PELLUTEINE. [Pstosss.] PELOPONNEESlAN WAIL is the name given to the great contest between Athens and her allies on the one side, and the Peloponnesian confederacy, headed by Sparta, on the other, which lasted from 431 to 404 ngi. The political state of Greece at the commencement of the war has been briefly described under GIIEECE, in 0E00. Drv. The war was a consequence of the jealousy with which Sparta and Athens regarded each other, as states each of which was aiming at supremacy in Greece, as the heads respectively of the Dorian and Ionian races, and as patrons of the two opposite forms of civil government, oligarchy and democracy. The war was eagerly desired by a strong party in each of those states; but it was necessary to find an occasion for com mencing hostilities, especially as a truce, for thirty years had been concluded between Athens and Sparta in the year Ise. 445. Such an occasion was presented by the affairs of Corcyra and Potidiea. Ina quarrel which soon became a war between Corinth and Corcyra, respecting F.pidainnus, a colony of the latter state (me 436), the Corey reans applied to Athens for assistance. Their request was granted, as far as the conclusion of a defensive alliance between Athens and Cor cyra, and an Athenian fleet was sent to their aid, which however soon engaged in active hostilities against the Corinthians.
Potichea, on the isthmus of Pallene, was a Corinthian colony, and even after its subjection to Athens continued to receive every year from Corinth certain functionaries or officers (6rianaloupyol). The Athenians, suspecting that the Potidseans were inclined to join in a revolt to which Perliecas, king of Macedon, was instigating the towns of Chalcidice, required them to dismiss the Corinthian functionaries, and to give other pledges of their fidelity. The Potidnenns refused, and, with most of the other Chalcidian towns, revolted from Athens, and received aid from Corinth. The Athenians sent an expedition against them, and, after defeating them in battle, laid siege to Potithea (me. 432).
The Corinthians now obtained a meeting of the Peloponnesian con federacy at Sparta, in which they complained of the conduct of Athens with regard to Corcyra and Potidien. After others of the allies pied brought their charges against Athens, and after seine Athenian envoys, who happened to be in the city, had defended the conduct of their state, the Spartans first, and afterwards all the allies, decided that Athens had broken the truce, and they resolved upon immediate war : king Arehidamus alone recommended some delay. Ian the interval necessary for preparation, an attempt was made to throw the blame of commencing hostilities upon the Athenians, by sending three several embassies to Athens with demands of such a nature ns could not be accepted. In the assembly which was held at Athens to
give a final answer to these demands, Pericles, who was now at the height of his power [PsnreLss, in BIOG. Div.), urged the people to engage in the war, and Laid down a plan for the conduct of it. 11e advised the people to bring all their moveable property from the country into the city, to abandon Attica to the ravages of the enemy, and not to suffer themselves to be provoked to give them battle with inferior numbers, but to expend all their strength upon their navy, which might be employed in carrying the war into the enemies' territory, and in collecting supplies from the subject states ; and further, not to attempt any new conquest while the war lasted. His advice was adopted, and the Spartan envoys were sent home with a refusal of their demands, but with an ofkr to refer the matters in difference to an impartial tribunal, an offer which the Lacedremonians hind no intention of accepting. After this the usual peaceful inter course between the rival states was discontinued.
Thucydides (ii. 1) dates the beginning of the war from the early spring of the year 431 the fifteenth of the thirty years' truce, when a party of Thebana made an attempt, which at first suc ceeded, but was ultimately defeated, to surprise Platcea. The truce being thus openly broken, both parties addressed themselves to the war. The Peloponnesian confederacy included all the states of Peloponneaus, except Achosa (which joined them afterwards) and Argue, and without the Peioponneaus, Phocis, Locris, Ilceotia, the island of Lcucas, and the cities of Ambracia and Auaetorium. The allies of the Athenians were Chios and Lesbos, besides Samos and the other islands of the A:gmn which had been reduced to subjection (Thera and 31elos, which were still independent, remained neutral), Platsea, the Messenian colony in Naupactus, the majority of the Acar nanians, Coroyra, Zacynthus, and the Greek colonies in Asia Minor, in Thrace, and Macedonia, and on the Hellespont. The resources of Sparta lay chiefly inkier land forces, which however consisted of con tingents froin the allies, whose period of service was limited ; the Spartans were also deficient in money. The Athenian strength lay in their fleet, which was manned chiefly by foreign sailors, whom the wealth that they collected from their allies enabled them to pay.