hoplites not including 10,000 from Central Greece and Boeotia; these soldiers were highly trained. The Athenian army was undoubtedly smaller. There has been considerable discussion as to the exact figures, the evidence in Thucydides being highly confusing, but it is most probable that the available fighting force was not more than half that of the Peloponnesian confederacy. Even of these we learn (Thuc. iii. 87) that 4400 died in the great plague. The only light-armed force was that of Boeotia at Delium (10,000 with 500 peltasts). Of cavalry Athens had 1000, Boeotia a similar number. The only other cavalry force was that of Thessaly, which, had it been loyal to Athens, would have meant a distinct superiority. In naval power the Athenians undoubtedly had an overwhelming advantage at the beginning, both in numbers and in training.
Financially Athens had an enormous apparent advantage. She began with a revenue of 1000 talents (including 600 from σύμμαχοι), and had also, in spite of the heavy expense which the building schemes of Pericles had involved, a reserve of 6000 talents. The Peloponnesians had no reserve and no fixed revenue assessment. On the other hand the Peloponnesian armies were unpaid, while Athens had to spend considerable sums on the payment of crews and mercenaries. In the last stages of the war the issue was determined by the poverty of Athens and Persian gold.
The events of the struggle from 431 to 404 may be summarized in the three periods distinguished above.
1. The Ten Years’ or Archidamian War.—The Spartans sent to Athens no formal declaration of war but rather sought first to create some specious casus belli by sending requisitions to Athens. The first, intended to inflame the existing hostilities against Pericles (q.v.) in Athens, was that he should be expelled the city as being an Alcmaeonid (grand-nephew of Cleisthenes) and so implicated in the curse pronounced on the murderers of Cylon nearly 200 years before. This outrageous demand was followed by three others—that the Athenians should (1) withdraw from Potidaea, (2) restore autonomy to Aegina, and (3) withdraw the embargo on Megarian commerce. Upon the refusal of all these demands Sparta finally made the maintenance of peace contingent upon the restoration by Athens of autonomy to all her allies. Under the guidance of Pericles Athens replied that she would do nothing on compulsion, but was prepared to submit difficulties to amicable arbitration on the basis of mutual concessions. Before anything could come of this proposal, matters were precipitated (end of March 431) by the attack of Thebes upon Plataea (q.v.), which immediately sought and obtained the aid of Athens. War was begun. The Spartan king Archidamus assembled his army, sent a herald to announce his approach, marched into Attica and besieged Oenoe.
Meanwhile Pericles had decided to act on the defensive, i.e. to abandon Attica, collect all its residents in Athens and treat Athens as an island, retaining meanwhile command of the sea and making descents on Peloponnesian shores. The policy, which Thucydides and Grote commend, had grave defects though it is by no means easy to suggest a better, e.g. it meant the ruin of the landed class, it tended to spoil the moral of those who from the walls of Athens annually watched the wasting of their homesteads, and it involved the many perils of an overcrowded city—a peril increased by, if not also the cause of, the plague. Moreover sea power was not everything, and delay exhausted the financial reserves of the state, while financial considerations as we have seen, were comparatively unimportant to the Peloponnesians. The descents on the Peloponnese were futile in the extreme.
Archidamus, having wasted much territory, including Acharnae, retired at the end of July. The Athenians retaliated by attacking Methone (which was secured by Brasidas), by successes in the West, by expelling all Aeginetans from Aegina (which was made a cleruchy), and by wasting the Megarid.
In 430 Archidamus again invaded Attica, systematically wasting the country. Shortly after he entered Attica plague broke out in Athens, borne thither by traders from Carthage or Egypt (Holm, Greek History, ii. 346 note). The effect upon the overcrowded population of the city was terrible. Of the 1200 cavalry (including mounted archers) 300 died, together with 4400 hoplites; altogether the estimate of Diodorus (xii. 58) that more than 10,000 citizens and slaves succumbed is by no means excessive. None the less Pericles sailed with 100 triremes, and ravaged the territory near Epidaurus. Subsequently he returned and the expedition proceeded to Potidaea. But the plague went with them and no results were achieved. The enemies of Pericles, who even with the aid of Spartan intrigue had hitherto failed to harm his prestige, now succeeded in inducing the desperate citizens to fine him for alleged malversation. The verdict, however, shocked public feeling and Pericles was reinstated in popular favour as strategus (c. Aug. 430). About a year later he died. In the autumn of 430 a Spartan attack on Zacynthus failed and the Ambraciots were repulsed from Amphilochian Argos. In reply Athens sent Phormio to Naupactus to watch her interests in that quarter. In the winter Potidaea capitulated, receiving extremely favourable terms.
In 429 the Peloponnesians were deterred by the plague from invading Attica and laid siege to Plataea in the interests of Thebes. The Athenians failed in an expedition to Chalcidice under Xenophon, while the Spartan Cnemus with Chaonian and Epirot allies was repulsed from Stratus, capital of Acarnania, and Phormio with only 20 ships defeated the Corinthian fleet of 47 sail in the Gulf of Corinth. Orders were at once sent from Sparta to repair this disaster and 77 ships were equipped. Help sent from Athens was diverted to Crete, and after much manoeuvring Phormio was compelled to fight off Naupactus. Nine of his ships were driven ashore, but with the other 11 he subsequently defeated the enemy and recovered the lost nine. With the reinforcement which arrived afterwards he established complete control of the western seas. A scheme for operating with Sitalces against the Chalcidians of Thrace fell through, and Sitalces joined Perdiccas.
The year 428 was marked by a third invasion of Attica and by the revolt of Lesbos from Athens. After delay in fruitless negotiations the Athenian Cleippides, and afterwards Paches, besieged Mytilene, which appealed to Sparta. The Peloponnesian confederacy resolved to aid the rebels both directly and by a counter demonstration against Athens. The Athenians, though their reserve of 6000 talents was by now almost exhausted (except for 1000 talents in a special reserve), made a tremendous effort (raising 200 talents by a special property tax), and not only prevented an invasion by a demonstration of 100 triremes at the Isthmus, but sent Asopius, son of Phormio, to take his place in the western seas. In spring 427 the Spartans again invaded Attica without result. The winter of 428–427 was marked by the daring escape of half the Plataean garrison under cover of a stormy night, and by the capitulation of Mytilene, which was forced upon the oligarchic rulers by the democracy. The Spartan fleet arrived too late and departed without attempting to recover the town. Paches cleared the Asiatic seas of the enemy, reduced the other towns of Mytilene and returned to Athens with upwards of 1000 prisoners. An assembly was held and under the invective of Cleon (q.v.) it was decided to kill all male Mytileneans of military age and to sell the women and children as slaves. This decree, though in accordance with the rigorous customs of ancient warfare as exemplified by the treatment which Sparta shortly afterwards meted out to the Plataeans, shocked the feelings of Athens, and on the next day it was (illegally) rescinded just in time to prevent Paches carrying it out. The thousand[1] oligarchic prisoners were however executed, and Lesbos was made a cleruchy.
Meanwhile there occurred civil war in Corcyra, in which ultimately, with the aid of the Athenian admiral Eurymedon, the democracy triumphed amid scenes of the wildest savagery. In the autumn of the year Nicias fortified Minoa at the mouth of the harbour of Megara. Shortly afterwards the Spartans
- ↑ So Thuc. iii. 50. It is suggested that this number is an error for 30 or 50 (i.e., Λ or N for A). It seems incredible that 1000 could be described as “ringleaders” out of a population of perhaps 5000.
