There is no human affair which stands so constantly and so generally in close connection with chance as War." So spoke Carlvon Clausewitz in the 19th century. But the thought is surely as old as warfare itself and was examined some 23 centuries earlier by the Athenian historian Thucydides. Many examples of the decisive effects of chance on the course of events emerge from his profound study of the Peloponnesian War of 431404 bc, and among the more interesting and decisive are those connected with the capture of Pylos in 425 bc. 

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The conflict between the city-states of Athens and Sparta was in its sixth year, and the Athenians were straying from the careful plan laid down by Pericles for a limited, defensive war. Uninterested in territorial expansion or in decisively defeating the Spartans, who were overwhelmingly strong on land with the forces of their Peloponnesian League, Pericles had outlined a strategy that would capitalize on the strong suits of Athens’ mercantile empire in the Aegean–money and ships. With her population sheltered in the Athens? Piraeus fortress and fed by her grain ships, Athens could simply ignore the enemy invasion and crop destruction that were at the heart of traditional Greek warfare. Meanwhile, her navy would raid the coastal areas of Sparta’s allies in the Peloponnesus, helping to convince them that the war was not in their best interests. Under growing pressure from their reluctant allies, Pericles concluded, the Spartans would tire of spending their summers in Attica without achieving anything, and the war would fizzle to an end.

Although it was hard on the morale of the Athenians, who had to be restrained by Pericles from launching suicidal attacks on the enemy army lying outside their walls, his strategy appeared to be working in the opening years of the war. Unfortunately for Athens, however, Pericles died in 429, and with him died his plan for history’s first war of attrition. Falling increasingly under the sway of the emerging radical imperialists, the Athenian democracy found it more and more difficult to resist the temptations of power inherent in its immense superiority of resources. Without Pericles, the state began undertaking more risky offensive operations, aimed at expanding Athenian power rather than simply defending it. This development was gradual and was resisted by a conservative faction led by Nicias, but each success whetted the imperial appetite of the people and strengthened the position of the radical hawks.

In the spring of 425, a fleet of 40 warships was sent west to aid the pro-Athenian democrats in the civil war on Corcyra and to further Athenian ambitions in Sicily. With the expedition was the experienced general Demosthenes, at that time a private citizen with no official position, but with a writ from the assembly to use the fleet "around the Peloponnesus." His plan was to establish a fortified base at Pylos on the west coast of Messenia, a fortified base from which the Athenians could raid into Spartan territory and to which helots, the serfs on whose toil the Spartan system depended, could flee. The actual commanders of the fleet, Eurymedon and Sophocles, were unenthusiastic about the operation, especially once they heard that a Peloponnesian squadron had already arrived at Corcyra, but a sudden storm forced them to take refuge at Pylos. As the bad weather continued, the men fell to fortifying the position out of sheer boredom. Six days later, the work was complete, and the fleet sailed on, leaving Demosthenes with a garrison of five ships.

The Athenian generals were not overly impressed with Pylos as a strategic base, but the Spartan leadership was, and it reacted immediately. King Agis brought his army back from its annual sojourn in Athenian territory, while locally available troops were sent to the area as an advance guard. The 60 Peloponnesian ships at Corcyra were also summoned and reached the area soon after the first land forces, but not before Demosthenes had sent off two of his own vessels to catch the Athenian fleet, while the remaining three were dragged up behind a palisade.

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