Greek and Persian Wars | The Athenians Build a Fleet (Lecture 7)

Lecture 7: Well aware that they were Xerxes’s prime target, the Athenians (persuaded by a farsighted citizen named Themistocles) created a Greek navy of 200 triremes. In the autumn of 481 B.C., a Greek city-state convention at the Isthmus of Corinth sent spies to Sardis to uncover the Persian army’s strength. Themistocles, who proved to be the most persuasive voice at the convention, convinced his fellow Athenians to evacuate their families to offshore islands or to the Peloponnese and urged the delegates to confront Xerxes as far forward as possible to slow his progress into central Greece. When the Greeks learned of Xerxes’s success crossing into Europe, they took Themistocles’s advice and set out to bar the Great King’s path.

Recommended Reading:
Lazenby, The Defence of Greece, 490–479 B.C.
Lenardon, The Saga of Themistocles.