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SS.6.W.3.4
The Persians started
out as a small tribe in
present-day Iran.
 They built a large
empire by conquering
their neighbors.
 At its height, the
Persian Empire was the
largest empire the
world had ever known.
 King Darius reigned
during this period.
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In 546 B.C.E. the Persians
had conquered the wealthy
Greek settlements in Ionia.
The Ionians knew they
could not defeat the
Persians alone, so they
asked mainland Greece for
help.
Athens sent soldiers and a
small fleet of ships.
Unfortunately, the
Athenians went home after
their initial success, and the
Ionian army lost control of
the region.
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Angered by the aid Greece
offered during the Ionian
revolt, King Darius decided
to conquer mainland
Greece as well.
He demanded the Greeks
obey him and pay tribute,
but they refused.
In 490 B.C.E., Darius,
furious at the Greeks for
their refusal to pay, sent a
large army across the
Aegean Sea to Greece.
They assembled on the
plain of Marathon.
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A brilliant general
named Miltiades
convinced the other
Greek commanders to
fight the Persians at
Marathon…except the
Spartans who were
celebrating a religious
festival and refused to
come.
Although Miltiades was
left with far fewer men
than the Persians, he
decided to attack.
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At Marathon, Miltiades
ordered the center
portion of his army to
advance.
When the Persians also
came forward, he
ordered the left and right
sides of his army to
sweep down and attack
the Persians from the
sides as well.
The Greeks won a
stunning victory, but
their fight with the
Persians had just begun.
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After King Darius died, his
son, Xerxes, organized
another attack on Greece.
He put together a huge army
of more than 180,000 soldiers.
To get his army to Greece,
Xerxes chose to cross the
Hellespont, a narrow sea
channel between Europe and
Asia.
There he made 2 bridges by
roping hundreds of boats
together with wooden boards
across their bows.
Then he walked his army
across the channel into
Europe.
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Several Greek city-states were
overwhelmed, so Athens and
Sparta decided they had to
come together to fight their
enemy.
The Athenian navy would try
to stop the Persian navy, and
the Spartan army, led by King
Leonidas, would try to stop the
Persian army.
The Spartans chose to make
their stand at a place called
Thermopylae, where the
Persian army would have to go
through a narrow pass
between the mountains and
the sea.
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Leonidas has only 6,0007,000 Greek troops
under his command to
stop 180,000 Persians.
They were able to hold
off the Persians for
awhile, but then a Greek
traitor led the Persians
through a mountain path
that would allow them to
attack the Greeks from
more than one angle.
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Surrounded, Leonidas
knew that he could only
delay the Persian
advance.
To keep his army from
being destroyed, he
ordered most of his
troops to escape.
With a much smaller
army, including 300
Spartans, he prepared to
fight.
Although they fought
bravely, all 300 were
killed.
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When the news of the
slaughter at Thermopylae
reached Athens, most
people panicked and fled.
Themistocles, an Athenian
navy leader, decided to try
to fight the Persian navy in
the narrow channels
between the islands and
the mainland.
The Athenians knew those
waterways well, and the
Persians would find it hard
to maneuver their ships
around the Greek navy.
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Themistocles set a trap
for the Persian navy near
a place called Salamis.
He sent a loyal slave to
Xerxes’ camp with a
message that
Themistocles wanted to
change sides and join
the Persians.
If Xerxes attacked now,
he said, half the Greek
sailors would surrender.
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Xerxes fell for the trick and
ordered his ships to enter
the narrow waterway.
As the Persians
approached, the Greek
ships seemed to retreat in
order to throw them off.
Really, they were just trying
to lure them deeper into
the channel.
Soon, the Persian ships
were surrounded, and the
Greeks sank 300 Persian
ships.
The Greeks only lost 40
ships!
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After the defeat at Salamis,
Xerxes left the rest of his army
in Greece with orders to
attack again in the spring of
479 B.C.E.
When spring arrived, the
Persians approached Athens
once more, and a decisive
battle took place near the
town of Plataea.
Led by the Spartans, a force of
80,000 Greek troops
destroyed the Persian army,
and the threat from the
Persian Empire was over.
This important victory
preserved the Greeks’
independence.