Firstly, then, let us eulogize their nobility of birth, and secondly their nurture and training : [237b] thereafter we shall exhibit the character of their exploits, how nobly and worthily they wrought them. Now as regards nobility of birth, their first claim thereto is this — that the forefathers of these men were not of immigrant stock, nor were these their sons declared by their origin to be strangers in the land sprung from immigrants, but natives sprung from the soil living and dwelling in their own true fatherland ; and nurtured also by no stepmother, like other folk, but by that mother-country [237c] wherein they dwelt, which bare them and reared them and now at their death receives them again to rest in their own abodes. Most meet it is that first we should celebrate that Mother herself ; for by so doing we shall also celebrate therewith the noble birth of these heroes.
Our country is deserving of praise, not only from us but from all men, on many grounds, but first and foremost because she is god-beloved. The strife of the gods who contended over her and their judgement testify to the truth of our statement. [237d] And how should not she whom the gods praised deserve to be praised by all mankind ? And a second just ground of praise would be this, — that during that period in which the whole earth was putting forth and producing animals of every kind, wild and tame, our country showed herself barren and void of wild animals, but chose for herself and gave birth to man, who surpasses all other animals in intelligence and alone of animals regards justice and the gods. [237e] And we have a signal proof of this statement in that this land of ours has given birth to the forefathers both of these men and of ourselves. For every creature that brings forth possesses a suitable supply of nourishment for its offspring ; and by this test it is manifest also whether a woman be truly a mother or no, if she possesses no founts of nourishment for her child. Now our land, which is also our mother, furnishes to the full this proof of her having brought forth men ; for, of all the lands that then existed, she was the first and the only one to produce human nourishment, [238a] namely the grain of wheat and barley, whereby the race of mankind is most richly and well nourished, inasmuch as she herself was the true mother of this creature. And proofs such as this one ought to accept more readily on behalf of a country than on behalf of a woman ; for it is not the country that imitates the woman in the matter of conception and birth, but the woman the country. But this her produce of grain she did not begrudge to the rest of men, but dispensed it to them also. And after it she brought to birth for her children the olive, sore labor’s balm. And when she had nurtured and reared them up to man’s estate, [238b] she introduced gods to be their governors and tutors ; the names of whom it behoves us to pass over in this discourse, since we know them ; and they set in order our mode of life, not only in respect of daily business, by instructing us before all others in the arts, but also in respect of the guardianship of our country, by teaching us how to acquire and handle arms.
Such being the manner of their birth and of their education, the ancestors of these men framed for themselves and lived under a civic polity [238c] which it is right for us briefly to describe. For a polity is a thing which nurtures men, good men when it is noble, bad men when it is base. It is necessary, then, to demonstrate that the polity wherein our forefathers were nurtured was a noble one, such as caused goodness not only in them but also in their descendants of the present age, amongst whom we number these men who are fallen. For it is the same polity which existed then and exists now, under which polity we are living now and have been living ever since that age with hardly a break. One man calls it “democracy”, another man, according to his fancy, gives it some other name ; but it is, in very truth, [238d] an “aristocracy” backed by popular approbation. Kings we always have ; but these are at one time hereditary, at another selected by vote. And while the most part of civic affairs are in the control of the populace, they hand over the posts of government and the power to those who from time to time are deemed to be the best men ; and no man is debarred by his weakness or poverty or by the obscurity of his parentage, or promoted because of the opposite qualities, as is the case in other States. On the contrary, the one principle of selection is this : the man that is deemed to be wise or good rules and governs. And the cause of this [238e] our polity lies in our equality of birth. For whereas all other States are composed of a heterogeneous collection of all sorts of people, so that their polities also are heterogeneous, tyrannies as well as oligarchies, some of them regarding one another as slaves, others as masters ; we and our people, [239a] on the contrary, being all born of one mother, claim to be neither the slaves of one another nor the masters ; rather does our natural birth-equality drive us to seek lawfully legal equality, and to yield to one another in no respect save in reputation for virtue and understanding.
Wherefore the forefathers of these men and of us, and these men themselves, having been reared up thus in complete freedom, and being nobly born, achieved before all men many noble deeds both individual and national, [239b] deeming it their duty to fight in the cause of freedom alike with Greeks on behalf of Greeks and with barbarians on behalf of the whole of Greece. The story of how they repulsed Eumolpus and the Amazons, and still earlier invaders, when they marched upon our country, and how they defended the Argives against the Cadmeians and the Heracleidae against the Argives, is a story which our time is too short to relate as it deserves, and already their valor has been adequately celebrated in song by poets who have made it known throughout the world ; [239c] consequently, if we should attempt to magnify the same achievements in plain prose, we should probably find ourselves outmatched.
These exploits, therefore, for these reasons I judge that we should pass over, seeing also that they have their due meed of praise ; but those exploits for which as yet no poet has received worthy renown for worthy cause, and which lie still buried in oblivion, I ought, as I think, to celebrate, not only praising them myself but providing material also for others to build up into odes and other forms of poetry in a manner worthy of the doers of those deeds. And of the deeds whereof I speak the first were these : [239d] The Persians were in command of Asia, and were enslaving Europe, when they came in contact with the children of this land, our own parents, of whom it is right and proper that we should make mention first and celebrate their valor. But if we are to celebrate it fitly, in order to visualize it we must place ourselves, in thought, at that epoch when the whole of Asia was already in bondage to the third of the Persian kings. Cyrus, the first of these kings, had by his own spirited action set free his fellow-countrymen, the Persians, and not only enslaved the Medes, their masters, [239e] but also gained command of the rest of Asia, as far as to Egypt. His son ruled over Egypt and as much of Libya as he could traverse ; while the third king, Darius, extended his empire by land as far as to the Scythians, and by his navy controlled the sea and the islands, [240a] so that none so much as thought of disputing his sway. Thus the minds of all men were enslaved ; so many were the mighty and warlike nations which had fallen under the yoke of the Persian Empire.
Then Darius, accusing us and the Eretrians of having plotted against Sardis, dispatched fifty myriads of men in transports and warships, together with three hundred ships of war, and Datis as their commander ; [240b] and him the king ordered to bring back the Eretrians and Athenians in captivity, if he wished to keep his own head. He then sailed to Eretria against men who were amongst the most famous warriors in Greece at that time, and by no means few in number ; them he overpowered within three days, and lest any should escape he made a thorough search of the whole of their country and his method was this. His soldiers marched to the limits of Eretria and posted themselves at intervals from sea to sea ; [240c] then they joined hands and passed through the whole of the country, in order that they might be able to report to the king that not a man had escaped out of their hands. With the same design they sailed off from Eretria to Marathon, supposing that they would have an easy task in leading the Athenians captive under the same yoke of bondage as the Eretrians. And while these actions were being accomplished in part, and in part attempted, not one of the Greeks lent aid to the Eretrians nor yet to the Athenians, save only the Lacedaemonians (and they arrived on the day after the battle) ; all the rest were terrorstricken, and, hugging their present security, [240d] made no move. It is by realizing this position of affairs that we can appreciate what manner of men those were, in point of valor, who awaited the onset of the barbarians’ power, chastised all Asia’s insolent pride, and were the first to rear trophies of victory over the barbarians ; whereby they pointed the way to the others and taught them to know that the Persian power was not invincible, since there is no multitude of men or money but courage conquers it. [240e] I, therefore, affirm that those men were the begetters not merely of our bodies but of our freedom also, and the freedom of all the dwellers in this continent ; for it was the example of that exploit of theirs which fired the Greeks with courage to risk the later battles in the cause of salvation, learning their lesson from the men of Marathon.
To them, therefore, we award in this our speech the first prize for valor, and the second to those who fought and won the sea-fights off Salamis [241a] and at Artemisium. And truly concerning these men also one might have much to relate, regarding the manner of onsets they endured both by land and sea, and how they repelled them ; but the achievement I shall mention is that which was, in my judgement, the noblest that they performed, in that it followed up the achievement of the men of Marathon. For whereas the men of Marathon had only proved to the Greeks thus much, — that it was possible to repel [241b] the barbarians by land though few against many, yet the prospect in a sea-fight remained still doubtful, and the Persians still retained the reputation of being invincible by sea, in virtue of their numbers and their wealth, their naval skill and strength. For this, then, the men who fought those sea-fights merit our praise, that they delivered the Greeks from the second of their fears, and put an end to the terrors inspired by multitudes of ships and men. So it came about, by the action of both — the soldiers who fought at Marathon and the sailors who fought at Salamis — , [241c] that the rest of the Greeks were trained and accustomed to have no fear of the barbarians, neither by land, as our soldiers taught them, nor yet, as our sailors taught them, by sea.
The exploit at Plataea I put third both in order and in merit of those which secured the salvation of Greece ; and in this exploit, at last, the Lacedaemonians cooperated with the Athenians.
By the action of all these men the greatest and most formidable danger was warded off, and because of this their valor [241d] we pronounce their eulogy now, as our successors will in the time to come. But, in the period that followed, many cities of the Greeks were still in league with the barbarian, and of the king himself it was reported that he was purposing to renew his attempt against the Greeks. Wherefore it is right that we should make mention also of those men who put the finishing touch to the work of salvation executed by their predecessors by sweeping away the whole of the barbarian power and driving it clean off the seas. These were the men who fought [241e] the sea-fight at the Eurymedon, the men who served in the expedition against Cyprus, the men who voyaged to Egypt and to many another quarter, — men whom we ought to hold in memory and render them thanks, seeing that they put the king in fear and caused him to give his whole mind to his own safety in place of plotting the destruction of Greece. Now this war was endured to the end by all our citizens who warred against the barbarians [242a] in defence of all the other Greek-speaking peoples as well as themselves.
But when peace was secured and our city was held in honor, there followed the usual consequence which the successful suffer at the hands of men ; for it was assailed by jealousy first, and after jealousy by envy ; and thereby our city was plunged against its will into war with the Greeks. Thereupon, when war had broken out, they encountered the Lacedaemonians at Tanagra while fighting in defence of [242b] the liberties of the Boeotians ; and though the battle itself was indecisive, it was decided by the subsequent result. For whereas the enemy retired and made off, deserting those whom they had come to assist, our men won a victory after a two days’ battle at Oenophyta, and rightfully restored those who were wrongfully exiled. These were the first of our men who, after the Persian war and now helping Greeks against Greeks in the cause of freedom, proved themselves men of valor and delivered those whom they were aiding ; [242c] and they were the first to be honored by the State and laid to rest in this tomb.
Later on, when there was widespread war, and all the Greeks had marched against us and ravaged our country, most evilly requiting our city, and our men had defeated them by sea and had captured their Lacedaemonian leaders in Sphagia, although they had it in their power to destroy them, yet they spared their lives and gave them back [242d] and made peace, since they deemed that against their fellow Greeks it was right to wage war only up to the point of victory, and not to wreck the whole Greek community for the sake of a city’s private grudge, but to wage war to the death against the barbarians. It is meet, indeed, that we should praise these men who were warriors in this war and now lie here, inasmuch as they demonstrated that if any contended that in the former war, against the barbarians, others were superior to the Athenians, their contention was false. [242e] This they now proved by their triumph in the war when the Greeks were at feud, and by their conquest of those who were the leaders of the rest of Greece, when, alone by themselves, they defeated that city by whose allied aid they had formerly defeated the barbarians.
This peace was followed by a third war, as formidable as it was unexpected, wherein many brave men lost their lives and now lie here. Many of these reared up numerous trophies of victory in Sicily, fighting for the freedom [243a] of Leontini, to succour which city, and to honor their pledges, they sailed to those regions ; but inasmuch as our city was in a helpless, situation and unable to reinforce them owing to the length of the voyage, fortune was against them and they renounced their design ; yet for their prudence and their valor they have received more praise from their foes of the opposite army than the rest of men am their friends. Many others of them fought in the sea-fights in the Hellespont, where in one single day they captured all the enemy’s ships, [243b] besides winning many other engagements. But what I have termed the formidable and unexpected character of the war lay in this, that the rest of the Greeks had arrived at such a pitch of jealousy towards this city that they even brought themselves to solicit privately the aid of their deadliest foe, the very king whom they had publicly expelled with our assistance, inviting a barbarian as their ally against Greeks ; and dared to range against our city the united forces of all the Greeks [243c] and barbarians. And then it was that the strength and valor of our State shone out conspicuously. For when men fancied that she was already reduced by war, with her ships cut off at Mytilene, her citizens sent sixty ships to the rescue, manning the ships themselves and proving themselves disputably to be men of valor by conquering their foes and setting free their friends ; albeit they met with undeserved misfortune, and were not recovered from the sea to find their burial here. And for these reasons it behoves us to have them in remembrance [243d] and to praise them always ; for it was owing to their valor that we were conquerors not only in the sea-fight on that day but in all the rest of the war ; and it was due to them that men formed the conviction regarding our city (and it was a true conviction) that she could never be warred down, not even by all the world. And in truth it was by our own dissensions that we were brought down and not by the hands of other men ; for by them we are still to this day undefeated, and it is we ourselves who have both defeated and been defeated by ourselves.
[243e] After these happenings, when we were at peace and amity with other States, our civil war at home was waged in such a way that — if men are fated to engage in civil strife — there is no man but would pray for his own State that its sickness might resemble ours. So kindly and so friendly was the way in which the citizens from the Peiraeus and from the city consorted with one another, and also — beyond men’s hopes — with the other Greeks ; and such moderation did they show in their settlement [244a] of the war against the men at Eleusis. And the cause of all these actions was nothing else than that genuine kinship which produces, not in word only but in deed, a firm friendship founded on community of race. And of those who fell in this war also it is meet to make mention and to reconcile them by such means as we can under present conditions, — by prayer, that is, and by sacrifice, — praying for them to those that have them in their keeping, seeing that we ourselves also have been reconciled. [244b] For it was not through wickedness that they set upon one another, nor yet through hatred, but through misfortune. And to this we ourselves, who now live, can testify ; for we who are of the same stock as they grant forgiveness to one another both for what we have done and what we have suffered.After this, when peace was completely re-established, the city remained quiet, granting forgiveness to the barbarians for the vigorous defence they had offered when she had done them injury, but feeling aggrieved with the Greeks at the thought of the return they had made for the benefits she had done them, [244c] in that they joined themselves to the barbarians, and stripped her of those ships which had once been the means of their own salvation, and demolished her walls as a recompense for our saving their walls from ruin. Our city, therefore, resolved that never again would she succour Greeks when in danger of enslavement either by one another or at the hands of barbarians ; and in this mind she abode. Such then being our policy, the Lacedaemonians supposed that we, the champions of liberty, were laid low, and that it was now open to them to enslave the rest, and this [244d] they proceeded to do. But why should I prolong the story ? For what followed next is no tale of ancient history about men of long ago. Nay, we ourselves know how the Argives, the Boeotians and the Corinthians — the leading States of Greece — came to need our city, being stricken with terror, and how even the Persian king himself — most marvellous fact of all — was reduced to such a state of distress that eventually he could hope for salvation from no other quarter save this city of ours [244e] which he had been so eager to destroy. And in truth, if one desired to frame a just accusation against the city, the only true accusation one could bring would be this, — that she has always been compassionate to excess and the handmaid of the weak.
And in fact, on that occasion, she proved unable to harden her heart and adhere firmly to her resolved policy of refusing to assist any in danger of enslavement against those who wronged them ; [245a] on the contrary she gave way and lent assistance. The Greeks she aided herself and rescued them from slavery, so that they remained free until such time as they enslaved each other once more ; but to the King she could not bring herself to lend official aid for fear of disgracing the trophies of Marathon, Salamis and Plataea, but she permitted exiles only and volunteers to assist him, and thereby, beyond a doubt, she saved him. Having, then, restored her walls [245b] and rebuilt her navy, she entered upon the war, since war was forced upon her, and in defence of the Persians warred against the Lacedaemonians. But the King, becoming afraid of our city when he saw that the Lacedaemonians were desisting from the naval struggle, wished to desert us ; so he demanded the surrender of the Greeks in the Continent, whom the Lacedaemonians had formerly given over to him, as the price of his continuing his alliance with us and the other allies, [245c] thinking that we would refuse and thus furnish him with a pretext for his desertion. Now in the case of the rest of his allies he was mistaken ; for they all — including the Corinthians, Argives, Boeotians, and the rest — consented to hand them over to him, making a sworn agreement that if he would supply them with money they would hand over the Greeks in the Continent ; but we, and we alone, could not bring ourselves either to hand them over or to join in the agreement.
So firmly-rooted and so sound is the noble and liberal character of our city, and endowed also [245d] with such a hatred of the barbarian, because we are pure-blooded Greeks, unadulterated by barbarian stock. For there cohabit with us none of the type of Pelops, or Cadmus, or Aegyptus or Danaus, and numerous others of the kind, who are naturally barbarians though nominally Greeks ; but our people are pure Greeks and not a barbarian blend ; whence it comes that our city is imbued with a whole-hearted hatred of alien races. None the less, we were isolated once again because of our refusal to perform the dishonorable and unholy act of surrendering Greeks to barbarians. [245e] And thus we found ourselves in the same position which had previously led to our military overthrow ; but, by the help of God, we brought the war to a more favorable conclusion than on that occasion. For we still retained our ships, our walls, and our own colonies, when we ceased from the war, — so welcome to our enemies also was its cessation. Yet truly in this war also we suffered the loss of valiant men, — the men who had difficult ground to cope with at Corinth and treachery at Lechaeum ; [246a] valiant, too, were the men who rescued the King and drove the Lacedaemonians off the seas. These men I recall to your memory, and you it becomes to join in praising and celebrating men such as these.