Text 5: Greek Wars With Lesson 2: The Greek City-States ...€¦ · Text 5: Greek Wars With Persia Topic 5: Ancient Greece Lesson 2: The Greek City-States. Greek City-States Join

Text 5: Greek Wars With

Persia

Topic 5: Ancient GreeceLesson 2: The Greek City-States

Greek City-States Join Together

In 500 B.C.E. the Greek world was small

The rival city-states and a growing number of Greek colonies scattered around the Mediterranean

The Greeks were often bitterly divided

Athens, the wealthiest Greek city-state, had rivals

More powerful than any Greek city-state was the huge Persian empire, that lay to the east, just across the Aegean Sea

When the Persians threatened them, the Greeks briefly put aside their differences to defend their freedom

The Persians had conquered a huge empire from Asia Minor to the border of India

Their subjects included the Greek city-states of Ionia in Asia Minor

Though under Persian rule, these Ionian city-states were largely self-governing

Still, they resented their situation

In 499 B.C.E. Ionian Greeks rebelled

Athens sent ships to help them

As the historian Herodotus wrote some years later, “These ships were the beginning of mischief both to the Greeks and to the barbarians”

They triggered the Persian Wars, a series of wars that lasted on and off for half a century

Athens Wins at Marathon

The Persians crushed the rebel cities in Ionia

Emperor Darius I was furious at Athens

Darius sent a huge force across the Aegean to punish Athens for its interference

The mighty Persian army landed near Marathon, a plain north of Athens, in 490 B.C.E.

The Persians greatly outnumbered Athenian forces

The invaders were amazed to see “a mere handful of men coming on at a run without either horsemen or archers.”

The Persians responded with a rain of arrows, but the Greeks rushed onward

They broke through the Persian line and engaged in fierce hand-to-hand combat

Overwhelmed, the Persians hastily retreated to their ships

The Athenian leader, Themistocles, knew the victory at Marathon had bought only a temporary lull in the fighting- urged Athens to build a fleet of ships for an army

Joint Effort

In 480 B.C.E. Darius's son Xerxes sent a much larger force to conquer Greece

Athens had persuaded Sparta and other city-states to join in the fight against Persia

Once again, the Persians landed in northern Greece

A small Spartan force guarded the narrow mountain pass at Thermopylae

Led by their great warrior-king Leonidas, the Spartans held out heroically against the enormous Persian force but were defeated in the end

The Persians marched south and burned Athens which was empty

The Athenians had already withdrawn to safety, using the ships Themistocles had urged them to build

The Athenians lured the Persian fleet into the narrow strait of Salamis where Athenian warships rammed, burned, and sank the Persian fleet

From the shore, Xerxes watched helplessly

The next year, the Greeks defeated the Persians on land in Asia Minor

This victory marked the end of the Persian invasions

In a brief moment of unity, the Greek city-states had saved themselves from the Persian threat

The Delian League

Victory in the Persian Wars increased the Greek sense of their own uniqueness

The gods, they felt, had protected their superior form of government—the city-state—against invaders from Asia

Athens emerged from the war as the most powerful city-state in Greece

To meet continued threats from Persia, it organized with other Greek city-states an alliance

Modern scholars call this alliance the Delian League after Delos, the location where the league held meetings

Athens dominated the Delian League used its position of leadership to create an Athenian empire

It moved the league treasury from the island of Delos to Athens and forced reluctant allies to remain in the league against their will

It even used money contributed by other city-states to rebuild Athens

Yet, while Athens was enforcing its will abroad, Athenian leaders were championing political freedom at home