Papers of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens (5.1886-1890)

274

THE BATTLEFIELD OF PLATAIA.

plain, with its streams about three stades apart,and then conies together.
Its name is Oeroe, and the natives call it 'the daughter of Asopos.' "

Again Herodotos (ix. 51) speaks of the Island as the place " which
Oeroe forks about as it flows from Ivithairon." From this we gather
that the Island was : (a) before the city of Plataia ; (b) ten stades from
the Asopos and Gargaphia; (c) three stades wide; and (7/) that it ended
in the plain. And in the plain before Plataia, ten stades from the
Asopos, we must accordingly find one point of the Island.

The statement of Herodotos, that the island is " ten stades from the
Asopos and the spring Gargaphia, at which they were

second position j „ , ., . , n

then encamped, makes it important to fix the posi-

of greek troops. 1 . \

tion of the troops at this time. Herodotos (ix. 25)
says the forces went " from Erythrai past Hysiai to the Plataian terri-
tory, and on arriving took up their position by nations near the spring
Gargaphia and the sacred enclosure of the hero Androkrates, over
low hills and level ground."4 Later, Herodotos (ix. 49) says the
Persian cavalry choked up the spring Gargaphia, from which all the
Greek army procured water. " Xow the Lakedaimonians alone were
posted at the spring, while for the rest of the Greeks the spring was
distant as every contingent happened to be drawn up, and the Asopos
was near; but being kept back from the Asopos they continued to
resort to the spring, for it was not possible for them to get water
from the river on account of the horsemen and arrows." The
left, then, held by the Athenians, was near the Asopos, and the line
extended away from the river to the spring Gargaphia, where the
Lakedaimonians held the right. When Herodotos (ix. 51) says that
the Island to which they proposed to retreat was ten stades from the
Asopos and from the spring Gargaphia, he seems to imply that each
end of the line would fall back ten stades to the Island ; in which
case the new line would be about parallel to the old. Acting on this
supposition, we draw, from the part of the Island which we have fixed,
a circle with a radius often stades, and the left of the Greek line will
lie on this circle near the Asopos.

At the other end of the line was Gargaphia—(a) ten stades from the
Island,5 (b) near low hills and level ground, aeeess-

GABGAPHIA. ... i « / \ l y i in

lble to cavalry, (c) ten stades trom the temple ot

4 Diodoros says (xi. 30) that the Greeks, in their second position, had on their
right a high hill and on their left the Asopos, and here they won their victory.

5 Herodotos, ix. 51. 11 ix. 25, 49.