The ancient Greek historians (Harvard lectures) by J. B. Bury.

III

THUCYDIDES

95

of the Lacedaemonians, in the absence of which
they would not have declared war, and the particular actions which brought matters to a head and
determined the beginning of a war at a certain
date, is perfectly clear and valid. The further
question can be raised, whether in his account of
the affairs which moved the Peloponnesian alliance
to hostile action at a given moment, Thucydides
estimated rightly their proportional gravity. The
charge is that he has not given its due importance
to the Megarian business, whether failing to realise
its meaning, or deliberately keeping it in the background in order to devolve the responsibility for
the war from the shoulders of Pericles who was
responsible for the Megarian policy. The second
insinuation I need not consider; for I will show
hereafter (in the next Lecture) that the historian's
attitude to Pericles and his policy is detached. I
will only observe here that if he had wished to
shield that statesman from the alleged responsibility, it was clumsy of him not to suppress or
explain away the fact that in the final negotiations the Lacedaemonians made Megara the testquestion, and said they would be satisfied if Athens
yielded on that point,
This ultimatum of the Lacedaemonians may
indeed appear, at first sight, inconsistent with the
subordinate role which the Megarian grievance
plays in the historian's narrative of the circumstances which led to the war; and it has been
urged that instead of keeping it in the background