In I.21.2 Thucydides moves on to a

In I.21.2 Thucydides moves on to a fresh topic which does not supply any reason for his believing at the beginning of the war that the war would be great. The following chapters are therefore not part of the 'Archaeology'. He begins with the assertion that the very actions of the Peloponnesian War show it to have been greater than any preceding war (I.21.2). In I.22, which treats of his method in ascertaining and expounding the speeches and events of the Peloponnesian War, the connexion of thought lies in the slender thread formed by the word Epya. In I.23 this phrase is resumed, and he demonstrates in I.23.1-3 that the Epya of the Peloponnesian War were greater than the Epya of the Persian War. These chapters I.21.2-23.3 do not concern either the grounds for Thucydides' belief at the beginning of the war or the disturbance which preceded and led up to the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War. They only maintain that in length of duration and in their concomitant destruction the 'actions' of the Peloponnesian War surpassed those of the Persian War and of any preceding war.