Battle of Plataea facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Battle of Plataea
Part of the Greco-Persian Wars
The Greek world at the time of the battle
Date August 479 BC Location Plataea, Greece Result Decisive Greek victory. Territorial changes Persia loses control of Attica and Boeotia.
Belligerents
Greek city-states	Achaemenid Empire
Commanders and leaders
Pausanias	Mardonius  †
Strength
110,000 (Herodotus) 100,000 (Pompeius) ~40,000 (Modern consensus)	300,000 (Herodotus) 70,000–120,000 (Modern consensus, including Greek allies)
Casualties and losses
10,000+ (Ephorus and Diodorus) 1,360 (Plutarch) 159 (Herodotus)	257,000 (Herodotus)

Starting lineup

Battle lines

The Battle of Plataea was the final land battle during the second Persian invasion of Greece. It was a decisive victory for the Greeks as it ended that war. The battle was in 479 BC near the city of Plataea in Boeotia. It was fought between the Greek allies (the city-states, of Sparta, Athens, Corinth and Megara), and the Persian Empire of Xerxes I.

The previous year, the Persian invasion force, led by the Xerxes in person, won the Battles of Thermopylae and Artemisium, and conquered Thessaly, Boeotia and Attica. However, at the last-ditch naval Battle of Salamis, the Allied Greek navy had won a surprise victory, and that stopped the conquest of the whole Peloponnesus. Xerxes then returned home with some of his army, leaving his general Mardonius to finish off the Greeks the next year.

In the summer of 479 BC, the Greeks got together a huge army by the standards of the day, and marched out of the Peloponnesus. The Persians retreated to Boeotia, and built a fortified camp near Plataea. The Greeks refused to be drawn into the open cavalry ground near the Persian camp, and this led to a stalemate which lasted eleven days. When their supply lines were disrupted, the Greeks retreated a distance, and their battle-line fragmented. Mardonius thought the Greeks were in full retreat, and ordered his men to pursue them. The Greeks (particularly the Spartans, Tegeans and Athenians) turned and gave battle, routing the lightly armed Persian infantry and killing Mardonius.

Much of the Persian army were caught in their camp, and slaughtered. The destruction of this army, and the remnants of the Persian navy, allegedly on the same day at the Battle of Mycale, ended the invasion. After Plataea and Mycale, the Greek allies would take the offensive against the Persians, marking a new phase of the Greco-Persian Wars. Although Plataea was in every sense a decisive victory, it does not seem (even at the time) to have been as famous as the Athenian victory at the Battle of Marathon or even the Allied defeat at Thermopylae.

Legacy

The Serpent Column dedicated by the victorious Greeks

Monuments to the battle

A bronze column in the shape of intertwined snakes (the Serpent column) was created from melted-down Persian weapons, and was erected at Delphi. It commemorated all the Greek city-states that had participated in the battle, listing them on the column, and thus confirming some of Herodotus's claims. Most of it still survives in the Hippodrome of Constantinople (present-day Istanbul), where it was carried by Constantine the Great during the founding of his city on the Greek colony of Byzantium.

Images for kids

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  The Achaemenid Empire and its allied Greek states (Macedonia, Thessaly, Malis, Locris, Phocis and Boeotia) at the time of the Battle of Plataea.

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  Movements of the Persian and Greek armies in 480–479 BC

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  Answer of Aristides to the ambassadors of Mardonius: "As long as the sun holds to its present course, we shall never come to terms with Xerxes".

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  Death of Masistius in early skirmishes.

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  The Spartan general Pausanias commanded the Allied Greek troops.

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  Disposition of Achaemenid troops beyond the Asopos river at the beginning of the Battle of Plataea. From left to right: Greek allies, Sacae, Indians, Bactrians, Medes and Persians.

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  Aristides, commander of the Athenians, informed by Alexander I of Macedon (a nominal ally of the Achaemenids) that delaying the encounter with the Persians would help further diminish their already low supplies. Battle of Plataea, 479 BC.

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  The battlefield of Plataea from the Achaemenid (northern) side.

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  Pausanias offering sacrifice to the Gods before the battle

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  Scene of the Battle of Plataea. 19th century illustration.

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  Scene of the Battle of Plataea on the south frieze of the Temple of Athena Nike, Athens. The scene on the right may show the fight over the body of Masistius. British Museum.

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  Greek hoplite and Persian warrior depicted fighting on an ancient kylix. 5th century BC

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  Coin of Alexander I of Macedon in the decade following the Battle of Plataea and the departure of Achaemenid forces (struck in 480/79-470 BC).

See also

In Spanish: Batalla de Platea para niños