29.
In the same summer, Nymphodorus the son of Pythes, a native of Abdera and a man of
great1 influence with Sitalces who had married his sister, was made by the Athenians
their proxenus at that place and invited by them to Athens.
[2]
He had formerly been considered their enemy, but now they hoped that he would gain over
to their alliance Sitalces, who was the son of Teres and king of Thrace.
This Teres, the father of Sitalces, was the first founder of the great Odrysian empire,
which he2 extended over a large part of Thrace, although many of the Thracian tribes are
still independent.
[3]
He has no connexion with Tereus who took to wife from Athens Procnè, the
daughter of Pandion; they do not even belong to the same Thrace.
For Tereus dwelt in Daulia, a part of the region which is now called Phocis but in
those days was inhabited by Thracians, and in that country Itys suffered at the hands of
the women Procnè and Philomela.
Many of the poets when they make mention of the nightingale (Philomela) apply to the
bird the epithet Daulian.
Further, Pandion would surely have formed a marriage connexion for his
daughter among his neighbours with a view to mutual protection, and not at a distance of
so many days' journey, among the Odrysian Thracians.
[4]
And the Teres of whom I am speaking, and who was the first powerful king of the
Odrysae, has not even the same name3.
Now Sitalces, whom the Athenians made their ally, was the son of this Teres;
[5]
they wanted4 him to assist them in the conquest of Chalcidicè and of Perdiccas.
So Nymphodorus came to Athens, negotiated the alliance with Sitalces, and got his son
Sadocus enrolled an Athenian citizen.
He also undertook to terminate the war in Chalcidicè, promising that he
would persuade Sitalces to send the Athenians an army of Thracian horsemen and
targeteers.
[6]
He further reconciled Perdiccas with the Athenians, and persuaded them to restore
Thermè to him5 Whereupon Perdiccas joined the Athenian army under Phormio6, and with him fought against the Chalcidians.
[7]
Thus Sitalces the son of Teres king of Thrace, and Perdiccas son of Alexander king of
Macedonia, entered into the Athenian alliance.
1 The Athenians make. Nymphodorus their proxenus, hoping that he will gain over Sitales, king of Thrace.
2 Sitalces was the son of Teres, the founder of the Odrysian empire. This Teres has no connexion with the Tereus of mythology.
3 i. e. is called Teres, not Tereus.
4 Sitalces becomes an ally of Athens, and his son is made an Athenian citizen: Perdicas is also reconciled.
5 Cp. 1.61 init.
Thucydides translated into English; with introduction, marginal analysis, notes, and indices. Volume 1. Thucydides. Benjamin Jowett. translator. Oxford. Clarendon Press. 1881.
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