Archidamian or Ten Years War

• This phase is named after the Spartan king Archidamus who had opposed war with Athens and whose cautious policy dominated Spartan strategy at the beginning of the war.
• During this period, the Spartans under the leadership of Archidamus marched into Attica and beseiged its territory.
• The Athenians, under the leadership of Pericles (who died in 429), withdrew into Athens and fought the Spartans by raiding the Peloponnesian coastline and by encouraging helot revolts.
• Athenian strategy was otherwise focused on recovery of the land empire of around 460, when Megara and Argos were allied with Athens and Athens controlled all of central Greece except for Thebes.
• 426 Demosthenes attempts to invade Boeotia by marching from Naupactus through Aetolia; worst disaster of the first part of the war.
• 425 Athenian victory at Pylos; capture of 292 (out of 320) Spartan hoplites.
• 424 Battle of Delium in Boeotia; Athenian attempt to reestablish land hegemony fails conclusively.
• 422 Battle of Amphipolis in Thrace; both Cleon and Brasidas killed.