Thucydides, puts very little emphasis upon the decree in his analysis of the cause of the war and treats it as a pretext on the part of the Spartans. Thucydides considers the true cause of the war to be Sparta's fear of Athens' growing empire. He does not describe the decree in detail, unlike for the conflicts over Potidaea and Corcyra. The main evidence for the significance of the decree is Aristophanes, an ancient playwright and satirist of the time. His play The Acharnians (II.530-7) mentions how the decree left the Megarians "slowly starving" and caused them to appeal to the Spartans for aid. Another of Aristophanes's plays, Peace, also mentions how war was being brewed in Megara by the god of war. However, as these are comedic plays meant to entertain, their veracity as historical records are questionable. Oblique references to the decree in Thucydides seems to suggest its importance since the Spartans state that "war could be avoided if Athens would revoke the Megarian decree". However, Thucydides also reports that the Spartans had sought a declaration of war from the Peloponnesian League during the rebellion of Samos in 440, well before the Megarian decree had been passed. Donald Kagan interprets the decree as an attempt by Athens to solve a problem without breaking the Thirty Years' Peace with Sparta. Megara had injured Athens in a way that required some meaningful response, but Athens openly attacking the Spartan ally would violate the peace. Athens thus imposed the embargo, which was meant to show other Spartan allies that Athens had commercial means of punishing attackers who were under Sparta's military protection. Thus, the decree could be seen as an attempt to avoid provoking Sparta directly. Alternative Interpretations The historical revisionist G. E. M. de Ste. Croix argues that a trade sanction would not significantly affect Megara as the decree applied only to Megarian citizens although the majority of trade in all cities was likely conducted by metics (foreigners or outsiders), who would be unaffected by a ban on citizens of Megara. The scholar attributed the war to the Spartan zeal for war, which he said was driven by a number of factors such as a sense of invincibility, its vulnerability as a polity, and the danger posed by its massive slave population. De Ste. Croix also highlights the uncertainty regarding the context in which the decree was passed. At the