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THIRD MILLENNIUM LIBRARY |
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A HISTORY OF PERSIA
CHAPTER XVII
THE REPULSE OF PERSIA BY
HELLAS
A King sate on the rocky brow
Which looks o'er sea-born
Salamis;
And ships, by thousands, lay
below,
And men in nations — all were
his!
He counted them at break of
day —
And, when the sun set, where
were they?
Byron.
The Accession of Xerxes. 485 BC. — According to Persian custom,
Darius had many wives. Among them was the daughter of Gobryas, one of his
fellow-conspirators in the attack on the false Gaumata. By her he had three
children, the eldest of whom, Artabazanes, had long been regarded as heir to
the throne. But Atossa, daughter of Cyrus, ranked supreme, and her influence on
the old king was so strong that just before his death he nominated as his
successor her son Khshayarsha, better known by his Greek name Xerxes, and he
ascended the throne without opposition. The new monarch, the Ahasuerus of the
book of Esther, was famous for his radiant beauty and superb physique, but he
was indolent, weak, and easily swayed by his advisers. Voluptuous and fond of
luxury, he had no desire for glory, and to these defects in his character
Greece, in all probability, owed her salvation. From the first he was inclined
to treat the failure in Hellas as of no importance; but Mardonius insisted that
the prestige of Persia would suffer, and remonstrated with such effect that in
the end he gained his point, and the great invasion was undertaken.
The Rebellion in Egypt crushed. 484 BC.— But first Xerxes marched on Egypt to put down
the rebellion, and although Khabbisha had for two years been busily preparing
to face the coming storm, the Egyptians were crushed. The pretender
disappeared, but his supporters were severely punished and the delta was ravaged.
Achaemenes, the king’s brother, was appointed Satrap, and Egypt settled down as
before, the hereditary princes and the priests being left in full possession of
their powers and properties.
The Revolt of Babylon. 483 BC.— Egypt was not the only cause of anxiety to
Xerxes. There was a short-lived rebellion in Babylon, where a pretender of
unknown origin, Shamasherib by name, was crowned king. A siege of a few months,
however, sufficed for the capture of the great city, and on this occasion not
only was Babylon sacked, but the temples were plundered and the people carried
into captivity. Xerxes showed no fear of Bel-Marduk, whose treasury he looted
and whose golden statue he carried off. Babylon never recovered. From the time
of this siege her commerce, her religion, her influence and her glory gradually
passed away. But the work of the great city was accomplished; and when we
reckon up what our modern civilization owes to Babylon, we cannot fail to be
astonished at the greatness of our debt.
The Composition and Numbers of the Great
Expedition.— In 481 BC the preparations for the greatest of
recorded expeditions were completed, and in the autumn of that year the various
contingents assembled in the province of Cappadocia and marched to Lydia, where
Xerxes spent the winter. The force under his orders, drawn from every quarter
of the enormous Persian empire, was so impressive that, vast as the numbers
undoubtedly were, they have become legendary and exaggerated. The best account
of the various elements that made up the army is supplied by Herodotus. It is
not only delightfully graphic, but of great value to the ethnologist as well as
the historian.
The Persians and Medes head
the list, armed with lance, bow, and sword; the Cissians and the Hyrcanians are
mentioned next, as being armed like the Persians; the Assyrians with bronze
helmets follow; the Bactrians, Arians, Parthians, and neighboring tribes with
javelins and spears; the Sakae, noted warriors with curious pointed caps and
battle-axes; the Indians with their cotton coats; the Ethiopians of Africa with
painted bodies, and armed with long bows and stone-tipped arrows; the
Ethiopians of Asia—probably the aborigines of Southern Persia and Makran—with
extraordinary helmets made of horses’ heads; and others, down to the remote
islanders of the Persian Gulf. Over each levy was set a Persian, and the army
was divided roughly into divisions, regiments, companies, and sections. The
supreme command of the infantry was vested in Mardonius, but the “Immortals”
had a separate commander.
The mounted troops, including
in this category the tribes which fought from chariots, consisted mainly of
Persians and Medes, and included some 8000 Sagartians from Northern Persia,
armed with lassos. There were also Cissians and Indians, the latter with
chariots drawn by wild asses, which could hardly have been of much military value;
Bactrians, Caspians, and Libyans who fought from chariots; and there was
besides a force of Arabs mounted on dromedaries.
The twelve hundred and seven
warships, with crews averaging 200 men, were supplied by the Phoenicians,
Egyptians, and subject Greeks, and each vessel carried a few Persians or Sakae,
who acted as marines and supported the Persian commanders. There were 3000
transports.
Herodotus gives the
composition of the grand army as follows:
(a) Infantry .... 1,700,000
(b) Mounted troops . . .
100,000
(c) Sailors and marines . .
510,000
Total ……………………………2,310,000
Reinforcements in Europe and
servants bring up the figures to over five millions, a total which it is
impossible to accept. In view of the reliance the Persians placed on numbers
and the size of the empire, we are perhaps justified in assuming that the land
and sea forces combined, inclusive of followers, aggregated perhaps two millions.
In any case, no invasion on such a scale had ever before been attempted, and
its immensity constituted the highest compliment to the valor of Hellas. But in
its very numbers lay its weakness; for such an army could not be used for any
lengthy turning movement, owing to the ever-present difficulty of supplies, nor
could it be separated from the fleet for more than a few days at a time.
The Military Position in Greece.— As in the case of the former invasion, Athens
was the objective, and upon Athens the brunt of the attack was intended to
fall. On the other hand, the Persians, unless opposed at sea, could with the
utmost ease turn the flank of the defence of the Corinthian Isthmus or any
other line; consequently, in the last resort, Sparta’s fate was wrapped up in
that of Athens, although this was not generally grasped by the obtuse Spartans
and their confederates, who were committed to the defence of the Isthmus.
Through the exertions of Themistocles, the Athenians during the last decade had
developed their sea-power to a remarkable degree, not only by building
triremes, but also by the creation of the fortified base of the Piraeus. They
were thus able, when the invaders came, to remove the population to the
neighboring islands, and in the last resort they could have sailed away to
found a new Attica in Italy, as indeed Themistocles at one time threatened to
do.
An attempt had been made to
heal all internal feuds and to form a grand league of the entire Hellenic world
against the invader. In the first place, Argos was approached, but the
negotiations failed owing to the claim of the Argives that their state should
be placed on an equal footing with Sparta so far as the command was concerned.
Argos, however, did not declare openly in favour of Persia, although her
attitude caused grave anxiety. Gelon, tyrant of Syracuse, was also approached,
but it appears that, owing to an impending invasion of Sicily by the
Carthaginians, he was unable to give any aid. Finally, neither Crete nor Corfu
rendered any assistance to the common cause.
The March of the Great Army.— The departure from Sardes of the great army, as
described by Herodotus, must have been a wonderful sight. Intervals were
maintained only by the picked troops; the rest were armed mobs and marched in
no set order. But the mere fact that such a force could be successfully moved
and fed proves that the Persian Empire was highly organized. Its power, too, in
other directions was great; for not only were two solid bridges of vessels
constructed across the Hellespont, but the Strymon was bridged and a canal was
cut through the promontory of Athos—no slight engineering task at such a
distance from the heart of the empire. In addition, vast supply depots were
formed at the various stages, and the only vital point on which there was
occasional failure was the supply of water for such a host.
The crossing of the Hellespont
was a great feat. The two bridges of boats, across which a solid causeway was made,
were constructed with cables of exceptional strength, and the passage was made
under the eye of the Great King, who sat in state upon a marble throne erected
on a hill near Abydos. At sunrise, Xerxes poured a libation into the sea from a
golden cup and prayed that he might conquer Europe. The golden cup, a golden
bowl, and a Persian sword were thrown into the sea, and the Immortals, wearing garlands on their
heads, led the way across the bridge, which was strewn with myrtle branches.
The enormous host crossed into Europe, contingent by contingent, under the
ever-present lash, and in the plain of Doriscus the army was numbered. From
Doriscus it marched to Acanthus, where it broke up temporarily into three
divisions, to unite again at Therma.
In reply to an appeal from
Thessaly for help to defend the passage of Mount Olympus, the Greeks had in the
first place dispatched a force of ten thousand men to Tempe; but according to
Herodotus they found that the position could be outflanked, and they
consequently retreated, leaving the Thessalians to make their own terms with Xerxes,
which they promptly did. The Persian army thus advanced unopposed through
Macedonia and Thessaly, and before the first action was fought most of the Greek
states of Northern and Central Hellas had submitted, with the honorable
exceptions of Thespiae and Plataea.
The Defence of Thermopylae. 480 BC.— The Spartans, as we have seen, were committed
to the defence of the Isthmus of Corinth, and wished the Athenians to leave Attica
to the enemy and retire to the south. This proposal of a passive defence was
rightly rejected, and finally, after the retreat from Tempe, a most foolish compromise,
essentially Spartan, resulted in the dispatch of a force aggregating seven
thousand men, under Leonidas, to hold the narrow pass of Thermopylae. This was
the strong position of Hellas, situated between cliffs and the sea, and it was
guarded on the right flank by the Greek fleet of some three hundred ships,
posted off the promontory of Artemisium in Euboea. Had the Greeks sent reinforcements
and had they held the position with the full strength of Hellas, it is probable
that the might of Xerxes would have been broken by force of arms, as happened
to Brennus and his Gauls in 279 BC.
On this occasion, the fatal policy of the petit
paquet was attempted, and failed. An important division was annihilated
without materially delaying the advance of the enemy. On the other hand, the
moral effect on the Persian army of the valor that was displayed must have been
enormous; and the faulty strategy does not detract a whit from, but rather
heightens, the immortal fame of Leonidas and his band of heroes.
Xerxes with his countless host
marched forward from Therma, but halted and sent out a reconnoitering party upon
receiving information that the pass was held. Today the coast-line has advanced
considerably, but in 480 BC there was
only a strip of ground 100 feet wide at the base of the cliffs, and between the
two narrowest points was encamped the Greek force. The reconnoitering party
reported that the enemy were calmly engaged in athletic exercises and in
combing their long hair as if for a festival. Xerxes, who waited for four days,
apparently in the expectation that his fleet would force the passage of the
Euripus, finally ordered the Medes and Cissians, and then the Immortals, to attack. Their short spears
and indifferent armor, in spite of their courage, made no impression on the
heavily armored Greeks, who slaughtered them by hundreds. The following day the
combat was resumed, with the same result, and Xerxes was in despair. The
situation was saved for the Persians by a track across the mountains, which was
revealed by a traitor to Hellas. The Immortals were sent along it, and the Phoceans contingent which had been stationed to
guard it betrayed their trust, offering no resistance and retreating off the
track. Warning was given of this disaster, and all the contingents retired except
the Spartans, who numbered three hundred, the Thespians, and the Thebans, the
last named, according to Herodotus, being detained by force. Then the band of
heroes, not waiting to be surrounded, advanced on the Persians and fought,
against hopeless odds, that fight to the death which has earned them deathless
fame.
The Naval Engagements off Artemisium.— Meanwhile at sea much had been happening. The
Persian fleet waited at Therma for twelve days after the departure of the army,
as there was no harbor between this port and the Pagasaian Gulf. The fleet then
advanced, preceded by ten fast-sailing vessels which came upon three Greek ships
engaged in reconnoitering duties off the mouth of the River Peneius. Two of
these were destroyed. The squadrons of the invaders arrived on the Magnesian
coast in safety, but owing to its numbers the armada had to lie in eight lines
parallel to the coast, and while it was at anchor in this dangerous position a
sudden storm arose and wrecked four hundred ships. After the storm had subsided,
the battered Persian fleet moved across to Aphetae, situated on the mainland
opposite Artemisium.
The Persians, who were by no
means lacking in initiative, and who never dreamed of defeat, detached two hundred
ships to sail round Euboea with a view to sealing up the straits that separated
that island from the mainland, hoping thereby to capture the whole of the Greek
fleet. This move having been reported, the Greeks, under the command of the
Spartan Admiral Eurybiades, attacked the main fleet and captured thirty vessels;
the battle was, however, indecisive. On the following night, the elements again
warred in their favour and annihilated the Persian squadron which had been sent
round Euboea. This welcome intelligence was brought by a strong reinforcement
of fifty-three Athenian ships, which had probably been guarding the strait at
Chalcis. In the final encounter the Persians, who were presumably receiving
repeated orders from Xerxes to break through the Greek fleet and regain touch
with the army, engaged the enemy all along the line, and a desperate struggle
ensued. The battle was going against the Greeks, half of whose ships were damaged,
when news came of the forcing of Thermopylae.
This disaster changed the
situation and at night an order to retire was given. Had the Persian fleet
pursued in force, many of the damaged Greek ships would have been captured; but
the Persians were ignorant , of the retirement, although they should surely
have anticipated it, and the Greeks sailed leisurely along the coast of Euboea,
the Athenians acting as rearguard.
The Advance of the Persian Army and the Capture
of Athens.— So far the
campaign had gone well for the Persians. The most formidable pass had been
forced, the Greek fleet, after two engagements, had retreated, and Central
Hellas lay open and unprotected before the invaders. Xerxes marched into Phocis,
which was devastated, and then the great host turned towards Attica. The
Athenians, who had hoped for success at Thermopylae, had not vacated Athens;
but this operation was now hurriedly effected, the women and children being
sent to Troizen, Aegina, and Salamis. A few misguided individuals, relying on
an ambiguous Delphic oracle that Athens should trust to its wooden walls, held
the Acropolis; but after a desperate defence they were overcome and massacred.
Athens was at last in the hands of the invaders, and in revenge for the
destruction of Sardes its shrines were burnt. The Great King, having carried
through with success the devastation of Attica and the capture of Athens, no
doubt felt that the whole campaign would soon be crowned with victory; but he
reckoned from false premises.
The Battle of Salamis. 480 BC.— The Greek fleet, upon the urgent
representations of Themistocles, whose ability to persuade the Spartans by
arguments that would appeal to them was remarkable, after leaving Artemisium made
for Salamis, on the plea of allowing the Athenians to save their families. At
this island it received its last reinforcements, which brought the numerical
strength of the fleet, on which depended the salvation of Hellas, up to about
four hundred vessels; the number of the enemy’s ships was considerably greater.
The capture of Athens and the
advance of the Persian fleet to Phaleron caused such a panic that the
Peloponnesian contingents urgently insisted on a retreat of the fleet to the Isthmus
of Corinth, regardless of the fate of the Athenians, whose families would have
been thereby exposed to capture. The argument was that, if defeated at Salamis,
they could not hope to escape the Persians, whereas at the Isthmus they would
be protected by the united forces of Hellas. So general was this feeling that
Themistocles was in despair : but at the council of war, held under the
presidency of Eurybiades, his personality again triumphed, and he secured an
unwilling adhesion to his views by pointing out that the only hope for Hellas
was to fight in narrow waters, and that off Corinth the numerical superiority of
the Persian fleet would unquestionably tell. The Corinthian admiral tried to
force a quarrel on Themistocles by declaring that, since the Athenians had lost
their country, they were no longer in the position to give an opinion. This
attack was skillfully parried by a telling threat that, if the Athenians sailed
off to found a new Attica in Italy, they would be missed at this juncture.
Matters were in this state and
the defection of one or more contingents seemed probable when Themistocles made
his winning stroke and saved Hellas by an act of disloyalty to his colleagues.
He sent a messenger to Xerxes with the intelligence that the Greeks were contemplating
retreat, and that his opportunity to destroy them had at last come. Accustomed
to Greek treachery, Xerxes decided to trust this information, and dispatched his
Egyptian squadron of two hundred ships to close the western passage between
Salamis and Megara. His main fleet then advanced from Phaleron, and took up
station for the great battle in three lines on each side of the island of
Psyttaleia, which was occupied by a Persian force. Xerxes thought success
assured and the main object of his dispositions was to prevent the escape of
the Greeks.
Information of the movements
of the Persian fleet, which made it clear that victory alone could save Hellas,
was brought to the Council by Aristides, who had recently returned from exile.
The Greeks fully realized that their own lives and the lives of their families
were at stake. They had the advantage of homogeneity, and the fact that the
battle was to take place in narrow waters was an additional point in their favor.
The Persian fleet, on the other hand, was composed of various contingents, and,
although there was at first ample sea-room, it came into contact with the enemy
in an area which was too small for its numbers, and where an advance had to be
made in column, in face of an enemy drawn up in line. But no lack of courage
was shown by the subjects of the Great king, who realized that they were
fighting under the eye of their merciless master.
The famous sea-fight opened
favorably for the Persians. When morning dawned the Greeks, appalled by the
odds, backed their ships almost to the shore; but suddenly the courage of
despair nerved them to heroism of the highest order, and they advanced on the
enemy. The Phoenician column, which moved between Psyttaleia and the mainland,
was faced by the Athenians and Aeginetans; and the Ionian Greeks, who advanced between
Psyttaleia and Salamis, were opposed by the Peloponnesian squadrons. The battle
was desperately contested. The Persian numbers were a hindrance rather than a
help in the narrow fairways, and, although they gained ground on their left
wing, their right wing was finally defeated by the valor and skill of the
Athenians and Aeginetans, to whom, by common consent, the honors of the day
belonged. At last the Persians gave way all along the line and retreated to
Phaleron with a loss of two hundred ships, not counting those which were captured
with their crews; the Greeks lost forty ships. There was no pursuit by the
victors.
Thus ended the great naval
battle, which is one of the decisive battles of the world; for I hold, with
Grundy, that its claims to be so classed exceed those of Marathon, admitted by
the historian Creasy.
The account of the battle
given by Aeschylus, who fought in one of the ships, deserves to be quoted :
At first the Persian navy’s
torrent-flood
Withstood them : but when our
vast fleet was cramped
In strait space — friend could
lend no aid to friend,
Then ours by fangs of allies’
beaks of bronze
Were struck, and shattered all
their oar-array;
While with shrewd strategy the
Hellene ships
Swept round, and rammed us, and
upturned were hulls
Of ships; — no more could one
discern the sea,
Clogged all with wrecks and
limbs of slaughtered men:
The shores, the rock-reefs,
were with corpses strewn.
Then rowed each bark in
fleeing disarray,
Yea, every keel of our barbarian
host.
They with oar-fragments and
with shards of wrecks
Smote, hacked, as men smite
tunnies, or a draught
Of fishes; and a moaning, all
confused
With shrieking, hovered wide o’er
that sea-brine
Till night’s dark presence
blotted out the horror.
The Retreat of Xerxes.— Towards the end of the battle Xerxes had
hastily summoned a council of war and, heedless of Persian honor and prestige,
had readily allowed himself to be persuaded by Mardonius to return to Sardes
and to leave Mardonius with 300,000 troops to complete the subjugation of
Greece. The unworthy monarch withdrew unmolested from Attica, as the Spartans took
advantage of an eclipse of the sun, which occurred on 2nd October 480 BC, as an excuse for not quitting their
position at the Isthmus.
After halting in Thessaly,
Xerxes continued the retreat, losing thousands of men on the road from hunger and
disease. Finding the bridge at the Hellespont destroyed by a storm, he was glad
to escape in a ship to the safe shores of Asia, where it is stated that
thousands more of his famished soldiers died from surfeit. The Greeks pursued
the Persian fleet, but in vain. Upon reaching Andros they held a council of
war, at which Themistocles urged that they should sail north and destroy the
Hellespont bridge. Eurybiades, however, as might have been expected, strongly
objected, and on the defeat of his proposal the crafty Athenian made capital
out of it and sent his servant to Xerxes with the information. It was actions
like these which tarnished the luster of the great Athenian’s glory.
The Carthaginian Invasion of Sicily. 480 BC.— Another act in the great drama was played in
Sicily. The Carthaginians, probably instigated by Persian diplomacy, organized
a powerful force to attack Hellas in Sicily, and after losing its cavalry and chariots
in a storm the expedition reached Panormus. From this port Hamilcar the leader
marched along the sea-coast to his objective, Himera, which he besieged. Gelon,
tyrant of Syracuse, promptly came to the rescue of Theron of Himera with a
force of 50,000 infantry and 5000 cavalry. The decisive battle was prefaced by
the destruction of the Carthaginian sea-camp and the death of Hamilcar. This
operation was carried out by Syracusan cavalry, who were admitted under the
mistaken belief that they were allies. Gelon then attacked the panic-stricken
Carthaginians, who offered little resistance and were cut down or captured
almost to a man. The battle of Himera thus resulted in another decisive victory
for Hellas.
The Campaign of Mardonius.— The curtain was now raised on the third and
final act of the long, heroic struggle between the numbers of Asia and the
highly disciplined and patriotic valor of the Greeks. While halting in Thessaly,
Xerxes had entrusted to Mardonius the picked troops through whose
instrumentality the gallant Persian hoped to add Hellas to the long list of the
provinces of the Great King. He was at last freed from the encumbrance of the
undisciplined contingents, and, more important still, from the presence of the
monarch and his courtiers, whose large retinues, while not adding materially to
the fighting line, had to be fed before the warriors received their rations.
Moreover, nothing is more true in war than that disaster almost certainly
attends military operations when their conduct is interfered with by a court.
Before making any movement,
Mardonius, whose experience of the Greeks was now considerable, not only consulted
various oracles, but opened negotiations with the Athenians through King
Alexander of Macedon, offering them the honored position of allies of the Great
King. The Spartans, hearing of this, dispatched a special embassy to Athens,
and although in the past the leading land power had played but a sorry role,
the solemn oaths of the ambassadors were accepted by the sorely tried
Athenians, who nobly refused the tempting offer, in the following terms : “So
long as the sun runs his course in the heavens, we will never make terms with
Xerxes”. Mardonius, upon realizing that he could not detach the Athenians,
marched south from Thessaly and reoccupied Athens ten months after its first
capture; and once again the Athenians, unsupported by their allies, transported
their families to Salamis, where, this time, they were absolutely safe. At this
point Mardonius again opened negotiations both with the Argives and with the
Athenians, but without result. The Spartans, in face of these facts, continued
to fortify the Isthmus before the necessity for action dawned on their dull
minds. They had, indeed, strained the loyalty of the Athenians very nearly to
breaking point. At last, possibly owing to the death of Cleombrotus and the
accession of Pausanias to the command, an active policy was adopted, and the
army of the Peloponnesus, when once the order was given, marched swiftly north
to meet the foe.
Mardonius, who had destroyed
what was left of Athens, retired to Boeotia, where he was supported by allies and could use his cavalry to greater
effect than in hilly Attica. The Greek army, which included no mounted troops,
followed, and at first took up its position on the lower slopes of Mount Cithaeron,
where it was less exposed than in the open plain to the attacks of the Persian
cavalry. Mardonius sent all his cavalry, under Masistius, to harass the Greeks,
and by charging in the Persian manner division after division, it inflicted considerable
loss. Finally, however, the horse of Masistius was wounded and threw him. The
Greeks then rushed forward and killed the prostrate leader. The Persian cavalry
charged with the utmost fury to recover his body, but in vain; and after
incurring serious losses returned to camp much dejected.
The Battle of Plataea. 479 BC.— Elated by this success, and influenced no doubt
by the important matter of the water supply, the army of Hellas quitted the protection
of the hills and took up an advanced position, with its left resting on a
tributary of the Asopus River, and its right near the spring of Gargaphia. The
main stream of the Asopus lay between the Greeks and the Persians. The Persian
cavalry could now be employed more effectively. The new Greek position had
ceased to protect the two passes across which their lines of communication ran,
and as a result a convoy of five hundred pack animals, with its drivers, and
presumably its escort, was cut to pieces by the Persians.
Mardonius, possibly owing to
shortness of supplies, was anxious to fight a decisive battle. His plan was to weaken
the Greek moral by a free use of his mounted troops, and in this he partially
succeeded. His active horsemen “harassed the whole Greek army by hurling javelins
and shooting arrows, being mounted archers who could not be brought to close
combat. The spring of Gargaphia, too, from which the entire Greek army obtained
water, they spoiled and filled up”. This quotation from Herodotus indicates
that the position of affairs was most favorable to the Persians. The Greek
leaders, abandoning the offensive, decided to effect a night retreat to a
better position near Plataea. This, the most difficult of all the operations of
war, nearly proved disastrous; for one of the Spartan generals refused to
retire for several hours, and the centre, composed of small contingents, lost touch
with the wings. Consequently, daybreak found the main bodies of Spartan and
Athenian troops out of effectual supporting distance of one another, the former
being much nearer the foe; while the other allies were nowhere to be seen.
Mardonius must have believed
the battle already won; for he had about 200,000 Persians and some 50,000 Greeks,
to attack at most 100,000 Greeks, who were split up into at least three
divisions, none of which was able to support the other. Eager to close, he
launched the cavalry, and followed with the Immortals to attack the Spartans, who, finding the omens unfavorable, at first supported
passively the showers of arrows. At last the omens changed, and they fiercely
charged their lightly armed enemy, with whom at last they came to close quarters.
The Persians exhibited splendid courage, but their lack of armor made all their
efforts fruitless. The battle was finally decided by the death of the gallant Mardonius,
killed at the head of the Immortals,
who fell in thousands around his corpse. The loss of the commander, as so often
happens with Asiatic armies, produced a panic; and the Persians fled in
confusion back to their entrenched camp. Meanwhile the Athenians, who were
marching to the help of the Spartans, were attacked by the formidable Hellenic
contingent of Mardonius, which, however, with the exception of the Boeotians,
displayed little zeal in their assault. Upon its retreat, the Athenians led the
way in the successful assault on the stockade, for they were regarded as the
engineers of Hellas, and the Spartans were awaiting their arrival.
In the Persian camp the
slaughter was prodigious. The unnerved Asiatics offered little resistance, and
Herodotus relates that only 3000 Persians escaped. He states, however, that an
entire corps of 40,000 men under Artabazus, who had opposed the views of
Mardonius and had advised a waiting game, retreated in perfect order from the
battlefield, without even engaging the Greeks. Moreover, it is not to be
believed that the large force of cavalry was overtaken by the Greek infantry.
Thanks mainly to Spartan valor,
the victory of the Greeks was of the most decisive kind. Their army had been
caught in the open and at great disadvantage, with only two divisions out of
three on the battlefield, and these unable to support one another; and yet, in
spite of these serious drawbacks and in the face of great odds, Greek training and
armament had triumphed completely.
The Battle of Mycale. 479 BC.— Just about the date of this epoch-making
battle, if not on the same day, as the Greeks would have it, the Persian fleet
stationed off Samos was destroyed by the Greeks. Unwilling to face the victors
of Salamis, the Persians drew their ships up on the mainland at Cape Mycale,
where they were protected by a force of 60,000 men and an entrenched position. But
the heroes of Hellas were not to be baulked of their prey, and following up the
enemy on shore they won yet another glorious victory and burned the whole of
the ships. This final blow shattered the power of Persia over the Greek islanders.
Rebellion broke out in a blaze and spread like wildfire. The Athenians, who now
assumed their rightful position as leaders at sea, aided this revolt, until the
Hellenes in Europe and those of the islands were alike free and able to assist
their brethren on the Asiatic mainland to regain their liberty.
The Capture of Sestos, 478 BC.— The concluding feat of arms in this wonderful
campaign was the capture of Sestos, which, from its situation on the European
side of the Hellespont, served as an admirable tête-du-pont for the Great King. The Spartan squadron, whose leader
was unable to realize the strategical necessity for the enterprise, sailed
home, and to the perseverance of the Athenians was due the final capture of
this important fortress. The Persian garrison escaped, but was pursued and
overtaken. The capture of Sestos ended the great Persian War, and is thus the
final act of the stupendous drama.
The Final Results.— These titanic campaigns, in which the leading
Aryan nation in Asia attacked its distant kinsmen in Europe, merit some retrospect,
and the first question to be asked is why the Greeks won. Apart from their
wonderful morale they had the advantage of fighting on rugged ground with which
they were familiar, and which suited their training and constitution, whereas
the Persians were accustomed to the vast open plains of Asia, where infantry
unsupported by cavalry is hopelessly inferior to a mobile mounted force. In
addition to this, there was the difference in armament. The Greeks were trained
to carry heavy armor with relative ease, and also to wield heavier weapons than
their adversaries, who trusted to quantity rather than quality. Finally,
although the organization of the Persian army was in itself remarkably
efficient, the remoteness of Hellas from the Persian base stood her in good
stead. It is possible to exaggerate the importance of the military results of
these campaigns, inasmuch as, even if Xerxes had conquered Hellas, such a distant
province could not have been held effectively for very long. As Grundy well
puts it, “It was the war itself rather than its issue which proved the
salvation of Greece”. In other words, the bitter hostility aroused by the invasion
saved the civilization of Hellas from being orientalized.
Many writers have assumed that
the Persian Empire was doomed because of its repulse by the Greeks; and there
is no doubt that the miserable survivors of the Great Army carried the tale of
defeat to every corner of the empire. Yet we see Persia play the leading role
on the world’s stage for another century and a half, and this proves that her
race was by no means run. Indeed Greece, split up into small and generally
rival states, was not, even after Marathon, Salamis, and Plataea, an equal opponent
of the Lord of Asia; and it was not until the rise of Macedonia and its paramountcy
that Hellas, represented by a great genius for war, perhaps the greatest of all
time, was strong enough to throw down the gauntlet of the challenger with
success. Until then it was only the fringe of Asia Minor that was operated
against by the Greeks, and the populations of the interior continued to obey
the Satrap of Sardes.
But, if writers on Greek
history have exaggerated the force and weight of the blows inflicted on Persia
in the repulse of the Great King, it is almost impossible to exaggerate the
importance of the victories to Hellas and to modern civilization. Persia, after
the defeat of Croesus, had annexed with conspicuous ease the Greek colonies on the
coast of Asia Minor and the adjacent islands, and Darius after the Scythian War
had detached a force which had extended Persian suzerainty to the borders of
Northern Greece. Then, when the great expedition was launched, most of Northern
and Central Hellas submitted, and practically only heroic Attica and the
Peloponnesus (where, however, Argos was in favour of the Persians) were left; and
the enemy ravaged even Attica at will, and twice destroyed Athens. The
victories of the Greeks at once freed the whole of Hellas and almost all her
colonies in Europe and Asia Minor; the islands simultaneously regained their
liberty, and many of the cities on the mainland also. Indeed, thanks to the
feebleness of character displayed by Xerxes, who, during the remainder of his inglorious
reign, refused to face the Greek problem, Hellas ceased to act on the defensive
and was able to assume the offensive. This role she maintained until Alexander
burned the capital of Iran and became Lord of Asia. But there is the wider
aspect of the case, the world aspect; and, from this point of view, Marathon,
Salamis, and Plataea were victories not only for Greece but for mankind. It was
the triumph of the higher ideal, and even today we cannot estimate fully what
we owe to those intrepid heroes, who wrought and fought as few have done before
or since.
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