1. For a somewhat different view of this “pathology of power,” see Immerwahr 1973.

2. For a recent discussion of this general topic by a classicist, see Rose 1992, 6–12.

3. E.g., Andrewes 1962; Lang 1972; Kagan 1975; Cogan 1981a, 50–65; Cogan 1981b; Connor 1984, 79–81; for further bibliography (with useful comments), see Hornblower 1991, 421–422.

4. Connor (1984), for example, leaves this speech out of his discussion as a whole; see, however, Cogan 1981a, 44–49, and now Orwin 1994, 64–70; see also Macleod 1978, 64–68; Macleod argues that “Thucydides deliberately presents his speakers getting entangled in their own arguments,” primarily because they, “like Cleon later on, try to maintain that their action is both just and expedient” (p. 66).

5. Macleod 1978, 64; he cites Rhetorica ad Alexandrum 1424b37: δεικνύναι τοὺς τὴν συμμαχίαν ποιουμένος μάλιστα μὲν διακαίους ὄντας.

6. Cf. Thucydides speaking in propria persona about the origins of the war at 1.23.6.

7. Compare the similar fashion in which the Athenians treat the eunoia enjoyed by Sparta at 1.77.6.

8. Mauss 1990, 44.

9. See the essay by that title at Sahlins 1972, 149–183.

10. So Macleod 1974, but note Hornblower 1991, 391–392, which qualifies Macleod’s analysis.

11. On this, see Cogan 1981b.

12. This attempts to capture the pungency implied by the Greek ἐπανέστησαν μᾶλλον ἢ ἀπέστησαν on which, see Hornblower 1991, ad loc.

13. So Connor 1984, 112 n. 10.

14. De Romilly 1963, 172.

15. Wiedemann 1982, xxix.

16. Cogan 1981a, 75.

17. Gomme on 4.20.4: “Their offer on this occasion, militarily speaking worth nothing, except in the moral effect of its having been made at all, demanded not only a generosity of feeling and a far-sightedness on the part of Athens which they had no reason and no right to expect (and no country can throw a stone at Athens for that), but an even greater generosity, μεγαλοψυχία on their own, to accept the Athenians’ gesture and forget their own disgrace”; Kagan (1969) concludes that the Spartans had not yet reached the frame of mind where they could truly give up the idea of defeating Athens; Cartledge (1979, 242) follows Gomme and terms this “an empty and, almost certainly, a vain offer.”

18. Edmunds 1975a, 100.

19. Not all have read the Spartan speech this way: Strauss (1964, 173) suggests that the Spartan emphasis on Athens’s good fortune makes their offer “underhanded and grudging,” and observes that “their lack of frankness and of pride is not redeemed by graciousness.”

20. Hunter 1973, 74.

21. On this, see Strauss 1964, 239, near the conclusion of his analysis of Thucydides: “The order of cities which is presupposed in the most noble Spartan proclamations is altogether impossible, given the unequal power of the different cities which inevitably leads to the consequence that the most powerful cities cannot help being hegemonial or even imperial.”

22. On the dilemma facing the Spartans, see chapter 8 below.

23. For an even harsher analysis of Spartan dealings with Plataia, see Badian 1989.

24. For a discussion of the limits of this comparison, see Cogan 1981b, 7.