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The Greco-Persian Wars (also often called the Persian Wars) were a series of conflicts between the Achaemenid Empire and Greek city-states that started in 499 BC and lasted until 449 BC. The collision between the fractious political world of the Greeks and the enormous empire of the Persians began when Cyrus the Great conquered the Greek ...
At the Battle of Plataea, the Greek army won a decisive victory, destroying much of the Persian army and ending the invasion of Greece. [131] Meanwhile, at the near-simultaneous naval Battle of Mycale, they also destroyed much of the remaining Persian fleet, thereby reducing the threat of further invasions. [132]
The second Persian invasion of Greece (480–479 BC) occurred during the Greco-Persian Wars, as King Xerxes I of Persia sought to conquer all of Greece. The invasion was a direct, if delayed, response to the defeat of the first Persian invasion of Greece (492–490 BC) at the Battle of Marathon, which ended Darius I's attempts to subjugate Greece.
Greek hoplite and Persian warrior depicted fighting. 5th century BC The defeat at Marathon ended for the time being the Persian invasion of Greece. However, Thrace and the Cycladic islands had been resubjugated into the Persian empire, and Macedon reduced to a subordinate kingdom part of the empire; since the late 6th century BC they had been ...
Beginning of the first Persian invasion of Greece: 492–490 BC: First Persian invasion of Greece: Greeks: Achaemenid empire: Inconclusive: Persians capture Thrace and part of Macedon, but they fail to achieve their goals Sparta and Athens remain independent; 480–479 BC: Second Persian invasion of Greece: Greeks: Achaemenid empire: Greek victory
The Greek army inflicted a crushing defeat on the more numerous Persians, marking a turning point in the Greco-Persian Wars. The first Persian invasion was a response to Athenian involvement in the Ionian Revolt , when Athens and Eretria sent a force to support the cities of Ionia in their attempt to overthrow Persian rule.
The Ionian Greek contingents in the Persian army defected, and the camp was assailed, with a large number of Persians slaughtered. The Persian ships were then captured and burned. The complete destruction of the Persian navy, along with the destruction of Mardonius' army at Plataea (allegedly on the same day as the Battle of Mycale), decisively ...
Famously, the much smaller Greek army held the pass of Thermopylae against the Persians for three days before being outflanked by a mountain path. Much of the Greek army retreated, before the Spartans and Thespians who had continued to block the pass were surrounded and killed. [30]