- This topic has 4 voices and 14 replies.
-
Posts
-
Sparta- Peloponnesian League, Athens – Delian LeagueDid any of these alliances change over the course of the war? I would imagine some who were neutral probably joined one of the leagues at some point or vice versa, but other than the falling out between Sparta and Elis, I wonder if there were a lot of major changes in membership alliances during any phases of this war.My purpose for this is I want to begin listing the members of each league. If there were a lot changes, other than additions, this could get confusing. But then again, it would be interesting to see why they changed or it it was more a forced alliance rather than voluntary.
I am no scholar on this but check out the map below of the Delian League. Could there have been any way that it did not expand or shift over time? It was a common defense fund….almost like insurance for city security. I think that the nature of the beast is that membership would have changed over time. Not to mention the fact that the Greeks were colonists, and so colonies that started after the commencement of the Delian League could have joined, thus adding to the league's roster.Image by Once in a Blue Moon.This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 2.5, Attribution ShareAlike 3.0, and GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version. Official license.
Yes, it does seem the majority of the Delian League was located around the Aegean, but I wonder how many were forced into it. I'm guessing Athens demanded tribute from a majority of them, but they also threatened Melos to join or else face destruction. Was Melos an exceptional case, or was this how Athens did it? If I remember correctly, many willingly joined because they wanted protection. I'm particularly curious as to where Corinthian and Theban loyalties were, because they seemed to be a third or maybe even a fourth league with loyalties to neither Sparta nor Athens (or a lukewarm alliance with whoever was winning at the time).
This can get quite confusing and I better make sure I get my “synthesizing” hat on before I proceed with this. Just read a journal article about Argive foreign policy and it was very confusing. They were (and sometimes all at once) anti-Spartan, anti-Athenian, pro-Athenian, pro-Spartan (this guy did a good job disproving their neutrality). Also explained was how some of the decisions made by Argos affected Corinthian policy. I'm sure there's much, much more interaction like this. And can't forget to examine the internal politics as well as the propaganda! ??? One thing that seems consistent, at least with the few poleis I've read about so far, is how specific actions (or inactions) in the Persian Wars related to the Peloponnesian War. Sure glad the professor said the paper needs to be 30-50 pages, because I'm going to need to be near that 50!
Wasn't the Delian League just an ancient version of a mafia protection racket with Athens playing the part of Guido?
I wish it was that easy, scout. But then again, it wouldn't be as interesting. There is a lot of self-interest in play here to those who were not Spartans or Athenians.
Doesn't self-interest play into the decision to give in and pay off the mob for today's business man? It is easier to go along than to fight it.
Then how do explain the policy of Corinth? After the Peace if Nicias they were pretty much isolated. And how do you explain Argive animosity towards Sparta? It was not because Argos aligned with Athens, it's because they wanted Cynouria back from Sparta. These two examples have nothing to do with mafia-like protection because neither sought protection from Athens or Sparta. Argos aligned with Athens only because they were tricked by Sparta and saw that the newly formed Spartan-Boeotian alliance was a threat to their democracy. In other words, they weren't forced to go along. It was self-interest. I guess one point I'm trying to make is that Athens wasn't the imperialistic “bad guy” as many seem to think they were.
I don't necessarily think that Imperialism is always a bad thing. I am certain that there were many members of the Delian League that joined for reasons other than simple protection but wasn't it Athenian demands for increased contributions that drove many of them away?
Ski, I'm still unclear why you don't think the Delian League was in practice similar to a mobster scheme. Setting aside Sparta for the moment, Greek cities had self-interest at heart when they joined the League, the revolts we see among these cities was perhaps in response to Athenian abuses and understandable desire for self-rule. It would be an interesting paper topic to investigate why a place like Melos did not want to be part of the League, since from my understanding the answers we are given in the “Melian debate” by Thucydides do not provide clear answers.
Phid, I tend to disagree about Melos because the motive of Athens was quite clear, “we're stronger than you, so submit or else” I am not aware of any other threat like that made to other states.As of now, I think a majority of the stronger states chose sides, IF they chose sides, depending on how the war went. Most of the alliances seem to be based on past relations anyway, that's why I don't think it can be compared to mobster rule. Many of the states were just too autonomous and many had their own internal disagreements. Argos, for example, had both pro-democratic and pro-oligarchical factions that rarely if ever came to any agreement as to whom they should side with.
I think the Athenian motive you mention isn't clear (to me) because it doesn't get into specifics. Yes, Athens could make a claim of “we powerful, you not”, but I think there are more convincing, underlying reasons as to why Melos needed to join the Delian League….reasons which can plausibly justify the sending of forces to lay siege to the island. Put in another way, it seems that there are unspoken reasons why Athens did what it did and the “we're powerful” rationale seems more like a cover. Potential reasons could be (and I'm theorizing here) Melos as a strategic military location or economic source, fear of a “domino” effect with uprisings among other city-states, etc.Anyway, the fact that the League was largely contained along the rim of the Aegean Sea, and the fact that multiple rebellions in this area had to be suppressed over the course of decades, suggests to me that the mobster analogy is appropriate. However - and perhaps this is where your concern is best addressed - Athens would have had less power when dealing with city-states in the Peloponnesus because of the power of the Peloponnesian League. Cities such as Corinth and Argos would have held more autonomy in their own affairs because they were in between Sparta and Athens; neither "superpower" would have been able to use these cities as their doormats. Think of it - if Athens had at least some difficulty in putting the smack down on the small island of Melos, how much harder would it have been to conquer a city-state in the Peloponnesus which has your archenemy watching on from close by?
According to a few sources, Melos was a Lacedaemon (Spartan) colony at that time. That could be a good reason.
A colony yes, but the island likely remained neutral (according to the sources I've read)…possible that Athens didn't believe this neutrality and wanted a more concrete declaration of loyalty. Here's something else. Regarding Athens' treatment of Melos:"What the Athenians hoped to gain by this campaign is not clear because Melos had neither much property worth plundering nor a strategically crucial location. ... Thucydides portrays Athenian motives in the affair of Melos as concerned exclusively with the amoral politics of the use of force, while the Melians he shows as relying on a concept of justice that they insisted should govern relations between states."Ancient Greece: from Prehistoric to Hellenistic Times, by Thomas R. Martinhttp://books.google.com/books?id=cE406VHVdRcC&lpg=PA157&dq=Melos&client=firefox-a&pg=PA157#v=onepage&q=Melos&f=falseSo I guess that answers some questions about what the motives of Athens was likely not...
