Thucydidēs (c.455–c.400 BCE) was a Greek historian. He was the author of the History of the Peloponnesian War between Athens and Sparta, 431–404 BCE, in eight books.
Little is known about the life of Thucydidēs. Born near Athens, he survived the Athenian plague (c.430 BCE) and commanded an Athenian squadron of ships at Thasos (424 BCE) during the Peloponnesian war. After losing the settlement of Amphipolis to the Spartans (424 BCE,) he was convicted as a traitor.
Thucydidēs lived in exile in his family’s Thracian estates for 20 years. He lived through the war and wrote his eight-volume De Bello Peloponnesiaco (History of the Peloponnesian War.)
Regarded the progenitor of modern historiography, Thucydidēs’s work demonstrates a profound understanding of human motives. His work not only presents an objective analysis of the political causes and course of the war but also records political and moral analysis of a state’s war policies.
More: Wikipedia • READ: Works by Thucydides
Ignorance is bold and knowledge reserved.
—Thucydides
Topics: Ignorance
Few things are brought to a successful issue by impetuous desire, but most by calm and prudent forethought.
—Thucydides
Topics: Planning, Forethought
The secret of Happiness is Freedom, and the secret of Freedom, Courage.
—Thucydides
Topics: Happiness
So remarkably perverse is the nature of man, that he despises those that court him, and admires whoever will not bend before him.
—Thucydides
The secret of freedom, courage.
—Thucydides
Topics: Freedom, Courage
The peoples of the Mediterranean began to emerge from barbarism when they learnt to cultivate the olive and the wine.
—Thucydides
Topics: Wine
Stories happen to those who tell them.
—Thucydides
We secure our friends not by accepting favors but by doing them.
—Thucydides
Topics: Friendship
The sufferings that fate inflicts on us should be borne with patience, what enemies inflict with manly courage.
—Thucydides
Topics: Suffering
The secret of happiness is freedom. The secret of freedom is courage.
—Thucydides
Topics: Freedom, Happiness
The bravest are surely those who have the clearest vision of what is before them, glory and danger alike, and yet notwithstanding, go out to meet it.
—Thucydides
Topics: Vision, Courage, Danger
History is Philosophy teaching by examples.
—Thucydides
Topics: History, Philosophy, One liners
Men naturally despise those who court them, but respect those who do not give way to them.
—Thucydides
Topics: Respect, Opposition
They are surely to be esteemed the bravest spirits who, having the clearest sense of both the pains and pleasures of life, do not on that account shrink from danger.
—Thucydides
Topics: Courage, Risk, Danger, Bravery
Our form of government does not enter into rivalry with the institutions of others. We do not copy our neighbours, but are an example to them. It is true that we are called a democracy, for the administration is in the hands of the many and not of the few. But while the law secures equal justice to all alike in their private disputes, the claim of excellence is also recognised; and when a citizen is in any way distinguished, he is preferred to the public service, not as a matter of privilege, but as the reward of merit. Neither is poverty a bar, but a man may benefit his country whatever be the obscurity of his condition.
—Thucydides
We Greeks believe that a man who takes no part in public affairs is not merely lazy, but good for nothing.
—Thucydides
Men’s indignation, it seems, is more excited by legal wrong than by violent wrong; the first looks like being cheated by an equal, the second like being compelled by a superior.
—Thucydides
With reference to the narrative of events, far from permitting myself to derive it from the first source that came to hand, I did not even trust my own impressions, but it rests partly on what I saw myself, partly on what others saw for me, the accuracy of the report being always tried by the most severe and detailed tests possible. My conclusions have cost me some labor from the want of coincidence between accounts of the same occurrences by different eyewitnesses, arising sometimes from imperfect memory, sometimes from undue partiality for one side or the other. The absence of romance in my history will, I fear, detract somewhat from its interest; but I shall be content if it is judged useful by those inquirers who desire an exact knowledge of the past as an aid to the interpretation of the future, which in the course of human things must resemble if it does not reflect it. My history has been composed to be an everlasting possession, not the showpiece of an hour.
—Thucydides
Topics: Romance
An avowal of poverty is no disgrace to any man; to make no effort to escape it is indeed disgraceful.
—Thucydides
Topics: Poverty
The powerful exact what they can; the weak grant what they must.
—Thucydides
Be convinced that to be happy means to be free and that to be free means to be brave. Therefore do not take lightly the perils of war.
—Thucydides
An Athenian citizen does not neglect the state because he takes care of his own household; and even those of us who are engaged in business have a very fair idea of politics. We alone regard a man who takes no interest in public affairs, not as a harmless, but as a useless character, and if few of us are originators, we are all sound judges of a policy.
—Thucydides
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