A colony is in its broadest definition an organized settlement typically distant from its origin. Colonies can be as small as a military outpost or trading hub, or they can comprise whole territories larger and more populous than the imperial center. The relationship between a colony and its mother city or country is similarly variable. For the Greeks, colonial ventures were organized by the mother city, or metropolis, sometimes with the cooperation of another city, and at times were a result of political exile. The Greeks were prolific colonizers and spread along the shoreline of the Aegean, Mediterranean, and Black Seas. Melos was one such colonial enterprise undertaken by the Dorians (the same ethnic group the Spartans hailed from). The Melian colony began in the first wave of Greek colonization, and as such it was entirely independent by the time of the Peloponnesian War.

Divination is a method of predicting the future by consulting the supernatural. The practice was widespread in the Greek world, practiced by individuals or at organized religious sites, i.e., oracles. The methods of divination ran the gamut from augury (observing omens, e.g., bird flight patterns), throwing lots or dice, hydromancy (reading the waters), pyromancy (reading the flames), necromancy (consulting the dead, similar to a séance), drawing writings at random (similar to fortune cookies), inspecting pebbles, or examining animal entrails (of an offering sacrificed to the god consulted).