Battle of Salamine

The battles of Salamine is a naval Bataille which opposed in 480 av. J. - C. the Greek fleet carried out by Eurybiade and Thémistocle to the Persian fleet of Xerxès I {{er}}.

The situation the day before the battle and strategy of Thémistocle

The Greek fleet is with damping with the Artémision when starts the battle of the Thermopyles. It must push back besides an attack of the fleet of Xerxès at the time of an extremely undecided battle where several tens of ships are lost. Also the Greek chiefs decide unanimously to leave Artémision, the more so as Léonidas died and that the terrestrial army of the united Greek cities is withdrawn towards the south. In the night, surreptitiously, the fleet directed by Eurybiade borrows the channel of the Eubée and sails towards the south.

The situation for the Greeks is not encouraging, as brings it back Diodore of Sicily. The defeat of Thermopyles, the tender of the Béotie, the catch of Athens sow the discouragement in the spirits. Cléombrote Ier, the brother of Léonidas and king of the Spartans, only thinks of protecting the Peloponnese by construction from a wall towards the Isthme of Corinth. As for the fleet, it settles with Salamine at the request of Thémistocle. This plan, to hold the Isthmus of Corinth and the gulf of Salamine, implies the total abandonment of the Attique, which explains also the catch of Athens, given up by its inhabitants on the councils of Thémistocle.

Thémistocle has a precise plan which it imposes against the opinion of Eurybiade. It is a question of fighting in the narrow roads of Salamine because it is persuaded, rightly, that Persians will not be able to undertake the encircling movement by the wings outlined in Artémision. Moreover it is persuaded that in this narrow master key the enemy ships will be obstructed mutually and will be as many preys for a boarding or a éperonnage by the solids Greek trières. Finally it is persuaded that while cutting the Persian army of its fleet it will make half-turn. It makes the following remarks, brought back by Plutarque:

“You will never manage to stop on ground the flood of this immense army. What one needs it is him to cut the vivres by destroying its fleet of transport. Reduced to the famine, it will not have any more an other choice but to make half-turn. It is your only chance of hello. ”

Eurybiade prefers to defend another point of view of, more circumspect. Now that the Greek fleet ensured the evacuation of the Attique, it is necessary to turn over near the terrestrial forces in order to undertake combined actions. This point of view is shared by the Corinthians, second fleet of the coalition. Thémistocle however receives the support of Egine and of Mégare, he true is directly threatened in the event of return to the Isthmus of Corinth of the Greek fleet. At this point in time Thémistocle, according to Plutarque and Hérodote, uses the trick and forwards a message in Xerxès, via a Greek probably originating in Ionie named Sicinnos, informing it of the desire of escape of part of the Greek generals by the Western master key of bay of still free Éleusis. This operation, we would say misinformation today, functions fully and part of the Persian fleet finishes the surrounding of the Greeks while the small island of Psyttalie is occupied by a detachment with for objective collecting the Persian crews and completing the Greeks when the battle bursts.

Manpower

Which are the manpower engaged in the battle of Salamine? Difficult to answer precisely.

For the Greek forces we can consider that the figure of 350/380 Trière S is credible, which represents the near total of the Greek fleet. In addition to the ships of Athens, more half of the fleet, we have 40 ships of Corinthe, about thirty Égine, between 15 and 20 for cities like Mégare, Sicyone,… the remainder being negligible.

It is for manpower of the fleet of Xerxès that it is more difficult to slice. The ancient historians, such Hérodote, Diodore of Sicily or the Panégyrique of Athens of Isocrate give the figure of 1200 ships. These figures are whimsical and do not seem to take account of the losses undergone at the time of the storms and of the battle of Artémision. Moreover, it is necessary to consider that the Persian fleet must ensure the supply of the army, to keep neuralgic points (straits, deposits,…). It is probably necessary to at least admit a figure from 500 to 600 ships, which makes it possible Xerxès to keep the numerical superiority and to compensate for inferiority with the combat of its troops.

Taken care of weapons

While the Persian fleet finishes in the night the surrounding of the island of Salamine, the Greek generals always tergiversate. However Aristide arrives of Égine, having succeeded in passing through the Persian blockade, and informs Eurybiade and Thémistocle that the blockade is total and that the fleet hardly any more has the choice. From now on any possibility of retirement being crossed it is necessary to fight. The trick of Thémistocle has just succeeded. The tactics used are simple. The narrowness of the strait makes that only the first lines of ships will fight, which destroys the numerical superiority of Persians. The preceding combat terrestrial showed that the value with the combat of the Greeks as well as the armament are higher, which in the case of boarding of the enemy ships is an advantage. Finally the Persian crews, makes of it especially Phéniciens or Ionian, will be tired because having traversed an average distance of ten kilometers for some since their dampings of Phalère.

Two requirements are binding to the Greeks. First of all to settle slightly in on this side strait so that the Persian mass settles in the bottleneck, but also not too much not to move back so that the Persian ships cannot draw advantage from their numerical superiority. It is also necessary to avoid a Persian unloading with Salamine where are taken refuge a big number of Athenians, protected by a detachment from hoplites ordered by Aristide.

Persians also prepare with the battle with in particular this incredible installation of the throne of Xerxès on the slopes of the Aegalée mount which dominate the strait. Little before the paddle the September 29th 480 Xerxès is installed on its throne with its ministers and officers, its secretaries charged to note the brilliant deeds and the faults to punish, and its guard of the Immortal ones. In same time the fleet is put in position. With the right-hand side are Phéniciens of the fleets of Tyr, Sidon directed by the Persian generals Mégabaze and Préxaspe. In the center the body of battle is directed by Achéménès, half-brother of Xerxès, which holds the role of Lord High Admiral and more precisely directs the fleets of Cilicie and Lycie. Finally with the left wing the fleets of Ionie are, of the Pont and Carie directed by a prince achéménide, Ariabignès and where combat Artémise I {{Re}}, queen of Halicarnasse, only having dared to say to Xerxès, a few days before, that it was to better avoid the combat.

The battle

Upon the departure Persians make a wrong movement described thus by Diodore of Sicily:

“the Persian ships kept their row as long as they sailed with the broad one, but while engaging in the channel they were obliged to make leave the line some their ships, which involved a great confusion. ”

Persians make an upward bias of confidence and are disorganized at the beginning of the battle. At this point in time the Greek fleet appears and, without breaking its lines, melts on the Persian ships. There remains a point on which the historians are still in disagreement, it is of knowing which was the axis of the two lines of ships at the time of the impact. For some it is acquired that the Greek fleet is leant in the island of Salamine and that the Persian fleet is aligned more or less parallel to the shore of the Attique. For others on the contrary the Greek fleet entirely bars the strait what gives then an axis of battle perpendicular to the axis of the strait. This second assumption seems most commonly allowed at present. In any event, whatever was the alignment of the fleets at the beginning of the battle, the principal action proceeds in the throttling of the strait of Salamine and in the two channels spared by the small island of Psyttalie between Salamine and the Attic.

The Greek right wing, directed by Eurybiade, and consisted of the ships lacédémoniens, Corinthians and éginètes, flanche at the beginning and moves back temporarily, under the probable hootings of the civilians massed on the shores of the island of Salamine. Thémistocle directs, him, all the remainder of the fleet, namely in the center the fleets of Mégare, Chalcis and of the Athenian ships, and especially on the left wing a homogeneous fleet of approximately 120 Athenian trières. Vis-a-vis them their old adversaries, Phéniciens are held.

Hérodote thus tells the release of this battle:

“the Athenian Aminias de Pallène, sailing apart from the line, ran up against a Persian vessel and could not get clear; the remainder of the fleet going to its help, the fray started. But, in addition, Eginètes claim that it was the vessel sent to Égine which engaged the fight. ”

This competition of glory is the translation of an old conflict between the two cities but also the translation of an established fact: Athenians and Éginètes were the burning adversaries of the Greek at the time of the battle. It should not be believed besides that bravery is only side of the Athenians and their allies. The presence of Xerxès Ier which supervises the battle, its severity in the repression of the cowards or the incompetents, the competitions between Greeks, make that the Greeks of Ionie serve very honestly the Perses and fight with eagerness. Sailors of Samos like Théomestor or Phylacos, the son of Histiée, run Greek ships and will receive later many rewards of Xerxès. One needs all the skill of the sailors of Égine to contain the attack of the ships of Ariabignès.

However the combativeness of the Greeks of Ionie, or the Phéniciens vis-a-vis Thémistocle on the left wing, is not enough to counterbalance the initial error which had been the disorder introduced into their lines as of before the attack. The scuffle, panic result many Persian ships in presenting the side instead of the prow what in a combat with the spur is crippling especially vis-a-vis Greeks who succeed in holding their alignment. The Athenians apply a particularly effective operation of sawing - an attack ahead then retreat to take dash and to set out again forwards without deviating of the axis of attack - which sows devastation in the rows phenicians.

The battle is already committed when a breeze marinades rises - according to Plutarque - which gene not the Greek ships whose superstructures are relatively low but disadvantage clearly the boats in particular phenicians whose poop is high and the elevated tillac. If it is not very plausible that Thémistocle awaited this breeze to approach the Persian fleet, the more so as it did not have the choice of the hour of engagement, he is on the other hand extremely possible which he waited this favourable moment to engage his reserves which, the breeze helping, complete to sow the distress in the unfavourable rows.

The disaster proves to be irremediable when during the combat the fleet of Xerxès loses one of its commanders admirals: Ariabignès, the brother of the Large King, is killed by a javelin while going up to the boarding of a Greek trière. Its body is fished out by the Artémise queen of Halicarnasse which will carry it to Xerxès. This woman, who had disadvised the battle, realizes that all is lost. But it is full with resources, in the absence of scruples, and does not hesitate to get clear to run the ship of Damasithymos, king de Calynda (in Lycie). More surprising is that it accepted praises of Xerxès for this feat of arms because in confusion it appeared that she had just run an enemy ship. It is not very probable that much Calydiens survived to show it. It is in connection with this episode that one lends to Xerxès the famous sentence:

“ My men became women and my wives of the men. ”

At the evening of the battle

The stampede becomes general but the problem is to be able to leave the bow net which the tangle of ships in the narrow narrow part of Salamine constitutes to join the damping of Phalère. The backward flow of the Persian boats is carried out in the most complete disorder at the end of the day, the battle having lasted approximately twelve hours. Aristide, with the head of a detachment of Hoplites, unloads on the small island of Psyttalie and destroys the troops there that Xerxès had made install the night before. As for Xerxès itself it had to undoubtedly leave in a rather fast way its observatory because the Athenians seized in the evening its throne, that many years later one showed with pride with the pilgrims in the Parthenon.

However Thémistocle does not wish to continue the Persian fleet in open sea because in spite of the disaster it probably preserves its numerical superiority. It seems that the Greeks immediately do not include/understand the range of their victory and that they expect a new attack the following day. The Persian fleet quite unable, is demoralized of it by this disaster. The crews take refuge with Phalère under the protection of the Army while the Egyptian ships which had sailed round the island of Salamine by the south to block the western entry of the strait return without being to them-also worried. The come evening silence reconsiders the place of this battle like writes it Eschyle in Persians :

“ a complaint interfered sobs only reigns on the sea with broad until the hour when the night with the dark face comes all to stop. ”

At the time of this battle, Persians lost at least 200 trières, without counting those fallen to the hands winners, and the Greeks forty…

Shortly after Salamine

The situation after the defeat cuisante of Salamine is not therefore desperate for the Perses. Their Army intact if the troops are excluded, not very important, is massacred on the small island of Psyttalie by the hoplites of Aristide. The Persian fleet remains, in spite of its losses, higher in tonnage and the immense resources of the empire can allow the construction of many ships whereas for the Greek , the destruction of the building sites of the Attique is an irreplaceable loss. This is why the attitude of Xerxès I {{er}} after the battle poses many interrogations and that as of the Antiquité where one speaks about the pusillanimity of the Large King. Indeed, leaving the command of its army with Mardonios, his/her brother-in-law, that which directed already the forwarding of 492, Xerxès gives up his troops to turn over towards its capitals Suse and Persépolis.

It takes in that the advice of Mardonios and about the queen Artémise I {{er}} of Halicarnasse, namely to leave in Greece an important army, Hérodote speaks about 300 000 men what is undoubtedly excessive, which will winter in continental Greece, then to attack the Peloponnese in spring. As for Xerxès its presence is not useful any more, since its main objective is achieved, namely the destruction of Athens. This presentation of the facts makes it possible to the Persian king to save appearances and not to turn over in its empire in overcome. Xerxès passes the Hellespont in the last days of the year 480 not without difficulty because Thraces, made furious by the requisitions of the summer, launch many raids on the Persian troops.

As for the winners they are surprised by the inaction of the Perses and do not seem to initially include/understand the width of their success. When it appears that Persians make retirement, Thémistocle in the euphoria of the victory proposes to cut the road of the Asia in Xerxès while crossing the Égée. But Aristide and Eurybiade objects prudence. Moreover Greeks lost in Salamine more than 40 ships and only their adversaries can replace them also quickly. Lastly, to also send all the fleet far from Greece whereas the refugees of Athens are still on the island of Salamine and that the Greek coasts are not protected is rather hazardous. The season finally becomes dangerous for navigation. For Aristide a possible defeat of Athens would make the play of Sparte, the more so as Sparte is finishing the wall which bars the isthmus of the Peloponnese and thus any more the Persian threat with same acuity does not feel.

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