29 Sparta, Athens and the Western Greeks

In the winter of 416 B.C., Alcibiades championed the envoys of Segesta, an Athenian ally in Sicily, to intervene against Selinus, a Corinthian colony and friend of Sparta. Thucydides presents this appeal as an isolated event seized upon by Alcibiades and the assembly to launch an ill-advised western adventure. Yet the Athenians were aware of the power of Syracuse, founded by Corinth in 734 B.C. Dorian, Locrian, and Achaean colonies in southern Italy and Sicily had been linked by kingship, cults, and trade to the Peloponnesian League since the 6 th century B.C. Syracuse controlled a rich agricultural hinterland and supplied grain, olive oil, horses, and timber to the Peloponnesus. In the early 5 th century B.C., the Deinomenid tyrants of Syracuse ruled over eastern and southeastern Sicily. In 480 B.C., the tyrant Gelon defeated the Carthaginians at Himera, and thus secured peace and prosperity in Sicily. Gelon’s victory proved the demise of tyrants, who were overthrown within the next 15 years. Cities adopted oligarchic and timocratic constitutions. Syracuse clashed with the Ionian cities of Leontini, Naxos, and Rhegium, which looked to Athens for support. From 427 to 424 B.C., Athenian squadrons intervened in Sicily to prevent aid from reaching the Peloponnesus. With the Peloponnesian theater closed, the Athenians turned to Sicily in 416 B.C. in the hopes of gaining a decisive advantage over Sparta. In 415 B.C., after a heated debate between Alcibiades and Nicias, the Athenian assembly voted to send out the largest overseas expedition since 455 B.C.