395 



PELOPONNESIAN WAE. 



PELOPONNESIAN WAK. 



SGG 



Plafcea, the Messenian colony in Naupactus, the majority of the Acar- 

 nanians, Corcyra, Zacynthus, and the Greek colonies in Asia Minor, in 

 Thrace, and Macedonia, and on the Hellespont. The resources of 

 Sparta lay chiefly in her land forces, which however consisted of con- 

 tingents from the allies, whose period of service was limited ; the 

 Spartans were also deficient in money. The Athenian strength lay in 

 their fleet, which was manned chiefly hy foreign sailors, whom the 

 wealth that they collected from their allies enabled them to pay. 



Thucydides informs us that the cause of the Lacedaemonians was 

 the more popular, as they professed to be deliverers of Greece, while 

 the Athenians were fighting in defence of an empire which had become 

 odious through their tyranny, and to which the states which yet 

 retained their independence feared to be brought into subjection. 



In the summer of the year 43L.B.C., the Peloponnesians invaded 

 Attica under the command of Archidamus, king of . Sparta. Their 

 progress was ' slow, as Archidamus, their commander, appears to have 

 been still anxious to try what could be done by intimidating the 

 Athenians before proceeding to extremities. Yet their presence was 

 found to be a greater calamity than the people anticipated ; and when 

 Archidamus made his appearance at Acharme, they began loudly to 

 demand to be led out to battle. Pericles firmly adhered to his plan of 

 defence, and the Peloponnesians returned home. Before their depar- 

 ture the Athenians had sent out a fleet of one hundred sail, which was 

 joined by fifty Corcyrean ships to waste the coasts of Peloponnesus ; 

 and towards the autumn Pericles led the whole disposable force of the 

 city into Megaris, which he laid waste. In the same summer the 

 Athenians expelled the inhabitants of /Egina from their island, which 

 they colonised with Athenian settlers. In the winter there was a 

 public funeral at Athens for those who had fallen in the war, and 

 Pericles pronounced over them an oration, the substance of which is 

 preserved by Thucydides (ii. 35-46). 



In the following summer (B.C. 430} the Peloponnesians again invaded 

 Attica under Archidamus, who now entirely laid aside the forbearance 

 which he had shown the yew before, and left scarcely a corner of the 

 land unravaged. This invasion lasted forty days. In the meantime -a 

 grievous pestilence broke out in Athens, and raged with the more 

 yirulence on account of the crowded state of the city. Of this 

 terrible visitation Thucydides, who himself was a sufferer, has left a 

 minute and apparently faithful description (ii. 46, &c.). The murmurs 

 of the people against Pericles were renewed, and he was compelled to 

 call an assembly to defend his policy. He succeeded so far as to 

 'it any overtures for peace being made to the Lacedaemonians, but 

 In- himself was tined, though immediately afterwards he was re-elected 

 general. While the Peloinmnesians were in Attica, Pericles led a fleet 

 to ravage the coasts of Peloponnesus. In the winter of this year 

 Potidica surrendered to the Athenians on favourable terms. (Thucyd., 

 ii. 70.) 



The next year (B.C. 429), instead of invading Attica, the Pelopon- 

 neidans laid siege to Platica. The brave resistance of the inhabitants 

 forced their enemies to convert the siege into a blockade. In the same 

 summer an invasion of Acarnania by the Ambraciaus and a body of 

 IVl<>[ionue.iian troops was repulsed; and a large Peloponnesian fleet, 

 which was to have joined in the attack on Acamauia, was twice 

 defeated by Phormion in the mouth of the Corinthian Gulf. An 

 expedition sent by the Athenians against the revolted Chalcidian towns 

 was defeated with great loss. 



hi the preceding year (B.C. 430) the Athenians had concluded an 

 alliance with Sitalces, king of the Odrye, in Thrace, and Perdiccas, 

 king of Macedon, on which occasion Sitalces had promised to aid the 

 Athenians to subdue their revolted subjects in Chalcidice. He now 

 collected an army of 150,000 men, with which he first invaded 

 Macedonia, to revenge the breach of certain promises which Perdiccas 

 had made to him the year before, and afterwards laid waste the 

 territory of the Chalcidians and Buttia-ans, but he did not attempt to 

 reduce any of the Greek cities. About the middle of this year Pericles 



The invasion of Attica was repeated in the next summer (428 B.C.) ; 

 and immediately afterwards all Lesbos, except Methymne, revolted 

 ii 'in the Athenians, who laid siege to Mytilene. The Mytilenauans 

 begged aid from Sparta, which was promised, and they were admitted 

 into the Spartan alliance. In the same winter a body of the Plateaus, 

 amounting to 220, made their escape from the besieged city in the 

 night, and took refuge in Athens. 



In the summer of 427 B.C. the Peloponnesians again invaded Attica, 

 while they sent a fleet of forty-two galleys, under Alcidas, to the relief 

 of Mytilene. Before the fleet arrived Mytilene had surrendered, and 

 Alcidas, after a little delay, sailed home. In an assembly which was 

 held at Athens tu decide on the fate of the Mytilenuians, it was 

 resolved, at the instigation of Cleon, that all the adult citizens should 

 be put to death, and the women and children made slaves ; but this 

 barbarous decree was repealed the next day. [CLF.ON, in Bioo. Div.] 

 The land of.the Lesbians (except those of Methymne) was seized, and 

 divided among Athenian citizens, to whom the inhabitants paid a rent 

 for the occupation of their former property. In the same summer 

 the Platieans surrendered; they were massacred, and their city was 

 given up to the Thebans, who razed it to the ground. 



In the year 426 the Lacedaemonians were deterred from invading 

 Attica by earthquakes. An expedition against /Etolia, under the 



Athenian general Demosthenes, completely failed; but afterwards 

 Demosthenes and the Acarnaniaus routed the Ambracians, who nearly 

 all perished. In the winter (426-5) the Athenians purified the island 

 of Delos, as an acknowledgment to Apollo for the cessation of {he 

 plague. 



At the beginning of the summer of 425 the Peloponnesians invaded 

 Attica for the fifth time. At the same time the Athenians, who had 

 long directed their thoughts towards Sicily, sent a fleet to aid the 

 Leontini in a war with Syracuse. Demosthenes accompanied this fleet, 

 in order to act as occasion might offer on the coast of Peloponnesus. 

 He fortified Pylus on the coast of Messeuia, the northern headland of 

 the modern bay of Navarino. In the course of the operations which 

 were undertaken to dislodge him, a body of Lacedaemonians, including 

 several noble Spartans, got blockaded in the island of Sphacteria at the 

 mouth of the bay, and were ultimately taken prisoners by Cleon and 

 Demosthenes. [CLEON, in Bioo. Div.] Pylus was garrisoned by a 

 colony of Messeuians, in order to annoy the Spartans. After this 

 event the Athenians engaged in vigorous offensive operations, of which 

 the most important was the capture of the island of Cythera by Nicias, 

 early in B.C. 424. This summer however the Athenians suffered some 

 reverses in Bccotia, where they lost the battle of Delium, and on tho 

 coasts of Macedonia and Thrace, where Brasidas among other exploits 

 took Amphipolis. [BRASIDAS ; THUCYDIDES, in BIOG. Div.] 



The Athenian expedition to Sicily was abandoned, after some opera- 

 tions of no great importance, in consequence of a general pacification of 

 the island, which was effected through the influence of Hermocrates, a 

 citizen of Syracuse. 



In the year 423, a year's truce was concluded between Sparta and 

 Athens, with a view to a lasting peace. Hostilities were renewed in 

 422, and Cleon was sent to cope with Brasidas, who had continued his 

 operations even during the truce. A battle was fought between these 

 generals at Amphipolis, in which the defeat of the Athenians was amply 

 compensated by the double deliverance which they experienced in the 

 deaths both of Cleon and Brasidas. In the following year (421) Nicias 

 succeeded in negotiating a peace with Sparta for fifty years, the terms 

 of which were, a mutual restitution of conquests made during the war, 

 and the release of the prisoners taken at Sphacteria. This treaty was 

 ratified by all the allies of Sparta, except the Boeotians, Corinthians, 

 Eleans, and Megarians. 



This peace never rested on any firm basis. It was no sooner con- 

 cluded than it was discovered that Sparta had not the power to fulfil 

 her promises, and Athens insisted on their performance. The jealousy 

 of the other states was excited by a treaty of alliance which was con- 

 cluded between Sparta and Athens immediately after the peace ; and 

 intrigues were commenced for the formation of a new confederacy with 

 Argus at the head. An attempt was made to draw Sparta into alliance 

 with Argos, but it failed. A similar overture subsequently made to 

 Athens met with better success, chiefly through an artifice of Alci- 

 v, ho was at the head of a large party hostile to the peace, and 

 the Athenians concluded a treaty offensive and defensive with Argos, 

 Elis, and Mantinea for 100 yearn (B.C. 420). [ALCIBIADES, in Broa. Div.] 

 In the year 418 the Argive confederacy was broken up by their defeat 

 at the battle of Mantinea, and a peace, and soon after an alliance, was 

 made between Sparta ami Argos. In the year 416 an expedition was 

 undertaken by the Athenians against Melos, which had hitherto 

 remained neutral. The Melians surrendered at discretion : all the 

 males who had attained manhood were put to death ; the women and 

 children were made slaves ; and subsequently five hundred Athenian 

 colonists were sent to occupy the island. (Thucyd., v. 116.) 



The fifty years' peace was not considered at an end, though its terms 

 had been broken on both sides, till the year 415, when the Athenians 

 undertook their disastrous expedition to Sicily. [ALCIBIADES, in 

 Bioo. Div. ; SYRACUSE, in GEOO. Div.] After the failure of that 

 expedition (B.C. 413), the war became on the part of Athens a 

 struggle for existence ; but even then she put forth energies which 

 might have saved her, but for her own infatuation and the gold 

 which her enemies obtained from Persia. The events of the war, from 

 this period to the battle of Notium (B.C. 407), have been related under 

 ALCIBIADES, in BIOG. Div. The Spartans had now, by the aid of 

 Persian gold, obtained a fleet with which they could cope with Athens 

 on her own element. In the year 406, Conon, who had been appointed, 

 with nine other generals, to succeed Alcibiades, was blockaded in the 

 harbour of Mytilene by the Spartan admiral Callicratidas. His col- 

 leagues sailed to his assistance, and completely defeated the Spartau.i 

 in the battle of ArginusiC. The Spartans now made overtures for peace, 

 which were rejected by the Athenians at the instigation of a dema- 

 gogue named Cleophou. 



In the following year (B.C. 405) Lysander was appointed to the com- 

 mand of the Lacedaemonian fleet. [LYSANDEIUU Bioo. Div.] Heattacked 

 the Athenians at yEgospotami on the Hellespont at a moment when 

 they were off their guard, and entirely destroyed their fleet. This blow 

 in effect finished the war. Lysander sailed to Athens, receiving as ho 

 went the submission of the allies, and blockaded the city, which 

 surrendered after a few months (B.C. 404), on terms dictated by Sparta 

 with a view of making Athens a useful ally by giving the ascendancy 

 in the state to the oligarchical party. [ATHENS, in GEoa. Div.] 



The history of the Peloponnesian War was written by Thucydides, 

 upon whose accuracy and impartiality, as far as his narrative goes, we 



