Ancient greek city in movie 300
In order to achieve hegemony over the Greek mainland, Xerxes planned to attack by land and by sea. A group of Greeks, including Spartans, Athenians, and others, banded together to fight against the Persian menace. This great battle in 480 happened during the Greco-Persian Wars in which King Xerxes of Persia was attempting to gain more territory. Spartans hold back Persian forces at Anopaea, a single-file pass near Thermopylae. Thus, even though Aristotle had not yet described the Greek ideal of freedom, all the city-states defended their independence against enemies foreign and domestic, particularly in the case of the Battle of Thermopylae. While the governments of poleis sometimes differed (Athens had a democracy while Sparta had an oligarchy) and even fought against one another, almost all the Greek city-states did agree in at least one aspect: the Persians were authoritarian, had no concept of freedom, enslaved its people, and must be defeated. Each city-state zealously guarded its autonomy, desiring the freedom to live according to its own dictates, not another city-state’s, or more importantly, authoritarian regime’s, opinions. A plethora of poleis existed throughout Greece since about the eighth century B.C. happened about one hundred years before the great philosopher and defender of freedom Aristotle was born, the Greeks still had a concept of defending the city-state, the polis.
Of course, such a defense could have happened, but it might have been harder knowing that the Spartans and other Greeks defending freedom at the Battles of Thermopylae, Salamis, and Platea had not been able to do it.Īlthough the Battle of Thermopylae in 480 B.C.
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Authoritarian monarchy would have been the norm, and it would have taken a group of people much like the Spartans to champion again values like protection, free will, and freedom over imperialism, coercion, and authoritarianism. If the 300 Spartans had stayed home and if Persians had won the Greco-Persian Wars, the Western concept of freedom most likely would not exist. Three hundred Spartans, joined by a small force of Greeks, defend the mountain pass of Thermopylae against the invading Persians. Your browser does not support the audio element.The year is 480. Listen to a recorded reading of this page:.Take a ten question quiz about this page.They soundly defeated the Persians causing Xerxes to retreat back to Persia. They rammed into the sides of the large Persian ships and sunk them. However, the Athenian ships, called triremes, were fast and maneuverable. The much larger Persian fleet attacked the small Athenian ships. The Athenian fleet, however, was waiting off the coast by the island of Salamis. When they arrived at the city of Athens, they found it deserted. The Persian army continued to march on Greece. The Spartans fought to the death, killing as many Persians as they could.
King Leonidas told most of his troops to flee, but stayed behind with a small force including his 300 Spartans in order to allow the rest of the Greek army to escape. The Greeks held off the Persians killing thousands, until the Persians found a way around the mountains and got behind the Greeks. They decided to meet the Persians at a narrow pass in the mountains called Thermopylae. The Greeks put together a small force, led by the Spartan King Leonidas I and 300 Spartans. He amassed a huge army of over 200,000 soldiers and 1,000 warships. Ten years later, in 480 BC, the son of Darius I, King Xerxes, decided to get his revenge on the Greeks. This is the origin of the Marathon running race. The army of Athens routed the Persian army killing around 6,000 Persians and only losing 192 Greeks.Īfter the battle, the Athenian army ran the 25 miles back to Athens in order to prevent the Persians from attacking the city. The Persians had a lot more soldiers, but they underestimated the fighting capability of the Greeks. The Persian fleet landed at the Bay of Marathon, about 25 miles from the city of Athens.
They boarded the Persian fleet and headed to Greece. He gathered a vast army of soldiers that outnumbered any army the Greeks could muster. Darius I, King of Persia, decided he wanted to conquer the Greeks in 490 BC.