Stephen P. Kershaw - The Harvest of War: Marathon, Thermopylae, and Salamis: The Epic Battles that Saved Democracy

Marathon, Thermopylae, and Salamis: The Epic Battles that Saved Democracy

The Harvest of War

Stephen P. Kershaw

For Lal & Hero

I am extremely grateful to a great many individuals, groups and institutions without whose help and inspiration this book could not have been written. I would like express my deepest thanks to many of my fellow students, and the brilliant teachers, from Salterhebble County Primary School, Heath Grammar School and Bristol University, without whose enthusiasm, dedication and expertise I would never have been able to engage with the ancient Greeks and Persians, their languages and culture; the fine people at Swan Hellenic and Vikings Navita, whose itineraries allowed me to explore the physical world of the Greeks and Persians in so much style; my colleagues and students (both real and virtual) at Oxford University Department for Continuing Education, the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Arts Society, who in their various ways have sustained my interest and facilitated my professional development via our explorations of the ancient world together; Duncan Proudfoot, Zoe Bohm, Zo Carroll, Ben McConnell, Howard Watson, David Andrassy, Kim Bishop, David Atkinson and Kate Hibbert for their professional excellence in the publishing world; my late parents Philip and Dorothy Kershaw for their unconditional, rock-solid support throughout my career; Hero for her unwavering canine companionship; and my wife Lal Jones, whose constant love and understanding make all this possible.

The question of Greek and Persian names transliterated into English presents an insoluble problem. The Persian sources are often written in multiple languages, so the ruler commonly known as Darius was Drayavau, sometimes shortened to Drayau in Old Persian, Da-ri-(y)a-ma-u-i or Da-ri-ya-(h)u-(-)i in Elamite, Da-(a-)ri-ia-(a-)mu or Da-(a)ri-mu in Babylonian, tr(w), trjw, intr(w) or intrjw in Egyptian, and Dareios in Greek. Greek names are commonly Latinised into slightly more familiar-looking English equivalents, so that Alexandros (the direct transliteration from the Greek) becomes Alexander, Themistokles becomes Themistocles, Peististratos becomes Peisistratus or Pisistratus, etc. Our Greek sources are also written in different dialects, so the Spartan Leotychidas (Leotykhidas) also appears as Leotychides, Latychidas and Leutychides, and sometimes there is just confusion over what the correct form of the name should be, as with the Persian Artaphernes/Artaphrenes. There are frequently multiple names for the same place: the island of Keos can appear as Ceus, Ceos, Cea, Kea, Zea and Tzia. With this in mind, I have, for the most part, followed the convention of Latinising the Greek names, and using the Greek renderings of Persian names, but there will inevitably be inconsistencies.

All the dates in the text are BCE unless it is obvious or otherwise specified. To avoid causing religious offence, the neutral expressions BCE and CE , Before the Common Era and Common Era, are used instead of BC and AD respectively.

All the translations and paraphrases are my own, unless otherwise indicated and acknowledged.

Athenians are here, whose city is thought to have developed civilisation, learning, religion, crops, justice, and laws, and disseminated them across the entire world.

Cicero

As winter was turning into spring in the year they called The Archonship of Hybrillides (490 BCE ), the free, native-born, adult, male Athenians did something utterly extraordinary. They went to the polls to elect their annual military officers and civilian magistrates for the next year. Hardly anyone else anywhere in the ancient world had a democratic political process like this, and the outcome of the election is sometimes felt to have determined the entire history of the Western world.

Hybrillides and his fellow citizens certainly knew it was important. Athens was under threat from the might of the Persian Empire of King Darius I. Persian forces had already made one attempt at invading Greece, which had come to grief in the rough seas off the Mt Athos peninsula about eighteen months before, and Darius had demanded earth and water as tokens of submission from the Athenians, which they had unceremoniously refused to provide. They knew what was coming.

Standing for election was a charismatic and controversial figure, Miltiades (Son of the Red Earth/Redearthson) son of Cimon. He was an Athenian aristocrat with many domestic enemies; he had operated as a tyrant, admittedly on Athenss behalf, in the Thracian Chersonese (Gallipoli peninsula); he had close and possibly ambiguous relations with the Persians; and he had narrowly escaped death on two recent occasions, first when he evaded the Persian invasion force by the skin of his teeth as it was heading for Greece, and second when he had arrived in Athens, only to be put on trial for his tyranny in the Chersonese. He had been acquitted then, and he was elected now, as one of the ten strategoi (generals) who would command their respective tribal contingents in the inevitable war. It was one of the most politically and militarily significant decisions ever made. An equally important choice was the appointment alongside Miltiades of Callimachus (Beautiful-Fighter) of Aphidnae as the polemarkhos (polemarch or war leader). The two men would take up office in the summer of 490 BCE .

Ancient Athens has become synonymous with democracy, and the exploits of the Greeks at the three epic battles of Marathon, Thermopylae and Salamis are lauded for saving the world from tyranny. Yet Athens had not always had a democratic system of government. In the mythical tradition the city was ruled by kings, who had a zero-tolerance policy when it came to democracy. In Homers Iliad, Odysseus is said to put any man of the people firmly in his place: sit still, he says, listen to men who are better than you; you are unwarlike; you are impotent; you are an irrelevance in combat and in counsel; we cant all be kings; the rule of many is a bad thing; there should just be one king and commander who takes the decisions on behalf of his people.

A defining element in the self-image of the Athenians, which undoubtedly played a key role in stiffening their resistance to the Persians, was the idea that they were autochthonous, i.e. the aboriginal inhabitants of their land (Greek: