," RhM 57 (1902) 540-542, thought that the Melians contributed to the Spartan war fund in the year following their restoration by Lysander, 405-404, but two separate, paltry Melian contributions were not likely solicited for the war effort in the period following the battle of Aegospotami. Frankel noted rightly that it is unlikely that Thucydides would have neglect- ed to inform his reader of a sizable contribution by the Ephesians in the 420s (1,000 darics = four talents, 3186 drachmas; cf. Loomis p. 78). The Ephesians revolted from the Delian League in 413/2 and Bleckmann, Freunde (as in n. 33) 304-306, points out that they would have had good reason to contribute to the Spartan cause after 410 when they received Spartan assistance in the face of the Athenian attack led by Thrasyllus (cf. Xen. Hell. 1.2.6- 1 1; Diod. 13.64.1). The Chian exiles, who donated 1,000 Aeginetan staters (the equivalent of 2,837 drachmas), were restored to their island by the Spartans in 409/8 and this year must serve as a terminus ante quem for their contribution. Both Bleckmann and Pidrart

have argued persuasively for a date of all the contributions in 409/8 and this is probably the date for the contributions listed on the front of the stone. But the stone appears to have been inscribed over time and the Melian contributions, along with that of Molokros, were probably given some time later (otherwise why not choose a stone large enough to accommodate all entries on the front?). We do not have adequate information to pinpoint a year (or years) for the two Melian donations to the Spartan war fund but they most probably made them between the years 408 and 405. The fact that Thucydides makes no mention whatsoever of this inscription (i.e. that the Spartans solicited contributions from nontraditional allies and that they were in part successful - something that the Spartans themselves would not have wanted to keep secret) is perhaps additional evidence that all donations were made after 411, the point at which Thucydides' history breaks off.


may have served as Athenian propaganda.64 Thucydides' implication that Me- los was "formally" neutral until its submission in 416, despite open hostilities in 426, lends support to the view that the island was only in the "potential sphere" of Athenian influence. But several scholars, notably M. Treu and A. E. Raub- itschek, dismissing the Melian Dialogue as rhetoric, believe the credibility of Thucydides is put into question by several epigraphic and literary sources.65

Another inscription, a stele inscribed on Pentelic marble and found on the Acropolis, has been identified by some scholars with the decree relating to the dispatch of the Athenian forces described in the Melian Dialogue.66 The frag- mentary inscription, which appears to be an Athenian decree sending out an expedition of some sort, contains passages that resemble the Melian Dialogue. Both describe an expedition consisting of 30 triremes, 1200 hoplites and 300 bowmen. The corresponding figures led Tod and others to conclude confidently that the "agreements between certain phrases of [the] decree and the account given by the historian can hardly be due to mere coincidence."67 A more thorough study of the decree conducted by B. D. Meritt in 1953, however, exposed several inconsistencies between the inscription and the narration of Thucydides.68 Meritt pointed out that the inscription, which does not mention Melos, refers merely to "a routine expedition of thirty ships," noting in particular that Thucydides records no fewer than twelve such Athenian expeditions in addition to the one against Melos.69

64 B. D. Meritt, H. T. Wade-Gery, and M. F. McGregor, The Athenian Tribute Lists (= ATL) (Cambridge, Mass./Princeton 1939-53) III, 196: "A 9 was an unrealistic assessment which contained names of cities from whom Athens could scarcely expect payments." They further stressed (p. 345) that one "must never forget that many cities in the assessment list are known never to have paid tribute at all, including Melos and probably many of the Pontic cities, and that many were included for their propaganda value, like the cities beyond Phaselis, long after they had ceased to belong to the Athenian Empire."

65 For the Melian Dialogue as rhetoric, cf. M. Treu, "Athen und Melos und der Melierdialog des Thukydides," Historia 3 (1954) 271; A. E. Raubitschek, "War Melos tributpflichtig?" Historia 12 (1963) 82.

66 IG 12 97 = Tod 76. Kirchhoff, who published the text in 1873 (IG I 54 and 99), was the first to make the connection with Melos. Tod followed suit labeling it "Decree regulating the Melian Expedition." Citations below are from IG 12 97 which rightly incorporates a third fragment (c) rejected by Tod, GHI (as in n. 23) 192.

67 Tod, ibid. 192. 68 Already unconvinced in 1950 were the editors of the tribute lists who had determined that

the decree "has nothing to do with Melos." Cf. MerittJWade-Gery/McGregor, ATL (as in n. 64) III, 11. Among the differences cited by Meritt, "An Athenian Decree," in G. E. Mylonas (ed.), Studies Presented to D. M. Robinson on his Seventieth Birthday (St. Louis 1953) II, 300, are the fact that Thucydides names Chian and Lesbian ships not mentioned in the inscription (5.84.1) while the inscription names 150 volunteers in addition to the hoplites (1. 10) and names bowmen and peltasts from both the Athenians and their allies (1. 17).

69 Meritt, ibid. 300. Meritt further notes that Cleon's expedition to Macedonia resembles the


One year after Meritt published his study of the inscription, M. Treu published a study which attempted to associate the inscription with Melos again.70 Treu believes, however, not only that the inscription points to the Athenian expedition to Melos, but that it also shows that the island was tributary and revolting from Athens in 416. He inferred, from the preserved words eVtefkl T6Oj 006pov in the third line of the inscription, that Athens was sending the expedition against Melos because the island had not paid to Athens the full amount of their assessed tribute payments.71 Treu therefore drew a connection between this inscription and the Athenian tribute reassessment decree of 425. He theorized that Melos, since it was on the Reassessment Decree, must have become an ally of Athens by 425 but that by 416 she had "fallen away" and needed to be brought back into the fold. Treu's theory, which rests in part on the interpretation of three words, has justifiably come under attack.72 In 1959, W. Eberhardt published a careful survey of the areas where the assessment of 425 must be considered unrealistic and convincingly showed that the decree must list many cities from which Athens probably never collect- ed.73 For Eberhardt, the Reassessment Decree of 425 is a list of those cities and peoples within the actual or potential sphere of influence of the Athenian empire on whom the tribute was assessed.74 Under the weight of Meritt's and Eberhardt's arguments, Treu's epigraphic evidence cracks and one may therefore conclude that Melos, like many other states listed on the decree, was not tribute-paying in 425 but was only declared tribute-bound by the Athenians.

IV: Additional Literary Evidence

In 1963, Treu's theory was revived by A. E. Raubitschek, who cited not epigraphic but literary evidence to support the view that Melos was a tribute-

inscription every bit as much as the expedition described in the Melian Dialogue. It too consisted of a squadron of 30 ships, 1,200 hoplites, 300 horsemen and a number of allies (5.2.1). Meritt (ibid. 301-303) dates the inscription to 430 and believes the decree was for a tribute-collecting fleet of "drafted marines."

70 Treu, Athen (as in n. 65), did not discuss Meritt's arguments. 71 Treu, ibid. 261 f. 72 Cf. E. Buchner, "Die Aristophanes-Scholien und die Frage der Tributpflicht von Melos,"

Chiron 4 (1974) 91, who correctly noted that for Treu, the expedition decree is even more important than the Reassessment Decree because it shows for him both "that Athens continued her demand for tribute from Melos and that Melos had actually paid."

73 W. Eberhardt, "Der Melierdialog und die Inschriften ATL A 9 (IG 12 63 +) und IG 12 97 +,

Historia 8 (1959) 284-314. 74 It is worth noting that in the 430s the number of cities recorded in the tribute lists never

exceeded 175 but was no less than 380 in 425. Buchner, Scholien (as in n. 72) 92, writes that the Reassessment Decree should be seen as "eine einseitige Absichtserklarung Athens".


paying member of the Athenian empire in 425.75 Raubitschek twice calls on the testimony of the Aristophanic scholia and once on Diodorus Siculus in his attempt to show that Melos was tributpflichtig.76 In his view, the Athenian sack of Melos in 416 is referred to in the scholia on the Birds. Line 186 of that play states that the gods will be killed kiti Mlkiw. Under the heading of these two words the Suda gives the following commentary:

eV yap Tto; IHeXoiroVVTaX1oti XccTa' iEdvTov Nuxiav nrEwave; 'AOi1vatoi n' TOOOiDTOV *6EioXi6pxT1(av al'Yoi; 60oTE ktC iaoetltpat. TX & npo)TC

FTCt Ntxicaq MiXov napecroaao oi5 govov nIlXavwv tpouayMil, a,AXaz cai kXuC, &ta' co &royrovat avudiv, nrp67v imnorO. ovoav.

For during the Peloponnesian War, the Athenians, sending Nicias out against everyone, besieged [the Melians] until they perished by famine. In the first year [of the siege], Nicias attacked Melos not only by the drawing up of siege engines but also by famine because, having recently become tributary, they had revolted [from the Athenians].77

The scholiast thus says that Melos was besieged by Athens because it had revolted after having recently become tribute-bound and that Nicias was the general who led the Athenian expedition to Melos when the island capitulated. But Thucydides relates that the Athenian commanders of the expedition in 416 were originally Cleomedes son of Lycomedes and Teisias son of Teisimachus (5.84.3) and that they were later joined by another force commanded by Philoc- rates son of Demeas (5.116.3). Raubitschek finds in the above passage of the Suda "proof' of a report of the occupation of Melos "entirely different from Thucydides."78 But such a hasty conclusion should be resisted for two reasons: the nature of the source and the fact that it attributes the leadership of the Athenian expedition to Melos of 416 to the very same general who made the expedition in 426. The Suda, believed to have been compiled about the end of the tenth century A.D., is notorious for its contradictions and ineptitude.79 In

75 Raubitschek, Melos (as in n. 65). 76 Though he believes IG I1 71 (the Reassessment Decree of 425) is evidence for the

tributary status of Melos, in his article Raubitschek, ibid., does not address Eberhardt's convincing arguments. Raubitschek also cites (p. 82) as evidence of Melos in open revolt from Athens IG V 1,1 (the Spartan War Fund) and, inferring from Diod. 12.65.2, wonders whether Ephorus knew of Melian payments to the Spartan war fund and therefore "did not hold the neutrality of the island in high esteem."

77 I have translated Kax& niavtov as "against everyone" though I suspect the phrase is corrupt. LSJ s.v. Kard (A.5) allows that Kcaz& + gen. can be used "in a hostile sense" but evidently not in a verb of motion, with which we would expect the acc. (ibid. III).

78 Raubitschek, Melos (as in n. 65) 82. 79 Cf. Adler, RE s.v. "Suidas," cols. 675-717. The Suda contains many contradictions and is

thought to have undergone much interpolation.


fact it is precisely the mention of Nicias that betrays the confusion of the writer.80 We know from an inscription that it was not Nicias who commanded the expedition which destroyed Melos but Teisias son of Teisimachus and Cleomedes son of Lycomedes, the same commanders Thucydides narrates.81

Raubitschek's source for the "second tradition" is Ephorus and he traces ingeniously an invisible path back to the fourth century historian both through Diodorus Siculus and through Symmachus, one of the main sources for the oldest scholia to Aristophanes. Ephorus was a chief source for Diodorus and Raubitschek cites a passage from Diodorus which appears to substantiate the assertion of the scholia that Nicias commanded the Athenian expedition to Melos in 416:

'A6vatot 6U Niuiou ctpaTnyoi5vro; Etiov 80o iu6X&;, Kv i)pa cat Ni'atav Mv te Milov ?aiC1oXop1C1iaav?e; [ncvta;] ihp8o&v ii?oIatav, ntat6a; 6? iai c uvaYKa; E'iv8pawuo8tavto (Diod. 12.80.5).82

80 Already in 1914 J. W. White, The Scholia on the Aves of Aristophanes (Boston 1914) 50, 52, concluded that the author of the passage had confused the two Athenian expeditions to Melos.

81 IG I3 370 = ML 77. There can be little doubt that the inscription refers to the Melian expedition of 416. Though some letters are illegible, Meiggs and Lewis, Selection (as in n. 23) 231, read "[Teisilas son of Teisimachus and Cleomedes son of Lyco[medesl." F. E. Romer, "Atheism, Impiety and the Limos Melios in Aristophanes' Birds," AJP I 15 (1994) 351-365, has persuasively demonstrated that the Suda's reference to "Melian famine" may have as much or more to do with Diagoras the Melian than with the events on Melos in 416/5. It is worth noting that this is the sole reference to "Melian" in the text of the Birds, though Diagoras the Melian is alluded to on two other occasions (11. 1420f., 1072- 1074 where he is mentioned by name; cf. Romer pp. 352-358). Cf. also Raubitschek, "Melos" (as in n. 65) 83. In Clouds 830, to make Socrates an atheist, Aristophanes simply calls him 6 MrXto;. The entry under "Melian famine" is another example of interpolation in the Suda. As further evidence that suggests Nicias besieged Melos in 416, Raubitschek, Melos (as in n. 65) 81, cites the scholia to lines 362f. of the Birds. In these lines Aristophanes has one of the characters say to another "You outdo Nicias in siege- engines" (6n?epaicovti4ei.; a?j y' AS&r NtKiav taot; IifXavcxi), perhaps implying that Nicias was quite skilled with them. Though Melos is not mentioned, the scholia again interpret these lines to refer to the capture of Melos by Nicias. But Buchner, Scholien (as in n. 72) 96, has cleverly demonstrated that the scholiast must have incorrectly linked line 186 to lines 362f. since there is little reason to believe that the Athenians, having heard these lines at the City Dionysia in March 414, the time of the first performance of the Birds, would have made the connection with the siege of Melos which ended in winter 416/5, especially given the fact that they were already nearly one year into the Sicilian campaign: "Der Text selbst von V. 362f. bietet keinen Widerspruch zu Thukydides. Er ist entweder in aktueller Weise auf das damalige Wirken des Nikias in Sizilien zu beziehen oder allgemein auf dessen langjahrige Feldherrntatigkeit." In view of Nicias' resignation of command to Cleon in 425 (and perhaps considering his subsequent performance at Syracuse), it may be that the compliment paid to Nicias was actually meant to be a joke.

82 Ephorus is believed to be Diodorus' chief source for books 11-16.


The Athenians under the command of Nicias seized two cities, Cythera and Nisaea; having forced Melos by siege, they slew the men of military age and enslaved the children and women.

For Diodorus, this passage constitutes the whole of Athenian affairs for the year 418. While it may be inferred from the quotation that Diodorus believed that Nicias led the Melian expedition of 416, this is not at all clear and the passage itself has several difficulties which make it hard to accept it as constituting a "second tradition." Early editors of the text correctly inserted a semicolon after the word Nitatav. The separation in the author's mind between the taking of Cythera and Nisaea and the destruction of Melos is clear since Diodorus says specifically that, "under the command of Nicias, the Athenians took two cities," not three. In the second part of his sentence Diodorus relates that "[The Athenians] besieged Melos, slew all the adult men and enslaved the children and women." In view of the fact that Diodorus was hereby summing up in a single sentence all Athenian events of an individual year worthy of mention and in view of the inherent textual division, it appears evident that he did not mean to say that Nicias was in command for all the military expeditions outlined in the sentence but only for the taking of the first two cities.83 This is made even more clear from Diodorus' account of the oration of Gylippus at Syracuse.

83 The fact that Diodorus places the Melian siege in his narration of the events of 418 only serves to lesson his credibility in his account of the expedition. He earlier (12.65.2) says correctly that Nicias led the first Athenian expedition to Melos but he misplaces the affair in 424, two years late, and adds that the Athenians laid siege, explaining that Melos was "the only island among the Cyclades observing the alliance with the Lacedaemonians." W. Kierdorf, "Zum Melier-Dialog des Thukydides," RhM 105 (1962) 253f., points out that, although Diodorus (wrongly) makes the Melians allies of the Spartans, he says nothing about their revolting from Athens, something we would expect him to include if he were using a "second tradition" in Ephorus. Moreover, while the taking of Cythera is a well established feat of Nicias (4.53-55; Plut. Nic. 6.4), Diodorus seems to have muddled his account of the occupation of this island as well. In 12.65.8 he has already stated that in 424 Nicias attacked and received the surrender of Cythera and this chronology agrees with Thucydides. Since Cythera was restored to the Spartans in the Peace of Nicias (5.18.7), there is no reason to believe that the Athenians reoccupied the island in 418 thereby breaking the treaty. In the same passage cited above, the thoroughly confused Diodorus, who is followed by Plutarch (Nic. 6.4), also relates that Nicias gained posses- sion of Nisaea in 418, an accomplishment which Thucydides (4.66.3-69.4) ascribes to the generals Hippocrates son of Ariphron and Demosthenes son of Alcisthenes in the year 424. If the Athenians were to "keep Nisaea" (Nicatav 6' eXetv: 5.17.2) by the terms of the Peace of Nicias, why would they need to conquer it again in 418? A full discussion is provided by Buchner, Scholien (as in n. 72) 93f. The passages in Diodorus hardly inspire confidence. In view of these and other such blunders of Diodorus, in the case of Melos we should be inclined to agree with the wisdom of Meiggs, Empire (as in n. 10) 457: "When Diodorus differs from Thucydides we can usually ignore him."


When advising against granting mercy to the Athenians, the Spartan general reminds the Syracusans of the fate of the Melians (Diod. 13.30.6; 32.1-2). Though Diodorus makes Gylippus find Nicias worthy of the death penalty for various reasons, he does not have Gylippus assign to Nicias the credit (or blame) for the siege and massacre at Melos, as we would expect him to if he had previously held Nicias responsible for it.84 If there was in antiquity a "second tradition" of the siege of 416 which gave the credit to Nicias, we might expect Plutarch to have commented on it in his Life of Nicias.85 Without the help of Diodorus (and therefore Ephorus) Raubitschek's argument depends on a very late and unreliable source which conflates the two Athenian expeditions to Melos.86 Therefore, there is no credible evidence in either Diodorus or the scholia which suggests that Melos was ever tributary.87

84 As noted by Buchner (ibid. 92f.), Diodorus 13.30.6 seems to have Gylippus assign the blame for the fate of the Melians to the Athenians as a whole: Kca Ti xi yo MTjXiov;, oiv; elcnoXdopicioavtE; lplSov ad6rrtevav, Kcai XcKtovaiou;, oi a-yyEvEtS; ovt; nT; aTi)S;

MTjXiot;5 iXi1S ECotv6;vq1aav; 6o-m HMo %iou;V np?S 'ATT}iKhv 6pyi1v 6rJt1C-a;a. 85 In his account of the death of Nicias, Plutarch (Nic. 28.4) does not hesitate to relate two

traditions recorded by three different authors. Dionysius of Halicarnassus too appears ignorant of any "second tradition" since he makes no mention of Nicias when relating the affair (Thuc. 37-41). There is some merit in Buchner's argument, Scholien (as in n. 72) 93, that the killing which followed the siege does not correspond to the character of Nicias that has come down to us. We might recall that when the Athenian army burst into the revolting city of Mende which was unexpectedly betrayed to them, the generals Nicias and Nicostratus "restrained with difficulty" the Athenian soldiers from massacring the inhabitants (4.130.6).

86 Buchner, ibid. 96-98, shows just how unreliable as a historical source the scholia of the Birds are. They err constantly (cf. 11. 13, 362, 395-99) when describing historical events alluded to by Aristophanes.

87 Daniel Gillis and ltdouard Will are two scholars among those who have followed Treu and Raubitschek in accepting the tributary status of Melos. Cf. Gillis, "Murder on Melos," RAIB 112 (1978) 186f. Will, Le monde grec et l'orient: Le cinquieme siecle (5th ed. Paris 1994) I, 345, believes that "la minuscule Mdlos avait d6ja subi une attaque en 426, que Thucydide avait 6voqu6e [...l sans en donner la conclusion: car Melos fut contrainte de payer tribut a Athenes." Will, however, can accept Thucydides' statement that Melos was neutral in 416 since he holds that "la paix de Nicias rendit les Meliens a leur neutralite" (ibid.). This view is implausible given the favorable terms of the Peace of Nicias which allowed the Athenians to "determine as they think best" about those cities not mentioned specifically by the treaty (5.18.8). Gomme, HCT (as in n. 3) III, 675, well sums up the fate of the cities within the Athenian empire but not mentioned specifically by the treaty: "Athens is to be left a free hand not only with this group of cities but with the rest of those in her empire." There is no clear indication that Melos was tributary by 421, but even if it was, as Will would have it, if we accept Thucydides' version of the treaty, we might ask why the Athenians would have voluntarily restored Melian neutrality and deprived themselves of an annual payment of 15 (or any) talents.


V: Conclusions

As we have seen, there is no reliable evidence which refutes Thucydides' version of the Athenian expedition to Melos in 416. No ancient source, epigraphic or literary, shows that before 416 Melos was either allied to Sparta or subject to Athens; that she was not in fact both independent and neutral, just as Thucydides tells us.88 But we may well ask whether the Melian Dialogue is historically credible. The documentary value of Thucydides' speeches has been much debated and this is especially true for the Melian Dialogue. It is assumed by many scholars that Thucydides uses the Melian episode to analyze in the form of invented speeches his own views of Athenian imperialism and to show what the conquest of Melos really implied.89 Perhaps he intended to show the extent of Athenian moral degeneration before the Sicilian disaster.90 The juxta- position of the Melian affair and the Sicilian disaster is indeed dramatic, but unless it can be proven that Thucydides omitted significant historical events that took place between the two, "we cannot accuse Thucydides of sacrificing history to art."91 Much attention has been focused on "the moral question" but there is no reason to doubt the historical substance of the dialogue.92

88 This should come as no surprise, however, since to maintain that the Melians were tributary we would have to assume that Thucydides was either ignorant of the facts (while others apparently were not) or that he positively falsified them, both in regard to matters of consequence (e.g. that the Melians were allied with Sparta or that they were revolting from Athens, in which case he would have omitted both the circumstances of their incorporation into the empire - since he has them neutral in 431 - and their subsequent return to neutrality by rebellion or other means) and in lesser details (e.g. the names of the Athenian generals who campaigned against Melos). We might also consider that it would have added to Thucydides' artistry to have Nicias as commander of both the Melian and Sicilian expeditions. His absence is therefore stronger than the usual argument from silence.

89 Cf. especially J. de Romilly, Thucydide et l'impe6rialisme athenien (Paris 1947) 230: "Le dialogue est 6videmment une oeuvre de Thucydide autant qu'un dialogue de Platon est une oeuvre de Platon;" M. I. Finley, "The Melian Dialogue," Appendix 3 in R. Warner (trans.), Thucydides' History of the Peloponnesian War (2nd ed. New York 1972): "[In the Melian Dialogue] Thucydides has invented more or less everything;" see also M. I. Finley's Ancient History: Evidence as Models (New York 1985) 13f., 1 10, n. 15. Cf. also A. G. Woodhead, Thucydides on the Nature of Power (Cambridge, MA 1970) 3, 8-10. Amit, Dialogue (as in n. 14) 225-227, supplies a general survey of those who hold the view that the Melian Dialogue is an invention of Thucydides.

90 See especially F. M. Cornford, Thucydides Mythistoricus (London 1907) 182-185; J. H. Finley, Thucydides (as in n. 40) 208-212; more recent is de Romilly, The Rise and Fall of States According to Greek Authors (Ann Arbor 1977) 57f.

91 Meiggs, Empire (as in n. 10) 387. If Thucydides had intended to sacrifice facts to generate sympathy for the Melians he would have done better to leave out the line [oi MiAXtotf ?5 r6XsEov 4avep6v KcareaTqoav (5.84.2).

92 Thucydides tells us himself (1.22. 1) that in the speeches he has "adhered as close as


We should bear in mind that even though Thucydides likely composed the Melian Dialogue after the war was over, perhaps with the intention to remind his reader that "war teaches men to be violent" (3.82.2), neither the form nor the date of composition necessarily precludes it from accurate historicity. Thucyd- ides probably wrote about the second campaign against Melos shortly after the events took place. Narrating the affairs of 426, Thucydides deemed it worthy to relate (in a scant two lines) that the Athenians sailed to Melos with the futile hope of bringing the island into the alliance and departed having merely ravaged the surrounding land. A second, successful expedition to the island would surely have warranted narration and our historian would have realized this in 416. Thucydides may have actually invented the dialogue itself very late, composing arguments of highly sophistic philosophical nature, while still in- corporating the essential previously gathered facts. Nor would it have been impossible for Thucydides to learn what was said on the island.93 Thucydides

possible to the general sense of what was actually said" (eyyivrata rti; )ugndors; yv6gyr; 'r6)v dXrI0d; x0VXOvxv). I am inclined to agree with F. W. Walbank, Polybius (Berkeley/

Los Angeles 1972) 44, that "unless one is prepared to regard Thucydides as blind or dishonest, then his speeches must presumably have borne some relation to the overall purpose of what was said, and remain anchored, however loosely, toT& dXi0 a0XCX Oxv- Ta "

93 Cf. Jones, Democracy (as in n. 23) 66: "It is virtually impossible that [Thucydides] can have had any information on the Melian debate, which was held behind closed doors between the Athenian commissioners and the Melian government, who were all subsequently executed, and it must be regarded as a free composition." But while the range of possible sources for the Melian Dialogue is indeed narrow, we know of Melian survivors whom Thucydides could have interviewed, perhaps somewhere in the Peloponnese. From them he would also have learned that the Athenians brought no specific charge against the Melians in 427 (i.e. the comforting and harboring of Alcidas, the payment of 20 mnas, or the minting of new coinage, for which arguments cf. n. 104 below). Thucydides himself informs us (5.26.5) that while writing his history he spent his time o06 asov Tot; HeIXotovvrlaiov ("mostly among the Peloponnesians"). Ronald Stroud, "Thucydides and Corinth," Chiron 24 (1994) 267-304, has recently made a strong case that Thucydides resided largely in Corinth during his twenty years away from Athens. Thucydides may also have found a source among the Athenians. It is not difficult to imagine Athenian generals informing their subordinates of what was discussed at a private conference and of Thucydides' learning of it. A parallel might be when Thucydides informs us of the conference held in 413 by the Athenian generals Nicias, Demosthenes and Eurymedon to decide whether to abandon Syracuse or remain despite their disadvantageous position. Though all three generals perished soon thereafter, and of the Athenian soldiers "few out of many returned," Thucydides reports to us in great detail of each general's views (7.47- 49). K. J. Dover, Thucydides (Oxford 1973) 23, reminds us that Greek military officials were not particularly known for their reticence: "Generals will have boasted or com- plained to their friends after a conference, and half the distinguished Athenians who fled into exile in 415 could have been at dinner-parties with an envoy who had returned from Melos." For boasting Athenians at a symposium, cf. Ar. Wasps 1186-1205.


indeed dramatized the Melian episode but there is no solid evidence that suggests he did not depict accurately the bare facts: First, that the Athenians had brought no specific charges against the Melians in 416 and that they offered to spare her if she joined the empire and paid tribute; and second, that the main line of the Melian defense was that they would rely on the gods and on their ties of kinship to the Spartans.94 Despite all the arguments to the contrary, Thucyd- ides' account of the Melian affair remains essentially unshaken.

VI: Summary of Events Leading up to and Following the Athenian Expedition to Melos in 416 B.C.

I submit the following chronology of events concerning the Athenian expedition to Melos in 416. In 431 the Melians were officially allied to neither side. Their sympathy, however, probably lay with Sparta, to whom they felt united by strong ties of kinship.95 It was probably for this reason that the Melians never joined the Delian League, even though they had fought alongside the Athenians at Salamis. At first, the Melians kept a low profile and were careful not to reveal publicly any pro-Spartan sympathies. In 427 the admiral Alcidas maneuvered the Spartan fleet stealthily through Aegean waters to Ionia and, though retreating in haste upon being sighted by the two swift Athenian state triremes, the Salaminia and the Paralus, his actions were sufficient cause for alarm in Athens (3.33.1-2). In the following year, the Athenians under the leadership of Nicias sent an expedition to Melos in an effort to secure the last area of the Aegean that had up until then successfully eluded her.96

It is significant that Nicias did not lay siege to Melos in 426. The Athenians did not attempt a prolonged siege perhaps because they still respected to an extent Melian neutrality. They might be less inclined to lay siege to a neutral state in times of war since overly aggressive action might drive other neutral

94 These arguments of the Melians are summed up in their closing remarks: ri;l cxcp ToV6c qO(00V1 T1) EK TtOF 8o-o axTTv Kat TTj ano Ttv dv6poiov Kai AaK?x6at- .oviWov.W piq RiI FeC)OVxE; iEtpacor60a a)aea0at (5.112.2).

95 Pro-Spartan sympathies on Melos were no doubt felt most intensely among the ruling oligarchs (cf. 5.84.3-85).

96 There is no need to assume (and no evidence to suggest) that the expedition was punishment for certain assistance that the Melians had provided to Alcidas in 427 (see pp. 398f. above). It is rather more likely that the Athenians were simply reasserting their authority over the Aegean, which they considered their private domain. It could be that the expedition is an indication that "AthMnes entendait posseder toute la mer E'gee," as PiErart, Notes (as in n. 11) 165, has suggested, though such a policy seems more attributable to Cleon after the victory at Pylos the following year. The expedition may reflect only the desire to follow up the Athenian success in bringing the Therans into the alliance.


states into the hands of their enemies. More likely, however, was that there was little incentive to undergo such an operation. With the war "in full bloom" (3.3.1) and a Spartan fleet still active in the war, the Athenians probably thought it impracticable to lay siege to an island, the conquest of which would generate little strategic advantage. Sparta, already at war with Athens, might be tempted to intervene on behalf of her kinsmen and prolong the whole affair. Once the Peace of Nicias was established, however, there would be less risk for the Athenians and greater danger for the Melians, since an intervention on the part of Sparta would mean breaking the treaty.

The following year, however, the Spartan fleet was liquidated (4.14.4; 4.16), partly destroyed in battle, partly impounded, and Melos was assessed an incredible 15 talents. The Melians ignored the assessment and, despite their claims to neutrality, their relations with Athens deteriorated. In spite of a clash of arms in 426, the Melians maintained their neutrality, though their relations with Athens would hardly have been cordial. Of all Aegean islands of any importance, Melos alone had preserved its independence, but without the assurance of defense by a Spartan fleet that independence was less secure.97 The Peace of Nicias provided Athens with the opportunity to invest Melos without the worry that Sparta might try to intervene. By 416, with virtually no chance of Spartan intervention, the Athenians set out on the task they could not afford to undertake in 426. Melos was the only significant island left in the Aegean not subject to Athens and its submission would bring her both greater dominion and greater security.98

In the spring of 416, while formally at peace with Sparta, the Athenians sent a second expedition of considerable force to Melos with the identical purpose as the first: to bring the Melians over to the alliance. Though Thucydides says nothing of Melian wrongdoing, many scholars have presumed an immediate antecedent conflict that provoked the expedition of 416.99 Andrewes, followed by others, believes that the large number of allied islanders that participated in the siege "arouses the suspicion that the attack was not just an evidently monstrous outrage."100 But allied participation, even if the allies were com-

97 For Athenian assessment of the Aegean islands see Meiggs, Empire (as in n. 10) 50-52. 98 The two reasons for the expedition which Thucydides has the Athenians admit. 99 Cf. A. Andrewes, "The Melian Dialogue and Pericles' Last Speech," PCPhS n. s. 6 (1960)

2: "There was a case, perhaps even a plausible case, for Athens' attack on Melos in 416, and Thucydides no doubt knew what it was [but he] excluded these facts from his account." Macleod, Form (as in n. 14) 397, and others accept this view.

100 Andrewes, HCT(as in n. 3) IV, 157. Cf. also M. I. Finley, Dialogue (as in n. 89) 614. The force consisted of 30 Athenian ships, six Chian and two Lesbian, 1,200 Athenian hoplites, 300 bowmen, 20 mounted archers, and tcov 5e 4ivgciov Kcavi vaiiotv 6lniXat; gcxva- Qa nevTaicoaiot; ical Xtkiot; (5.84.1). The wording is strange since the islanders were

allies and Andrewes and others interpret it to mean that the allied force was confined to islanders.


prised only of islanders, does not necessarily imply particular grounds for an attack in 416.101 We should distinguish between the attack on Melos and the subsequent massacre of the islanders since the offensive itself was probably not an outrage to Greek sentiment. Andrewes observes acutely that while the massacre later became a standard charge brought against Athens, "no one was interested in re-examining the reasons for sending the expedition."102 This is because no one needed a reason to re-examine the expedition: forcible incorporation into the empire was nothing new.103 There is no solid evidence for a special charge brought against the Melians in 416 and there is no compelling reason to presume one.104 If there was an antecedent quarrel that provoked the

101 This view rests on the false premise that there existed solidarity between all Aegean islands. Andrewes, Pericles (as in n. 99) 2, writes: "Clearly they knew they could trust their allies: clearly, then, the expedition was not a monstrosity of aggression, but something with which already subject islanders could sympathise." But while this solidarity may have been felt among Aegean islands in general, it did not necessarily apply to Melos since, as Thucydides constantly reminds us, the Melians, unlike their attackers, were Dorians.

102 Andrewes, HCT(as in n. 3) IV, 158. 103 Neither was wholesale execution for that matter, though killing of innocent victims was

no doubt detested by many. Cf. Gillis, Murder (as in n. 87) 197: "The 'atrocious conduct' of the Athenians was by now fairly standard practice in Greece," as was similar conduct by the Spartans and their allies. For a discussion, cf. Gillis 187-201.

104 Kierdorf, Dialog (as in n. 83) 156, points out that there is no need to assume a reason for the attack other than that of the first expedition. Several scholars, R. Jameson and J. G. Milne most notably among them, have made the rather implausible suggestion that Melian coinage may have provided an excuse for the Athenian expedition. Cf. R. Jameson, "Une trouvaille de stat6res de M6los," RN 12 (1908) 301-310; cf. also his "La trouvaille de Milo," RN 13 (1909) 188-208; J. G. Milne, The Melos Hoard of 1907 (New York 1934). Jameson and Milne have drawn a connection between the events of 416 and a coin hoard discovered on the island in 1907. The "Melian hoard" consists of some 84 staters struck on a standard weight of c. 14 grams, the Lydian standard on which the Melian stater was based throughout the fifth century. The virtual absence of Melian coinage struck with these types outside the island has led these scholars to conclude (perhaps unnecessarily) from an argumentum ex silentio that the entire hoard was minted at once shortly before 416 in which year it was either buried or melted down by the Athenians. Jameson believed ([1909] p. 205f.) that an independent Melian coinage in the mid-fifth century threatened Athenian control over the coinage of their subject allies (cf. IG I) 1453 = ML 45: the Athenian Standards Decree) and thus "etait forc6ment interdit aux membres de la ligue delienne." Along similar lines, Milne argued (pp. 14-17) that the Melians provoked the attack of 416 by underselling Athenian coinage (c. seven grams against the Athenian of c. four) thereby threatening Athenian control of the silver market. But it is difficult to see how the minor island of Melos could ever have seriously challenged Athenian economic supremacy in the Aegean. Moreover, as C. M. Kraay, "The Melos Hoard of 1907 Re-examined," NC ser. 7, vol. 4 (1964) 18, points out, the reason for the unusual weight likely had a basis in tradition and anyway the Athenian tetradrachm still outweighed the Melian stater (17.2 grams against 14.1). Kraay (p. 18f.) advanced the


attack, it probably would not have remained hidden in the sources but would have surfaced, if not in Thucydides or Xenophon, then certainly in the writings of the fourth century Attic orators who defended the expedition.'05

The motive for the expedition was in all probability Athenian imperialism, plain and simple. We know from the Athenian tribute quota lists that during the Peace of Nicias the Athenians began advancing upon those islands left independent in the South Aegean. In 425, three minor Dorian islands of the South- em Cyclades, Cimolos, Pholegandros and Sicinos, along with Melos, were assessed for the first time.106 By 418 two of these three neighbors of the Melians had made payments to Athens.107 The Athenians would hardly have overlooked the island of Melos, the relatively minor but significantly richer neighbor of these Southern Cyclades.'08 It was their intention to gain complete

plausible theory that the Melian hoard represents a "siege coinage," the product of an emergency tax minted in anticipation of the eventual attack for the purpose of buying mercenaries and supplies. But the fact that the coins employ at least 14 obverse and 34 reverse dies, including at least 24 different reverse types among a mere 84 coins, suggests a longer period of issue. As Milne notes (p. 3), it is quite exceptional for "a state the size of Melos to use as many dies in such a short period." Even if Kraay is right, however, no solid evidence yet suggests a link between the Melian coin hoard and the causes of either of the Athenian expeditions to Melos.

105 Isocrates essentially justifies the Athenian actions on Melos on three occasions (Panath. 63, 89; Paneg. 100-102). In Paneg. 101, he seems to condone the Athenian executions on Melos and at Scione, justifying them as suitable punishment for offenders and labeling the two groups as 'rvE; TrCov xoXeriTadvrov ilgiv ("some of those who fought against us") but this is surely rhetoric designed to obscure the facts and extol the glory of a former empire. Of the later writers who comment on the affair, Strabo (10.5.1) merely mentions the massacre in passing; though Aelius Aristides (Panath. 302), as might be expected, echoes Isocrates' virtual apologia. A. Andrewes, "The Peace of Nicias and the Sicilian Expedition," in D. M. Lewis et al. (eds.), CAH V (2nd ed. Cambridge 1992) 446, believes that the reason Melos stands out so prominently in later judgments of Athenian imperialism is due in no small measure to Thucydides' extensive treatment of the Melian affair. But it is likely that the attention paid to defending Athenian actions on Melos in the speeches of the fourth century orators is rather due to the unjust nature of those executions. For Arrian, writing in the second century A.D., the massacres on Melos and at Scione ranked not only foremost among Athenian misdeeds but were perhaps the greatest acts of injustice in the entire Hellenic world: "Finally, the capture of Melos and Scione, which were little island towns, brought more shame to the captors than any great shock to the whole Greek world" (Anab. 1.9.5).

106 On the Athenian Reassessment Decree of 425/4 (IG I3 71 = ML 69, lines 87, 89, 90) Cimolos and Sicinos were each assessed 1,000 drachmas and Pholegandros 2,000.

107 Payments are preserved in the tribute quota lists for Sicinos in 422/1, 418/7, 417/6 and 416/5; for Pholegandros in 418/7, 417/6 and 416/5. Cimolos appears in 416/5.

108 Though the motivation is clear, we cannot know the actual arguments advanced by the Athenians in the Melian Dialogue. Perhaps, as Meiggs, Empire (as in n. 10) 389, noted, the Athenians reasoned that the Melians were "enjoying all the benefits derived from


control of the seas and to discourage disaffection among the allies, precisely as Thucydides tells us.109

After the island was conquered, the Athenians executed those adult Melian men "whom they caught" and later sent out 500 colonists to repopulate the island. I IO The survivors were resettled, probably by Sparta in the Peloponnese, and these "refugee" Melians later made two paltry contributions to the Spartan war fund, probably sometime after 409, when the Chian exiles likely made their donation, but before they were led back to their island by Lysander in 405. It is indeed ironic to consider that it was in fact her longstanding neutrality which left Melos as prey for Athens during the Peace of Nicias. 1

Appendix

Suggested Chronological Scheme

Summer 431 Outbreak of Peloponnesian War Melos, Thera unallied

428 Thera, independent in 431, appears in ATL

Athenian thalassocracy without contributing to the cost" or the Athenians might have maintained that they had come to liberate the oppressed demos from Melian oligarchs.

109 A. Momigliano, "Le cause della spedizione di Sicilia," RFIC 7 (1929) 377, wisely speculated that, frustrated in their performance on land after their defeat in 418 at the battle of Mantinea, the Athenians set out to restore their confidence and prestige by a victory at sea and this may well be what is behind the Athenian drive into the Southern Cyclades. A string of easy naval victories was probably the most attractive opportunity available to the Athenians at the time. Cf. also Andrewes, HCT (as in n. 3) IV, 157; Amit, Dialogue (as in n. 14) 220. Peter Green, Armada from Athens (New York 1970) 92, has suggested that the subjugation of Melos may be evidence "that [Athens] was concerned to develop or safeguard her trade routes to North Africa."

110 Whether the status of the Athenian settlement was an clotlKia or a OKXlpovXia has been debated but is altogether unclear. See Jones, Democracy (as in n. 23) 169f., who argues for the former and A. J. Graham, Colony and Mother City in Ancient Greece (Manchester 1964) 173f., for the latter.

111 It is relevant to ask why the Melians did not yield. Perhaps they in fact believed that the Spartans would assist them out of ties of kinship. There must have been a genuine odium felt among the Melians for the Athenians ever since the first expedition ravaged the island in 426. The Melians in 416 likely thought they could withstand a second Athenian expedition, especially given that the contingent of 426 was such a considerable size. They had remained independent thus far (since their settling the island, we are told; cf. 5.112.2) and, in the end, it was at least in part treachery that brought about their capitulation and this only after Athenian reinforcements were sent (5.116.3). Perhaps too their obstinacy was due in no small measure to the ruling Melian oligarchs (cf. 5.84.3) and to the looming threat of having to pay an incredible, if not impossible, annual tribute of 15 talents.


427 Spartan fleet moves stealthily through the Aegean

Summer 426 Melians successfully resist the first Athenian expedition under Nicias. "Open hostility" between Athens and Melos

425 Loss of Spartan fleet at Pylos Melos assessed 15 talents by Athens Melian neighbors Cimolos, Sicinos, and Pholegandros all assessed

422/1 Sicinos begins to appear in ATL

April 421 Peace of Nicias renders previously assessed, unallied Aegean islands open prey to Athenians Melos remains unallied and independent

418/7 Pholegandros begins to appear in ATL

Spring 416 Second Athenian expedition to Melos Melian Dialogue Siege of Melos

Winter 416/5 Cimolos appears in ATL Fall of Melos Athenians execute those adult Melian men "whom they caught" Melian survivors relocate probably in Peloponnese Athenians send out 500 colonists to Melos

413 Sparta renews the war

409-405 Relocated Melians make two contributions to the Spartan war fund

405 Battle of Aegospotami Theopompos son of Lapompos, a Melian, participates in the battle Displaced Melians led back to Melos by Lysander

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University of California, Los Angeles Michael G. Seaman

The Athenian Expedition to Melos in 416 B.C.

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