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Misconceptions concerning the Battle of Thermopylae
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Post by
Laihendi
Thermopylae was a catastrophic failure
The Spartans (along with several other cities) put up a heroic fight against the Persians, but they were ultimately defeated, which resulted in the Persian land forces conquering all of Boeotia and Attica, taking over the city of Athens (arguably the most important of all the allies Greek cities), and burning it down. Basically because of the Greek loss in that battle, half of their territory was conquered, they lost their strongest city, and were brought closer to being completely conquered by the Persians than at any other point.
The Battle of Salamis is the battle that won the Greeks the war
First off, this was a naval battle. Of the 21 allied cities that participated in this battle, Athens was by far the strongest. This battle took place after Thermopylae of course, and if you're wondering how Athens participated in it after their city was captured and burned, it's because they basically evacuated it before they could be killed. Of the 366 Greek ships that participated in the battle, 180 of them were Athenian (Athens was emerging as a naval power thanks to Themistocles). Modern estimates say that approximately 600-800 Persian ships participated in this battle.
Due to various naval tactics carried out by Themistocles (too long to describe, you'll have to look it up yourself!), possibly the most powerful Athenian leader at that time, the Greeks were able to defeat the Persian fleet, which resulted in huge losses for them, and saved the Peloponnese from being conquered by the Persian forces. Xerxes had his entire navy retreat back to Persia, and left his land forces to finish the invasion. Without going into detail, due to the absence of the Persian navy, the Greeks were able to focus all of their war efforts on driving the Persians out of Attica and Boeotia, and take back the rest of the territory lost.
What if the Greeks had lost the Battle of Salamis?
It should also be noted that the Battle of Salamis is possibly the most influential battle in recorded history, because if the Persians had won, there would have been no resistance left to defend the Peloponnese (which was the last major base of Greek resistance), and would have effectively ended the invasion with a Persian victory. If this had happened, the growth of western culture would have ended, and it is not difficult to imagine that the world of today would be dominated by a society rooted in Persian culture, rather than America, and various European nations before that, which are rooted in Greco-Roman culture.
TL;DR
1. The Persian victory at Thermopylae caused about half of Greece to be taken over by Persia, and brought the other half closer to defeat than at any other point in the war.
2. It was due to the Greek (primarily Athenian) victory at Salamis that the Persian invasion failed.
3. The Battle of Salamis is possibly the most influential battle in recorded history.
Post by
Dhazy
This is Sparta.
Post by
Laihendi
Clearly Athens > Sparta.
Until Pericles died during the Peloponnesian War... then they kind of fell apart.
:(
Post by
266586
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Post by
Laihendi
Laihendi likes reading about ancient Greece more. He just gets all angry whenever he reads about Rome... he loves them and yet he hates them *cry*
Post by
266586
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Post by
TheMediator
Well considering how big of a zerg the Persians had, the Greeks had to be strategically "better" to win, which they were for the most part. It was one goat herder revealing the passage behind the army that turned the tide of that battle; the Persians would never have broken through without it.
Post by
Laihendi
The thing Laihendi doesn't like about them is that during the republic you have a bunch of aristocrats with no respect for the lower classes, and then you have a big civil war where a dictator takes over, and then his heir establishes an empire, and then eventually a series of nutcases rule it, and drive it into the ground.
It kind of reminds Laihendi of LOTR though. In LOTR you have Arnor and Gondor (which were initially ruled by one king), in real history the Roman Empire splits into East and West, the West Empire falls first, in LOTR the western kingdom fails, and the Eastern (Gondor) lives on but diminishes in power over the centuries (like the Eastern empire)... except Gondor wasn't ultimately defeated of course.
Post by
Laihendi
Well considering how big of a zerg the Persians had, the Greeks had to be strategically "better" to win, which they were for the most part. It was one goat herder revealing the passage behind the army that turned the tide of that battle; the Persians would never have broken through without it.
The point of this thread is to inform readers that Thermopylae was not some amazing Spartan victory like many people seem to think. True, if the Persians hadn't discovered that passage they would have eventually had to retreat due to lack of food and water, but they did discover it.
Basically this thread is an attempt to end the "LOL 300 THIS IS SPARTA" stuff Laihendi hears/reads all the time.
This is Sparta.
>:(
Post by
buzz3070
im gonna have to say rome>greece
i mean they built the largest amphitheater in the world the largest race track and is one of the longest lasting empires ever
and i mean they had naval battle in the collsium getting amusment out of slaves killing each other on boats
but other wise thanks for the history lesson laihendi i might have to post one of these sometime since im gonna go to collage to do something history related
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85162
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Post by
285472
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Post by
109094
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Post by
TheMediator
Well you're saying hypothetically the Persians could have defeated the Greeks... well hypothetically the Persians couldn't have found the goat path and would have been held off long enough for Greek reinforcements to arrive.
The emphasis in Western culture is because it was symbolic of the strength of heroism and the sting of betrayal. Its not about how well the Spartans did, its about how well they were doing until they were backstabbed.
Post by
109094
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Post by
289682
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135207
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Post by
TheMediator
If you look at the literature, the emphasis is placed on the few outlasting the many for just long enough.
But they didn't hold off long enough. Their sacrifice wasn't anything except a morale boost.
Anyways, at this comment -
Except the Spartans were not betrayed, the Persians found that Goat path themselves
Read below.
Late on the second day of battle, however, as the Persian king was pondering what to do next, he received a windfall; a Trachinian traitor named Ephialtes informed him of the mountain path around Thermopylae and offered to guide the Persian army. Ephialtes was motivated by the desire of a reward. For this act, the name of Ephialtes received a lasting stigma, his name coming to mean "nightmare" and becoming the archetypal term for a "traitor" in Greek.
Post by
Laihendi
It wasn't just the 300 spartans at Thermopylae but also roughly 3000 other greeks. In a few short days they slaughtered tens of thousands of persians. Laihendi specifically said that other cities participated in the battle.
While this battle was going on at Thermopylae, the greek fleet led by Themistocles were preventing the Persians landing elsewhere. They were also heavily out numbered and inflicted heavy losses on the persian fleet, dispite having identicaly styled and armed ships. This doesn't make Thermopylae any better for the Greeks or Salamis any less important.
Athens was evacuated before the Persians arrived there, all the treasures of the city had been removed. This was simply because the greeks had not rallied enough troops to confront the Persians.
Laihendi already said that Athens was evacuated, and there can be little doubt that it would have been taken even if it hadn't been, since there were about 180,000 Persian soldiers attacking Greece from the north after Thermopylae.
It was thanks to the naval successes and the Spartan sacrifce at Thermopylae that destroyed both the persians capability to feed there massive army, as well as the moral issues that forced the persian retreat.After the Persians took Boeotia and Attica they didn't have to worry to much about food. And morale issues didn't lead to the Persian retreat. Thermopylae was a strategic victory (and a tremendous one at that) for the Persians, and left all of northern Greece vulnerable to attack. It was the Battle of Salamis that caused the Persian navy to retreat, but that was a separate entity from the army attacking to the north.
The Persian land army remained in the north, and were not decisively beaten until the Battle of Plataea.
It was also as a result of this that saw the rise of a unified greek state and allowed Alexander the Great to conquer Persia
If you are implying that Thermopylae led to the unification of Greece as a single state you could not be more wrong. After the second Greco-Persian war, Athens began dominating much of Greece by using the Delian League. The tensions caused by Athenian imperialism led to the Peloponnesian war with Sparta and its allies, so Greece remained anything but united.
"Greece" did not conquer Persia until after it was conquered by Macedon (led by Philip of Macedon at the time). Macedon was not part of Greece, the Greeks considered the macedonians to be barbarians like all other foreigners. That also explains why to this day, Greece and Macedonia are two separate countries. And Alexander the Great was Philip's son, so really he was king of an extended Macedon rather than Greece, although obviously by conquering Persia he spread Greek culture into the east.
.
Post by
Laihendi
It kind of reminds Laihendi of LOTR though. In LOTR you have Arnor and Gondor (which were initially ruled by one king), in real history the Roman Empire splits into East and West, the West Empire falls first, in LOTR the western kingdom fails, and the Eastern (Gondor) lives on but diminishes in power over the centuries (like the Eastern empire)... except Gondor wasn't ultimately defeated of course.
Tolkien based Middle-earth history (and his other pre-LOTR legends) on our world history...so there's no surprise why those events are similar...
Your point?
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