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GREEK REFERENCES
John Sloan
This table is a list of names of prominent Greek politicians - generals active in the wars of the Greek communities from circa 500 to 200 BC. It also includes Persian, Macedonian and other of their opponents. And also terms used in references. It also includes important cities, regions or islands that were involved in Greek warfare. For those for which we found Wikipedia entries links are provided. Likewise links to the History of war web site. The Encyclopedia Britannica and Livus have entries but they are more difficult to link. Some links are to the sources, we have two very different editions of Cornelius Nepos' book on great generals. Plutarch also wrote essays about some of these leaders and there are several editions available on line. Many of the strategems developed and employed by Greek commanders are described in Frontinus Strategems, this is in the Loeb series, and Polyaenus The Strategems of War this has several versions on line.
There is an extensive reference list of classical and modern sources in the accompaning article on classicgreekwars.
This table is a supplement for the table listing battles and wars
When one reads about the many individuals who participated in the warfare of the 5th - 2nd centuries one realizes that the inter relationships betwen the Greeks and Persians were more extensive than our popular history text books indicate. And the personal motivations of both the powerful leaders in all cities and of the larger citizenry in the 'democratic' cities dominated political policy.
Clauswitz's famous statement that war is politics raised to a higher dimension does not make itself clear as these three accounts do, namely that conflict extends from that between individuals, families, tribes, and civic associations, to larger societies, principalities, satrapies, kingdoms and empires.
The lesson to be learned from this history is that conflict at all levels including wars and battles is conceived of and waged by individuals (not abstact concepts such as the 'state') And the leaders and their followers take actions as a result of decisions which are based on ideas and beliefs. In some respects the beliefs of these 'ancients' are the same or similar to 'modern's but in many others they are quite different - dramatically different. Therefor this list describes results and the reader must think more deeply about causes in the personalities and motivations of the individuals as they are revealed. I include some basic general histories and speciality references for those who desire to study more deeply these beliefs. In order to make this list shorter I include much detail in the links, which are either or both the highlighted name or a little blue button.
Agiad - Eurypontid
The names of two of the hereditary dynasties of kings of Sparta. Both these many generation families claimed descent from Hercules. There were two kings simultaneously. The office had little political power apart from influence. But the kings typically did lead the Spartan army into battle.
The title of the chief executives in classical Greek cities. In the Athenian government there were typically three elected to serve simultaneously.
Boeotarch
The elected leader of the Theban Confederation from 379.
The ephors were leaders of ancient Sparta, and its colonies of Taras and Heraclea, and shared power with the two Spartan kings. The ephors were a council of five elected annually who swore "on behalf of the city" while the kings swore for themselves. Herodotus claimed that the institution was created by Lycurgus, while Plutarch considers it a later institution. It may have arisen from the need for governors while the kings were leading armies in battle. The ephors were elected by the popular assembly, and all citizens were eligible. They were forbidden to be re-elected and provided a balance for the two kings, who rarely co-operated. Plato called the ephors tyrants who ran Sparta as despots while the kings were little more than generals.
Gerosia
The Gerousia was the Spartan council of elders, which was made up of men over the age of sixty. It was created by the semi-legendary Spartan lawgiver Lycurgus in the seventh century, in his Great Rhetra ("Great Pronouncement"). According to Lycurgus' biographer Plutarch, the creation of the Gerousia was the first significant constitutional innovation instituted by Lycurgus.
Helepolis
Helepolis is the Greek name for a movable siege tower. see Helepolis and model
Models of modern ideas about what the Boeotian flamethrower looked like.
Hoplites were citizen-soldiers of Ancient Greek city-states who were primarily armed with spears and shields. Hoplite soldiers utilized the phalanx formation to be effective in war with fewer soldiers. The formation discouraged the soldiers from acting alone, for this would compromise the formation and minimize its strengths. The hoplites were primarily represented by free citizens – propertied farmers and artisans – who were able to afford the bronze armour suit and weapons (estimated at a third to a half of its able-bodied adult male population). Most hoplites were not professional soldiers and often lacked sufficient military training. Some states maintained a small elite professional unit, known as the epilektoi ("chosen") since they were picked from the regular citizen infantry. These existed at times in Athens, Argos, Thebes, and Syracuse, among others. Hoplite soldiers made up the bulk of ancient Greek armies. In the 8th or 7th century, Greek armies adopted the phalanx formation. The formation proved successful in defeating the Persians when employed by the Athenians at the Battle of Marathon in 490 during the First Greco-Persian War. The Persian archers and light troops who fought in the Battle of Marathon failed because their bows were too weak for their arrows to penetrate the wall of Greek shields that comprised the phalanx formation. The phalanx was also employed by the Greeks at the Battle of Thermopylaein 480 and at the Battle of Plataeain 479 during the Second Greco-Persian War.
See the link for more detail.
The phalanx was a rectangular mass military formation, usually composed entirely of heavy infantry armed with spears, pikes, sarissas, or similar pole weapons. and a diagram
See the link for more details
Phalangite
A member of a phalanx
The helots were a subjugated population that constituted a majority of the population of Laconia and Messenia – the territories comprising Sparta. There has been controversy since antiquity as to their exact characteristics, such as whether they constituted an ethnic group, a social class, or both.
The first link is to a description. The second link is to an article about the helot revolt.
Polemarch
the Greek name for the chief of the three archons in Athens
Lochoi
A regiment sized unit in the Spartan army
A battalion sized unit in the Spartan army
Navarch
the Greek name for a naval commander - admiral
An Athenian idea to enable the voters annually to exile the individual they believed was most likely to assume too much power or simply too popular. By consideration of the motivations behind each specific example the reader can gain an idea about the nature of Athenian 'democracy' in action.
Peltast
A light infantryman who could fight in irregular warfare better than hoplites
The mass infantry formation the Greeks and then Macedonians used effectively
the Greek name for a military commander - general
trireme
A trireme was an ancient vessel and a type of galley that was used by the ancient maritime civilizations of the Mediterranean, especially the Phoenicians, ancient Greeks and Romans. see Trireme and model It was very dangerous to allow a trireme to turn in the face of the opponent, so the seating was arranged so that in order to 'back water' keeping the bow facing the enemy the crew could step over their oar and row powerfully while moving astern.
diekplous
This is one of the main naval tactics using triremes, described by William Rodgers. It consisted of a maneuver to pass through the opposing line of triremes to attack him from the rear or before they could turn. Along the passage the idea was to shere off the opposing ship oars and then ram an opposing ship. The bows were strengthened and mounted with a heavy bronze ram. But it was a dangerous maneuver and its main success was achieved by Phormio. In the battle in the Syracuse harbor the defenders greatly reenforced their ships in order to be able to 'our ram' the Athenians.
periplous
This was the other main naval tactic using triremes as described by Rodgers. It was the opposite of penetrating the line -rather it was envelopment by deploying in a longer line and then outflanking the opponent. To be successful it required superior numbers. Both tactics greater manuverability by better crews. Both were new tactics designed to use the triremes themselves. Previously (and subsequently by the Romans) the battle consisted of a firepower between missles from both sides followed by ship direct contact enabling marines to wage a kind of land battle on board the opponent's ship.
trierach
The officer commanding a trireme - frequently the wealthy individual who was required to build it.
5th century d.459
Achaemenes
He was a son of king Darius I by his queen Atossa and thus a full brother of Xerxes I, He was sent as satrap of Egypt some time between 486 and 484. There he defeated the local revolt 484. When Xerxes launched the second Persian invasion of Greece (480–479), Achaemenes was ordered to bring the Egyptian fleet and take command of the combined Persian fleet. He commanded at Artimisium and at Salamis. He faced an Athenian navy and army again in 460. After Salamis Achaemenes returned to Egypt as satrap. In 460, under the leadership of a native prince named Inaros, Egypt revolted once more against Persian rule. The Athenians sent a naval-military force from Cyprus. Achaemenes confronted Inaros in the Battle of Papremis in 459 but was defeated and slain. But eventually the Persians sent an army and defeated the Egyptians and Athenians. Xerxes lost two other brothers who were killed at Thermpolae.
Acilus
He was commander of the Oricum fleet
c. 246-213
Achaeus
General of Antiochus III among the successors of Alexander the Great
377 -326
Ada of Caria
Ada of Caria (fl. 377 – 326) was a member of the House of Hecatomnus (the Hecatomnids) and ruler of Caria during the mid-4th century, first as Persian Satrap and later as Queen under the auspices of Alexander III (the Great) of Macedon.
Adeimantus
He was the Corinthian naval commander at Artemisium and Salamis. He opposed Themistocles but eventually agreed to follow his plan. He was the father Aristeus, also a Corinthian general.
He was the son of Leucolophides and an Athenian commander - supporter of Alcibiades. He was elected strategosand participated in campaign to Andros 407, and battles of Arginusae406 and Aegospotami 405. At that battle he opposed Philocles' motion that captured individuals should have their right hands cut off. He was spared after the battle but accused of treachery.
Aeneas Tacticus
Military author of books on military tactics. His book on sieges survives. He notes the importance in Greek warfare of dealing with potential opposition parties inside a city
Agesilaus I
Agesilaus I, son of Doryssus, was the 6th king of the Agiad line at Sparta, excluding Aristodemus. According to Apollodorus of Athens, he reigned forty-four years, and died in 886. Pausanias makes his reign a short one, but contemporary with the legislation of Lycurgus. He was succeeded by his son Archelaus. His grandson was Teleclus.
c. 444 - 359
Agesilaus II
He was a king who ruled over Sparta during the 4th century. Agesilaus was from the Eurypontid family, one of the two royal dynasties of Sparta (the other being the Agiad family). This Spartan king is perhaps best known for his victories against the Persians in Anatolia, as well as his successes in the Corinthian Wars. The Spartan defeat by the Thebans at the Battle of Leuctra, which took place during Agesilaus' reign in 371, however, brought an end to Spartan dominance in the Peloponnese. Agesilaus was the second son of Archidamus II, a Spartan king reigned from around 477 to 426. and his second wife, Eupolia, the daughter of Melesippidas. There is a biography by Plutarch who compares him to Pompey.
See the links for details.
Agesandridas or Hegesandridas
Hegesandridas or Agesandridas was a son of a "Hegesander" or "Agesander", perhaps the same who is mentioned as a member of the last Spartan embassy sent to Athens before the Peloponnesian War, was himself a Spartan general in that war. In 411 he was placed in command of a fleet of 42 ships destined to further a revolt in Euboea. see Hegesandridas
Agesipolis I
Agiad king of Sparta His father was Pausanias and his colleague was Agesilaus II. While he was still a minor, the Spartan army was led by Aristodemus. In 390 he led the army in invasion of Argolis. In 385 he led the army against Mantinea. In this battle the Theban generalsEpaminondas and Pelopidas were nearly killed. He captured the town by diverting a stream against the walls to make them collapse. In 380 he stormed Toroni, but died soon after from a fever. See the links for details
Agesipolis II
Agiad king of Sparta He ruled briefly. See the links for details.
Agis II
Eurypontid king of Sparta He was the son of Archidamus II for whom the first phase of the Peloponnesian war - The Arhchidamian War - is named. In 425 he invaded Attica but was called back. In 421 he signed the Peace of Nicias. In 418 the Athenians , Argives and Mantineans marched toward Tegea so the Spartans had to stop them. Agis maneuvered his troops successfully and defeated them near Mantinea.The Livius entry quotes Thucydides' account fully Decelean or Ionian War. Agis not only invaded Attica but for the first time his Spartans fortified Decelea thus putting a permanent garrison there to raid continually instead of periodically. In 401 he defeated the Eleans at Elis and died on the way back to Sparta. He was succeeded by his younger half-brother, Agesilaus II
See the links.
Agis III
Eurypontid king of Sparta He was a son of king Archidamus III of Sparta and succeeded his father in 338. In 333, while Alexander the Great was busy in Persia, he began an anti-Macedonian effort by recruiting Greek mercenaries who had served in the Persian army and had survivedIssus and he then invaded Crete. This forced Alexander to send a fleet commanded by Amphoterus. Agis next campaigned in Greece and defeated a Macedonian army commanded by Corragus while Antipater was busy. But when Antipatermarched south with a large army in 351 Agis was defeated in battle at Megalopolis.
Agis IV
Agis IV(c. 265 – 241), the elder son of Eudamidas II, was the 25th king of the Eurypontid dynasty of Sparta. Posterity has reckoned him an idealistic but impractical monarch.
Plutarch wrote a biography in which he compared Agis and Cleomenes with the Roman would-be reformers Caius and Tiberius Gracchus, an excellent choice .
See links for details.
Alcibiades
Athenian politician and general - He repeatedly switched sides between Athens and Sparta and between Greek cities and Persia, depending on his political standing in those places. He was both famous and notorious to contemporaries and historians. Nepos and Plutarch both wrote assessments. He was such an important figure in Greek history that I include a summary of his full biography from Wikipedia here.
The contemporary and modern historians' description of his career and (significantly) its reception and influence on both powerful, experienced political leaders and on the Athenian public is testimony to the role of 'great men' in history. It contradicts the concept that individuals play no such role but that history is created by 'forces' and abstract entities such as 'the state'. The ancient Greeks and Romans had no such abstract concept as a 'state'.
Plutarch wrote his biography and compared him with the Roman Coriolanus, a very striking comparison indeed.
Alcidas
Spartan leader who in 427 supported Mytilenean aristocrats against Athens. But he was so afraid of the Athenian seamanship at the battle of Naupactus that he avoided contact and returned home. He attacked cities along the Ionian coast. He supported the aristocrats at Corcyra in 426 but lost the naval battle against the Athenian and Corcyrean fleets.
Alexander I of Epirus
Alexander I, king of Epirus about 342, brother of Olympias the mother of Alexander the Great, and son-in-law of Philip of Macedon, whose daughter Cleopatra he married (336). In 332 he crossed over to Italy to assist the Tarentines against the Lucanians, Bruttians and Samnites. He gained considerable successes and made an arrangement with the Romans for a joint attack upon the Samnites ; but the Tarentines, suspecting him of the design of founding an independent kingdom, turned against him. Although the advantage at first rested with Alexander, he gradually lost it, and his supporters dwindled away. In 330 (or earlier) he was defeated at Pandosia and slain by a Lucanian emigrant.
He was the son of Philip II the king of Macedon. He led a Macedonian and other Greek army to conquer Persia. Encyclopedia Britannica article
Alexander of Pherae
Alexander was tyrant or despot of Pherae in Thessely, ruling from 369 to c. 356. See the link
Amompharetus
Amompharetus, son of Poliadas, was a Spartan company commander at the Battle of Plataea. The name means "of irreproachable valor". Before the battle, both the Greek and Persian armies camped in front of each other for 10 days on the plain of Plateaea, with only small raids on each side. The plan was for the main contingent of Greeks to set out first during the night, with the Spartans guarding the rea. After the main contingent of Greeks had left the encampment, and it was time for the Spartans to set off to take up the rear, Amompharetus refused to leave the field without a fight, insisting that the unalterable law of Sparta forbade retreat from the battlefield. There is another mention of Amompharetus (in Plutarch's Solon) as one of the five Spartans arbitrating the dispute over the island of Salamis between the citizens of Athens and Megara. The verdict was in favor of Athens. See the link.
Amphictyonic League
Amphictyonic League was an ancient religious association of Greek tribes formed in the dim past, before the rise of the Greek poleis. See the links.
Amyntas
There were three Amyntas closely connected with Macedonian family and court intrigue. This one was the son of Perdiccas II and rightful heir to the Macedonian throne in 359. Philipp II seized power and later married Amyntas to his daughter, Cynnane. While Alexander was campaigning in the Balkans and Amyntas was in Athhens he was picked due to his ancestry to replace Alexander in a coup hatched by the Greek cities seeking independene. He was then accused of plotting against Alexander in 336 and was executed.
c. 560 -525
Anaxandridas
Agiad king of Sparta. Father of Cleomenes and Dorieus
Antalcidas
Spartan admiral/general who in 393 attempted to end the war with Persia by giving up the Ionian Greeks. He was unsuccessful, but in 388 he persuaded the Persian king, Artaxerxesto decree that all Asia Minor plus Cyprus and Cnidos was Persian territory and all other Greek cities would be independent. In 387 Antalcidas commanded the Spartan fleet in the Hellespont to enforce this "King's peace".
Antigenes
Antigenes died 316) was a general of Alexander the Great, who also served under Philip II of Macedon,and lost an eye at the siege of Perinthus (340). After the death of Alexander in 323 he obtained the satrapy of Susiana. He was one of the commanders of the Argyraspides and, with his troops, took the side of Eumenes. On the defeat of Eumenes in 316, Antigenes fell into the hands of his enemy Antigonus, and was thrown in a pit and burnt alive by him. The reason for Antigenes particularly cruel execution method was due to his unit, the Silver Shields, and their exceptional performance against Antigonus' infantry during the Second War of the Diodochi..
c 381 - 301
Antigonus I
(Monophthalmus)- Macedonian general in Alexander the Great's army who fought the other 'successor' generals for power. But during the initial campaign into Asia,after Issus, he defeated the remains ofthe Persian fores in 3 battles, securing the Macedonian rear and supply lines through Asia Minor. After Alexander's death he was one of the senior generals who was prominent in the (Wars of the Diodachi) He was satrap of Phrygia and then took Lycia and Pamphylia. The wars continued back and forth, waged also by his son, Demetrius Poliorcetes, until in 306 he declared himself king. In 301 he was attacked by the combined forces of the other 4 dynasts at Ipsus (also) and killed.
See the links for much more.
Antigonus II - Gonatas
King of Macedon. He was son of Demetrtius Poliorcetes and grand son of Antigonus I. He was Demetrius' general in Greece. When his father died in 283, he claimed to be king and won Macedon by 277. From there he waged war against southern Greece, Sparta and Athens. And he also waged naval war against the Ptolemies and Seleucids. His legacy was to make Macedon a powerful kingdom ruled by his successors. His 'nickname' (besieger) came from his extensive application of technology in the conduct of sieges.
Antiochus
Antiochus of Athens was a naval commander in Greece during the Peloponnesian War who was left by the Athenian commander Alcibiades at Notiumi in command of the Athenian fleet in 407, with strict injunctions not to engage the Spartan commander Lysander. Antiochus was the master of Alcibiades' own ship, and his personal friend; he was a skilful seaman, but arrogant and heedless of consequences. Antiochus gave no heed to the injunctions of Alcibiades, and provoked Lysander to an engagement in what came to be known as the Battle of Notium, in which fifteen Athenian ships were lost, and Antiochus himself was killed.
See the link.
Antiochus I Soter
Antiochus I Soter "Antiochus the Saviour"; c. 324/3 – 2 June 261) was a king of the Hellenistic Seleucid Empire. He succeeded his father Seleucus I Nicator in 281 and reigned until his death on 2 June 261. He is the last known ruler to be attributed the ancient Mesopotamian title King of the Universe. See the link
Antiochus II Theos
Antiochus II Theos (286 – July 246) was a Greek king of the Hellenistic Seleucid Empire who reigned from 261 to 246. He succeeded his father Antiochus I Soter in the winter of 262–61. He was the younger son of Antiochus I and princess Stratonice, the daughter of Demetrius Poliorcetes.
Antiochus III the Great
Antiochus III the Great– 3 July 187, ruled April/June 222 – 3 July 187 was a Macedonian Hellenistic king and the 6th ruler of the Seleucid Empire. He ruled over the region of Syria and large parts of the rest of western Asia towards the end of the 3rd century. Rising to the throne at the age of eighteen in 222, his early campaigns against the Ptolemaic Kingdom were unsuccessful, but in the following years Antiochus gained several military victories and substantially expanded the empire's territory. His traditional designation, the Great, reflects an epithet he assumed. He also assumed the title Basileus Megas (Greek for "Great King"), the traditional title of the Persian kings. A militarily active ruler, Antiochus restored much of the territory of the Seleucid Empire, before suffering a serious setback, towards the end of his reign, in his war against Rome. Declaring himself the "champion of Greek freedom against Roman domination", Antiochus III waged a four-year war against the Roman Republic beginning in mainland Greece in the autumn of 192 before being decisively defeated at the Battle of Magnesia. He died three years later on campaign in the east.
Antiochus of Orestis
Antiochus (Greek: 4th century BC) was a Macedonian man who lived during the time of Philip II of Macedon (ruled 359-336). He originally came from Orestis, Macedonia. Antiochus served as an officer under Philip II, and gained distinction as a military general. Antiochus was from an upper noble family. His father was probably called Seleucus, his brother was called Ptolemy and he probably had a nephew called Seleucus. Antiochus married a Macedonian woman called Laodice and in about 358 Laodice bore Antiochus a son Seleucus I Nicator, who became a general of Alexander the Great and later founded and became the first king of the Seleucid Empire;
Antipater
Macedonian general in Alexander the Great's army. He controlled the home front in Macedon and Greece as regent. He held the 'home front' in Greece and the Aegean from Memon's efforts and defeated Spartan King Agis III who attempted to free Greece from Alexander. He suppressed the Greek revolt in 323-322, in the Lamian War. Meanwhile he sent large reinforcement detachments to Alexander during his campaign in Bactria and India. In 321 he joined Perdiccas' enemies.
Aratus of Sicyon
Aratus of Sicyon was a politician and military commander of Hellenistic Greece. He was elected strategos of the Achaean League 17 times, leading the League through numerous military campaigns including the Cleomenean War and the Social War. Aratus was exiled to Argos at the age of seven, after his father, the magistrate of Sicyon, was killed in a coup. In 251, he led an expedition composed of other exiles which freed Sicyon from tyranny, and assumed power in the city. Sicyon joined the Achaean League, in which Aratus would later be elected strategos. He had retired from active public affairs but was poisoned while in Aegium.
Plutarch wrote a lengthy biography and considered him of excellent character, writing: "As for Aratus, he was in his behavior true statesman, high-minded, and more intent upn the public than his private concerns, a bittter hater of tyrants, making the common good the rule and law of his friendships and enemies."
Archelaus
King of Macedon He killed several relatives to become king. Plato called him the 'greatest criminal in Macedon". But Thucydides wrote that he increased Macedon's military power more than the prior 8 kings all together. He expanded Macedonian power in Thessaly. He was murdered as was his son.
Archidamus II
He was an Eurypontid king of Sparta. . He saved Sparta from helot rebellion in 464 during an earthquake. He held Ithome (it was a mountain and location of a city). He is recorded by Thucydides as urging restraint and caution before the beginning of the Peloponnesian War. The first phase of the war is named after him. He led the invasions of Attica in 431 - 430 and 428 and conducted the Spartan attack on Plataea in 429.
Archidamus III
He was an Eurypontid king of Sparta. He rescued the survivors of Leuctra. He campaigned in Arcadia in 368 and 364. He defended Sparta during Epaminondas' invasion in 362. He fought in the Sacred War 355 - 346. (also) He led expeditions to Crete and Tarentum in Italy, where he died in battle at Mandurion.
Archestratus
He was the son of Lycomedes. He commanded the initial Athenian fleet of 30 ships sent to Potidaeain 432. The town was originally a Corinthian colony but was then a member of Athens' Delian League. But Archestratus considered his force insufficient to quell the rebellion in Potidaea, so instead attacked Macedon. Corinth recruited an army and sent it with Aristeus. The Athenians responded by sending Callias, son of Callliades, with 40 more ships. Then a battle was fought - Potidaea. It was one of the immediate causes of the Peloponnesian War.
309/8 -265/4
Areus I
He was an Agiad king of Sparta. In 279 he led an unsuccessful attack on Aetolia. In 273 he defended Sparta. In 264 he was killed near Corinth while attempting to break through the Isthmus to relieve Athens in the War of Chermonides.
Ariabignes
Ariabignes was one of the sons of the Persian king Darius I and his mother was a daughter of Gobryas. He participated in the Second Persian invasion of Greece, as one of the four admirals of the fleet of his brother Xerxes I, and was killed in the Battle of Salamis in 480. Ariabignes was the commander of the Carian and Ionian forces. Plutarch calls him, Ariamenes, and speaks of him as a brave man and the most just of the brothers of Xerxes. The same writer relates that this Ariamenes laid claim to the throne on the death of Darius, as the eldest of his sons, but was opposed by Xerxes, who maintained that he had a right to the crown as the eldest of the sons born after Darius had become king. The Persians appointed Artabanus to decide the dispute; and upon his declaring in favour of Xerxes, Ariamenes immediately saluted his brother as king, and was treated by him with great respect.
Read the link for more details.
Arimnestos
Arimnestos ( early 5th century) was the commander of the Plataean contingent at the battles of Marathon and Plataea during the Greco-Persian Wars.
Battle of Plataea:
Plutarch relates that Arimnestos was responsible for selecting the location of the Battle of Plataea, after receiving guidance from Zeus Soter in a dream. He shared this insight with the Athenian general Aristides, who in turn showed the site to the Spartan regent Pausanias, the overall commander of the Greek forces. He was present at the death of Callicrates later during the battle. He was depicted by painted portrait in the Temple of Athena Areia built on the site of the battlefield by the Athenians, beneath a statue of the goddess made by Pheidias to commemorate the victory.
Ariobarzanes of Persis
Ariobarzanes died 330 and commonly known as Ariobarzanes the Brave, was an Achaemenid prince, satrap and a Persian military commander who led a last stand of the Persian army at the Battle of the Persian Gate against Macedonian King Alexander the Great in the winter of 330. See the links
Ariobarzanes of Phrygia
He was a Persian satrap at Dascylium. He revolted from his king in 360's and was assisted by the Spartan king Agesilaus and the Athenian Timotheus. He was betrayed by his son, Mithridates and executed. See the links.
Aristagoras
He was the ruler (tyrant) of Miletus. He led the Ionian Revolt 499 - 492 and went to Athens to obtain assistance. When he was defeated by the Persians, he fled to Myrcinus in Thrace and was killed in battle with the Edoni.
Arist(e)ides
He was an archon of Athens, known in contemporary society as 'the just' and was lauded by Cornelius Neposfor his character - he is also listed by Plutarch. But he actually was very wealthy. He was a political rival of Themistocles. On the eve of Marathon he publically made a pact of unity with Themistocles. He was one of the 10 generals at Marathon in 490 in command of his tribe phalanx in the central of the line in that battle. Themistocles commanded the other. He was ostracized in 482, but was recalled in 480 to capture and then command on Psyttaleia Island during the battle of Salamisin 480. The island was south of but near Salamis island so holding it prevented the Persians from using it during the battle. He commanded the Athenian troops at Plataea in 479. He went on to command the Athenian navy in the Aegean counter offensive and replaced the Spartan commander, Pausanias (who also is listed by Nepos). Then he helped organize the Delian League and establish the naval and financial contributions.
In his biography Plutarch compared him with the Roman Marcus Cato.
Aristomenes
He was a king of Messenia, celebrated for his struggle with the Spartans in theSecond Messenian War685–668 , and his resistance to them on Mount Eira for 11 years. see Aristomenes.
Arrhidaeus
Arrhidaeus or Arrhidaios lived in 4th century, one of Alexander the Great's generals, was entrusted by Ptolemy to bring Alexander's body to Egypt in 323, contrary to the wishes of Perdiccas who wanted the body sent to Macedonia. On the murder of Perdiccas in Egypt in 321, Arrhidaeus and Peithon were appointed temporary commanders in chief, but through the intrigues of the queen Eurydice they were obliged soon afterwards to resign their office at Triparadisus in Northern Syria. On the division of the provinces which was decided by those attending Triparadisus, Arrhidaeus obtained the Hellespontine Phrygia. In 319, after the death of Antipater, Arrhidaeus made an unsuccessful attack upon Cyzicus; and Antigonus gladly seized this pretext to require him to resign his satrapy. Arrhidaeus, however, refused to resign and shut himself up in Cius.
Arrhidaios
He was Alexander's half-brother, but physically or mentally deficient to rule. He was declared king and served as a legitimating figure head until that no longer being necessary he was killed
Artabazos of Phry gia
Artabazos was a Persian general in the army of Xerxes I, and later satrap of Hellespontine Phrygia (now northwest Turkey) under the Achaemenid dynasty, founder of the Pharnacid dynasty of satraps. He was the son of Pharnaces, who was the younger brother of Hystaspes, father of Darius I. Artabazos was therefore a first cousin of the great Achaemenid ruler Darius I. Artabazus was one of the generals of Xerxes in 480 in the Second Persian invasion of Greece, in command of the Parthians and the Chorasmians in the Achaemenid army.
See the link for more.
Artabazos II
Artabazos II was a Persian general and satrap of Hellespontine Phrygia. He was the son of the Persian satrap of Hellespontine Phrygia Pharnabazus II, and younger kinsman (most probably nephew) of Ariobarzanes of Phrygia who revolted against Artaxerxes II around 356. His first wife was an unnamed Greek woman from Rhodes, sister of the two mercenaries Mentor of Rhodes and Memnonof Rhodes. She and his son, Hioneus, were captured at Damascus afer the battle of Issus. Towards the end of his life, he became satrap of Bactria for Alexander the Great.
ca. 513 - 492
Artaphernes
He was a brother of the Achaemenid king of Persia, Darius I, satrap of Lydia from the capital of Sardis, and a Persian general. see Artaphernes
Artaymtes
He was a Persian admiral
Artaxerxes I
He was the sixth King of Kings of the Achaemenid Empire. From 460 - 453 the Egyptians led by Inaros II revolted with the assistance of Athenian mercenaries, led by admiral Charitmides, and defeated a Persian army commanded by satrap Akheimenes. In 454 the Persians counter attacked and conducted a two-year siege led by Megabyzus. Artaxerxes' strategy was to take advantage of Athenian- Spartan warfare to alternately support one side or the other in order to keep both out of action in Asia. In 450 the Greeks attacked at the Battle of Cyprus. After Cimon's failure to attain much in this expedition, the Peace of Callias was agreed among Athens, Argos and Persia in 449. Artaxerxes I offered asylum to Themistocles.
Artaxerxes II
Artaxerxes II Mnemon was the King of Kings of the Achaemenid Empire from 404 until his death in 358. see Artaxerxes II
He won the battle and war brought on by the rebellion of his younger brother, Cyrus the Younger at Cunaxa.
Plutarch wrote a biography of this Persian king the only one for which he did that.
Artaxerxes III
Ochus better known by his dynastic name of Artaxerxes III, was King of Kings of the Persian Empire from 358 to 338. He was the son and successor of Artaxerxes II and his mother was Stateira.
see Artaxerxes III.
Aristeus
He was the son of Adeimantus the Corinthian fleet commander at the battle of Salamis.in 480. He himself commanded the Corinthian volunteer troops who went to Potidaea when it revolted from Athens in 432. He was captured in Thrace and executed at Athens in 430.
Astyochus
He was a Spartan admiral who commanded their fleet in the Aegean in 412-411, after the Athenians lost theirs at Syracuse. He operated around Chiosand Lesbosand established a base at Miletus. He was considered to be too timid and was replaced by Mindarus. He had a complicated relationship with Alcibiades during one of that fellow's turns to helping Sparta.
Attalus
He was a Macedonian general for king Philip II who with Parmenion led the initial Macedonian incursion into Asia Minor.
Peter Green in his masterful biography of Alexander describes his role in the event of Philip II's murder and Alexander's immediately being declared king. But he was accused of treason and executed by Alexander the Great.
Autophradates
Autophradates was a satrap of Lydia during the Satrap's Revolt, and then served Darius III during the invasion of Alexander the Great, taking joint control of the Persian fleet in the Aegean after the death of Memnon of Rhodes. As is so often the case with Persian figures there is no certainty about the career of Autophradates, or even how many people were involved. Here we will treat the satrap of the 360s and the commander of the 330s as the same person, but they could just as easily have been two different officers.
Bagonas
There were several Persian officials with this name. One murdered Ochus and was forced by Darius to take his own poison.
Battus I
He founded the Greek colony in Cyrene in Libya in 630
Bessus
He was Darius III's satrap of Bactria who commanded 8,000 Bactrian and Massagetae cavalry at Gaugamela. He accompanied Darius while fleeding from that battle to Bactria. He murdered Darius and proclaimed himself king. Spitamenes captured and sent him to Alexander who had him executed.
Brasidas
He was one of the most successful Spartan generals and an aggressive proponent of expanded war. He saved Methone from the Athenians in 431 and in 425 was wounded while leading an ampbibious landing at the Spartan loss at Pylos. He blocked the Athenian effort to take Megara. In 429-427 he advised Spartan admirals at Naupactus and Corcyrea. Then he organized and led a mercenary army to take the war into northern Greece, Chalcidice and Thrace. He gained support (temporarily) from the Macedonian king Perdiccas II by assisting him against Artabaeus. In 424/3 he took Acanthus, Argilus, Stagirus, Torone and Amphipolis from Athenian control, The last of these was critical for Athens and Thucydides was exiled from Athens for failing to secure it.. He then helped Scione and Mende revolt from Athens. In 422 he defeated the Athenian general Cleon who lead an army to recapture Amphipolis in a battle in which both generals were killed..
Brennus (or Brennos)(died at Delphi, was one of the Gaul leaders of the army of the Gallic invasion of the Balkans. He is noted as the commander of one of the three Gaulic armies at the battle of Thermopylae in 279
Callisthenes
He was Alexander's official historian and nephew of Aristotle. But he was accused of plotting and was executed.
Callixenus
Callixeinus was an Athenian politician. After the Battle of Arginusae, in 406 he argued that the generals who failed to rescue Athenian shipwreck victims should be tried together by the Assembly. Euryptolemus brought a suit against Callixeinus claiming that the proposal was unlawful, but was forced to drop it in the face of public opinion. At the trial, two of the generals, Aristogenes and Protomachus, had already fled Athens rather than face trial – were found guilty, and sentenced to death. By coincidence the presiding judge on the final trial date was Socrates. The other generals were Aristocrates, Erasinides, Lysias, Pericles the Younger, Diomedon and Thrasyllus. They were among the best Athenian commanders and their loss strongly influenced the Athenian failures in 404. Later public opinion turned against the motion brought by Callixeinus, a case was brought against him and he fled Athens. He returned in the general amnesty of 403, but was disdained by the citizens and died in Athens of starvation. The trial and speeches are prominent in Xenophon's Hellenica.
Callias
He was the son of Calliades and a prominent Athenian politician. He arranged for the transfer of 3000 talents of gold to the Acropolis in preparation for the Peloponnesian War.He established the Athenian alliance with Rhegium and Leontini in Italy. In 432 he died while commanding the Athenian troops at Potidaea the battle that led to the Peloponnesian War.
of Caria
Callias became tyrant of Chalis (major city on Euboea) after his father, Mnesarchus. He allied himself with Philip of Macedon in order to gain control overall of Euboea.So in response Plutarch asked Athens for assistance. The Athenians sent an army commanded by Phocion into Euboea. They defeated Callias at Tamynae in 350. Callias fled to the Macedon. However, he then moved to Thebes, in the hope of gaining Theban assistance. Failing there he moved to Athens, in 343, where Demosthenes arranged an alliance in which Athens agreed to Chalis' independence. In the bargain Callias promised assistance in men and money from Megara and Euboea. Philip was trying to take Ambracia at that time, so Demosthenes might have considered control of Euboea would defeat Philip's efforts. In 341 Phocion defeated the Macedonian effort to replace Callias in control of Euboea.
Callias II
He was the son of another Hipponicus. His family owned the slaves whom he leased to Athens to work in the silver mines. He was sent as an ambassador to Persia where he arranged the "Peace of Callias' between Athens and Persia in 449, and the Thirty Years' Peace in 446 between Athens and Sparta after the First Peloponnesian War. His son, another Hipponicus, was a general (strategos) when he died in battle at Deliumin 424. His son was Hipponicus III.
Callias III
He was the son of Hipponicus and was a prominent Athenian politician. His wife was Miltiades' daughter. His grand father was Callias II. He inherited the family wealth in 424 upon the death of his father at Delium. In 392 he commanded the Athenian troops at Corinth when the Spartan mora was defeated by Iphicrates. In 371 he was one of the Athenian ambassadors to negotiate peace at Sparta. He was noted for extravagant living and dissipating the family wealth from the silver mines.
Callicratidas
He was a Spartan admiral who opposed Lysander politically. He was successful in the Aegean by taking Delphinium, Teos and Methymna. He blockaded Conon'sAthenian fleet at Mytilene on Lesbos but when he attacked the Athenian relief fleet at Arginusae he was defeated and drowned.
Callicrates
He was a Spartan soldier who became famous after being killed at the opening of the battle at Plataea
Callimachus
He was the Athenian - polemarch- senior general - whose vote enabled Miltiadesto take command for the battle of Marathon in 490. He was killed while pursuing the Persians to their boats.
c.355-297
Cassander
Cassander "son of Antipatros": was king of Macedon from 305 until 297 , and de facto ruler of southern Greece from 317 until his death. Eldest son of Antipater and a contemporary of Alexander the Great, Cassander was one of the Diadochi who warred over Alexander's empire following the latter's death in 323 . Cassander later seized the crown by having Alexander's son and heir Alexander IV murdered. In governing Macedonia from 317 until 297 , Cassander restored peace and prosperity to the kingdom, while founding or restoring numerous cities (including Thessalonica, Cassandreia, and Thebes); however, his ruthlessness in dealing with political enemies complicates assessments of his rule. See the link for details.
Chabrias
He was an Athenian general also employed by foreign powers as a mercenary. (390 - 387), (379 - 369), 362, 359. He was employed in Egypt in the 380's and 360's. (He is among Cornelius Nepos' greatest generals). He won an important victory at Naxos in 376 (Second Athenian Confederacy). He died in battle against rebels at Chios in 356.
mid 4th century
Chares
He was an Athenian general. He fought at Corcyra (modern Corfu) in 361 and Embata in 356 where the Athenians lost. He then served Artabazus in defeating a Persian army until recalled by the king, Artaxerxes III. He fought against Philip II in Thrace and the Hellespont (353 - 340) and was a strategos at Chaeronea in 338. He met Alexander the Great in 334 but joined the anti-Macedonians defending Mytilene during Alexander's siege in 332.
mid- 4th century
Charidemus
He was from Oreus in Euboea. He was a mercenary general in Thrace (368 - 362) alternatively fighting for and against Athens. In 367 he served under Athenian general Iphicrates.He served in Asia Minor under command of Memnon and Mentor and then back in Thrace. He became an Athenian citizen in 357 and was elected strategos in 351 , 349, and 338. He fought atChaeronea and then fled to Persian king Darius III who welcomed him. But then he differed with the king on tactics and was executed..
Charitimides
Charitimides was an Athenian admiral of the 5th century. At the time of the Wars of the Delian League, a continuing conflict between the Athenian-led Delian League of Greek city-states and the Persian Empire, he was sent in 460 to Egypt in command of a fleet of triremes (some authors say 40 ships, others 200 ships) to support Inaros II, a Libyan ruler who was leading a revolt against the Persian rule over the country. His fleet had been operating on the coasts of Cyprus, from where he was diverted to Egypt. Charitimides led his fleet against the Persians in the Nile river, and defeated a fleet of 50 Phoenician ships. It was the last great naval encounter between the Greeks and the Persians. Of the 50 Phoenician ships, he managed to destroy 30, and capture the remaining 20 that faced him in that battle. When the Persians returned with a large army under Megabyzus, they lifted the siege of Memphis (459-455) where the remaining Persian garrison had been blockaded, and then besieged the Egyptians and their Greek allies in the Siege of Prosopitis in 455. Charitimides perished in the battle against the Persians at Prosopitis. Other famous Greek generals who fought for the Egyptians are Chabrias and Agesilaus.
Cimon
One of the most famous and successful Athenian generals - admirals - who rated biographies by both Nepos and Plutarch. His strategems are mentioned by both Frontinus and Polyaenus. But he is almost unknown to modern students of military history. He was a son of Miltiades and member of the wealthy Philad family of Attica. He promoted a strongly anti-Persian policy. After the Persians were driven out of Greece, Cimon led the Athenian fleet in the combined Greek campaign throughout the Aegean. He led campaigns to Cyprus and Byzantium. He drove the Persian garrison out of Eion. His greatest victory was the dual one on both land and sea at theEurymedon River in 469-466. He was ostracized in 461 (as so many of Athens' greatest leaders were). But he was recalled and led another naval expedition to Cyprus where he died during the siege of Citium.
Plutarch compared Cimon with the Roman Lucullus. He begins with: "One might bless the end of Lucillus, which was so timed as to let him die before the great revolution, which fate, by intestine wars was already effecting gainst the established govenment, and to close his life in a free though troubled common wealth. And in this, above all other things, Cimon and he are alike. For he died also when Greece was as yet undisordered, in its highest felicity." Plutarch continues with many more points of comparison including this: "In war, it is plain they were both soldiers of excellent conduct, both at land and sea." The comparisons continue and in them reveal much of interest to us about Cimon.
Cleander
He was the son of Polemocrates. Alexander sent him back to Greece to recruit and bring reinforcements, which he did at Tyre. He was among Parmenion's assassins on orders from Alexander.
Clearchus
He was the son of the Spartan, Ramphias. He fought in Attica and at Byzantium which he defended unsuccessfully from the Athenians in 408 during the Decelean War, 413 - 404. In 406 Callicratidas appointed Clearchus to replace himself. In 403 the Spartan government sent him to rule Byzantium. He moved to Cyprus, then fought for Cyrus the younger in Thrace. He commanded Cyrus' Peloponnesian mercenaries in the campaign against Persian king Artaxerxes II.After Cyrus' death he was captured by Tissaphernes and executed.
Cleisthenes
He was an Athenian aristocratic politician. In 510 with Spartan help he overthrew the tyrant Hippias I. He reorganized the government, on the democratic basis. He was forced to flee Athens by Isagoras, but returned. He changed the 4 tribe system to 10 demes based on territory in Athens and Attica.
375 - 328/7
Cleitus the 'black'
Clitus was the son of Dropides, who probably belonged to the Macedonian nobility and may have belonged to the faction that helped Philip become king in the first weeks of 360. His daughter was wet-nurse of Philip's son and crown-prince Alexander. Clitus became an officer of the Companion cavalry, a unit of eight squadrons (of 225 horsemen each) that was Macedonia's most effective weapon in battle. Its overall commander was Philotas, the son of Philip's most reliable general Parmenion. Clitus' exact position among the Companions is unclear, but he may already have been commander of the agema, the squadron that served as the king's bodyguard. In any case, he was close to the young king during the battle of the Granicus, where Alexander defeated a Persian satrap's army in June 334. During the fight, Clitus saved Alexander's life. He certainly was commander of the agema during the battle of Gaugamela (1 October 331). See the links for the rest of the story.
Cleitus the 'white'
Cleitus (Clitus) the White died c. 317 was a general of Alexander the Great surnamed "White" to distinguish him from Cleitus the Black. He is noted by Athenaeus and Aelian for his pomp and luxury, and is probably the same who is mentioned by Justin among the veterans sent home to Macedonia under Craterusin 324.
He defeated the Athenian fleet at the battle of Amorgos in 322 during the Lamian War. He allied with Polyperchon and assisted in the fall of Phocion. He was killed after failing to block Antigonus crossing the Bosporus.
Cleomaeus
He was a Rhodian admiral
Cleombrontus
Spartan Agiad family regent between 480 and 479 . He was son of Anaxandridas II and the brother of Cleomenes I, Dorieus and of Leonidas I. When Leonidas died at Thermopylae he became tutor of Leonidas' son, Pleistarchus. He then commanded the Spartan hoplites continuing the Greco-Persian Wars. He built the wall across the Isthmus of Corinth that was intended to keep the Persian army out of the Peloponnesus. He died soon after that.
Cleombrontus I
He was an Agiad Spartan king. His father was Pausanius But he became king of Sparta after the death of his brother, Agesipolis Iin 380. He and led the allied Spartan-Peloponnesian army against the Thebans under Epaminondas in the Battle of Leuctra. His death and the utter defeat of his army led to the end of Spartan dominance in ancient Greece. Cleombrotus was succeeded by his son Agesipolis II. His other son was Cleomenes II.
Cleomenes I
He was an Agiad king of Sparta. He succeeded his father in 519. He fought to expand Spartan power against Argos. He came to aid Isagoras against Cleisthenesin Athens in two campaigns to oust Hippias. In 499 Aristagoras of Miletus came to Sparta to ask Cleomenes for support of an Ionian revolt from Persia but Cleomenes refused. In 494 he defeated the Argives at the battle of Sepeia extending Spartan power into northern Peloponnesus. Finally, according to some contemporary accounts, he was considered insane and put in prison where he died.
Cleomenes II
He was an Agiad King of Sparta. His father was Cleombrotus I, but he succeeded his brother, Agesipolis II. His son was Acrotatus I, and is grand son was Areus I
Cleomenes III
Cleomenes III was one of the two kings of Sparta from 235 to 222. He was a member of the Agiad dynasty and succeeded his father, Leonidas II. He is known for his attempts to reform the Spartan state. From 229 to 222, Cleomenes waged war against the Achaean League under Aratus of Sicyon. After being defeated by the Achaeans in the Battle of Sellasia in 222, he fled to Ptolemaic Egypt. After a failed revolt in 219, he committed suicide.
Plutarch wrote his biography along with that of Agis IV and compared them with the Grachi brothers are wood-be but failed reformers - an excelent choice.
See the link for details.
He was one of the 'new politicians, that is not a member of the old aristocratic families and a political opponent ofPericleswho was an aristocrat. Contemporary writers including Thucydides considered him as a violent and aggressive demagogue. For instance, he proposed that the entire captured population of Mytilene be executed. After an Athenian naval expedition happened to capture Pylos and Sphacteria in 425, during the Peloponnesian War, he refused to enable the Spartan ransom of the captured hoplites or agree to the offered peace treaty. He tripled the annual tribute assessed on Athens' Aegean allies. He commanded the Athenian force sent to recover Amphipolis but died in the battle won by the Spartan general Brasidas.
Cnemus
He was a Spartan admiral who fought in Arcarnania in the Peloponnesian war. He campaigned in Arcarnania at Zacynthus island off the north-east coast of the Peloponnesus in 430. He was defeated by Phormioin the second battle of Naupactus in 429.
Coenus
was a son of Polemocrates and son-in-law of Parmenion, was one of the ablest and most faithful of Alexander the Great's generals during his eastern expedition. In the autumn of 334, while Alexander was in Caria, he sent those of his soldiers who had been recently married to Macedonia to spend the ensuing winter with their wives. Coenus was one of the commanders who led them back to Europe. In the spring of the following year, Coenus returned with the Macedonians and joined Alexander at Gordium. He commanded infantry at Issus and Gaugamela. Then he led the detachment that encircled the the Persian defenders at the Persian Gate. He commanded troops in Sogdiana in 328 and was a cavalry commander at the Hydaspes.
See the links for more.
Conon
Another of the great Athenian admirals whom Nepos includes in his biographies of the greatest. He was a strategos in 414 in command of the Athenian fleet at Naupactus. After Alcibiadesagain was fired in 407, Conon took command of the Athenian fleet in the Aegean. He was blockaded by the Spartans at Mytilene in 406 but freed after the Spartans lost the significant battle at Arginusae. Lucky for him that he was not at the battle, because the vindictive Athenians tried and executed 6 of the victorious admirals for failing to pick up some crew members of sunken ships during a storm. He escaped the decisive Athenian loss at Aegospotami in 404 and fled to Cyprus. In 400 after the Spartan campaign (recorded by Xenophon) to support Cyrus the Younger marched out of Persia, Conon was assigned by Artaxerxes IIto use the Persian fleet against Sparta and captured Rhodes. He defeated the Spartans at Cnidus in 394. This ended the brief Spartan dominance after Athens surrendered in 404. He took the Persian fleet around Laconia and captured Cythera on Cythera Island. Returning to Athens he rebuilt the Long Walls then restored Athenian colonies at Lemnos, Imbros and Scyros. He was tricked into attending a conference at Sardis by Tiribazus but escaped again to Cyprus where he died. His son, Timotheus, was also an outstanding Athenian admiral also considered great by Nepos.
Cotys I
When he became king of the Odysian kingdom (Oreus) the Athenians made him their ally. He married his daughter to the Athenian general, Iphicrates, who then became his second-in-command. With the help of Iphicrates, Cotys was able to expand his kingdom but this concerned the Athenians. In the 370s, the Athenians formed their Second Athenian Confederacy in part to contain Cotys. In 375 he supported Hales, leader of Triballi, a powerful Thracian tribe in NW Thrace. The Athenian general, Chabrias, blocked his efforts in Thrace. In 367 Ariobarzanes, the Persian satrap of Phrygia, occupied Sestos. In 365 after Ariobarzanas began his revolt against Artaxerxes II, Cotys opposed him and Ariobarzanes' ally, Athens. The Athenian general, Timotheus,was able to capture Sestos and Krithote. Cotys then opened war with the Athenians for the possession of the Thracian Chersonesus. Several Athenian generals in succession fought unsuccessfully against him and his mercenary commander Charidemus. But then a rebellion against Cotys broke out. Iphicrates, with the help of Charidemus, bribed the Athenian military and naval commanders to suppress the rebellion. In 361, Charidemus returned to Athens with a treaty from Cotys, proclaiming him an ally. Cotys had successfully retained his kingdom. By 360, Cotys controlled the whole Chersonesus peninsula. But in 360 he was murdered.
Craterus
He was Macedonian general under Alexander the Greatand one of the Diadochi. Craterus was the son of a Macedonian nobleman named Alexander from Orestis and brother of admiral Amphoterus. Craterus commanded the phalanx and all infantry on the left wing in Battle of Issus in 333. He commanded again at Tyre, Gaugamela and the Persian Gates. In Hyrcania he was sent on a mission against the Tapurians. In 326 he commanded the rear guard at the Battle of the Hydaspes. Craterus and Polyperchon were appointed to lead Macedonian veterans back home. He had reached Cilicia when Alexander died. In 322 Craterus aided Antipater in the Lamian War against Athens. He sailed with his Cilician navy to Greece and led troops at the Battle of Crannon in 322. When Antigonus rose in rebellion against Perdiccas and Eumenes, Craterus joined him, alongside Antipater and Ptolemy. He married Antipater's daughter Phila, with whom he had a son, also called Craterus. He was killed in battle against Eumenes in Asia Minor when his charging horse fell over him, somewhere near the Hellespont, in 321.
Critias
He was one of the wealthiest oligarchs in Athens. He participated in the coup in 411. Again, in 404 he returned to Athens with the victorious Spartan army and was installed as one of the Thirty Tyrants. After the Spartans departed they were overthrown by Thrasybulus, as described by Nepos, and killed in the battles including Munychia.
Cyrus the great
Cyrus II of Persia -Kuruš; New Persian: Kuruš; c. 600 – 530 commonly known as Cyrus the Great, and also called Cyrus the Elder by the Greeks, was the founder of the Achaemenid Empire, the first Persian Empire. Under his rule, the empire embraced all the previous civilized states of the ancient Near East, expanded vastly and eventually conquered most of Western Asia and much of Central Asia. From the Mediterranean Sea and Hellespont in the west to the Indus River in the east, Cyrus the Great created the largest empire the world had yet seen. Under his successors, the empire eventually stretched at its maximum extent from parts of the Balkans (Bulgaria-Paeonia and Thrace-Macedonia) and Eastern Europe proper in the west, to the Indus Valley in the east.
See the links for much more detail.
?-401
Cyrus the younger
Cyrus the Younger -Kuruš, son of Darius II of Persia and Parysatis, was a Persian prince and general, Satrap of Lydia and Ionia from 408 to 401. His birth date is unknown, but he died in 401 during a failed battle to oust his elder brother, Artaxerxes II, from the Persian throne. The history of Cyrus and of the retreat of his Greek mercenaries is told by Xenophon in his Anabasis. Another account, probably from Sophaenetus of Stymphalus, was used by Ephorus. Further information is contained in the excerpts from Artaxerxes II's physician, Ctesias, by Photius; Plutarch's Lives of Artaxerxes II and Lysander; and Thucydides' History of Peloponnesian War. These are the only early sources of information on Cyrus the Younger.
Darius I
Darius the Great, was the third Persian King of Kings of the Achaemenid Empire, reigning from 522 until his death in 486. He ruled the empire at its peak, when it included much of West Asia, parts of the Caucasus, parts of the Balkans (Thrace-Macedonia, and Paeonia), most of the Black Sea coastal regions, Central Asia, as far as the Indus Valley in the far east and portions of north and northeast Africa including Egypt (Mudrâya), eastern Libya, and coastal Sudan.
Darius II
Darius II, also called Nothus or Darius II Ochus, was King of Kings of the Achaemenid Empire from 423 to 405 or 404. Artaxerxes I, who died in 424, was followed by his son Xerxes II. After a month and half Xerxes II was murdered by his brother Sogdianus. His illegitimate brother, Ochus, satrap of Hyrcania, rebelled against Sogdianus, and after a short fight killed him, and suppressed by treachery the attempt of his own brother Arsites to imitate his example. Ochus adopted the name Darius (Greek sources often call him Darius Nothos, "Bastard"). Neither the names Xerxes II nor Sogdianus occur in the dates of the numerous Babylonian tablets from Nippur; here effectively the reign of Darius II follows immediately after that of Artaxerxes I.
Darius III
He was the last Achaemenid King of Kings of Persia. He was the Persian king whom Alexander the Great fought in three famous battles. As he was escaping he was murdered by one of his satrap, Bessus.
Datames
He was a Persian who rose through the ranks to become army commander and then governor of Cappadocia. Enemies at court caused him to rebel in the 360's. (revolt of the satraps)He eventually was enticed by a false friendship of Mithridates and assassinated. Nepos considered him one of the bravest and most honest of the foreign leaders along with Hannibal.
Demaratus
Demaratus (fl.510-480) was a king of Sparta best known for serving as an advisor to Xerxes I of Persia during his invasion of Greece in 480. His co-ruler, Cleomenes I, was firmly anti-Persian, and this resulted in tension between the two men.
See the link for more details.
350 -26
Demetrius of Phalerum
Demetrius of Phalerum (also Demetrius of Phaleron or Demetrius Phalereus) was an Athenian orator originally from Phalerum, a student of Theophrastus, and perhaps of Aristotle, and one of the first Peripatetics. Demetrius was a distinguished statesman who was appointed by the Macedonian king, Cassander, to govern Athens, where he ruled as sole ruler for ten years, introducing important reforms of the legal system while maintaining pro-Cassander oligarchic rule. He was exiled by his enemies in 307, and he went first to Thebes, and then, after 297, to the court of Alexandria. He wrote extensively on the subjects of history, rhetoric, and literary criticism. He is not to be confused with his grandson, also called Demetrius of Phaleron, who probably served as regent of Athens between 262 and 255, on behalf of the Macedonian King Antigonos Gonatas.
Demetrius I
He was nicknamed "The Besieger", for his conduct of many sieges. He was the son of Antigonus I Monophthalmus and Stratonice, was a Macedonian nobleman, military leader, and finally king of Macedon (294–288).
Plutarch wrote his biography in which he compared him with Antonius the Trumvir and cites Plato noting "two persons who have abundantly justified the words of Plato, that great natures produce great vices as well as virtues. Both alike were amorous and intemperate, warlike and munificent, sumptuous in their way of living and overbearing in their manners. And the likeness of their fortunes carried out the resemblance in their characters. Not only were their lives each as series of great successes and great disasters, mighty acquisitions and tremedous losses of power, sudden overthrows followewd by unexpected recoveries, but they died, also, Demetrius in actual captivity to his enemies and Antony on the verge of it." A briliant evaluation and description.
Demosthenes
There were many Athenians named Demosthenes, this one was a son of Alcisthenes and a strategos. He was a leader during theArchidamian war431 - 421 (the first phase of the Peloponnesian War). He won the battle ofOlpae in 426. He advocated and led aggressive land campaigns contrary to Pericles' strategy. In 417/6 he campaigned in Aetolia and saved Naupactus. In 425 he happened to stop atPylosas he was sailing around Lyconia on his way to Sicily. Finding a great opportunity he fortified the place and occupied the adjacent island - Sphacteria. When the Spartans reacted and attempted to eject the Athenians Demosthenes captured several hundred Spartans (unheard of ) and sent them off to Athens. In 424 he attempted to capture Megara but was prevented by the unexpected arrival of Brasidas who was passing by on his way to the Chersonesus. He then attempted a dangerous invasion of Boeotia from Naupactus. But the other Athenian army was decisively defeated at Delium. In 417 he evacuated the Athenian army after the battle of Mantinea In 413 he was sent with a large Athenian fleet to reinforce the Athenian expedition at Syracuse. After the defeat he was captured and executed
Dercylidas
The Spartan general who occupied Abydos and Lampascus in 411. He was noted for his cunning and inventiveness. After Conon's victory at Cnidusin 394 he defended the Hellespont region for Sparta until 390. He served almost continually as a Spartan leader in Asia Minor commanding the Spartan army there from 399 to 397. In 394 he was superseded as commander in chief of the Spartan fleet by king Agesilaus See the links for more details
Diocles
He was a Syracusian leader who reformed the constitution into more democratic politics. He lead the Syracusian army against Carthaginians in 409
He was a Syracusian leader who served his brother-in-law, the tyrant Dionysius Iand then opposed Dionysius II. He invited Plato to Syracuse. He captured Syracuse from Dionysius IIin 357 and then the citadel at Ortygia in 355. He was influenced by Plato toward the Platonist idea of a dictatorial ruler . He was murdered in a coup by Callippus.
Both Plutarch and Nepos wrote biographies that attempt to find him worthwhile. Plutarch compared him to Brutus, the assassin of Caesar. He wrote: "There are noble points in abundance in the characters of these two men, and one to be first mentioned is their attaining such a height of greatness upon such inconsiderable means; and on this score Dion has by far the advantage". He bases this on Dion having done it all himself while Brutus had assistance from Cassius and others.
Dionysius
Dionysius was an Athenian commander during the Corinthian War. In 388, he participated in naval operations around Abydus. Along with fellow commanders Demaenetus, Leontichus and Phanias, Dionysius unsuccessfully pursued the Spartan fleet under Antalcidas. However, Antalcidas was able to evade them and link up with an ally Syracusan and Italian squadron at Abydus.
Dionysius I
He was a tyrant ruler of Syracuse who was elected due to his success as a populist demagog against the oligarchic faction. He was a strategos conducting war against Carthage. With peace secured he built a fortress on Ortygia island in Syracuse. He began a new war with Carthage in 398 in which he kept Carthaginian influence to western Sicily. Then he moved against Croton (388), Rhegium (386), and Pyrgi (384), and even as far north at the Po. He sent Syracusian ships to aid Sparta in 387. He was acclaimed by ancients as the epitome of a tyrant.
Dionysius II
He was son of Dionysius I and another tyrant. He secured peace with Carthage and had a peaceful reign. He lost Syracuse in 357-55 but returned in 347. He was then driven out by Timoleonand exiled to Corinth.
Diphilus
He was the Athenian admiral commanding their squadron at Naupactus who attacked the Corinthian squadron of 33 ships across the strait at Erineus commanded by Polyanthes who had about the same number. The battle was a draw but was very important due to the technical improvement Polyanthes had made to the Corinthian triremes by greatly strengthening the bow in order to smash the Athenians when they attempted their standard tactic of bow to bow ramming. The innovation was quickly followed by the Syracusian to defeat the Athenian fleet there.
Dorieus
He was a member of the Spartan royal family as younger son of Cleomenes, king from c. 520 , and brother of king Leonidas. Dorieus' Expedition to Sicily in c.510 was an unsuccessful attempt by a band of Greek adventurers to capture the town of Eryx in western Sicily and use it as the basis of a new Greek city.
He was the Syracusian admiral who brought a fleet to Rhodes and then to the Hellispont in support of the Spartans He should not be confused with the Dorieus who went from Sparta to Sicily in earlier century.
Ducetius
Ducetius (died 440) was a Hellenized leader of the Sicels and founder of a united Sicilian state and numerous cities. It is thought he may have been born around the town of Mineo. His story is told through the Greek historian Diodorus Siculus in the 1st century, who drew on the work of Timaeus.
? - 362
Epaminondas
He was a Theban politician and general - one of the few ancient Greeks well studied by modern military history students for his innovative tactics. He survived the pro-Spartan coup in 382 and helped with the restoration in 379 and was then the Theban ambassador to Sparta in 372. He was elected Boeotarch in 371 and then won the famous battle of Leuctra that revealed that the Spartan army was not invincible. (An important psychological change due to the nature of Greek hoplite warfare). Subsequently he led four campaigns into the Peloponnesus. He attempted to create a naval force for Thebes in 364. He assisted with the foundation of Messene in 369 and a counter to Sparta. He died in battle at Mantinea and Mantinea in 362 although Thebes won. Nepos wrote a biography in his book on great commanders, but Plutarch's Life of him is lost. Cicero called him the 'greatest' of the Greeks.
Epaminondas is one of the few ancient military leaders who are studied in detail in current courses on military history. See the links for more details.
He was an Athenian politician and an early leader of the democratic movement. In the late 460s he oversaw reforms that diminished the power of the Areopagus. In 465 he was elected stragegos in command of the Athenian fleet in the Aegean . In 464 an earthquake in Sparta enabled the helots to revolt and hold Mount Ithome. The Spartans called for assistance from the Hellenic League including Athens. In the debate on sending assistance Ephialties recommend against it. Cimon was stratgeos and recommended sending aid and won the debate in 463. He himself led 4.000 hoplites there. But then the Spartans refused help and sent them back. This 'dishonor' generated increased annimosity between Spartans and Athenians plus cost Cimon political leadership for which he was ostracized. The radical democratic faction gained power to politically attack the Areopagus through which Cimon had held poltical power.
In 461 he was assassinated, probably at the instigation of resentful oligarchs, and the political leadership of Athens passed to his deputy, Pericles, who continued his political program.
Eumenes
He was a Cardian Greek (in the Chersonesus) who served as secretary to Macedonian king Philip II and then served Alexander the Great in various capacities including commanding the fleet on the Euphrates and then of the cavalry. After Alexander's death he opposed the power struggle and diffusion amongst the generals. In 323 he was given Cappadocia and Paphlagonia. He used the limited military power available to support Perdicas against the other 'successors'. He defeated Craterus in 321. But after Perdicas died the other generals outlawed him. He held out against a lengthy siege in his fortress, Nora, in the Taurus mountains. He continued war against Antigonus (and) in favor of Polyperchon and the rightful heirs of Alexander. He lost the battle ofGabinne to Antigonus in 316, was captured and executed. Both Nepos and Plutarch considered him a great leader who was overcome by superior military power.
Plutarch compared him with the Roman Sertorius. He wrote: "These are the most remarkable passages that are come to our knowledge concerning Eumenes and Sertorius. In comparing their lives, we may observe that this was common to them both; that being aliens, strangers, and banished men, they came to become commanders of powerful forces, and had the leading of numerous and warlike armies, made up of divers nations." ... "Their deeds in war were equal and parallel, but their general inclinations different."
Euphranos
Eurylochus
He was a Spartan general defeated by Demonsthenes at the battle of Olpae. There is no entry for him but he is mentioned in entries for Demonsthenes and the battle of Olpae.
Euryptolemus
He was an Athenian politician and cousin of Alcibiades. Probably his most famous action was his strong and brave speeches in defense of the 8 admirals who were put on trial - accused of having abandoned the drowing trireme crews after the battle of Arginusae in 406. His speechs are described by Xenophon in the Hellenica.
Eurybiades
He was a Spartan admiral who commanded the Greek fleet against the Persians at Artemisium andSalamisin 480 during Xerxes invasion. At Salamis he deferred to Themistocles' plan of battle.
Evagoras
He was king of Salamis city in Cyprus. He maintained strong relationship with Athens. He gave Conon safety twice when he fled Sparta or Persia. He arranged for the Persian king to use the Persian fleet to attack Sparta in 398. He was murdered.
He was an Athenian commander
Gorgidas
He was a Theban general who had a role in the expulsion of the Spartans in 379 and was then elected Boeotarch. He was known as creator of the elite military "Sacred band". It had an important role in the Theban victory against Sparta atLeuctra in 371. but suffered badly against the Macedonians in their decisive victory at Chaeronea in 338.
Gorgopas
He was a Spartan commander during the Corinthian War. In 388 the Spartans sent Hierax to Aegina to take over the Spartan fleet. The Spartans under the command of Teleutias had earlier driven off the Athenian fleet blockading Aegina. Soon after taking over, Hierax departed for Rhodes with most of the fleet leaving Gorgopas, his vice-admiral with twelve triremes as governor in Aegina, replacing Eteonicus who held the post before. Gorgopas continued operations against the Athenian army led by Pamphilius who was still laying siege to the city. He ultimately forced Athens to send ships to evacuate their land forces from the area. He subsequently sailed to Ephesus .While returning he faced the Athenian fleet under Eunomus. Gorgopas retreated and was able to make it back to the port in Aegina. Then, as the Athenians were returning to Piraeus he caught them at night by surprise and captured 4 triremes forcing the remainder to refuge in Piraeus. Later he was ambushed by Chabrias.
late 5th century
Gylippus
He was a Spartan general whom Alcibiades recommended be sent to Syracuse in 415. He took Spartan and other soldiers with him and prevented the Athenians from completing siege lines around the city during theirSicilian Expedition.. In 413 he won the decisive victory destroying the Athenian fleet in the harbor. The Athenian army attempted to retreat but was also destroyed and its commanders, Demosthenes and Nicias were killed. In 404 he moved the loot to Sparta, was accused of embezzlement and exiled.
Hagnon
He was an Athenian strategos who suppressed the Samian revolt in 440. He is reputed to be the general sent to found the Athenian colony at Amphipolisin Thrace in 437. He was a strategos again in 431 and 429.
Harpagus
Harpagus, also known as Harpagos or Hypargus was a Median general, credited by Herodotus as having put Cyrus the Great on the throne through his defection during the battle of Pasargadae. According to Herodotus' Histories, Harpagus was a member of the Median royal house in service to King Astyages, the last king of Media. When word reached Astyages that Cyrus was gathering his forces, he ordered Harpagus, as his primary general, to lead the army against Cyrus. After a three-day battle on the plain of Pasargadae, Harpagus took his revenge for the death of his son when he turned on the battlefield in favor of Cyrus, resulting in Astyages' defeat and the formation of the Persian Empire. After the defeat of Astyages in 550 Harpagus started - according to Herodotus - a military career under the new ruler Cyrus II: Harpagus suggested using camels as the front line against the Lydians in Cyrus II's war against Croesus, thereby scattering the Lydian cavalry (the horses panicked at the smell of the dromedaries). Following a revolt by the Lydians and the death of Cyrus's infantry commander, General Mazares, Cyrus II turned over the conquest of Asia Minor to Harpagus, who went on to serve as Cyrus's most successful general. The Median general followed his victory at Lydia by conquering Ionia, Phoenicia, Caria, Lycia and many other regions of Asia Minor (except Miletus, which had earned the favor of Cyrus through their great sage Thales's advice to stay neutral in the Lydian war). Harpagus was also known for innovations in engineering techniques; specifically, the use of earthwork ramps and mounds during sieges (a method later employed by Alexander the Great during his siege of Tyre) and the use of mountain climbers to scale opponents' walls.
Harpalus
He was Alexander's treasurer and close friend. But he feared for his own misdeeds imbezelment) twice, fleeing to Athens, the second time while Alexander was in India so fled to Athens when he learned that Alexander was returning.
Hegesandridas
Hegesandridas or Agesandridas was a son of a "Hegesander" or "Agesander", perhaps the same who is mentioned as a member of the last Spartan embassy sent to Athens before the Peloponnesian War, was himself a Spartan general in that war. In 411 he was placed in command of a fleet of 42 ships destined to further a revolt in Euboea. News of their being seen off Las of Laconia came to Athens at the time when the Four Hundred were building their fort of Eëtioneia on a promontory commanding Piraeus, and the coincidence was used by Theramenes in evidence of their treasonable intentions.
Hegelochus
He was a Macdeonian general of Alexander the Great who was tasked with subduing the islands on the Aegean as Alexander continued into Persia.
c 356 -324
Hephaestion
Hephaestion, son of Amyntor, was an ancient Macedonian nobleman and a general in the army of Alexander the Great. He was "by far the dearest of all the king's friends; he had been brought up with Alexander and shared all his secrets." This relationship lasted throughout their lives, and was compared, by others as well as themselves, to that of Achilles and Patroclus. He commanded in many operations but is considered second rate. He led the fleet from Tyre to Gaza in 332. at Gaugamela he was wounded. He led 1/3 of the army during the campaign in Sogdiana in 328 He led a separate part of the army through the Kyber Pass and bridged the Indus while Alexander was besieging Arnos. He commanded infantry at Hydaspes and during the remainder of the campaign in India.
Herippidas
He was a Spartan general who served as a commander in the Spartan, mercenary army king Agesilaus IIled in to Asia Minor. He was in the army that supported of Cyrus the younger and then was a navarch in 392. At Coronea in 394 he commanded the remaining mercenaries of the '10 thousand' in Agesilaus' army winning the battle. In 382 he was garrison commander of the Spartans holding the Cadmea in Thebes and then was tried and executed by his government for- as they claimed - abandoning it too easily.
Hermocrates
Hermocrates was a Syracusan general during the Athenians' Sicilian Expedition in the midst of the Peloponnesian War. He is also remembered as a character in the Timaeus and Critias dialogues of Plato. The first historical reference to Hermocrates comes from Thucydides, where he appears at the congress of Gela in 424 giving a speech demanding the Sicilian Greeks stop their quarrelling. In 415 he proposed a coalition that would even include non-Sicilian cities (as well as non-Greek cities such as Carthage) in an alliance against Athens. He was elected as one of Syracuse's three strategoi, along with Heracleides and Sicanus, but was dismissed from this position after a short period because of his lack of success in battle. Later he was one of the most important advisers to the Spartan general Gylippus, and thus contributed to the victory over Athens during its siege of Syracuse. In 412 he held the position of admiral during the battle ofCyzicus. In this battle, the Spartans and their allies were badly defeated by the Athenians and, as a result, Hermocrates was banned "in absentia". He did not return to Sicily until 408. He died in a street fight after a failed coup in Syracuse in 407.
Hierax
He was a Spartan admiral who held Athenians off Aegina in the Corinthian War.In 389 he was dispatched by Sparta to Aegina, to take over the Spartan fleet. The Spartans under the command of Teleutias had earlier driven off the Athenian fleet blockading Aegina. Soon after taking command, Hierax departed for Rhodes with most of the fleet, leaving Gorgopas, his vice-admiral, with twelve triremes as governor in Aegina. Not long afterward, Antalcidas was sent to replace Hierax as admiral.
Hierophon
He was in command of the Athenian naval force at the battle of Olpae.
Hippias
Hippias of Athens was one of the sons of Peisistratos, and was the last tyrant of Athens between about 527 and 510. see Hippias
Hippocrates of Athens, the son of Ariphron, was a strategos of the Athenians in 424, serving alongside Demosthenes. In the summer of 424, Hippocrates and Demosthenes set out from Athens to seize the long walls of Megara (which connected the city with its port Nisaea). The Spartan garrison at Nisaea surrendered, but the Athenians were unable to capture Megara itself, and were compelled to withdraw when Brasidas arrived to relieve the Megarans. Hippocrates then commanded an Athenian force which invaded Boeotia. Hippocrates was given command of the land force that was to take Delium and he succeeded in doing so and fortifying a garrison there. When Hippocrates learned that the Boeotian army was approaching, Hippocrates began to retreat to Athens; he was unable to do so, and fought an army commanded by Pagondas at the Battle of Delium. The Athenians were clearly defeated. Hippocrates died near the beginning of the battle and nearly a thousand Athenians were slain alongside him. Only nightfall prevented further losses. After a siege of seventeen days, Delium fell to the Boeotians and at that point the bodies of Hippocrates and the other men were returned to the Athenians.
Hipponicus III
Hipponicus was an Athenian military commander. He was the son of Callias II of the deme Alopece and Elpinice of Laciadae (sister of Cimon). He was known as the "richest man in Greece". Shortly after 455 Hipponicus married the former wife of Pericles, whose name is unknown. By her he had two children: Callias III and a daughter, Hipparete who later married Alcibiades. A second son, Hermogenes was probably illegitimate since he received none of his father's estate. Hipponicus' wealth came, from among other things, the fact that he owned six hundred slaves working at the silver mines at Laurion in southern Attica. In 445/4 he was secretary of the Athenian Council (boule) and was still active as late as 426 when he, Nicias, and Eurymedon commanded Athenian regiments in an incursion into Boeotian territory where they successfully engaged Tanagran and Theban forces at Tanagra. Hipponicus was reported by Andocides to have been slain at the Battle of Delium in 424, but this appears to have been an error, either on Andocides part or a later transcriber, for Thucydides reports that the general at Delium was Hippocrates.
Histiaeus
He was appointed by Persian kingDarius I as tyrant of the conquered city, Miletus. He and other similar tyrants took part in Darius' campaign into Thrace and across the Danube into Scythia. The Greeks were tasked with building and defending the pontoon bridge over the Danube. There was and still is controversy over who had the idea to destroy or keep) the bridge intact - Histiaeus or Miltiades. After Histiaeus returned to Sardis with Darius, Darius took him on to Susa instead of rewarding him with Myrcinus, a town in Thrace leaving his son-in-law, Aristagoras as tyrant at Miletus. Histiaeus then induced Aristagoras to lead a revolt of the Ionian Greek towns against Persia. Aristagoras was already in trouble for failing to capture Naxos. So he went to get assistance from Sparta (which refused) and Athens (which agreed). The Greeks attacked the Persian satrapy capital at Sardis, held by Artaphernes, and burned it. Artaphernes defeated the Greeks at Ephesus but Histiaeus managed to flee to Chios. He tried to regain Miletus but could not so went to Lesbos and engaged in outright piracy in goth the Aegean and Black Sea. Persians continued to suppress the revolt and defeated the Ionians at Lade in 494. Histiaeus returned to attempt to raise a revolt again but was captured by Persian general Harpagus in 493. Artaphernes then executed him.
Idrieus
Idrieus, or Hidrieos; died 344 was a ruler of Caria under the Achaemenid Empire, nominally a Satrap, who enjoyed the status of king or dynast by virtue of the powerful position his predecessors of the House of Hecatomnus (the Hecatomnids) created when they succeeded the assassinated Persian Satrap Tissaphernes in the Carian satrapy. More details at the link.
Iphicrates
He was an Athenian general who served also as a mercenary commander. He defeated a Spartan mora (battalion) in 392 near Corinth in the battle of Lechaeum. He had various successes in the Hellespont. After 387 he served king Cotys in Thrace and then in 377 Persian king Artaxerxes asked the Athenians to send Iphicrates to command his forces against Egypt but dissention in the Persian high command aborted the campaign. He replaced Timotheus in 373 for a campaign in the Peloponnesus, but that was aborted. In 369 he prevented Epaminondas from capturing Sparta. In the 360's he campaigned in northern Greece near Amphipolis and then in support of Thracians. He was sent with Timotheus as advisors to Chares to campaign against Chios. Chares lost the battle of Embata in 356. He is much studied by military historians for his innovations in tactics and individual arms and armor, especially of peltasts. Nepos considered both Timotheus and Iphicrates among the greatest generals. see also
Isagoras
He was an Athenian politician who was a friend of Spartan king Cleomenes.Cleomenes drove the tyrant,Hippias, out of Athens in 510. Then Isagoras asked him to expel Cleisthenes as well. Isagoras was an archon in 508 who sought to rule using the Council of Three Hundred which generated popular opposition. He and the Spartan garrison were besieged and forced out of Athens. A Spartan effort to restore him, led by Cleomenes and Demaratus in 505 failed and Cleisthenes remained in control of Athens.
Jason of Pherae was the ruler of Thessaly during the period just before Philip II of Macedon came to power. see Jason
Lacedaemonius
He was a son of Cimon and an Athenian general. He fought at the battle of Oenophyta in 457 as the hipparch of the cavalry. In 433 he was a strategos commanding the fleet supporting Corcyra against Corinth.
Lamachus
He was an Athenian general who operated in the Black Sea area in the 430's. In 435 he commanded the Athenian fleet sent to support Sinope. In 433 his trireme was sunk in a storm off Heraclea Pontica. He signed the Peace of Nicias in 421. He was one of the three generals selected to lead the Athenian expedition against Syracuse in 415 - the most experienced real military leader of the three (Nicias and Alcibiades). Unfortunately, he was killed in the first attack on the city.
Leomedon
He was brother of Erigynis and another of Alexander's personal friends. After Alexander's death he received Syria and Phoenicia as his satrapies.
He was an Athenian who was elected general by those opposed to Alcibiades. He escaped from Mytilene on Lesbos with Conon in 406 when they were besieged by Callicratidas.
He was an Agiad king of Sparta succeding Cleomenes I. He became famous in history as the commander of the Spartan and Thespian army detachment sent to defend Thermopylae in 480.
Leonnatus
He was a Macedonian general. From 322 he was a bodyguard and kinsman of Alexander the Great. After Issus he was sent to guard Darius' family. He advised Alexander during the Philoas affair and attempted to restrain him durig the Clitus event. He saved Alexander's life at the siege of Malion. He was honored for his service in India. After Alexander's death he supported Alexander IV and became satrap of Hellespontine Phrygia. In 322 he returned to Macedon and supported Antipater in the Lamian War in which he was killed in battle against the Athenians led by Antiphilus..
Leonitades
He was pollemarch of Thebes who, for his own purposes, persuaded Phoibidas to use the Spartan troops to sieze the Cadmea. Phoibidas was tried in Sparta for this unauthorized action and Leonitades spoke in his behalf. The Spartans kept the Cadmea until Theban democrats led by Epaminondas executed a suprise coup and retook it - ans also executed Leonitades.
Leontichus
was an Athenian commander during the Corinthian War. In 388, he participated in naval operations around Abydus and along with fellow commanders Demaenetus, Dionysius and Phanias unsuccessfully pursued the Spartan fleet under Antalcidas. However, Antalcidas was able to evade them and link up with an allied Syracusan and Italian squadron at Abydos.
Leosthenes
He was an Athenian who was commander of the combined Greek army in theLamian War.
see Leosthenes
c. 545 - c. 469
Leotychidas II
Leotychidas was co-ruler of Sparta between 491–476, alongside Cleomenes I and later Leonidas I and Pleistarchus. He led Spartan forces during the Persian Wars from 490 to 478. Born in Sparta around 545, Leotychidas was a descendant of the Royal House of the Eurypontids (through Menamus, Agesilaus, Hippocratides, Leotychides, Anaxilaus, Archidamos, Anaxandridas I and Theopompus) and came to power in 491 BC with the help of the Agiad King Cleomenes I by challenging the legitimacy of the birth of Demaratus for the Eurypontid throne of Sparta. Later that year, he joined Cleomenes' second expedition to Aegina, where ten hostages were seized and given to Athens. However, after Cleomenes' death in 488, Leotychidas was almost surrendered to Aegina. In the spring of 479, following the death of his co-ruler Leonidas at the Battle of Thermopylae, Leotychidas commanded a Greek fleet consisting of 110 ships at Aegina and later at Delos, supporting the Greek revolts at Chios and Samos against Persia. Leotychidas defeated Persian military and naval forces at the Battle of Mycale on the coast of Asia Minor in the summer of 479 (possibly around mid-August). In 476, Leotychidas led an expedition to Thessaly against the Aleuadae family for collaboration with the Persians but withdrew after being bribed by the family. Upon returning to Sparta he was tried for bribery, and fled to the temple of Athena Alea in Tegea. He was sentenced to exile and his house burned. He was succeeded by his grandson, Archidamus II, son of his son Zeuxidamus, called Cyniscus, who had died in his father's lifetime. Leotychidas died some years later, around 469. Leotychidas is not to be confused with another Eurypontid, Leotychides, who was the (allegedly illegitimate) son of Agis II.
He is another example of what often happened to leading politicians in Greecian cities.
Leukon I
Leukon I of Bosporus (Leucon of Bosporus) also known as Leucon, and Leuco, was a Spartocid ruler of the Hellenistic Bosporan Kingdom who ruled from 389 to 349. He is arguably the greatest ruler of the Bosporan Kingdom. He was the son of Satyros I (432 - 389), and was the grandson of Spartokos I, the first Spartocid ruler of the Bosporan Kingdom. See the link for details.
d. c.586
Lycophron
Lycophron of Corinth was the second son of the Corinthian tyrant Periander. He was exiled by Periander in the seventh century when he found out Periander had killed his mother Melissa. Lycophron then lived for many years in Corcyra and some modern authors believe that he ruled the island as tyrant for the Corinthians, but ancient sources offer little evidence for this. At the end of his life, Periander asked his son to return to Corinth and rule as his successor, but Lycophron refused to accomplish, as long as his father lived in the same city. Periander then agreed to change positions and was ready to go to Corcyra if his son came to Corinth, but when the Corcyreans learned about this plan they killed Lycophron, probably about 586. (Herodotus III 50-53 ; Diogenes Laërtius I 94, 95 ; comp. Pausanias, II 28.)
Lycurgus
Plutarch wrote his biography and compared him with the Roman Numa Pompilius, an apt comparison as both were legendary founders and authors of the fundamental laws. He was the quasi-legendary lawgiver of Sparta who established the military-oriented reformation of Spartan society in accordance with the Oracle of Apollo at Delphi. All his reforms promoted the three Spartan virtues: equality (among citizens), military fitness, and austerity. He is referred to by ancient historians and philosophers Herodotus, Xenophon, Plato, Polybius, Plutarch, and Epictetus. It is not clear if Lycurgus was an actual historical figure; however, many ancient historians believed that he instituted the communalistic and militaristic reforms–most notably the Great Rhetra–which transformed Spartan society.
He was a Spartannavarch in 407 in the Aegean. He established his base at Ephesus where he became a friend of Persian satrap Cyrus the Younger who supplied him with resources to build a fleet. Alcibiadesled the Athenian fleet at Samos but Lysander refused to meet him in a sea battle. But while Alcibiades was absent collecting resources Antichous led the fleet out and Lysander saw his opportunity and defeated the Athenians at the battle of Notium in 406. Athens fired Alcibiades who retired to Thrace. Spartan law prohibited Lysander from being navarch the next year so he was replaced by Callicratidas. Callicratidas sailed to Lesbos which he besieged. Conon brought an Athenian fleet and in the battle of Arguinusae defeated Callicratidas who died in battle. This brought Lysander back into command. He outmaneuvered the Athenians and established his fleet in the Hellespont. When the Athenians followed he outwitted them again and destroyed their fleet at Aegospotami. He then captured Byzantium, Chalcedon and Lesbos. He besieged Athens jointly with king Pausanius forcing the Athenians to surrender and destroy their wall. He established a pro-Spartan oligarchy - the Thirty Tyrants . This was subsequently overthrown by Thrasybulusin 403 and Lysander was defeated in the battle of Munychia. He continued in various military operations in the Hellespont. In 395 he instigated the Spartans to begin the Corinthian War against an alliance of Thebes, Athens, Argos and Corinth and others. He led a Spartan army to Orchomenus and then died in the battle of Haliartus and outside the city walls.
His biography was written by both Nepos and Plutarch
Plutarch compared him with the Roman Lucius Cornelius Sylla. He notes that both were creators of their own 'greatness' but that Lysander had public approval in this while Sylla made himself dictator.
See the links for more details.
Lysimachus
Lysimachus (360 – 281) was a Macedonian officer and diadochus (i.e. "successor") of Alexander the Great, who became a basileus ("King") in 306, ruling Thrace (306 - 281), Asia Minor (301-281)and Macedon (288-281).
See the link for much more.
Mardonius
He was a nephew of Persian king Darius. The king also married Mardonius' sister. He served Darius during the Ionian revolt. In 492 he regained Persian control of Thrace. He was one of Xerxes' generals and remained in Greece when Xerxes departed. In 479 he destroyed Athens but was defeated and killed by the combined Greek city forces atPlataea.
Mausolus
He was a ruler of Caria. He interveened in the Social War. He is most famous for his magnificent tomb from which the generic name, Mausoleum derives.
6th - 5th centuries
Megabates
He was a Persian military leader in the late 6th and early 5th centuries. He was a cousin of Darius I and his brother Artaphernes, satrap of Lydia. Megabates is most notable for his joint participation in the failed 499 siege of Naxos. With Aristagoras and 200 ships, he was sent by Darius the Great to annex the small Aegean island to the Persian Empire. Megabates who forewarned the Naxians of the ensuing Persian siege, as he and Aristagoras argued after Megabates punished a captain for not setting up a watch. As a result, the people of Naxos gathered supplies and fortified their city to withstand a four-month-long siege. It is believed that Megabates sought to shame Aristagoras at the Persian court because of their dispute during the voyage to Naxos. needed] Megabates followed in his older brother's footsteps and was appointed satrap of Phrygia, with his residence at Dascylium. One of his sons was Megabazus.
Meleager
Meleager was a Macedonian officer who served Alexander the Great with distinction. Among the king's generals who went with him to Asia, he was the most experienced as the only military figure who exceeded his experience was the Macedonian general Antipater who remained in Macedon during Alexander's entire Asian campaign. He was the commander of the Macedonian phalanx. He is described by Quintus Curtius as being very disruptive and demanding during the general's conference at Alexander's death over who should reign and how to divide up the spoils. He threatened to use the Macedonian infantry against the other generals. He claimed to support Philip Arrhidaeus for king. Perdiccas maneuvered into personal danger and had him executed.
Melissus
He commanded the Samian fleet that initially defeated the Athenians (commanded by Pericles) in the Samian War441 but Samos lost their rebellion after a 9-month siege.
He was a Rhodian mercenary general who fled to Macedonia in 352 where he learned about Phillip II and Alexander. In 339 he defended Byzantium against Philip II. He commanded the Greek mercenaries at the battle ofGranicus. He defended Halicarnassusuntil overwhelmed and then burned the city and escaped. He then organized the Persian fleet to attack Alexander's supply lines in the Aegean capturing many islands. He almost managed to get Athens and Sparta to revolt. He nearly succeeded and died in 333 during a siege of Mytilene.
Menidas
He was the commander of mercenary cavalry at Gaugamela. Prior to the battle he conducted field reconnaissance and discovered traps on the prepared field. During the battle he defended the camp and baggage and, according to Arrian and Diodorus, was wounded.
He was Memnon's brother and also was a Rhodian mercenary general who served his brother-in-law, Artabazus, in the Troad and then fled with him and Memnon to Macedon. He fought both for and against the Persian kingArtaxerxes IIIFirst, he was hired by Egyptian Pharaoh Nectanebo II to defend Egypt at Sidon, where the Persians captured him. Recognizing his skill Artaxerxes then hired him as commander of one of the mercenary units for the reconquest of Egypt in 344 - the critical battle was at Pelusium in 343. For his excellent contribution he was named commander of Persian forces in Asia Minor in 342. He died there.
He was an Athenian general. His father and son were both named Cimon. He is frequently confused with his uncle, Miltiades the Elder, who established the Athenian colony in the Chersonesus in 455. But he did succeed his uncle after the latter died in 520 and his elder brother also died. He was then sent in 516 by the Athenian tyrant, Hippias to take over there. He married the daughter of Thracian king Olorus. Persian King Darius I led his army across the Bosporus in 513 to attack the Scythians. As a vassal, Miltiades participated as far as the Danube. Historians question the story that Miltiades recommended destruction of the bridge there in order to trap Darius. In 499 he joined in support of the Ionian Revolt. He returned to Chersonesus in 496 and then fled to Athens in 492. With some difficulty from having been a 'tyrant' he did regain political favor. He was elected one of the strategosgenerals and thanks to his reputed knowledge of the Persians was given command of the Athenian army at Marathon in 490. In 489 he led a large Athenian naval campaign to Paros. After that effort failed (during which he was seriously wounded) and the fleet returned, his political rivals charged him with treason, and he was found guilty, fined, and put in prison where he died. The fine was paid by his son, Cimon. Nepos wrote a short biography. Plutarch mentions him in the biographies of others.
c.590 - 525
Miltiades the Elder
He was an Athenian politician from the Philaid family. He is most famous for traveling to the Thracian Chersonese, where he ruled as a tyrant. During his reign, Miltiades' best-attested action is the construction of a defensive wall across the peninsula. Miltiades was the uncle of Miltiades the Younger. The Dolonci, the population of the Thracian Chersonese— suffered several military defeats against their rivals, the Apsinthians. Miltiades took a group of Athenian settlers and these followers populated and fortified Cardia. He died, childless, around 525 . He was succeeded as tyrant by his nephew, Stesagoras, who was killed shortly afterward by the Lampsacenes.
Mindarus
He was a Spartan admiral who commanded the Peloponnesian fleet in 411 and 410, during the Peloponnesian War. seeMindarus
Myronides
was an Athenian general of the First Peloponnesian War. In 458 he defeated the Corinthians at Megara and then in 457 he defeated the Boeotians at the Battle of Oenophyta. Myronides' victory at Oenophyta led to a decade of Athenian domination over Boeotia, Locris and Phocis sometimes called the Athenian 'Land Empire'.
Nectanebo I
Egyptian Pharoh Kheperkare Nakhtnebef, better known by his hellenized name Nectanebo I, was an ancient Egyptian pharaoh, founder of the last native dynasty of Egypt, the XXXth. Nectanebo was an army general from Sebennytos, son of an important military officer named Djedhor and of a lady whose name is only partially recorded. see Nectanebo I
Nectanebo II
Nectanebo II ruled in 360–342 and was the third and last pharaoh of the Thirtieth Dynasty of Egypt as well as the last native ruler of ancient Egypt. see Nectanebo II
Neoptolemus
Neoptolemus died 321 ) was a Macedonian officer who served under Alexander the Great. He then participated in the wars of the Diodochi.
Nicias
He was an Athenian politician and general. During the Peloponnesian War he led campaigns to Minoa in 427, to Boeotia in 426 (Tanagra) and occupied Cythera in 425. But he was desiring and recommending peace in opposition to Cleon's constant advocacy of war. In 423 he arranged a truce with Sparta. He conquered Mende and persuaded Macedonian king Perdiccas II to become an ally. In 421 he authored the 50-year Peace of Nicias. After Cleon's death Nicias faced the aggressive political adventures of Alcibiades. In 415 he reluctantly accepted joint command for an expedition against Syracuse in Sicily, promoted by Alcibiades who was also elected to the joint command along with Lamachus. Alcibiades was recalled en route for trial and Lamachus did in the first battle. Demosthenes was sent with reinforcements. The Athenian fleet was destroyed in the harbor and the army destroyed during its retreat. Nicias was killed.
Plutarch wrote a biography of Nicias in which he compared him to the Roman Crassus. The obvious point is that both generals died while on loosing campaigns far from home. But in this Plutarch gives the better grade to Crassus who died honorably while Nicias surrendered and hoped for his life. The main set of comparisons, however, as with Plutarch's evaluations, is about their personal characters and public actions and in these Nicias gets the better grade.
Onesilus
Onesilus or Onesilos; was the brother of king Gorgos (Gorgus) of the Greek city-state of Salamis on the island of Cyprus. Cyprus was a part of the Persian Empire, but, when the Ionians rebelled from Persian rule, Onesilus captured the city of Salamis and usurped his brother's throne. He was able to win over every city on the island except for the Graeco-Phoenician city-state of Amathus, which stayed loyal to the Persians despite being besieged by Onesilus' troops. He is known only through the work of Herodotus (Histories, V.104–115). See the link.
Onomarchus
Onomarchus was a Phocian general in the Third Sacred War, brother of Philomelus and son of Theotimus. After his brother's death he became commander of the Phocians and pursued a warmongering policy.
Orontobates
Orontobates was a Persian, who married the daughter of Pixodarus, the usurping satrap of Caria, and was sent by the king of Persia to succeed him. see Orontobates
Paches
He was an Athenian general who commanded the campaign to end the rebellion of Mytilene in 428.
Pagondas
Pagondas, a son of Aeolidas, was a Theban general and statesman, who is best known for his command of the Boeotian forces at the Battle of Delium in 424 during the Peloponnesian War. His modification of the standard hoplite formation and his use of reserve cavalry in that battle constitute what most historians agree is the first recorded use of formal military tactics in human history.
Pammenes
He was a Theban general 371- 362 and later. In 369Epaminondas sent him to defend Megalopolis from the Spartans. He was sent again in 362. He supported Artabazusin 356 and twice defeated armies sent by Artaxerxes III. He fought on the side of Philip II against the Phocians in the Third Sacred War 355-346.
Parmenion
He was a Macedonian general who was joint commander of Phillip's invasion of Asia in 336. He was then Alexander's second in command at battles of Granicus, Isssus and Gaugamela. He also conducted separate operations. He remained at Ecbatana in 331 as Alexander continued east to India. He was murdered on Alexander's order.
He was a member of the Agiad family and Spartan regent and general. After Leonidas died in battle, he was regent for Pleistarchus who died in 458. He commanded the 31 allied Greek armies at Plataea in 479. But when he then commanded the allied Greek fleet in the Aegean his overbearing dictatorial methods caused revolts even though he did capture Byzantum from the Persians in 478. The Spartan government recalled him and sent Dorieus, who also was dismissed. Cimon drove him out of Byzantium in ca. 475-470. He was tried and found guilty but fled to a temple where he was then blocked in and died.
Pausanias II
He was grandson of Pausanias and became an Agiad king of Sparta. 445. His father was Pleisstoanax and his uncle Cleomenes.He led the Spartan land blockade of Athens in 405 forcing the Athenian surrender. In 403 he opposeed Lysander and took the Spartan army back home. In 394 he failed to prevent Lysander's death at Haliartus in Boeotia. For which he was condemed and fled to Tegea. His son was Aegisipolus _
Peisander
He was a Spartan general during the Corinthian War. His brother-in-law was King Agesilaus II. In 395 he was assigned command of the Spartan fleet in the Aegean. But he was a relatively inexperienced general, and in its very first action his Spartan fleet was decisively defeated by the Persian fleet commanded by Cononand Pharnabazus II at the Battle of Cnidus. Peisander died fighting aboard his ship. The defeat ended Spartan naval power in the Aegean.
Peisistratos
He was the son of Hippocrates, and was a ruler of Athens during most of the period between 561 and 527. He established the Panathenaic Games, in 566. He supported and was supported by the lower class of Athens. He greatly reduced the power and privileges of the wealthy to spread the wealth more equally among the Athenians. He was a distant relative of Solon. He became politically popular by capturing Megara's port of Nisaea in 565. This victory opened up trade to the west which improved Athenian grain supply. But that popularity was not sufficient for him to gain complete power. Gradually he gained sufficient support from the poorer population to seize the Acropolis and the government. The Athenians accepted tyranny in the name of peace and prosperity when he declared himself tyrant. But he still had to fight opposing factions. He was removed from political office and exiled twice during his reign, first in 555. He was exiled for 3 to 6 years then returned to Athens. He managed to again be tyrant for a few years before being exiled again but again after assembling forces for 10 years regained power. When he died in 527 power was assumed by his oldest son Hippias as tyrant.
Peithias
Peithias was a democratic leader of Corcyra during the Peloponnesian War. In 427 he was killed together with "... sixty others, senators and private persons;..."This happened because Peithias was accused by Corcyraeans (in favor of Corinth) of enslaving Corcyra to Athens. Peithias won the charge and accused then five of the richest of his accusers "... of cutting stakes in the ground sacred to Zeus and Alcinous; ...",[1] who then could not pay the fee. The oligarchic party fearing then Peithias "... to persuade the people to conclude a defensive and offensive alliance with Athens, ..." killed him then in the senate.
Pelopidas
He was a Theban general who led the revolution in Thebes in 379 and was then elected Boeotarch. He commanded the "Sacred Band" in the battle at Tegyra in 379 and then at Leuctra in 371 and at Mantinea. He operated with Epaminondas in the campaign of 370 but otherwise led campaigns in north Greece against Pherae and in Thessaly. He died fighting Alexxander of Pherae at Cynoscephalae in 364. He was recognized by Nepos as a great general as well as byPlutarch who especially comended his for his close relationship rather than rivalry with Epaminondas.
In his biography Plutarch compared him with the Roman Marcellus..
Perdiccas
Perdiccas - Perdikkas; c. 355 – 321/320 became a general in Alexander the Great's army and participated in Alexander's campaign against Achaemenid Persia. Following Alexander's death, he rose to become supreme commander of the imperial army and regent for Alexander's half brother and intellectually disabled successor, Philip Arridaeus (Philip III). He was murdered by his own officers while campaigning to Egypt in 320
Perdiccas II
King of Macedon He fought civil wars against his brothers Alceas and Philip in the 440 -430's. He supported the rebellion of Potidaea and later made peace with Athens. He supported the Spartans and Brasidas in 424.
Perdiccas III
King of Macedon from 365 - 360 That year he was killed while attempting to reconquer upper Macedonia the Illyrian Bardylis,
He was an Athenian politician and general. He held political power in the 440- 430's and led the city during the first years of the Peloponnesian War until dying during the plague. He was at Tanagra in 457 but not involved with the Athenian expedition to Egypt in 454 as he was commanding the Athenian squadron in the Gulf of Corinth.
Plutarch wrote his biography and compared him with the Roman general Fabius Maximus.
Phalacus
He was a Phocian general. from 351. He was deposed in 347 and regained power in 346. In 346 he let the Macedonians into central Greece to defeat the Phocians and end the Third Sacred war. He then went to Italy and Crete
d 370/69
Pharax
He was a Spartan junior officer at Aegospotami in 405 and was promoted admiral in 398 in the Aegean. He then went to Sicily to assist Dionysius I.
d. before 430
Pharnabazus I
Pharnabazus I, was a member of the Pharnacid dynasty that governed the province of Hellespontine Phrygia as satraps for the Achaemenid Empire. He is a very obscure figure, almost always mentioned alongside his father Artabazus. He may have succeeded his father as satrap between 455 and 430, but it is also possible that Artabazus was directly succeeded by his grandson (Pharnabazus' son), Pharnaces II.
Pharnabazus II
He was a Persian satrap and general in Phrygia. His Persian support and oposition to Sparta alternated during the Peloponnesian war. In 409 he agreed with Alcibiades. But this was canceled in 408. Between 400 and 395 the Spartans attaked his satrapy. In 394 he financed and help lead Conon's victory at Cnidos which destroyed Spartan naval power and ended the war. He and Conon used the Persian fleet to attack Sparta and restore Athens. In 392 he went to the Persian court at Susa. In 388-6 and 373 he was Persian commander attempting to conquer Egypt with the assistance of Athenian general Iphicrates.
Pharnabazus III
Pharnabazus III; c. 370 - after 320 ) was a Persian satrap who fought against Alexander the Great. His father was Artabazus II, and his mother a Greek from Rhodes. .
Pharnabazus was the son of Artabazus, satrap of Hellespontine Phrygia. However, Artabazus was exiled after a failed rebellion against Artaxerxes III in 358. From 352 to 342, the family went into exile to Macedonia, in the capital of Pella in Pella, under the rule of king Philip II (360-336), where they met the young Prince Alexander, future Alexander the Great. With Artabazus and Pharnabazus was Memnon of Rhodes, a Greek mercenary and relative by marriage. Artabazus, Pharnabazus and Memnon were later allowed to return to Persia, in 343.
Phayllas
Phayllus was the third leader of the Phocians during the Third Sacred War, succeeding his brother Onomarchus. After a fairly unsuccessful period in command he died of natural causes, and was succeeded by his nephew Phalacus.
Pherendatis
Pherendatis was a Persian general who was appointed Supreme Commander of the ground forces in the Battle of the Eurymedon. He perished in this battle.
Philip II
King of Macedon He created the Macedonian army that his son, Alexander the Great employed to conquer Persia. But first Philip conquered Greece.
See the link for much more detail.
Philoces
Philoces was Philip V of Macedon's prefect and commander on the island of Euboea. In 200 he was ordered by Philip to ravage Attica with 2,000 infantry and 200 cavalry. According to Polybius the ravaging that Philoces gave Attica was the worst since the Persian War. In 197 he tried to relieve the city of Eretria but he was driven off by the Roman army besieging the city. He was then put in charge of a group of 1,500 who went to Achaea and relieved Corinth and had Argos surrendered to them. Philioces later gave Argos to Nabis of Sparta in return for a Spartan alliance with Macedon. Philoces still remained commander of the Macedonian garrison at Argos after the exchange and when Nabis deserted the Macedonians and went over to the Romans, Philoces was offered by the Romans to surrender the city to them. Philoces surrendered the city and was allowed free passage to Macedon. This is the last that is heard about Philoces.
Philocrates
He was Athenian general at Melos in 416 when they surrendered .
He was a Greek politician from Athens who first negotiated the Peace of Philocrates with Philip II of Macedonia after Philip devastated the city of Olynthos in 348. The unpopularity of the treaty resulted in Philocrates being prosecuted in 343.
Philomelos
Philomelos of Phocis was general of the Phocians in the Third Sacred War, brother of Onomarchus and son of Theotimus. Philomelos, with the help of Sparta, set up as a strategos autokrator a mercenary army and managed to defeat the Locrians. Then he conquered Delphi and fully controlled the local Oracle, forcing Pythia to admit and agree that he could do what he wanted as owner of the Oracle. After that, he stole the treasures of the temple and all the valuable offerings to the god Apollo and used them in order to form additional army corps consisting of 10,000 mercenaries. With the support and help of Sparta, Athens and Corinth, Philomelos again prevailed over the Locrians and Thessalians, but he was defeated in 354 by the Boeotians and was killed falling off a cliff.
Philopoemen
Plutarch wrote his biography and compared him with the Roman Titus Quintius Flamininus. He rated Philopoemen the greater in military skill but Flamininus the better in having confered benefits to Rome while Philopoemen was fighting as a Greek against other Greeks.
Philotas
He was the son of Parmenion and commanded the Companion cavalry. This critical command put him into power near Alexander. He was accused of being an acomplis in Cebalinus's plot against Alexander, so was tried and executed. This caused Alexander to order the murder of his father.
Phyllus
He was a Phocian general who prevented Philip II of Macedon from passing through Thermopyle in 352.
Philoas
He was a Macedonian general, commanding Alexander's cavalry
402- 318
Phocion
He was an Athenian politician and general. He was considered among the greats by both Neposand Plutarch.
See essay on Phocion and Plutarch's Lives and both edition of Cornelius Nepos. Plutarch compared Phocion with the Roman Cato the Younger and found them both of excellent private and public character.
Phoebidas
He was a Spartan general who occupied the Theban Cadmea but since this move was unauthorized he was recalled. He was killed by Theban cavalry in 378 as Harmos (military governor) of Thespiae.
Phormio
He was an Athenian admiral who commanded at the battle against the rebels in Samos in 432 - Samian war. He fought atPotidaea and commanded the Athenian fleet at Naupactus in 430 - 429, where he defeated the Spartans twice. He was noted for deveoping the new Athnenian ramming tactics in sea battles.
Phrynichus
He was one of the Athenian admirals commanding the fleet at Samos. He became one of the 400 Hundredoligarchic government in 411 and was assassinated. His role at Samos and Athens is described as part of the Athenian coup.
Pleistoanax
He was an Agiad king of Sparta. He invaded Attica in 446 in the First Peloponnesian War . He was condemed for taking bribes and exiled. In 427 he was recalled. He supported the peace with Athens in 421.
Pleistarchus
He was an Agiad king of Sparta His tutor was Cleombrotus. His father and mother were his uncle and niece.
Polyanthes
He was the Corinthian admiral commanding their squadron at Erineus located on the south side of the channel that opened the Gulf of Corinth to the Adriatic. The Corinthian squadron was based there to protect convoys west to Sicily and Italy. He was attacked by the Diphilus commanding the Athenian squadron at Naupactus. The battle was a draw with neither side loosing much, but it was a critical battle because Polyanthes had made technical change to his ships by greatly strengthing the bow in order to defeat the Athenian tactic of bow-to-bow rammng. This was successful and was quickly adopted by the Syracusians to enable them to defeat the Athenian fleet in their harbor.
Polycrates
Polycrates was a son of Aeaces, and the tyrant of Samos from the 540s to 522. He had a reputation as both a fierce warrior and an enlightened tyrant. . Polycrates recruited an army of 1,000 archers and assembled a navy of 100 penteconters, which became the most powerful navy in the Greek world at that time. Both Herodotus and Thuycides credit Polycrates with the importance of sea power. No doubt this was in recognition of the significance to Samos itself which gained its wealth from control of commerce along the Aegean coast. But commerce was not his only objective.He wanted to bring all the Greek islands and cities of Ionia under his rule. Polycrates' rule coresponded with the Persian conquest of Lydia in 546. This made it expedient for the coastal and island cities of Ionia to recognize this Persian power. He took advantage of the situation. Herodotus refers to an attack on Miletus, in which he won a great naval victory. He then conquered Delos, the key religious centre of the Aegean. Polycrates sought a counterpalance of power by an alliance with King Amasis of Egypt. That a local ruler on an island in the Agean could have significant dealings with the kings of Persia and Egypt is an indication of the wealth of Samos as much as the role of its ruler. Polycrates also engaged in outright piracy including capture of prisoners who could be sold as slaves. Herodotus states that Polycrates later established a fleet 40 triremes, probably becoming the first Greek state with a fleet of such ships. In circa 520 Sparta and Corinth invaded Samos but were unsuccessful. The Persian satrap at Sardis, Oroetes invited Polycrates to visit at Magnesia where he assissinated him. After the murder of Polycrates by Oroetes, Samos was ruled by Maiandrios. Under Polycrates the Samians developed an engineering and technological expertise to a level unusual in ancient Greece.
Polyperchon
He was a Macedonian general commanding Tymphaean units in Alexander the Great's army. He was sent back to Macedon as second in command to Craterus.He assisted Antipater defeat the Greeks in the Lamian War. After 319 on Antipater's death he was appointed commander of all the Macedonian forces but soon was opposed by Cassander. He allied with Eumenus against rivals Cassander, Antigonus and Ptolemy. A complex multisided series of campaigns ensued in which Poyperchon lost out..
Procles
He was a citizen of Philus who acted as an external advocate for reason in the diplomatic meetings in 370 and 369 between Athenians, Spartans and Corinthians and Thebans discussing if the Athenians should or should not aid Spartans against the Theban campaign against them. Xenophon presents the speeches in full and uses them as example of right ethical policy. Dr. Emily Baragwanath analyzed the speeches in detail in her article 'A Noble Alliance: Herodotus, Thucydides, and Xenophon's Procles'
Protomachus
He was an Athenian general during the Peloponnesian War. When the Athenians lerned of the Battle of Notium, they denounced Alcibiades, claiming that he had lost the ships through neglect of duty and dissolute conduct. Protomachus was one of the new 10 strategos elected. He commanded the right wing of the Athenian fleet at the Battle of Arginusae, with fifteen ships.Thrasyllus commanded fifteen ships. Lysias was stationed behind Protomachus with fifteen ships. Protomachus was one of the eight generals who were deposed from their office and ordered to return to Athens to stand trial because they failed to rescue the sailors after the battle. He fled and did not return to Athens.
He was a Macedonian general in the Battle ofIssus commanding the Prodromoi and replacing Amyntas (son of Arrhabaeus). In the battle of Gaugamela he was replaced by Aretes.
Ptolemy I
Ptolemy I Soter "Ptolemy the Savior"; c. 367 – January 282) was a companion and historian of Alexander the Great of the Kingdom of Macedon in northern Greece who became ruler of Egypt, part of Alexander's former empire. Ptolemy was pharaoh of Ptolemaic Egypt from 305/304 to his death. He was the founder of the Ptolemaic dynasty which ruled Egypt until the death of Cleopatra in 30, turning the country into a Hellenistic kingdom and Alexandria into a center of Greek culture. Ptolemy I was the son of Arsinoe of Macedon by either her husband Lagus or Philip II of Macedon, the father of Alexander.
Ptolemy II
Ptolemy II Philadelphus, (Philadelphus in Greek: "Brother-Loving") (born 308, Cos—died 246), king of Egypt (285–246), second king of the Ptolemaic dynasty, who extended his power by skillful diplomacy, developed agriculture and commerce, and made Alexandria a leading centre of the arts and sciences.
Ptolemy III
Ptolemy III Euergetes "Ptolemy the Benefactor"; c. 280 – November/December 222 was the third king of the Ptolemaic dynasty in Egypt from 246 to 222 . The Ptolemaic Kingdom reached the height of its power during his reign. Ptolemy III was the eldest son of Ptolemy II Philadelphus and his first wife Arsinoe I. When Ptolemy III was young, his mother was disgraced and he was removed from the succession. He was restored as heir to the throne in the late 250s and succeeded his father as king without issue in 246 . On his succession, Ptolemy married Berenice II, reigning queen of Cyrenaica, thereby bringing her territory into the Ptolemaic realm. In the Third Syrian War (246-241 ), Ptolemy III invaded the Seleucid empire and won a near total victory, but was forced to abandon the campaign as a result of an uprising in Egypt.
Satyros I
Satyros I (died 389) also known as Satyrus was the Spartocid ruler of the Bosporan Kingdom from 432 to 389. During his rule he built upon the expansive foreign policy of his father, Spartokos I. He conquered Nymphaion, became involved in the political developments of the neighbouring Sindike kingdom and laid siege to the city of Theodosia, which was a serious commercial rival because of its ice-free port and proximity to the grain fields of eastern Crimea. He presided over a strengthening of ties with Athens, and at one point possibly had a statue raised in his honour in the city. He was also the father of Leukon and Gorgippos who would expand their realm into a powerful kingdom.
Selucus I Nicantor
Seleucus I Nicator . 'Seleucus the Victor') was one of the Diadochi (the rival generals, relatives, and friends of Alexander the Great who fought for control over his empire after his death). Having previously served as an infantry general under Alexander the Great, he eventually assumed the title of basileus and established the Seleucid Empire over the bulk of the territory which Alexander had conquered in Asia. He was the last living of Alexander's generals and was one of the most sucessful in founding a ruling dynast.
Selucus II
Seleucus II Callinicus Pogon -Kallinikos means "gloriously triumphant"; Pogon means "the Beard"; July/August 265 – December 225 was a ruler of the Hellenistic Seleucid Empire, who reigned from 246 to 225 . Faced with multiple enemies on various fronts, and not always successful militarily, his reign was a time of great turmoil and fragmentation for the Seleucid empire, before its eventual restoration under his second son and eventual successor, Antiochus III. See the link for details.
Seleucus III
Seleucus III Soter, called Seleucus Ceraunus c. 243 – April/June 223, ruled December 225 – April/June 223, was a ruler of the Hellenistic Seleucid Kingdom, the eldest son of Seleucus II Callinicus and Laodice II. He was assassinated.
Plutarch wrote his biography and compared him with the Roman, "Poplicola" - Publius Valerius - both famous servants of their respective societies.
Sphodrias
Sphodrias was a Spartan general. In 379, he was in command of a garrison in the Spartan-occupied city of Thespiae in Boeotia. Aiming to increase Spartan power in the region, he attempted to march by night to seize the Piraeus, the port of Athens. He miscalculated the length of the march, however, and when the sun rose he and his army were caught out in the middle of the Thyrian plain, still some miles from the Piraeus. He retreated back to Boeotia. The Athenians, furious at Sphodrias' action, seized several Spartan emissaries who were in Athens at the time, and released them only when the Spartans promised that Sphodrias would be executed. Sphodrias' son Cleonymos, however, got Archidamus, the son of the Spartan king Agesilausto intervene. Agesilaus then used his influence to secure Sphodrias' unexpected acquittal.
Together with Phoebidas, who had seized Thebes several years earlier, Sphodrias came to be seen as representative of an aggressive Spartan foreign policy that alienated other states throughout Greece. In 371 Sphodrias died in the battle of Leuctra
Spitamenes
He was a Bactrian noble who, with Dataphernes and Catanes, arrested Bessus. But he then opposed Alexander and ambushed Menedemus when Alexander sent the latter to capture him. He conducted war against Alexander. Eventually he was murdered by his wife.
Strombichides
Strombichides was an Athenian admiral and politician. His father was Diotimus. Strombichides was appointed to command the eight ships which the Athenians sent to the coast of Asia Minor, following the news of the revolt of Chios in 412. On his arrival at Samos he added a Samian trireme to his squadron and sailed to Teos to check on the rebellion there. But soon after, he was compelled to flee to Samos from a superior Peloponnesian fleet, underChalcideus and Alcibiades and, as a result, Teos revolted. Not long after this Strombichides seems to have returned to Athens, and later in the same year he was one of three commanders who were sent to the Athenians at Samos with a reinforcement of thirty-five ships, which increased their whole force to 104. This they now divided, retaining the greater part of the fleet at Samos to command the sea, and to carry on the war against Miletus, while Strombichides and two others were despatched to Chios with thirty triremes. On their way they lost three of their vessels in a storm. However, with the rest of the fleet they proceeded to Lesbos, and made preparations for the Siege of Chios, to which island they then crossed over, fortified a strong post named Delphinium, and reduced, for a time, the population of Chios to great extremities. In 411, following the revolt of Abydos and Lampsacus, Strombichides sailed from Chios with twenty four ships and recovered Lampsacus, but was unable either to persuade or compel Abydos to return to its allegiance. Accordingly he crossed over to Sestus, and there established a garrison to command the whole of the Hellespont. Soon after this, he was summoned to reinforce the Athenians at Samos, who were unable, before his arrival, to make headway against the superior force of the Peloponnesians under Astyochus. Lysias regarded Strombichides as was one of the friends of democracy who expressed their indignation at the terms of the peace with which Theramenes and his fellow-ambassadors returned to Athens from Lacedaemon in 404. Having thus made himself an enemy of the oligarchs, he was involved with the other prominent men of his party, in the accusation brought against them by Agoratus before the council, of a conspiracy to oppose the peace. They were all accordingly thrown into prison, and not long after were put to death following a mockery of a trial under the government of the Thirty. Strombichides is believed to have been the father of the Athenian statesman, Autocles. With Strombichides' father, Diotimus, being head of the fleet as Nauarch, himself being a Taxiarch, and his son, Autocles rising to lead the army as strategos, this family from the southern Deme of Euonymeia was one of the most influential of Athenian politics and military hierarchy.
Taxiles
His former name was Omphis. He was ruler of Taxila in the Punjab and became Alexander's ally. He gave Alexander 30 elephants. His brother died in battle with Porus.
Teleutias
Teleutias was the brother of the Spartan king Agesilaus II, and a Spartan naval commander in the Corinthian War.or Corinthian war. He first saw action in the campaign to regain control of the Corinthian Gulf after the Spartan naval disaster at Cnidus in 394, and was later active in the Spartan campaign against Argos in 391.
c. 524 - c.459
Themistocles
He was an Athenian populist politician and military commander. Nepos and Plutarchwrote his biographies. He is one of the few classical era Greeks well known to students today. He led the contingent of his clan in the center of the Athenian phalanx at Marathon in 490. When silver was discovered at Laureum in 483 he insisted that it be used to finance the construction of 200 triremes. In 481 he advocated an alliance with Sparta to prepare defense against the coming Persian attack. In 480 he led the Athenian fleet at Artemisium. Then he enticed Xerxes to attack the combined Greek fleets at Salamiswhere he convinced the Spartans and others to fight in the constricted area instead of retreating into Peloponnessus.
After the war he personally went to Sparta to manipulate deplomacy that enabled the Athenians to refortify the city and also build walls to Piraeus. He was politially opposed to Cimon. He was ostracized in 471 and fled to Persia.
There is much more about this very famous Athenian leader. His fate after saving Athens was similar to quite a few other Athenian and other Greek leaders - execution - exile - or move to Persia. I include on the left links to various articles but they are woefully brief. And most essays are more about his activities in the Persian invasion than about the individual himself. So I also copied the complete Plutarch Life of Themistocles to read. and the essay by Rickard here. Nepos included Themistocles in his list of greatest commanders, there are two editions of his book available now.
Theramenes
He was a controversial Athenian politician and military commander. His father was Hagnon, the founder of Amphipolis. In 411 he was a member of the oligarchic faction that staged the coup and installed the 400 but he was too moderate for the likes of the extreme oligarchs. He was one of the commanders at Arginusaein 406 but escaped the execution of 6 other admirals. He served at sea with Thrasybulus in the Aegean campaigns. After Athens surendered in 404 he became a member of the Thirty Tyrants but again opposed extreme oligarchy and was executed.
Thibron
He was a Spartan general who was sent in 400 with 5,000 mercenaries to oppose Tissapherenes. He was not successful until he also used the remaining mercenaries of the Ten Thousand to march along the Asiatic coast to Ephesus in an attempt to block Tissapherenes. He was recalled but sent again in 391 with 8,000 soldiers to combat the satrap, Strythas, but was defeated and killed.
Timaeus
He was son of Mentor and commanded theGreek mercenaries in Darius' service on the Aegean. He brought then to darius at Issus whee he commanded the 30,000 Greeks.
Thrasybulus
He was an Athenian democratic politican and general who was included in Nepos' essays on great generals. But he is little known today. In 441 he was elected by the democratic faction on Samos to resist the oligarchic coup in Athens. He then recalled Alcibiades and worked with him on naval actions in the Aegean and Hellelspont- Cynossemia and Abydos and Cyzicus. In 406 he was only a triarch at the Battle of Arginusae, thus escaping the vindictive Athenian assembly that executed 6 of the admirals. Nepos wrote that he was responsible for victories but Alcibiades got credit. After Athens lost and was occupied by the Spartans in 404, who also installed an oligarchy - the Thirty Tyrants, Thrasybulus organized a resistance and then defeated both the Spartans and oligarchs at Munychia. After which he restored the democracy. He continued to serve and was the leading politician in Athens for years. But he lost the battles at Nemea and Coronea in the Corinthian war and was replaced by the victorious naval commander, Conon. When Conon had to flee a Persian prison to Cyprus in 392, Thrasybulus regained political power. In 389 he commanded an Athenian fleet campaign around the Aegean, capturing Byzantium, imposing customs taxes on shipping there, and resetablishing Athenian control of many islands. In 388 during his attack on Aspendus he was killed by the Aspendians. See also Thrasybulus
Thrasyllus
Thrasyllus was an Athenian strategos and statesman who rose to prominence in the later years of the Peloponnesian War. First appearing in Athenian politics in 410, in the wake of the Athenian coup of 411 , he played a role in organizing democratic resistance in an Athenian fleet at Samos. There, he was elected strategos by the sailors and soldiers of the fleet, and held the position until he was controversially executed several years later after the Battle of Arginusae.
See the links for much more detail including his trial.
He was an Athenian military commander but is famous throughout history and today as the historian who wrote a history of the Peloponnesian War. In 424 he was the strategos controling Thasos when Brasidies besieged Amphipolis. Thucydides was urged to relieve the city but he arrived too late. For that he was blamed and exiled. Thus the world benefited from his travels around Greece observing the Peloponnesian War at first hand and writing his influential account.
Thymochares
He was an Athenian general. In 411 he was sent with a fleet to Eretria on Euboea Island. This was during a civil struggle in Athens plus revolt of come members of Delian League and of course Spartan atttacks. While Spartan naval commander Agesandridas led his fleet around Laconia and based at Epidaurus from which he attacked Aegeina, and then moved closer to Athens at Megara. When he departed there there Athenians spotted his fleet and discovered it was going around Attica to Eretreia. He stopped opposite Euobea at Oropus. Thymochares had about 36 ships at Eretria and thought the city was friendly and competly safe as he set the sailors into town to eat. But there were many pro- Spartans in the city. They alerted Agesandridas that the Athenians were away from this ships and also delayed them as they rushed back. Agesandridas did the same maneuver that Lysander did in 404, he attacked while the Athenians were looking for lunch. Some Athenians managed to reach Chalsis (rival city to Eretria on Euboea). The Spartans enbled all of Euboea to revolt. At Athens citizens were terrified that the Spartans could then attack Piraeus which was undefended.
He also commanded a small Athenian fleet in the Hellespont.
Timoleon
He was a Corinthian who was well known as the liberator of Syracuse from the tyrant Dionysus II. He also freed Corinth from his own brother, Timophanes. Both Nepos and Plutarch considered him great. He was sent to assist Syracuse against Dionysius II in 345. At the time Dionysus was already trapped in the Ortygia by Hicetas. So he had to rescue Syracuse from both Dionysus and the Carthaginians. He reorganized politics in Syracuse. He then defeated a Carthagian army at Crimisus in 341 or 339. In 338 he became blind and retired from public life.
In his biography Plutarch compared him with the Roman Aemilius Paulus who also fought abroad.
Timotheus
He was an Athenian general. His father was Conon. He worked hard to revive Athens and make it dominant in a Second Athenian League but by then conditions had changed. Between 378 and 356 he was repeatedly elected strategos. In 375 during the Boeotian war he commanded an Athenian fleet that sailed around the Peloponnesus and to gain friendship of Acarnanians and Molossians.
Nepos considered him one of the great leaders and notedthat this was unique when both father and son were awarded with statues in Athens.
See links for much more.
Tissaphernes
He was a Persian satrap of Lydia and Caria, with capital as Sardis, from 413. He sometimes gave Sparta assistance against Athens and in 412 signed a treaty to supply a navy in exchange for ending Greek support of the Ionian ciies. In 408 he was replaced at Lydia by Cyrus the Younger but retained Caria. He remained loyal to king Artaxerxes II and warned him about Cyrus, then supplied his cavalry at Cunaxa in 401. He arrested the main Greek commanders and had them executed, then harrassed the Greek "Ten Thousand" as the retreated. He returned to Lydia and continued to try to keep the Athenians and Spartans in equal balance. He was defeated by Agesilaus at the Pactolus River near Sardis in 395.
Tithrantes
He was a Persian satrap who partnered with Pharnabazus in the failed expedition to regain Egypt from Nechtanbo I
Tolmidas
He was an Athenian admiral. He commanded the expedition around the Peloponnesese in 454 and campaigned in Boeotia in 455. He commanded the Athenian army that was defeated at Coroneain 446. as a result Athens lost all of Boeotia and faced revolts elsewhere.
Xanthippus
He was an Athenian political leader and father of Pericles. He served in the Athenian fleet that landed and then defeated the Persians at Mycale in 479, which ended the Persian invasion effort. He then led the fleet to the Chersonese, reconquered Sestos in 479 and established Athenian control of the grain route from the Black Sea.
He was an Athenian military commander and then a famous historian. He was sufficiently wealthy to serve in the cavalry. He wrote two important books about horsemanship and cavalry. In 402 he joined the Spartan (and other) mercenary army that Cyrus the Younger recruited to campaign into Persia. He surviveed the battle at Cunaxa and led the Greek survivors on the famous march through modern Turkey to the Black Sea. (His book recounting this is famous) After that he served as a mercenary for Sparta and well knew Agesillaus in Asia Minor and back into the Corinthian War. He fought against the Athenians at Coronea in 394. He was exiled and was given an estate by Sparta. After Leuctra in 371 he moved to Corinth. Along with Thucydides he was a active general who fought in the very wars about which he wrote as an eye witness. His many works include: Hellenica, Anabasis, Cyropaedia, Memorabilia, Hipparchicus and others.
Ancient Greek generals
Ancient Athenian generals
Ancient Athenian admirals
Ancient Spartan generals
Ancient Spartan admirals
Ancient Theban generals
Ancient Phocian generals
Ancient Macedonian generals
Ancient Macedonian admirals
Ancient Macedonian military personnel
Abydos was an ancient city on the Asiatic coast the Hellespont, opposite the ancient city of Sestos, and near the city of Çanakkale in Turkey. see Abydos
Acarnania
Was a region of west-central Greece that lies along the Ionian Sea, west of Aetolia, with the Achelous River for a boundary, and north of the gulf of Calydon, which is the entrance to the Gulf of Corinth. The main city in ancient times was Stratos. Because it is located strategically on the maritime route to Italy, Acarnania was involved in many wars. see Arcanania
It is part of theregion of Western Greece and is located in the northwestern part of the Peloponnese peninsula, occupying the coastal strip north of Arcadia. It is generally a mountainous region.
The twelve cities of Achaea were grouped into an early Achaean League which had an important position in general Greek politial and military events. see Achaea.
Aegina
The importance of Aegina during theGreco-Persian and Peloppnesian wars in largely omitted in our text books. It is one of the Saronic Islands in the Saronic Gulf, only 17 miles from Athens. In that location it was a significant economic - trading rival of Athens until it was finally conquered. see Aegina
Aegospotami
It was the name of a river on the European side of the Hellespont northeast of Sestos in Thrace of which the mouth was the scene of the decisivebattlein 405 in which Lysander destroyed the Athenian fleet, ending the Peloponnesian War. There was a Greek village nearby.
It is a mountainous region of Greece on the north coast of the Gulf of Corinth. The Aetolians were one of the most powerful military people of the time but refused to participate in the Persian Wars. In 426, led by Aegitios, they defeated the Athenians and their allies, who had turned against Apodotia and Ophioneia under the general command of Demosthenes. However, they failed to regain Naupaktos, which had meanwhile been captured by the Athenians. At the end of the Peloponnesian War, the Aetolians took part as mercenaries of the Athenians in the expedition against Syracuse. In 338, Naupaktos was again taken by the Aetolians, with the help of Philip II. During the Lamian War, the Aetolians helped the Athenian general Leosthenes defeat Antipater (temporarily). As a result, they came into conflict with Antipater and Craterus,they saved by the disagreement between the two Macedonian generals and Perdiccas. The Acarnanians then attempted to invade their land, but the Aetolians were able to force them to flee. The great courage shown by the Aetolians during the fighting against the Macedonians increased their glamour and fame, especially after winning the last Amphictyonic war.
Ambracia
It was a city of classical Greece on the site of modern Arta, located 7 miles from the Ambraian Gulf on the Arachthos river. It was founded between 650 and 625 by Gorgus, son of the Corinthian tyrant, Cypseius. After the expulsion of Gorgus's son, Periander, its government developed into a strong democracy. The early policy of Ambracia was determined by its loyalty to Corinth as it was a commercial base for trade to the west. It was a strong rival of Corcyra and in 433 allied with Corinth in the Battle of Sybota. Ambraciot politics featured many frontier disputes with the Amphilochians and Acarnanians. It played an important role in the Peloponnesian War until the crushing defeat atIdomene in 426. In the 4th century it continued its traditional policy, but in 338 was besieged byPhilip II of Macedon. With the assistance of Corinth and Athens, it escaped complete domination, but was forced to accept a Macedonian garrison. In 294, after forty-three years of semi-autonomy under Macedonian suzerainty, Ambracia was given by the son of Cassander to Pyrrhus, king of Epirus.
Ambracian gulf
The Ambracian Gulf, also known as the Gulf of Arta or the Gulf of Actium, and in some official documents as the Amvrakikos Gulf. It is a gulf of the Ionian Sea in northwestern Greece. About 25 miles long and 9 miles wide.
Amfilochia
Amfilochia is located by the Ambracian Gulf north of the Gulf of Corinth. It was the site of Amphilochian Argos and Limnaia.
Amphilochian Argos
This was the chief town of Amphilochia, located at the eastern end of the Ambracian Gulf, on the river Inachus. seeamphilochianargos
Amphipolis was located on the north-west coast of the Aegean Sea and was an Athenian ally until captured by the Spartans. Throughout the 5th century, Athens sought to consolidate its control over Thrace, which was strategically important because of its primary materials (the gold and silver of the Pangaion hills and the dense forests essential for naval construction), and the sea routes vital for Athens' supply of grain from Scythia. see Amphipolis
The island is the northernmost of the Greek Cyclades archipelago, about 6 miles southeast of Euboea, and about 2 miles north of Tinos. It is mostly mountainous, with many valleys. It was an important maritime center and one of the earliest examples of fortification in Greece. In 480 it supplied ships to Xerxes and was then raided by the Greek fleet. It joined the Delian League, but never really allied itself with Athens. In 477 the Athenians created a colony with imported Athenians. In 411 Andros proclaimed its freedom, and in 408 withstood an Athenian attack. As a member of the second Delian League, it was again controlled by an Athenian garrison. In 333, Antipater established a Macedonian garrison and in 308 it was freed by Ptolemy I. In the Chremonidean War (266–263) it passed again to Macedon after a battle fought off its shores. The Ptolemaic empire was at its height then, with a considerable fleet stationed at Andros.
Arginusae
There were three islands off the Dikili Peninsula on the Ionian coast, famous as the site of the Battle of Arginusae. They were also collectively referred to as Canaea after the city of Canae on the largest island.
The city was the largest one in Argolis, in the north-eastern part of the Peloponnese. As a strategic location it was a major stronghold during the Mycenaean era. During the classical era Argos was a powerful rival of Sparta for dominance over the Peloponnese. It remained neutal by not participating in the defense from the Persian invasion in 480, resulting its being somewhat politially outcast there after.
In 494 the Argives were decisively defeated by the Spartans at the Battle of Sepeiaafter which they considered Spartans constant enemies. As usual in Greece there were internal opposing oligarchic and democratic factions in the city. In 462 Argos joined a tripartite alliance with Athens and Thessaly. This alliance was somewhat dysfunctional, however, and the Argives are only thought to have provided marginal contributions to the alliance at the Battles of Oenoe and Tanagra. Following the allies' defeat at Tanagra in 457, the alliance began to fall apart, resulting in its dissolution in 451. Argos remained neutral or the ineffective ally of Athens during the first phase of the Peloponnesian War - called the Archidamian War. In 421 Argos organized and led an alliance against both Sparta and Athens. They included Mantinea, Corinth, Elis, Thebes, Argos, and eventually Athens. This alliance also collapsed after the allied loss at the Battle of Tegea in 418. There was an oligarchic coup in 417. Democracy was restored within a year, but Argos was left permanently weakened. Argos played a minor role in the Corinthian War against Sparta.
Artemisium
is a cape in northern Euboea, Greece. The Battle of Artemisium, a series of naval engagements over three days during the second Persian invasion of Greece in 480, simultaneously with the more famous land battle at Battle of Thermopylae, took place here.
Athens became a significant naval power as well as leading culltural center after the Persian invasions. see Athens.
The peninsula was the location of the landowning farmers of Athens. On the north it borders Boeotia and on the west it borders theMegaris the eastern end of the Corinthian isthmus. The Athenians disovered profitable silver mines on the southern tip of the peninsula. The area was divided into municipalities reorganized by Cleisthenes in 508/7 and grouped into three zones: urban (astu) in the region of Athens main city and Piraeus (port of Athens), coastal (paralia) along the coastline, and inland (mesogeia) in the interior. The wealthy land owners frequently lived in suburbs of Athens itself. It was after Peisistratos's tyranny and the Cleisthenes' reforms that the local communities lost their independence and were incorporated into the central government in Athens. For political purposes the citizenry was organized into three categories, town dwellers, farmers and seamen divided into ten tribes with each having voting rights. Several fotresses were built along the northern frontier. Of course Athens itself was strongly fortified. The mines at Laurium, were also defended.
was an ancient Greek city later renamed Constantinople and then Istanbul. Byzantium was colonized by Greeks from Megara in 667 - 657 on the north side of the Bosporus opposit opposite Chalcedon on the Asiatic side. It was founded as a trading city at the entrance to the Black Sea. It was captured during Darius I expedition to Scythia in 512, along with other sities in Thrace including another port, Sestos. After Xerxes retreated to Persia in 479 the Greeks recaptured it. During the Peloponnesian War it was a very important strategic target as it controlled the grain supply from the Black Sea to Athens. The Spartans captured it in 411 and the Athenians retook it in 408 but lost it again after the disaster at Agesopotamia.
Caria was a region of western Anatolia extending along the coast from mid-Ionia (Mycale) south to Lycia and east to Phrygia. The Ionian and Dorian Greeks colonized the west of it and joined the Carian population in forming Greek-dominated states there. The inhabitants of Caria, known as Carians, had arrived there before the Ionian and Dorian Greeks. They were described by Herodotus as being of Minoan descent, while the Carians themselves maintained that they were Anatolian mainlanders intensely engaged in seafaring and were akin to the Mysians and the Lydians. The Carians did speak an Anatolian language, known as Carian, which does not necessarily reflect their geographic origin, as Anatolian once may have been widespread.[citation needed] Also closely associated with the Carians were the Leleges, which could be an earlier name for Carians or for a people who had preceded them in the region and continued to exist as part of their society in a reputedly second-class status.Caria was then incorporated into the Persian Achaemenid Empire as a satrapy (province) in 545. The most important town was Halicarnassus, from where its sovereigns, the tyrants of the Lygdamid dynasty (c.520-450), reigned. Other major towns were Latmus, refounded as Heracleia under Latmus, Antiochia, Myndus, Laodicea, Alinda and Alabanda. Caria participated in the Ionian Revolt(499–493) against the Persian rule.
Carystus
Town on southern end of Euboea that was besieged by Persians at opening of the campaign to Marathon after the citizens refused to surrender. The city was stormed and population taken to Persia in 490.
Chalcedon (sometimes transliterated as Chalkedon) was an ancient maritime town of Bithynia, in Asia Minor. It was located almost directly opposite Byzantium, south of Scutari (modern Üsküdar) and it is now a district of the city of Istanbul named Kadiköy. The name Chalcedon is a variant of Calchedon, found on all the coins of the town as well as in manuscripts of Herodotus's Histories, Xenophon's Hellenica, Arrian's Anabasis, and other works. Except for a tower, almost no above-ground vestiges of the ancient city survive in Kadiköy today; artifacts uncovered at Altiyol and other excavation sites are on display at the Istanbul Archaeological Museum. The site of Chalcedon is located on a small peninsula on the north coast of the Sea of Marmara, near the mouth of the Bosphorus. A stream, called the Chalcis or Chalcedon in antiquity, flows into Fenerbahçe Bay. There Greek colonists from Megara in Attica founded the settlement of Chalcedon in 685, some seventeen years before Byzantium. The colonists from Megara settled on a site that was viewed in antiquity as so obviously inferior to that visible on the opposite shore of the Bosphorus (with its small settlements of Lygos and Semistra on Seraglio Point), that the 6th-century Persian general Megabazus allegedly remarked that Chalcedon's founders must have been blind.
Chalkidiki - Chalcidice, is a peninsula and regional unit of Greece, part of the Region of Central Macedonia in Northern Greece.The first Greek settlers in this area came from Chalcis and Eretria, cities in Euboea, around the 8th century who founded cities such as Mende, Toroni and Scione a second wave came from Andros in the 6th century who founded cities such as Akanthos. The ancient city of Stageira was the birthplace of the great philosopher Aristotle. Chalkidiki was an important theatre of war during the Peloponnesian War between Athens and Sparta. Later, the Greek colonies of the peninsula were conquered by Philip II of Macedon and Chalkidiki became part of Macedonia.
Chersonesos
According to the Greek Historian Herodotus,Militiades the Elder was chosen by the Dolonci to be tyrant of Chersonesos. His most notable achievement was building a long wall to guard from invaders crossing the isthmus. Following the death of Militiades the Elder, his maternal half brother, Stesagoras acquired power. Stesagoras only ruled for approximately three years (519 - 516), when he was struck in the head by an axe. After Stesagoras' death, the Peisistratids of Athens sent Militiades the Younger, Stesagoras' brother, to mourn and honor him. After grieving for a period of time, Militiades the Younger restrained all the powerful men of Chersonesos and seized control of the area. He later abandoned the area when Darius I invaded in 493.
Chios is the fifth largest of the Greek islands, situated in the northern Aegean Sea. The island is separated from Turkey by the Chios Strait. Chios is notable for its exports of mastic gum and its nickname is "the Mastic Island". The principal town of the island and seat of the municipality is Chios.Chios was one of the original twelve member states of the Ionian League. In 546, Chios was conquered by the Persians. Chios joined the Ionian Revolt against the Persians in 499. The naval power of Chios during this period is demonstrated by the fact that the Chians had the largest fleet (100 ships) of all of the Ionians at the Battle of Lade in 494. At Lade, the Chian fleet doggedly continued to fight the Persian fleet even after the defection of the Samians and others, but the Chians were ultimately forced to retreat and were again subjected to Persian domination. The defeat of Persia at the Battle of Mycale in 479 meant the liberation of Chios from Persian rule. When the Athenians formed the Delian League, Chios joined as one of the few members who did not have to pay tribute but who supplied ships to the alliance. By the fifth to fourth centuries , the island had grown to an estimated population of over 120,000 (two to three times the estimated population in 2005), based on the huge necropolis at the main city of Chios. It is thought that the majority of the population lived in that area. In 412, during the Peloponnesian War, Chios revolted against Athens, and the Athenians besieged it. Relief only came the following year when the Spartans were able to raise the siege. In the 4th century, Chios was a member of the Second Athenian League but revolted against Athens during the Social War (357–355), and Chios became independent again until the rise of Macedonia.
Cirrha
Cirrha or Kirra was a town in ancient Phocis on the coast, which served as the harbour of Delphi. Cirrha was built at the head of the gulf, and rose into a town from being the port of Crissa. The original town is built upon a height at some distance from the sea, to secure it against hostile attacks, especially by sea; but in course of time, when property has become more secure, and the town itself has grown in power, a second place springs up on that part of the coast which had served previously as the port of the inland town. This was undoubtedly the origin of Cirrha, which was situated at the mouth of the river Pleistus, and at the foot of Mount Cirphis. Thus Crissa declined, as Cirrha and Delphi rose in importance. The power of Cirrha excited the jealousy of the Delphians, more especially as the inhabitants of the former city commanded the approach to the temple by sea. Moreover, the Cirrhaeans levied exorbitant tolls upon the pilgrims who landed at the town upon their way to Delphi, and were said to have maltreated Phocian women on their return from the temple. In consequence of these outrages, the Amphictyons declared war, the First Sacred War, against the Cirrhaeans about 595, and at the end of ten years besieged (see Siege of Cirrha) and succeeded in taking the city, which was razed to the ground, and the plain in its neighbourhood dedicated to Apollo, and curses imprecated upon any one who should till or dwell in it.
Cirrha is said to have been taken by a stratagem which is ascribed by some to Solon. The town was supplied with water by a canal from the river Pleistus. This canal was turned off, filled with hellebore, and then allowed to resume its former course; but scarcely had the thirsty Crissaeans drank of the poisoned water, than they were so weakened by its purgative effects that they could no longer defend their walls. This account sounds like a romance; but it is a curious circumstance that near the ruins of Cirrha there is a salt spring having a purgative effect like the hellebore of the ancients.
Cirrha was thus destroyed; but the fate of Crissa is uncertain. It is not improbable that Crissa had sunk into insignificance before this war, and that some of its inhabitants had settled at Delphi, and others at Cirrha. At all events, it is certain that Cirrha was the town against which the vengeance of the Amphictyons was directed. The spoils of Cirrha were employed by the Amphictyons in founding the Pythian Games. Near the ruins of the town in the Cirrhaean plain was the Hippodrome, and in the time of Pindar the Stadium also. Cirrha remained in ruins, and the Cirrhaean plain continued uncultivated down to the time of Philip II of Macedon. He became involved in the Second Sacred War, in which Amphissa was taken by Philip, to whom the Amphictyons had entrusted the conduct of the war, in 338.
Citum
A town on the south-east coast of Cyprus was the principal Phoenician city in Cyprus, situated on the southeast coast near modern Larnaca. The earliest remains at Citium are those of an Aegean colony of the Mycenaean Age (c. 1400–1100). The biblical name Kittim, representing Citium, was also used for Cyprus as a whole. A Phoenician dedication to the god "Baal of Lebanon," found at Citium, suggests that the city may have belonged to Tyre; and an official monument of the Assyrian king Sargon II indicates that Citium was the administrative centre of Cyprus during the Assyrian protectorate (709–c. 668). During the Greek revolts of 499, 386 and following years, and 353, Citium led the side loyal to Persia. It remained an important city even after Alexander the Great conquered Persia.
Cnidus
Kindos was a Greek city in Caria and part of the Dorian group of colonies in south-western Asia Minor. It was located on the Datça peninsula.
Colophon was an ancient city in Ionia. Founded around the turn of the first millennium , it was likely one of the oldest of the twelve cities of the Ionian League. It was located between Lebedos (120 stadia to the west) and Ephesus (70 stadia to its south). Its ruins are south of the town Degirmendere in the Menderes district of Izmir Province, Turkey. Colophon was the strongest of the Ionian cities and renowned both for its cavalry and for the inhabitants' luxurious lifestyle, until Gyges of Lydia conquered it in the 7th century. Colophon then went into decline and was eclipsed by neighbouring Ephesus and by the rising naval power of Ionia, Miletus. After the death of Alexander the Great, Perdiccas expelled the Athenian settlers on Samos to Colophon, including the family of Epicurus, who joined them there after completing his military service. In the 3rd century , it was destroyed by Lysimachus—a Macedonian officer, one of the successors (Diadochi) of Alexander the Great, later a king (306 in Thrace and Asia Minor, during the same era when he nearly destroyed (and did depopulate by forced expulsion) the neighboring Ionian League city of Lebedos. Notium served as the port, and in the neighbourhood was the village of Clarus, with its famous temple and oracle of Apollo Clarius, where Calchas vied with Mopsus in divinatory science.
Corfu is the modern name of the Greek island, Corcyra, on the east shore of the Ionian Sea north of mainland Greece. It was orignially a colony of Corinth., founded about 730,, but as it became very powerful, itself, aserted independence and sought support from Athens. Its commercial weallth came from its key location as the last Greek port in the shipping route west to Italy and Sicily. It had the third largest navy in Greece. Its history is full of battles and conquests. The first such naval battle mentioned in Greek history took place in 665, in which the Corinthians won and held it for a short period. And it suffered internally by the typical Greek conflict between oligarchial and democratic factions leading to rebellions and revolts, during which a faction would call for aid from Corinth or Athens. During the Persian invasion of 480 Corcyra had the second largest Greek fleet but did not participate. A battle which was an immediate cause of the Peloponnesian War was between a Corinthian fleet and the Corcyrians with a small Athenian squadron near the island and nearby Sybota. in 435. This new alliance with Athens was one of the chief immediate causes of the Peloponnesian War, in which Corcyra was of considerable use to the Athenians as a naval station, but did not render much assistance with its fleet. The island was nearly lost to Athens by two attempts - in 427 and 425 - of the oligarchic faction to effect a revolution; on each occasion the popular party ultimately won the day and took a most bloody revenge on its opponents. During the Sicilian campaigns of Athens Corcyra served as a supply base. After a third abortive rising of the oligarchs in 410 it practically withdrew from the war. In 375 it again joined the Athenian alliance; two years later it was besieged by a Spartan force, but in spite of the devastation of its flourishing countryside held out successfully until relieved.
Coroneia
Coroneia was a town in Boeotia, and a member of the Boeotian League. It was located on a hill south of Mt. Helicon. It was founded by Thessalians along with Haliartus. Several significant battles were fought in the plain in front of the town. Battle of Coroneain 447 in which the Athenians commanded by Tolmides were defeated by the Boeotians forcing the Athenians to lose their control over Boeotia. Coronea was again the location of a battle in 394 in which the Spartans comanded by King Agesilaus II defeated the Thebans and their Argive allies in the Corinthian War. In the Third Sacred War, Coroneia was twice taken by the Phocians under Onomarchus. Philip II of Macedon, after he conquered the Phocians, gave the town to the Thebans.
Cynossema
Was a cape on the European - north - side of the Hellispont in the Thracian Cheronesse It was a point at which the Hellispont had a sharp turn which blocked the view of anyone on either side seeing what was occuring in the watter on the other side. It was the location of a significant naval battle between the Ahenians - who won - and the Spartans with allies during the Peloponnesian War.
Cyzicus
Cyzicus was an ancient town of Mysia in Anatolia in the current Balikesir Province of Turkey. It was located on the shoreward side of the present Kapidag Peninsula (the classical Arctonnesus), a tombolo which is said to have originally been an island in the Sea of Marmara only to be connected to the mainland in historic times either by artificial means or an earthquake.The city was said to have been founded by Pelasgians from Thessaly, according to tradition at the coming of the Argonauts; later it received many colonies from Miletus, allegedly in 756, but its importance began near the end of the Peloponnesian Warwhen the conflict centered on the sea routes connecting Greece to the Black-Sea. At this time, the cities of Athens and Miletus diminished in importance while Cyzicus began to prosper. The Athenian fleet defeated the Spartan fleet at a major naval engagement near Cyzicus known as the Battle of Cyzicus in 410. During the Peloponnesian War (431–404) Cyzicus was subject to the Athenians and Lacedaemonians alternately. At the peace of Antalcidas (387), like the other Greek cities in Asia, it was given to Persia. Alexander the Great later captured it from the Persians in 334 and was later claimed to be responsible for the land bridge connecting the island to the mainland.
"Hellespont" redirects here. For the ancient town, see Hellespontine Phrygia. Dardanelles is located beteen Europe and Asia
Classical Antiquity it was called the Hellespont It is one of the world's narrowest straits used for international navigation, the Dardanelles connects the Sea of Marmara with the Aegean and Mediterranean Seas, while also allowing passage to the Black Sea by extension via the Bosphorus. The Dardanelles is 61 kilometres (38 mi) long, and 1.2 to 6 kilometres (0.75 to 3.73 mi) wide, averaging 55 metres (180 ft) deep with a maximum depth of 103 metres (338 ft) at its narrowest point adjacent to Çanakkale. The Persian army of Xerxes I of Persia and later the Macedonian army of Alexander the Great crossed the Dardanelles in opposite directions to invade each other's lands, in 480 and 334 respectively. Herodotus says that, circa 482, Xerxes I (the son of Darius) had two pontoon bridges built across the width of the Hellespont at Abydos, in order that his huge army could cross from Persia into Greece. According to Herodotus (vv.34), both bridges were destroyed by a storm and Xerxes had those responsible for building the bridges beheaded and the strait itself whipped. He provides details of building and crossing of Xerxes' Pontoon Bridges. Xerxes is then said to have thrown fetters into the strait, given it three hundred lashes and branded it with red-hot irons as the soldiers shouted at the water. Herodotus commented that this was a "highly presumptuous way to address the Hellespont" but in no way atypical of Xerxes. Harpalus the engineer eventually helped the invading armies to cross by lashing the ships together with their bows facing the current and, so it is said, two additional anchors.
Dascylium
Dascyliumm, also known as Dascylus, was a town in Anatolia some 30 kilometres (19 mi) inland from the coast of the Propontis. After the Conquests of Cyrus the Great in 547, Dascylium was chosen as the seat of the Persian satrapy of Hellespontine Phrygia, comprising lands of the Troad, Mysia and Bithynia. Pharnabazus was satrap of Darius III there, until Alexander the Great appointed Calas, who was replaced by Arrhidaeus in the Treaty of Triparadisus. It was a member of the Delian League. When Alexander of Macedon invaded Asia in 334, the first of the major battles by which he overthrew the Achaemenid Empire was fought at the Granicus river on his way to Dascylium from Abydos on the coast.
Decelea
This town was a key strategic one on the border of Attica. was a deme and ancient village in northern Attica serving as a trade route connecting Euboea with Athens, Greece. It was situated near the entrance of the eastern pass across Mount Parnes, which leads from the northeastern part of the Athenian plain to Oropus, and from thence both to Tanagra on the one hand, and to Delium and Chalcis on the other. It was situated about 120 stadia from Athens, and the same distance from the frontiers of Boeotia: it was visible from Athens, and from its heights also might be seen the ships entering the harbour of Peiraeeus. It was originally one of the twelve cities of Attica. The historian Herodotus reports that Decelea's citizens enjoyed a special relationship with Sparta. The Spartans took control of Decelea around 413. With advice from Alcibiades in 415, the former Athenian general wanted on Athenian charges of religious crimes, the Spartans and their allies, under king Agis II, fortified Decelea as a major military post in the later stage of the Peloponnesian War, giving them control of rural Attica and cutting off the primary land route for food imports. This was a serious blow to Athens, which was concurrently being beaten in the Sicilian Expedition it had undertaken in the west. The Spartan military presence in Attica, in a deviation from previous policy where Spartans returned home for the winter months, was maintained year-round. Spartan patrols through the Attic countryside strained the Athenian cavalry and curtailed the ability of Athens to continue exploiting the Laurium silver mines in southeastern Attica that were an important source of income. Thucydides estimated that 20,000 slaves, many of them skilled workers, escaped to Decelea, from 413 until the close of the Peloponnesian War in 404.
Delium
was a small town in ancient Boeotia with a celebrated temple of Apollo. It was located by the sea-coast in the territory of Tanagra in Boeotia, and at the distance of about a mile from the territory of Oropus. This temple, which like the town took its name from the island of Delos. There were two important battles at Delium. In the first battle, called the Battle of Delium, the Athenians suffered a critical defeat from the Boeotians in the eighth year of the Peloponnesian War, in 424. This battle lasted for several days. Hippocrates, the Athenian commander, had seized the temple at Delium, which he converted into a fortress by some temporary works, and after leaving there a garrison, was on his march homewards, and had already reached the territory of Oropus at the distance of 10 stadia from Delium, when he met the Boeotian army advancing to cut off his retreat. In the battle which ensued, the Athenians were defeated with great loss; Hippocrates was killed; and on the seventeenth day after the battle, the Boeotians retook the temple. Socrates fought at this battle among the hoplites, and, according to one account, saved the life of Xenophon, while, according to another, his own retreat was protected by Alcibiades, who was serving in the cavalry. The Boeotians outnumbered the Athenians, resulting in the Boeotian victory. The Athenians began the battle 15,000 total and the Boeotians began with 18,500. The Athenians lost 1,200 and the Boeotians lost much fewer, only 500.
Delphi, formerly also called Pytho, is the ancient sanctuary that grew rich as the seat of Pythia, the oracle who was consulted about important decisions throughout the ancient classical world. The ancient Greeks considered the centre of the world to be in Delphi, marked by the stone monument known as the omphalos (navel). It occupies a site on the south-western slope of Mount Parnassus, overlooking the coastal plain to the south and the valley of Phocis. Apollo's sacred precinct in Delphi was a Panhellenic Sanctuary, where every four years, starting in 586 athletes from all over the Greek world competed in the Pythian Games, one of the four Panhellenic Games, precursors of the Modern Olympics. The victors at Delphi were presented with a laurel crown (stephanos) which was ceremonially cut from a tree by a boy who re-enacted the slaying of the Python. Delphi is perhaps best known for its oracle, the Pythia, the sibyl or priestess at the sanctuary dedicated to Apollo. According to Aeschylus in the prologue of the Eumenides, the oracle had origins in prehistoric times and the worship of Gaea. Apollo spoke through his oracle. She had to be an older woman of blameless life chosen from among the peasants of the area. Alone in an enclosed inner sanctum she sat on a tripod seat over an opening in the earth. According to legend, when Apollo slew Python its body fell into this fissure and fumes arose from its decomposing body. Intoxicated by the vapours, the sibyl would fall into a trance, allowing Apollo to possess her spirit. In this state she prophesied. The oracle could not be consulted during the winter months, for this was traditionally the time when Apollo would live among the Hyperboreans. Dionysus would inhabit the temple during his absence. The time to consult pythia for an oracle during the year is determined from astronomical and geological grounds related to the constellations of Lyra and Cygnus but the hydrocarbon vapours emitted from the chasm. While in a trance the Pythia "raved" – probably a form of ecstatic speech – and her ravings were "translated" by the priests of the temple into elegant hexameters. It has been speculated that the ancient writers, including Plutarch who had worked as a priest at Delphi, were correct in attributing the oracular effects to the sweet-smelling pneuma escaping from the chasm in the rock. That exhalation could have been high in the known anaesthetic and sweet-smelling ethylene or other hydrocarbons such as ethane known to produce violent trances. Ancient sources describe the priestess using "laurel" to inspire her prophecies. Several alternative plant candidates have been suggested including Cannabis, Hyoscyamus, Rhododendron and Oleander. The Pythia may have chewed oleander leaves and inhaled their smoke prior to her oracular pronouncements and sometimes dying from the toxicity. The toxic substances of oleander resulted in symptoms similar to those of epilepsy, the "sacred disease," which may have been seen as the possession of the Pythia by the spirit of Apollo. The Delphic oracle exerted considerable influence throughout the Greek world, and she was consulted before all major undertakings including wars and the founding of colonies. She also was respected by the Greek-influenced countries around the periphery of the Greek world, such as Lydia, Caria, and even Egypt. The town started to gain pan-Hellenic relevance as both a shrine and an oracle in the 7th century. Initially under the control of Phocaean settlers based in nearby Kirra (currently Itea).
Delphi was reclaimed by the Athenians during the First Sacred War (597–585). The conflict resulted in the consolidation of the Amphictyonic League, which had both a military and a religious function revolving around the protection of the Temple of Apollo. This shrine was destroyed by fire in 548 and then fell under the control of the Alcmaeonids banned from Athens. In 449–448, the Second Sacred War (fought in the wider context of the First Peloponnesian War between the Peloponnesian League led by Sparta and the Delian-Attic League led by Athens) resulted in the Phocians gaining control of Delphi and the management of the Pythian Games. In 356 the Phocians under Philomelos captured and sacked Delphi, leading to the Third Sacred War (356–346), which ended with the defeat of the former and the rise of Macedon under the reign of Philip II. This led to the Fourth Sacred War in 339, which culminated in the Battle of Chaeronea in 338 and the establishment of Macedonian rule over Greece. In Delphi, Macedonian rule was superseded by the Aetolians in 279, when a Gallic invasion was repelled, and by the Romans in 191.
The Echinades mentioned by Homer Echinae are a group of islands in the Ionian Sea, off the coast of Acarnania, Greece. The archipelago is commonly subdivided into three groups: the Drakoneres in the north, the Modia in the middle and the Ouniades in the south. Administratively, the Echinades form part of two regional units: Ithaca and Cephalonia. The Battle of the Echinades in 1427 and the Battle of Lepanto in 1571 were fought at or near the islands.
Eion
Eion was a Greek Eretrian colony in Thracian Macedonia specifically in the region of Edonis at the mouth of the Strymon River which flows into the Aegean from the interior of Thrace. Athenians for the first time attempted to capture Eion in 497 during the Ionian Revolt, which was unsuccessful as the revolt ended with Persians re-establishing control over Thrace, including Eion, and a Persian fortress meant for permanent stay was built there, probably in 492. Eion functioned as one of the main Persian cities in Thrace where food was stored for the king Xerxes I for his campaign. Xerxes had recalled most of the Persian troops from the area in the winter of 480/479. It was then captured by the Delian League in 475 under the leadership of the Athenian general Cimon, the son of Miltiades the Younger. Refusing Cimon's offer of an honorable withdrawal, the Persian commander, Boges, destroyed the treasure, killed his family, and committed suicide as the food ran out. Cimon turned the course of the River Strymon so that it flowed against the city walls, causing the mud brick fortifications to dissolve. The inhabitants were enslaved. The capture of Eion was the beginning of a military campaign undertaken by the newly formed Delian League, whose objective was to clear the Aegean Sea of Persian fleets and pirates in order to facilitate Athenian access to the Hellespont. The nearby Athenian colony of Amphipolis was founded in 437 three miles up the Strymon River. The settlers, led by Hagnon, used Eion as their initial base of operations; and Eion functioned as the harbour of Amphipolis. In 424, during the Peloponnesian War, Eion was the site where the Athenian commander Aristides intercepted a Persian messenger named Artaphernes. The message, which was on its way to Sparta, was a letter from the Persian king addressing previous requests made to him by the Spartans. Later in the war, in the winter of 424/423, the Spartan general Brasidascaptured Amphipolis. When he moved against Eion, however, he was unable to overcome the Athenian defenders, who were led by Thucydides, who had come from Thasos with his squadron in time to save it. Although he held Eion, Thucydides was subsequently ostracized by the Athenians for his failure to defend the more pivotal city of Amphipolis.
Elis is in southern Greece in the Peloponnese, bounded on the north by Achaea, east by Arcadia, south by Messenia, and west by the Ionian Sea. Over the course of the archaic and classical periods, the polis "city-state" of Elis controlled much of the region of Elis, most probably through unequal treaties with other cities; many inhabitants of Elis were Perioeci—autonomous free non-citizens. Perioeci, unlike other Spartans, could travel freely between cities. Thus the polis of Elis was formed. The local form of the name was Valis, or Valeia, and its meaning, in all probability was, "the lowland" (compare with the word "valley"). In its physical constitution Elis is similar to Achaea and Arcadia; its mountains are mere offshoots of the Arcadian highlands, and its principal rivers are fed by Arcadian springs. Elis held authority over the site of Olympia and the Olympic games. The spirit of the games had influenced the formation of the market: apart from the bouleuterion, the place the boule "citizen's council" met, which was in one of the gymnasia, most of the other buildings were related to the games, including two gymnasia, a palaestra, and the House of the Hellanodikai. The original inhabitants of Elis were called Caucones and Paroreatae. They are mentioned by Homer for the first time in Greek history under the title of Epeians, as setting out for the Trojan War, and they are described by him as living in a state of constant hostility with their neighbours the Pylians. At the close of the 11th century the Dorians invaded the Peloponnese, and Elis fell to the share of Oxylus and the Aetolians. These people, amalgamating with the Epeians, formed a powerful kingdom in the north of Elis. Olympia was in Elian land, and tradition dates the first games to 776. The Hellanodikai, the judges of the Games, were of Elian origin. In the Prloponnesian war, Elis sided at first with Sparta. But Sparta, jealous of the increasing prosperity of its ally, availed itself of the first pretext to pick a quarrel. At the Battle of Mantinea (418), the Eleans fought against the Spartans, who later took vengeance upon them by depriving them of Triphylia and the towns of the Acrorea. The Eleans made no attempt to re-establish their authority over these places until Thebes rose in importance after the Battle of Leuctra in 371. In 366 hostilities broke out between Eleans and Triphylians, and though the Eleans were at first successful, they were soon overpowered; their capital very nearly fell into the hands of the enemy, and the territory of Triphylia was permanently ceded to Arcadia in 369. Unable to make head against their opponents, they applied for assistance to the Spartans, who invaded Arcadia, and forced the Arcadians to recall their troops from Elis. The general result of this war was the restoration of their territory to the Eleans, who were also again invested with the right of holding the Olympic games. During the Macedonian supremacy in Greece they sided with the victors, but refused to fight against their countrymen. After the death of Alexander the Great in 323 they renounced the Macedonian alliance. At a subsequent period they joined the Aetolian League.
was a Greek city on the coast of Ionia, three kilometres southwest of present-day Selçuk in Izmir Province, Turkey. It was built in the 10th century on the site of the former Arzawan capital by Attic and Ionian Greek colonists. During the Classical Greek era it was one of the twelve cities of the Ionian League. . Croesus made the populations of the different settlements around Ephesus regroup (synoikismos) in the vicinity of the Temple of Artemis, enlarging the city. Later in the same century, the Lydians under Croesus invaded Persia. The Ionians refused a peace offer from Cyrus the Great, siding with the Lydians instead. After the Persians defeated Croesus, the Ionians offered to make peace, but Cyrus insisted that they surrender and become part of the empire. They were defeated by the Persian army commander Harpagos in 547. The Persians then incorporated the Greek cities of Asia Minor into the Empire. Those cities were then ruled by satraps. Ephesus continued to prosper, but when taxes were raised under Cambyses II and Darius, the Ephesians participated in the Ionian revoltagainst Persian rule in the Battle of Ephesus 498, an event which instigated the Greco-Persian wars. In 479, the Ionians, together with Athens, were able to oust the Persians from the shores of Asia Minor. In 478, the Ionian cities with Athens entered into the Delian League against the Persians. Ephesus did not contribute ships but gave financial support. During the Peloponnesian War, Ephesus was first allied to Athens but in a later phase, called the Decelean War, or the Ionian War, sided with Sparta, which also had received the support of the Persians. As a result, rule over the cities of Ionia was ceded again to Persia. These wars did not greatly affect daily life in Ephesus. The Ephesians were surprisingly modern in their social relations: they allowed strangers to integrate and education was valued. In 356 the temple of Artemis was burnt down, according to legend, by a lunatic called Herostratus. The inhabitants of Ephesus at once set about restoring the temple and even planned a larger and grander one than the original.
Epidaurus
Epidaurus was a small city (polis) on the Argolid Peninsula at the Saronic Gulf. Thait is it was almost directly across the gulf from Athens with Aegina Island in between. Epidaurus was independent of Argos and not included in Argolis until the time of the Romans. With its supporting territory, it formed the small territory called Epidauria. Reputed to be founded by or named for the Argolid Epidaurus, and to be the birthplace of Apollo's son Asclepius the healer. The Asclepeion at Epidaurus was the most celebrated healing center of the Classical world, the place where ill people went in the hope of being cured. To find out the right cure for their ailments, they spent a night in the enkoimeteria, a big sleeping hall. In their dreams, the god himself would advise them what they had to do to regain their health.
Euboea
It is the second-largest Greek island in area and population, after Crete. It is separated from Boeotia in mainland Greece by the narrow Euripus Strait (only 40 m (130 ft) at its narrowest point). It is a long and narrow island; it is about 180 km (110 mi) long, and varies in breadth from 31 miles) to 3.7 miles. On it are two main cities, Chalcis and Eretria. Both cities were settled by Ionian Greeks from Attica. The Athenians settled 4.000 colonists there in 506. The commercial influence of these cities resulted in the Euboic scale of weights and measures being used among the Ionic cities generally, and in Athens until the end of the 7th century. Chalcis and Eretria were rival cities. One of the earliest major military conflicts in Greek history took place between them, known as the Lelantine War, in which many other Greek city-states also took part. The Euboeans joined the Athenians in the campaign to Sardis in support of the Ionian rebellion. As part of their invasion in 490 the Persians deported the population and destroyed Eretria. After Marathon the Athenians restored what they could but it never returned to former status. After the second Persian invasion and battles at Thermopylae and Artemisium, the Persians again occupied it and went on to sack Athens as they occupied northern and central Greece. The Athenians considered Euboea as a critical strategic region. It was an important source of grain and cattle, and controlling the island meant Athens could prevent invasion and better protect its trade routes from piracy. In 446 the Euboeans attempted to gain independence. Pericles, led the Athenian supression and settled more Attic citizens in Histiaea. During the Peloponnesian war War in 410, Euobea succeeded in regaining its independence until taken by Philip of Macedon in 338.
The Gallipoli peninsula is located in the southern part of East Thrace, the European part of Turkey, with the Aegean Sea to the west and the Dardanelles strait to the east. In ancient times, the Gallipoli Peninsula was known as the Thracian Chersonesus to the Greeks and later the Romans. It was the location of several prominent towns, including Cardia, Pactya, Callipolis (Gallipoli), Alopeconnesus, Sestos, Madytos, and Elaeus. The peninsula was renowned for its wheat. It also benefited from its strategic importance on the main route between Europe and Asia, as well as from its control of the shipping route from Crimea. The city of Sestos was the main crossing-point on the Hellespont. Settlers from Ancient Greece, mainly of Ionian and Aeolian stock, founded about 12 cities on the peninsula in the 7th century. The Athenian statesman Miltiadesthe Elder founded a major Athenian colony there around 560. He took authority over the entire peninsula, building up its defences against incursions from the mainland. It eventually passed to his nephew, the more famous Miltiades the Younger, around 524. The peninsula was abandoned to the Persians in 493 after the outbreak of the Greco-Persian Wars (499–478). The Persians were eventually expelled, after which the peninsula was for a time ruled over by Athens, which enrolled it into the Delian League in 478. The Athenians established a number of cleruchies on the Thracian Chersonese and sent an additional 1,000 settlers around 448. Sparta gained control after the decisive battle of Aegospotami in 404, but the peninsula subsequently reverted to the Athenians. In the 4th century, the Thracian Chersonese became the focus of a bitter territorial dispute between Athens and Macedon, whose king Philip II sought possession. It was eventually ceded to Philip in 338. After the death of Philip's son Alexander the Great in 323, the Thracian Chersonese became the object of contention among Alexander's successors. Lysimachus established his capital Lysimachia here. In 278, Celtic tribes from Galatia in Asia Minor settled in the area. In 196, the Seleucid king Antiochus III seized the peninsula. This alarmed the Greeks and prompted them to seek the aid of the Romans, who conquered the Thracian Chersonese, which they gave to their ally Eumenes II of Pergamon in 188..
Gulf of Corinth
The Gulf of Corinth or the Corinthian Gulf ) is a deep inlet of the Ionian Sea, separating the Peloponnese from western mainland Greece. It is bounded in the east by the Isthmus of Corinth which includes the shipping-designed Corinth Canal and in the west by the Strait of Rion which widens into the shorter Gulf of Patras (part of the Ionian Sea) and of which the narrowest point is crossed since 2004 by the Rio–Antirrio bridge. The gulf is bordered by the large administrative divisions: Aetolia-Acarnania and Phocis in the north, Boeotia in the northeast, Attica in the east, Corinthia in the southeast and south and Achaea in the southwest.
Haliartus
Haliartus was a town in Boeotia, and one of the cities of the Boeotian League. It was situated on the southern side of Lake Copais in a pass between the mountain and the lake. In the invasion of Greece by Xerxes I, in 484, it was the only town that remained true to the cause of Greece, and was in consequence destroyed by the Persians. It was, however, soon rebuilt, and in the Peloponnesian War appears as one of the chief cities of Boeotia. It is chiefly memorable in history on account of the Battle of Haliartus in 395 fought under its walls between Lysander and the Thebans, in which the former was slain,
Halicarnnaisus
was an ancient Greek city at what is now Bodrum in Turkey. It was located in southwest Caria on a picturesque, advantageous site on the Ceramic Gulf. The city was famous for the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus, also known simply as the Tomb of Mausolus, whose name provided the origin of the word "mausoleum". The mausoleum, built from 353 to 350, ranked as one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. Halicarnassus' history was special on two interlinked issues. Halicarnassus retained a monarchical system of government at a time when most other Greek city states had long since rid themselves of their kings. And secondly, while their Ionian neighbours rebelled against Persian rule, Halicarnassus remained loyal to the Persians and formed part of the Persian Empire until Alexander the Great captured it at the siege of Halicarnassus in 334. Halicarnassus originally occupied only a small island near to the shore called Zephyria, which was the original name of the settlement and the present site of the great Castle of St. Peter built by the Knights of Rhodes in 1404. However, in the course of time, the island united with the mainland, and the city was extended to incorporate Salmacis, an older town of the Leleges and Carians and site of the later citadel. Ruins of the fortifications of Halicarnassus (modern Bodrum); 4th c. The inhabitants appear to have accepted Anthes, a son of Poseidon, as their legendary founder, as mentioned by Strabo, and were proud of the title of Antheadae.[1] At an early period Halicarnassus was a member of the Doric Hexapolis, which included Kos, Cnidus, Lindos, Kameiros and Ialysus; but it was expelled from the league when one of its citizens, Agasicles, took home the prize tripod which he had won in the Triopian games, instead of dedicating it according to custom to the Triopian Apollo. In the early 5th century Halicarnassus was under the sway of Artemisia I of Caria (also known as Artemesia of Halicarnassus), who made herself famous as a naval commander at the battle of Salamis.
Hellespontine Phrygia
Hellespontine Phrygia was a Persian satrapy (province) in northwestern Anatolia, directly southeast of the Hellespont. Its capital was Dascylium, and for most of its existence it was ruled by the hereditary Persian Pharnacid dynasty. Together with Greater Phrygia, it made up the administrative provinces of the wider Phrygia region.The satrapy was created in the beginning of the fifth century, during the time of administrative reorganisations of the territories in western Asia Minor, which were amongst the most important Achaemenid territories. The first Achaemenid ruler of Hellespontine Phrygia was Mitrobates (ca. 525–522), who was appointed by Cyrus the Great and continued under Cambises. He was killed and his territory absorbed by the satrap of neighbouring Lydia, Oroetes. Following the reorganization of Darius I, Mitrobates was succeeded by Oebares II (c.493), son of Megabazus. Artabazus then became satrap circa 479 and started the Pharnacid dynasty, which would rule Hellespontine Phrygia until the conquests of Alexander the Great (338 . As Alexander the Great was conquering and incorporating the Achaemenid Empire, he appointed Calas, a Macedonian General to govern Hellespontine Phrygia in 334, after he had sent Parmenion to secure Dascylium, the provincial capital. Calas, being the very first non-Achaemenid ruler of the province, was awarded the Persian title of "satrap", rather than a Macedonian title, and Alexander instructed him to collect the same tribute from his subjects that had been paid to Darius III. After Alexander's death in 323, the satrapy was awarded to Leonnatus, who was killed in action in the Lamian War. The region was seized by Lysimachus, was added to the Seleucid Empire after the Battle of Corupedium in 281, and was finally integrated in the Bithynian kingdom.
Hysiae - Argolis
Hysiae or Hysiai was a garrison town of ancient Argolis, also called the Argeia, southern Greece during the archaic period. It was located to the southwest of Argos and east of Tegea, on the road between them, at the foot of Mount Parthenium, not far from the Argive border with Laconia. In c.669, the First Battle of Hysiae was fought between the Spartans and the Argives, who won to repulse a Spartan invasion of Argolis. It appears to have been destroyed by the Argives, along with Tiryns, Mycenae, and the other towns in the Argeia, after the Greco-Persian Wars; but it was afterwards restored, and was occupied by the Argives in the Peloponnesian War as a frontier-fortress. During the Peloponnesian War, in 417, the Second Battle of Hysiae was fought, again between the Spartans and the Argives, and resulted in a decisive Spartan victory. The Spartans captured Hysiae and destroyed it; all captured male citizens were executed.
Hysiae - Boeotia
Hysiae or Hysia, was a town in Boeotia, in the Parasopia, at the northern foot of Mount Cithaeron, and on the high road from Thebes to Athens. It was said to have been a colony from Hyria, and to have been founded by Nycteus, father of Antiope. Herodotus says that both Hysiae and Oenoe were Attic demoi when they were taken by the Boeotians in 507. It probably, however, belonged to Plataea. Oenoe was recovered by the Athenians; but, as Mt. Cithaeron was the natural boundary between Attica and Boeotia, Hysiae continued to be a Boeotian town. Hysiae is mentioned in the operations which preceded the Battle ofPlataea.
Idomene
was a town in Ambracia The Battle of Idomene was a battle in the Peloponnesian War in 426, between the Athenians and the Ambracians. The Ambracians, who were allies of the Spartans, had sent a relief force to help the army that had invaded Amphilochia previously. Unbeknownst to the Ambracians, the first army had been defeated, surrounded and scattered by the allied Athenians, Amphilochians and Acarnanians the day before. The Ambracians, unaware of the incoming Athenian army, camped on the lower of two steep hills. Demosthenes, the Athenian commander, occupied the higher hill, obtaining a strategic advantage. Before dawn, while the Ambracians were still asleep, they were attacked and destroyed by the Athenians. Overall, the Ambraciots lost about 1,000 men over the two battles. Thucydides describes this disaster as: "The greatest disaster to strike a single city in an equal number of days in this war."
Imbros
Imbros is the largest island of Turkey and the seat of Gökçeada District of Çanakkale Province. It is located in the north-northeastern Aegean Sea, at the entrance of Saros Bay, and is the westernmost point of Turkey (Cape Incirburnu). In classical antiquity, Imbros, like Lemnos, was an Athenian cleruchy, a colony whose settlers retained Athenian citizenship; although since the Imbrians appear on the Athenian tribute lists, there may have been a division with the native population. The original inhabitants of Imbros were Pelasgians, as mentioned by Herodotus In 511 or 512 the island was captured by the Persian general Otanes. But later, Miltiades conquered the island from Persia after the battle of Salamis; the colony was established about 450, during the first Athenian empire, and was retained by Athens (with brief exceptions) for the next six centuries. During the Social War (357–355) the Chians, Rhodians and Byzantians attacked Imbros and Lemnos, which were allies of Athens.
Ionia was a region on the central part of the western coast of Anatolia in present-day Turkey, the region nearest Izmir, which was historically Smyrna. It consisted of the northernmost territories of the Ionian League of Greek settlements. see Ionia
Ionian revolt
The Ionian Revolt, and associated revolts in Aeolis, Doris, Cyprus and Caria, were military rebellions by several Greek regions of Asia Minor against Persian rule, lasting from 499 to 493. At the heart of the rebellion was the dissatisfaction of the Greek cities of Asia Minor with the tyrants appointed by Persia to rule them, along with the individual actions of two Milesian tyrants, Histiaeus and Aristagoras. see Ionian Revolt
Knidos - Cnidus
Knidos or Cnidus was a Greek city of ancient Caria and part of the Dorian Hexapolis, in south-western Asia Minor, modern-day Turkey. It was situated on the Datça peninsula, which forms the southern side of the Sinus Ceramicus, now known as Gulf of Gökova. By the 4th century, Knidos was located at the site of modern Tekir, opposite Triopion Island. . It was built partly on the mainland and partly on the Island of Triopion or Cape Krio. The walls, both of the island and on the mainland, can be traced throughout their whole circuit; and in many places, especially round the acropolis, at the northeast corner of the city, they are remarkably perfect.
Knidos was a Hellenic city of high antiquity. According to Herodotus, the Cnidians were Lacedaemonian colonists; however, the presence of demiurges there argues for foundation or later influence by other Doric Greeks, possibly Argives. Along with Halicarnassus (present day Bodrum, Turkey) and Kos, and the Rhodian cities of Lindos, Kamiros and Ialyssos it formed the Dorian Hexapolis, which held its confederate assemblies on the Triopian headland, and there celebrated games in honour of Apollo, Poseidon and the nymphs. This was also the site of the Temple of Aphrodite, Knidos. The city was at first governed by an oligarchic senate, composed of sixty members, and presided over by a magistrate; but, though it is proved by inscriptions that the old names continued to a very late period, the constitution underwent a popular transformation. The situation of the city was favourable for commerce, and the Knidians acquired considerable wealth, and were able to colonize the island of Lipara, and founded a city on Corcyra Nigra in the Adriatic. They ultimately submitted to Cyrus, and from the battle of Eurymedon to the latter part of the Peloponnesian War they were subject to Athens.
Kythira also Cythera, is an island in Greece lying opposite the south-eastern tip of the Peloponnese peninsula. It is traditionally listed as one of the seven main Ionian Islands, although it is distant from the main group. The island is strategically located between the Greek mainland and Crete, and from ancient times until the mid 19th century was a crossroads of merchants, sailors, and conquerors. As such, it has had a long and varied history and has been influenced by many civilisations and cultures. This is reflected in its architecture (a blend of traditional, Aegean and Venetian elements), as well as the traditions and customs, influenced by centuries of coexistence of the Greek, and Venetian cultures. In classical times, Kythira was part of the territory of several larger city-states. Sparta took the island from Argos early in the sixth century, and ruled it under a kytherodíkes, in Thucydides' time Athens occupied it three times when at war with Sparta (in 456 during her first war with Sparta and the Peloponnesians; from 426 to 410, through most of the great Peloponnesian War;and from 393 to 387/386, during the Corinthian War against Spartan dominance) and used it both to support her trade and to raid Laconia.
Laconia is bordered by Messenia to the west and Arcadia to the north and is surrounded by the Myrtoan Sea to the east and by the Laconian Gulf and the Mediterranean Sea to the south. It encompasses Cape Malea and Cape Tainaron and a large part of the Mani Peninsula. The Mani Peninsula is in the west region of Laconia. The islands of Kythira and Antikythera lie to the south, but they administratively belong to the Attica regional unit of islands. The island, Elafonisos, situated between the Laconian mainland and Kythira, is part of Laconia. The Eurotas is the longest river in the prefecture. The valley of the Eurotas is predominantly an agricultural region that contains many citrus groves, olive groves, and pasture lands. The main mountain ranges are the Taygetus 2,407 m (7,897 ft) in the west and the Parnon 1,961 m (6,434 ft) in the northeast. Taygetus, known as Pentadaktylos (five-fingers) throughout the Middle Ages, is west of Sparta and the Eurotas valley. It is the highest mountain in Laconia and the Peloponnese and is mostly covered with pine trees. Two roads join the Messenia and Laconia prefectures: one is a tortuous mountain pass through Taygetus and the other bypasses the mountain via the Mani district to the south. The stalactite cave, Dirou, a major tourist attraction, is located south of Areopolis in the southwest of Laconia. The history of Laconia is described as part of the history of Sparta.
Location of the critical naval battle in which the Persians defeated the Ionian revolt.
Lamia city
In antiquity, the city played an important role due to its strategic location, controlling the narrow coastal plain above Thermopylae that connected southern Greece with Thessaly and the rest of the Balkans. The city formed a polis. The city was therefore fortified in the 5th century, and was contested by the Macedonians, Thessalians and Aetolians until the Roman conquest in the early 2nd century. After Alexander the Great's death in 323, the Athenians and other Greeks rebelled against Macedonian overlordship. Antipatros, the regent of Macedon, took refuge behind the substantial walls of the city (Lamian War, 323–322). The war ended with the death of the Athenian general Leosthenes, and the arrival of a 20,000-strong Macedonian army. Lamia prospered afterwards, especially in the 3rd century under Aetolian hegemony, which came to an end when Manius Acilius Glabrio sacked the city in 190.
Lampachus
Lampsacuswas an ancient Greek city strategically located on the eastern side of the Hellespont in the northern Troad. An inhabitant of Lampsacus was called a Lampsacene. Originally known as Pityusa or Pityussa, it was colonized from Phocaea and Miletus. In the 6th century Lampsacus was attacked by Miltiades the Elder and Stesagoras, the Athenian tyrants of the nearby Thracian Chersonese. During the 6th and 5th centuries, Lampsacus was successively dominated by Lydia, Persia, Athens, and Sparta. The Greek tyrants Hippoclus and later his son Acantides ruled under Darius I. Artaxerxes I assigned it to Themistocles with the expectation that the city supply the Persian king with its famous wine. When Lampsacus joined the Delian League after the battle of Mycale in 479, it paid a tribute of twelve talents, a testimony to its wealth; it had a gold coinage in the 4th century, an activity only available to the more prosperous cities.A revolt against the Athenians in 411 was put down by force. Suda writes that the people of Lampsacus were pro-Persian and Alexander the Great was furiously angry, and threatened to do them massive harm. In order to save their women, children and homeland they asked from Anaximenes of Lampsacus, who was a tutor and historian of Alexander, to intercede. Alexander knew why he had come, and swore by the gods that he would do the opposite of what he would ask, so Anaximenes said, 'Please do this for me, your majesty: enslave the women and children of Lampsacus, burn their temples, and raze the city to the ground.' Alexander had no way round this clever trick, and since he was bound by his oath he reluctantly pardoned the people of Lampsacus.
Lechaeum
Lechaeum or Lechaion, also called Lecheae and Lecheum, was the port in ancient Corinthia on the Corinthian Gulf connected with the city of Corinth by means of the Long Walls, 12 stadia in length. The Long Walls ran nearly due north, so that the wall on the right hand was called the eastern, and the one on the left hand the western or Sicyonian. The space between them must have been considerable; since there was sufficient space for an army to be drawn up for battle. Indeed, the area was the scene of battles between Sparta and Athens in 391, leaving Spartans in command of Lechaeum, which they garrisoned with their troops (see Battle of Lechaeum). The flat country between Corinth and Lechaeum is composed only of the sand washed up by the sea; and the port must have been originally artificial, though it was no doubt rendered both spacious and convenient by the wealthy Corinthians. Lechaeum was the chief station of the Corinthian ships of war; and during the occupation of Corinth by the Macedonians, it was one of the stations of the royal fleet. It was also the emporium of the traffic with the western parts of Greece, and with Italy and Sicily. The proximity of Lechaeum to Corinth prevented it from becoming an important town like Piraeus.
Lefkada, also known as Lefkas or Leukas and Leucadia, is a Greek island in the Ionian Sea on the west coast of Greece, connected to the mainland by a long causeway and floating bridge. The principal town of the island and seat of the municipality is Lefkada.
is a Greek island located in the northeastern Aegean Sea. It has an area of 1,633 km2 (631 sq mi) with 321 kilometres (199 miles) of coastline, making it the third largest island in Greece. It is separated from Turkey by the narrow Mytilini Strait and in late Palaeolithic/Mesolithic times was joined to the Anatolian mainland before the end of the last glacial period. According to later Greek writers, Mytilene was founded in the 11th century by the family Penthilidae, who arrived from Thessaly and ruled the city-state until a popular revolt (590–580) led by Pittacus of Mytilene ended their rule. The name Mytilene itself seems to be of Hittite origin. When the Persian king Cyrus defeated Croesus (546) the Ionic Greek cities of Anatolia and the adjacent islands became Persian subjects and remained such until the Persians were defeated by the Greeks at the Battle of Salamisin 480. The island was governed by an oligarchy in archaic times, followed by quasi-democracy in classical times. For a short period it was a member of the Athenian confederacy, its apostasy from which is recounted by Thucydides in the Mytilenian Debate.
Leuctra
was a village of ancient Boeotia, situated on the road from Thespiae to Plataea, and in the territory of the former city. Its name only occurs in history on account of the celebrated Battle of Leuctra fought in its neighbourhood between the Spartans and Thebans in 371, by which the supremacy of Sparta was for ever overthrown. In the plain of Leuctra, was the tomb of the two daughters of Scedasus, a Leuctrian, both were violated by Spartans, and had afterwards slain themselves; this tomb was crowned with wreaths by Epaminondas before the battle, since an oracle had predicted that the Spartans would be defeated at this spot. The site of Leuctra is near the modern village of Lefktra, renamed to reflect to connection with the ancient place.
is a Greek island in the northern part of the Aegean Sea. The principal town of the island and seat of the municipality is Myrina. It is the 8th-largest island of Greece. But in 510 it was reconquered by Miltiades the Younger, the tyrant of the Thracian Chersonese. Miltiades later returned to Athens and Lemnos was an Athenian possession until the Macedonian empire absorbed it. By 450 Lemnos was an Athenian cleruchy. The Athenian settlers brought with them Athenian drama, dated to at least 348.
The Satrapy of Lydia, known as Sparda in Old Persian, was an administrative province (satrapy) of the Achaemenid Empire, located in the ancient kingdom of Lydia, with Sardis as its capital. Tabalus, appointed by Cyrus the Great, was the first satrap; however, his rule did not last long as the Lydians revolted. The insurrection was suppressed by general Mazares and his successor Harpagus. After Cyrus' death, Oroetus was appointed as satrap. Oroetus ruled during the reign of Cambyses, and after the chaotic period that followed the Persian king's death, he conquered the Greek isle of Samos, killing its ruler Polycrates. Due to his growing power, Darius the Great had Bagaeus kill Oroetus. Bagaeus himself may have become satrap for a short period, but the next rulers were Otanes and Darius' younger brother, Artaphernes.
During theIonian revolt in 499, Sardis was sacked by the Greeks. Five years later, the rebellion was suppressed and to the surprise of the Greek world, Artapherneswas very lenient in his treatment of the rebels. After this period, many Persians settled in Lydia. The worship of eastern gods such as Anahita, as well as persified Lydian deities, began. Although members of the Persian aristocracy were given estates in the region following the Greek revolt, Greeks loyal to the Persian Empire were also given estates.
Invasion of Greece (480-479)
Artaphernes was succeeded as satrap in 492 by his son Artaphernes II. Lydians enrolled in the Achaemenid army, and participated to the Second Persian invasion of Greece (480–479). Sardis was where all the troops of Xerxes stationed during the winter of 481-480 to prepare for the invasion of Greece.
From the period of 480 to 440, there is little historical information about the satrap of Lydia. In 440, the satrap Pissuthnes attempted to retake Samos, which had rebelled against Athens, but failed. In 420, Pissuthnes revolted against the Persian king Darius II. The Persian soldier and statesman Tissaphernes, a grandson of Hydarnes, was sent by Darius II to Lydia to arrest and execute Pissuthnes. Tissaphernes became satrap of Lydia in 415 and continued to fight Amorges, son of Pissuthnes. After Sparta had defeated Athens, the Greeks invaded Lydia. Tissaphernes overcame the invasion of Thibron in 399 but was defeated at Sardis by the Spartan King Agesilaus II. The satrap was executed and replaced by Tiribazus, who restored order in Lydia and was responsible for a series of treaties between the Persian king and the Greek city states. Autophradates was probably Tiribazus' direct successor, and was loyal to the Achaemenid monarch during a series of revolts in 370. The last satrap of Lydia was Spithridates, who was killed by Alexander the Great at the battle of Granicus.
Lyncestis
was a region of the kingdom of Macedonia, located on the southern borders of Illyria and Paeonia. It was fought over by the Macedonians - See battle of Lyncestis
Mantinea
Mantineia was a city in ancient Arcadia, Greece, which was the site of two significant battles in Classical Greek history. The city emerged from the amalgamation of several neighbouring villages around 500. Its patron god was Poseidon. It was a large city with numerous temples. The fortifications originally were polygonal. The city was the place of the First Battle of Mantineia, in 418, the largest land battle of the Peloponnesian war. On one side were Sparta and its remaining allies, and on the other were Athens, its allies, plus the cities that had revolted against the Spartans. After the Athenians' commander, Laches, was killed, the battle turned into a rout of the Athenian and allied armies, a result attributed to greater Spartan courage. Mantineia had been a member of the Peloponnesian League, but during the Peloponnesian War, the city joined Athens. After the war, it was forced to rejoin the Peloponnese. Later, Sparta used the Peace of Antalcidas in 387 as a pretext to break Mantineia into its constituent villages. In response, the Mantineans expelled pro-Spartans from the city, but were vanquished in the Siege of Mantinea in 385, and the city was dismembered and destroyed. After the Spartan defeat at the end of the Corinthian War, Mantineia re-formed into a single city. The fortifications now became almost circular, keeping some parts of the old walls. The Second Battle of Mantinea, in 362, led to the fall of Theban hegemony. In that battle, Athens and Sparta were allied. Thebes won the battle, but its greatest general, Epaminondas, was killed in the fighting.
Macedonian king Antigonus III Doson sacked the city at 223. Antigonus handed the city to the Achaeans, which colonized it, under Aratos, and renamed the city to Antigonia. Roman emperor Hadrian restored Mantineia's name.
Democracy in Mantineia
There was a democracy in place in Mantineia by 420, when Thucydides says that the Mantineans joined an alliance led by Argos because it was a fellow democracy. Aristotle describes an unusual feature of the Mantinean system: officials were elected, not by the people as a whole, but by a special committee selected by the people. For this committee to be selected, the people did have to attend an Assembly of sorts, probably once a year, and there was also a Council, like in other Greek democracies. Officials included damiourgoi (a political role) as well as theoroi (a religious one) and polemarchoi (military). In 385 the Spartans forcibly suppressed the democracy, though it did have a brief revival in the 360s when Mantineia was part of the Arcadian League.
Marathon is the site of the Battle of Marathon in 490, in which the heavily outnumbered Athenian army defeated the Persians. Legend has it that Pheidippides, a Greek herald at the battle, was sent running from Marathon to Athens to announce the victory, which is how the marathon running race was conceived in modern times.
(This is pure modern legend as there is no contemporay such account, rather Pheidippides did run from Athens to Sparta in record time to urge the Spartans to hurry for the battle, which they did not.
In ancient times, Marathon was located on a small plain in the northeast of ancient Attica, which contained four places, Marathon, Probalinthus, Tricorythus, and Oenoe, which originally formed the Tetrapolis, one of the 12 districts into which Attica was divided before the time of Theseus. Here Xuthus, who married the daughter of Erechtheus, is said to have reigned; and here the Heracleidae took refuge when driven out of Peloponnesus, and defeated Eurystheus. The Marathonii claimed to be the first people in Greece who paid divine honours to Heracles, who possessed a sanctuary in the plain. Marathon is also celebrated in the legends of Theseus, who conquered the ferocious bull, which used to devastate the plain. Marathon is mentioned in Homer's Odyssey in a way that implies that it was then a place of importance. In mythology, its name was derived from an eponymous hero Marathon, who is described by Pausanias as a son of Epopeus, king of Sicyon, who fled into Attica in consequence of the cruelty of his father. Plutarch calls him an Arcadian, who accompanied the Dioscuri in their expedition into Attica, and voluntarily devoted himself to death before the battle. After Theseus united the 12 independent districts of Attica into one state, the name of Tetrapolis gradually fell into disuse; and the four places of which it consisted became Attic demi, Marathon, Tricorythus, and Oenoë belonging to the tribe Aeantis, and Probalinthus to the tribe Pandionis; but Marathon was so superior to the other three, that its name was applied to the whole district down to the latest times. Hence Lucian speaks of "the parts of Marathon about Oenoë". Few places have obtained such celebrity in the history of the world as Marathon, on account of the victory which the Athenians here gained over the Persians in 490 (Battle of Marathon). After Miltiades (the general of the Greek forces) defeated Darius' Persian forces, the Persians decided to sail from Marathon to Athens in order to sack the unprotected city. Miltiades ordered all his hoplite forces to march "double time" back to Athens, so that by the time Darius' troops arrived they saw the same Greek force waiting for them.
This settlement was located in northern Peloponnesus at 1,400 feet on the Akhíllion plain on both banks of the river Elisson. It was founded on a grandiose scale (371–368 by Epaminondascapital of the Arcadian League and as a bastion for the southern Arcadians' containment of Sparta. Megalopolis on the Helisson was populated by the wholesale transfer of inhabitants from 40 local villages and by contingents from Tegéa, Mantineia, and other locations to form a counter weight to Sparta. Encompassed by strong walls, the city reached about 5.5 miles (9 km) in circumference; its territory, extending 24 miles (39 km) northward, was the greatest of any city-state in Arcadia. Spartan attempts to take the city, which had been weakened by the failure of the Arcadian League, were foiled in 353 and 331—as well as after 234, when Megalopolis joined the Achaean League. Megalopolis was a member of the Arcadian League after its foundation until the dissolution of the federation in 362. In 331, Megalopolis was invaded by the Spartans and there was a battle with the Macedonians that came to Megalopolis' help. In 317 at the start of the Second War of the Diadochi,Polyperchon, the new Regent of the Macedonian Empire, besieged Megalopolis which had sided with his enemy Cassander. The siege failed. In the 270s, Aristodamos the Good managed to take control over the city as a tyrant backed by Macedon. In 235, the second tyrant of the city, Lydiades, gave up control over the polis and the city became a member of the Achaean League. In 222, the Spartan king Cleomenes III burnt down the city but it was rebuilt in the years after the destruction. As a member of the Achaean League, Megalopolis had a profound influence on the federal politics and it was the hometown of several notable Achaean figures such as Philopoemen, Lykortas and Polybius.
It was the main city of its region knowed as the Megarid. It was at the eastern end of the Corinthian Istmus and had ports on both the Gulf of Corinth and Saronic gulf. It was thus adjacent to Attica. Megara was also a trade port, its people using their ships and wealth as a way to gain leverage on armies of neighboring poleis. Megara specialized in the exportation of wool and other animal products including livestock such as horses. It possessed two harbors, Pagae to the west on the Corinthian Gulf, and Nisaea to the east on the Saronic Gulf of the Aegean Sea. In historical times, Megara was an early dependency of Corinth, in which capacity colonists from Megara founded Megara Hyblaea, a small polis north of Syracuse in Sicily. Megara then fought a war of independence with Corinth, and afterwards founded Chalcedon in 685, as well as Byzantium (c. 667). Megara is known to have early ties with Miletos, in the region of Caria in Asia Minor. In the 7th/6th century Megara and Miletos acted in concordance with each other. Both cities acted under the leadership and sanction of an Apollo oracle. Megara cooperated with that of Delphi. Miletos had her own oracle of Apollo Didymeus Milesios in Didyma. Also, there are many parallels in the political organisation of both cities. In the late 7th century Theagenes established himself as tyrant of Megara by slaughtering the cattle of the rich to win over the poor. During the second Persian invasion of Greece (480–479) Megara fought alongside the Spartans and Athenians at crucial battles such asSalamisand Plataea. Megara defected from the Spartan-dominated Peloponnesian League (c. 460 ) to the Delian league due to border disputes with its neighbour Corinth; this defection was one of the causes of the First Peloponnesian War (460 – c. 445). By the terms of the Thirty Years' Peace of 446–445 Megara was forced to return to the Peloponnesian League. In the (second) Peloponnesian War (c. 431 – 404), Megara was an ally of Sparta. The Megarian decree is considered to be one of several contributing "causes" of the Peloponnesian War. Athens issued the Megarian decree, which banned Megarian merchants from territory controlled by Athens; its aim was to constrict the Megarian economy. The Athenians claimed that they were responding to the Megarians' desecration of the Hiera Orgas, a sacred precinct in the border region between the two states. Arguably the most famous citizen of Megara in antiquity was Byzas, the legendary founder of Byzantium in the 7th century. The 6th century poet Theognis also came from Megara. During the Chremonidean War, in 266, the Megarians were besieged by the Macedonian king Antigonus Gonatas and managed to defeat his elephants employing burning pigs. Despite this success, the Megarians had to submit to the Macedonians. In 243, exhorted by Aratus of Sicyon, Megara expelled its Macedonian garrison and joined the Achaean League, but when the Achaeans lost control of the Isthmus in 223 the Megarians left them and joined the Boeotian League. Not more than thirty years later, however, the Megarians grew tired of the Boeotian decline and returned their allegiance to Achaea. The Achaean strategos Philopoemen fought off the Boeotian intervention force and secured Megara's return, either in 203 or in 193.
Was an island south east of mainland Greece.
In thesiege of Melosduring the Peloponnesian War (431-404 ) between Athens and Sparta, the Melians made some small donations to the Spartan war effort, but remained largely neutral despite sharing the Spartans' Dorian ethnicity. In 426 the Athenians raided the Melian countryside, and the following year demanded tribute, but Melos refused. In the summer of 416, Athens invaded again with 3,400 men, and demanded that Melos ally with them against Sparta, or be destroyed. The Melians rejected this, so the Athenian army laid siege to the city and eventually captured it in the winter. After the city's fall, the Athenians executed all the adult men, and sold the women and children into slavery. They then settled 500 of their own colonists on the island. In 405 with Athens losing the war, the Spartan general Lysander expelled the Athenian settlers from Melos and repatriated the survivors of the siege. Sparta annexed Melos, which would mean that like other liberated islands, it received a military governor (a harmost). The tribulations of its population and the loss of its independence meant that the cultural distinctiveness of Melos faded away as it was absorbed into mainstream Greek culture. In 338, Philip II of Macedon defeated the Greeks at the Battle of Chaeroneia and became the overlord of Greece and the Cyclades. During this time, Melos and the nearby island Kimolos disputed each other over the ownership of the islands of Polyaigos, Heterea, and Libea (the last two are probably today's uninhabited islands of Agios Efstathios and Agios Georgios). In the past, this dispute would have been settled by war, but the two communities took their dispute to Argos on the Greek mainland. The Argives decided the islands belonged to Kimolos.
Miletus
was a Greek city on the western coast of Anatolia, near the mouth of the Maeander River in ancient Caria. Its ruins are located near the modern village of Balat in Aydin Province, Turkey. Before the Persian invasion in the middle of the 6th century, Miletus was considered the greatest and wealthiest of Greek cities. Evidence of first settlement at the site has been made inaccessible by the rise of sea level and deposition of sediments from the Maeander. The first available evidence is of the Neolithic. In the early and middle Bronze Age the settlement came under Minoan influence. Legend has it that an influx of Cretans occurred displacing the indigenous Leleges. The site was renamed Miletus after a place in Crete. In the 13th century speakers of the Luwian language from south central Anatolia calling themselves the Carians moved there. Later in that century other Greeks arrived. The city at that time rebelled against the Hittite Empire. After the fall of that empire the city was destroyed in the 12th century and starting about 1000 was resettled extensively by the Ionian Greeks. Legend offers an Ionian foundation event sponsored by a founder named Neleus from the Peloponnesus. In 479 the Greeks decisively defeated the Persians on the Greek mainland at the Battle of Plataea, and Miletus was freed from Persian rule. During this time several other cities were formed by Milesian settlers, spanning across what is now Turkey and even as far as Crimea. The city's gridlike layout became famous, serving as the basic layout for Roman cities. In 387 the Peace of Antalcidas gave the Persian Empire under king Artaxerxes II control of the Greek city-states of Ionia, including Miletus. In 358 Artaxerxes II died and was succeeded by his son Artaxerxes III, who in 355 forced Athens to conclude a peace which required its forces to leave Asia Minor (Anatolia) and acknowledge the independence of its rebellious allies. In 334 the Siege of Miletus by the forces of Alexander the Great of Macedonia liberated the city from Persian rule, soon followed by most of Asia Minor. In this period the city reached its greatest extent, occupying within its walls an area of approximately 90 hectares (220 acres). When Alexander died in 323, Miletus came under the control of Ptolemy, governor of Caria and his satrap of Lydia Asander, who had become autonomous. In 312 Macedonian general Antigonus I Monophthalmus sent Docimus and Medeius to free the city and grant autonomy, restoring the democratic patrimonial regime. In 301, after Antigonus I was killed in the Battle of Ipsus by the coalition of Lysimachus, Cassander, and Seleucus I Nicator, founder of the Seleucid Empire, Miletus maintained good relations with all the successors after Seleucus I Nicator made substantial donations to the sanctuary of Didyma and returned the statue of Apollo that had been stolen by the Persians in 494. In 295 Antigonus I's son Demetrius Poliorcetes was the eponymous archon (stephanephorus) in the city, which allied with Ptolemy I Soter of Egypt, while Lysimachus assumed power in the region, enforcing a strict policy towards the Greek cities by imposing high taxes, forcing Miletus to resort to lending.
Mithymna
Mithymna also sometimes spelled Methymna is a town and former municipality on the island of Lesbos, North Aegean, Greece. Methymna had a long-standing rivalry with Mytilene, and during the Peloponnesian War it sided with Athens during the Mytilenaean revolt in 428 when all the other cities of Lesbos sided with Mytilene. When the Athenians put down the revolt the following year, only Methymna was spared from having its territory turned into a cleruchy. After 427, Methymna and Chios were the only members of the Delian League to remain self-governing and exempt from tribute, indicating the privileged position Methymna held within the Athenian Empire. Methymna was briefly captured by the Spartans in summer 412, before quickly being retaken by the Athenians: in describing this episode, the historian Thucydides indicates that the Methymnaeans were much more inclined to side with Athens than Sparta. This was likewise the case in 411, when a group of Methymnaeans who were in exile at Cyme in Aeolis attempted to return to Methymna by force, but were rebuffed by the population. When the Spartan commander Callicratidasbesieged Methymna in 406, the city stayed loyal to its Athenian garrison and held out until it was betrayed by several traitors. By at least the 340s, the tyrant Cleommis had expelled the city's democrats and remained in power for the next decade. Lesbos changed hands several times between the Macedonian forces of Alexander the Great and the Persian forces of Memnon of Rhodes, who captured Methymna in 333, and that when Alexander's admiral Hegelochus recaptured Methymna in 332 its tyrant was Aristonicus not Cleommis.
is a Greek island and the largest of the Cyclades. It was the centre of archaic Cycladic culture. The island is famous as a source of emery, a rock rich in corundum, which until modern time was one of the best abrasives available. Naxos dominated commerce in the Cyclades. Naxos was the first Greek city-state to attempt to leave the Delian League circa 476; Athens quickly squashed the notion and forcibly removed all military naval vessels from the island's control. Athens then demanded all future payments from Naxos in the form of gold rather than military aid. In 502, an unsuccessful attack on Naxos by Persian forces led several prominent men in the Greek cities of Ionia to rebel against the Persian Empire in the Ionian Revolt, and then to the Persian War between Greece and Persia.
Nemea
Nemea is an ancient site in the northeastern part of the Peloponnesehaia Nemea is immediately southwest of the archaeological site, while the new town of Nemea lies to the west. In 394 the Battle of the Nemea River was fought between Sparta and her allies the Achaians, Eleians, Mantineians, and the Tegeates against a coalition of Boetians, Euboeans, Athenians, Corinthians, and Argives. This was the last clear-cut victory that Sparta enjoyed. The tactics were similar to all other Greek hoplite battles, except that when the armies were arrayed, with the Spartans having the customary honour of being on the right, the army drifted right as it advanced. This was not good for the Spartan allies, as it exposed the soldiers to a flanking attack, but it gave the Spartans the opportunity to use their superior coordination and discipline to roll up the flank of the Athenians, who were stationed opposite. The result of the battle was a victory for Sparta, even though her allies on the left suffered significant losses. This willingness to accept losses on the left flank for flanking position on the right was a dramatic change from typical conservative hoplite military tactics.
Nothm
Oenophyta
Oenophyta or Oinophyta a town in Boeotia. During the First Peloponnesian War, in the Battle of Oenophyta fought here in 457, the Athenians under Myronides gained a signal victory over the Boeotian League. As this victory was followed by the destruction of Tanagra, there can be little doubt that it was in the territory of the latter city, not far from the frontier of Attica. Its name, moreover, shows that it was the place where the wine was chiefly produced, for which the territory of Tanagra was celebrated. Its site is located near modern Oinofyta (Staniates).
Olpae
was a town of ancient Amphilochia, where the Battle of Olpae was fought between the Spartans and the Athenians in 426 during the Peloponnesian War. Olpae sat upon a fortified hill, in the territory of Amphilochian Argos, about 3 miles from Argos itself. Eurylochus, the Spartan commander, marched from Aetolia, with 3000 hoplites into the territory of Amphilochian Argos, and captured Olpae. Thereupon the Acarnanians marched to the protection of Argos, and took up their position at Crenae. Meantime Eurylochus, with the Peloponnesian forces, had marched through Acarnania, and had succeeded in joining the Ambraciots at Olpae, passing unperceived between Argos itself and the Acarnanian force at Crenae. He then took post at Metropolis, probably northeast of Olpae. Shortly afterwards Demosthenes, who had been invited by the Acarnanians to take the command of their troops, arrived in the Ambraciot Gulf with 20 Athenian ships, and anchored near Olpae. Having disembarked his men, and taken the command, he encamped near Olpae. The two armies were separated only by a deep ravine: and as the ground was favourable for ambush, Demosthenes hid some men in a bushy dell, so that they might attack the rear of the enemy. The stratagem was successful, Demosthenes gained a decisive victory, and Eurylochus was slain in the battle. This victory was followed by another still more striking. The Ambraciots at Olpae had some days before sent to Ambracia, to beg for reinforcements; and a large Ambraciot force had entered the territory of Amphilochia about the time when the Battle of Olpae was fought. Demosthenes being informed of their march on the day after the battle, formed a plan to surprise them in a narrow pass above Olpae. Demosthenes sent forward a detachment to secure the peak above the pass, and then marched through the pass in the night. The Ambraciots had obtained no intelligence of the defeat of their comrades at Olpae, or of the approach of Demosthenes; they were surprised in their sleep, and put to the sword without any possibility of resistance.
Olynthus
Olynthus was an ancient city of Chalcidice, built mostly on two flat-topped hills 30–40m in height, in a fertile plain at the head of the Gulf of Torone, near the neck of the peninsula of Pallene, about 2.5 kilometers from the sea, and about 60 stadia (c. 9–10 kilometers) from Poteidaea. The city was fought over by Macedonians and Greeks. It was at war with Sparta in 382- 379.
Orchomenus in Arcadia
Orchomenus or Orchomenos was a city of Arcadia, Greece, called by Thucydides the Arcadian Orchomenus to distinguish it from the Boeotian town. Orchomenos was a prehistoric settlement and became one of the powerful cities in West Arcadia along with Tegea and Mantineia. The heyday of the city was between 7th–6th century and it became a rich city which minted its own currency. Its ruins are near the modern village of Orchomenos. Orchomenos was initially established at the foot of the acropolis on a plain surrounded on every side by mountains. Later the settlement was built on the mountain where the most important monuments of the city have been found. This plain was bounded on the south by a low range of hills, called Anchisia, which separated it from the territory of Mantineia: on the north by a lofty chain, called Oligyrtus, through which lie the passes into the territories of Pheneus and Stymphalus, and on the east and west by two parallel chains running from north to south. Upon the summit of the western hill stood the acropolis of Orchomenus, nearly 900 m (3,000 ft) high, resembling the strong fortress of Messenian Ithome and, like the latter, commanding two plains.
Orchomenus is mentioned by Homer, who gives it the epithet of "abundant in sheep," In the Persian Wars, Orchomenus sent 120 men to Thermopylae, and 600 to Plataea. In the Peloponnesian War, the Lacedaemonians deposited in Orchomenus the hostages they had taken from the Arcadians; but the walls of the city were then in a dilapidated state; when the Athenians and their Peloponnesian allies advanced against the city in 418, the Orchomenians dared not offer resistance, and surrendered the hostages. At the time of the foundation of Megalopolis, Orchomenians was exercising supremacy over Theisoa, Methydrium, and Teuthis; but the inhabitants of these cities were then transferred to Megalopolis, and their territories assigned to the latter. The Orchomenians, through their enmity to the Mantineians, refused to join the Arcadian confederacy, and made war upon the Mantineians. Henceforth, Orchomenus lost its political importance; but, from its commanding situation, its possession was frequently an object of the belligerent powers in later times. In the war between Cassander and Polyperchon, it fell into the power of the former, 313. It subsequently espoused the side of the Aetolians, made an agreement with the Achaean League under a ruler named Nearchus around 234 was taken by Cleomenes III in 229 with the acquiescence of the Aetolians, and was in 223 retaken by Antigonus Doson, who placed there a Macedonian garrison.
Orchomenus in Boeotia
The town is best known as a rich archaeological site in Boeotia, Greece, that was inhabited from the Neolithic through the Hellenistic periods. Orchomenus is also referenced as the "Minyean Orchomenus" in order to distinguish the city from the "Arcadian Orchomenus". According to the founding myth of Orchomenos, its royal dynasty had been established by the Minyans, who had followed their eponymous leader Minyas from coastal Thessaly to settle the site. In 480–479, the Orchomenians joined their neighbouring rivals the Thebans to turn back the invading forces of Xerxes in the Greco-Persian Wars. In mid-century, Orchomenos sheltered the oligarchic exiles who freed Boeotia from Athenian control. In the fourth century the traditional rivalry with Thebes made Orchomenos an ally of Agesilaus IIand Sparta against Thebes, in 395 and again in 394. The Theban revenge after their defeat of Sparta in the battle of Leuctrain 371 was delayed by the tolerant policies of Epaminondas: the Boeotian League sacked Orchomenos in 364. Although the Phocians rebuilt the city in 350, the Thebans destroyed it again in 349. The broad plain between Orchomenos and the acropolis of Chaeronea witnessed two battles of major importance in Classical antiquity. In 338, after a whirlwind march south into central Greece, Philip II of Macedon defeated Thebes and Athens on the plain of Chaeronea during the First Battle of Chaeronea, establishing Macedonian supremacy over the Greeks. During Alexander's campaign against Thebes in 335, Orchomenos took the side of the Macedonians. In recompense, Philip and Alexander rebuilt Orchomenos, when the theatre and the fortification walls, visible today, were constructed. The Second Battle of Chaeronea occurred when Roman Republican forces under Dictator Sulla defeated those of King Mithridates VI of Pontus near Chaeronea, in 86 during the First Mithridatic War. This Second Battle of Chaeronea was followed by the Battle of Orchomenus, when Archelaus' forces were completely destroyed.
Ozolian Locris
Ozolian Locris or Hesperian Locris was a region in Ancient Greece, inhabited by the Ozolian Locrians a tribe of the Locrians, upon the Corinthian Gulf, bounded on the north by Doris, on the east by Phocis, and on the west by Aetolia. They first appear in history in the time of the Peloponnesian War, when they are mentioned by Thucydides as a semi-barbarous nation, along with the Aetolians and Acarnanians, whom they resembled in their armour and mode of fighting. In 426, the Locrians promised to assist Demosthenes, the Athenian commander, in his invasion of Aetolia; but, after the defeat of Demosthenes, most of the Locrian tribes submitted without opposition to Spartan Eurylochus, who marched through their territory from Delphi to Naupactus. They belonged at a later period to the Aetolian League.
Pedasus
City in Caria where during the Ionian Revolt the rebels defeated the Persians in 497
Perinthus
The town was located a few miles west of Byzantium on the north (European) side of the Sea of Mamora. It was a Samian colony, founded about 599. Before and during the Peloponnesian War it was very important as it was a port on the vital Athenian route for shipping grain from the Black Sea to Athens. It was particularly renowned for its obstinate defence against Philip V of Macedon. At that time it appears to have been a more important and flourishing town even than Byzantium and being both a harbour and a point at which several main roads met, it was the seat of extensive commerce. After the fourth century AD it assumed the name of Heraclea or Heracleia
Phocaea
Phocaea was an Ionian Greek city on the western coast of Anatolia. Greek colonists from Phocaea founded the colony of Massalia. Phocaea was the northernmost of the Ionian cities, on the boundary with Aeolis. It was located near the mouth of the river Hermus (now Gediz), on the coast of the peninsula separating the Gulf of Cyme to the north, named for the largest of the Aeolian cities, and the Gulf of Smyrna (now Izmir) to the south. Along with the other Greek coastal cities it was captured by Cyrus the Great in 546. It participated in the Ionian Revolt in 500. The Phocaean leader, Dikonysius was chosen to command the Ionian fleet at the decisive Battle of Lade, in 494. The Ionian fleet was defeated and the revolt ended shortly thereafter., Phocaea joined the Delian League, paying tribute to Athens of two talents. In 412 , during the Peloponnesian War,with the help of Sparta, Phocaea rebelled along with the rest of Ionia. The Peace of Antalcidas, which ended the Corinthian War, returned nominal control to Persia in 387. see Phocaea city
Phocis
Phocis was an ancient region in the central part of Ancient Greece, which included Delphi. The early history of Phocis remains quite obscure. During the Second Persian invasion of Greece in 480 the Phocians at first joined in the national defence, but, by their irresolute conduct at the Battle of Thermopylae lost that position for the Greeks; at the Battle of Plataea they were enrolled on the Persian side. They participated in the many subsequent wars as well. see Phocis region
Phyle
The best-attested new government system was that created by Cleisthenes for Attica in or just after 508. The landscape was regarded as comprising three zones: urban (asty), coastal (paralia) and inland (mesogeia). Each zone was split into ten sections called trittyes ('thirdings'), to each of which were assigned between one and ten of the 139 existing settlements, villages or town-quarters, which were henceforth called demoi. Three sections, one each from urban, coastal and inland, were then put together to form a tribe. The 30 sections therefore yielded ten tribes, each named after a local hero and each with a geographically scattered membership roughly equal in size and hereditary in the male line thenceforward. They rapidly took on various functions. They became the brigading units for the army; constituencies for the election of magistrates, especially the ten generals (strategoi), for the section of members of the Council of 500 (boule) and of the 6,000 jurors, and for the selection of boards of administrative officials of every kind: and bases for the selection of competing teams of runners, singers or dancers at various festivals. They had their own corporate life, with officials and sanctuaries, and came to have an official order: 1. Erechtheis, 2. Aigeis, 3. Pandionis, 4. Leontis, 5. Acamantis), 6. Oineis, 7. Kekropis, 8. Hippothontis, 9. Aiantis and 10. Antiochis.
Potidaea
was a colony founded by the Corinthians around 600 in the narrowest point of the peninsula of Pallene, the westernmost of three peninsulas at the southern end of Chalcidice in northern Greece. While besieged by the Persians in 479, the town may have been saved by a tsunami rather than a particularly high tide. Herodotus reports how the Persian attackers who tried to exploit an unusual retreat of the water were suddenly surprised by "a great flood-tide, higher, as the people of the place say, than any one of the many that had been before".
In 2012 researchers from Aachen University announced that they had discovered evidence that the area should be included among Greek regions prone to tsunamis. Tsunami are generally associated with earthquakes, but Herodotus, the source of this story, makes no mention of an earthquake at the time. This makes it more likely that the event was a meteotsunami. Not only are such events relatively common in the Mediterranean, but their effect is amplified in a long, narrow body of water, which is a good description for the situation of Potidaea, which lies at the head of Toroneos Gulf. During the time of the Delian League, conflicts occurred between Athens and Corinth. However, the Corinthians still sent a supreme magistrate each year. Potidaea was inevitably involved in all of the conflicts between Athens and Corinth. The people revolted against the Athenians in 432, and it was besieged at the beginning of the Peloponnesian War and taken in theBattle of Potidaea in 430. The Athenians retook the city in 363, but in 356 Potidaea fell into the hands of Philip II of Macedon. Potidaea was destroyed and its territory handed to the Olynthians. Cassander built a city on the same site which was named Cassandreia. It was probably at this time that the canal, which still exists today, was dug through the sandy soil at the narrowest part of the isthmus, perhaps with the aim of making the city a naval base.
Pylos
Pylos also known as Navarino, is a town and a former municipality in Messenia, Peloponnese, Greece. It was a significant kingdom in Mycenaean Greece, with remains of the so-called "Palace of Nestor" excavated nearby, named after Nestor, the king of Pylos in Homer's Iliad. In Classical times, the site was uninhabited, but became the site of the Battle of Pylos in 425, during thePeloponnesian War.
It was one of the last places which held out against the Spartans in the Second Messenian War, after which the inhabitants emigrated to Cyllene, and from there, with the other Messenians, to Sicily.
During the Peloponnesian war Demosthenes, was sailing around the Peloponneses and put in at Pylos, then recognized it might be useful to establish a fort there. He completed the fort in 424. The erection of this fort led to one of the most memorable events in the Peloponnesian War. Thucydides has given a minute account of the topography of the district, which, though clear and consistent with itself, does not coincide, in all points, with the existing locality, Thucydides describes the harbour, of which the promontory Coryphasium (Koryphasion) formed the northern termination, as fronted and protected by the island Sphacteria, which stretched along the coast, leaving only two narrow entrances to the harbour,--the one at the northern end, opposite to Coryphasium, being only wide enough to admit two triremes abreast, and the other at the southern end wide enough for eight or nine triremes. The island was about 15 stadia in width, covered with wood, uninhabited and untrodden. A little later the Athenians captured a number of Spartan troops besieged on the adjacent island of Sphacteria (see Battle of Sphacteria). Spartan anxiety over the return of the prisoners, who were taken to Athens as hostages, contributed to their acceptance of the Peace of Nicias in 421.
Salamis
Salamis has an area of 93 km2 (36 sq mi); its highest point is Mavrovouni at 404 m (1,325 ft). A significant part of Salamis Island is rocky and mountainous. On the southern part of the island a pine forest is located, which is unusual for western Attica. Unfortunately, this forest is often a target for fires.[13] While the inland inhabitants are mainly employed within the agricultural sector, the majority of Salamis' inhabitants work in maritime occupations (fishing, ferries, and the island's shipyards) or commute to work in Athens.[15][16] The maritime industry is focused on the north-east coast of the island at the port of Paloukia (?a?????a), where ferries to mainland Greece are based, and in the dockyards of Ampelakia and the north side of the Kynosoura peninsula. Salamis Island is very popular for holiday and weekend visits from Athens mainland; its population rises to 300,000 in peak season of which c. 31,000 are permanent inhabitants.[13] This supports a strong service industry sector, with many cafes, bars, ouzeries, tavernas and consumer goods shops throughout the island. On the south of the island, away from the port, there are a number of less developed areas with good swimming beaches including those of Aianteio, Maroudi, Perani, Peristeria, Kolones, Saterli, Selenia, and Kanakia.[17]
In Cyprus
Sestos
Sestos was a city in Thrace. It was located at the Thracian Chersonese peninsula on the European coast of the Hellespont, opposite Abydos. Sestos is first mentioned in Homer's Iliad as a Thracian settlement, and was allied with Troy during the Trojan War. The city was settled by colonists from Lesbos in c. 600 In c. 512, Sestos was occupied by the Persian Empire, and Darius I ferried his army across from the city to Asia Minor after his Scythian campaign. In 480, at the onset of the Second Persian invasion of Greece, Xerxes I bridged the Hellespont near Sestos. In 479, after the Greek victory at the Battle of Mycale, Sestos was besieged by Athenian forces led by Xanthippus. The Greek siege was resisted by a joint force of Persian soldiers and the city's native inhabitants and endured the whole winter, however, food supplies were inadequate as the siege was unexpected, and the city's garrison suffered from famine. The garrison subsequently capitulated and the Persian soldiers were imprisoned. Artayctes, the Persian governor of Sestos, had escaped, but was captured and crucified. However, Athenian influence over Sestos lapsed briefly, according to Plutarch, as Cimon retook the city in a second campaign at some point between 478 and 471. Sestos became a member of the Athenian-led Delian League, and was part of the Hellespontine district. The city contributed a phoros of 500 drachmas annually from 446/445 to 435/434, after which Sestos provided 10 drachmas until 421/420. At Sestos, a 10 per cent tax was levied on westbound, non-Athenian, merchant grain ships. The city served as a base for the Athenian fleet until it was occupied by Spartan forces led by Lysander in 404, during the Peloponnesian War. Sestos' population was briefly expelled and replaced by Spartan settlers, but the city's native inhabitants were permitted to return to the city soon after. During theCorinthian War, Sestos was occupied by Athenian forces led by Conon in 393, and the city came under the control of Ariobarzanes, Satrap of Phrygia. In 365, an attack on Sestos by Cotys I, King of Thrace, was repelled with the aid of Timotheus, for which Athens was awarded with Sestos and Krithotai in the same year. A cleruchy was established at Sestos in 364, but the city was conquered by Cotys I after a surprise attack in 360, and a Thracian garrison was established. The Athenian general Chares seized Sestos in 353 and carried out andrapodismos whereby the male population was killed and women and children were enslaved; the city was repopulated by Athenian cleruchs. Sestos remained under Athenian control until the Peace of 337 and dissolution of the Second Athenian League, after which Sestos joined the Macedonian-led League of Corinth. Alexander the Great, King of Macedonia, crossed over from Sestos to Asia Minor in 334. After the death of Alexander the Great in 323, the city, alongside other Macedonian dependencies in Thrace, was allocated to Lysimachus as a result of the Partition of Babylon. The mint of Sestos was established in c. 300. Lysimachus retained control of the city until his death at the battle of Corupedium in 281. The city was seized by Philip V, King of Macedonia, in 200, and remained under Macedonian control until the conclusion of the Second Macedonian War in 196 with the Peace of Flamininus, which proclaimed Sestos a free city. In 196, during the Roman–Seleucid War, Sestos surrendered to Antiochus III, Megas Basileus of the Seleucid Empire, who refortified the city in 191 in preparation for a Roman attack, only for the city to surrender to Gaius Livius Salinator in 190. At the end of the war, the Treaty of Apamea of 188 awarded Sestos to the Kingdom of Pergamon. By the end of the Hellenistic period, the offices of gymnasiarch and of ephebarch, with responsibility for the neoi (young) and epheboi (adolescents), are attested at Sestos.
Sicyon
Sicyon was built on a low triangular plateau west of Corinth and about two miles from the Corinthian Gulf. Between the city and its port lay a fertile plain with olive groves and orchards.
During the Persian Wars, the Sicyonians participated with fifteen triremes in the Battle of Salamis and with 3,000 hoplites in the Battle of Plataea. In 479 a Sicyonian contingent fought bravely in the Battle of Mycale, where they lost more men than any other city.
The Sicyonians fought two battles against the Athenians, first against their admiral Tolmides in 455 and then in a land battle against Pericles with 1000 hoplites in 453. In the Peloponnesian War Sicyon followed the lead of Sparta and Corinth. At the beginning of the 4th century, in the Corinthian war, Sicyon sided again with Sparta and became its base of operations against the allied troops round Corinth. In 369 Sicyon was captured and garrisoned by the Thebans in their successful attack on the Peloponnesian League. see Sicyon city
Soli was a town on Cyprus that was besieged and taken by the Persians as part of their defeat of the Ionian Revolt.
Spahacteria
Island on west coast of Peloponneses- Location of an unexpected battle in which the Athenians captured Spartan hoplites.
Sparta was a prominent city-state (actually mostly a collection of villages) in ancient Greece. In antiquity, the city-state was known as Lacedaemon, while the name Sparta referred to its main settlement on the banks of the Eurotas River in Laconia, in south-eastern Peloponnese. Around 650, it rose to become the dominant military land-power in ancient Greece. Given its military pre-eminence, Sparta was recognized as the leading force of the unified Greek military during the Greco-Persian Wars, in rivalry with the rising naval power of Athens. Sparta was the principal enemy of Athens during the Peloponnesian Warbetween 431 and 404 from which it emerged victorious. The decisive Battle of Leuctra in 371 ended the Spartan hegemony, although the city-state maintained its political independence until the Roman conquest of Greece in 146.
Sparta was unique in ancient Greece for its social system and constitution, which were supposedly introduced by the semi-mythical legislator Lycurgus. His laws configured the Spartan society to maximize military proficiency at all costs, focusing all social institutions on military training and physical development. The inhabitants of Sparta were stratified as Spartiates (Spartan citizens with full rights), mothakes (non-Spartan free men raised as Spartans), perioikoi (free residents engaged in commerce), and helots (state-owned serfs, enslaved non-Spartan locals). Spartan men underwent the rigorous agoge training and education regimen, and Spartan phalanx brigades were widely considered to be among the best in battle. Spartan women also enjoyed considerably more rights and equality with men than elsewhere in classical antiquity. Sparta was frequently a subject of fascination in its own day, as well as in Western culture following the revival of classical learning. The admiration of Sparta is known as Laconism or Laconophilia.
Bertrand Russell wrote:The ancient Greeks used one of three words to refer to the Spartan city-state and its location. First, "Sparta" refers primarily to the main cluster of settlements in the valley of the Eurotas River. The second word, "Lacedaemon" was often used as an adjective and is the name referenced in the works of Homer and the historians Herodotus and Thucydides. The third term, "Laconice" referred to the immediate area around the town of Sparta, the plateau east of the Taygetos mountains, and sometimes to all the regions under direct Spartan control, including Messenia. Herodotus seems to use "Lacedaemon" for the Mycenaean Greek citadel at Therapne, in contrast to the lower town of Sparta. This term could be used synonymously with Sparta, but typically it denoted the terrain in which the city was located. In Homer it is typically combined with epithets of the countryside: wide, lovely, shining and most often hollow and broken (full of ravines), suggesting the Eurotas Valley. "Sparta" on the other hand is described as "the country of lovely women", an epithet for people. The residents of Sparta were often called Lacedaemonians. This epithet utilized the plural of the adjective Lacedaemonius. The ancients sometimes used a back-formation, referring to the land of Lacedaemon as Lacedaemonian country. As most words for "country" were feminine, the adjective was in the feminine: Lacedaemonia. Eventually, the adjective came to be used alone. "Lacedaemonia" was not in general use during the classical period and before. It does occur in Greek as an equivalent of Laconia and Messenia during the Roman and early Byzantine periods, mostly in ethnographers and lexica of place names. For example, Hesychius of Alexandria's Lexicon (5th century CE) defines Agiadae as a "place in Lacedaemonia" named after Agis. The actual transition may be captured by Isidore of Seville's Etymologiae (7th century CE), an etymological dictionary. Isidore relied heavily on Orosius' Historiarum Adversum Paganos (5th century CE) and Eusebius of Caesarea's Chronicon (early 5th century CE), as did Orosius. The latter defines Sparta to be Lacedaemonia Civitas, but Isidore defines Lacedaemonia as founded by Lacedaemon, son of Semele, which is consistent with Eusebius' explanation. There is a rare use, perhaps the earliest of "Lacedaemonia", in Diodorus Siculus' The Library of History, but probably with (''chora'', "country") suppressed. Lakedaimona was until 2006 the name of a province in the modern Greek prefecture of Laconia.
In the Second Messenian War, Sparta established itself as a local power in the Peloponnesus and the rest of Greece. During the following centuries, Sparta's reputation as a land-fighting force was unequalled. At its peak around 500, Sparta had some 20,000–35,000 citizens, plus numerous helots and perioikoi. The likely total of 40,000–50,000 made Sparta one of the larger Greek city-states; however, according to Thucydides, the population of Athens in 431 was 360,000–610,000, making it much larger.
In 480 a small force led by King Leonidas (about 300 full Spartiates, 700 Thespians, and 400 Thebans, although these numbers were lessened by earlier casualties) made a legendary last stand at the Battle of Thermopylae against the massive Persian army, inflicting very high casualties on the Persian forces before finally being overwhelmed. The superior weaponry, strategy, and bronze armour of the Greek hoplites and their phalanx fighting formation again proved their worth one year later when Sparta assembled its full strength and led a Greek alliance against the Persians at the battle of Plataea.
Ancient Sparta. The decisive Greek victory at Plataea put an end to the Greco-Persian War along with Persian ambitions to expand into Europe. Even though this war was won by a pan-Greek army, credit was given to Sparta, who besides providing the leading forces at Thermopylae and Plataea, had been the de facto leader of the entire Greek expedition.
In later Classical times, Sparta along with Athens, Thebes, and Persia were the main powers fighting for supremacy in the northeastern Mediterranean. In the course of the Peloponnesian War, Sparta, a traditional land power, acquired a navy which managed to overpower the previously dominant flotilla of Athens, ending the Athenian Empire. At the peak of its power in the early 4th century , Sparta had subdued many of the main Greek states and even invaded the Persian provinces in Anatolia (modern day Turkey), a period known as the Spartan Hegemony. During the Corinthian War, Sparta faced a coalition of the leading Greek states: Thebes, Athens, Corinth, and Argos. The alliance was initially backed by Persia, which feared further Spartan expansion into Asia. Sparta achieved a series of land victories, but many of her ships were destroyed at the battle of Cnidus by a Greek-Phoenician mercenary fleet that Persia had provided to Athens. The event severely damaged Sparta's naval power but did not end its aspirations of invading further into Persia, until Conon the Athenian ravaged the Spartan coastline and provoked the old Spartan fear of a helot revolt. After a few more years of fighting, in 387 the Peace of Antalcidas was established, according to which all Greek cities of Ionia would return to Persian control, and Persia's Asian border would be free of the Spartan threat. The effects of the war were to reaffirm Persia's ability to interfere successfully in Greek politics and to affirm Sparta's weakened hegemonic position in the Greek political system. Sparta entered its long-term decline after a severe military defeat to Epaminondas of Thebes at the Battle of Leuctra. This was the first time that a full strength Spartan army lost a land battle. As Spartan citizenship was inherited by blood, Sparta increasingly faced a helot population that vastly outnumbered its citizens. The alarming decline of Spartan citizens was commented on by Aristotle. Sparta never fully recovered from its losses at Leuctra in 371 and the subsequent helot revolts. Nonetheless, it was able to continue as a regional power for over two centuries. Neither Philip II nor his son Alexander the Great attempted to conquer Sparta itself. Even during its decline, Sparta never forgot its claim to be the "defender of Hellenism" and its Laconic wit. An anecdote has it that when Philip II sent a message to Sparta saying "If I enter Laconia, I will raze Sparta", the Spartans responded with the single, terse reply: "if". When Philip created the League of Corinth on the pretext of unifying Greece against Persia, the Spartans chose not to join, since they had no interest in joining a pan-Greek expedition unless it were under Spartan leadership. Thus, upon defeating the Persians at the Battle of the Granicus, Alexander the Great sent to Athens 300 suits of Persian armour with the following inscription: "Alexander, son of Philip, and all the Greeks except the Spartans, give these offerings taken from the foreigners who live in Asia". During Alexander's campaigns in the east, the Spartan king Agis III sent a force to Crete in 333 with the aim of securing the island for Sparta. Agis next took command of allied Greek forces against Macedon, gaining early successes, before laying siege to Megalopolis in 331. A large Macedonian army under general Antipater marched to its relief and defeated the Spartan-led force in a pitched battle. More than 5,300 of the Spartans and their allies were killed in battle, and 3,500 of Antipater's troops. Agis, now wounded and unable to stand, ordered his men to leave him behind to face the advancing Macedonian army so that he could buy them time to retreat. On his knees, the Spartan king slew several enemy soldiers before being finally killed by a javelin. Alexander was merciful, and he only forced the Spartans to join the League of Corinth, which they had previously refused.
Sybota
The battle of Sybota in 433 was an inconclusive naval battle between Corinth and Corcyraean that saved Corcyra from invasion, but that also played a part in the outbreak of the Great Peloponnesian War.
The Corinth-Corcyra War (435-431) broke out because of a dispute over the city of Epidamnus, on the Illyrian coast (modern Albania). The city was a colony of Corcyra (Corfu), but its official founder had been provided by Corinth, Corcyra's mother city. Since then relationships between Corinth and Corcyra had broken down.
Tanagra sometimes written Tanagraea, was a town of ancient Boeotia, situated upon the left bank of the Asopus, in a fertile plain, at the distance of 130 stadia from Oropus and 200 from Plataeae. Several ancient writers identified Tanagra with the Homeric Graea; but others supposed them to be distinct places, and Aristotle regarded Oropus as the ancient Graea.
In the First Battle of Tanagra, both sides fought with great bravery; but the Lacedaemonians gained the victory, chiefly through the treacherous desertion of the Thessalians in the very heat of the engagement. At the beginning of the following year(456), and only sixty-two days after their defeat at Tanagra, the Athenians under Myronides again invaded Boeotia, and gained at Oenophyta, in the territory of Tanagra, a brilliant and decisive victory over the Boeotian League, which made them masters of the whole country. The walls of Tanagra were then razed to the ground. The Second Battle of Tanagra was fought in 426. The Athenians made an incursion into the territory of Tanagra, and on their return defeated the Tanagraeans and Boeotians. see Tanagra City
Tegea
Tegea was a settlement in Arcadia, The legendary founder of Tegea was Tegeates, a son of Lycaon. It was one of the most ancient and powerful towns of ancient Arcadia, situated in the southeast of the country. Its territory, called Tegeatis was bounded by Cynuria and Argolis on the east, from which it was separated by Mount Parthenium, by Laconia on the south, by the Arcadian district of Maenalia on the west, and by the territory of Mantineia on the north.
Tegea's struggle against Spartan hegemony in Arcadia came to an end, about 560 and it was forced into some form of collaboration, maybe as one of the earliest members of what would become the Sparta-centered Peloponnesian League. Tegea, however, still retained its independence, though its military force was at the disposal of Sparta; and in the Greco-Persian Wars it appears as the second military power in the Peloponnesus, having the place of honour on the left wing of the allied army. Five hundred of the Tegeatae fought at the Battle of Thermopylae, and 3000 at the Battle of Plataea, half of their force consisting of hoplites and half of light-armed troops. As it was not usual to send the whole force of a city upon a distant march, it is likely that on this occasion as not more than three-fourths of their whole number were dispatched. This would give 4000 for the military population of Tegea, and about 17,400 for the whole free population. Soon after the Battle of Plataea, the Tegeatae were again at war with the Spartans.
TheTegeatae fought twice against the Spartans between 479 and 464, and were each time defeated; first in conjunction with the Argives, and a second time together with the other Arcadians, except the Mantineians at Dipaea, in the Maenalian district. During the Peloponnesian War the Tegeatae were the firm allies of the Spartans, to whom they remained faithful both on account of their possessing an aristocratical constitution, and from their jealousy of the neighbouring democratical city of Mantineia, with which they were frequently at war.
They accompanied the Lacedaemonians in their expedition against Argos in 418. They also fought on the side of the Spartans in the Corinthian War, 394. After the Battle of Leuctra in 371, however, the Spartan party in Tegea was expelled, and the city joined the other Arcadian towns in the foundation of Megalopolis and in the formation of the Arcadian League. They fought under Epaminondas against the Spartans at the great Battle of Mantineia in 362. see Tegea city.
Thrace is a geographical and historical region in Southeast Europe, now split among Bulgaria, Greece, and Turkey, which is bounded by the Balkan Mountains to the north, the Aegean Sea to the south, and the Black Sea to the east. It comprises southeastern Bulgaria (Northern Thrace), northeastern Greece (Western Thrace), and the European part of Turkey (East Thrace). The region's boundaries are based on that of the Roman Province of Thrace; the lands inhabited by the ancient Thracians extended in the north to modern-day Northern Bulgaria and Romania and to the west into the region of Macedonia.
Thermopylae
Thermopylae is a place in Greece where a narrow coastal passage existed in antiquity. It derives its name from its hot sulphur springs. The Hot Gates is "the place of hot springs" and in Greek mythology it is the cavernous entrances to Hades. Thermopylae is world-famous for the battle in 480 that took place there between the Greek forces (notably the Spartans, Lachedemonians, Thebans and Thespians) and the invading Persian forces, commemorated by Simonides in the famous epitaph, "Go tell the Spartans, stranger passing by, That here obedient to their laws we lie." Due to its critical location there were several other battles there. see Thermopylae pass
Toroni was an ancient Greek city on the southwest edge of Sithonia peninsula in Chalkidiki, Greece. The ancient city was founded by Chalkidian settlers probably during the 8th century. Its strategic location and rich resources developed Toroni into one of the most significant cities in Chalkidiki, giving its name to the gulf that forms between Pallene and Sithonia peninsulas. During theGreco-Persian Wars it allied with the Persians, who as a reward gave Olynthus to Kritoboulos, a local ruler, in 479 and later became part of the Athenaean League, contributing one of the highest taxes that reached 12 Attic talents per year, giving an indication of its prosperity. When the Peloponnesian War broke out, the Athenians, fearing a revolt against them, placed a garrison in the city but that did not stop Brasidas, the Spartan general from seizing the city with a surprise attack during the night, before he came to an understanding with the Toronaeans in 423. He then tried to expand the city's walls by including the harbour suburb, before leaving to attack Amphipolis. However, the Athenians recaptured Toroni under Cleon, just before the return of Brasidas, who was 2 miles away. When war ended, Toroni, a leading member of the Olynthian synoecism, became part of the Chalcidian League, which included most of the peninsula's cities. It was besieged by the Athenian General Timotheus by means of cutters attached to the top of masts made to cut open sandbags used in the city's defence.After 348, and the abolition of the league by Phillip, Toroni became part of Macedon.
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