Thucydides, an Athenian, wrote the history of the war between
the Peloponnesians and the Athenians, beginning at the moment
that it broke out, and believing that it would be a great war
and more worthy of relation than any that had preceded it.
This belief was not without its grounds. The preparations of
both the combatants were in every department in the last state
of perfection; and he could see the rest of the Hellenic race
taking sides in the quarrel; those who delayed doing so at once
having it in contemplation. Indeed this was the greatest movement
yet known in history, not only of the Hellenes, but of a large
part of the barbarian world--I had almost said of mankind. For
though the events of remote antiquity, and even those that more
immediately preceded the war, could not from lapse of time be
clearly ascertained, yet the evidences which an inquiry carried
as far back as was practicable leads me to trust, all point to
the conclusion that there was nothing on a great scale, either in
war or in other matters.

For instance, it is evident that the country now called Hellas
had in ancient times no settled population; on the contrary,
migrations were of frequent occurrence, the several tribes
readily abandoning their homes under the pressure of superior
numbers. Without commerce, without freedom of communication
either by land or sea, cultivating no more of their territory
than the exigencies of life required, destitute of capital,
never planting their land (for they could not tell when an invader
might not come and take it all away, and when he did come they
had no walls to stop him), thinking that the necessities of
daily sustenance could be supplied at one place as well as
another, they cared little for shifting their habitation, and