1. War, Glory, and Decline 4 iv

2. The Persian Wars
546 B.C the Persian armies led by Cyrus II conquered the Greek city-states of Ionia in Asia minor.

3. "I am Cyrus, who founded the empire of the Persians
"I am Cyrus, who founded the empire of the Persians. Grudge me not therefore, this little earth that covers my body." (Inscription on the tomb)

4. 499 B.C. the Ionians revolted against the Persians, but Darius I of Persia defeats them and decides to punish them for revolting.

5. Marathon Darius’s first try fails due to storms.
In 490 B.C. sent fleet directly across the Ægean to Marathon (25 mi. North of Athens).
Wait for the Athenians but seeing they are outnumbered 2 to 1, Athens does nothing.
1st tries to send army around the nothern coast of the Aegean Sea. Supply ships are destroyed in storm forced back

6. The forces.

7. Athens strike not letting Persia take the offensive.
Marathon
Persians decide to attack so they begin loading their cavalry and infantry into ships.
Athens strike not letting Persia take the offensive.
Cavalry strongest part of Persian Army.

8. Persian Cavalry

9. Persian Immortal

11. Marathon
Athenian foot soldiers are ordered to charge down a hill and attack Persians in the shallow water waiting to board ships.
Persians are taken by surprise and defeated losing 6,400 men to only 192 Greek casualties. The Persians withdraw from Greece. .
The Athenian Army was outnumbered 4 to 1 but they launched a suprise offensive thrust which at the time appeared suicidal. But by day's end, 6400 Persian bodies lay dead on the field while only 192 Athenians had been killed. The surviving Persians fled to sea and headed south to Athens where they hoped to attack the city before the Greek Army could re-assemble there The Athens, vastly outnumbered, desperately needed the help of Sparta's military base to help fend off the attack. Time was short, so the Athenian generals send Phidippides (or Philippides) a professional runner to Sparta to ask for help. The 140 mile course was very mountainous and rugged. Phidippides ran the course in about 36 hours. Sparta agreed to help but said they would not take the field until the moon was full due to religious laws. This would leave the Athenians alone to fight the Persian Army. Phidippides ran back to Athens (another 140 miles!) with the disappointing news. Immediately, the small Athenian Army (including Phidippedes) marched to the plains of Marathon to prepare for battle.

12. Greek soldier fighting a Persian soldier.

13. According to legend, Phedippides carried the news of the victory at Marathon back to Athens. Because he had previously run 280 mi in four days he barely managed to reach the city and deliver his message before he fell to the ground dead from exhaustion. Get word marathon to describe a long-distance race.
Phidippides was again called upon to run to Athens (26 miles away) to carry the news of the victory and the warning about the approaching Persian ships. Despite his fatigue after his recent run to Sparta and back and having fought all morning in heavy armor, Phidippides rose to the challenge. Pushing himself past normal limits of human endurance, the reached Athens in perhaps 3 hours, deliverd his message and then died shortly thereafter from exhaustion. Sparta and the other Greek polies eventually came to the aid of Athens and eventually they were able to turn back the Persian attempt to conquer Greece.

14. Phidippedes run to Athens.

15. Fig. 1: A view of Persopolis looking across the palace of Xerxes.
480 B.C. Darius’s son, Xerxes, invaded Greece from the north with 200,000 soldiers.

16. Offshore supply ships accompanied them to supply their large army.
Battle of Salamis
Offshore supply ships accompanied them to supply their large army.

17. The oracle at Delphi predicted that Greece would be safe behind a wooden wall.

18. The Athenian general Themistocles convinced Greece that a “wooden wall” meant a fleet of ships. The Greeks would have to defeat the Persians at sea.

19. A delaying action on land at Thermopylae (a mountain pass north of Athens) was needed.

21. 7,000 Greeks led by King Leonidas of Sparta stood firm against the Persians for three days.
A Greek traitor showed the enemy a trail where they could attack from behind.

22. Realizing he would be surrounded, Leonidas sent off most of his troops while he and 300 Spartans fought to the death to buy Themistocles time to carry out his plan.
Phase two: the drama of Thermopylae. The Battle at Thermopylae, 480 B.C. Persians Greeks
Infantry
Cavalry None
Xerxes ordered his corps d'elite, the Immortals, to attack the Greek stronghold. This elite unite was called the Immortals as before a battle people were assigned to immediately take in the place of a fallen person. This way the strength of the unit was always the same. Leonidas' men held out magnificently for two days against the best that Xerxes could sent at them, and they would have probably continued this for several more days if a traitor would not have shown the Persians an ill-guarded mountain track. The men who had to guard this path could not stop the sudden attack and were forced to retreat higher into the mountains. The Immortals could now move round on Leonidas' rear. When he heard of this he sent everybody home except his famed 300 Spartans and the men from Thespiae. The Thebans also stayed, but not because they wanted too: they were an insurance that Thebes would not collaborate to the Persians. All but the Thebans, who did surrender, fought and died. It was almost a victory.

23. Themistocles drew the Persian fleet into the strait of Salamis, a narrow body of water between Athens and Salamis, causing the heavy Persian ships to crowd together and be easy targets for the lighter Greek ships.

24. Fig. 14: A speculative overview of the distribution of forces for the battle of Salamis; the red forces are Greek, the yellow ones Persian.
The Battle at Salamis, 480 B.C.
Persians Greeks
Phoenicia 150 Athens Egypt
100 Ionian Greeks 50 Cyprus 20 Lycia 25 Karia 30 Cilicia
Fleet
50 Others Aegina 20 Megara 50 Peloponesse 40 Corinth 20 Others
Total
Triremes 310 Triremes

25. The Greek navy destroyed the Persian fleet forcing the Persians to retreat.

26. With the end of the Persian Wars, Athens emerged as the most powerful city-state in Greece.

27. The Golden Age of Athens
The period from 461 B.C. to 429 B.C. when Greek culture reached its peak through achievements in the arts and sciences centered mostly in Athens.

28. Pericles, an Athenian general, led Athens through the Golden Age
If anyone can be credited with creating the Athens that you picture when you hear the word, it is this man. Pericles was the architect of Athenian foreign policy. Pericles was the force behind many of the buildings on the acropolis, including the Parthenon itself. Pericles made Athens the most powerful city in Greece, and the most beautiful. And the richest.
He finally arranged peace with Persia, in 449, a peace that lasted almost 40 years. That treaty in turn allowed Pericles to transfer the treasury of the Delian League to Athens, where it became a convenient and deep extension to the city treasury.
The sudden influx of wealth paid for the beautiful Parthenon and other statues and buildings. It paid also for the fortification of the Piraeus, making the port of Athens vulnerable only by sea. And from the port to Athens itself he caused to be built the famous Long Walls--a pair of walls seven miles long with space between them for four wagons across. The Long Walls, and the fortifications at Piraeus, essentially extended Athens down to the sea, where her magnificent navy ruled.

29. After the Persians burned Athens, Pericles began rebuilding Athens in 447 B.C.

31. The Acropolis with the Parthenon (temple to Athena) represented all that was best in Athens, making it the most beautiful city-state in Greece.

33. Daily Life Public buildings were lavish
Homes were simple with two main rooms
dining room for entertaining
wool room for spinning for the women
Courtyards contained an alter for worship, wash basin, a well, and livestock.

34. Slaves
Mostly were foreigners or prisoners of war
Did most of the heavy work such as mining and craft production.
Worked as teachers and servants in the home.

35. Men worked in the morning
attended the Assembly or the Gymnasium in the Afternoon

36. Upper-class Athenian men enjoyed the symposium as a form of recreation.
A symposium was a drinking session followed by a banquet. Wives were excluded.

37. Women
Most women spent time at home cooking and making wool cloth.
Poor women worked in the open air markets as food sellers and cloth weaver.

38. Public opinion allowed the greatest freedom in the metic class.
Despite restrictions, many Athenian women were able to participate in public life and were able to read and write.
Public opinion allowed the greatest freedom in the metic class.

39. The most famous metic woman was Aspasia who was known for her intelligence and personal charm.
I believe Periclese and Aspasia were married.

40. The Peloponnesian War

41. After the Persian Wars, Athens persuaded city-states excluding Sparta to ally against any future attack.

42. This alliance became known as the Delian League because the treasury was kept on the sacred island of Delos.
Prosperous time
- Athens provided the naval and land forces while others provided money and ships
- freed Ionia from Persian rule
- swept the Agean free of pirates
- overseas trade expanded and greece grew richer.
A league was formed in 477, with a common treasury (a war chest) at the sacred island of Delos. Athens was the dominant member and an Athenian was always to be admiral of the combined fleet. The other members contributed men and ships and money. Sparta was not a member. Because the treasury was kept at Delos, we call this the Delian League.
The League was successful in its immediate aim of driving the Persians from the northern Aegean. By the later 470s, the League had cleared much of the southern Aegean, too, and some of the League's members began to consider the work complete.

43. Athens began to dominate under Pericles’ rule.
Part of the treasury was used to build the Parthenon.
Criminal cases were only tried in Athens.
Other city-states had to adopt Athenian coinage system.
Athens’s trade and political influence grew, transforming Athens into an Empire.

44. As a result, Sparta and other rival city-states formed their own alliance against Athens.

45. Conflict ( )
At the beginning of the war, Athens had the superior navy, while Sparta had no navy.

46. Sparta made a deal with Persia to return Ionia in exchange for gold to build its own fleet.

47. In 430 B.C. a disastrous plague, probably typhus, weakened Athens losing around 1/3 of its population including Pericles in 429 B.C.
Mass grave of those who died from this plague

48. Some Athenians wanted peace while others urged to keep fighting.
War continued deadlocked for many years.

49. Athenian Hoplite

50. Spartan Hoplite

51. Sparta destroyed the Athenean fleet and laid siege to Athens, bringing their surrender in 404 B.C.

52. Effects of the War
There was a decline in population.
Land was destroyed.
Unemployment was so widespread that many men became mercenaries, or hired soldiers, in the Persian Army.
Greece lost their ability to govern themselves.