Essay about The Peloponnesian War

Pericles, the Athenian leader, avoided land battles and concentrated on control of the sea. After Pericles' death, the Athenians signed a fifty year truce called the Peace of Nicias in 421. This provided that each side restore captured places and prisoners and remain at peace with each other. This was soon supplemented by an actual Athenian-Spartan alliance, which concluded for fifty years. The intention was chiefly to give each power a chance to put its own alliance in order while secure from an attack by the other. The war had been marked by numerous acts of brutality on both sides; prisoners had been slaughtered or enslaved, and agreements broken in a way that were shameful. (Winks)

Athens and Sparta were both dominant powers in ancient Greece. However, a legendary rivalry existed between the two. When Athens ended its alliance with Corcyra in 433 B.C. and began to surround Potidaea, it threatened Corinth’s position. Sparta feared that Athens was becoming too powerful and tried to avert war. The Spartans believed that peace was possible if the Athenians would revoke measures against Sparta's ally, Megara. The Athenian leader, Pericles, refused to concur with this because Sparta and Athens had earlier agreed that conflicts would be solved by negotiation. If the Athenians would yield to Sparta's request, they would in fact be accepting Sparta’s orders. This was unacceptable, and as a result, war broke out. Athens and its Delian League were attacked by Sparta and its Peloponnesian League. Diodorus mentions that the Spartans did not just declare war, but sought additional support from Persia.

The Peloponnesian war lasted from 431 to 404 B.C. and was profoundly influenced by two Athenian men, Pericles and Alcibiades. Though Pericles and Alcibiades were related by blood they were quite different. Pericles was a diplomat, he approached matters with a level head and tried to find a solution that did not end in bloodshed. Alcibiades was less stable, he either fought, manipulated, or ran when confronted with a problem. Both men spoke eloquently enough to move almost the entire city of Athens, using their words to bend people to their will.  What was different between them was what their will was, one cared about the city and its wellbeing, the other cared about his own wellbeing.

The Athenian Empire was a more voluntary alliance of city-states that were impressed by the Athenian Navy's prowess in the Persian War and were willing to pay for its protection. Athens used this revenue to further improve its navy, as well as improve its own infrastructure and defenses. Included in these improvements was the construction of large walls around the city and down to the port at Piraeus, home of the Athenian Navy.

The Peloponnesian War brought disease, destruction, famine, widespread civil wars, and a huge loss of life. The war was a complete catastrophe for Athens, who never fully regained their empire back. Sparta won the war, but they didn’t become a great city and a new empire was never built. Sparta attempted to lead the Greeks, but soon fell short and new leaders were called forth.

The political failure of the Greek led the country to a great war. According to Herodotus, who dedicate his life writing real ancient stories in the fifth century BC shows that the catalyst was a political conflict in Miletus started Persian war. Athens, Sparta and other polies

The Traditional Period of Greece, 500 - 338 BCE, cleared a path to a wide range of changes in Athenian history. The Athenian government transformed from an oppression to a vote based system, and after the Persian war in 499 BCE, Athens' begun to turned into a military superpower, also. Because of Themistocles supporting to construct a more grounded naval force, their military influence developed, making Athens' economy rise turning into the wealthiest city-states. The Peloponnesian War drew out the significance of lawmakers and pioneers, since now the administration is controlled by the general population. This war brought two of the most noticeable and powerful people to lead Athens through the war and molded Athens' future. The two pioneers are cousins, Pericles and Alcibiades. They have various similitudes, similar to their genealogy and instruction, while additionally using their interesting identities in their authority abilities.

While Ancient Greek tragedies are purely fictional, their themes are based on prevalent issues in society at the time. Historians often attribute the Second Peloponnesian War to the arrogance of Athens--to the Athenian belief that they were invulnerable. In early fifth-century B.C., otherwise known as the Golden Age, Athens was the leading city-state

The Peloponnesian war (431–404 BC) was an ancient Greek war fought by Athens against the Peloponnesian led by Sparta. Thucydides famously claims that the war started “because the Spartans were afraid of further growth of Athenian power, seeing as they did have the greater part of Hellas was under the control of Athens”. The two main protagonists from opposing sides Lysander and Alcibiades had the most influential impact on the end of the war.

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When Sparta gave its ultimatum to Athens, Pericles was more than happy to oblige and go to war. He embodies Athenian arrogance and overzealousness. Pericles speaks to the Athenian assembly convincing them to go to war because according to him, they cannot lose. Pericles explains how Sparta doesn’t have the same financial advantages that Athens does and how Athens has a far superior navy. According to Pericles, the best strategy is to use that to Athens’ advantage, leaving Attica exposed by only attacking and defending the sea were they have an advantage. Pericles finishes of by saying that Athens possesses all of Sparta’s strengths and none of its weaknesses, and Athens must fight so that future generations will have an Athens that is as good as ever.

The large amount of fatalities in Athens caused the Athenian military to be greatly outnumbered by the forces of the Peloponnesian League. This series of defeats, both on land and at sea, eventually led to Sparta’s victory in a final battle in 405 B.C.E., which was located near Hellespont. Sparta required Athens to give up their battleships and naval forces, surrender their city and territories to Spartan rule and monitoring, and allow their walls leading to the port at Piraeus to be knocked down. The dominance of Sparta in ancient Greece was now clearly

For the realization of the strategy in the first part of the war, Athens used all the available elements of national power. The Athens’s strategy, viewed from today 's standpoint, was based on a comprehensive approach to the defense of vital national interests. In other words, military assets were not the only instrument, because the economy played an important role. The economy, in the context of the Athens strategy, should be viewed in a dual role: as a source of power sufficient to bear the cost of long-term warfare and as a means of influencing other actors in the environment, especially Sparta. Sufficient wealth and money enabled Athenians not to defend Aticca and avoid a direct confrontation with superior Spartan forces. The Athens strategy partly rested on the calculation that the costs of the war would provoke the rebellion of Spartan 's allies and also make Sparta give up his intentions. The primary role of their strong Navy was to secure the free trade of the Athens Empire in order to obtain the necessary wealth for the functioning of the state and the payment of the costs of war. In an offensive role, the Navy successfully attacked the coastal areas under the control of Sparta and its

This is because he was the one who started the war between Sparta and Athens. He also refused to make agreements with the Spartans who were scared of his powerful ruling. He even caused the Spartans to destroy the fields of the Athenians after asking the citizens of Attica to move inside the city. This allowed the Spartan soldiers to invade the Athenians fields of produce and the economy of Athens declined. Pericles also brought the downfall of Athens when he became emotional for the death of his sons and found that leading the battles against the Spartans was no longer important and he became weak. The Spartans dominated and the powerful ruler died and this brought a great disaster to Athens and its citizens as stated by the great historian of the time by the name Thucydides. If Pericles had given concessions to Sparta as they requested, then the Peloponnesian War could not have started and Athens could not have been

Sparta and Athens were the more powerful empires around 4 and 5 B.C.E. and their growth made it seem likely that their empires would quarrel. Sparta was alarmed by the vast growth of the Athenian empire, along with the fact that they did not want the Athenians to possibly side with the Corinths in the near future. Athens demanded Poteideia to give them resources such as timber, however, the Poteideians refused and looked to the Spartans for assistance. The Athenians invaded the city and applied the Megarian Decrees on Megara, establishing a trade embargo. Later on, Thebes would attack Platea, one of Athens allies and the Spartan king Archidamos invaded Attica. This would lead to the second Peloponnesian war in 431 B.C.E, which was the deadliest and had the greatest number of casualties in any war in Greece at the time.