History of the Peloponnesian War

The Thebans, when they found they had been deceived, drew themselves up in close ranks and sought to repel the assaults of the enemy wherever they fell upon them.

And twice or three times they repulsed them; then when the Plataeans charged upon them with a great uproar, and at the same time the women and slaves on the house-tops, uttering screams and yells, kept pelting them with stones and tiles—a heavy rain too had come on during the night—they became panic-stricken and turned and fled through the city; and since most of them were unfamiliar with the thoroughfares by which they must save themselves amid the darkness and mud—for these things happened at the end of the month[*](When there would be no moon.)--, whereas their pursuers knew full well how to prevent their escape, many of them consequently perished.

One of the Plataeans, moreover, had closed the gates by which they had entered--the only gates which had been opened--using the spike of a javelin instead of a pin to fasten the bar, so that there was no longer a way out in that direction either.

And being pursued up and down the city, some of them mounted the wall and threw themselves over, most of these perishing; others succeeded in getting out by an unguarded gate without being observed, cutting through the bar with an axe which a woman gave them—but not many, for they were soon discovered; and others got isolated in various parts of the city and were put to death.

But the greater number, those who had kept more together than the others, rushed into a large building abutting upon[*](Or, as most MSS. read, a large building . . . whose doors near by happened to be open; with Didot and Haase, a large building near the wall whose doors ... ) the wall whose doors happened to be open, thinking that the doors of the building were city-gates and that there was a passage right through to the outside.

And the Plataeans, seeing that they were cut off, began to deliberate whether they should set fire to the building and burn them up without more ado or what other disposition they should make of them.

But finally these and the other Thebans who survived and were wandering up and down the city came to an agreement with the Plataeans to surrender themselves and their arms, to be dealt with in any way the Plataeans wished.

The Thebans in Plataea had fared thus;