Definition: The Peace of Nicias was named for an Athenian leader, Nicias, who came to power after the death of Pericles and opposed, but then led the Sicilian Expedition. Just as Pericles was associated with the Peloponnesian War, so Nicias was associated with the peace and it was for this reason, according to Plutarch, that it was given his name.
The Peace of Nicias was a treaty made between Sparta and Athens and concluded in 421 B.C., during the Peloponnesian War, that was supposed to last for 50 years and cover the allies of each side. It basically returned matters to their status before the war.
Allies were not consulted, and Spartan allies were unwilling to abide by the treaty.
Within 7 years the Peace of Nicias was over.
Examples: About the Peace of Nicias, Plutarch writes:
The articles being, that the garrisons and towns taken on either side, and the prisoners should be restored, and they to restore the first to whom it should fall by lot, Nicias, as Theophrastus tells us, by a sum of money procured that the lot should fall for the Lacedaemonians to deliver the first.
Plutarch's Life of Nicias
