If you look at a map of the world in 490 BCE, the Achaemenid Empire—better known as the Persian Empire—looks like a monster. It was the first true superpower. It stretched from the edges of India all the way to Egypt and modern-day Turkey. Then you have Greece. Greece wasn't even a country back then. It was just a collection of rowdy, independent city-states like Athens and Sparta that spent half their time hitting each other over the head.
So, did Persia conquer Greece? The short answer is no. But the long answer is a lot more interesting because, for a brief, terrifying moment, they actually did hold parts of it. Most people think of the movie 300 where the Greeks win some moral victory and then kick the Persians out immediately. Reality was messier. The Persians burned Athens. Twice. They occupied northern and central Greece. But they never managed to make the "conquest" stick, and that failure changed the trajectory of Western civilization forever.
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The First Attempt: Marathon and the Grudge
King Darius I was the one who started it. He wasn't even trying to take over all of Europe at first. He was mostly annoyed. The Athenians had supported a revolt in Ionia (part of modern Turkey) and helped burn down a Persian regional capital called Sardis. Darius wanted payback.
In 490 BCE, he sent a fleet across the Aegean. This led to the Battle of Marathon. You've heard the name because of the race, but the battle itself was a massive upset. The Persians expected the Greeks to fold. Instead, the Athenian hoplites—heavily armored infantry—charged at a run. It was a slaughter. The Persians retreated to their ships and went home. Darius died before he could try again, leaving the grudge to his son, Xerxes.
Xerxes didn't just want a raid. He wanted the whole thing.
The Great Invasion: When Persia Almost Won
Ten years after Marathon, Xerxes returned with one of the largest armies the ancient world had ever seen. We’re talking hundreds of thousands of soldiers, though ancient historians like Herodotus probably exaggerated the numbers into the millions. Still, it was massive.
This is where the story gets intense. To get his army into Greece, Xerxes built a "bridge of boats" across the Hellespont. He literally marched his empire from Asia into Europe. For the Greeks, this was an existential nightmare. Many Greek cities actually "Medized"—they surrendered and gave the Persians "earth and water" as a sign of submission.
Thermopylae and the Fall of Athens
Everyone knows about the 300 Spartans. King Leonidas and his small force held the pass at Thermopylae for three days. It’s a great story, but we have to be honest: the Greeks lost that battle. Leonidas died, the pass was taken, and the road to central Greece was wide open.
Persia basically conquered everything north of the Isthmus of Corinth. They marched into Athens, which had been evacuated. They smashed the statues. They burned the temples on the Acropolis. If you were standing in Greece in late 480 BCE, you would have said, "Yeah, Persia conquered Greece."
But they couldn't hold the sea.
The Turning Point at Salamis
The Athenian general Themistocles was a bit of a genius and a lot of a liar. He tricked Xerxes into bringing his massive fleet into the narrow straits of Salamis. The big Persian ships couldn't maneuver. The smaller, faster Greek triremes rammed them into splinters. Xerxes watched the disaster from a throne on a nearby mountain.
Panicked that the Greeks might sail north and destroy his bridge of boats, Xerxes took a large portion of his army and fled back to Asia. He left a massive force behind under his general, Mardonius, to finish the job the following year.
Why the Conquest Failed
In 479 BCE, the Greeks finally put aside their bickering and fielded a massive combined army at the Battle of Plataea. It was one of the largest hoplite battles in history. Mardonius was killed, the Persian army was routed, and at the same time, the Greek navy destroyed the remnants of the Persian fleet at Mycale.
Persia didn't have the stomach for a third attempt. They had other problems—revolts in Egypt, palace intrigues, and the sheer logistical nightmare of trying to rule a bunch of stubborn, mountainous city-states that were thousands of miles from the Persian capital of Susa.
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Essentially, Persia "occupied" Greece, but they never "conquered" it. To conquer a place, you have to govern it. You have to collect taxes. You have to install a satrap (a governor) who stays. Persia did none of those things in the Greek heartland.
What if Persia Had Won?
It’s a fun "what if" for historians. If Persia had succeeded, the Golden Age of Athens might never have happened. No Parthenon. No Socrates. No Plato. Western democracy, which had its messy beginnings in Athens, might have been smothered in its crib.
However, some scholars, like those referenced in Tom Holland’s Persian Fire, argue that Persian rule might not have been the "dark age" the Greeks claimed it would be. The Persian Empire was actually fairly tolerant for its time. They usually let people keep their religions and local customs as long as they paid their taxes. But for the Greeks, who obsessed over "Eleutheria" (freedom), any foreign rule was a death sentence for their way of life.
Key Facts About the Conflict
- Duration: The main wars lasted from 499 BCE (Ionian Revolt) to 449 BCE (Peace of Callias).
- Major Battles: Marathon (490), Thermopylae (480), Salamis (480), Plataea (479).
- Persian Kings: Darius the Great and Xerxes I were the primary aggressors.
- Greek Leaders: Miltiades (Marathon), Leonidas (Thermopylae), Themistocles (Salamis), Pausanias (Plataea).
- The Result: Greece remained independent; Persia eventually went into a slow decline until Alexander the Great showed up 150 years later to flip the script.
The Long-Term Impact
After the Persians were kicked out, Athens became the superpower of the Greek world. They formed the Delian League, ostensibly to keep the Persians away, but they eventually turned it into an empire of their own. This led directly to the Peloponnesian War against Sparta. So, in a weird way, by failing to conquer Greece, Persia accidentally triggered the civil war that would eventually tear Greece apart.
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History is funny like that.
Actionable Steps for History Enthusiasts
If you want to understand this conflict beyond the Hollywood version, there are a few things you can do right now to get a clearer picture of the era.
- Read the Primary Source (with a grain of salt): Pick up Herodotus’s The Histories. He’s known as the Father of History (and the Father of Lies). He’s the main reason we know about these wars, but he’s incredibly biased toward the Greeks. It’s a wild read.
- Visit the Sites: If you ever travel to Greece, don't just stay in Athens. Go to Marathon. It's about an hour from the city. You can stand on the mound where the Athenian soldiers are buried. Go to the pass of Thermopylae. It’s much narrower today because the shoreline has moved, but standing there makes the tactical reality of the battle hit home.
- Check out the Persian side: Look into the "Behistun Inscription" or the ruins of Persepolis. To understand why Persia failed, you have to understand how massive and complex their empire was. Greece was a tiny fringe province to them, not the center of the world.
- Explore the Archeological Museum in Athens: They have actual Persian helmets found on the battlefields. Seeing the physical gear—the bronze Greek helmets vs. the Persian wicker shields—explains the outcome of the hand-to-hand fighting better than any textbook.
Persia never conquered Greece, but they came close enough to change the world. The struggle defined the "East vs. West" narrative that we are still talking about today.