The Athenian general,
Thrasyllus, sails out from Athens with a sizable force to campaign in
Ionia. There, he quickly captures
Colophon and raids the Ionian countryside, but is defeated outside
Ephesus by a combined Ephesian,
Persian, and
Syracusan force.
Taking advantage of the quarrels between the Greek cities in
Sicily and of the mutual exhaustion of
Athens and
Syracuse,
Carthage seeks to reimpose its influence over the island.
Hannibal Mago, grandson of
Hamilcar, invades Sicily with a strong force. He defeats the Sicilian Greeks and avenges his grandfather through the torture and killing of 3,000 Greek prisoners. In the
Battle of Selinus and
Battle of Himera he captures and destroys both cities before returning triumphantly to Carthage with the spoils of war.
Tissaphernes' influence is limited to the satrapy of
Caria. Darius II also gives Cyrus funds to re-create the Spartan fleet and sends him to
Sardis with instructions to increase Persian support for Sparta. Cyrus begins to collect an army of mercenaries (including Greeks) for his own ends.
Greece
Alcibiades enters
Athens in triumph after an absence of 7 years. He leads the religious procession from Athens to
Eleusis, thus atoning for his alleged impiety in
415 BC when he was held to have joined in
profaning the
Sacred Mysteries. Alcibiades is appointed commander-in-chief with
autocratic powers and leaves for
Samos to rejoin his fleet.
The Spartan admiral
Lysander arrives at
Ephesus in autumn and builds up a great fleet with help from the new Persian satrap, Cyrus.
At the Panhellenic gathering at
Olympia, the philosopher
Gorgias speaks out against the Spartan alliance with Persia.
In 408 BC, the three city-states of the island of
Rhodes (
Ialysos,
Kamiros,
Lindos) unite and create the homonymous city on the northernmost part of the island.
The
Spartan admiral
Lysander refuses to be lured out of
Ephesus to do battle with
Alcibiades. However, while Alcibiades is away seeking supplies, the
Athenian squadron is placed under the command of
Antiochus, his helmsman, who is routed by the Spartan fleet (with the help of the
Persians under
Cyrus) in the
Battle of Notium (or Ephesus).
The defeat gives the enemies of Alcibiades an excuse to strip him of his command. He never returns again to Athens. He sails north to land he owns in the
Thracian Chersonese. Except for a brief appearance at
Aegospotami, Alcibiades' involvement in the
Peloponnesian War is over.
Sicily
The exiled former leader of the moderate democrats of
Syracuse,
Hermocrates, is killed while attempting to force his way back into Syracuse.
Alcibiades is replaced by a board of generals. Athens sends a member of the board, Admiral
Conon, to relieve the siege of
Mytilene. To defend Lesbos, Conon is forced to move his numerically inferior fleet from
Samos to the Hekatonnesi islands near Methymna. When Callicratidas attacks him, Conon is forced back to Mytilene, where he is blockaded by Callicratidas' Spartan fleet.
Athens wins the
Battle of Arginusae, near Lesbos, and the blockade of Conon is broken. To relieve Conon, the Athenians assemble a new fleet composed largely of newly constructed ships crewed by inexperienced sailors. This inexperienced fleet is inferior to the Spartans, but its commanders employ new and unorthodox tactics, which allow the Athenians to secure a dramatic and unexpected victory. The Spartan force is soundly defeated, and Callicratidas is killed.
Returning to Athens after the battle,
Theramenes leads Athenian agitation against the eight generals who have commanded in the engagement; the six who have returned to Athens are condemned for negligence in not having picked up survivors from the ships disabled in the battle. The Athenian generals (including
Pericles' son) are put to death.
Sparta sues for peace, which the Athenian leader
Cleophon rejects. Sparta yields to demands by the Persian
satrapCyrus that Lysander command a fleet in the Hellespont.
Roman Republic
The
Roman forces begin a decade-long siege against
Veii.
Carthage
The
Carthaginians again invade
Sicily and attack
Agrigentum (Acragas).
Plague breaks out in their camp and Hannibal Mago dies.
Himilco assumes command and captures Agrigentum (Acragas),
Gela and
Camarina. Gela is destroyed and its treasures sacked. The survivors take refuge in
Syracuse. The plague is carried back to Carthage by its soldiers.
The Spartan king
Pausanias lays siege to Athens while Lysander's fleet blockades
Piraeus. This action closes the grain route through the Hellespont, thereby starving Athens.
While the
Peloponnesians besiege Athens,
Theramenes tries to negotiate with Lysander. He is away for three months while Athens is being reduced to starvation. Then he heads the embassy that negotiates the terms of
capitulation to the Spartans.
Sicily
Dionysius the Elder rises to power as the tyrant of
Syracuse. He makes peace with the
Carthaginian general,
Himilco (whose army has been weakened by the plague), and fortifies Syracuse. This treaty leaves Carthage in control of most of Sicily.
Dionysius the Elder ruthlessly consolidates and expands his power. He builds a wall around Syracuse and fortifies Epipolae. The
Greek citizens of
Naxos,
Catana, and
Leontini are removed from their cities; many of them are enslaved and their homes are given to Sicilian and
Italianmercenaries. Dionysius prepares his army to fight against Carthage, which now occupies western and southern Sicily.
The Erechtheum, which includes The Porch of Maidens (
Caryatid Porch), is completed in the
Ionian style on the
Acropolis in
Athens after 16 years of construction.
The Athenian leader
Cleophon continues to urge resistance against the
Peloponnesians, but the situation becomes desperate and he is arrested, condemned to death and executed.
Theramenes secures terms that save the city of Athens from destruction. The
Spartans allow Athens to retain its independence. However, Athens loses all its foreign possessions and what is left of its fleet and is required to become an ally of Sparta. The
Long Walls around Athens are pulled down. Greek towns across the
Aegean Sea in
Ionia are again the subjects of the
Persian Empire.
The Spartan general,
Lysander, puts in place a puppet government in Athens with the establishment of the
oligarchy of the "
Thirty Tyrants" under
Critias and including Theramenes as a leading member. This government executes a number of citizens and deprives all but a few of their rights.
Many of Athens' former allies are now ruled by boards of ten (decarchy), often reinforced with garrisons under a Spartan commander (
Harmost).
The Athenian general
Thrasybulus is exiled by the Thirty (the oligarchy of Athens), and he retires to
Thebes.
A split develops between Theramenes and Critias who has Theramenes killed (by drinking poison) on charges of treason.
Emerging after the Spartan victory at
Aegospotami, the former Athenian leader,
Alcibiades, takes refuge in
Phrygia in northwestern
Asia Minor with the Persian
satrap,
Pharnabazus, and seeks their assistance for the Athenians. The Spartans discover his plans and arrange with Pharnabazus to have him assassinated.
Lysander sails to
Samos and conquers it for Sparta.
The Persian King
Darius II dies of an illness in
Babylon. He is succeeded by his son
Artaxerxes II (Memnonâ'the Mindful').
Darius II's younger son,
Cyrus, is accused by
Tissaphernes, the
satrap of
Caria, of plotting his brother Artaxerxes II's murder. On the intercession of Artaxerxes II and Cyrus's mother,
Parysatis, however, Cyrus is pardoned and sent back to his satrapy.
Thrasybulus leads the
democratic resistance to the new
oligarchic government, known as the
Thirty Tyrants, that the victorious
Spartans have imposed on
Athens. He commands a small force of exiles that invades
Attica and, in successive battles, defeats first a Spartan garrison and then the forces of the oligarchic government (which includes the Spartan general,
Lysander) in the
Battle of Munychia. The leader of the Thirty Tyrants,
Critias, is killed in the battle.
The
Battle of Piraeus is fought between Athenian exiles, who have defeated the government of the Thirty Tyrants and occupied
Piraeus, and a Spartan force sent to combat them. In the battle, the Spartans narrowly defeat the exiles, with both sides suffering large numbers of casualties. After the battle, the
Agiad King of Sparta,
Pausanias arranges a settlement between the two parties which allows the reunification of Athens and Piraeus, and the re-establishment of democratic government in Athens. The remaining oligarchic Thirty Tyrants are allowed to flee to
Eleusis.
Thrasybulus restores democratic institutions to Athens and grants amnesties to all except the oligarchic extremists. He is helped by
Lysias, the Athenian orator, in arguing the case against the oligarchy.
Andocides, Athenian orator and politician, who has been implicated in the mutilation of the
Herms on the eve of the departure of the Athenian expedition against
Sicily in
415 BC, returns from exile under the general amnesty.
Rome elects eight
military tribunes with consular power; Manlius Aemilius Mamercus, Lucius Valerius Potitus, Appius Claudius Crassus, Marcus Quinctilius Varus, Lucius Julius Julus, Marcus Postumius, Marcus Furius Camillus, and Marcus Postumius [2]
Cyrus the Younger uses a quarrel with
Tissaphernes over the
Ionian cities as a pretext for gathering a large army and also pretends to prepare an expedition to
Pisidia, in the
Taurus Mountains. Cyrus starts out with about 15,220 men, of whom
10,400 are
Greekmercenaries. When he reaches the
Euphrates River at
Thapsacus, he announces that he is marching against
Artaxerxes II. He advances unopposed into
Babylonia; but Artaxerxes, warned at the last moment by Tissaphernes, hastily gathers an army. The two forces meet in the
Battle of Cunaxa, north of Babylon, where Cyrus is slain.[3]
Greece
The Greek mercenaries fighting for Cyrus are left stranded after Cyrus' defeat. They fight their way north through hostile Persians, Armenians, and Kurds to
Trapezus on the coast of the Black Sea under
Xenophon, who becomes their leader when the
satrap of Lydia, Tissaphernes, has
Clearchus of Sparta and the other senior Greek captains captured and executed.
TamÔs, the
satrap of
Ionia, fled from his
satrapy in fear of the king's retribution. He loaded his possessions onto his satrapy's fleet of
triremes and sailed to
Egypt seeking the protection of Psammetichus, the King of the Egyptians. Psammetichus executed TamÔs and his family and took his possessions and fleet for himself.[4][6]
When the Greek cities of
Ionia heard about
Cyrus' defeat they knew
Artaxerxes would want to exact his revenge on them for supporting Cyrus. They sent several embassies to
Sparta to request the
Lacedaemonians assistence. The Spartans sent
Thibron who recruits 5,000 soldiers to aid the Ionian Greeks.[4][7][8]
Thibron embarks his army at the
Isthmus of Corinth and sails to
Ephesus on the Ionian coast. Upon arrival, he recruits an additional 2,000 soldiers and starts his campaign against
Tissaphernes.[7][9]
Xenophon's "
Ten Thousand" make their way back to
Greece, with most of the men enlisting with the
Spartans. Xenophon's successful march through the Persian Empire encourages Sparta to turn on the Persians and begin wars against the Persians in Asia Minor.[citation needed]
With the outbreak of the war between Sparta and the Persians, the
Athenian admiral,
Conon, obtains joint command, with
Pharnabazus, of a Persian fleet.[citation needed]
London has its origins on a rise above marshy waters at the point where the
Walbrook joins the
River Thames. The
Celtic king,
Belin, rebuilds an earth wall surrounding a few dozen huts and orders a small landing place to be cut into the south side of the wall, along the river front, where a wooden quay is built (approximate date).[citation needed]
Amyrtaeus of
Sais successfully completes a revolt against Persian control by gaining control of all of
Upper Egypt.[10]
Dionysius I, Greek tyrant of
Syracuse, confiscates gold and silver
coins and re-mints them, keeping the weight the same but changing the
denomination from one to two
drachmae â the first known official
devaluation at the expense of the general population. A virulent
inflation ensues (approximate date).[citation needed]
Zoroastrianism becomes the faith of many Persians. The Zoroastrians believe in a struggle between their god,
Mazda, and the devil. They believe that the birth of their founder, the prophet
Zarathustra, was the beginning of a final
epoch that is to end in an
Armageddon and triumph of good and evil.[citation needed]
The Athenian general,
Thrasyllus, sails out from Athens with a sizable force to campaign in
Ionia. There, he quickly captures
Colophon and raids the Ionian countryside, but is defeated outside
Ephesus by a combined Ephesian,
Persian, and
Syracusan force.
Taking advantage of the quarrels between the Greek cities in
Sicily and of the mutual exhaustion of
Athens and
Syracuse,
Carthage seeks to reimpose its influence over the island.
Hannibal Mago, grandson of
Hamilcar, invades Sicily with a strong force. He defeats the Sicilian Greeks and avenges his grandfather through the torture and killing of 3,000 Greek prisoners. In the
Battle of Selinus and
Battle of Himera he captures and destroys both cities before returning triumphantly to Carthage with the spoils of war.
Tissaphernes' influence is limited to the satrapy of
Caria. Darius II also gives Cyrus funds to re-create the Spartan fleet and sends him to
Sardis with instructions to increase Persian support for Sparta. Cyrus begins to collect an army of mercenaries (including Greeks) for his own ends.
Greece
Alcibiades enters
Athens in triumph after an absence of 7 years. He leads the religious procession from Athens to
Eleusis, thus atoning for his alleged impiety in
415 BC when he was held to have joined in
profaning the
Sacred Mysteries. Alcibiades is appointed commander-in-chief with
autocratic powers and leaves for
Samos to rejoin his fleet.
The Spartan admiral
Lysander arrives at
Ephesus in autumn and builds up a great fleet with help from the new Persian satrap, Cyrus.
At the Panhellenic gathering at
Olympia, the philosopher
Gorgias speaks out against the Spartan alliance with Persia.
In 408 BC, the three city-states of the island of
Rhodes (
Ialysos,
Kamiros,
Lindos) unite and create the homonymous city on the northernmost part of the island.
The
Spartan admiral
Lysander refuses to be lured out of
Ephesus to do battle with
Alcibiades. However, while Alcibiades is away seeking supplies, the
Athenian squadron is placed under the command of
Antiochus, his helmsman, who is routed by the Spartan fleet (with the help of the
Persians under
Cyrus) in the
Battle of Notium (or Ephesus).
The defeat gives the enemies of Alcibiades an excuse to strip him of his command. He never returns again to Athens. He sails north to land he owns in the
Thracian Chersonese. Except for a brief appearance at
Aegospotami, Alcibiades' involvement in the
Peloponnesian War is over.
Sicily
The exiled former leader of the moderate democrats of
Syracuse,
Hermocrates, is killed while attempting to force his way back into Syracuse.
Alcibiades is replaced by a board of generals. Athens sends a member of the board, Admiral
Conon, to relieve the siege of
Mytilene. To defend Lesbos, Conon is forced to move his numerically inferior fleet from
Samos to the Hekatonnesi islands near Methymna. When Callicratidas attacks him, Conon is forced back to Mytilene, where he is blockaded by Callicratidas' Spartan fleet.
Athens wins the
Battle of Arginusae, near Lesbos, and the blockade of Conon is broken. To relieve Conon, the Athenians assemble a new fleet composed largely of newly constructed ships crewed by inexperienced sailors. This inexperienced fleet is inferior to the Spartans, but its commanders employ new and unorthodox tactics, which allow the Athenians to secure a dramatic and unexpected victory. The Spartan force is soundly defeated, and Callicratidas is killed.
Returning to Athens after the battle,
Theramenes leads Athenian agitation against the eight generals who have commanded in the engagement; the six who have returned to Athens are condemned for negligence in not having picked up survivors from the ships disabled in the battle. The Athenian generals (including
Pericles' son) are put to death.
Sparta sues for peace, which the Athenian leader
Cleophon rejects. Sparta yields to demands by the Persian
satrapCyrus that Lysander command a fleet in the Hellespont.
Roman Republic
The
Roman forces begin a decade-long siege against
Veii.
Carthage
The
Carthaginians again invade
Sicily and attack
Agrigentum (Acragas).
Plague breaks out in their camp and Hannibal Mago dies.
Himilco assumes command and captures Agrigentum (Acragas),
Gela and
Camarina. Gela is destroyed and its treasures sacked. The survivors take refuge in
Syracuse. The plague is carried back to Carthage by its soldiers.
The Spartan king
Pausanias lays siege to Athens while Lysander's fleet blockades
Piraeus. This action closes the grain route through the Hellespont, thereby starving Athens.
While the
Peloponnesians besiege Athens,
Theramenes tries to negotiate with Lysander. He is away for three months while Athens is being reduced to starvation. Then he heads the embassy that negotiates the terms of
capitulation to the Spartans.
Sicily
Dionysius the Elder rises to power as the tyrant of
Syracuse. He makes peace with the
Carthaginian general,
Himilco (whose army has been weakened by the plague), and fortifies Syracuse. This treaty leaves Carthage in control of most of Sicily.
Dionysius the Elder ruthlessly consolidates and expands his power. He builds a wall around Syracuse and fortifies Epipolae. The
Greek citizens of
Naxos,
Catana, and
Leontini are removed from their cities; many of them are enslaved and their homes are given to Sicilian and
Italianmercenaries. Dionysius prepares his army to fight against Carthage, which now occupies western and southern Sicily.
The Erechtheum, which includes The Porch of Maidens (
Caryatid Porch), is completed in the
Ionian style on the
Acropolis in
Athens after 16 years of construction.
The Athenian leader
Cleophon continues to urge resistance against the
Peloponnesians, but the situation becomes desperate and he is arrested, condemned to death and executed.
Theramenes secures terms that save the city of Athens from destruction. The
Spartans allow Athens to retain its independence. However, Athens loses all its foreign possessions and what is left of its fleet and is required to become an ally of Sparta. The
Long Walls around Athens are pulled down. Greek towns across the
Aegean Sea in
Ionia are again the subjects of the
Persian Empire.
The Spartan general,
Lysander, puts in place a puppet government in Athens with the establishment of the
oligarchy of the "
Thirty Tyrants" under
Critias and including Theramenes as a leading member. This government executes a number of citizens and deprives all but a few of their rights.
Many of Athens' former allies are now ruled by boards of ten (decarchy), often reinforced with garrisons under a Spartan commander (
Harmost).
The Athenian general
Thrasybulus is exiled by the Thirty (the oligarchy of Athens), and he retires to
Thebes.
A split develops between Theramenes and Critias who has Theramenes killed (by drinking poison) on charges of treason.
Emerging after the Spartan victory at
Aegospotami, the former Athenian leader,
Alcibiades, takes refuge in
Phrygia in northwestern
Asia Minor with the Persian
satrap,
Pharnabazus, and seeks their assistance for the Athenians. The Spartans discover his plans and arrange with Pharnabazus to have him assassinated.
Lysander sails to
Samos and conquers it for Sparta.
The Persian King
Darius II dies of an illness in
Babylon. He is succeeded by his son
Artaxerxes II (Memnonâ'the Mindful').
Darius II's younger son,
Cyrus, is accused by
Tissaphernes, the
satrap of
Caria, of plotting his brother Artaxerxes II's murder. On the intercession of Artaxerxes II and Cyrus's mother,
Parysatis, however, Cyrus is pardoned and sent back to his satrapy.
Thrasybulus leads the
democratic resistance to the new
oligarchic government, known as the
Thirty Tyrants, that the victorious
Spartans have imposed on
Athens. He commands a small force of exiles that invades
Attica and, in successive battles, defeats first a Spartan garrison and then the forces of the oligarchic government (which includes the Spartan general,
Lysander) in the
Battle of Munychia. The leader of the Thirty Tyrants,
Critias, is killed in the battle.
The
Battle of Piraeus is fought between Athenian exiles, who have defeated the government of the Thirty Tyrants and occupied
Piraeus, and a Spartan force sent to combat them. In the battle, the Spartans narrowly defeat the exiles, with both sides suffering large numbers of casualties. After the battle, the
Agiad King of Sparta,
Pausanias arranges a settlement between the two parties which allows the reunification of Athens and Piraeus, and the re-establishment of democratic government in Athens. The remaining oligarchic Thirty Tyrants are allowed to flee to
Eleusis.
Thrasybulus restores democratic institutions to Athens and grants amnesties to all except the oligarchic extremists. He is helped by
Lysias, the Athenian orator, in arguing the case against the oligarchy.
Andocides, Athenian orator and politician, who has been implicated in the mutilation of the
Herms on the eve of the departure of the Athenian expedition against
Sicily in
415 BC, returns from exile under the general amnesty.
Rome elects eight
military tribunes with consular power; Manlius Aemilius Mamercus, Lucius Valerius Potitus, Appius Claudius Crassus, Marcus Quinctilius Varus, Lucius Julius Julus, Marcus Postumius, Marcus Furius Camillus, and Marcus Postumius [2]
Cyrus the Younger uses a quarrel with
Tissaphernes over the
Ionian cities as a pretext for gathering a large army and also pretends to prepare an expedition to
Pisidia, in the
Taurus Mountains. Cyrus starts out with about 15,220 men, of whom
10,400 are
Greekmercenaries. When he reaches the
Euphrates River at
Thapsacus, he announces that he is marching against
Artaxerxes II. He advances unopposed into
Babylonia; but Artaxerxes, warned at the last moment by Tissaphernes, hastily gathers an army. The two forces meet in the
Battle of Cunaxa, north of Babylon, where Cyrus is slain.[3]
Greece
The Greek mercenaries fighting for Cyrus are left stranded after Cyrus' defeat. They fight their way north through hostile Persians, Armenians, and Kurds to
Trapezus on the coast of the Black Sea under
Xenophon, who becomes their leader when the
satrap of Lydia, Tissaphernes, has
Clearchus of Sparta and the other senior Greek captains captured and executed.
TamÔs, the
satrap of
Ionia, fled from his
satrapy in fear of the king's retribution. He loaded his possessions onto his satrapy's fleet of
triremes and sailed to
Egypt seeking the protection of Psammetichus, the King of the Egyptians. Psammetichus executed TamÔs and his family and took his possessions and fleet for himself.[4][6]
When the Greek cities of
Ionia heard about
Cyrus' defeat they knew
Artaxerxes would want to exact his revenge on them for supporting Cyrus. They sent several embassies to
Sparta to request the
Lacedaemonians assistence. The Spartans sent
Thibron who recruits 5,000 soldiers to aid the Ionian Greeks.[4][7][8]
Thibron embarks his army at the
Isthmus of Corinth and sails to
Ephesus on the Ionian coast. Upon arrival, he recruits an additional 2,000 soldiers and starts his campaign against
Tissaphernes.[7][9]
Xenophon's "
Ten Thousand" make their way back to
Greece, with most of the men enlisting with the
Spartans. Xenophon's successful march through the Persian Empire encourages Sparta to turn on the Persians and begin wars against the Persians in Asia Minor.[citation needed]
With the outbreak of the war between Sparta and the Persians, the
Athenian admiral,
Conon, obtains joint command, with
Pharnabazus, of a Persian fleet.[citation needed]
London has its origins on a rise above marshy waters at the point where the
Walbrook joins the
River Thames. The
Celtic king,
Belin, rebuilds an earth wall surrounding a few dozen huts and orders a small landing place to be cut into the south side of the wall, along the river front, where a wooden quay is built (approximate date).[citation needed]
Amyrtaeus of
Sais successfully completes a revolt against Persian control by gaining control of all of
Upper Egypt.[10]
Dionysius I, Greek tyrant of
Syracuse, confiscates gold and silver
coins and re-mints them, keeping the weight the same but changing the
denomination from one to two
drachmae â the first known official
devaluation at the expense of the general population. A virulent
inflation ensues (approximate date).[citation needed]
Zoroastrianism becomes the faith of many Persians. The Zoroastrians believe in a struggle between their god,
Mazda, and the devil. They believe that the birth of their founder, the prophet
Zarathustra, was the beginning of a final
epoch that is to end in an
Armageddon and triumph of good and evil.[citation needed]