History of the Peloponnesian War

These were the most powerful of the fleets; and even these, we learn, though they were formed many generations later than the Trojan war, were provided with only a few triremes, but were still fitted out with fifty-oared galleys and the ordinary long boats,[*](πλοῖα, usually contrasted with war-ships (τριήρεις), but here marked as ships of war by the epithet μακρά, though probably differing little except in size from trading-vessels.) like the navies of that earlier time.

Indeed, it was only a little before the Persian war and the death of Darius,[*](485 B.C.) who became king of the Persians after Cambyses, that triremes were acquired in large numbers, namely by the tyrants in various parts of Sicily and by the Corcyraeans; and these were the last navies worthy of note that were established in Hellas before the expedition of Xerxes.

As for the Athenians and Aeginetans and any other maritime powers, the fleets they had acquired were inconsiderable, consisting mostly of fifty-oared galleys; and it was only quite recently that the Athenians, when they were at war with the Aeginetans and were also expecting the Barbarians,[*](Referring to Xerxes' invasion. The Aeginetan referred to in 91.2.) built their fleet, at the instance of Themistocles—the very ships with which they fought at Salamis. And these vessels were still without decks throughout their length.