Download Greco-Persian War Essay, Research Paper In September of 490 BC

Greco-Persian War Essay, Research Paper
In September of 490 BC. The Greco-Persian war rages on in the Marathon Plain of Northwest
Attica. The Athenians have just repulsed the first Persian invasion of Greece. The Greek army
was vested to ten different generals each controlling one day of battle. The generals were evenly
divided on whether to wait for the Persians to attack or to attack them. A civil official,
Callimachus, who decided to attack, broke the tie. Four of the generals ceded their commands to
the Athenian general Miltiades making him commander in chief. The Greeks did not want to face
the Persian cavalry on the open plain, but before dawn the Greeks learned the cavalry was
temporarily absent from the Persian camp. Miltiades ordered a general attack on the Persian
army. He led his contingent of 10,000 Athenians and 1,000 Plataeans against the Persian force of
15,000. By re-enforcing his battle lines flank thus decoying the Persians best troops into pushing
back his center where they were surrounded by inward-wheeling Greek wings. According to
legend an Athenian messenger was sent from Marathon to Athens, a distance of 25 miles, where
he announced the Persian defeat before dying of exhaustion. That tale became the basis for the
modern marathon race. Herodotus tells that a trained runner Pheidippides was sent from Athens
to Sparta before the battle to request assistance from the Spartans. He is said to have run some
150 miles in about two days.
Through all the fighting there was one tradition that continued through all the ages. For centuries
Olympic games have never stopped. The Olympian games were celebrated in the summer every
four years in the sanctuary of Zeus at Olympia. The order of events is really not known but they
believe that the first day was devoted for sacrifices to the gods. The second day began with foot
races. Spectators gathered in the stadion, an oblong area enclosed by sloping banks of earth. On
other days wrestling, boxing, and the pancratium, a combination of the two, was held. In the first
of the sports the object was to throw your opponent to the ground three times. Contestants in
boxing would originally wrap strips of soft leather over their fingertips to deaden the blows; they
then started using hard leather weighted with metal. They fought until one opponent
acknowledged defeat. Horse racing and a pentathlon next, the pentathlon included sprinting, long
jumping, javelin, discus, and wrestling. Every event that the ancient Olympians had, we now
have, and the Olympics is still a chance for life long enemies to put aside their weapons and
compete as gentlemen. The Olympic games are a way for all kinds to get along if only for a short
time.
By Josh Rudolph
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