Everything Everywhere Daily: History, Science, Geography & More - The Peloponnesian War

Starting point is 00:00:00 In the 5th century BC, the Greek world found itself in the middle of one of its greatest wars. This wasn't one of their existential conflicts against the Persians. This time, it was a war of Greeks against Greeks. An alliance of city-states led by Athens fought a coalition led by Sparta for control of the Greek world. Over nearly 30 years, the two city-states fought for supremacy, leaving a lasting impact on the Greek world that would change its course forever. Learn more about the Peloponnesian War. its causes and its resolution on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.

Starting point is 00:00:35 What if your perceptions about the past were wrong? ThruLine is a podcast that takes you back in time to uncover the parts of the story that may have gone unnoticed. It effectively turned day into night. And how it shaped the world now. Time travel with us every week on the ThruLine podcast from NPR. To understand the causes of the Pelopin, It's essential to understand the political landscape of the Greek world in the late 5th century BC.

Starting point is 00:01:23 The Peloponnesian War was rooted in the shifting power dynamics of the Greek world following the Persian Wars, which took place from about 490 to 479 BC. This was the conflict that saw many of the famous battles of antiquity, including the Battle of Marathon and Thermopylai. During the Persian invasions, two dominant Greek powers, Athens and Sparta, had cooperated to defeat their common enemy. However, the aftermath of that victory sowed the seeds of conflict between them. Athens emerged from the Persian Wars not only as a symbol of Greek resistance, but as a rising imperial power. It led to the formation of the Delian League in 478 BC, an alliance of city-states

Starting point is 00:02:04 meant to defend against further Persian aggression. Over time, Athens transformed this alliance into a de facto empire, compelling tribute payments, suppressing revolts, and using the league's resources to fund its own projects, including rebuilding the Acropolis. The Athenians also moved the League's treasury from Delos to Athens in 454 BC in a show of dominance. Sparta, traditionally the most powerful land-based state in Greece and the leader of the rival Peloponnesian League, viewed Athenian expansion with increasing alarm. And if you're not familiar with the geography of Greece, the Peloponnese is a peninsula that's almost an island. It's connected to the rest of the Greek mainland by the very narrow isthmus of Corinth, which is only 6.3 kilometers or 3.9 miles

Starting point is 00:02:50 wide. The Spartans were culturally conservative and preferred a stable balance of power. As Athens grew in economic strength, naval supremacy, and political influence, often at the expense of smaller city states, Sparta and its allies came to see it as a direct threat to their autonomy and the regional order. The fundamental tension arose from what historians now called the Thucydides' trap, named after the Athenian historian Thucydides who documented much of the war. The Thucydides trap refers to the inevitable conflict that arises when a rising power, in this case Athens, threatens to displace an established power such as Sparta. The war began in 431 BC with a strategy that seemed logical to both sides, but proved

Starting point is 00:03:36 deeply flawed. The Spartan king, Archadamus, led annual invasions of Attica, the territory around Athens, hoping to force the Athenians into a decisive land battle, where Spartan superiority would prove decisive. The Athenians, following the strategy of their leader, Pericles, withdrew their population behind their long walls, the defensive fortifications that connected Athens to its port at Pyraeus, and used their naval supremacy to raid the Peloponnesian coast. This created a strategic stalemate that neither side had anticipated. The Spartans could devastate Athenian farmland, but they could create. couldn't force a decisive battle.

Starting point is 00:04:16 The Athenians likewise could strike coastal targets, but couldn't break Spartan power on land. It was like watching a heavyweight boxer fight a judo master. Each was supreme in their own element, but neither could force the other to fight on their preferred terms. The turning point came with a plague that struck Athens in 430 BC. This devastating epidemic, which killed perhaps a third of the population, including Pericles himself, fundamentally altered Athenian. society and their strategy in the war. The cramped condition behind the long walls, with rural refugees packed into the city, created perfect conditions for the disease to spread. The psychological impact was even more profound, and many Athenians began to question

Starting point is 00:04:59 whether the gods favored their cause. This phase of the war, known as the Archidamian War after the Spartan King, dragged on for a decade. The period was punctuated by battles like those at Phylos and Svacteria, which saw the rare capture of Spartan hopolites by Athenian forces. The war was eventually paused with the peace of Nisius signed in 421 BC. It was intended to be a 50-year truce between Athens and Sparta after the first phase of the Peloponnesian War. However, during what was nominally still the period of peace, the treaty had effectively collapsed. The Battle of Mantinia fought in 418 BC was the largest land battle of the Peloponnesian war and marked a temporary resurgence of Spartan prestige after years of military

Starting point is 00:05:44 and diplomatic setbacks. The fact that the battle took place during the peace of Nisius showed how little regard either of them had for the treaty. The battle was sparked by a shifting web of alliances. Argos, Mantinia, Ellis, and Athens had formed a coalition against Sparta, threatening its dominance in the Peloponnese. In response, the Spartans, led by King Agis II, mobilized a large force to confront the alliance near the city of Manatea in Arcadia. The battle was a traditional hop-like clash, and despite early confusion in the Spartan ranks, they achieved a clear and decisive victory, routing the coalition forces. The triumph at Mantinia restored Spartan confidence and reaffirmed their military reputation, which discourage further revolts amongst their allies and temporarily

Starting point is 00:06:29 stabilize the internal Greek balance of power in Sparta's favor. In 415 BC, Athens embarked on what would prove to be its most disastrous decision, the invasion of Sicily. This massive expedition involving over 100 ships and thousands of men represented both the magnificent and tragic aspects of Athenian democracy. The plan emerged from the intersection of ambition, opportunity, and democratic politics. The wealthy young aristocrat, El Sabiades, envisioned a Sicilian conquest that would make Athens the master of the Western Mediterranean. It was initiated obstinively to help the small Sicilian city of Segestia,

Starting point is 00:07:12 an ally of Athens in its local conflict with Selenute, which was backed by Syracuse, which was friendly with Sparta. The moderate Athenian Nis opposed the expedition, but was maneuvered into leading it when his warnings about its dangers were used as arguments for sending an even larger force. The expedition became a perfect storm of bad leadership, political interference and military miscalculation. El Sabiades was recalled on charges of religious sacrilege just as the campaign began.

Starting point is 00:07:43 Nisius, never enthusiastic about the venture, proved overly cautious. The Athenians found themselves besieging Syracuse, one of the most powerful cities in Sicily, with inadequate forces and no clear strategy for victory. The disaster was almost complete. The entire expedition was destroyed, with most of the survivors sold in a state. slavery. Athens lost not only ships and men, but its aura of invincibility. It was as if a modern superpower had lost an entire carrier group along with all of its most experienced personnel. El Sabiades, who was one of the biggest forces in promoting this expedition, after being recalled

Starting point is 00:08:22 to Athens in 413 BC, defected to Sparta rather than returning and gave them crucial intelligence. The final phase of the war saw a shift in strategy. Sparta established a permanent fort at Dekelia in northern Attica, disrupting Athenian supply lines and encouraging revolts among its allies. The destruction of the Athenian-Secilian expedition opened the door for Sparta to do something that would have been unthinkable just years earlier. Ally with Persia, the great enemy of all Greeks. The Persians, who were eager to weaken Athens, provided gold that allowed Sparta to build a fleet and challenge Athenian naval supremacy. The final phase saw warfare of unprecedented intensity and violence. Both sides employed tactics that would have

Starting point is 00:09:09 horrified earlier generations, including mass executions of prisoners, the systematic destruction of neutral cities, and the use of barbarian Persian gold to settle Greek disputes. The war at this point had corrupted both sides, turning them into versions of themselves that their ancestors might not have recognized. The end of the war came at Agos Potami in 405 BC in what is modern day Turkey, where the Spartan Admiral Lysander destroyed the last Athenian fleet with a combination of tactical brilliance and Athenian overconfidence. With their fleet gone and their city under siege, the Athenians faced starvation and surrender. The war ended with Sparta imposing harsh terms on Athens, the destruction of its long walls, the loss of its empire and navy, and the establishment of a pro-Spartan

Starting point is 00:09:58 oligarchy known as the 30 tyrants. Although Sparta emerged as the the dominant power in Greece, its victory was short-lived. Thirty years of conflict between Athens and Sparta devastated the major Greek city states, leaving them economically ruined, militarily exhausted, and politically fractured. Athens, once the strongest naval power in the eastern Mediterranean, was defeated and stripped of its empire. Sparta, despite emerging victorious, lacked the administrative and financial infrastructure to maintain control over its new possessions and quickly alienated to the

Starting point is 00:10:33 its former allies. This led to renewed warfare amongst the Greek city states, including conflicts like the Corinthian War and the Thebian-Spartan War, all of which destabilized the region even further. And in that power vacuum that followed, Macedonia, long considered a peripheral and semi-baric kingdom to the north, was uniquely positioned to take advantage. They had been on the sidelines during most of the wars that were fought,

Starting point is 00:10:59 avoiding most of the damage that the rest of Greece had. Philip II, who ascended to the throne in 359 BC, had spent part of his youth as a hostage in Thebes, where he observed Greek military and political systems firsthand. He used this knowledge to reform the Macedonian army, introducing the phalanx formation armed with long spears called Cirrises, refining cavalry tactics, and centralizing his authority. As the Greek city-states remained mired in mutual suspicion and conflict, Philip expanded Macedonian territory and influence with relatively little unified resistance. His decisive victory over the Greek coalition at the Battle of Carania in 338 BC marked the end of effective Greek independence. Thus, the long-term disintegration of Greek unity and strength caused by the Peloponnesian War paved the way for Philip the Second's rise, and the subsequent Macedonian domination of Greece, and the emergence of Alexander the Great.

Starting point is 00:11:56 Perhaps most importantly, the Peloponnesian War brought about the end of the golden age of classical Greece, Greece by destroying the political stability, economic prosperity, and cultural confidence that had defined the 5th century BC, particularly in Athens. Much of what we think of when we think of ancient Greece came from that period earlier in the century. Athens was the intellectual, artistic, and democratic heart of the Greek world, producing achievements in philosophy, drama, architecture, and politics. However, after the war with Sparta, it was never the same again. Before I close, there's one other thing about the Peloponnesian War that deserves mention. This war took place almost 2,500 years ago.

Starting point is 00:12:41 Yet, we know far more about it than we do about almost any other war from this period in history. In many places, we might have an inscription on a tomb or other scant information we have to piece together. But for the Peloponnesian War, we know so much about it, thanks to the aforementioned Thucydides. His history of the Peloponnesian War, though never finished, is one of the most important historical accounts to survive from antiquity and provides an in-depth narrative of the causes, events, strategies, speeches, and political dynamics of the war. He was, in many senses, one of the first modern historians. Thucydides approached history with a critical and empirical mindset, rejecting myth and divine causality in favor of rational analysis, eyewitness accounts,

Starting point is 00:13:29 and careful chronology of events. He also included restructured speeches to explore the motives and reasoning of key figures, giving insight into the ideological and psychological dimensions of the war. For example, earlier conflicts such as the Greco-Persian wars are known largely through Herodotus, whose work mixes historical fact with anecdote and folklore. Other conflicts we know about from authors

Starting point is 00:13:55 who might have lived centuries after the events took place. The Peloponnesian War wasn't the biggest war in ancient history. It was smaller than the Greco-Persian wars which predated it. However, it was an important war insofar as it marked a transition in the history of Greek city-states and laid the foundation for the likes of Philip and Alexander, which came after. The executive producer of Everything Everywhere Daily is Charles Daniel. The associate producers are Austin Oakden and Cameron Kiefer. I want to thank everyone who supports the show over on Patreon,

Starting point is 00:14:31 your support helps make this podcast possible. I'd also like to thank all the members of the Everything Everywhere community who are active on the Facebook group and the Discord server. If you'd like to join in the discussion, there are links to both in the show notes. And as always, if you leave a review or send me a boostagram, you too can have it read on the show.

Everything Everywhere Daily: History, Science, Geography & More - The Peloponnesian War

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