History of the Peloponnesian War

When the Peloponnesians had failed in this attempt also, they left behind them a certain part of their force, [having disbanded the rest,] and proceeded to raise a wall of circumvallation round the town, dividing the whole extent amongst the contingents of the different states. There was a ditch, too, both inside and outside of the lines, from which they made their bricks.

All being finished by about the [*]( i. e. its morning rising, nearly coincident with the autumnal equinox.) rising of Arcturus, they left troops to man half the extent of the wall, (the other half being manned by the Boeotians,) and retired with their army, and dispersed to their different cities.

Now the Plataeans had previously carried out of the town to Athens their children, and wives, and oldest men, and the mass of the inhabitants that would be of no service; but the men themselves who were left in the place and stood the siege, amounted to four hundred, with eighty Athenians, and one hundred and ten women to make bread for them.

This was the total number of them when they began to be besieged, and there was no one else within the walls, either bond or free. Such was the provision made for the siege of Plataea.

The same summer, and at the same time as the expedition was made against the Plataeans, the Athenians marched with two thousand heavy-armed of their own, and two hundred horse, against the Thrace-ward Chalcidians, and the Bottiaeans, when the corn was ripe, under the command of Xenophon son of Euripides, and two colleagues.

On arriving under the walls of Spartolus in Bottiaea, they destroyed the corn; and expected that the town would also surrender to them, through the intrigues of a party within. Those, however, who did not wish this, having sent to Olynthus, a body of heavy-armed and other troops came as a garrison for the place;