The two antagonists were fairly matched. The one was
strong where the other was weak. Sparta, mainly a continental power, commanded
all the Peloponnesian states except Argos and Achaea, besides some of the
smaller states of central Greece. Athens, mainly a maritime power, ruled all
the subject cities of the Aegean. The Spartans possessed the most formidable
army then in the world, but lacked money and ships. The Athenians had a
magnificent navy, an overflowing treasury, and a city impregnable to direct
attack. It seemed, in fact, as if neither side could seriously injure the
other.
FIRST STAGE OF THE WAR, 431-421 B.C.
The war began in 431 B.C. Its first stage was indecisive.
The Athenians avoided a conflict in the open field with the stronger
Peloponnesian army, which ravaged Attica. They were crippled almost at the
outset of the struggle by a terrible plague among the refugees from Attica,
crowded behind the Long Walls. The pestilence slew at least one-fourth of the
inhabitants of Athens, including Pericles himself. After ten years of fighting
both sides grew weary of the war and made a treaty of peace to last for fifty
years.
