ABSTRACT
In 499 bc, a number of the Ionian Greek states in Asia Minor rebelled against Persian rule, with the support of Athens and the small state of Eretria on the island of Euboea. e rebellion was crushed by Darius I in 494, but it allegedly provided one of the prompts for Darius’ naval invasion in 490 of the western Greek world, including the islands of the Cyclades and the Greek mainland. (is followed a Persian land and sea campaign to the west in 492, which resulted in the conquest of race and Macedonia but was ended prematurely because of several major setbacks, including the destruction of a large part of Persia’s eet in a storm o Cape Athos.) e Persian navy gained control of a number of Cycladic islands en route, captured Eretria through an act of treachery, and anchored in the bay of Marathon in preparation for an assault upon Athens, 35 km away. Here on the Marathon plain, the Persians were resoundingly defeated by forces from Athens and Plataea (the latter lay in Boeotia in central Greece), and forced to abandon their Greek campaign. But Darius’ successor Xerxes (486-465) made plans for a fresh assault upon mainland Greece, preparing a massive force for a coordinated invasion by land and sea, under his personal command, via the coast of race and Macedonia. e Persians advanced with little resistance through the Greek mainland until they reached Athens, which they captured and destroyed. But they were forced to abort their invasion when they suered major defeats by the allied Greek forces in a sea battle in the strait of Salamis just o the coast of Attica (480) and a land battle the following year at Plataea.
