Characters

"The wooden wall will not be taken. A wooden wall only will be unconquered."

Themistocles was the most consequential Athenian of his generation — a man of low birth and questionable personal ethics whose strategic vision saved Greece. As archon in 493 BC he began fortifying the Piraeus harbour, sensing that Athens's future power depended on the sea. After Marathon proved only a temporary reprieve, he persuaded Athens to use a windfall of silver from the Laurion mines not for cash distributions to citizens but to build 200 triremes — the fleet that won at Salamis. His masterstroke at Salamis combined brilliant psychology with tactical genius. He read Xerxes' character correctly, sent a disinformation message to lure the Persian fleet into the straits, and chose the battleground where numbers were irrelevant. When the battle was won, he persuaded Sparta not to pursue and destroy Xerxes' retreat bridge — understanding that a cornered Xerxes fighting for survival would be more dangerous than a Xerxes allowed to withdraw. Peacetime proved Themistocles' undoing. Ostracized by Athenians jealous of his fame, accused of collaboration with Persia, he fled ultimately to the Persian court — where Artaxerxes received him with honor and gave him three cities to govern. He died there, the saviour of Greece in the service of its former enemy, a figure too brilliant and too dangerous for his own city to contain.

"Come and take them."

Leonidas became king of Sparta only in his forties, after the deaths of two elder brothers. Little is known of his early life — Sparta left no literature. What survives is the legend forged at a narrow coastal pass called Thermopylae in the summer of 480 BC. When Xerxes' vast army demanded Sparta surrender its weapons, Leonidas replied with the word that would echo through twenty-five centuries: 'Molon labe' — Come and take them. The choice of Leonidas to command the Greek rear-guard may have been deliberate martyrdom. The Oracle at Delphi had told Sparta that either their city or one of their kings must perish. Leonidas reportedly selected the 300 Spartans personally, choosing only men who had fathered sons — ensuring each family line would continue. He held the pass for three days, the finest hoplite warriors in the world defending a frontage of fifty metres. When Ephialtes' treachery was revealed and the position became hopeless, Leonidas dismissed most of the Greek allies. He remained with his 300, 700 Thespians, and 400 Thebans who had no choice. They died to the last man in a final stand, reportedly covering themselves in arrows. His body was decapitated on Xerxes' personal orders — an honour of sorts, recognising that this man had frightened an empire.

"It is now in your power, Callimachus, either to reduce Athens to slavery or by making her free to leave behind you a memory beyond even Harmodius and Aristogeiton."

Miltiades was the hero of Marathon and one of the most complex figures of the Persian Wars — a man who had served the Persian Empire before becoming its most dangerous opponent. As tyrant of the Thracian Chersonese (Gallipoli peninsula) under Persian overlordship, he had participated in Darius's Scythian campaign and came within a decision of sabotaging Persia's retreat bridge. He fled to Athens when the Ionian Revolt collapsed. At Marathon, Miltiades faced ten generals with equal votes on whether to attack or await. He persuaded six colleagues and the polemarch to fight. His tactical insight was decisive: strengthen the Greek wings, thin the centre, charge at a run. The wings enveloped the Persian infantry, which broke and fled to the ships. It was one of the great tactical improvisations of the ancient world. Glory proved brief. The following year Miltiades led an Athenian expedition against Paros, allegedly for personal reasons. It failed, and he returned to Athens wounded. His political enemies prosecuted him; he died in prison of his wound before sentence could be carried out. Marathon was his monument.

"I will march against Athens with my army and punish them for the wrong they have done to me and to my father."

Xerxes I inherited from his father Darius I an empire stretching from the Aegean to the Indus, along with an unfinished vendetta against Athens. For four years he prepared the most ambitious military expedition the ancient world had ever seen — bridging the Hellespont with a pontoon of boats, digging a canal through the Athos peninsula to spare his fleet the dangerous cape, and assembling an army ancient sources described in millions (modern scholars estimate 100,000–300,000). His campaign began brilliantly. Thermopylae fell, Athens was burned, and for weeks Xerxes sat on his golden throne watching what seemed like inevitable triumph. Then Salamis shattered his fleet in a single afternoon. He watched the battle from his throne on the shore, reportedly ordering court officials strangled every time a Greek ship appeared to be winning. After the disaster he returned to Asia, leaving Mardonius to finish the conquest — who also failed, dying at Plataea. Xerxes never returned to Greece. His later years were consumed by harem intrigues, construction projects at Persepolis, and the endless administration of empire. He was assassinated in 465 BC by the commander of his palace guard. His ambition had been vast; his legacy was the proof that even the greatest empire in the world could be stopped by determined freemen fighting for their homes.

"May Ahura Mazda protect this country from a hostile army, from famine, and from the Lie."

Darius I was perhaps the greatest administrator in Persian history — the man who reorganised a vast empire into 20 satrapies, standardised weights and measures, built the Royal Road from Sardis to Susa, and constructed the magnificent ceremonial capital at Persepolis. He expanded Persian power to the Indus Valley in the east and into Thrace in the west, and when the Ionian Revolt of 499 BC erupted with Athenian support, he took it personally. His first expedition against Athens under Mardonius (492 BC) ended when storms wrecked the fleet off Mount Athos. His second, under Datis and Artaphernes (490 BC), landed at Marathon. When news of the defeat arrived, Darius allegedly had a servant repeat three times at every dinner: 'Master, remember the Athenians.' He began preparing a third, larger expedition but died in 486 BC before it could be launched, leaving the task to his son Xerxes. Darius never visited Greece, never saw Marathon, and never faced the Greeks in battle. Yet his obsession with punishing Athens for its support of the Ionian Revolt set in motion a fifty-year conflict that would ultimately diminish Persian power in the Aegean and contribute to the cultural explosion of Periclean Athens.

"Persians, yesterday you dared to attack the Spartans with arrows; today, face us with spears in your hands."

Pausanias was regent of Sparta during the minority of Leonidas's son Pleistarchus, and commanded the combined Greek army at Plataea in 479 BC — the battle that ended the Persian invasion of Europe. His performance at Plataea showed both brilliance and patience: he endured eleven days of Persian cavalry harassment, maintained coalition discipline against enormous pressure to retreat, and when battle was forced, held his Spartans in disciplined formation against repeated Persian assaults until Mardonius fell and the enemy army disintegrated. After Plataea, Pausanias led a Greek fleet to Cyprus and Byzantium, where his behaviour began to alarm his allies. He was accused of negotiating with Xerxes, adopting Persian dress and manners, and writing to Xerxes offering to betray Greece in exchange for power and a Persian bride. The Spartans recalled him twice; both times he was acquitted for lack of evidence. On the third accusation, the ephors moved to arrest him. Pausanias took sanctuary in a temple of Athena at Sparta. The Spartans, unwilling to violate sacred ground but determined to prevent his escape, walled up the entrance and removed the roof. He starved to death inside. The victor of Plataea — the man who had perhaps done more than any other to save Greece in 479 BC — was literally entombed alive by the city he had served.

"The Athenians shall not lack for gold while I have estates to sell."

Cimon was the son of Miltiades — hero of Marathon — and carried his father's instincts for bold offensive action to a new generation. Raised in poverty after his father's disgrace and death in prison, he rose through military courage to become Athens's foremost general of the 470s and 460s BC, the man who transformed the Delian League from a defensive alliance into an Athenian instrument for driving Persia from the Aegean permanently. His greatest achievement was the Battle of the Eurymedon (c. 466 BC), where he won simultaneous victories on land and sea in a single day, destroying the Persian fleet and army at the Pamphylian coast. He planted Athenian colonies on the northern Aegean coasts, cleared pirates from the islands, and kept the tribute flowing that funded Athens's golden age. He was also known for personal generosity — opening his orchards to all comers and feeding the Athenian poor. Politically he backed the Spartan alliance, believing the two powers could coexist as land and sea hegemonies respectively. When this policy failed — Sparta expelled an Athenian force Cimon had brought to help suppress a helot revolt — he was ostracised. Recalled when the policy of confrontation with Sparta also failed, he died during his last campaign, besieging Citium in Cyprus, at around 60 years old. He was the last great champion of the Persian Wars generation.

"Write what you will — only make it just."

Aristides earned his epithet 'the Just' through a lifetime of incorruptible public service and personal austerity so extreme that he died in poverty despite decades in the highest offices. He was political rivals with Themistocles throughout the Persian Wars — the two men represented fundamentally different visions of Athens, Aristides favouring the hoplite-farming citizen, Themistocles the sailor-empire. At Marathon he commanded one of the ten Athenian tribal regiments. During the crucial deliberations about the fleet from the Laurion silver mines, he supported Themistocles' naval policy despite their rivalry — recognising that Athens had to bet on ships. He was ostracised in 482 BC, but recalled when the Persian invasion began and fought at Salamis. At Plataea he co-commanded the Athenian contingent, holding the left wing while Pausanias's Spartans bore the brunt. His greatest legacy was the founding and organisation of the Delian League in 478 BC. Aristides assessed the initial tribute for each member city with such scrupulous fairness that all members accepted his verdicts without protest — a remarkable achievement in a world of fractious city-states. The league he organised became the financial foundation of Athens's golden age.