27/02/2023
Thucydides (Greek ??????????, c. 460 - c. 400 B.C.) was the greatest ancient Greek historian, founder of historical science, author of the History of the Peloponnesian War.
Thucydides' year of birth is not exactly known. Based on the writer Pamphila's testimony to the second-century Roman writer Aulus Gellius,[2] he was born about 470 B.C.; from the words of his biographer Marcellinus, however, we must conclude that he was born about 450 B.C. The historian says, that at the beginning of Peloponnesian war (431 B.C.) he was mature enough and could understand and observe the events [3]; besides it is known, that Thucydides already showed some strategic skills in 424 B.C. and was not less then 30 years old. He was most probably born about 460-455 B.C. Thus his youth coincided with the age of Pericles: he was a contemporary of Euripides, the Sophists, and Socrates.
Thucydides' biography is not exactly known. The reports of his biographers, of whom the main one is a certain Markellinus (who lived in the 6th century, a thousand years later) are not reliable. The most reliable accounts are those of the historian himself, made in passing.
Thucydides belonged to a rich and noble family: his ancestor was the Thracian king Olor, and he was related to the family of the Athenian statesman and commander Miltiades (the winner of the Battle of Marathon), the old aristocratic family of Philae. As the son of Oloras, of the Attic demesne of Galimuntes, Thucydides had great material resources - he owned gold mines in Thrace and was influential there. In Athens he seems to have stood close to influential persons, including probably Pericles, whose remarkable characterization he presented.
Thucydides, as his work proves, received an excellent education. Reaching a mature age, he took part in state and military affairs. The historian spent the first years of the Peloponnesian War in Athens; during an epidemic of plague, which broke out in the second year of the war, he himself fell ill with this terrible disease, which he then described. When the Spartan general Brasidas led the war effort into Thrace (424), Thucydides had a squadron in command on the island of Thassos; he was unable to prevent Amphipolis from advancing to Brasidas (having only taken measures to protect Aion). Forced, therefore, to go into exile, he settled in his Thracian estate, where at his leisure he could compose and process his work, quietly, as an onlooker, observe the two warring parties and, in particular, become closer to the Peloponnesians. He visited, apparently, many places which had been the theater of war, the court of the Macedonian king Archelaus, Sicily, and in particular Syracuse, as may be inferred from his lively and accurate description of their surroundings and siege. Thucydides spent 20 years in exile. At the end of the Peloponnesian War (404), owing to an amnesty (general or, according to some sources, special, proposed by Enobius), he was able to return home, but soon died (c. 399-396; in any case not later than 396, for he does not know the restoration of the Long Walls by Conon and the eruption of Etna in 396), some say in Athens, others in a foreign country, in Thrace, or on his way back home. There is an account[source not cited 568 days] that he died a violent death.