Peloponnesian War Causes

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The Peloponnesian War is told to us by Thucydides and it ends in 404 BC with the eventual surrender of Athens to Sparta and her allies, the conflict proved to show many mistakes for each sides in times which the war could have finished on better grounds.

The Peloponnesian and Delian Leagues which followed the Persian Wars placed Greece into greater strife as it created tension between surrounding city states and Athens who had recently emerged as an upcoming force. The need for the Spartans to garrison their own city due to the risk of a Helot uprising, this caused and pushed Athens to increase in military prowess and strength to counter the Persian forces. With little Spartan force in the Persian war, Athens was able to push for an alliance …show more content…

During the time of the Archidamian War Sparta’s tactic of occupation and razing in the lands surrounding Athens and Attica was seemingly futile due to their access to their ports and trade routes however the ravaging of lands did later have an effect on the masses hidden within the Athenian walls. At the beginning of the Second Peloponnesian War 430 BC, Sparta was still a formidable land force and so, under Pericles’ command, the Athenian civilians crowded behind the walls. The first of the problems was the initial overcrowding and therefore strain on resources however that soon became the least of their worries due to an epidemic which had arrived over seas. The disease is said to have killed one to two thirds of the Athenian populace, Thucydides who was present wrote of the disease “Appalling too was the rapidity with which men caught the infection; dying like sheep if they attended on one another; and this was the principal cause of mortality.” After the death of Pericles, Thucydides writes that the following generals were weak and Athens did not have her strength recovered until she then lead the disastrous Sicilian Campaign. The poor strategy of housing all Athenian natives within the walls can easily be blamed for the deaths of many fighters and future Athenian

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