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Created 5941[(?)]12 29 2027 [2011-04-04]

Last edited 5941[(?)]13 08 2027 [2011-04-12]

 

 

 

 

Nicias’ Lunar Eclipse

Revised to

August 18, 385 BCE

 

 

Abstract:

Total lunar eclipses are relatively common and relatively unspecific for dating purposes in comparison to total solar eclipses. Whereas potentially fitting lunar eclipses may be found on the average every two to three years, there are frequently less than one total solar eclipse per one hundred years that will fit a recorded total solar eclipse associated with a reasonably precise location…

My overall challenge at this point is to find a more exact chronology for the Greek and early Roman era, that is, from the fifth through the first centuries BCE, an era which has been characterized, even by ancient historians, such as Macrobius, by words such as “the years of confusion.” Having found some of my best historical sources for this era on Bill Thayer’s web site, I proceeded to search his entire web site for all entries of the word “eclipse.” I then collected and sorted my 67 hits, after which I am now further analyzing and identifying, one by one, each of those records…

 

 

Given that Nicias’ eclipse is reasonably well specified, so far as it being 1) a total eclipse, 2) an eclipse that was observed in the evening, and 3) an eclipse that was being observed from Syracuse on Sicily in Italy, is helpful, yet without more definite specifics such as a more precise month (cf. below!) or season it could fit a number of different total eclipses.

The one saving remedy allowing us to exactly date Nicias’ eclipse is that our primary source, Thucydides, a contemporary Greek historian, has provided for us also the exact year relative to Pericles’ solar eclipse. That is, Pericles’ solar eclipse may be associated with the second year of the Peloponnesian War and Nicias’ eclipse is quite clearly associated with the nineteenth year in the same sequence, both as recorded by Thucydides.

Given that Pericles’ solar eclipse may be quite certainly identified with the January 18, 402 BCE total solar eclipse, it follows that Nicias’ lunar eclipse can be none other than the August 18, 385 BE total lunar eclipse, both of which perfectly fits all criteria I’ve been able to identify…

 

Description: Description: http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/5MCLEmap/-0399--0300/LE-0384-08-18T.gif

 

Furthermore, I find belated soft confirmation[1] for this date also from the exact date for “the day upon which they had taken Nicias” provided by Plutarch, that is, “the twenty-sixth of the month Carneius, which the Athenians call Metageitnion:”

 

28 At a general assembly of the Syracusans and their allies, Eurycles, the popular leader, brought in a motion, first, that the day on which they had taken Nicias be made a holy day, with sacrifices and abstention from labour, and that the festival be called Asinaria, from the river Asinarus (the day was the twenty-sixth of the month Carneius, which the Athenians call Metageitnion); 2 and second, that the serving men of the Athenians and their immediate allies be sold into slavery, while the freemen and the Sicilian Hellenes who had joined them be cast into the stone quarries for watch and ward, — all except the generals, who should be put to death.

 

(Plutarch, Parallel Lives, The Life of Nicias, 28:1)

 

In Wikipedia the month Metageitnion is being “certainly” associated with August/September. Based upon lunar month reckoning, the 26th of Metageitnion would then translate to the day beginning at sunset August 30, 385 BCE, which day began following eleven full days after the above specified lunar eclipse which fell on the day beginning at sunset August 18 and ending at sunset August 19.

 

 

 

Considerations:

Having found 5 hits for Nicias’ eclipse at Bill Thayer’s website, my first challenge was to identify as many specifics as possible out of the available sources,

while taking care to give all due priority to the most original sources, which sources must also first be identified. I first found these three specifics:

1)      “23 But just as everything was prepared for this and none of the enemy were on the watch, since they did not expect the move at all, there came an eclipse of the moon by night.” (Plutarch, Parallel Lives Vol III:23)

2)      But on that very night, the moon, being full, was totally eclipsed.” (Francis Marion Crawford, The Rulers of the South, p. 143.)

3)      The Syracusans lost no time in completely blocking the entrance of the harbor.” (Francis Marion Crawford, The Rulers of the South, p. 144.)

Using these three identifiers (red font items) I then proceeded to review all the eclipses from 413 BCE forwards in time to 367 BCE for which time period I found at the NASA lunar eclipse page no more than 18 eclipses[2] that could at all be further considered. Noting carefully that my reference for “the moon, being full, was totally eclipsed” are the words of a recent historian and not from a contemporary source I made a mental note not to rely too heavily upon those particular words, but to give leeway for anything  reasonably close to a total eclipse.

My next challenge was to identify my most original source and to extract whatever words of timing available for more precisely identifying the correct lunar eclipse. Discovering that, although Plutarch lived a few centuries subsequent to these events, he is my only extant ancient source re the eclipse event per se, and I am therefore forced to rely on him to some extent, yet I find that I can clearly and definitely correlate Plutarch’s record of that war event with Thucydides, the contemporary historian, and the more precise dates provided by the latter in terms of years of the Peloponnesian War:

 

2… [2]… Nicias was a younger man. He was held in some repute even while Pericles was still living, so that he was not only associated with him as general, but frequently had independent command himself; after Pericles was dead,[3] Nicias was at once put forth into the position of leader, especially by the party of the rich and notable. These made him their champion to face the disgusting boldness of Cleon. (Plutarch, Parallel Lives Vol III:2:2.)

 

26. This also hath the same Thucydides of Athens written from point to point, by summers and winters, as everything came to pass, until such time as the Lacedaemonians and their confederates had made an end of the Athenian dominion and had taken their long walls and Pieraeus. To which time, from the beginning of the war, it is in all twenty-seven years. [2] As for the composition between, if any man shall think it not to be accounted with the war, he shall think amiss. For let him look into the actions that passed as they are distinctly set down and he shall find that that deserveth not to be taken for a peace, in which they neither rendered all nor accepted all, according to the articles. Besides, in the Mantinean and Epidaurian wars and in other actions, it was on both sides infringed; moreover, the confederates on the borders of Thrace continued in hostility as before; and the Boeotians had but a truce from one ten days to another. [3] So that with the first ten years' war, and with this doubtful cessation, and the war that followed after it, a man shall find, counting by the times, that it came to just so many years and some few days, and that those who built upon the prediction of the oracles have this number only to agree. [4] And I remember yet that from the very beginning of this war and so on till the end it was uttered by many that it should be of thrice nine years' continuance. [5] And for the time thereof I lived in my strength and applied my mind to gain an accurate knowledge of the same. It happened also that I was banished my country for twenty years, after my charge at Amphipolis; whereby being present at the affairs of both, and especially of the Lacedaemonians by reason of my exile, I could at leisure the better learn the truth of all that passed. [6] The quarrels, therefore, and perturbations of the peace, after those ten years, and that which followed, according as from time to time the war was carried, I will now pursue. (Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War, V.26.)

 

It took me a little while before discovering the “More(##)” link in the upper right hand corner of Perseus’ Search Results box, which search machine, before that discovery, never seemed to give me more than one hit… Having once made that discovery my search soon became much more effective, first for identifying the parallel records of Plutarch and Thucydides, and then for finding the passages where Thucydides identifies the specific years for the events recorded:

 

 

“4 Timaeus denies that Demosthenes and Nicias were put to death by the orders of the Syracusans, as Philistus and Thucydides64 state; but rather, Hermocrates sent word to them of the decision of the assembly while it was yet in session, and with the connivance of one of their guards they took their own lives. Their bodies, however, he says, were cast out at the prison door, and lay there in plain sight of all who craved the spectacle. 5 And I learn that down to this day there is shown among the treasures of a temple in Syracuse a shield which is said to have been the shield of Nicias. It is a welded mosaic of gold and purple interwoven with rare skill.”

(Plutarch, Parallel Lives, Vol III:28:4.)

                                                                                                               

 

“Some say that Demosthenes and Nicias killed themselves, and this is more likely, but others say that the Syracusans stoned them to death.”

(Francis Marion Crawford, The Rulers of the South, p. 144.)

 

 

2:47. Such was the funeral made this winter, which ending, ended the first year of this war.

 

2:70… These were the things done in this winter. And so ended the second year of this war, written by Thucydides.

 

2:103… [2] So ended that winter, and the third year of the war written by Thucydides.

3:116… [3] These were the things that came to pass this winter. And so ended the sixth year of this war written by Thucydides.

4:50… [3] But Artaphernes they send afterwards away in a galley, with ambassadors of their own, to Ephesus. And there encountering the news that king Artaxerxes, the son of Xerxes, was lately dead (for about that time he died), they returned home.

4:51. The same winter also, the Chians demolished their new wall by command of the Athenians, upon suspicion that they intended some innovation, notwithstanding they had given the Athenians their faith and the best security they could to the intent they should let them be as they were. Thus ended this winter, and the seventh year of this war written by Thucydides.

4:135… [2] So ended this winter, and the ninth year of this war written by Thucydides.

7:18… [4] And this winter, they sent about unto their confederates to make ready iron, and all instruments of fortification. And for the aid they were to transport in ships to the Sicilians, they both made provision amongst themselves and compelled the rest of Peloponnesus to do the like. So ended this winter, and the eighteenth year of the war written by Thucydides.

7:86. The Syracusians and their confederates, being come together, returned with their prisoners, all they could get, and with the spoil into the city. [2] As for all the other prisoners of the Athenians and their confederates, they put them into the quarries as the safest custody. But Nicias and Demosthenes they killed, against Gylippus' will.

8:6… [5] And of these at first they were about to send out ten, with Melancridas for admiral; but afterwards, upon occasion of an earthquake, for Melancridas they sent Chalcideus, and instead of ten galleys they went about the making ready of five only in Laconia. So the winter ended, and nineteenth year of this war written by Thucydides.

8:57. Presently after this, the same winter, Tissaphernes went to Caunus with intent both to bring the Peloponnesians back to Miletus and also (as soon as he should have agreed unto new articles, such as he could get) to give the fleet their pay, and not to fall directly out with them for fear lest so many galleys, wanting maintenance, should either be forced by the Athenians to fight and so be overcome, or, emptied of men, the business might succeed with the Athenians according to their own desire without him. Besides, he was afraid lest looking for maintenance they should make spoil in the continent. [2] In consideration and foresight of all which things he desired to counterpoise the Grecians. And sending for the Peloponnesians, he gave them their pay, and now made the third league, as followeth:

8:58. "In the thirteenth year of the reign of Darius, Alexippidas being ephor in Lacedaemon, agreement was made in the plain of Maeander between the Lacedaemonians and their confederates on one part and Tissaphernes and Hieramenes and the sons of Pharnaces on the other part concerning the affairs of the king and of the Lacedaemonians and their confederates.

8:60: Thus ended this winter, and the twentieth year of this war written by Thucydides.”

 

(Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War.)

 

 

Conclusion:

From the above, while given that Pericles’ solar eclipse fell at the very beginning of “the second year of this war written by Thucydides” I can only conclude that the only possible lunar eclipse fitting all the facts is the one dated August 18, 385 BCE, which dark moon, per my Starry Night Backyard astronomy software, if at all visible as such, rose over the eastern Mediterranean horizon, being fully eclipsed at the time of moonrise at 18:48:09 (SNB sunset: 18:52:15;) the shadow beginning to recede at 19:15:15 until completely off at 9:11 PM local Syracuse time.

No wonder Nicias did not at first quite know what was going on! Certainly not everyone would have noticed the completely eclipsed moon as it rose over the eastern sea horizon… :

 

According to Pliny, 2.ix.54, Englished by Holland; Pliny expresses some dubiety, as he does about night rainbows: II.lix (English), HN 2.lx.150. The tragedy was occasioned rather by the ritual noise made by the Athenians on seeing the eclipse; Nicias, not realizing what was the cause of the noise, feared to take the fleet out of the harbor and was trapped.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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[1] Noting, however, that this particular item, in and of itself, also equally fits Bill Thayer’s date: August 27, 413 BCE, and also the general uncertainty re placement of the named months vs. the seasons for this particular era.

[2] All total and near total lunar eclipses visible from the Greece and Sicily area within the range of time listed:

1.       Aug 28, 413 BCE

2.       (Jan 1, 410 BCE)

3.       Dec 22, 410 BCE

4.       Oct 21, 407 BCE

5.       Apr 15, 406 BCE

6.       Feb 13, 403 BCE

7.       (Nov 21, 399 BCE)

8.       Sep 19, 396 BCE

9.       Jan 12, 392 BCE

10.    Sat Aug 18, 385 BCE (B4 completely dark moonrise 6:48:09 PM)-9:09PM

11.    Sat Dec 12, 382 BCE 7-12 PM

12.    Mon Jun 6, 381 BCE 7PM (moonrise)-11PM

13.    Apr 6, 378 BCE

14.    Jul 19, 9.30 PM-Jul 20 3AM, 374 BCE

15.    (Jan 12, 373 BCE)

16.    Nov 11, 371 BCE

17.    Nov 1, 370 BCE

18.    Mar 6, 367 BCE

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[3] Bill Thayer’s original footnote: “429 B.C.”

Revised date: 400 BCE  (Accession year = 1st year of the war? è Two years = 2nd and 3rd year; plus 6 months? è Pericles died in 400 BCE; Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War, II.65.6.)