In engagements of 200 to 300 ships—and there were several such showdowns in the latter Peloponnesian War—40,000 to 60,000 men, the equivalent of a large Greek city, were at once hurling missiles, rowing, boarding, clinging to wreckage, and swimming to shore. So in minutes the seas were flooded with the flotsam and jetsam of broken triremes, bodies, and men splashing and clinging to debris. Because there were no uniforms or clear naval insignia—oarsmen probably wore little more than a loincloth during summer sailing—crews sometimes even attacked their own ships, killing friendly sailors in the
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