Note 49 — Chapter XLVII · FROM THE THIRTY YEARS’ TRUCE, FOURTEEN YEARS BEFORE THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR, DOWN TO THE BLOCKADE OF POTIDÆA, IN THE YEAR BEFORE THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR.

Plutarch, Periklês, c. 17. Plutarch gives no precise date, and O. Müller (De Phidiæ Vitâ, p. 9) places these steps for convocation of a congress before the first war between Sparta and Athens and the battle of Tanagra,—i. e., before 460 B.C. But this date seems to me improbable: Thebes was not yet renovated in power, nor had Bœotia as yet recovered from the fruits of her alliance with the Persians; moreover, neither Athens nor Periklês himself seem to have been at that time in a situation to conceive so large a project; which suits in every respect much better for the later period, after the thirty years’ truce, but before the Peloponnesian war.