Nothing like playing at home, really.  Always a good thing, in my book.

Last week, we saw the Romans defeat the last effort to restore the monarchy there, and successfully establish peace for quite some time to come.  Meanwhile, we last left the situation in Persia a bit up in the air, with Darius, Cambyses’ bodyguard, coming to the throne in the midst of a palace coup against someone that may, or may not, have been Cambyses’ brother, who himself came to the throne in a palace coup.

Persian politics, folks.

Darius came to the throne in 522, in the midst of the sort of trouble that tears apart Empires thrown together rapidly by a great conqueror or two.

If you like this topic, feel free to discuss it below.  If you want to check out previous posts, take a look at the archive here.

The Early Reign of Darius

The federated nature of the Persian Empire led to a great deal of turmoil on the death of Cambyses.  The Kings of Elam, Babylonia, Assyria, Bactria, Media, and the Pharaoh of Egypt, all erupted into revolt against Darius and his army by 522.  However, while Darius did not have a great deal of popular support, or legitimacy amongst the nobility, he did control the army, and that’s basically all that mattered.  His forces marched against the disorganized revolts, crushing them quickly.  By the end of 521, Darius could boast of eliminating 8 “False Kings,” and establishing control over the Empire.

The revolts changed the complexion of the Persian Empire going forward.  It firmly established the army, and control of the army, as the key to holding the Empire together.  None of the revolts could get anything like the military might wielded by Darius and his leaders, which doomed them to failure from the get go- but, at least they could brag that they went down fast.  However, control via the military would prove to have its own set of problems down the line- when the Persian Emperor suffered military defeat outside the Empire, he could expect serious revolts back in the Empire.

The revolts also ended the semi-federal system of tributary kings, negotiated tribute and military support.  Rather than replace the kings with more pliable ones, Darius ended their kingdoms.  Instead, he established the satrap system, which had been used by the earlier emperors in the wilder areas of the Empire.  These satraps were governors of provinces, rather than kings of kingdoms.  The satraps were required to pay taxes, as directed by the central government, as well as provide quotas of troops on demand.  They were answerable to the central government, though, admittedly, removing a satrap who didn’t want to go would take some effort.  They were allowed to keep certain taxes for internal improvements, and a small number of troops for internal defense, or, on the borders, to delay invaders long enough for the Emperor to bring the main army.

This new system regularized Imperial finances, making it easier for the Emperor to collect taxes and predict his income.  It also allowed him to more easily maintain and recruit the powerful central army he needed to keep control over the Empire.  With his rule largely secure, he could turn his efforts to other issues.

In 516-515, Darius invaded the Indus River Valley, using Afghanistan as his jumping off point.  He campaigned down the river valley, defeating local forces and taking submission from local rulers.  He established two more satrapies in the area, and then returned home.   In 513, he launched a campaign against the Scythians, who had invaded and raided Persian lands during the revolt.  He crossed the Bosporus, then the Danube, forcing the Scythians, a semi-nomadic people, to retreat before him.  He attacked and burned the towns of their allies and tributaries.  When the Scythians retreated into uncultivated lands, where they expected the Persians to starve, Darius used his navy to shuttle supplies and keep them in the field.  In the end, Darius erected several forts in the area, and accepted tribute from the Scythians, and, while he was at it, the Macedonians.  While he was in Egypt, he also added Sirte to his control.  In fact, by the end of all of this, almost half the world’s population would be under his control.

The Ionian Revolt

Ionia, on the Aegean coast of modern Turkey, had been settled in the 700s BC by a variety of Greek colonists, only to be eventually conquered by Lydia.  These Greek cities and towns were rather typical polies, with feuding aristocracies and a general distrust of outsiders.  The Lydians largely settled for taxing the Ionian Greeks, rather than really imposing any sort of system on them.  Cyrus, however, had a different plan.  He split Ionia from Lydia, creating a satrapy. He placed the satrap in Sardis, and the satrap ruled the Greek cities by imposing tyrants on them to keep the feuding nobles of the cities in check.

In 500, the Tyrant of Meltus, Aristagoras, found himself in a bit of a jam.  His brother, who had fought with Darius, had been required to stay with the Emperor, who was afraid of his ambition.  Aristagoras found him in an unfamiliar town without much authority, and feared a revolt, or worse.  However, in 500, some men from Naxos, who were on the outs in their city, asked Aristagoras to conquer the place so they could be in charge.  Sensing a chance to bolster his reputation, he asked the Satrap of Ionia, Artaphernes, to give him support in return for a cut of the loot.  Artaphernes asked Darius for his blessing, and Darius sent ships to back up this invasion of Naxos.  Artaphernes sent some troops to meet up with Aristagoras under the command of Artaphernes’ brother, Megabates. 

Megabates and Aristagoras got along poorly, and fell into quarrels basically from jump street.  On the voyage, they kept fighting, and Megabates, out of spite, warned Naxos they were about to get hammered.  As a result, the city was able to rally its defenses, and, rather than storming the city, the Persians had to settle for a siege of the place.  After four months, though, the Persians ran out of money, and they had to call the whole thing off.

Since the whole Naxos thing was a disaster of his own doing, Aristagoras figured he was about to get fired, at the very least.  So, he did the logical thing anyone would do in his spot- he revolted.  He convinced the people of Miletus to revolt against the Persian tyranny, declaring a democracy in Miletus and calling on all Greeks to follow his example.  His declarations were a spark in a powder keg- the tyrants ruled with the authority of Persia, not popular support, and the cities quickly followed Miletus’ example and formed democracies, declaring their effective independence.

However, if this thing was going to work, it was going to take more than the Ionians.  During the winter of 499/498, he travelled to Sparta to ask for help from the best army in Greece.  The Spartans, who were not known for being idiots, declined to send an army across the sea, and away from their slaves, to fight the man who ruled half the people in the world.  So, Aristagoras made a stop in Athens, pretty sure the answer would be the same.  However, the Athenians were supportive of his efforts.  They, too, had recently thrown off the yoke of a tyrant, Hippias, and established a democracy.  The Persians, through Artaphernes, had tried to restore Hippias several times, and the Athenians wanted to support democracy and freedom in Ionia, and get Hippias and Artaphernes in the bargain.

In 498, the Athenians, with some other  Greeks, arrived in Ionia, and the Ionian/Athenian army marched on Sardis, the satrap’s capital.  Able to sneak up on the city, somehow, the Greeks stormed the city.  They captured the lower city, but Artaphernes managed to hold the city’s citadel.  While the Greeks tried to storm the citadel, the city caught on fire, and the Greeks had to retreat.  However, since they had captured Sardis, for a bit, and burned it to the ground, the Athenians figured that was good enough, so they declared victory and headed for home.  The Persian cavalry, leading the rest of the Persian army, caught up with the Greeks outside of Ephesus, and defeated them.  The Athenians figured the whole thing was over for them, and told the Ionians “Good luck with the rest of it.”

Still, the burning of Sardis encouraged more revolt.  Most of the nobles of Cyprus revolted against the Persians, while the Ionians marched on Byzantium and took control of the city there.  They also convinced their neighbors, the Carians, to revolt as well, spreading discontent against Persia.  Needless to say, Darius wasn’t going to take this lying down.

In 497, the Persians launched a three pronged counter attack.   One prong went to the Hellespont, which quickly fell to the Persians.  Another army, with the support of the Phoenician fleet, sailed to Cyprus.  There, the Persians defeated the rebel army and killed most of the rebel leaders.  The third army marched on Caria.  There they defeated the Carian army.  While the Carians debated surrender, an Ionian Greek army showed up, and convinced them to fight on, only to be crushed again in a second battle.  However, while the Persians seemed to be in control, the refugees from the previous defeats set an ambush for the Persian army, crushing it and driving the Persians out of Caria.

The defeat in Caria made the Persians act cautiously in 496 and 495.  The Ionian Greeks could use their fleet to move troops quickly around the region, and respond to any small Persian attacks.  The Carians relied on this support as they rebuilt their forces, and the war settled into something of a stalemate.

 

The Battle of Lade

Needing some sort of result, Darius sent more men, and his general most experienced in dealing with Greeks, Datis, to the area.  Datis surmised that Miletus was at the center of all the trouble, and that the best solution was to take that city out.  Without the leadership of Miletus, then the whole revolt would collapse.  Datis opted to approach the city by the seaward side, rather than the landward side.  Approaching by land meant having to fight through a number of cities, while approaching by sea offered a chance to drive directly on the city without any interference, if the Greek fleet could be defeated.

Hearing of the Persian approach by sea, the Ionian Greeks decided to face the Persians at sea rather than by land, where their odds were better.  The Greeks put together a force of 350 ships, with Chios giving 100, Miletus 90, Lesbos 80, Samos 60 and 43 more from other, smaller towns.  The Persians had 600 ships, but did not trust their ability to defeat the Greeks at sea, and, fearing punishment if they failed, parked their ships nearby, rather than fight immediately.

The Persians decided to go for skullduggery over direct assault.  They called together all the old tyrants of the various cities in the fleet, and sent them to negotiate in secret with them.  The Persians promised leniency for defectors, and rewards for those who would join them.  Each contingent refused to follow along with them, but seems to be unaware that all the Greeks were approached- each city thought the Persians had approached only them.

The Ionians selected Dionysus as their admiral, who promised to train them to a level of skill so fearsome that the Persians wouldn’t even dare to fight them.  He lead the fleet out for six days of hard drills in rowing, tactics, and maneuvering.  However, on the 7th, the sailors of the fleet declared that they were tired of getting better at war, and decided that they wouldn’t go out and do any more practice.  Upon deciding this the leaders from Samos met with the Persians again, and took the offer of clemency.  However, the Samians agreed only to leave the battle, not desert the Ionians immediately.

Not knowing of the Samian treachery, but knowing his fleet would only decay from inactivity, Dionysus decided he had to try to force a battle.  Knowing a big chunk of the Ionian fleet was on their side, the Persians were happy to do so.  The Greeks deployed with the Miletian fleet on the left, the Chios fleet in the center, and the Lesbians and Samians on the right.  As the fleets closed with each other, the Samians did just as they promised, and bailed on the fight.  The Lesbians, seeing the Samians fleeing the battle, decided to get out of dodge, too.  The Chians and Miletians, however, stuck around to fight, and were quickly surrounded by the Persians.  While the fight went on the rest of the day, there wasn’t much they could do.  Over 200 Greek ships were sunk by the end of the day, against fewer than 60 lost Persian ships. 

With the Greek fleet destroyed, putting down the rest of the revolt was fairly simple.  Miletus fell that year, and, with it, most of the heart for a rebellion.  493 proved to be the year of the hangman, as cities in Iona and Caria fell quickly, and the Persians reestablished control over Ionia.

However, Darius wasn’t done- someone had crossed over the ocean, and gotten mixed up in his business.  Not only did the Ionians have to go down for the revolt, so did the Athenians.