History of the Peloponnesian War

In the meantime not only had the Chians strengthened their command of the sea, but Astyochus also and the Peloponnesians at Miletus, learning the result of the sea-fight and about the departure of Strombichides and his fleet, took courage.

So Astyochus sailed along the coast to Chios with two ships, took on the ships which were there, and with what was now the entire fleet advanced against Samos; but when the Athenians, because their two factions entertained suspicions of one another, would not come out to meet him, he sailed back again to Miletus. For it was about this time, or somewhat earlier, that the democracy at Athens was being overthrown.

When the envoys led by Peisander had come to Samos from Tissaphernes, they had got matters in the army itself still more firmly under their control and had instigated the influential men among the Samians also to attempt in concert with them to establish an oligarchy, although the Samians had risen in revolt against their own countrymen in order to avoid being governed by an oligarchy.

At the same time the Athenians at Samos, after conferring among themselves, had determined, since Alcibiades would not agree with them, to let him alone—for he was not a suitable person, they thought, to come into an oligarchy—but by themselves, as being already actually in peril, to see to it that the movement should not be abandoned, and at the same time to hold out so far as the war was concerned; they had also resolved zealously to contribute from their own private resources either money or whatever else should be necessary, feeling that from now on the burdens they would bear would be for no others than themselves.1