Many Rivers To Cross

Unlike Thucydides, we made it to Amphipolis! Yes, I have been waiting over a year to make this joke.

The view south from the walls of Amphipolis towards Eïon and the Strymonian Gulf.

Overall, a fantastic day. Partly, it must be said, this was because we started at the Lion of Amphipolis monument (allowing me to develop various theories about its original purpose that were then soundly falsified by reading recent research suggesting that it was originally part of the Kasta tomb complex to the north-east of the city, rather than having always occupied its current position to the south-west). We then walked up the quiet(ish) road that followed the river, rather than the main road towards Serres; we saw a fabulous range of bird life – bee-eaters, golden orioles, a pair of eagles with very light undersides that could have been short-toed snake eagles (either that, or Bonelli’s eagles), plus hearing a hoopoe and a cuckoo, and my wife had a lovely time photographing the impressive variety of wildflowers. This is definitely now my go-to method for putting her in a good mood for being dragged round ancient remains and museums.

The most important aspect of Amphipolis itself, for me, was its topography: getting a proper sense of how it dominates the pass from the coast into the wide plains of southern Thrace and the route over to Mount Pangaion – the original name of the place, according to Thucydides, was Nine Roads, and while I couldn’t identify as many as nine it was undoubtedly a major route centre. While the course of the river Strymon has changed substantially since drainage works from the 1930s onwards, it was likewise easy to see how the river once flowed on both sides of the hill on which Amphipolis stood – hence the ‘Amphi’ – and how this was plausibly the first practical crossing point. All in all, even before you think about the resources that inland Thrace could supply so long as you held the pass, it was manifestly a REALLY bad idea to lose control of this strategic location, and one can see why Thucydides was determined to narrate events – very subtly – to show how he really couldn’t have done any more to try to save it…

The site itself also has lots of great things to offer, to the point where I’m a bit surprised to keep encountering colleagues who know northern Greece well who’ve never visited. The walls – enough of which survive to give a clear sense of the circuit – could be used as a case study in changing construction techniques, from perfect late C5 isodromic blocks to the random reuse in late antiquity of bits of column and assorted rubble. There are some nice tombs from different eras; above all, the rock-cut cist tomb in a building complex within the walls (now sheltered by part of the museum building) that contained a silver-plated casket in which was found a gold wreath; the claim that this is the tomb of Brasidas seems as plausible as any hypothesis could be about the identification of the deceased in the absence of epigraphic evidence: “…all the allies attended in arms and buried Brasidas at the public expense in the city, in front of what is now the market-place, and the Amphipolitans having enclosed his tomb, ever afterwards sacrifice to him as a hero and have given to him the honour of games and annual offerings” (Thucydides 5.11.1). Best of all, they’ve found many of the wooden piles from the bridge across what was then the western branch of the river, and there are substantial remains of the post-Brasidas extension of the walls down to defend/control the river crossing.

We didn’t make it down to the gymnasium or the Roman house, unfortunately, as we wanted to leave time for the museum before our pre-booked taxi arrived, but they look pretty good too. The museum has some interesting material beside Brasidas’ burial casket, but more importantly has really made the best of its more domestic, less spectacular artefacts to offer a good introduction to everyday life over the centuries – minor bits of jewellery, pottery, toys, glassware, carved reliefs and so forth. Compared with the National Archaeological Museum in Athens, say, which is really “Here’s some amazing stuff!” “Here’s some more amazing stuff!” “Here’s some stuff we think is amazing but we’re not going to explain it!”, someone has put real thought and effort into the display and descriptions. There is a rather striking contrast with the mezzanine level, outlining the history of the site from the archaic to the Hellenistic period, in a text-heavy manner that *I* found largely unintelligible, even knowing what it ought to be saying, and A. gave up on after about two minutes. It’s almost a palimpsest of different eras of museum curation.

The archaeological park of Amphipolis has clearly had a lot of money spent on it in the relatively recent past; both around the main site and down by the river gate there are (reasonably) well-constructed paths and lots of information boards. Partly, to judge from the couple of ‘In the Footsteps of St Paul’ waymarkers, this seems to be an attempt at grabbing some of the pilgrimage traffic that we saw last year at Philippi – though one fears that Acts 17.1 may not amount to the strongest case that this is a must-visit place for the faithful: “When Paul and his companions had passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica…” Mostly, though, it focuses on the development of the site in its own right, offering reasonably clear explanations of different buildings; still a bit of a tendency to talk in detail about the early Christian basilica with only a passing mention of the classical building underneath, but so much better than Philippi. Which makes it even more jarring that the information board by the bridge gets things horribly, gratuitously muddled…

The first reference to Amphipolis’ wooden bridge is by the historian Thucydides, who notes that the bridge was a turning point in the Peloponnesian War.

I am not sure how this statement relates to the one at the end of the paragraph that “We have further references to the bridge by Euripides, Charon, and Herodotus”. Not having read the relevant passage in Herodotus for a while, let alone considered what I believe is a fragmentary play by Euripides, I can’t say if this is making a subtle and contentious point about the precise chronology of publication of different texts, or is just confused. Turning point? It could be argued, I suppose, through a counterfactual scenario in which Athens remained in its strong post-Sphacteria position vis-à-vis Sparta and either extracted much better terms in a peace settlement or pressed on with the war, having the advantage of all the timber and metal resources of Thrace – the loss of Amphipolis, then, as the last point where they could have won a decisive victory overall. But Thucydides doesn’t actually say this. A better case would be that the bridge was decisive for the history of the Pel War, since it freed up Thucydides to write it…

Specifically, he notes that in 422 BC the Spartan general Brasidas, as victor in the battle with Cleon, took possession of the bridge, which connected the city of Amphipolis with its harbor.

No. Nope. Definitely not. NO.

Where to start with this? In 422, Brasidas already had possession of the bridge, which he’d seized in 424. If by the ‘harbor’ of Amphipolis they mean the city of Eion, that is on the east bank of the river that this bridge is crossing, the same side as Amphipolis. There is a case to be made that the bridge did play a role in the Battle of Amphipolis, given that Brasidas’ strategem (Thuc. 5.6.3 onwards) was to take a load of troops up onto the heights of Cerdylion on the western side of the river (giving him a good view of everything), implying that he crossed the bridge to get there, and then to rush back down to take the Athenians by surprise, again using the bridge – but the bridge isn’t mentioned specifically. Most importantly, Brasidas couldn’t take possession of the bridge after the battle, BECAUSE HE WAS DEAD. You’ve got what is plausibly his funeral casket in the museum, with the whole story. Don’t you read your own labels?

What is completely ridiculous is that Thucydides’ actual first mention of the bridge, in his narrative of events in the winter of 424/423, is not just (1) specific, (2) clear and (3) exciting, but gives a really good sense of the importance of the bridge, which is surely the whole point of this display.

Thucydides 4.103.4-104.2 (apologies for using the Crawley translation, but we’re travelling light and so I don’t have a better version with me. Yes, I now regret this packing decision):

…and that same night [the Argilians] took [Brasidas] on to the bridge over the river; where he found only a small guard to oppose him, the town being at some distance from the passage, and the walls not reaching down to it as at present. This guard he easily drove in, partly through there being treason in their ranks, partly from the stormy state of the weather and the suddenness of his attack, and so got across the bridge, and immediately became master of all the property outside; the Amphipolitans having houses all over the quarter. The passage of Brasidas was a complete surprise to the people in the town; and the capture of many of those outside, and the flight of the rest within the wall, combined to produce great confusion among the citizens, especially as they did not trust one another. It is even said that if Brasidas, instead of stopping to pillage, had advanced straight against the town, he would probably have taken it.

You don’t have to worry about the question of whether Thucydides is over-egging the “No one could possibly have anticipated this daring attack” self-exculpatory stuff; just from the perspective of explaining and presenting the archaeological material, this gives you the importance of the bridge and an indication of the stages of development – walls didn’t yet extend all the way down (but clearly were extended in Thucydides’ lifetime). Even if you are an archaeologist who really, really hates the traditional dominance of literary sources in the interpretation of classical sites, would it really be so bad to make use of this material?

Okay, I’m a Thucydides obsessive; I know this information is completely wrong (and almost wonder if I’m being trolled – that they know some visitors to Amphipolis will be there because of Thucydides, and want to wind them up). Everyone else is being presented with statements that look plausible, if rather dull, and are simply false. I’m reasonably sure that the information pre-dates Generative AI – actually I’m pretty confident that ChatGPT would have done a far better job. Was the display in fact put together with no academic input or oversight?

Clearly it’s not enough that Amphipolis should be Thucydides’ Waterloo, do to speak; now they want to inflict a crushing defeat on his historiography…

Note: I have a load of other nice photos, but either the WiFi in this Sofia flat or my iPad are struggling, so I may have to update this later.