Reconstructions of ancient Greek galleys (sailing warships). The Greek vessels were smaller, lower and more manoeuvrable than the rather grand galleys of the Persians, which had been built to transport troops and intimidate rather than to fight in tight spaces on windy days. The credit for the Greek victory must go to Themistocles, whose gift for uniting the Greeks in a common cause, for meticulous planning and (it must be said) for Machiavellian duplicity thwarted the Persian King’s imperial ambitions.
Part 1 of 2
IN the summer of 480 BC, Xerxes I of Persia crossed into Europe by a bridge constructed over the Hellespont,* at the head of a monstrous army of conquest said to be two million six hundred thousand strong.* Late in August he was encamped on the eastern mainland near Thermopylae, but progress was delayed for three days through the valour of Leonidas, King of Sparta.*
The delay was priceless for the Greeks of Attica. Their allies, who thought only of defending the Peloponnese, were ready to retreat beyond the Isthmus of Corinth, and leave Athens to fend for herself. But the Athenian commander Themistocles consulted the oracle at Delphi, who said ‘Put your trust in wooden walls, and Salamis the divine shall cause sons of women to perish’. This Themistocles interpreted to mean that the whole city must take refuge on the neighbouring island of Salamis, defended by ships;* and after the Persians captured the Acropolis and set Athens ablaze, Themistocles managed (by tact and some subterfuge) to get most of the Greeks behind him.
Constructing the bridge was not easy, and Xerxes behaved a little foolishly over it. See Xerxes Scourges the Hellespont.
Herodotus’s estimate is of course rejected by modern scholars, who generally do not go much above 300,000.
See The Battle of Thermopylae.
Salamis lies in the Saronic Gulf, the vast bay between the Peloponnese in the west and Attica (where Athens stands) on the east. The Strait of Salamis is a narrow water between the island and the mainland, with Athens some eight miles away. SeeGoogle Maps.
Précis
In 480 BC, the Persian army of King Xerxes I broke through the Greek defences at Thermopylae and went on to sack Athens. Athenian commander Themistocles managed to persuade the other Greek leaders not to abandon Attica entirely, but to help him move the population of Athens to the nearby island of Salamis, and trust to the Greek fleet. (58 / 60 words)
Part Two
The Strait of Salamis today, with the Island of Salamis to the left and the mainland ahead and to the right. The Greek ships lay huddled just above the spit projecting out into the Strait (Kynosoura), whereas the Persians came from below and to the right, and massed on the opposite side, where the modern suburb of Perama now stands. See an overlay of the battle order at Wikimedia Commons.
SEEING the size and splendour of the Persian fleet, some Greeks quailed and were preparing to desert until a daring Athenian, Aristides, broke through enemy lines to warn them that the Persians had cut off all escape from the Strait of Salamis.
Themistocles took Aristides aside, and confessed to deliberately leaking details of his position so Xerxes would bottle up the deserters; besides, a close fight in the Strait was what he wanted, as he forecast a stiff breeze to come and play havoc with the Persians’ clutter of clumsy, top-heavy galleys. Aristides listened in awe. Xerxes meanwhile seated himself comfortably on a golden throne overlooking the Strait,* but watched in horror as amid frenzied fighting and windswept seas two hundred Persian ships sank, five times the Greeks’ losses. Evening confirmed the utter ruin of his fleet, and his campaign.
Greek spies now spread another fairytale, whispering that Themistocles was preparing to demolish Xerxes’s bridge over the Hellespont.* The panic-stricken barbarian beat a hasty retreat across it with his dispirited army, and never returned.
On Mount Aigaleo, a short distance northwest of Athens and with a commanding view of the Strait of Salamis, which lies some six miles from the peak. See A view of Mount Aigaleo looking across to the hill from the Erechtheon on the north side of the Acropolis in Athens.
Plutarch tells us that at first this was a serious proposal, but Aristides urged that far from destroying the bridge ‘we ought rather, if possible, at once to build another, and send the man out of Europe as quickly as possible.’ Themistocles then dreamt up this bluff as a ruse to hurry the Persian king away.
Précis
By leaking his position to Xerxes, Themistocles managed not only to head off a planned desertion, but also to draw the Persians into the Strait of Salamis, where the lack of space and the choppy conditions helped inflict heavy losses. Xerxes reluctantly abandoned his campaign, and fearing the Greeks might cut his bridge over the Hellespont raced home to Asia. (60 / 60 words)
