Battle of Pylos

Battle of Pylos
Part of the Peloponnesian War
Date 425 BC Location Pylos 36°55′N 21°42′E / 36.917°N 21.700°E / 36.917; 21.700 Result Athenian victory
Belligerents
Athens	Sparta
Commanders and leaders
Demosthenes	Thrasymelidas, Brasidas
Strength
50 ships 90 hoplites ~540 light troops	60 ships Unknown troops
Casualties and losses
8 ships	18 ships 420 hoplites captured

The naval Battle of Pylos took place in 425 BC during the Peloponnesian War at the peninsula of Pylos, on the present-day Bay of Navarino in Messenia, and was an Athenian victory over Sparta. An Athenian fleet had been driven ashore at Pylos by a storm, and, at the instigation of Demosthenes, the Athenian soldiers fortified the peninsula, and a small force was left there when the fleet departed again. The establishment of an Athenian garrison in Spartan territory frightened the Spartan leadership, and the Spartan army, which had been ravaging Attica under the command of Agis, ended their expedition (the expedition only lasted 15 days) and marched home, while the Spartan fleet at Corcyra sailed to Pylos.

Demosthenes had five triremes and their complements of soldiers as a garrison, and was reinforced by 40 hoplites from a Messenian ship that happened to stop at Pylos. In total, Demosthenes probably had about 600 men, only 90 of which were hoplites. He sent two of his triremes to intercept the Athenian fleet and inform Sophocles and Eurymedon of his danger. The Spartans, meanwhile, had 43 triremes and a large land army. Finding himself thus outnumbered, Demosthenes pulled his remaining three triremes up on land and armed their crews with whatever weapons were at hand. He placed the largest part of his force at the strongly fortified point facing the land. Demosthenes then hand-picked 60 hoplites and a few archers and brought them to the point where he anticipated the Spartans would launch their amphibious assault. Demosthenes expected that the Spartans would hit the south-west corner of the peninsula where the defensive wall was the weakest and the land was most suitable for a landing. The Spartans attacked where Demosthenes had expected, and the Athenians were faced with simultaneous assaults from land and sea. The Athenians held off the Spartans for a day and a half, however, causing the Spartans to cease their attempts to storm Pylos and instead settled in for a siege.

While the Spartans' siege preparations were underway, the Athenian fleet, 50 triremes strong, arrived from Zacynthus. The Spartans failed to blockade the entrance of the harbour, so the Athenians were able to sail in and catch the Spartans unprepared; the Spartan fleet was decisively defeated, and the Athenians gained control of the harbour. In doing so, they trapped 420 Spartan hoplites on the island of Sphacteria, off Pylos. 120 of these were from the Spartiate class, and their peril threw the Spartan government into a panic. Members of the government were dispatched to the scene, and negotiated an armistice on the spot; the entire Spartan fleet was surrendered to the Athenians as a guarantee for Spartan good conduct, and ambassadors were sent to Athens to seek a permanent peace. When these negotiations failed, the Athenians retained possession of the Spartan ships on a pretext, and settled in to besiege the hoplites on Sphacteria; eventually, in the Battle of Sphacteria, those hoplites were captured and taken as hostages to Athens. Pylos remained in Athenian hands, and was used as a base for raids into Spartan territory and as a refuge for fleeing Spartan Helots.