The siege of Melos occurred in 416 BC, during the Peloponnesian War between Athens and Sparta, when the Athenians attacked Melos, an island in the Aegean Sea roughly east of mainland Greece. Though the Melians had ancestral ties to Sparta, they were neutral in the war. Athens invaded Melos in the summer of 416 BC and demanded that the Melians surrender and pay tribute to Athens or face annihilation. The Melians refused, so the Athenians laid siege to their city. Melos surrendered in the winter, and the Athenians executed the men of Melos and enslaved the women and children.
This siege is best remembered for the Melian Dialogue, a dramatization of the negotiations between the Athenians and the Melians before the siege, written by the classical Athenian historian Thucydides. In the negotiations, the Athenians offer no moral justification for their invasion, but instead bluntly tell the Melians that Athens needs Melos for its own ends and that the only thing Melians stand to gain in submitting without a fight was self-preservation.
The Melian Dialogue is taught as an advocation of imperialism at the expense of other states, and that the only rational approach is based on power and advantage. In particular, the quotation "the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must" is taken as an appeal to political power as opposed to justice.
Background The Peloponnesian War lasted from 431 to 404 BC. The war was fought between the Peloponnesian League, which was an alliance of Greek cities led by Sparta, and the Delian League, which was an alliance led by Athens. Athens had the superior navy and controlled nearly all the islands in the Aegean Sea. Melos was the only significant island in the Aegean Sea that Athens did not control. The people of Melos were Dorians, the same ethnic group as the Spartans, but they were independent of the Spartan empire; the Athenians were Ionians.Brian Sparkes, in Herodotus. The Histories, 8.48: "The Melians (who are of Lacedaemonian stock) [...]"Thucydides. History of the Peloponnesian War, 5.84: "The Melians are a colony of Lacedaemon [...]"Brian Sparkes, in : "The start of the Peloponnesian War between Athens and Sparta in 431 BC saw Melos and Thera still independent..." In general, the Melians sought to remain neutral in the war,Thucydides. History of the Peloponnesian War, 5.84: "[The Melians] at first remained neutral and took no part in the struggle, but afterwards upon the Athenians using violence and plundering their territory, assumed an attitude of open hostility." although there is archaeological evidence that sometime between 428 and 425 BC, some Melians donated at least twenty minas of silver (about 12.5 kgEstimates of the weight of an Aeginetan mina: 605 g () 630 g () 622 g () 623.7 g ()) to the Spartan war effort.: "The inscription found near Sparta [...] records two separate donations by Melos to the Spartan war-funds, one of twenty Aeginetan minae [...] The other figure has perished. The donors are described, it will be noticed, as toi Malioi, 'the Melians'. [...] there is good reason to think these gifts to Sparta were made in the spring of 427.": "The Melians might have had a strong motivation to contribute to the Spartan war effort either in response to Nikias' attack, i.e. in 426 or 425, or, as independent Dorian islanders alarmed at Athenian control of the Aegean, they might have contributed earlier, perhaps in 428 or 427, and hence provoked the attack."Inscriptiones Graecae V 1, 1: "The Melians gave to the Lacedaimonians twenty mnas of silver."
In 426 BC, Athens sent an army of 2,000 men to raid the Melian countryside, but the Melians would not be bullied into submission.Thucydides. History of the Peloponnesian War, 3.91 In 425 or 424 BC, Athens demanded of Melos a tribute of fifteen talents of silverIn 425 or 424 BC, the government of Athens drew up a list of its client cities and the tributes it expected from each according to their respective wealth. This list was inscribed on marble slabs that were publicly displayed in Athens. The Athenians had hundreds of such presumptuous donors. A few these, taken from tables appearing in , , and and Attic Inscriptions Online, include: Thasos60 talents Paros30 talents Andros15 talents Melos15 talents Naxos15 talents Ceos10 talents Chalcis10 talents Kea10 talents Tenos10 talents Siphnos9 talents Kythnos6 talents Karystos5 talents Thera5 talents Mykonos2 talents Seriphos2 talents Ios1 talent Syros1 talent (roughly 390 kgEstimates of the weight of an Attic talent: 26.196 kg () 25.992 kg () 26.2 kg ()). This sum could have paid the wages of a trireme crew for 15 months,: "Each trireme had a crew of 200 [...] In good times, such as the early years of the Archidamian War, rowers could receive as much as a drachma per day. At this rate each ship would cost one talent per month to crew."Thucydides. History of the Peloponnesian War, 6.8: "Early in the spring of the following summer the Athenian envoys arrived from Sicily, and the Egestaeans with them, bringing sixty talents of uncoined silver, as a month's pay for sixty ships, which they were to ask to have sent them." or bought 540 metric tons of wheat, enough to feed 2,160 men for a year.Brian Sparkes, in : "[...] the assessed Melian tribute of 390 kg of silver would buy wheat sufficient to feed 2,160 men for one year. [...] 390 kg of silver would have bought, as calculated above, 540,000 kg of wheat in 425/424 BC." Given the relative size of Melos, this suggests that it was a prosperous island.Malcolm Wagstaff and John F. Cherry in : "The tribute payable by Melos was fixed by the 425/424 BC reassessment decree at fifteen talents, which to judge from the payments made by islands of other sizes was about twice what might have been expected. Although this may be related to the Melians' ability to produce silver from their own resources, it could be taken as an indication of a densely settled island, with correspondingly high levels of productivity and surplus" Melos refused to pay, but Athens initially did nothing about this, because its forces were fully engaged in fighting Sparta.Brian Sparkes, in
Siege
After the Spartan victory in the Battle of Mantinea (418 BC), a temporary truce was agreed between Athens and Sparta. This freed up military forces for use against states which had been neutral in the war. The Athenian democracy began to discuss how best to use its fleet and troops until the expected resumption of hostilities against Sparta. After much debate, the Athenian assembly voted to punish Melos for its earlier defiance and refusal to join the Delian League.
In the summer of 416 BC, Athens sent an army of at least 3,400 men to conquer Melos: 1,600 heavy infantry, 300 archers, and 20 mounted archers all from Athens, plus 1,500 heavy infantry from other Delian League cities. The fleet that transported this army had 38 ships: 30 from Athens, 6 from Chios, and 2 from Lesbos. This expedition was led by the generals Cleomedes and Tisias. After setting up camp on the island, the Athenians sent emissaries to negotiate with the rulers of Melos. The emissaries demanded that Melos join the Delian League and pay tribute to Athens or face destruction. The Melians rejected this ultimatum.
The Athenians laid siege to the city of Melos but found its defences too strong to capture by force. They invested the city, cutting it off from supplies, intending to starve the Melians into submission. The Athenians kept enough troops on the island to maintain the blockade, but withdrew most of their force to fight elsewhere. The Melians made several sorties, at one point capturing part of the Athenian line, but were unable to break the siege. In response, Athens sent reinforcements under the command of Philocrates. The Athenians also had help from collaborators within Melos. Melos surrendered in the following winter (416–415 BC).Thucydides. History of the Peloponnesian War, 5.84–116
Aftermath The Athenians executed the men of fighting ageThe word by which Thucydides referred to the executed is hebôntas (ἡβῶντας) which generally means young adult. In the Spartan military training system known as the agoge, the hebontes were males aged 20-29, eligible for military service, though it's not clear if the Melians had a similar system. Rex Warner translated this as "men of military age". Another possible translation is "men in their prime". Thucydides made no specific mention of what happened to the elderly males. and sold the women and children into slavery. They then settled 500 of their own colonists on the island.Thucydides. History of the Peloponnesian War, 5.116
In 405 BC, by which time Athens was losing the war, the Spartan general Lysander expelled the Athenian colonists from Melos and restored the survivors of the siege to the island. The once-independent Melos became a Spartan territory, which would mean that it had a Spartan garrison and a military governor (a harmost).Brian Sparkes, in : "Melos thus passed from Athenian to Spartan control, and the Melians who returned found a government of ten established, made effective by the presence of a Spartan garrison and of a harmost or military commander."
Melian Dialogue
In History of the Peloponnesian War (Book 5, Chapters 84–116), the contemporary Athenian historian Thucydides included a dramatization of the negotiations between the Athenian emissaries and the rulers of Melos. Thucydides did not witness the negotiations and in fact had been in exile at the time, so this dialogue paraphrases what he believed was discussed.
Synopsis The Athenians offer the Melians an ultimatum: surrender and pay tribute to Athens, or be destroyed. The Athenians do not wish to waste time arguing over the morality of the situation, because in practice might makes right—or, in their own words: "the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must."Thucydides. History of the Peloponnesian War, 5.89.
Possible translations:
William Smith (1831): "in what terms soever the powerful enjoin obedience, to those the weak are obliged to submit" Richard Crawley (1910): "the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must" Rex Warner (1954): "the strong do what they have the power to do and the weak accept what they have to accept" Benjamin Jowett (1881): "the powerful exact what they can, and the weak grant what they must" Thomas Hobbes (1629): "they that have odds of power exact as much as they can, and the weak yield to such conditions as they can get" Johanna Hanink (2019): "Those in positions of power do what their power permits, while the weak have no choice but to accept it."
The Melians argue that they are a neutral city and not an enemy, so Athens has no need to conquer them. The Athenians counter that if they accept Melos' neutrality and independence, they would look weak; their subjects would think that they left Melos alone because they were not strong enough to conquer it.
The Melians argue that an invasion will alarm the other neutral Greek states, who will become hostile to Athens for fear of being invaded themselves. The Athenians counter that the other Greek states on the mainland are unlikely to act this way, because they are free and independent and thus loath to take up arms against Athens. What worries Athens is potential rebellions in its empire from disgruntled peoples they have already conquered, including islands that would threaten its dominance of the seas. Conquering Melos will demonstrate Athens' strength and discourage rebellions.
The Melians argue that it would be shameful and cowardly of them to submit without a fight. The Athenians advise the Melians to swallow their pride because they are not facing a fair fight and defeat will mean annihilation.