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On the Long Walls of Athens
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 December 2013
Extract
According to the view which has long held the field and is still the most widely accepted, the Long Walls which the Athenians constructed in the fifth century to connect their town and harbour were three in number, viz., two outer walls extending respectively to the northern and southern sections of the harbour fortifications, and an intermediate wall running longitudinally in the gap between the outer pair.
This theory rests on evidence which prima facie appears very strong. Harpocration distinctly enumerates three walls, known respectively as the Northern, the Southern or Middle, and the Phaleric one, and in support of his statement he quotes a passage from Aristophanes, in which three walls are likewise mentioned. The same number of walls also seems to be implied in a passage of Thucydides, where mention is made, firstly, of a Phaleric wall, and secondly, of ‘Long Walls,’ which should presumably be identified with the Northern and Southern walls of Harpocration, so as to make three walls in all.
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- Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1914
References
1 Leake, , Topography of Athens i. p. 426Google Scholar; Curtius, , Stadtgeschichte von Athen, pp. 111–2Google Scholar; Wachsmuth, , Stadt Athen im Altertum i. pp. 328–9Google Scholar; Kaupert, , Monatsberichte der Berliner Akademie 1879, pp. 628–38Google Scholar; Judeich, , Topographie von Athen, pp. 144–8Google Scholar; Grote, , History of Greece (10th ed.), iv. pp. 505–6Google Scholar; Ed. Meyer, , Geschichte des Altertums, iv. p. 36Google Scholar; Busolt, , Griechische Geschichte, iii. p. 310.Google Scholar
2 S.v. διὰ μέσου τεῖχος τριῶν ὔντων τειχῶν ἐν τῇ ᾿ Αττικῇ, ὡς καὶ ᾿ Αριστοφάνης φησὶν ἐν Τριφἁλητι, τοῦ τε βορείου καὶ τοῦ νοτίου καὶ τοῦ Φαληρικοῦ, διὰ μέσου τούτων ἐλέγετο τὸ νότιον.
3 ii. 13. 7: τοῦ τε γὰρ Φαληρικοῦ τείχους στάδιοι ἦσαν πέντε καὶ τριάκοντα . . . . τὰ δὲ μακρὰ τείχη πρὸς τὸν Πειραιᾶ τεσσαρά κοντα σταδίων
4 Antiphon fr. 37 (ed. Blass); Cratinus ap. Plutarch, De Gloria Atheniensium, p. 351 A; Plutarch, Pericles, ch. 13 § 5; Schol. ad Plat. Gorgias, 455 E; Harpocration s.v. (see n. 2 above).
5 The passages in question are enumerated in Leake, pp. 422–3.
6 Leake, pp. 426–7, followed by most later writers.
7 Ancient Athens, pp. 68–71.
8 Leake, p. 427.
9 So Curtius, p. 110; Kaupert, pp. 632–4.
10 Gardner, pp. 57–8, 562; Judeich, p. 148.
11 Or. 6 p. 96 (ed. Dindorf).
12 Gorgias, 455 E.
13 Leake (p. 431, n. 4) supposes that the scholiast implied a single wall connecting Piraeus and Phalerum. But the phrase ῾τὸ μὲν . . . τὸ δέ᾿ clearly implies two distinct walls.
14 Phocion, ch. 15.
15 Gardner, p. 69, n. 2.
16 Numerous instances are given in Stephanus, s.v.
17 iii. 20: ὑπερβάντες τὰ τείχη τῶν πολεμίων. This refers to the single line of walls built by the Peloponnesians round Plataea. Cf. also our expression ‘the Walls’ (not ‘Wall’) of Chester. York, Jericho, etc.
The use of the plural form in all these cases shows that it is quite natural to think of a wall as an aggregate of its sections.
18 On this point see Gardner, p. 70, and n. 22 below.
The investment wall of the Peloponnesians at Plataea, referred to in the previous note, was likewise built with two faces.
19 De Pace §§ 5–7: πρῶτον μὲν τὸν Πειραιᾶ τότε ἐτειχίσαμεν ἐν τούτῳ τῷ χρόνῳ, εἶτα τὸ μακρὸν τεῖχος τὸ βόρειον . . . . . .μετὰ δὲ ταῦτα . . . . τὸ τεῖχος τὸ μαχρὸν τὸ νότιον ἐτείχισθη
This passage is repeated, verbatim in Aeschines, De Falsa Legatione, §§ 173–4.
20 See Plutarch, De Gloria Atheniensium, 8 p. 351, where it is mentioned that a delay took place in the completion of the walls.
The above-quoted passage from Thucydides points to the same conclusion. If the term ‘Long Wall’ (or ‘Walls’) could be specially appropriated by him for the Northern as against the Phaleric wall, it may be inferred that the two walls were not built simultaneously, but that the Northern wall came first.
The chronology of Andocides is confused in its details, but he is perfectly explicit about the Long Walls being built in successive stages.
21 Witness the ludicrous failure of the Peloponnesian League in its attempt to storm the tiny town of Plataea (Thuc. ii. 75 sqq.).
22 If we accept the view that beside the Phaleric wall there was only one other, we must also hold that this second wall was double-fronted. See Thuc. loc. cit.: τὰ δὲ μακρὰ τείχη πρὸς τὸν Πειραιᾶ (i.e. on the present hypothesis, the Northern wall) ὦν τὸ ἔξωθεν ἐτηρεῖτο These words imply the existence of an inner as well as an outer face.
23 In addition to the masonry of the wall the laying of the foundations was an expensive business. It required a special act of generosity on the part of Cimon to fill in the marshy tracts between Athens and the seaboard. (Plutarch, Cimon, ch. 13.)
24 A further argument might be drawn from Thucydides' description of the Athenian attack upon the Long Walls of Megara in 424 B.C. (iv. 66–9). In this account we read of one wall only being carried by the Athenians, and of one Wall serving as an abutment for the lines of circumvallation drawn round the harbour of Megara. But it is conceivable, though not probable, that Thucydides should have used ῾τεῖχος᾿ in the singular form to denote a pair of walls.
25 Thuc. i. 107, 1: ἤρξαντο δὲ κατὰ τοὺς χρόνους τούτους (458 B.C.) καὶ τὰ μακρὰ τείχη . . . τό τε Φαληρόνδε καὶ τὸ ἐς Πειραιᾶ
26 De Pace, §§ 5, 6.
27 It might also be suggested that by building a second wall at some little distance from the first the Athenians also intended to provide a protected camping ground for refugees from the countryside, for which purpose the intermediate area between the two walls would have served admirably. But Thucydides, who records that the homeless folk squatted on every open space and on the Long Walls themselves, does not mention any settlements in between the Walls (ii. 17, 3).
In favour of such settlements Leake quotes Xenophon, Hellenica ii. 2, 3: οἰμωγὴ ἐκ τοῦ Πειραιῶς διὰ μακρῶν τειχῶν εἰς ἄστυ διῆκεν But these words prove nothing.