By the time of the Peloponnesian War, the democracy in Athens was approximately 100 years old. Most of the upper class accepted this form of government, while either vying for positions of leadership within it or, remaining aloof outside of it. Until the war, most of the leading Athenian politicians had come from noble families.
Aristocratic cultural influences Despite the democracy in Athens, Greek tradition remained
aristocratic, and the works of
Homer celebrated an aristocratic worldview, in which the nobles made decisions and the commoners obeyed. The poems of
Theognis of Megara (from the sixth century BC) and the
Theban poet
Pindar (of the fifth century BC) were popular among the Athenian nobles at this time, casting democracy as an immoral and unfair situation where the good (i.e., those of noble birth) were artificially forced into equality with the base (i.e., those of common birth). These poems maintained that virtues such as judgment, moderation, restraint, justice, and reverence could not be taught, and that such inborn qualities were limited to a few, leaving the rest "shameless and arrogant". These poets compared the masses to the noble born, who were supposedly inherently superior. It was implied that the gap between them could not be overcome by education. During the war, a pamphlet titled
Constitution of the Athenians was produced and credited to an author now known as the "
Old Oligarch". The author derided democracy, writing, "As for the constitution of the Athenians, I do not praise them for having chosen it, because in choosing it they have given the better of it to the vulgar people (
poneroi) rather than to the good (
chrestoi)." The constitution established a system that assigned safe, salaried positions by
random lot; but left the hazardous jobs, such as those of the generals and cavalry commanders, to election of "the best qualified." In contrast, such men praised the
eunomia ("good law") of the constitutions of
Sparta and
Corinth. They longed for a time when Athens would adopt the ways of its neighbours and allow only "the best and most qualified" to deliberate public affairs and make the laws. They held that in such a situation the people would "fall into servitude" naturally.
Fiscal burden The Peloponnesian war had brought on unprecedented fiscal burden on the propertied classes of Athens, a burden that continued to multiply as the war dragged on. The early costs to maintain the military had grown exponentially when the Athenians were countered by a Peloponnesian navy that threatened to cut off their food supply. To address this threat the Athenians had to keep at sea as large a fleet as possible throughout the year. This was a radical drop in the number of citizens available to pay the expenses of the city-state. Historian
Donald Kagan calculates from ancient records that the special war taxes, religious services, and other fiscal demands legally required from the wealthy by the city state during a seven-year period (411–404 BC) was 2.5
talents. Kagan reminds us "that a talent consisted of 6,000
drachmas, that a drachma was a very good day's pay in the late fifth century, and that in those years an Athenian citizen rowing in the fleet was expected to get by on half that amount." Among the things expected of wealthy Athenians, besides special war taxes and religious obligations, were supporting the production of comic and tragic dramas; paying for choral competitions, dancers, athletic contests, and
trireme races; equipping triremes for battle in the war; serving in positions such as
trierarch; and paying the
eisphora; a tax on the wealth of the very rich—levied only when needed—usually in times of war. Kagan points out that, according to ancient documents, "
Nicias, one of the richest men in Athens, was expected to leave an estate of no more than 100 talents and that his son, not a notorious wastrel, left no more than 14 talents to his heir." Kagan concludes "There is good reason to think that the fortunes of many Athenian families were seriously reduced by public services during the Peloponnesian War. By 411, and especially in the years since the
Sicilian disaster, the unprecedented expense would already have been strongly felt, and it would not take much imagination for the propertied classes to see that there would be similar and even greater demands in the future." Despite the payments forced on the nobles, the fiscal situation of the Athenian empire remained in crisis. By June 411 BC, the Athenian leaders at Samos informed their troops that they could no longer expect to receive payments or funds for supplies and other expenses. The ancient historian
Xenophon reports that, by that winter, the generals in the
Hellespont were forced to waste time that might have otherwise been spent on training or other duties soliciting donations.
Leadership turnover Causing further discontent was that, by 415 BC many of the respected political figures from the nobility, such as
Cimon,
Pericles and
Nicias, had been replaced by people of lower class, such as
Cleon,
Hyperbolus and the noble-born but disreputable Alcibiades. Alcibiades, in 415 BC, had been accused of defaming the god
Hermes and sentenced to death
in absentia, a sentence causing him to flee and join the services of Sparta to escape. With a lack of well-respected political leaders, division in Athenian society increased. By 415 BC the clubs known as
hetairiai gained increasing political importance and were an outlet for those who opposed the system of democracy. With the military setback at Sicily, discontent with the city state's political institutions intensified even among the general populace.
Previous rumours of plots The ancient historian
Thucydides mentions that there was already a suspicion of a plot to overthrow the democracy before the
battle of Tanagra in 457 BC and rumours of a conspiracy to replace the Athenian democracy just before the Sicilian expedition in 415 BC. ==Early involvement by Alcibiades==