The success of Cleon at Pylos
In 425 B.C. the Athenian general
Cleon won an unprecedented victory by
capturing some 120 Spartan Equals and about 170 allied troops in a battle at
Pylos1 in the western Peloponnese. No Spartan soldiers had ever
before surrendered under any circumstances. They had always taken as their martial
creed the sentiment expressed by the legendary advice of a Spartan mother as she
handed her son his shield as he went off to war: “Come home either with this
or on it,” meaning he should return either as a victor carrying his shield
or as a corpse carried upon it. By this date , however, the population of Spartan
Equals had been so reduced that the loss of even such a small group was perceived as
intolerable. The Spartan leaders therefore offered the Athenians favorable peace terms
in return for the captives. Cleon's success at Pylos had vaulted him into a position
of political leadership, and he advocated a hard line toward Sparta. Thucydides, who
apparently had no love for
Cleon, called him “the most violent of the
citizens.”2 At Cleon's
urging the
Athenian assembly refused to make peace with
Sparta.3
