The Peloponnesian War - PART I: The Gathering Storm

In the year 480 BC, Xerxes, the King of Kings of the mighty Achaemenid Persian Empire, the only superpower at the time, launched a massive invasion of the Greek mainland. With perhaps as many as 200,000 men at his command, it seemed a foregone conclusion that his forces would be able to march nearly unopposed into the heart of the ancient Greek-speaking world. However, and against all odds, a coalition led by two of Greece's most powerful city-states, Athens and Sparta, were able to push the Persians back and cripple their forces, both at sea and on land. For centuries, such unity had been virtually unknown in the Greek-speaking world, and many were optimistic that a new era of peace and prosperity was at hand. Unfortunately, it was not meant to be. Barely half a century later, that same Greek world was rocked internally by a long and bloody conflict that over several decades may have ultimately resulted in the deaths of perhaps hundreds of thousands of people, as well as the destruction of whole cities and countless square miles of farmland. It was an extremely brutal war, where the strict codes of honor and basic civility were abandoned and replaced with savagery of the worst kind. For the Greeks of the time, it was simply known as the Great War. Today, we refer to this ancient conflict as the Peloponnesian War. 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. These are the opening words of Thucydides' great work, History of the Peloponnesian War. Writing these lines in the third person, it's as if he knew that he'd be remembered, not as a general, which he was, but for giving future generations a thorough historical account of what to him was the most intense conflict in recent memory. History has essentially proved him to have been right. While other accounts of certain parts of the conflict do exist, they're often incomplete and were written many years after the events that they describe took place. Thucydides, on the other hand, was a witness to many of the war's events, as well as a contemporary of most of the important people involved. This makes him the war's primary and most important historian. In Athenian general and naval commander during the Peloponnesian War, Thucydides took part in some of its early stages, but was eventually exiled from his hometown of Athens in 424 BC due to his role in the loss of the strategic northern Aegean port of Amphipolis. In a sense, it was a blessing in disguise, because it gave him time to both reflect and write about all that he witnessed during the conflict, which at the time was entering into its eighth year. From that point onward, Thucydides embarked upon the task of writing the most detailed account of the conflict based not just on his experiences, but also on the eyewitness accounts of others, as well as any documents, proclamations, or other pieces of evidence that he came across. Commenting on his own work, he wrote, Turning from these, we can rest satisfied with having proceeded upon the clearest data, and having arrived at conclusions as exact as can be expected in matters of such antiquity. As long and detailed as it is, Thucydides's work is incomplete, and ends with events that took place in the year 411 BC. The war itself went on until the year 404 BC. It's assumed that his history is incomplete, because he died around 400 BC, and was probably not able to complete his masterpiece before then. However, another great Athenian soldier and historian, Xenophon, did write about the later events of the war, from close to where Thucydides left off. His work is called Hellenica. There are also several other works that scholars and historians have used to piece together the full story of the Peloponnesian War, but Thucydides and Xenophon are arguably its two most reliable sources. According to Thucydides, the cause of the Peloponnesian War was due to the fierce rivalry between the Greek city-states of Athens, Sparta, and their respective allies. Thucydides tells us, The real cause, however, I consider to be one which was formerly most kept out of sight. The growth of the power of Athens, and the alarm which this inspired in Sparta, made war inevitable. The two had been allies in the second Persian invasion of Greece in 480 BC, when the Achaemenid Persian king of kings, Xerxes, led perhaps the largest invasion force that the world up until then had ever seen. Though there's a lot of debate on the actual number, scholars estimate the size of his army to have been anywhere between 50,000 to 200,000 men, which was augmented by forces, notably cavalry, from several allied Greek city-states, such as Thebes. Regardless of the actual number, it was a force that, at least numerically, was more than sufficient for subduing the Greek mainland. About ten years prior, Xerxes' father, the great Darius I of Persia, had sent a smaller force to punish the city-states of Athens and Eritrea for aiding the Greek-speaking territories of the eastern Aegean in revolting against Persian rule. Persian forces were able to take Eritrea, but they ultimately failed to take Athens due to their defeat at the Battle of Marathon. Ten years later, the Persians returned under Darius' son, Xerxes. Though the Persians initially had several victories on land, including the capture and burning of Athens, their forces suffered a catastrophic and decisive naval defeat in September of 480 BC at what became known as the Battle of Salamis. Though the Athenians mastered the sea, it was the Spartans who controlled the land due to the strength and skills of their infantry. According to the Greek historian Herodotus, it was a force of 300 hoplites under the command of the Spartan king Leonidas who held the Persians at bay at the Pass of Thermopylae, which allowed the bulk of the defending Greek army to escape and live to fight another day. The following year, a Spartan-led force kicked out the last remnants of the Persian army in Greece at Plataea. As we can see, both Athens and Sparta played pivotal roles in protecting the Greek mainland from foreign rule. Unfortunately, this alliance and the goodwill it created between the two powerful city-states was short-lived. Though the Spartans under General Pausanias won further victories against Persian naval forces, especially at the Battle of Mycale, continuing the war no longer seemed in their interests. The Persian threat had been neutralized, at least on the mainland, and there were more pressing matters at home to deal with. Pausanias was recalled back to Sparta, and all Spartan military attacks against the Persian empire came to an end. The Athenians, though, who maintained their powerful navy, wanted to continue the fight against the Persian empire, which, due to their proximity to its frontiers, would always be an existential threat to their security and growing commercial interests in the Aegean and eastern Mediterranean. In 478 BC, they created a new anti-Persian alliance, which scholars today call the Delian League. Eventually consisting of some 150 Greek city and island states, the Delian League was established for the sole purpose of ridding the Aegean Sea and the Greek cities of Asia Minor of Persian influence. Most of the League's members were in this region anyway, so in theory, such an alliance served them well. This, though, in practice was not the case. In fact, most of the members of the League ended up being oppressed by the Athenians, who claimed its leadership. Each member of the Delian League was required to either pay tribute or send soldiers to fight. The overwhelming majority chose to send money, with only the islands of Lesbos and Chios able to keep and command their own ships. The others that sent ships and sailors were forced to put them under Athenian command. Rather than being an alliance, in time, the Delian League in practice became a vehicle for Athens to enrich itself and enlarge its military forces, which it then used to bully the smaller, less powerful tribute-paying members of the League. The Athenians had essentially created their own Greek empire under the guise of the Delian League. Like the Athenians, the Spartans led their own alliance of states that we today call the Peloponnesian League. Like the name implies, it was made up primarily of city-states from the Peloponnese, though it wasn't limited to this. It also included members from Veotia and other regions. Unlike the Delian League, members of the Peloponnesian League had far greater autonomy within the organization, making it more like a traditional alliance. Its members all had equal voting rights when it came to major decision-making. Around 465 BC, a major earthquake devastated much of Sparta, killing thousands. This series of events sparked a major revolt of the helot population in Spartan-controlled Laconia and Messenia. Helots were essentially low-ranking serfs, perhaps just a step above slaves. Many were the descendants of once free people who had been conquered in years past and had been forced to farm the lands of the Spartan state. This system allowed full Spartan citizens the luxury of focusing solely on military training, which was one factor that had enabled them to become the best infantry force in the Greek-speaking world. The other major group in Spartan society were the perioikoi. Though non-citizens with few, if any, political rights, they were considered to be free people and generally made up the business and artisan class of Laconia and Messenia. Unlike the revolts of the past, which had been smashed relatively quickly, this one had gained momentum. By 462 BC, many helots, along with some perioikoi, had established a stronghold on Mount Itomi in Messenia. Since it looked like the Spartans couldn't put down the revolt on their own, they called upon their allies for assistance. At the time, Athens and Sparta were on good terms, or at least, that's what was thought. The Athenian general and statesman, Cimon, persuaded other leaders in Athens that they should come to the aid of the Spartans. Agreeing, Cimon and about 4,000 hoplites were dispatched to Sparta. They weren't there very long, because shortly after they arrived, the Spartans dismissed them. Thucydides describes the series of events as follows. The Spartans, meanwhile, finding that the war against the rebels in Itomi was likely to be a long one, invoked the aid of their allies, and especially the Athenians, who came in some force under the command of Cimon. The reason for this pressing summons lay in their reputed skill in siege operations. A long siege had taught the Spartans their own deficiency in this art, else they would have taken the place by assault. The first open quarrel between the Spartans and Athenians arose out of this expedition. The Spartans, when an assault failed to take the place, apprehensive of the enterprising and revolutionary character of the Athenians, and further looking upon them as of alien extraction, began to fear that if they remained, they might be persuaded by the besieged in Itomi to attempt some political changes. They accordingly dismissed them alone of the allies, without declaring their suspicions, but merely saying that they had now no need of them. But the Athenians, aware that their dismissal did not proceed from the more honorable reason of the two, but from suspicions which had been conceived, went away deeply offended. The instant that they returned home, they broke off the alliance and allied themselves with Sparta's enemy, Argos. Shortly afterward, Athens and Argos extended the coalition to include allies from Thessaly. Formalizing their pact in 460 BC, they lent support to neighboring Megara in its border conflict with Corinth, the latter being one of Sparta's greatest allies. In the words of Thucydides, the Athenians received another addition to their confederacy in the Megarans, who left the Spartan alliance, annoyed by a war about boundaries forced on them by Corinth. The Athenians occupied Megara and Pagai, and built for the Megarians their long walls from the city to Nicaea, in which they placed an Athenian garrison. This was the principal cause of the Corinthians conceiving such a deadly hatred against Athens. Knowing that any land attack from Corinth or even Sparta would pass through Megarian territory, the Athenians placed great importance on fortifying the area and also stationed a garrison there. As for Athens' own defenses, in 459 BC, what became known as the Long Walls were built to link the city to its main port of Piraeus. Clearly, the Athenians were preparing for some sort of retaliation from Corinth, Sparta, or both. In 457 BC, the expected attack came, though it took a bit of a detour. Spartan-led forces of the Peloponnesian League, instead of taking the land route through hostile Megara, ferried about 12,000 men across the Gulf of Corinth, where they came face to face with an Athenian-led army at Tanagra. The Athenian side was well prepared, with about 14,000 men that included about a thousand hoplites from Argos, as well as a contingent of Thessalian cavalry. Despite their slight advantage, the Athenians and their allies could not break through the Spartan defenses, and the battle seemed as if it would result in a stalemate. However, after about two days of fighting, the Thessalian cavalry switched sides, which tipped the balance in favor of the Spartan-led force, and gave them the upper hand. Knowing that they were now truly outnumbered, the Athenians fled. Victorious, the Spartans returned to the Peloponnese. This though may have been a bit premature, because shortly afterward, the Athenians defeated many of Sparta's allies in Boeotia, which gave them control over large parts of central Greece. Athens and the Delian League, though, were just getting started. For them, their navy was their greatest asset, and in 456 BC, about 50 ships under the command of General Ptolemy burnt the Spartan dockyards at Kaitheion, on the coast of Laconia. Shortly afterward, the Athenians captured the strategic port town of Naupactus, on the northern shore of the Gulf of Corinth. Instead of occupying it themselves, they resettled it with a group of Mycenaeans that had fled after the most recent Mycenaean war. Thucydides tells us, Meanwhile the rebels in Athome, unable to prolong further a ten year's resistance, surrendered to Sparta, the conditions being that they should depart from the Peloponnese under safe conduct, and should never set foot in it again. So they went forth with their children and their wives, and being received by Athens because of the hatred that she now felt for the Spartans, were relocated to Naupactus, which she had lately taken from the Azolean Locoreans. This old saying essentially became one of the cornerstones of Athenian foreign policy. Enemies of Sparta and the Peloponnesian League were now natural allies of Athens. Both sides though were getting weary of constant conflict, especially the conservative Spartans, many of whom ultimately didn't see a wider war with Athens to have been within their interests. In 451 BC, the Spartan leadership agreed to a five year truce with Athens that ended in a peace treaty. However, while both sides may have held to the letter of the law, they often violated it in spirit. The most egregious act was actually orchestrated not by Athens or Sparta, but by the Corinthians. They were still furious at Athens for aiding Magara in their border conflict with Corinth barely a decade before. This time, it was they who inspired the Magarians to revolt, which ultimately led to the killing of many Athenian soldiers who were garrisoned in Magara. Not only this, but to make sure that the Athenians wouldn't return, the Magarians allowed a Peloponnesian army under the Spartan to enter their now technically independent territory as further insurance, to protect them from any future Athenian reprisals. This, of course, was unacceptable to the Athenians. Think of it as a sort of ancient version of the Cuban Missile Crisis. Having a Spartan-led army so close to Athens put the city on red alert, and Athenian forces, led by the great general and statesman, Pericles, rushed back to face Pleistoannax. Not wanting to officially break the truce and treaty, let alone start a full-scale war, Pleistoannax withdrew his forces from Magara. That's one explanation. Many within the Peloponnesian alliance actually accused him of being bribed by the Athenians to leave, and though he was later acquitted of such charges, he still went into exile as a result. These latest incidents in Magara had nearly broken the fragile peace that existed between the Delian and Peloponnesian leagues. Knowing that a full-scale war would have catastrophic consequences, both sides tried to de-escalate the situation before it got out of hand. In 446 BC, the Athenians and Spartans signed a peace treaty meant to last for 30 years. In brief, the terms stated that each side would be permitted to keep any territory that they currently held, with Athens giving up any claims to Veotia, as well as ceasing to expand the Delian League alliance at the expense of Sparta and the Peloponnesian League. That meant no courting Peloponnesian allies, such as Magara, to switch sides. If during the 30 years there were any disputes, these would be subject to arbitration by an independent and non-aligned third party. What became known as the 30 years peace may have looked good on paper, but it didn't end the two sides' distrust of each other. Both tried to take advantage of any misfortune that afflicted the other. For example, when the powerful and wealthy Delian League member of Samos revolted against Athenian authority in 441 BC, many Spartans agitated to take advantage of the situation and start a war with Athens. They felt that the Athenians would have done the same if Sparta or another member of the Peloponnesian League had been caught in a similar predicament. What stopped war from breaking out was that the majority of the Peloponnesian League's members decided that another armed conflict was not in their best interests. Still, most people on both sides felt that a wider war was inevitable, and that it would only be a matter of time before one misstep or transgression would light the match that would inflame the region. Barely a decade into the 30 years peace, events unfolded that would do just that. In 435 BC, Corcyra, which had once been a colony of Corinth, was involved in a dispute with the city of Epidamnos, today in modern Albania. Epidamnos had been founded as a sort of Corinthian-Corcyrian joint venture. Since then, though, relations between the leadership of Corinth and Corcyra had all but been severed. When Epidamnos' pro-democracy faction expelled the city's oligarchs, the latter joined forces with the Talantai, an Illyrian people who lived nearby. They attacked Epidamnos, which caused the city's leaders to appeal to Corcyra for help. Though Corcyra also had a relatively democratic government, it had strong ties to the oligarchs, and so they denied Epidamnos' request for aid. Corinth, though, was more than happy to intervene on behalf of its former colony, as well as teach a strange Corcyra a lesson. The Corinthians sent both military and civilian support to Epidamnos. In response, Corcyra besieged the city. It should be noted that though it had once been merely a colony of Corinth, Corcyra was now a regional power in its own right. The city had a fleet of at least 120 ships, and wasn't afraid to use them. On the other hand, the Corinthians were part of the Peloponnesian League, and could rely on Spartan support if needed. 75 ships, 30 from Corinth and the rest from its allies, plus 2,000 hoplites, organized to meet the Corcyrian forces head-on. Scholars are still puzzled as to why a relatively small number of ships were sent to take on Corcyra's significantly larger fleet. If the Corinthians thought that Corcyra would back down, they were mistaken. At what became known as the Battle of Laosemi, the Corcyrian fleet split in two and routed the Corinthian-led force. Fifteen Corinthian ships were captured, and any prisoners executed, with the exception of any citizens who were kept as hostages. The city of Epidamnos also surrendered on the same day. Doing their best to avoid being dragged into what seemed to be a family squabble between Corinth and its former colonies, the Spartans wanted to de-escalate the situation and attempted to get all sides to come to a peaceful solution. Unfortunately for them, the humiliated Corinthians would accept nothing short of Corcyrian blood, and they began building new ships for another assault to take down Corcyra. Corcyra was strong, but not that strong. It needed allies if it were to permanently hold back Corinth and the Peloponnesian League. And so, the city's leadership decided to forge an alliance with Athens. With Corcyra's navy augmenting their own, Athens would become the uncontested master of the seas, and would threaten Corinthian interests, especially in the west. When word reached them that the Corcyrians had sent a delegation to Athens to discuss terms, the Corinthians quickly sent ambassadors of their own to present their side of the conflict. In September of 433 BC, both sides presented their arguments in front of the The Corinthian delegation's main argument was that Athens should not get involved, as well as not accept Corcyra as an ally, because it would violate the Thirty Years' Peace. The Corcyrian delegation countered this by stating that the Thirty Years' Peace only applied to entities already in the Delian or Peloponnesian Leagues, and not to currently non-aligned city states such as Corcyra. In other words, Athens could sign a pact with Corcyra if it wanted to. The Corinthians, though, made it known that if this were to occur, Athens would become their enemy, and by extension, an enemy of the Peloponnesian League. The Athenian assembly took a day to deliberate the matter, with the final result being that they would sign a purely defensive alliance with Corcyra. They wouldn't participate in any attacks on Corinthian forces, but would come to the aid of Corcyra if that city, or any of its territories, were attacked. As expected, this angered the Corinthian delegation, whose members stormed out of the assembly. Once the news of what had transpired in Athens reached Corinth, the city's leaders and generals prepared for war. They mustered together a fleet of 150 ships, 90 from Corinth and the rest from their allies, including Megara. Facing them were 110 Corcyrian ships, along with 10 from Athens, that had instructions not to engage in combat unless Corcyra was directly threatened. A naval battle began at dawn off the coast of Sibota, to the east of Corcyra. At first, the 10 Athenian ships stayed out of the fight, but as the Corcyrian line broke, they engaged a section of the Corinthian fleet. Thucydides tells us, Seeing the Corcyrians hard-pressed, the Athenians began at length to assist them more unequivocally. At first, it is true, they refrained from charging any ships, but when the route was becoming obvious, and the Corinthians were pressing on, the time at last came when the Corinthians and Athenians raised their hands against each other. The Corinthians ended up winning the battle and slaughtered any Corcyrian that they came across, though all 10 Athenian ships seemed to have survived the fray and avoided any major damage. Shortly afterward though, 20 new ships were sighted over the horizon. These turned out to be Athenian reinforcements. A standoff ensued between all 30 Athenian ships, plus whatever Corcyrian vessels remained, and the Corinthian fleet, whose commanders were worried that the Athenians might try to cut off their escape. According to Thucydides, the Corinthians sent a boat towards the Athenian side to learn what their intentions were. He describes the scene as follows. Accordingly, they resolved to put some men on board a boat, and send them without a herald's wand to the Athenians, as an experiment. Having done so, they spoke as follows. You do wrong, Athenians, to begin war and break the treaty. Engaged in chastising our enemies, we find you placing yourselves in our path, in arms against us. Now if your intentions are to prevent us sailing to Corcyra, or anywhere else that we may wish, and if you are for breaking the treaty, first take us that are here, and treat us as enemies. Such was what they said, and all the Corcyrian armament that were within hearing immediately called out to take them and kill them. But the Athenians answered as follows. Neither are we beginning war, Peloponnesians, nor are we breaking the treaty, but these Corcyrians are our allies, and we have come to help them. So if you want to sail anywhere else, we place no obstacle in your way. But if you are going to sail against Corcyra, or any of her possessions, we shall do our best to stop you. Convinced that the Athenians didn't want to escalate the conflict by attacking, the Corinthian fleet departed. The Athenians were practical, and knew that attacking the Corinthians, who within the Peloponnesian League were almost as powerful as Sparta, would have been extremely unwise. However, neighbouring Megara needed to be punished, both for its earlier betrayal, as well as for supplying the Corinthian fleet with ships in this latest encounter. The punishment came in the form of what became known as the Megarian Decree, which forbade Megarian ships from docking and trading their goods at any Athenian or Delian League port. In one of the earliest instances in recorded history of an organized economic embargo, Megara was essentially cut off from the ports of the Aegean Sea, which greatly crippled its economy and limited its access to foreign sources of grain. In addition to supporting Corinth and the Peloponnesian League, the Athenians also accused them of trespassing on sacred land known as Hiera Orgis, as well as harbouring fugitive slaves who had fled from Athens. Shortly after the Battle of Sibota, there was trouble in Potidaea, a city located on one of the fingers of the Chalcedician Peninsula in the northwestern Aegean. Potidaea was in a very awkward position. It had been founded by settlers from Corinth around 600 BC, but, unlike Corcyra, still had good relations with its mother city. In fact, Potidaea received its magistrates from Corinth every year. The city, which was extremely wealthy, was also a tribute-paying member of the Delian League, and at one point contributed as much as 7% to the League's annual revenue. Thucydides tells us that the Athenians were wary of Potidaea's ties to Corinth, and also feared the influence of King Perdiccas II of Macedon, who they believed was inspiring the city to rebel. As a precaution, the Potidaeans were ordered to demolish part of their city's defensive walls, send hostages to Athens, and to stop receiving Corinthian magistrates. Potidaea protested against these demands, but the Athenians refused to budge. And so, the Potidaeans appealed to the Spartans, who promised to invade Attica if the Athenians attacked Potidaea. With such assurances, in 432 BC, Potidaea and some of the neighboring cities revolted against Athens and seceded from the Delian League. In response, Athens moved north, first to keep Perdiccas and Macedon in check, and then to deal with Potidaea. According to Thucydides, Corinth's response was swift. Meanwhile, the Corinthians, with Potidaea in revolt and the Athenian ships on the coast of Macedonia alarmed for the safety of the place, and thinking its danger theirs, sent volunteers from Corinth and mercenaries from the rest of the Peloponnese to the number of 1,600 hoplites in all, and 400 light troops. They arrived in Thrace 40 days after the revolt of Potidaea. As for the Athenians, they sent 3,000 hoplites, along with 600 Macedonian cavalry from a faction that rivaled Perdiccas. In short, the Potidaean coalition was beaten, but not totally defeated, and many of them retreated behind Potidaea's city walls. The Athenians blockaded and held the city under siege for over two years, during which they brought in additional troops, and tried several times to take the city by force. At one point, they even lost 1,000 hoplites to plague. Finally, they decided to patiently starve the city into submission, which actually worked. The Potidaeans, who were so desperate that many of them had resorted to cannibalism, eventually surrendered and opened their gates to the Athenians. Potidaea's inhabitants were forced to leave, and new settlers from Attica brought in to take over what had remained of their city and surrounding farmland. The events of 432 BC, namely the Athenian alliance with Corcyra, the Megarian decree, and the attack and subsequent siege of Potidaea, along with Athens' occupation and mistreatment of Aegina, raised concerns with many members of the Peloponnesian League that Athens had gone too far and needed to be reined in. And so, a meeting of the Peloponnesian League took place in Sparta, where many of those affected by Athenian aggression stated their grievances to all of the forum's members. The most vocal were the Corinthians. They were angered, not just at the hostile actions of the Athenians, but perhaps even more so at the Spartans' inaction and lack of leadership as head of the Peloponnesian League. Pointing their fingers directly at the Spartan Spartans. The confidence which you feel in your constitution and social order inclines you to receive any reflections of ours on other powers with a certain skepticism. Hence springs your moderation, but hence also the rather limited knowledge you betray in dealing with foreign politics. Time after time was our voice raised to warn you of the blows about to be dealt us by Athens. And time after time, instead of taking the trouble to ascertain the worth of our warnings, you contented yourselves with suspecting the speakers of being inspired by private interest. And so, instead of calling these allies together before the blow fell, you have delayed to do so till we are smarting under it. And of the allies, it is not unfitting that we make this speech, for we have very great complaints of high-handed treatment by the Athenians and neglect by you. For all this, you are responsible. You it was who first allowed them to fortify their city after the Persian War, and afterwards to erect the long walls. You, who then and now, are always depriving of freedom not only those whom they have enslaved, but also those who have as yet been your allies. For the true author of the subjugation of a people is not so much the immediate agent as the power which permits it having the means to prevent it. The Corinthian speech went on and on, and at several points even seemed to go as far as to insult Sparta and Spartan society for being out of touch with the modern world. They ended their speech urging the Spartans to act and invade Attica in response to the Athenian siege of Potidaea. If there was no action, then the Corinthians implied that they and other members of the Peloponnesian League would look for new allies. The Athenians also had a delegation present at the assembly and demanded that they too be allowed to speak and share their side of the story, to which the Spartans agreed. The Athenians made no apologies for their past actions. On the contrary, they made the case that they were being viewed unfairly. After all, had they not been the ones at Marathon, Salamis, and other places to hold back and ultimately defeat Xerxes' armies, and, in effect, also defending the Peloponnese from Persian subjugation? The empire that they'd acquired, i.e. the Delian League, was the result of the need to continue that fight against their would-be oppressor, a fight that Sparta and its allies had chosen to abandon when they stopped fighting after Maikali and returned home. Therefore, the Athenians argued, they had a right to their empire, and could now not just simply give it up because they'd become powerful. They also cautioned the Spartans against acting too hastily and going into a war that would have disastrous consequences, not just for them, but also their Peloponnesian allies. After all sides had given their respective arguments, the Spartan assembly met on its own to discuss what they'd just heard. Most Spartans were incensed and believed that the Athenians had not only broken the Thirty Years' Peace, but were deliberately planning to break up the Peloponnesian League and expand their influence at Sparta's expense. For them, their honor and oath to their allies demanded war. Others, though, were much more cautious. Among these included Archidamus, one of Sparta's two kings and a seasoned general known for his wisdom. He reasoned that the timing wasn't right for the Spartans and their allies to rush into a war with the Athenian-led Delian League, especially since they had more resources and ships than the Peloponnesian alliance. Instead, Archidamus advised settling various disputes through diplomacy while simultaneously seeking new allies, resources, and ships to level the playing field with Athens. His own words according to Thucydides were as follows. Archidamus was met with a response from Stenilitis, one of Sparta's five ephors. Though small in number, the ephors were an elected body whose members held executive, judicial, and disciplinary powers over the Spartan state and government, including its two kings. Generally very conservative, the ephors acted as guardians of Spartan society and its traditions. Stenilitis appealed to the Spartans' sense of duty and honor and reportedly responded as follows. For while the other side may have plenty of money, ships, and horses, we have good allies whom we cannot betray to the Athenians. Nor is this something to be decided by diplomacy and negotiations. It's not through words that our interests are being harmed. Our vengeance must be strong and swift. So vote as befits you Spartans, for war. Do not allow the Athenians to become stronger and do not utterly betray your allies. With the gods beside us, let us challenge the unrighteous. In the end, the majority sided with Stenilitis and voted for war. The Spartans may have decided upon war, but what about the rest of the Peloponnesian League? Well, it was quite certain how the Corinthians and Magarians felt about the issue, but there were many member states that, at least initially, wanted to avoid war with Athens and other Delian League members because they had strong trade ties with them. In the end though, the war hawks amongst the Corinthians persuaded the majority of Peloponnesian League members that they had no respectable option other than to declare war on Athens and her allies. Even after this, the Spartans made one last effort to avoid a war by sending an envoy to Athens to negotiate a settlement. Though some progress seems to have been made, the main point of contention seemed to be the Magarian Decree, upon which the Athenians would not budge. Shortly after this, all negotiations broke down, and the chances of a peaceful settlement evaporated. Though no one knew exactly when it would start, it was clear to all on both sides that a long, costly, and bloody war was on the horizon. This is the end of Part 1. Part 2 coming soon. As always, thanks so much for listening, or if you're on YouTube, for watching. 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