Plague of Athens hits besieging Spartans?

During the Peloponnesian War Athens was ravaged by a plague that eventually killed almost half of the citizens in Athens and the surrounding areas. The Plague started at the Piraeus, the port of Athens, so it would seem that the plague was brought to Athens from somewhere else. If that is the case, is it possible to have the plague affect the besieging Spartan Army instead of the Athenians?
 
During the Peloponnesian War Athens was ravaged by a plague that eventually killed almost half of the citizens in Athens and the surrounding areas. The Plague started at the Piraeus, the port of Athens, so it would seem that the plague was brought to Athens from somewhere else. If that is the case, is it possible to have the plague affect the besieging Spartan Army instead of the Athenians?

I dont think so... The plague was propably carried to Athens along with ships transporting grain and since Piraeus was connected to Athens with the Long Walls (a serie of walls and fortresses protecting the road from Athens to Piraeus) the plague hit Athens fast. On the same time Long Walls kept Spartans outside with absolutely no contact with the people inside (neither in Athens nor in Piraeus) so it would be difficult for the plague to be spread to the Spartan camp... However its not entirely impossible... Had the plague spread to both parties i see a hasty truce signed as both belligerents would have had massive casualties. But even in such a case i can see hostilities resume fast.
 

RousseauX

Donor
If that is the case, is it possible to have the plague affect the besieging Spartan Army instead of the Athenians?
I guess the first part could happen, though in OTL the Spartans disengaged specifically to avoid that IIRC. But I don't see how it can -not- affect the Athenians considering how densely crowded the city was.
 
What about Athenians gifting the Spartan army with freshly deceased bodies, full of plague?

They could do that... But only if siege was too tight and Athens was in danger to fall to the Spartans.
Showing disrespect to the deads (aka throwing them outside the walls) especially if the deads were Athenian citizens would be viewed as a "grave sin" and propably many would believe that it would anger the Gods.
However as i said above if Athens was desperate they might have tried that.
 
I guess the first part could happen, though in OTL the Spartans disengaged specifically to avoid that IIRC. But I don't see how it can -not- affect the Athenians considering how densely crowded the city was.

Also the plague was brought along with grain ships from Black Sea (if i remember correctly or it was Egypt) so the ships docked in Piraeus and plague hit Athens first. I dont see any possible way that the plague would hit Spartans first since it was carried in by ships (as i said above Piraeus was enclosed in the Long Walls along with Athens).
However there is a (very) small chance for an outbreak in the Spartan camp through mice who could have carried the disease.
 
They could do that... But only if siege was too tight and Athens was in danger to fall to the Spartans.
Showing disrespect to the deads (aka throwing them outside the walls) especially if the deads were Athenian citizens would be viewed as a "grave sin" and propably many would believe that it would anger the Gods.
However as i said above if Athens was desperate they might have tried that.

Yeah i tought this too...But i don't recall well if the repulsion of the Greeks to treat deads in such manner was restricted to "their" citizens, all of Greeks or all humans beings?

If it's just for Greeks, we could have slaves or foreign sailors serving as bacteriological weapons.
 
It seems to me that you would need a really 'out-of-the-box' thinker among the Athenians to try to deploy biological warfare in any successful way. The Athenians may have been quite clever in regards to conventional military action, but that kind of a plan actually seems like something we'd more likely see from the Spartan side (Spartans being taught throughout the Agoge that subterfuge, terror, and unconventional warfare were crucial to success. The Athenians tended to value this kind of thing less.)

Your best bet might be to have the plague-riddled trade ship crash along the coast. If the ship smashes on the rocks and the Spartans raid it for supplies...perhaps then you can wedge some sort of POD in there where the Spartans catch the plague instead.
 
Surely we don't have to have biological warfare. All we have to do is have people fleeing the plague, passing through the Spartan lines.

OTL, I don't know how many people tried to flee, and I suppose most probably fled by sea, and I don't know how Spartans treated the fleeing Athenians.

But I can sure see people, desperate to flee a plague ridden city sneaking over the walls at night. A PoD might be as simple as having the Spartan commander encourage Athenian desertion.
 
Surely we don't have to have biological warfare. All we have to do is have people fleeing the plague, passing through the Spartan lines.

OTL, I don't know how many people tried to flee, and I suppose most probably fled by sea, and I don't know how Spartans treated the fleeing Athenians.

But I can sure see people, desperate to flee a plague ridden city sneaking over the walls at night. A PoD might be as simple as having the Spartan commander encourage Athenian desertion.

Atheneans didnt try to flee through Spartan lines in open land... They did exactly the opposite. Everyone outside Athens rushed inside the walls and remained there for the duration of the siege. None was allowed to get out since Athenean leadership feared that someone could betray them to Spartans and thats why the Generals doubled night shifts in the Long Walls. Even land trade stopped and Athens received supplies only from the port of Piraeus. Eventually that was what lead to the speedy spread of disease... Imagine hundreds of people stacked in the Long Walls all the way from Piraeus to Athens, its the perfect condition for spreading a disease.
 
Incidentally, what about Salamis? Salamis was actually closer to Piraeus than Athens, let alone most of Attica, rather more spacious than the walled area of Long Walls, and had been Athenian since the youth of Solon....
 
Atheneans didnt try to flee through Spartan lines in open land... They did exactly the opposite. Everyone outside Athens rushed inside the walls and remained there for the duration of the siege. None was allowed to get out since Athenean leadership feared that someone could betray them to Spartans and thats why the Generals doubled night shifts in the Long Walls. Even land trade stopped and Athens received supplies only from the port of Piraeus. Eventually that was what lead to the speedy spread of disease... Imagine hundreds of people stacked in the Long Walls all the way from Piraeus to Athens, its the perfect condition for spreading a disease.

You could have slaves escaping. ITOL the Spartan army attracted a fair number of escaped slaves to their camps by offering them freedom in exchange for information, maybe some slaves fleeing the plague could bring the plague to the Spartan camp this way.
 
Also the plague was brought along with grain ships from Black Sea (if i remember correctly or it was Egypt) so the ships docked in Piraeus and plague hit Athens first. I dont see any possible way that the plague would hit Spartans first since it was carried in by ships (as i said above Piraeus was enclosed in the Long Walls along with Athens).
However there is a (very) small chance for an outbreak in the Spartan camp through mice who could have carried the disease.
Actually the ships were from Crete.
 
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