History of the Peloponnesian War

But the Boeotians refused to give them up, unless they would make a separate alliance with them just as with the Athenians. Now the Lacedaemonians knew that they would thereby be wronging the Athenians, inasmuch as it was stipulated not to make either peace or war with anyone without mutual consent, yet they wished to obtain Panactum in order to recover Pylos in exchange for it. Besides, the party that was eager to break the treaty was zealous for the connection with the Boeotians. So they concluded the alliance, when the winter was closing and the spring at hand; and the demolition of Panactum was immediately begun. So ended the eleventh year of the war.

At the very beginning of the following[*](March, 420 B.C.) summer, when the envoys whom the Boeotians promised to send did not come, the Argives, perceiving that Panactum was being demolished and a private alliance had been made by the Boeotians with the Lacedaemonians, began to fear that they would be left alone and the whole confederacy would go over

to the Lacedaemonians. For they thought that the Boeotians had been persuaded by the Lacedaemonians to raze Panactum and to accede to the treaty with the Athenians, and that the Athenians knew these things, so that it was no longer possible for them to make an alliance even with the Athenians; whereas they had formerly hoped that if their treaty with the Lacedaemonians should not continue they might at any rate, in consequence of the differences,[*](ie. of the Lacedaemonians and Athenians.) become allies

of the Athenians. Being then in such perplexity and fearing lest they might have war at once with the Lacedaemonians and Tegeates, the Boeotians and the Athenians, the Argives, who before this had not accepted the treaty with the Lacedaemonians but proudly hoped to have the hegemony of the Peloponnesus, now sent to Lacedaemon in all haste two envoys, Eustrophus and Aeson, who seemed likely to be most acceptable to them, thinking it best under the present circumstances to make a treaty with the Lacedaemonians in whatever way might be feasible and to have quiet.

On their arrival their envoys made proposals to the Lacedaemonians as to the terms on which the treaty should be concluded.

At first the Argives claimed that they should be allowed to submit to the arbitration of some city or private person the matter of the Cynurian territory—a district containing the towns of Thyrea and Anthene and occupied by the Lacedaemonians—which being border ground they were always disputing about. Afterwards, however, although the Lacedaemonians would not permit them to make mention of that district, but said that, if they wished to make a treaty on the same terms as before, they were ready to do so, the Argive envoys did induce the Lacedaemonians to agree to the following terms: for the present that a treaty should be made for fifty years; that, however, either Lacedaemon or Argos, provided there were at the time neither pestilence nor war in either place, might challenge the other to decide by battle the question about this territory—just as once before,[*](550 B.C.; cf. Hdt. I. lxxxii.) when each had claimed to be victorious—but pursuit must not be made beyond the boundaries, between Argos and Lacedaemon.

At first this seemed to the Lacedaemonians mere folly, but afterwards, as they desired under any circumstances to have Argos friendly to them, they accepted the conditions demanded and joined in a written agreement. But the Lacedaemonians urged the envoys first, before any of the provisions should be regarded as settled, to return to Argos and lay the matter before the people, and then, if it should be satisfactory to them, to come to the Hyacinthian festival and take the oaths. So they withdrew.

In the meantime, while the Argives were negotiating these matters, the Lacedaemonian envoys, Andromenes, Phaedimus and Antimenidas, who were to take over Panactum and the prisoners from the Thebans and restore them to the Athenians, found that Panactum had been destroyed by the Boeotians themselves, on the pretext that once in former times, when there had been a quarrel about Panactum, oaths had been exchanged between the Athenians and Boeotians, that neither should inhabit the district, but they should graze it in common. As for the men of the Athenians, however, whom the Boeotians held as prisoners, Andromenes and his colleagues received these from them, and bringing them back restored them to the Athenians. They also told them of the demolition of Panactum, claiming that this, too, was a restoration; for thereafter no one hostile to the Athenians would dwell in it.

The moment this was said the Athenians were very indignant, thinking that they were wronged by the Lacedaemonians, both in the demolition of Panactum, which ought to have been restored to them intact, and because they heard that the Lacedaemonians had made a separate alliance with the Boeotians, although they had said before[*](cf. 5.35.3.) that they would join in coercing any that did not accept the treaty. And they took into consideration the other matters wherein the Lacedaemonians had failed in their contract and in which they thought they had been deceived; and so they gave the envoys an angry answer and sent them away.

As now the Lacedaemonians were thus at variance with the Athenians, the party at Athens that wished to annul the treaty at once became urgent in pressing their views.

To this party belonged, among others, Alcibiades son of Cleinias, a man who, though as regards his age he would in any other city have been accounted even at that time as still young,[*](Born about 450 B.C., and so now about thirty years of age.) was held in honour on account of the worth of his ancestors. To him it seemed really to be better to side with the Argives; it was not that alone, however, for he also opposed the treaty because he was piqued in his pride because the Lacedaemonians had negotiated it through Nicias and Laches, overlooking him on account of his youth and not showing him the respect that was due him on account of the old proxeny that once existed[*](cf. 6.89.2; Plut. Alcib. xiv.) in his family. This relationship, though his grandfather had renounced it, he himself was by his attentions to their captives from Sphacteria now planning to renew.

And so considering himself in every way slighted, he both spoke against the treaty in the first instance, alleging that the Lacedaemonians were not to be trusted, but that their object in making the treaty was, that by concluding a treaty with the Athenians they might utterly overthrow the Argives and then proceed against the Athenians when thus isolated; and at the present time, after the difference had occurred, he promptly dispatched a message to Argos privately, bidding them come as quickly as possible, along with the Mantineans and Eleans, and invite the Athenians to form an alliance, as the moment was favourable and he himself would cooperate to the utmost.