Peloponnesian War

• War between the Delian League led by Athens and the Peloponnesian League led by Sparta
• 431–404 BC

Thirty Year’s Peace

• A treaty signed between Athens and Sparta in 446 BC that brought an end to the conflict known as the ‘First Peloponnesian War’
  • That was a series of occasional battles raging from 460 BC
• The peace was first tested when the powerful Athenian ally Samos rebelled against the alliance (440 BC)
  • The Spartans called a congress of their allies whether to engage in war with Athens
    • The Corinthians were against the intervention so the council voted against war with Athens
  • The revolt was crushed and peace maintained

Outbreak of War

• 433–431 BC
• Outbreak of war between Athens and Corinth
  • A conflict arises between Corinth and its colony Corsyra
    • There were negotians, finally Athenians decided to take the side of Corsyra
      • To uphold the peace, the small fleet Athenians sent didn’t intervene in the battle of Sybota
  • Following this, another conflict arises with a Corinthian colony of Potadia that is a tribute paying member of the Delian League
    • Athenians order the Potedians to tear down their walls, send hostages to Athens and dismiss all Corinthian magistrates from the city
      • But Potadians decline and appeal to their mother city, Corinth
    • During the following battle of Potidaea, Corinth unoficially aided the city by sneaking contigents of men into the besieged city to help defend it
      • This was a direct violation of the peace treaty
  • Megara (a polis located between Athens and Corinth) decides to get involved on the Corinthian side
    • Athens responds with the Megarian Decree
      • Total embargo, economic warfare
  • Eventually, at the meeting in Sparta, Corinthians persuade Sparta to start war against Athens
    • To persuade them, they compared the Spartan and Athenian national characters and described Spartans as too afraid to do anything
  • Almost entire greek world joins the war afterwards
    • 

Athenian Strategy

• Pericles realized Athens didn’t stand a chance against the Sparta in the traditional hoplite warfare
  • So he drew Athenians of the land into the protected enclave of the long walls
  • As long as they have the fleet providing Athens with supplies and raid the Spartan coast, they would be fine
• At the end of first year of the war, Pericles delivers his famous funeral oration
• Shortly after this address, a plague broke out in Athens
  • Probably arrived by ship
  • Some kind of bubonic plague
  • It is estimated as much as a third of Athenian population died
  • Under the pressure of the plague, many laws collapsed
  • Athenians responded by taking it out on Pericles
    • In a long time, after 17 years, Pericles was not elected general
      • But they changed their minds quickly after
    • Pericles delivers his so-called last speech
      • He catches the plague and dies in 429 BC

Cleon and Brasidas

• Revolt of Mytilene against Athens (the island of Lesbos) (428–427 BC)
  • Athenians crushed the revolt and voted on the ultimate penalty
    • That is all men will be killed, women and children will be sold into slavery
  • After debate between Cleon (for the penalty) and Diodotus (against the penalty), the penalty is not exercised, but things are getting more and more tense in Athens
• Stasis (civil war) in Corcyra (427 BC)
  • Begins with killing an official Athenian friend there
• Cleon’s victory at Pylos/Sphacteria against Spartans (425 BC)
  • Cleon has become very influential in Athens afterwards
• There is a shortage of manpower in Sparta (helots and others get into battles as well)
• New Spartan general Brasidas launches a fast campaign north of Athens
  • Wins at Amphipolis (424 BC)
    • The battle was led by Thucydides who is in response to this event exiled from Athens
  • In response to that, Cleon is appointed general and goes north to Brasidas
    • 422 BC - There’s large battle, Athenians lose (600 of them are killed including Cleon), on Spartan they are only seven fatalities reported, but one of them was Brasidas

Peace of Nicias

• 421 BC
• Signed between both sides
• Mutual non-agression is to last for 50 years
  • Disputes are to be solved by arbitration rather than conflict
• The situation was still tense on many fronts
  • Sparta tried to get Corinth ally with Thebes against Athens
  • Athenian general Alcibades got the Peloponnesian states of Ellis and Mantineia to ally with Argos against Spart (420 BC)
    • Combined forces of these three states are defeated at at Argives (418 BC)

Siege of Melos

• 416 BC
• Athenians go to the island of Melos and demand that they join the Delian League as subordinate tribute paying allies
  • Melos refuses to
  • Siege is led by Alcibiades
• Famous Melian dialogue
  • Athenians give Melians a choice: either they become a tribute-paying members or they will be destroyed
• The Melians decide to resist
  • Athenians come back with a massive fleet
  • After a short siege, Athenians kill almost all adult males (few manage to escape into slavery) and sell women and children into slavery
    • Then they resettle the island with 500 colonists from Athens

The Sicilian Expedition

• 416–413 BC
• Athenians decide to invade Sicily
  • An Athenian ally, Segesta, got into quarrel with nearby state of Selinus and asked Athenians for help
    • Nicias (the general who signed the peace of Nicias), anti-war, and Alcibiades, pro-war, debate the issue
      • Alcibiades was more persuasive, although Niccius' arguments were more rational
• Shortly before their arrival, Alcibiades hears that the Athenians have sent a ship out with orders that he be arrested
  • So he flees to Sparta
    • He gives them invaluable advice to make advances on Athens (as the home defenses were way down at the time)
      • Spartans establish a fort at Dekelea in the Attic territory
• At first, Athenians have some successes
• Athenians start beseiging Syracuse (the only Spartan colony)
  • Syracusans build a number of counter-walls
  • During these small fights, Lamachus is killed and only Nicias remains from the original 3 generals
• Sparta sends help under general Gylippus
  • They began to make a counter-wall, making the Athenian wall useless
  • The Corinthian fleet under the command of Erasinides also arrives
• Nicias, exhausted from illness, sends a letter to Athens, hoping they would recall him
  • Instead of recalling the expedition, Athenians send out massive reinforcments under general Demosthenes and Eurymedon
  • Still they were losing
• As Athenians were preparing to sail home, there was a lunar eclipse and Nicias, as a particularly superstitous man, decided to wait for another 27 days because of it
  • Syracusans took advantage of this and attacked Athenian ships in the harbor (76 vs. 86)
    • Athenians were defeated, Eurymedon killed
• Eventually, Athenians were trapped and exterminated
  • Either killed or sold into slavery

The Sicilian Expedition Aftermath

• There was a series of revolts among in the Delian League
• Board of 10 probouloi was established
  • Sort of like a super executive comitee
  • Highly trusted men of upstanding character
    • Still a breach in the democratic process

• The Oligarchic Revolution

  • 411 BC
  • Membership in assembly restricted to 5K wealthiest citizens
  • A super council of 400 is established
  • This oligarchy slowly fades away, though, and democracy is restored

The Treaty of Miletus

• 412 BC
• Alcibiades had to leave Sparta for Persia
  • He led negotiations with Persians to lend money to build Spartan fleet (which was an oxymoron for most Spartans)
  • He seduced the wife of one of the Spartan kings
• But Spartans continued the negotiations and came up with a treaty
  • In return for money, they would no longer oppose Persian attempts to control the Ionian states
    • Just like that the focus of the war shifts up norteast, because there was a crucial supply line for the Athenians

Alcibiades returns to Athens

• 408 BC
• Spartans are defeated in two battles northeast
  • One of them is the battle of Cyzicus
    • The Spartans offered peace, Athenians declined it
    • Alcibiades joins the pro-Athenian side
      • Back in Athens, he was cleared of all charges of impiety and was made a “commander-in-chief”
      • But after a while, Athenian public opinion shifted, he fled Athens and never returned again

Battle of Arginusae

• 406 BC
• Battle of Athenian and Spartan fleets
  • Sparta lost
• A storm came afterwards, so Athenians failed to pick up their dead
  • Back in Athens a motion is proposed that the generals be tried for this as a group
    • That is a completely illegal practice
    • The vote was eventually carried out and six generals were executed (among them one of the sons of Pericles)

Battle of Aegospotami

• 406 BC
• The Spartan fleet is under command of a very capable general named Lysander
• Athenians were in very vulnerable position
• Spartans had a decisive victory
  • 160 out of 180 Athenian ships were destroyed and several thousands killed
    • Athenian navy is now effectively destroyed

Athens Surrender

• 404 BC
• Athens was surrounded and starved into submission
  • Some Athenian enemies, notably Corinth and Thebes wanted Athens to be treated like Athens treated Melos
    • But Spartans resisted
  • The long walls and Athenian city walls were torn down
• Athenians were free but reduced to Athens and the island of Salamis
  • Their fleet was reduced to 12 ships
• In the places of former Athenian allies, Spartans imposed decharcies
  • A board of ten to control a state
• In Athens, they imposed an oligarchy of thirty

After the war Spartans enjoyed a brief period of hegemony.