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" "For the love of gain would reconcile the weaker to the dominion of the stronger, and the possession of capital enabled the more powerful to reduce the smaller towns to subjection.
Thucydides (or Thoukydides)(c. 472 BC – c. 400 BC) was an ancient Greek historian, author of the History of the Peloponnesian War, which recounts the 5th century BC war between Sparta and Athens. This work is widely regarded a classic and represents the first work of its kind.
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When they (Lacedaemonians) had retreated, the Athenians posted guards to keep watch both by land and sea, a precaution which they maintained throughout the war. They then passed a decree reserving of the treasure in the Acropolis a thousand talents: this sum was set apart and was not to be expended unless the enemy attacked the city with a fleet and they had to defend it. In any other case, he who brought forward or put to the vote a proposal to touch the money was to be punished with death.
They also resolved to set apart yearly a hundred triremes, the finest of the year, and to appoint trierarchs for them; these they were only to use at the same time with the money, and in the same emergency.
(Book 2 Chapter 24)
The causes which led to the defections of the allies were of different kinds, the principal being their neglect to pay the tribute or to furnish ships, and, in some cases, failure of military service. For the Athenians were exacting and oppressive, using coercive measures towards men who were neither willing nor accustomed to work hard.
And for various reasons they soon began to prove less agreeable leaders than at first. They no longer fought upon an equality with the rest of the confederates, and they had no difficulty in reducing them when they revolted.
Now the allies brought all this upon themselves; for the majority of them disliked military service and absence from home, and so they agreed to contribute their share of the expense instead of ships. Whereby the Athenian navy was proportionally increased, while they themselves were always untrained and unprepared for war when they revolted.
(Book 1 Chapter 99)