>The Persians were meticulous record keepers; but no Persian source has survived
Eh, they weren't particularly big on record keeping. The Babylonians (who were part of the Persian empire) kept decent records, but not the Persians.
>Modern guesstimates by different means arrive at around 200,000.
Those are just people throwing out random figures. In reality it's highly unlikely that the Persians had the logistical capability to field an army that large beyond the fringes of their empire. Tens of thousands would likely be a more realistic number.
It seems to me that the Persians were just as good at record-keeping as any relatively sophisticated ancient civilization.
The Persepolis Fortification Archives, for example, contain about 20,000 records that deal with the movement of several commodities (e.g. cereals, fruit, livestock, etc.) in the region around Persepolis, and dates to exactly this period (c. 510-490 BC): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persepolis_Administrative_Arch...
This is an oddly shallow article. The Persian army, whatever its exact size, was vast; too vast to have travelled by sea, instead marching overland into Greece.
The Persian fleet's job was to supply them with food and other necessities, as the army was too large to live off the land. It is reasonable to view Thermopylae as a delaying maneuver, although due to political differences between the Athenians and the Spartans, it's also reasonable to view the Greek defenders as having been backed into a strategic corner by indecision.
Anyway, while the Spartans and a small Athenian contingent were marching off to Thermopylae, Themistocles, an Athenian leader, sent word to Xerxes that the (much smaller) Greek navy was fearful and likely to surrender - partly true, as the Peloponnesian contingent was less firmly committed than the Athenian one. Xerxes has his navy block the Greek ships into a relatively narrow strait, but then (on Themistocles' orders) the Greeks navy ran from the Persian ships instead of giving battle. The Persians, sensing victory, chased them into the strait.
But whereas a narrow passage provided a huge geographic advantage to the Spartan and Athenian foot soldiers bunched together in a phalanx, it was a fatal mistake for a naval force, which depends on freedom of maneuver. The huge Persian navy crowded into the narrow strait, leaving the ships bunched up against each other, at which point the Greeks reversed course and attacked their flanks, laying waste to them. With his supply system in pieces, Xerxes was forced to withdraw his army.
Incidentally, the popular book/film 300, which focuses heavily on the bravery and martial ethos of the Spartans, instead depicts the Persian fleet as being destroyed by a storm prior to the decisive battle. This makes for a simpler story, but at a rather significant loss of historical accuracy.
> Incidentally, the popular book/film 300, which focuses heavily on the bravery and martial ethos of the Spartans, instead depicts the Persian fleet as being destroyed by a storm prior to the decisive battle. This makes for a simpler story, but at a rather significant loss of historical accuracy.
Don’t watch the sequel, it is a terrible film made by people who didn’t understand the first one at all. It has some spectacular visual moments but it is a complete mess.
>Incidentally, the popular book/film 300, which focuses heavily on the bravery and martial ethos of the Spartans, instead depicts the Persian fleet as being destroyed by a storm prior to the decisive battle. This makes for a simpler story, but at a rather significant loss of historical accuracy.
What you're describing is the Battle of Salamis in the _second_ Persian invasion. The storm off Mount Athos in 300 happened during the first invasion (and it really did happen). Quoth wikipedia:
>The fleet then rounded the coastline as far as Acanthus in Chalcidice, before attempting to round the headland of Mount Athos.[42] However, they were caught in a violent storm, which drove them against the coastline of Athos, wrecking (according to Herodotus) 300 ships, with the loss of 20,000 men.[42]
The second time, instead of going around the peninsula, Xerxes had them dig a canal. For the longest time people doubted Herodotus' account of this canal, but it was actually real. [0]
>> Incidentally, the popular book/film 300, which focuses heavily on the bravery and martial ethos of the Spartans, instead depicts the Persian fleet as being destroyed by a storm prior to the decisive battle.
The Persians did lose a lot of ships in two storms, before the battle at Artemision:
Simultaneous with the battle at Thermopylae, an Allied naval force of 271 triremes defended the Straits of Artemisium against the Persians.[126] Directly before Artemisium, the Persian fleet had been caught in a gale off the coast of Magnesia, losing many ships, but could still probably muster over 800 ships at the start of the battle.[127] On the first day (also the first of the Battle of Thermopylae), the Persians detached 200 seaworthy ships, which were sent to sail around the eastern coast of Euboea. These ships were to round Euboea and block the line of retreat for the Allied fleet.[127] Meanwhile, the Allies and the remaining Persians engaged in the late afternoon, the Allies having the better of the engagement and capturing 30 vessels.[127] That evening, another storm occurred, wrecking the majority of the Persian detachment which had been sent around Euboea.[128]
> Incidentally, the popular book/film 300, which focuses heavily on the bravery and martial ethos of the Spartans, instead depicts the Persian fleet as being destroyed by a storm prior to the decisive battle. This makes for a simpler story, but at a rather significant loss of historical accuracy.
I'm pretty sure the film stopped caring about historical accuracy when they created a wall out of dead bodies, samurai-ninja-trolls attacked at night, and an executioner with swords-as-arms appeared on screen.
That's not the reality of the story being told; that's the embellishments of the narrator when telling the story to the second wave of soldiers the night before battle.
It's a Zack Snyder adaptation of a graphic novel loosely inspired by the retelling of a historian criticized even during his own time for preferring drama. Did anyone expect historical accuracy?
>> Yet another puzzle is Leonidas’ decision to stay and die.
That's probably the easiest question to answer: the Spartans were war-crazy.
This is well-documented, and the tales of Leonida's wife asking him what to do if he doesn't return, and the 300 celebrating their own funerals, etc, are par for the course, for Spartans. Their whole society was hyper-militarised, their highest ideal was bravery in battle, to kill their enemies with no regard for their own life (in the service of the City, of course). They drilled their children from a young age to this mindset and they all became mad with it. So when the time came to choose between ditching their shield and running to fight another day, or staying and dying, the Spartans stayed and died. "Ή ταν, ή επί τας" as a Spartan mother said to her child ("with it, or on it"; "it" being his shield: either he carried it home, or they carried him home on it).
It is perhaps difficult to interpret this mindset from the point of view of a rational actor, because in terms of a strategy that maximises rewards and minimises losses, heroism does not compute. But a good general must take into account the fact that people are not perfectly rational, that they are in their most irrational when faced with death, that men with their backs to the wall fight to the death to a man. And that, at the end of the day, some troops will never break and run.
Consider the source. The tales being told at the time amount to war-propaganda. In practice, you want to appear as if you were a war-crazy state, but actual behavior is extremely unusual.
The modern equivalent would be looking at North Korean documentation of the North Korean military. Probably not the best source.
It would be one thing if the Persians documented the battle, because then we'd have an outside viewpoint proving the war-craziness. (Or perhaps another example: the Assyrians were well documented by many cultures of being actually war-crazy). But we only have Greek propaganda / Greek tales to tell one side of the story. Obviously, things are lost in history, and the battle of Thermopylae was not a strategic hindrance at all to the Persians. So it makes sense that it was only really documented by the Greeks.
Still, it would be nice to have some non-Greek viewpoints into the battle.
Dan Carlin I feel does a relatively good job at covering this battle within the broader context of the war in his Hardcore History podcast. Specifically, in his three-part series King of Kings. Don’t ask me which one, as it’s been well over a year since I listened to it, but he does make a reasonable attempt at drawing out some logic for why the rearguard stayed and died. If I recall correctly, one factor is that it helped buy time for the Greek city-states to retreat back and remove sources of supplies, which would stretch the Persian supply chains even further.
He paints this particular battle into the context of many others too, and tries to put some thoughts around the broader environment in which both the Greeks and Persians were making their decisions during these wars. He tells it all with his trademark engaging fascination and I really cannot recommend it highly enough. It’s part of his free releases, so you should readily find them on your podcast source of choice.
Despite the huge numbers, the battlefield supremacy of the greek phalanx seems to be forgotten here. 100 years after this, Alexander the Great conquered the world with the phalanx enhanced with longer spears called the sarissa.
I recall reading many descriptions of the Alexander's forces taking on armies 10x bigger than them and routing them with little losses as he conquered Persia and other lands to the east.
- You are advised to submit without further delay, for if I bring my army into your land, I will destroy your farms, slay your people, and raze your city
For all who are interested in this I can strongly recommend the book Beyond the Gates of Fire: New Perspectives on the Battle of Thermopylae coaoutherd by a favorite authour of mine Christopher Matthew.
18 comments
[ 2.1 ms ] story [ 47.0 ms ] thread>The Persians were meticulous record keepers; but no Persian source has survived
Eh, they weren't particularly big on record keeping. The Babylonians (who were part of the Persian empire) kept decent records, but not the Persians.
>Modern guesstimates by different means arrive at around 200,000.
Those are just people throwing out random figures. In reality it's highly unlikely that the Persians had the logistical capability to field an army that large beyond the fringes of their empire. Tens of thousands would likely be a more realistic number.
The Persepolis Fortification Archives, for example, contain about 20,000 records that deal with the movement of several commodities (e.g. cereals, fruit, livestock, etc.) in the region around Persepolis, and dates to exactly this period (c. 510-490 BC): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persepolis_Administrative_Arch...
The Persian fleet's job was to supply them with food and other necessities, as the army was too large to live off the land. It is reasonable to view Thermopylae as a delaying maneuver, although due to political differences between the Athenians and the Spartans, it's also reasonable to view the Greek defenders as having been backed into a strategic corner by indecision.
Anyway, while the Spartans and a small Athenian contingent were marching off to Thermopylae, Themistocles, an Athenian leader, sent word to Xerxes that the (much smaller) Greek navy was fearful and likely to surrender - partly true, as the Peloponnesian contingent was less firmly committed than the Athenian one. Xerxes has his navy block the Greek ships into a relatively narrow strait, but then (on Themistocles' orders) the Greeks navy ran from the Persian ships instead of giving battle. The Persians, sensing victory, chased them into the strait.
But whereas a narrow passage provided a huge geographic advantage to the Spartan and Athenian foot soldiers bunched together in a phalanx, it was a fatal mistake for a naval force, which depends on freedom of maneuver. The huge Persian navy crowded into the narrow strait, leaving the ships bunched up against each other, at which point the Greeks reversed course and attacked their flanks, laying waste to them. With his supply system in pieces, Xerxes was forced to withdraw his army.
Incidentally, the popular book/film 300, which focuses heavily on the bravery and martial ethos of the Spartans, instead depicts the Persian fleet as being destroyed by a storm prior to the decisive battle. This makes for a simpler story, but at a rather significant loss of historical accuracy.
Justified in the story, given who's narrating.
What you're describing is the Battle of Salamis in the _second_ Persian invasion. The storm off Mount Athos in 300 happened during the first invasion (and it really did happen). Quoth wikipedia:
>The fleet then rounded the coastline as far as Acanthus in Chalcidice, before attempting to round the headland of Mount Athos.[42] However, they were caught in a violent storm, which drove them against the coastline of Athos, wrecking (according to Herodotus) 300 ships, with the loss of 20,000 men.[42]
The second time, instead of going around the peninsula, Xerxes had them dig a canal. For the longest time people doubted Herodotus' account of this canal, but it was actually real. [0]
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xerxes_Canal
The Persians did lose a lot of ships in two storms, before the battle at Artemision:
Simultaneous with the battle at Thermopylae, an Allied naval force of 271 triremes defended the Straits of Artemisium against the Persians.[126] Directly before Artemisium, the Persian fleet had been caught in a gale off the coast of Magnesia, losing many ships, but could still probably muster over 800 ships at the start of the battle.[127] On the first day (also the first of the Battle of Thermopylae), the Persians detached 200 seaworthy ships, which were sent to sail around the eastern coast of Euboea. These ships were to round Euboea and block the line of retreat for the Allied fleet.[127] Meanwhile, the Allies and the remaining Persians engaged in the late afternoon, the Allies having the better of the engagement and capturing 30 vessels.[127] That evening, another storm occurred, wrecking the majority of the Persian detachment which had been sent around Euboea.[128]
I'm pretty sure the film stopped caring about historical accuracy when they created a wall out of dead bodies, samurai-ninja-trolls attacked at night, and an executioner with swords-as-arms appeared on screen.
https://300.fandom.com/wiki/Executioner
That's probably the easiest question to answer: the Spartans were war-crazy.
This is well-documented, and the tales of Leonida's wife asking him what to do if he doesn't return, and the 300 celebrating their own funerals, etc, are par for the course, for Spartans. Their whole society was hyper-militarised, their highest ideal was bravery in battle, to kill their enemies with no regard for their own life (in the service of the City, of course). They drilled their children from a young age to this mindset and they all became mad with it. So when the time came to choose between ditching their shield and running to fight another day, or staying and dying, the Spartans stayed and died. "Ή ταν, ή επί τας" as a Spartan mother said to her child ("with it, or on it"; "it" being his shield: either he carried it home, or they carried him home on it).
It is perhaps difficult to interpret this mindset from the point of view of a rational actor, because in terms of a strategy that maximises rewards and minimises losses, heroism does not compute. But a good general must take into account the fact that people are not perfectly rational, that they are in their most irrational when faced with death, that men with their backs to the wall fight to the death to a man. And that, at the end of the day, some troops will never break and run.
Remember also the Sacred Band of Thebes.
Consider the source. The tales being told at the time amount to war-propaganda. In practice, you want to appear as if you were a war-crazy state, but actual behavior is extremely unusual.
The modern equivalent would be looking at North Korean documentation of the North Korean military. Probably not the best source.
It would be one thing if the Persians documented the battle, because then we'd have an outside viewpoint proving the war-craziness. (Or perhaps another example: the Assyrians were well documented by many cultures of being actually war-crazy). But we only have Greek propaganda / Greek tales to tell one side of the story. Obviously, things are lost in history, and the battle of Thermopylae was not a strategic hindrance at all to the Persians. So it makes sense that it was only really documented by the Greeks.
Still, it would be nice to have some non-Greek viewpoints into the battle.
He paints this particular battle into the context of many others too, and tries to put some thoughts around the broader environment in which both the Greeks and Persians were making their decisions during these wars. He tells it all with his trademark engaging fascination and I really cannot recommend it highly enough. It’s part of his free releases, so you should readily find them on your podcast source of choice.
I recall reading many descriptions of the Alexander's forces taking on armies 10x bigger than them and routing them with little losses as he conquered Persia and other lands to the east.
Alexander never conquered the Spartans, IIRC.
- If