Cnemus

The Battle of Naupactus was a naval battle in the Peloponnesian War. The battle, which took place a week after the Athenian victory at Rhium, set an Athenian fleet of twenty ships, commanded by Phormio, against a Peloponnesian fleet of seventy-seven ships, commanded by Cnemus. Cnemus (Greek: Κνῆμος) was the Spartan fleet commander during the second and third years (430–29 BC) of the Archidamian War. During his command, Cnemus oversaw a series of operations that met with failure. As a result, the Spartans began to question Cnemus' leadership and sent several advisers to assist him in his command.

Military service

Zacynthian Campaign

Cnemus' earliest recorded military operation during the Archidamian War occurred in the summer of 430 BC, at the island of Zacynthus. Because Zacynthus was populated by Achaeans who had allied themselves with Athens, Cnemus led an expedition, made up of Spartans and their allies, against the island. The expeditionary force consisted of 100 ships, carrying a total of 1000 Spartan hoplites.

Acarnanian Campaign The summer following the Zacynthian Campaign (429 BC), Cnemus led an expedition against Acarnania. Two of Sparta's allies, the Ambraciots and Chaonians, had convinced the Spartans to invade Acarnania with the purpose of eventually capturing the islands of Cephallenia and Zacynthus. As the Ambraciots and Chaonians argued, if the campaign succeeded, the Spartans would gain strategic positions, thus enabling them to complicate the Athenians' navigation around the Peloponnesus. As the land force approached Stratus, Cnemus divided his troops into three divisions. The left division was constituted of Spartans and Ambraciots, with Cnemus himself leading. The next day, knowing that Acarnanian reinforcements were coming from the coast, he retreated to the allied city of Oeniadae. Not having expected to engage in a sea battle, the Spartan fleet consisted primarily of ships suited only for transporting troops rather than for fighting. Taking advantage of the Spartan fleet's inexperience, Phormio developed a strategy to create confusion among the Spartan ships and was thus able to rout their forces, capturing twelve enemy ships by the end of the battle. The surviving Spartan ships sailed to Cyllene, where they regrouped with Cnemus. As a result, three commissioners, Timocrates, Brasidas and Lycophron, were sent by the Spartans to make up for what they perceived as Cnemus’ lack of energy and to help him reorganize the fleet. The Spartans, for their part, were unwilling to concede that the smaller Athenian naval force had defeated the Spartan fleet at Naupactus because of their greater experience at sea.

Second Naval Battle at Naupactus With the arrival of the three Spartan commissioners at Cyllene, Phormio began to prepare his ships for a second naval battle. Phormio, with the same twenty ships from his victory at Naupactus, set anchor at Molycrian Rhium, directly across the Spartans at the mouth of the Crissaean Gulf.

Because Cnemus and the Spartan commanders desired to wage the battle in the narrows between the Rhia, they ordered their ships to sail towards Corinth in the hope that Phormio would interpret their departure as a move to attack the now-unguarded Naupactus and would follow them into the narrows. It is not clear whether this was Cnemus’ plan or the plan of one of his advisers; nonetheless, Cnemus was responsible for agreeing to implement the plan. Phormio, taking the Spartans’ bait, ordered his ships to sail along the shore, in single file, towards Naupactus. The eleven remaining Athenian ships fled to Naupactus, pursued by twenty Spartan ships. The Spartans proceeded to retreat to Panormus. Although both sides later claimed victory, the Spartans, concerned about imminent Athenian reinforcement, retreated to Corinth. Although the blame for the Spartans’ second defeat at Naupactus lay primarily in the inexperience of their sailors, Cnemus’ willingness to retreat to Corinth rather than re-engage the Athenians cemented the Spartans’ perception that he was lacking in energy as a leader. Although it is unknown who was responsible for the decision to abort the plan of attacking the Piraeus, certain scholars claim that Thucydides, in his History of the Peloponnesian War, implies Cnemus was responsible. When the Spartans attacked, they took the Athenians by surprise, capturing three Athenian ships and wreaking damage throughout the island. The Athenians, thinking that the Spartans were either already attacking the Piraeus or just about to attack, fell into a panic.

Cnemus in the History of the Peloponnesian War According to H.D. Westlake, Cnemus was characterized by Thucydides in the History of the Peloponnesian War as a prototypical Spartan military leader in order to draw the general lesson of the inadequacy of conventional Spartan leadership. In Thucydides' characterization, Cnemus' similarities to the later Spartan fleet commander, Alcidas, may have been exaggerated to contrast and emphasize the superior leadership of the heterodox Brasidas. Thus, as Westlake argues, Cnemus may have been unfairly represented by Thucydides as largely responsible for Spartans' various military failures.