Here are a few quick facts to help you with your report:

1. The war began on 4 April 431 B.C. with a Theban attempt to surprise Plataea, Athens' ally and outpost on the northern base of Cithaeron. It ended on 25 April 404 B.C., when Athens capitulated.

2. The cities of the Boetian Confederacy under Theban leadership were Sparta's allies from the first. Syracuse and other Sicilian cities gave active help in the last part of the war. Argos, her hand tied by a treaty with Sparta, remained neutral during the first ten years, but as a democracy, was benevolently inclined towards Athens. Persia at first held aloof, waiting for an opportunity to regain her dominion over the Greek cities of the Asiatic seaboard, which Athens had liberated, but finally provided the crucial financial and logistic support required by Sparta to conduct a maritime offensive. Athens, was unpopular with many members of her own empire, but held most under control by her maritime supremacy.

3. The underlying cause of the war was Sparta's fear of the growth of the power of Athens.

4. Three phases of the War:
The Archidamian war: phase 1 431-427; phase 2 426-421
The Sicilian war: 421-413
The Ionian or Decelean War: phase 1 412-404; phase 2 407-404
Source(s):
http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~dee/GREECE/PELOWARS.HTM

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