The Peace of Nicias and the Sicilian Expedition

by Donald Kagan

Overview

"This is a solid piece of scholarship, a readable, consistent, and understandable account of a difficult period in Greek history, and rife with astute and provocative observations on Thucydides."
― The Historian

Why did the Peace of Nicias fail to reconcile Athens and Sparta? Donald Kagan examines the years between the signing of the peace treaty and the destruction of the Athenian expedition to Sicily in 413 B.C. The principal figure in the narrative is the Athenian politician and general Nicias, whose policies shaped the treaty and whose military strategies played a major role in the attack against Sicily.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780801499401
Publisher:	Cornell University Press
Publication date:	05/14/1991
Series:	A New History of the Peloponnesian War , #3
Edition description:	Volume 3
Pages:	400
Sales rank:	729,361
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.00(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Donald Kagan is Sterling Professor of Classics and History at Yale University.

Table of Contents

Part One: The Unraveling of the Peace
1. A Troubled Peace
2. The Separate League
3. The Alliance of Athens and Argos
4. The Challenge of the Separate League
5. The Battle of Mantinea
6. After Mantinea: Politics and Policy at Sparta and AthensPart Two: The Sicilian Expedition
7. The Decision to Attack Sicily
8. Sacrilege and Departure
9. Athenian Strategy and the Summer Campaign of 415
10. The First Attack on Syracuse
11. The Siege of Syracuse
12. Athens on the Defensive
13. Defeat on Land and Sea
14. Retreat and Destruction
ConclusionsBibliography
General Index
Index of Modem Authors
Index of Ancient Authors and Inscriptions

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

Kagan brings new insight into the natures of Agis II and Gylippus, Nicias and Alciabiades, and they come alive as never before.

Editorial Reviews

A profound analysis of the relation of strategy to politics, a sympathetic but searching critique of Thucydides' masterpiece, and a trenchant assessment of the voluminous modern literature on the war.

The Atlantic Monthly - Bernard Knox

"The temptation to acclaim Kagan's four volumes as the foremost work of history produced in North America in the twentieth century is vivid.... Here is an achievement that not only honors the criteria of dispassion and of unstinting scruple which mark the best of modern historicism but honors its readers. To read Kagan's 'History of the Peloponnesian War' at the present hour is to be almost unbearably tested."-George Steiner, The New Yorker

From the Publisher

This is a solid piece of scholarship, a readable, consistent, and understandable account of a difficult period in Greek history, and rife with astute and provocative observations on Thucydides.

The Historian