Themistocles

At break of day, Xerxes was seated on a high place and overlooking the disposition of his armament. This place was, according to Phanodemus, above the Heracleium, where only a narrow passage separates the island from Attica; but according to Acestodorus, it was in the border-land of Megara, above the so-called Horns. Here a gilded throne had been set for him at his command, and many secretaries stationed near at hand, whose task it was to make due record of all that was done in the battle.

But Themistocles was sacrificing alongside the admiral’s trireme. There three prisoners of war were brought to him, of visage most beautiful to behold, conspicuously adorned with raiment and with gold. They were said to be the sons of Sandauce, the King’s sister, and Artayctus. When Euphrantides the seer caught sight of them, since at one and that same moment a great and glaring flame shot up from the sacrificial victim and a sneeze gave forth its good omen on the right, he clasped Themistocles by the hand and bade him consecrate the youths, and sacrifice them all to Dionysus Carnivorous, with prayers of supplication; for on this wise would the Hellenes have a saving victory.

Themistocles was terrified, feeling that the word of the seer was monstrous and shocking; but the multitude, who, as is wont to be the case in great struggles and severe crises, looked for safety rather from unreasonable than from reasonable measures, invoked the god with one voice, dragged the prisoners to the altar, and compelled the fulfillment of the sacrifice, as the seer commanded. At any rate, this is what Phanias the Lesbian says, and he was a philosopher, and well acquainted with historical literature.

As regards the number of the Barbarian ships, Aeschylus the poet, in his tragedy of The Persians, as though from personal and positive knowledge, says this:—

1. But Xerxes, and I surely know, had a thousand ships
2. In number under him; those of surpassing speed
3. Were twice five score beside and seven; so stands the count.

Themistocles is thought to have divined the best time for fighting with no less success than the best place, inasmuch as he took care not to send his triremes bow on against the Barbarian vessels until the hour of the day had come which always brought the breeze fresh from the sea and a swell rolling through the strait. This breeze wrought no harm to the Hellenic ships, since they lay low in the water and were rather small; but for the Barbarian ships, with their towering sterns and lofty decks and sluggish movements in getting under way, it was fatal, since it smote them and slewed them round broadside to the Hellenes, who set upon them sharply, keeping their eyes on Themistocles, because they thought he saw best what was to be done,

and because confronting him was the admiral of Xerxes, Ariamenes, who being on a great ship, kept shooting arrows and javelins as though from a city wall,—brave man that he was, by far the strongest and most just of the King’s brothers. It was upon him that Ameinias the Deceleian and Socles the Paeanian bore down,—they being together on one ship,—and as the two ships struck each other bow on, crashed together, and hung fast by their bronze beaks, he tried to board their trireme; but they faced him, smote him with their spears, and hurled him into the sea. His body, as it drifted about with other wreckage, was recognized by Artemisia, who had it carried to Xerxes.

At this stage of the struggle they say that a great light flamed out from Eleusis, and an echoing cry filled the Thriasian plain down to the sea, as of multitudes of men together conducting the mystic Iacchus in procession. Then out of the shouting throng a cloud seemed to lift itself slowly from the earth, pass out seawards, and settle down upon the triremes. Others fancied they saw apparitions and shapes of armed men coming from Aegina with their hands stretched out to protect the Hellenic triremes. These, they conjectured, were the Aeacidae, who had been prayerfully invoked before the battle to come to their aid.[*](Hdt. 8.64)