CORCYRA

In 427 bce, the fourth year of the Peloponnesian War, about 250 Corcyreans were sent out from Corinth, where they had been held since their capture in the sea battle at the Sybota Islands at the beginning of the war. They were instructed to return to Corcyra in order to induce the city to break its strategic alliance with Athens and restore its former dependence on Corinth. Strategic realignment implied a change in government, thus the mission well suited these Corcyreans, for most of them had been leading men in their city before their capture and therefore anticipated returning to power. They may also have been ideologically opposed to the pro-Athenian democratic regime which currently governed in Corcyra, but pure ideology was lost in the violent power struggle which followed. At first, the returning Corcyreans tried to effect the change by a legal vote. Envoys from both Athens and Corinth arrived in Corcyra to influence the decision. After consultation with each, the Corcyrean assembly voted to maintain its alliance with Athens.

War, as Thucydides remarked (3.82.2), creates conditions which lead people to act in unaccustomed and violent ways. Defeated in the Assembly, the freed prisoners – whom Thucydides will presently label oligarchs (3.74.2) and their opponents democrats – turned to the courts, charging the democratic leader and Athenian “voluntary proxenos” Peithias with conspiracy to enslave Corcyra to Athens; such was the standard rhetoric of this war.