History of the Peloponnesian War

During the following winter, the Lacedaemonians, eluding the vigilance of the Athenians, sent a garrison of three hundred men, under the command of Agesippidas, by sea to Epidaurus.

And the Argives, coming to Athens, made complaint that, although it was written in the treaty that they were not to allow enemies to go through their respective territories,[*](cf. 5.47.5.) the Athenians had permitted the Lacedaemonians to go past their territory[*](ie. past Aegina, now Athenian territory.) by sea; unless, then, the Athenians should bring the Messenians and Helots to Pylos to annoy the Lacedaemonians, they themselves would feel aggrieved.

So the Athenians, on the advice of Alcibiades, inscribed at the bottom of the Laconian column that the Lacedaemonians had not kept their oaths, and they brought to Pylos the Helots from Cranii,[*](cf. 5.35.7.) to plunder the country;

but in other respects they kept quiet. During this winter, although the Argives and Epidaurians were at war, there was no pitched battle, but there were ambuscades and forays, in which some perished on either side as the chance might be.

As winter was closing and spring at hand, the Argives came with scaling-ladders against Epidaurus, supposing, as it was stripped of its defenders by the war, that they could take it by assault; but they accomplished nothing and went back home. And the winter ended and with it the thirteenth year of the war.