see Stephanos’s cousin Harpagos run wel in both events. He
was, by virtue of his position, a gentleman now, and he rose to it.
Some men cannot. I shared a canteen with him and
Epaphroditos after the second heat. We laughed together and
told each other that we were stil the men we had been five years
before.
Stephanos placed wel in the javelin throw for distance, and I
lost the throw for accuracy by the width of a finger.
I think it was at this point that I recognized I might win. For
those of you who have drunk the heady wine of victory, you
know this moment – when you start to pul away from the pack.
The next contest was a surprise, as Philocrates – my
Philocrates – won the discus throw with his first throw, a throw
so far and so mighty that much bigger men simply shook their
heads and declined to throw. They put the olive wreath on his
head before the last men had thrown, and men said the gods had
filed him, which made me laugh. But the victory made him a
different man – open-faced and beaming with good wil.
‘I have no idea where that throw came from!’ he said. ‘I’m
stil not sure it was me.’
‘Have you made your victor’s offering?’ I asked.
‘No,’ he said.
‘Do not forget,’ I said. ‘Blaspheme in private if you like, but if
you serve on my ship, you make public obeisance.’
When you are in command, you are always in command,
children. Even when a man you cal friend wins at the games. It
children. Even when a man you cal friend wins at the games. It
pleased me to do wel – but as commander, it pleased me more
that many of my people were also doing wel. I walked around
and congratulated them.
The sun was stil high in the sky, and the judges declared an
hour’s rest for al competitors. Then the archery started. The
Lesbians had several fine archers, and the Samians had one,
Asclepius, whose shots were so strong that I didn’t think he
could be beaten. Most men’s arrows lofted into the target at fifty
paces, but Asclepius’s arrows flew straight as if shot from
Apolo’s bow. But as a group, the Cretans were the best.
I was out in the first round. I can shoot a bow, but not with
archers like these.
Teucer was there, and he shot patiently and seriously. He just
made the first cut and went on to the second round, the lowest-
ranked man there. In the second round, he had to shoot against
Asclepius. That was a bout to see – every arrow thudding home
into the stretched hide at fifty paces, every shot inside the
charcoal marking of the highest score. None of us had ever seen
shooting like this. The judges sent both men to the third round
with the issue undecided.
Idomeneus also went to the third round, and one Lesbian, an
archer in service to Epaphroditos. The four of them poured
libations and drank wine together, and then the target hides were
moved to one hundred paces.
At that distance, even Asclepius had to loft his arrows. He
shot first, and hit the charcoal every time. Idomeneus was next,
and he placed two of his three arrows within the charcoal, but
and he placed two of his three arrows within the charcoal, but
the third was caught by a flutter of breeze and sailed high over
the target. We al sighed together, and Idomeneus bowed and
was applauded by two thousand men – out of the competition,
but with great honour. The Lesbian shot next, and only hit the
charcoal once. He, too, received the applause of the whole
army. Finaly, Teucer stood to the line. He shot al three arrows
so fast that a man who turned his head to speak to his neighbour
might have missed the whole performance, and every shot went
home in the charcoal.
Now there was open argument about how to carry on –
whether to award both men, or to move the target. Miltiades
rose to his feet and held up the baton of the judges.
‘For the honour of Lord Apolo, we wil have both of these
men shoot again,’ he said. ‘Although we deem both worthy of
holding the prize.’
There was much applause, and the hides were moved to one
hundred and fifty paces.
At that range, a bul’s hide is smaler than the nail on your little
finger. A moment’s inattention and your arrow drops short. At a
hundred and fifty paces, a man with a Greek bow must aim it at
the heavens to drop the arrow into the target.
It was Teucer’s turn to shoot first. He used the Persian bow I
had brought him, which pleased me. He shot one arrow, as
directed, and it hit the charcoal.
We roared for him.
Asclepius took a long time with his shot. By his own
Asclepius took a long time with his shot. By his own
admission, the Samian was an expert at close, flat shooting, and
he didn’t excel at the long shots. He waited patiently for the
breeze to die. There was no rule against it.
I drank water.
Suddenly, without warning, Asclepius lifted his bow and shot.
His arrow went high – very high – and came down at a steep
angle into the target. Dionysius proclaimed it in the charcoal and
we roared again. This was competition, dear to the gods. I
remember slapping Phrynichus on the back and saying that now
he had something to write about.
And then an arrow came from behind us. It lofted high over
the spectators and the red awning where the judges sat, and it
plummeted to earth like a stooping falcon to strike the target just
a few feet from where Dionysius stood. He leaped in the air, and
stumbled away.
Because I was near the awning, drinking water, I turned and
saw the archer, who had shot from at least two hundred and fifty
paces. In fact, I counted later two hundred seventy paces. His
shot hit the charcoal. He raised his bow in triumph, gave a long
war cry and ran.
He was a Persian. He must have slipped over the mudflats
while we al watched the competition. He kiled no Greek. He
shot further, and better.
Miltiades awarded him the prize – an arrow fletched in gold.
We roared our approval – even Teucer and Asclepius, both
of whom had shot like gods.
But later – much later – I saw Teucer pace off the distance.
But later – much later – I saw Teucer pace off the distance.
Night was faling, and he thought that no man watched him. He
raised his bow and his shaft fel true, but a fist of breeze moved
it, and later he told me that he missed the charcoal by the width
of his hand.
We were elated by the shooting – the sort of heroism in which
any Greek (and apparently, any Persian) might take joy.
I put on my armour with some trepidation. It wasn’t realy
mine – it was a good bronze bel cuirass that Miltiades had given
me, and while I liked it, it lacked the flexibility and lightness of
the scale cuirass I had won in my first games – a cuirass that was
hanging on its wooden form in my hal in Plataea with my shield
and my war spears. A bronze cuirass never seems to fit just right
over the hips. It flares there, so that the hips have ful play in a
long run, but that same flare makes a waist where much of the
weight of the armour is borne, just over the hard muscles of the
stomach, and that can make running uncomfortable.
Worse by far is running in il-fitting greaves. They snap over
the lower leg, covering a warrior from the ankle to the knee, and
if they are too big they slip and bite your arches, and if they are
too smal, they pinch your ankles and leave welts that bleed –
even in one stade. I’d spent al my spare time fitting and refitting
those greaves – a plain pair in the Cretan style, worn over linen
wraps.
It was a strong field – Epaphroditos, Sophanes, Stephanos,
Aristides himself, Lord Pelagius’s nephew Nestor, Nearchos of
Crete and his younger brother, Neoptolemus, Sophanes’ friend
Crete and his younger brother, Neoptolemus, Sophanes’ friend
Glaucon, and Dionysius of Samos’s son Hipparchus, a fine
young man without his father’s arrogance. He was next to me in
the first heat, and I made the mistake of giving way at the first
step – I never caught him. But I placed second, and went on to
the next round.
The men I named had al gone on in their rounds. We were
down to two eights, and the men running were the heroes of our
army, the champions of the East Greeks and their alies. I was
proud just to run with them. I drank water, pissed some of it
away and lined up, the aspis on my arm as heavy as lead after
just one race.
I was between Epaphroditos and Aristides, chatting with
both, waiting for Miltiades to start us, when the cry went up.
The Persian fleet was sailing around the point. Their fleet was
immense, and it came and came and came. They crossed the bay
under sail and put in to the beaches at the foot of Mycale, and I
stood on the shore and counted them.
Five hundred and fifty-three ships, first to last, biremes and
hemioliai included. Just two hundred more ships than we had,
including al of our lighter ships.
On the other hand, the Cyprians sailed like fools, and the
Aegyptians were so wary that they edged away from us, though
we didn’t launch a single ship.
We took it as an omen, that the Persians had come while we
competed. We watched them, and we laughed and caled out to
them to come and join us, and then, as if by common consent,
we turned our backs on their display of imperial power and went
we turned our backs on their display of imperial power and went
back to our athletics.
I remember that walk away from the shore, because I hated
the aspis I had on my arm, an awkward thing with a badly turned
bowl and an il-fitting bronze porpax. I stil had the cheap wicker
Boeotian I had purchased on the beach at Chios a year before, a
far less pretty shield with a split-ash face and a plain leather
porpax, but it weighed nothing. In those days, there was no rule
about competitions and shields, and besides, the Boeotian was,
in fact, the shield I would carry to fight. I dropped my heavy
aspis on my blanket rol, picked up my Boeotian and trotted to
the start line.
Aristides looked at my shield with interest. ‘Surely that big
thing wil impede your running,’ he said.
I shrugged. ‘It weighs less on my arm,’ I said.
‘I seem to remember that you beat me in this race four years
ago,’ he said.
I grinned. ‘Luck, my lord. Good fortune.’
Aristides smiled. ‘You are rare among men, Arimnestos.
Most men would tel me that they were about to beat me again.’
I shrugged, watching Miltiades go to the start line. ‘In a few
heartbeats, we wil know,’ I said.
Epaphroditos laughed. ‘Listening to you two is like an
education in arete,’ he said. ‘Me, I’l just run my best. But for the
record, Aristides, he may have beaten you in this race,’ he
grinned, and his teeth sparked, ‘but I beat him, as I remember.’
We al laughed. I remember it wel, the eight of us laughing. In
We al laughed. I remember it wel, the eight of us laughing. In
al the Long War, there were a few moments like that, that
sparkled like bronze in the sun. We weren’t fighting for our lives.
We weren’t freezing cold or burning hot. No one was going to
die. We were comrades – captains, leaders, but men who stood
together. Later, when al Greece was at the point of extinction,
we never laughed like that.
There is a Spartan joke, that eirene – peace – is an ideal men
discern from the observation that there are brief intervals
between wars.
You laugh, children. Hmm.
I wish I could end this story right there – with eight of us lined
up on the sand, ready to race. I remember it so wel. Young
Hipparchus, the Samian, was retying his sandals when Miltiades
caled us to order, and the poor boy fumbled the retie and ended
up running with one sandal.
Miltiades held his cane even with the ground, and then swept
it away like a sword cut, and we were off.
The race itself was an anticlimax of the worst sort, because
Aristides and Epaphroditos became entangled within a few
lengths of the starting line, and although neither fel, they never
caught the rest of us – and they should probably have been first.
Or perhaps not. But they were the two I had expected to have
I passed Sophanes in the first five steps and ran easily, knees
high, arms pumping, because my greaves fitted perfectly. In the
race in armour, the armour is part of the contest, and my armour
fitted.
fitted.
Sophanes wasn’t going to surrender meekly, however, and
after fifteen paces, we were side by side, wel in advance of the
other runners. He tried to cut inside me at the turning post, and I
shoved him with my big Boeotian shield, and he had to fal back
a step.
Hipparchus, running with one sandal flapping, was stil game,
and he came on past the men who should have been the front-
runners – because they were disheartened by their colision, I
suspect. But his badly tied sandal finaly fel away, tripping him,
and he went down. He let out a cry as he fel, and I think
Sophanes must have looked back, and that was the step he
never retrieved. I ran to the finish and crossed first by the length
of my leg.
Then I had a long rest while the other heats ran – three of
them. The final eight had me and Sophanes of Athens, as wel as
my own man, the Aeolian Herakleides, Nearchos of Crete and
some Chians I didn’t know.
Nearchos came and put an arm around me. ‘This is the life,’
he said. ‘Better than ploughing fields on Crete.’
‘You’ve never ploughed a field in your life, lord,’ I said, and
they al laughed.
‘He was my war tutor,’ Nearchos told Sophanes.
‘N
o wonder you are a hero now,’ Sophanes said – the boy
had a nice turn of phrase.
That was a race. No one fel, and no one clashed at the start
line, where most mishaps happen. We al went off at ful stride,
and in that final race, no one had a loose sandal strap, a bad
and in that final race, no one had a loose sandal strap, a bad
shield, a pebble.
We ran for the gods. I don’t remember much of it – I was
tired, and I was flying like a ship before the wind, without a
thought in my head. But I remember that as we came to the
turning post, al in a clump, Nearchos was first by a hand’s
breadth – but his paces were a little too long, and he landed his
left foot wel past the post and started his turn late. Quick as a
shark takes bait, I turned inside him, my light shield almost
catching the post as I scraped by, so that Sophanes, Nearchos
and I were exactly together as we came out of the turn and ran
for the spear Miltiades held out across the finish.
What can I say? We ran. We flew. We were in step, stride
for stride, al the way home, and the army roared its approval at
us, although I remember none of that. What I remember is how
fast that spear grew, and how nothing mattered but reaching it.
Nothing.
I won because my shield was a palm’s breadth larger than
theirs, and touched the spear first. Nothing else. Rather than
arrogance, my victory made me feel humble, and I embraced
both of them.
I’m not ashamed to say that I wept. As they say at Olympia,
for a moment I had been with the gods. I think that al three of us
had been.
The rest is a blur of exhaustion. Stephanos took me out in the
second round of pankration, but Sophanes of Athens put him
down in the third round before losing to Aeschylus the poet’s
down in the third round before losing to Aeschylus the poet’s
brother in the finals. Athenians are good at games. They train
harder than other men – even the Spartans.
I passed at boxing, and I watched a big Lesbian brute –
Calimachus, no less, and never was a fighter better named –
beat his way through other men like a plough through a field on
its second pass, when al the big chunks are broken and the bad
rocks already puled. Aristides caught him again and again, but
he was big enough to shake off the blows and continue, and he
finaly wore Aristides down and hit him hard, and Aristides