| |
The battle of Cithaeron in 376 was a minor Spartan defeat that
prevented them from conducting a fourth invasion of Boeotia in four years
(Theban-Spartan War).
Sparta had seized control of Thebes in 382, but the pro-Spartan government had
been expelled in 379. The Spartans responded with a series of invasions of
Boeotia. In 379 King Cleombrotus got close to
Thebes, but withdrew without achieving anything. In 378 and 377 King
Agesilaus II led the
invasions, and managed to get into Boeotia and again got close to Thebes, but
both invasions ended without achieving much. In the aftermath of the 377
campaign Agesilaus burst a vein in his leg, and was unfit for the campaign of
376. This meant that King Cleombrotus took command for a second time. In 377
the Spartan garrison of Thespiae had been ordered to keep the passes across the
Cithaeron range open, to allow the Spartans to move from Attica into Boeotia,
but in 376 the passes were defended by Theban and Athenian troops. It is
possible that the Spartan garrisons at Plataea and Tanagra, on the Boeotian
side of the mountains, had been defeated before this, thus explaining their
inability to help the invasion. Cleombrotus ordered his peltasts to seize the
pass. As the Spartans approached, the defenders sortied, and killed forty of
the attackers. Cleombrotus wasn't as persistent as Agesilaus, and he decided
that this made the entire invasion impossible. He retreated, disbanded the
army, and returned home. Cleombrotus's poor performance in Boeotia in 379 and
376 might have played a part in the Spartan disaster at Leuctra in 371 BC,
where Cleombrotus was defeated and killed, triggering the start of a dramatic
decline in Spartan power. The king may have been motivated to fight by a desire
to restore his reputation.
|
|
| |
Sparta at War, Scott M. Rusch. A study of the rise, dominance
and fall of Sparta, the most famous military power in the Classical Greek
world. Sparta dominated land warfare for two centuries, before suffering a
series of defeats that broke its power. The author examines the reasons for
that success, and for Sparta's failure to bounce back from defeat.
The Spartan Supremacy 412-371 BC, Mike Roberts and Bob Bennett. . Looks
at the short spell between the end of the Great Peloponnesian War and the
battle of Leuctra where Sparta's political power matched her military
reputation. The authors look at how Sparta proved to be politically unequal to
her new position, and how this period of supremacy ended with Sparta's military
reputation in tatters and her political power fatally wounded
|
|
