- Source
- Herodotus. Godley, Alfred Denis, editor. Cambridge, MA; London: Harvard University Press; William Heinemann, Ltd., 1920-1925 (printing).
- Translation
- AI-generated (gemini-3.5-flash) — machine translation; may contain errors
- Languages
- 日本語 · English · 简体中文 · 한국어
- CTS URN
- urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0016.tlg001.humanitext-grc2:5.50.1-5.50.3
- Generated
- Humanitext Reader · reader.humanitext.ai · 2026-11-10
In their next meeting, Cleomenes asks about the travel time to the interior, and Aristagoras makes the mistake of revealing that it takes three months. Upon hearing this, Cleomenes orders Aristagoras to leave Sparta before sunset.
τότε μὲν ἐς τοσοῦτον ἤλασαν· ἐπείτε δὲ ἡ κυρίη ἡμέρη ἐγένετο τῆς ὑποκρίσιος καὶ ἦλθον ἐς τὸ συγκείμενον, εἴρετο ὁ Κλεομένης τὸν Ἀρισταγόρην ὁκοσέων ἡμερέων ἀπὸ θαλάσσης τῆς Ἰώνων ὁδὸς εἴη1 παρὰ βασιλέα.
At that time they went only so far. But when the appointed day for the reply came and they met at the agreed place, Cleomenes asked Aristagoras how many days’ journey it was from the sea of the Ionians to the King.
ὁ δὲ Ἀρισταγόρης τἆλλα ἐὼν σοφὸς καὶ διαβάλλων ἐκεῖνον εὖ ἐν τούτῳ ἐσφάλη· χρὲον2 γάρ μιν μὴ λέγειν τὸ ἐόν, βουλόμενόν γε Σπαρτιήτας ἐξαγαγεῖν ἐς τὴν Ἀσίην, λέγει δʼ ὦν τριῶν μηνῶν φὰς εἶναι τὴν ἄνοδον. ὁ δὲ ὑπαρπάσας τὸν ἐπίλοιπον λόγον τὸν ὁ Ἀρισταγόρης ὥρμητο λέγειν περὶ τῆς ὁδοῦ, εἶπε ὦ ξεῖνε Μιλήσιε, ἀπαλλάσσεο3 ἐκ Σπάρτης πρὸ δύντος ἡλίου· οὐδένα γὰρ λόγον εὐεπέα λέγεις Λακεδαιμονίοισι, ἐθέλων σφέας ἀπὸ θαλάσσης τριῶν μηνῶν ὁδὸν ἀγαγεῖν.
And Aristagoras, who in other respects was clever and was deceiving him well, stumbled in this; for though it was necessary for him not to tell the truth, since he wished at least to lead the Spartans into Asia, he spoke nonetheless, saying that the journey inland was of three months. But Cleomenes, cutting short the remaining speech which Aristagoras was eager to make about the road, said: ”My Milesian guest, depart from Sparta before the sun sets; for you speak no acceptable word to the Lacedaemonians, wishing to lead them a three months’ journey away from the sea.”
- 5.50.1ὁκοσέων ἡμερέων ... εἴη
An indirect question meaning "of how many days' journey it was." ὁκοσέων ἡμερέων is a genitive of quality/measure functioning predicatively with ὁδός. εἴη is an optative of indirect discourse (optativus obliquus), replacing the indicative ἐστί because the leading verb (εἴρετο) is in a past tense.
- 5.50.2χρὲον
An impersonal expression (Ionic form of the Attic χρεών [ἐστι]), meaning "it was necessary." Here, the copula ἐστί (or ἦν representing the past) is omitted, and it takes the accusative pronoun μιν (Ionic for αὐτόν) as the subject of the infinitive μὴ λέγειν.
- 5.50.3ἀπαλλάσσεο
Second-person singular present imperative middle. It retains the uncontracted Ionic ending -εο, which corresponds to the contracted ending -ου in classical Attic (derived from the original -εσο through the loss of intervocalic sigma and subsequent contraction of -εο).