<P> In 446 BC a revolt broke out in Boeotia which was to spell the end of Athens' "continental empire" on the Greek mainland . Tolmides led an army out to challenge the Boeotians, but, after some early successes, was defeated at the Battle of Coronea . In the wake of this defeat, Pericles adopted a more moderate stance and Athens abandoned Boeotia, Phocis, and Locris . </P> <P> The defeat at Coronea, however, triggered a more dangerous disturbance, in which Euboea and Megara revolted . Pericles crossed over to Euboea with his troops to quash the rebellion there, but was forced to return when the Spartan army invaded Attica . Through negotiation and possibly bribery, Pericles persuaded the Spartan king Pleistoanax to lead his army home . Back in Sparta, Pleistoanax would later be prosecuted for failing to press his advantage, and fined so heavily that he was forced to flee into exile, unable to pay . With the Spartan threat removed, Pericles crossed back to Euboea with 50 ships and 5,000 soldiers, crushing all opposition . He then inflicted a harsh punishment on the landowners of Chalcis, who lost their properties . The residents of Istiaia, who had butchered the crew of an Athenian trireme, were uprooted and replaced by 2,000 Athenian settlers . The arrangement between Sparta and Athens was ratified by the "Thirty Years' Peace" (winter of 446--445 BC). According to this treaty, Megara was returned to the Peloponnesian League, Troezen and Achaea became independent, Aegina was to be a tributary to Athens but autonomous, and disputes were to be settled by arbitration . Each party agreed to respect the alliances of the other . </P> <P> The middle years of the First Peloponnesian War marked the peak of Athenian power . Holding Boeotia and Megara on land and dominating the sea with its fleet, the city had stood utterly secure from attack . The events of 447 BC and 446 BC, however, destroyed this position, and although not all Athenians gave up their dreams of unipolar control of the Greek world, the peace treaty that ended the war laid out the framework for a bipolar Greece . In return for abandoning her continental territories, Athens received recognition of her alliance by Sparta . The peace concluded in 445 BC, however, would last for less than half of its intended 30 years . In 431 BC, Athens and Sparta would go to war once again in the (second) Peloponnesian War, with decidedly more conclusive results . </P>

The peloponnesian war ended in 404 bce with the complete defeat of ____