Page "Peloponnesian War" Paragraph 3

As the preeminent Athenian historian, Thucydides, wrote in his influential History of the Peloponnesian War, " The growth of the power of Athens, and the alarm which this inspired in Lacedaemon, made war inevitable.

" Indeed, the nearly fifty years of Greek history that preceded the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War had been marked by the development of Athens as a major power in the Mediterranean world.

Its empire began as a small group of city-states, called the Delian League — from the island of Delos, on which they kept their treasury — that came together to ensure that the Greco-Persian Wars were truly over.

After defeating the Persian invasion of Greece in the year 480 BC, Athens led the coalition of Greek city-states that continued the Greco-Persian Wars with attacks on Persian territories in the Aegean and Ionia.

What then ensued was a period, referred to as the Pentecontaetia ( the name given by Thucydides ), in which Athens increasingly came to be recognized as an Athenian Empire, carrying out an aggressive war against Persia.

After a time, though, Athens ' influence began to dominate the other city-states.

The city proceeded to conquer all of Greece save for Sparta and its allies, and became known as the Athenian Empire.

By the middle of the century, the Persians had been driven from the Aegean and forced to cede control of a vast range of territories to Athens.

At the same time, Athens greatly increased its own power ; a number of its formerly independent allies were reduced, over the course of the century, to the status of tribute-paying subject states of the Delian League.

This tribute was used to support a powerful fleet and, after the middle of the century, to fund massive public works programs in Athens, ensuring resentment.