History of the Peloponnesian War

Thucydides

Thucydides, Vol. 1-4. Smith, Charles Foster, translator. London and Cambridge, MA: Heinemann and Harvard University Press, 1919-1923.

The Athenians, however, were inclined, not to risk arbitration, but to make an expedition as quickly as possible, being enraged to think that even the inhabitants of the islands now presumed to revolt, relying on the strength which the Lacedaemonians had on land, useless though it was to them.[*](Because the Athenians commanded the sea.)

Moreover, the truth about the revolt was rather as the Athenians claimed; for the Scionaeans revolted two days after the agreement. The Athenians, then, immediately passed a vote, on the motion of Cleon, to destroy Scione and put the citizens to death. And so, keeping quiet in other matters, they made preparations for this.