The Historians' History of the World 03

This triumph of Pericles and his party over the Areopagus seems to have been immediately followed by the ostracism of Cimon, which took place about two years after the return of the Athenians from Messenia: and it is therefore not improbable that his exile may have been not so much an effect of popular resentment, as a measure of precaution, which may have appeared necessary even to the moderate men of both parties, for the establishment of public tranquillity.b

The new character which Athens had assumed, as a competitor for landed alliances not less than for maritime ascendency, came opportunely for the protection of the neighbouring town of Megara. It appears that Corinth, perhaps instigated like Argos by the helplessness of the Lacedæmonians, had been making border encroachments—on the one side upon Cleonæ, on the other side upon Megara: on which ground the latter, probably despairing of protection from Lacedæmon, renounced the Lacedæmonian connection, and obtained permission to enrol herself as an ally of Athens. This was an acquisition of signal value to the Athenians, since it both opened to them the whole range of territory across the outer Isthmus of Corinth to the interior of the Crissæan gulf, on which the Megarian port of Pegæ was situated, and placed them in possession of the passes of Mount Geranea, so that they could arrest the march of a Peloponnesian army over the isthmus, and protect Attica from invasion. It was moreover of great importance in its effects on Grecian politics: for it was counted as a wrong by Lacedæmon, gave deadly offence to the Corinthians, and lighted up the flames of war between them and Athens; their allies the Epidaurians and Æginetans taking their part. Though Athens had not yet been guilty of unjust encroachment against any Peloponnesian state, her ambition and energy had inspired universal awe; while the maritime states in the neighbourhood, such as Corinth, Epidaurus, and Ægina, saw these terror-striking qualities threatening them at their own doors, through her alliance with Argos and Megara. Moreover, it is probable that the ancient feud between the Athenians and Æginetans, though dormant since a little before the Persian invasion, had never been appeased or forgotten: so that the Æginetans, dwelling within sight of Piræus, were at once best able to appreciate, and most likely to dread, the enormous maritime power now possessed by Athens. Pericles was wont to call Ægina the eyesore of Piræus: but we may be sure that Piræus, grown into a vast fortified port within the existing generation, was in a much stronger degree the eyesore of Ægina.

The Athenians were at this time actively engaged in prosecuting the war against Persia, having a fleet of no less than two hundred sail, equipped by or from the confederacy collectively, now serving in Cyprus and on the Phœnician coast. Moreover the revolt of the Egyptians under Inarus (about 460 B.C.) opened to them new means of action against the Great King. Their fleet, by invitation of the rebels, sailed up the Nile to Memphis, where there seemed at first a good prospect of throwing off the Persian dominion. Yet in spite of so great an abstraction from their disposable force, their military operations near home were conducted with unabated vigour: and the inscription which remains—a commemoration of their citizens of the Erechthid tribe who were slain in one and the same year in Cyprus, Egypt, Phœnicia, the Halieis, Ægina, and Megara—brings forcibly before us that remarkable energy which astonished and even alarmed their contemporaries.

[460-458 B.C.]

Their first proceedings at Megara were of a nature altogether novel, in the existing condition of Greece. It was necessary for the Athenians to protect their new ally against the superiority of the Peloponnesian land-force, and to insure a constant communication with it by sea. But the city (like most of the ancient Hellenic towns) was situated on a hill at some distance from the sea, separated from its port Nisæa by a space of nearly one mile. One of the earliest proceedings of the Athenians was to build two lines of wall, near and parallel to each other, connecting the city with Nisæa; so that the two thus formed one continuous fortress, wherein a standing Athenian garrison was maintained, with the constant means of succour from Athens in case of need. These “Long Walls,” though afterwards copied in other places and on a larger scale, were at that juncture an ingenious invention, and were erected for the purpose of extending the maritime arm of Athens to an inland city.

THE WAR WITH CORINTH