Who Was When
Wars

Greco-Persian Wars

See this year on the world timeline

Sides

Allied Greek city-states (the Hellenic League, then the Delian League)

Athens, Sparta, Eretria, Plataea, Corinth and other allied Greek city-states, Ionian Greek cities of Asia Minor (in revolt 499–493 BCE and again from 479 BCE), Cypriot kingdoms under Onesilus of Salamis, all but Amathus (joined the Ionian Revolt, 497 BCE), and Egyptian rebels under Inaros, allied with the Delian League (about 460–454 BCE)

against
The Achaemenid Persian Empire and the Greek states that sided with it

Achaemenid Empire and Macedon, a Persian vassal, with Thebes, Thessaly and other Greek states that sided with Persia in 480–479 BCE

Countries today: Cyprus, Egypt, Greece, Iran, and Türkiye

What happened

In 499 BCE the Greek cities of Ionia, on the coast of Asia Minor, rose against Persian rule. Athens and Eretria sent ships, and in 498 BCE the rebels burned Sardis, a Persian provincial capital. Persia's army and fleet put the revolt down by 493 BCE. In 490 BCE Darius I sent a fleet across the Aegean that razed Eretria, but the Athenians and Plataeans defeated its army at Marathon. In 480 BCE Xerxes I crossed the Hellespont with a far larger force, broke through at Thermopylae and burned Athens, but his fleet lost the battle of Salamis. In 479 BCE an allied Greek army under Spartan command defeated the Persian army at Plataea, and the Greek fleet destroyed the Persian ships at Mycale. The Athenian-led Delian League then fought Persia in the Aegean, Asia Minor, Egypt and Cyprus until about 449 BCE. No reliable count of the war's dead survives: the figures come from ancient writers, above all Herodotus.

Outcome: Persian forces left mainland Greece after 479 BCE and the Ionian cities broke away from Persian rule; fighting with the Delian League died out around 449 BCE, perhaps under a treaty, the Peace of Callias, whose existence is debated.

Key events

Leaders

  • Aristagoras · Tyrant of Miletus; led the Ionian revolt · Allied Greek city-states (the Hellenic League, then the Delian League)
  • Miltiades · Athenian general at Marathon · Allied Greek city-states (the Hellenic League, then the Delian League)
  • Leonidas I · King of Sparta; commanded at Thermopylae · Allied Greek city-states (the Hellenic League, then the Delian League)
  • Themistocles · Athenian commander at Salamis · Allied Greek city-states (the Hellenic League, then the Delian League)
  • Pausanias · Spartan regent; commanded the Greek army at Plataea · Allied Greek city-states (the Hellenic League, then the Delian League)
  • Cimon · Athenian commander of the Delian League fleet · Allied Greek city-states (the Hellenic League, then the Delian League)
  • Darius I · King of Persia, to 486 BCE · The Achaemenid Persian Empire and the Greek states that sided with it
  • Datis · Commander of the expedition of 490 BCE · The Achaemenid Persian Empire and the Greek states that sided with it
  • Xerxes I · King of Persia from 486 BCE; led the campaign of 480 BCE · The Achaemenid Persian Empire and the Greek states that sided with it
  • Mardonius · Persian commander in Greece, 480–479 BCE · The Achaemenid Persian Empire and the Greek states that sided with it

Cultures it ended or changed

Meanwhile, elsewhere in

Sources