The Wooden Walls of Thermopylae (26 page)

I still get a tingle when I hear those lines and find myself transported back in time to Delphi. Aristonice handed Themistocles a parchment and uttered one last sentence directed only towards Themistocles.

“I will wait with pleasurable anticipation for what you have promised on behalf of the Athenians to the servant of the God, son of Neocles.”

Then she turned her back and walked out, swinging her stringy buttocks, and I’m pleased to say I never saw her again. It took some time for it all to sink in, not that we needed to work it out for ourselves. Themistocles was in great high spirits over what he’d achieved and talked all the way down the mountain towards the sea sparkling below us in the sun.

“Couldn’t believe she’d give us all of it, Wooden Wall; real divine inspiration that was. How much more clearly can you say ships without using the words?”

He laughed so hard at this he almost slipped off his mule but recovered himself in time to continue.

“How can we lose now that the God has spelled out our battle plan for us? How can any of the allies, including those Spartan bastards, question how we use the fleet?”

And he was right; the Oracle interpreted correctly presented the essence of Themistoclean strategy and he wasn’t about to let us forget it. I think he considered this his finest moment but I only fully understood the genius of it later that day as we sat in a tavern on the harbour front. We were killing time, waiting for the ship that would take us to the
isthmus and the road home. Listening to him in that tavern even the dimmest of us realised the full magnitude of the God’s message.

“Not only the ships but where we’ll deploy them.”

He raised his hands in the air and chanted solemnly.

“At divine Salamis.”

He lowered his arms, took a huge slurp from his wine cup, ineffectually wiped at the stain from the spillage on his tunic and belched loudly.

“And the best of it, the best of it: it gives us a free hand, no time limit, you understand me?”

More wine spilled then he was quoting again.

“When the grain is scattered or when the harvest is gathered in.”

He waited for a response scanning our faces. We weren’t going to interrupt his flow.

“What other time is there. Everything is either before or after. We can act when we decide the time’s right. The God thinks of everything.”

Now we were laughing with him. We could see what this oracle had delivered to Athens and to him in particular. We should have stopped drinking but it was a special day. We had a couple of hours before the ship was ready so he ordered another chou of the finest the tavern could find. Maybe we should have quit then, maybe the God was listening: nemesis follows hubris.

Later, as we were flicking the lees from the dregs in our cups in a game of Kottabos, Themistocles muttered,

“Problem with oracles is they’re subject to a range of interpretations.”

We waited for what he was going to follow up with.

“So the great thing about this one came in the first line before all that waffle about Cecrop’s land and holy Cithaeron.”

Even through the clouds of drunkenness he must have noted our blank expressions.

“The first line, didn’t you get the first line.”

We said nothing.

“All right, listen, I’ll quote it for you.”

He raised his hands above his head.

“I shall tell you in words that can bear no distortion.”

He dropped his hands.

“See, see, ‘Bear no distortion’, the Gods telling them that there’s only one way to understand this, it isn’t ambiguous, the real meaning is nailed on.”

He favoured us with a pathetically pleased-with-himself smile, like a child, said,

“So no one can argue with it, see.”

Then went outside to be sick.

Shows just how wrong you can be, doesn’t it, reader?

The news and the exiles arrived at about the same time. The news eclipsed the return of the exiles. Mardonius was on the march, moving quicker than anyone could have predicted. With him marched the uncountable Persian host led by the immortals. An army three times larger than anything a united Greece could ever raise, and it would be faced by a disunited Greece. An army that marched towards us lusting for blood and revenge for Marathon.

Mardonius was headed for the high pass over the mountains of Thessaly. The pass, once traversed, descended into the soft underbelly of Greece. From that pass the road led straight south to Athens. Between them and us were a few vacillating states, like Thebes who we couldn’t trust. These bastards would betray us and within months Athens would burn.

Two days after the panic had taken hold we sailed back from Delphi into Athens, into a city racked with fear. A city preparing for the type of war it had never previously faced. A crowded city packed with refugees and riven by rumour.

There was a little comfort; we’d been reinforced by the returned exiles, Xanthippus, Aristides. Most of them had returned to stand with us, but not Hipparchus. There were many political fences to be mended.

I tasted the flavour of this in the New Year at a gathering in the house of Themistocles. A large group of his faction mingled with Xanthippus’s, Aristides’s and Megacles’s followers. But it wasn’t city rivalry on the agenda; there was something more serious to occupy the gathering. News had come that morning from Sparta that Mardonius scouts and skirmishers had crossed the border into Thessaly.

Old resentments were buried; the men of Marathon needed to stand together. There’s nothing like an external threat for promoting alliances. The erstwhile rivals hid any grievances; these could wait for the end of the war, if any of us lived to see the end. Most of us doubted we would, so what we promised today didn’t really matter. Aeschylus and I weren’t needed; we wandered off to find somewhere to drink, as there wouldn’t be many more chances – the fleet was to be mobilised.

That morning a message had been sent to the Spartans enquiring of their intentions. But events bypassed it. Along with their warning of the advance of the Persian skirmishers they’d sent a message direct from Leonidas to Themistocles: short, like all Spartan messages, and thus easy to quote.

“From Leonidas, King of the Spartans, to Themistocles, son Of Neocles Athenian.

Greetings,

I go direct with such men as are available to Tempe to hold the mountain pass against The Great King in obedience to my word. Do you the same. Gather your fleet to support us.”

So we had, at most, a couple of nights of freedom in Athens and then we’d be off to war. A war we’d fight at sea, packed into triremes, living on top of each other. That night we avoided the bars where we’d be likely to find the crew of the Athene Nike. We headed for the part of the Ceramicus furthest from the whores. These days of course the seamen
drink and live in Piraeus, but then it was different – although the first signs of that shift were beginning to appear.

We wanted a quiet bar but there weren’t any: war leads men to congregate in places where they can both drink and share their fear.

Not that Aeschylus was interested in sharing his fear, he didn’t fear the type of things the rest of us do. We found a place near the old shrine of the Goddess on the road leading to the wall. The shrine wasn’t much used now and exuded an air of neglect. But someone had left flowers at the feet of the ancient and worn figure of the Goddess. I remember that after a dry spell there had recently fallen a sharp shower, and the little square smelt of damp earth.

Aeschylus wanted to learn about what it was like to be a supplicant. Go see his play of that name, reader; it’s still performed in some of the rural demes. Because in that play you’ll see what we talked about that night. In many ways it’s a women’s play ending with the appeal to the gods to ‘grant victory to the women’s cause’ but, as in all things, he had another purpose. After one small jug, when he’d extracted from me as much as I could remember from my time with the oracle, he said,

“Not much time left, Mandrocles, you need to make things right.”

Must have been obvious from my expression I had no idea what he was talking about.

“She’s back, Mandrocles, you should go to her.”

“Where, when?”

“Back about a month. Living in her old place for now. Things have happened.”

He wouldn’t specify, thought it should be left for her to tell me. I wish he’d spelt it out. If he had, things might have been different. Don’t know how I felt, only that I wanted to see her.

It was almost like the old days: Demetrius favoured me with an evil squint as he let me in, his face had acquired another scar; there was a comforting sameness about that. There was another girl in her room and they were sitting on the bed together playing with an infant. She looked confused to see me and hastily handed the child back to its mother.

The mother must have been confused too; she looked surprised to be handed her own baby, which began to cry as she carried it out. I’ve never been good in situations like this. I knew there was something I was missing, something I needed to say but couldn’t think of; instead I remember mumbling something like,

“All right, Lyra? You look nice.”

She started to cry. She did look nice but she was different, life changes us all. Later, when we’d overcome the strange diffidence and I undressed her, I felt it. She was heavier, her breasts and belly particularly. But I liked that and when I entered her it was like coming back home. When we’d finished, she had Demetrius bring a flask of wine and we lay back to talk. I’d always liked to lie holding her and hear her talk after the act that men call ‘the little death’.

Her tale of having to go to the Megara to look after family didn’t quite make sense to me. Every time I questioned her about it she became distressed and then started to cry then said to me,

“Do you want the real truth?”

I didn’t, well I did really but I was trying to be kind. Everyone knows a whore has to make things up as she slips from one situation to another. I didn’t want to put her in that position. I just said,

“No, love, let’s just sleep.”

She looked disappointed: strange that. But settled her head onto my shoulder, I was tired, happy I drifted straight off. Looking back I …

I don’t want to write any more about that, I won’t.

Next day Cimon made his entrance into the legends of our city. It is a story still told to the young to encourage them in their duties. It has many versions and is set at different times. I’ll tell you how it really happened and when you’ve read this you will feel, deep in your soul, that this was how it was. Cimon was wild, his friends were wild, aristocratic roaring boys drinking, whoring and fighting. But like all of us back then we understood our duty to the Gods and to the city.

What we needed in those desperate days was to heal our divisions and fight as one. Something we’d only done once: at Marathon. There we’d fought on foot like gentlemen hoplites. Now that wasn’t our role. Greece needed our ships.

But there was bad blood between hoplites and seamen between the young aristos who served in the cavalry and the sons of the Demos. Remember Theodorus had been exiled for gutting a young aristo. There was resistance from the landed classes towards fighting from ships like low born pirates.

People believe the idea came from Themistocles, but for once I disagree. I think it was pure Cimon; it was an example of nobleness of spirit, and no one would accuse Themistocles of that. Those two days when we mobilised our fleet there was the atmosphere of a festival.

The public ways leading down from the city to the Piraeus were packed with all of Athens. Athenians love a crowd and no one was going to miss waving our new fleet off. It was before the traditional sailing season but we knew that whatever was going to happen would happen quickly.

We were provisioning for the expedition, triremes haven’t
space to carry much and whereas a few ships may be able to survive by living off what they can find along the coast, that’s not possible for a whole fleet. So we were to be supplied from a fleet of merchant craft, mainly pentecontors. Ariston was threatening the captain of the ship which would supply our squadron. There was a standard belief among trireme crews that the merchants adulterated the food and watered down the wine in order to increase profits.

The merchant captain was protesting his honesty while Ariston prodded his well-padded belly with a knife when there was shouting from higher up towards the city. Then a voice directed at me,

“Mandrocles, you’ve gotta see this.”

Then we were off, provisioning forgotten as all of us legged it up to the city. Got there just in time, too. In time to see a group of aristocratic youths carrying their horse harnesses emerge from the Agora. All Athens stopped and turned out to watch. It was a beautiful day as we often get at this time of year when summer begins to perfume the air. Hot too, so the crowd sweated and stank. At first we were too far back to see much, so shoved our way through the crowd to the front. That’s where I saw him: Cimon.

His father would have been so proud; it was just the kind of stunt he excelled at. The crowd were shouting questions at them but always received the same answer.

“We are going to make a dedication to the Goddess, follow if you want more.”

We did want more, all of us, so the crowd surged after them as they began to weave their way through the packed streets leading up to where the great ramp led into the Acropolis. We had no trouble fighting our way to the front and that’s the position we maintained until the show was over.

In the old songs of the fight at Troy the heroes are
described as Godlike. Well. let me tell you: Cimon was God like that day. Taller than his companions, broader too with his thick curly hair lying long over his shoulders. It could have been the young Achilles returned to us.

They processed onto the ramp in high spirits shouting out to each other and laughing. The city needed something like this to take off the edge of constant worry. At the top of the ramp, after a brief stop to honour the small shrine that used to stand there, they took the well-worn track that wandered through the forest of steles and statues leading to the ancient and lovely temple of the Goddess Athena.

You’ll have to imagine this, reader, it’s all gone now, all destroyed and vanished. What has replaced it and what is still being built although bigger, richer and grander lacks the simple dignity and sense of Godhead of the ancient Acropolis. There was no flashy marble gleaming white, just grey limestone hewn from the Attic Mountains. Six great columns at the front and back and twelve along the sides.

However there were fine marble sculptures adorning the temple. The finest of these depicted a battle between the Gods and giants. In this, mighty Athena was prominent. Back then the temple was hung with shields dedicated by soldiers returned safe from the wars. Cimon and his troop, with due reverence to the Goddess, approached the colonnade of the temple where the shields hung.

Aware of the watching Gods the crowd was shushed and in this sudden deep silence Cimon approached the Goddess. For a moment he stood before her, head bowed in reverence. Then, lifting his arms in supplication, he dedicated his horse trappings to her, hanging them before her statue. Then, turning, he walked to where the nearest shield hung.

As he lifted the shield the sun caught it, flashing off it in a dazzling beam that illuminated the shadowed face of Athena. I swear as this happened the Goddess opened her
eyes and smiled on him. Not just me; we all saw her so it must have happened.

Holding the shield he turned and faced us in the silence as, behind him, each of his companions in turn dedicated their horse bridals and took down a shield. None of us missed the significance of this gesture. When they were all arrayed, shield-bearing, behind him, he shouted out across us and down towards the city.

“We know our duty to the Goddess and the city. We will man the wooden walls. We will fight from the ships alongside the people.”

I didn’t realise he had such a stentorian voice; it would have graced any parade ground. He turned to his companions and shouted,

“To the ships.”

They replied,

“To the ships.”

They came down off the temple and began to make their way down through the city and to the harbour with the crowd surging behind them, shouting,

“To the wooden walls. To the ships.”

At Piraeus each of them chose and boarded a separate ship. Cimon, who as leader got to choose first, chose the Athene Nike, to the delight of its crew. A city faced with destruction needs moments like those, but moments like those come only from great leaders.

The euphoria was short lived.

We were betrayed. However good the reasons for the Spartan army to be seen as defending all Greece, there was no sensible military logic in attempting to defend Thessaly. The emotions of the Greek assembly infected our minds and distorted our logic. A mixed force under Spartan command was marching to guard the way to the mountain pass at Tempe. From the outset everything that could have gone
wrong did so. But there were also strategic reasons that weighed against us. The fleet and the army were too far apart for one to support the other.