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Name: The Peloponnesian War
Rating: 4.4 (92 reviews)
Author: Donald Kagan

Donald Kagan

Get a primer on the epic Peloponnesian War

4.4 (92 Bewertungen)

30 Min.

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"The Peloponnesian War" by Donald Kagan is a comprehensive and engaging history of the 27-year-long conflict between Athens and Sparta in ancient Greece. Kagan explores the political, social, and military factors that contributed to the war's outbreak and its disastrous consequences for both sides.

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What’s in it for me? Get a primer on the epic Peloponnesian War.

For three decades at the end of the fifth century BC, two empires collided: Athens and Sparta. It was a war unlike any that had come before. Previously, massive armies lined up in orderly rows and files had crashed into each other in large fields. One side would be declared the winner, and that was that.

The Peloponnesian War was different. It was fought largely on water, where the more experienced naval empire of Athens had the advantage. But it was also a war of insurgents, where allies on both sides were vulnerable to rebellions that resulted in violent uprisings and prolonged sieges. In short, it changed the rules of warfare in ways that are still relevant today.

In these blinks, you’ll learn

how the war escalated from a civil war in a place many had never heard of;
how a debacle in Sicily broke the peace between Athens and Sparta; and
which general spent time working for Athens, Sparta, and Persia.

Sparta and Athens had an uneasy rivalry leading up to the Peloponnesian War.

To understand how neighbors could turn against neighbors in a decades-long war, we first need to understand a bit of history between Athens and Sparta.

The Peloponnesian War started around 431 BC. Less than 30 years had passed since the end of the Persian Wars, which had seen Athens and Sparta united against Persia in a war that lasted around 50 years. Since then, Athens and Sparta had each enjoyed a period of relative peace.

Athens flourished and created a maritime empire. It controlled the Delian League, an alliance of 150 city-states, situated largely around the Aegean Sea. The alliance maintained a steady trade of food, supplies, and material. But this success didn’t sit well with Sparta, which headed its own alliance of city-states, known as the Peloponnesian League.

The key message here is: Sparta and Athens had an uneasy rivalry leading up to the Peloponnesian War.

While Athens had a functioning democracy, Spartan politics was something of a mixed bag, with democratic, oligarchic, and monarchic mixed together. Sparta had two kings, but they also had elected magistrates known as ephors, and an assembly of men over 30 who voted on foreign and domestic policy. But voting only took place when the Spartan elites called for it.

Another major difference between Athens and Sparta was their societal structure. In Athens, all citizens were considered equal, but Sparta had a strict hierarchy with two different types of subordinate people: helots and perioikoi. Helots were a step above slaves and were responsible for farming. The perioikoi were responsible for manufacturing and trade.

Above all, Sparta was focused on its legendary military. And due to the helots and the perioikoi, the Spartans themselves were free to train for battle. But since the helots outnumbered Spartans around seven to one, there was always the threat of a helot uprising, especially when the army was on a military campaign. So, Sparta wasn’t exactly eager to engage in any massive, prolonged wars.

And neither was Athens, for that matter. Nonetheless, there were serious concerns in Sparta that Athens and the Delian League were becoming too powerful – that Athens’s imperial ambitions had gotten out of hand. In 431 BC, this feeling would reach its tipping point.

Events in Epidamnus set the stage for a much bigger conflict.

Some historians have seen parallels between the Peloponnesian War and World War I. For starters, both of these epic conflicts were sparked by seemingly minor events that took place in relatively obscure parts of the world.

In the case of Athens and Sparta, that small and remote area was Epidamnus, a city so far north along the shores of the Adriatic Sea, that few Athenians had ever heard of it. In 436 BC, Epidamnus fell into the grips of civil war and the democrats within the city sent for help to their founders in Corcyra, a city on the island of Corfu. When Corcyra refused to help, the problem soon spiraled out of control.

With aggressions rising, Athens and Sparta moved closer to war.

When word got out that Corcyrean ambassadors were traveling to Athens, Corinth quickly sent its own people to present its side of the conflict. In September of 433 BC, each side was heard by the full Athenian assembly.

One of Corinth’s main arguments was that Athens shouldn’t get involved due to the treaty between Sparta and Athens, known as the Thirty Years’ Peace. The Corcyrean ambassadors, on the other hand, pointed out that the treaty did allow for any autonomous city to align itself with Athens or Sparta, if it so wished. So, technically, Athens was free to sign a pact with Corcyra

After failed ultimatums, the war began in 431 BC.

At the start of the war, Athens and Sparta each had a voice of moderation and reason in key positions of power. Athens had Pericles, a heroic veteran of the Persian War whose bloodline could be traced back to the very first founders of Athenian democracy. He was a confident and beloved leader, and one of the most respected orators and politicians in Greek history. Sparta, on the other hand, had Archidamus, who wasn’t only one of Sparta’s two kings but also a personal friend of Pericles.

Neither Pericles nor Archidamus wanted to throw aside 30 years of peace. They both knew that a war wouldn’t be won easily by either side. In fact, Archidamus was quite prescient. After the July assembly, he believed that if there were a war, it wouldn’t be over in their lifetimes.

Athens began the war with a defensive strategy, but it didn’t play out how it had imagined.

After the decision had been made to go to war, Athens adopted an unusual strategy. Devised by Pericles, the plan was a largely defensive one, designed to show Sparta that Athens was impervious to its aggression. Essentially, Athens would rely on its fortified walls to protect the city, and on its superior fleet and far more experienced rowers and naval crew to protect its interests and allies.

Pericles knew that the Spartan army was superior on land – and Sparta believed that this war, like previous ones, would be decided through traditional battles on land – but this war would be different. Athens would keep the fight primarily on the water, and Pericles thought that it would just be a matter of time before Sparta would recognize they didn’t stand a chance. As it turned out, neither side was right.

The war was a brutal affair, but after a key victory by Athens, a period of peace arrived.

The days of two armies squaring off in an open field were over. The Peloponnesian War was a different affair. In many cities, citizen-soldiers took up arms to fight on the side of democracy or Spartan-friendly oligarchs, depending on which way the tide of the war was turning.

Gone too were many of the traditional conventions of warfare, especially around the taking of prisoners. On both sides, prisoners were executed, and women were sold into slavery. But these were far from the biggest atrocities to occur as the war raged on.

The treaty remained for over five years, but it was undermined by a disaster in Sicily.

With the Spartan hostages as an important bargaining chip, Athens and Sparta were able to agree on terms for peace. In reality, neither side had been able to shift the balance of power over ten years of fighting. But although peace had been agreed, there was no shortage of ill will.

This was especially the case among some of the more influential allies, like Sparta’s allies in Thrace, who refused to give up the hard-won city of Amphipolis, even though this was a key point in the treaty. So, right from the beginning, there were signs that peace wasn’t going to last.

With Persia backing Sparta, Athenian democracy came under threat.

With Athenian and Spartan forces clashing in Sicily, the truce was officially over. Efforts at sparking uprisings throughout the region resumed and alliances were once again being made and broken.

After Sicily, a new player emerged: Persia. For a while, the former enemy of both Athens and Sparta was sitting on the sidelines, hoping the two combatants would wear each other down. But after Athens’s severe losses to Sicily, where both Nicias and Demosthenes were killed, Persia’s Great King Cyrus began to bet on Sparta by funding the construction of its warships.

After a regrettable defeat, Athens had a final grand victory marred by tragedy.

The Athenians needed a new hero. So they turned to Alcibiades, who’d proven ambitious and bold in his planning. They didn’t know of his involvement in the early stages of the coup, and for his part, Alcibiades likely never gave up his love for Athens. So when the people welcomed him back, he wanted to provide them with a great victory before he set foot back in the city. He also had good reason to fear that some in the city may not be so happy to see him.

In fact, it was four years before Alcibiades returned in 407 BC, and he did arrive after a series of victories in the Hellespont region, taking the city of Selymbria and bringing the important gateway city of Byzantium back into Athenian hands.

Athens lost the war, but with amazing resolve its democratic spirit stayed alive.

At Aegospotami, Lysander was back in charge of the Spartan fleet. He was the favorite admiral of the Persian Great King Cyrus, and Lysander wisely chose the location of the battle. Aegospotami was situated in an area with no harbor. Once more, Lysander was going to deny Athens the open water in which to outmaneuver its opponent.

Athens was again stuck, trying to lure Lysander out. Amazingly, Alcibiades showed up and tried to offer the inexperienced Athenian generals some advice. It seems he had a view of the standoff from his residence in Gallipoli. He advised the Athenian fleet to back off and use the nearby base in Sestos to wait Lysander out. As it stood, the Athenians were beaching many of their ships and had no safe supply of food and resources. Who knows what would have happened if they’d taken his advice.

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Worum geht es in The Peloponnesian War?

The Peloponnesian War (2003) tells the fascinating tale of a decades-long conflict among Greeks that would forever change how battles were fought and wars were won. It took warfare away from organized battlefields and put the strength of naval forces at the forefront. It also turned allies into enemies and became a struggle between democracy and oligarchy.

Bestes Zitat aus The Peloponnesian War

The original crisis, a small cloud in the blue sky . . . now threatened to reach a more dangerous level . . .

—Donald Kagan

Wer The Peloponnesian War lesen sollte

History buffs
Anyone interested in the history of warfare
People who want a refresher on classical antiquity

Über den Autor

Donald Kagan was a prominent American historian. Beginning in the 1960s, he wrote many books covering all aspects of the Peloponnesian War, including The Fall of the Athenian Empire and On the Origin of War and the Preservation of Peace. In 2002, he was awarded the National Humanities Medal.

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