The effects of epidemic
The innate unpredictability of war undermined Pericles' strategy, especially as an
epidemic disease ravaged Athens' population1 for several years beginning in 430 B.C. The disease struck while the Athenians
were jammed together in unsanitary conditions to escape Spartan attack behind their
walls. The symptoms were gruesome: vomiting, convulsions, painful sores,
uncontrollable diarrhea, and fever and thirst so extreme that sufferers threw
themselves into cisterns vainly hoping to find relief in the cold water. The rate of
mortality was so high it crippled Athenian ability to man the naval expeditions
Pericles' wartime strategy demanded.
Pericles himself died of the
disease2 in 429 B.C. He apparently had not anticipated the damage to
Athens which the loss of his firm leadership could mean. The epidemic also seriously
hampered the war effort by destroying Athenian confidence in their relationship with
the gods.” As far as the gods were concerned, it seemed not to matter
whether one worshipped them or not because the good and the bad were dying
indiscriminately,” was
Thucydides' description of the population's
attitude at the height of the epidemic.3
