The Persian Wars

MEDITERRANEAN PEOPLES HIST 1301 | History The Persian Wars A fight between the Greek city-states and the growing Persian Empire took place during the Persian Wars (492–449 BCE). Across the Aegean from Greece in western Asia Minor (Turkey), the Greek city-states of Ionia were subjugated by Persian soldiers in the mid-sixth century BCE under Cyrus the Great. The Persians imposed despots on the city, hiring Greek locals as their subjects. The local Greek population, together with Athens and the Greek towns on the island of Cyprus, revolted against the tyrants' authority in 499 BCE as the Ionian Rebellion. However, by 494 BCE, Ionian and Cypriot uprisings had been put down by Persian armies. The Persian monarch Darius determined that Athens had to pay for meddling in Persian affairs.Darius built up a sizable fleet and army in 490 BCE with the intention of crossing the Aegean from Asia Minor to conquer Athens and appoint one of Pisistratus's sons as a tyrant there. On Attica's western shore, at Marathon, these Persian soldiers made their landing. Although they were recruited subjects with no incentive to fight and perish, they significantly outnumbered the Athenians. In contrast, the troops in Athens had a strong desire to protect their democracy. In the Battle of Marathon, the Persians were driven back into their ships because they were unable to stave off the Athenians' fierce assault. The Persians then sailed across Attica to Athens after leaving the conflict. To protect the city, the troops at Marathon ran by land across the peninsula. The Persians were routed as they saw the city held, and they fled back to Asia Minor. The son and heir of Darius, Xerxes, invaded Greece in 480 BCE with the goal of exacting revenge and destroying all of the Greek city-states. He put together an army that would invade by land from the north, together with an even bigger navy. The majority of the Greek city-states made the decision to band together as allies during this difficult period and create the organisation known as the Hellenic League. Athens oversaw the navy, while Sparta commanded the soldiers. At Thermopylae, a narrow pass in northern Greece that separates mountains and the sea, a small group of the bigger land forces—mostly Spartans—made the decision to hold their ground. Their objective was to delay the Persian army so that the remaining soldiers could organise a defence, rather than to destroy them despite their massive numerical advantage. A Greek traitor notified the Persians of another mountain route, which allowed them to surround and circumnavigate the Spartans, after the tiny Spartan force, under the leadership of their king Leonidas, had successfully repelled a far larger Persian army for days. The Greeks were motivated to battle on and preserve the Hellenic League by the Spartan force's commitment to fighting to the death. Following the Thermopylae Battle, the Persian army moved closer to Athens. The Athenians fled their city and took refuge on the adjacent island of Salamis, relying on their navy to keep them safe. Athens commanded the united Greek force that defeated the Persian ships in the naval Battle of Salamis. Xerxes then made the decision to remove a large portion of his army from Greece since he lacked a ship to supply them. The diminished Persian army withdrew from Athens and withdrew to the Boeotia lowlands, which lay immediately north of Attica, in 479 BCE. At the Battle of Plataea, the Persian army confronted the Greek allied troops led by Sparta as they pushed into Boeotia. The majority of the Persian army was either killed or captured in the conflict, since the Persian forces—which consisted primarily of drafted individuals—were no match for the Spartan soldiers.