History of the Peloponnesian War

When they had done this and called the Corcyraeans to an assembly, they told them that what they had done was for the best and that they should not be now in bondage to the Athenians; and for the future they advised them to be in quiet and to receive neither party with more than one galley at once and to take them for enemies if they were more. And when they had spoken, forced them to decree it accordingly.

They also presently sent ambassadors to Athens both to show that it was fit for them to do what they had done and also to dissuade such Corcyraeans as were fled thither of the other faction from doing anything to their prejudice for fear the matter should fall into a relapse.

When these arrived, the Athenians apprehended both the ambassadors themselves as seditious persons and also all those Corcyraeans whom they had there prevailed with and sent them to custody in Aegina.

In the meantime, upon the coming in of a galley of Corinth with ambassadors from Lacedaemon, those that managed the state assailed the commons, and overcame them in fight.

And night coming on, the commons fled into the citadel and the higher parts of the city where they rallied themselves and encamped and made themselves masters of the haven called the Hillaique haven. But the nobility seized on the market place (where also the most of them dwelt) and on the haven on the side toward the continent.

The next day they skirmished a little with shot, and both parts sent abroad into the villages to solicit the slaves with promise of liberty to take their parts. And the greatest part of the slaves took part with the commons, and the other side had an aid of eight hundred men from the continent.