Battle of Mycale
The Battle of Mycale was one of the two major battles that ended the second Persian invasion of Greece during the Greco-Persian Wars. It took place on 27 or 28 August, 479BC on the slopes of Mount Mycale, which is located on the coast of Ionia opposite the island of Samos. The battle was fought between an alliance of Greek city-states, including Sparta, Athens and Corinth; and the Persian Empire of Xerxes I.
The previous year, the Persian invasion force, led by Xerxes himself, had scored victories at the battles of Thermopylae and Artemisium, and conquered Thessaly, Boeotia and Attica; however, at the ensuing Battle of Salamis, the Greek navy had won an unlikely victory, and therefore prevented the conquest of the Peloponnese. Xerxes then retreated, leaving his general Mardonius with a substantial army to finish off the Greeks the following year.
In the summer of 479BC, the Greeks assembled an army, and marched to confront Mardonius at the Battle of Plataea. At the same time, the Greek fleet sailed to Samos, where the demoralized remnants of the Persian navy were based. The Persians, seeking to avoid a battle, beached their fleet below the slopes of Mycale, and built a palisaded camp with the support of a Persian army unit. The Greek commander Leotychides decided to attack the Persians anyway, landing the fleet's complement of marines to do so.
Although the Persian forces put up a sturdy resistance, the heavily armored Greek hoplites eventually routed the Persian troops, who fled to their camp. The Ionian Greek contingents in the Persian army defected, and the Persian camp was attacked, with a large number of Persians slaughtered. The Persian ships were then captured and burned. The complete destruction of the Persian navy, along with the destruction of Mardonius' army at Plataea, allegedly on the same day as the Battle of Mycale, decisively ended the invasion of Greece. After Plataea and Mycale, the Greeks would take the offensive against the Persians, marking a new phase of the Greco-Persian Wars.
Background
After Xerxes I was crowned the emperor of the Achaemenid Empire, he quickly resumed preparations for the invasion of Greece, including building two pontoon bridges across the Hellespont. A congress of city states met at Corinth in late autumn of 481BC, and a confederate alliance of Greek city-states was formed. In August 480BC, after hearing of Xerxes' approach, a small Greek army led by the Spartan king Leonidas I blocked the Pass of Thermopylae, while an Athenian-dominated navy sailed to the Straits of Artemisium. The vastly outnumbered Greek army held Thermopylae against the Persian army for six days in total, before being outflanked by the Persians. The Persians also achieved a costly naval triumph at the Battle of Artemisium, where they forced the Greek fleet to withdraw and thus captured the Euripus Strait.After Thermopylae, the Persian army had burned and sacked the Boeotian cities which had not surrendered, namely Plataea and Thespiae, before taking possession of the now-evacuated city of Athens. The Greek army, meanwhile, prepared to defend the Isthmus of Corinth. The ensuing naval Battle of Salamis ended in a decisive victory for the Greeks, marking a turning point in the conflict. Following the defeat of his navy at Salamis, Xerxes retreated to Asia with a minor portion of his army.Image:Miletus Bay silting evolution map-en.svg|thumb|A map showing the position of Mount Mycale in relation to Lade, Samos and Miletus|alt=A color terrain map focused on northwestern Turkey and the islands of Greece. Mount Mycale is at the top center, Lade island is to its immediate south, Samos is to its immediate west and Miletus is to Lade's immediate east.
The Persian fleet had been stationed in Samos to defend Ionia and avert an Ionian revolt. The Persians were not expecting the Greeks to mount a naval attack on the other end of the Aegean Sea, because the Greeks had not followed through on their victory at Salamis by chasing the Persian fleet. However, the morale of the Persian fleet was breaking, and they were anxiously awaiting new reports on the status of the land army led by Mardonius. According to historian Charles Hignett, it was clear that only the triumph of the Persian land army in Greece could sustain Persian rule in Ionia.
Xerxes left Mardonius with most of his army, and the latter decided to camp for the winter in Thessaly. The 110 ships of the Greek fleet were anchored at Aegina under the command of the Spartan king Leotychides in the spring of 479BC. Six people from Chios who had made an unsuccessful attempt to overthrow Strattis, their ruling tyrant, escaped to Sparta. They requested the Spartan ephors to free Ionia, and the latter sent them to Leotychides. They managed to persuade the Greek fleet to move to Delos. The Greeks hesitated to sail anywhere farther than Delos; because they were unfamiliar with the lands which lay there, thought they were full of armed peoples and believed the journey was too long. The Greek and Persian fleets stayed in their positions, apprehensive of moving closer to their opponent. Meanwhile, the Athenian navy under Xanthippus had joined with the Greek fleet off Delos.
They were then approached by a delegation from Samos under the leadership of Hegesistratos in the month of July, who said the Ionian cities were eager to revolt. They also pointed out the poor morale and reduced seaworthiness of the Persian fleet, the latter had occurred probably due to the long time it had spent at sea. Leotychides found Hegesistratos' name to be a good omen, since it meant "Army Leader". The delegation from Samos, as envoys of their nation, pledged their loyalty to the Hellenic alliance. Leotychides and the council of war decided to exploit this opportunity and sailed for Samos. The route he took probably began from the Cyclades, it then involved sailing for approximately in the open ocean, passing Icaria and Coressia to finally land near Mount Ampelus in Samos.
The Persians withdrew from Samos; Hignett argues that by doing so, they left to the Greeks an advantageous post which was the strongest on the Ionian coast. The Persians at Samos had control of the best harbor in all of the Aegean Sea and a great water supply. Historian John Barron argues their retreat was not absurd: the channel was just about wide at its thinnest point, therefore, the Greeks could not send their entire fleet after the Persians. But the Persians did not force a battle and did not move to the excellent harbor at Miletus, instead choosing to land at Mycale, where Barron says they could observe the Greeks but the Greeks could not see them. Barron notes the absolute breakdown of the will to fight of the Persians at this point.
Image:Battle of Thermopylae and movements to Salamis, 480 BC.gif|thumb|Movements of the Persian and Greek armies in 480–479BC|alt=A map centered on southern Greece showing the movements of the Greek army with dark blue arrows and the Persian army with red arrows.
Classicists Michael Flower and John Marincola argue that the Greeks may have decided to sail to Samos only because they were told about a potential Ionian revolt, and about the disrepair of the Persian fleet. Flower and Marincola note that the Greeks had previously been quite hesitant to sail beyond Delos because of the Persian fleet. Historian Marcello Lupi also notes that the Greek fleet had sailed at the insistence of the Samians and had been unwilling to chase the Persians after Salamis, hesitating to move out of Delos.
Flower and Marincola argue that the envoys from Samos were more reliable than the envoys from Chios, since the latter were "conspirators on the run" while the former were the representatives of their people. They note that Hegesistratos had claimed there was a chance the Persian fleet could be seized with one maneuver. They argue that Leotychides may have considered this a risk he could take. They also note that the Greek fleet had already sailed for Samos when their ambassadors reported the dismissal of the Phoenician ships from the Persian fleet.
Historian Peter Green argues that the Phoenician ships were dismissed either to defend the shores of Thrace and the Dardanelles; or because the Persian high command could not trust the Phoenicians after Salamis. Barron argues that the Phoenicians were dismissed due to their low morale. Historian Jack Balcer observes the error of the Persians in dismissing the Phoenicians, and claims the battle would have unfolded differently had the Phoenicians not been dismissed. Hignett argues that Leotychides was taking the risk of fighting a naval battle where the location and circumstances would be picked by the Persians, who could thus maximize their advantages. Barron argues that passing over the opportunity to destroy their opponent's fleet would be an absurd decision to make for both the Persians and the Greeks, especially since the land war was coming to a close, and because both sides would be expecting the mustering of their opponent's flotillas. Balcer notes how the original mission of the Greek fleet was not letting the Persian fleet reinforce Mardonius, and how the fleet took a bold decision to go on the offensive.
Opposing forces
Persians
Ancient historian Herodotus gives the size of the Persian fleet which wintered at Cyme at 300 ships. The Phoenician ships were dismissed from the Persian fleet before the battle, which reduced its strength. Historian Charles Hignett found the fleet size of 300 ships to be too large, even if this number included the Phoenician ships. Green estimates that there were approximately just 100 ships in the Persian fleet after the Phoenicians left. Barron also arrives at an estimate of 100 ships after this dismissal.Tigranes was the commander of the Persian land forces at Mycale. Artaÿntes was the joint commander of the Persian fleet, and he appointed his nephew, Ithamitres, as the third commander for the fleet. Herodotus states that there were 60,000 soldiers in the Persian army at Mycale. Hignett argues that Herodotus' own narrative of the battle contradicts these numbers, and claims Tigranes could not have had more than 10,000 soldiers in his unit. Shepherd also estimates that Tigranes had around 10,000 soldiers; with an additional 3,000 Persian infantry who had disembarked from the ships. Shepherd also notes that Tigranes notably did not have cavalry contingents among his troops. Green estimates that Tigranes had only 6,000 soldiers with him, who were joined by the 4,000 marines in the Persian fleet, for a total of 10,000 combatants. Historian Richard Evans estimates that there were around 4,000 total combatants available to the Persians.File:Greek-Persian duel.jpg|thumb|Greek hoplite and Persian warrior, depicted fighting each other. Ancient kylix, 5th centuryBC|alt=An illustration on a circular surface in golden-yellow watercolor. A standing Greek soldier with a unicorn shield is sword fighting with a lunging Persian soldier wearing a drooping cap.