Sassanid Persians Analysis

The Role of Themistocles in the Greek Defeat of the Persians in 480 - 479 BC.

The reasons for the Greek victory against the Persians in 490 to 480/479 BC was a mixture of exceptional leadership, skilful tactics and strategy, superior weapons and soldiers, and Greek unity. Strong leadership was the most important aspect of the Greek defence, as without the intelligence and bravery of the leaders, the Greeks would have been easily defeated. As a result of the excellent leadership; Greek tactics, strategy, and unity were greatly strengthened. Combined with their better weapons and soldiers, the Greeks held the advantage and seized opportunities at the perfect moment. Also, with each

The Persian Wars were a series of conflicts fought between the Greek states and the Persian Empire from 500-449 BC. It started in 500 BC, when a few Greek city-states on the coast of Asia Minor, who were under the control of the Persian Empire, revolted against the despotic rule of the Persian king Darius. Athens and Eretria in Euboea gave aid to these Greek cities but not enough, and they were subdued by the Persians. The Persians became determined to conquer Hellas and make Athens and Eretria pay for helping the Ionian cities. In 492 BC, the first Persian invasion had its fleet crippled by a storm before it could do any damage. King Darius sent another Persian expedition in 490 which destroyed

The pre-eminence of the Greek soldier proved decisive in the Battle of Marathon. Although only ‘citizen soldiers’, the Greek hoplites were far more disciplined than their Persian counterparts and also better protected, with their bronze-visored helmets, solid bronze breastplates, shields and javelins. The Persians on the contrary were generally lightly dressed, with wicker shields and bows and arrows and sometimes had body armour of scales sewn to leather vest. Herodotus states that the Persians were “deficient in armour, untrained and greatly inferior in skill”. This crucial element destabilized the Persian assault as they fell at the hands of a much more skillful, better equipped and tactically superior Greek army. With their unprecedented use of battle strategy and intimate knowledge of their surroundings, the Greeks were able to defeat their Persian enemy.

By the fifth century, the “powerhouse of the Mediterranean” was struggling to protect itself with its decreased population, apathetic military, and leaders with debauched morals. Outside of the Roman Empire, Germanic tribes took notice of the internal chaos and began invading the empire’s borders. Many of the tribes were cruel and combative, such as the Huns. The Huns “exceed any definition of savagery” and were “fired with an overwhelming desire for seizing the property of others, these swift-moving and ungovernable people make their destructive way amid the pillage and slaughter of those who live around them.” (Document D, excerpts about an Asian tribe called the Huns from Roman History by Ammianus Marcellinus). Roman soldiers would have had a challenge ahead of them if they had to deal with the Huns at the height of the Roman military, let alone having to fight them when their numbers were depleted and motivation running low. The Huns played a large part in minimizing what little hope Rome had of reviving itself into the Mediterranean-dominating empire it once was. Many other tribes followed the Huns example and invaded Rome at its borders. Document C, a map created from various sources,

1.The word “barbarian” that we use today was a way of categorizing humans back in the Roman Empire ages.

In the picture on Document C * it shows How accessible the Roman empire borders were. This helps explain how Rome was an easy target and that it’s foreign population increased and became hard to control and keep them out. In Document B, * “So our soldiers fought the Goths without any protection for chest and head and were often beaten by archers”. When the Romans gave up their armor, it made it easy for the invaders to wipe them out. In Document E, * “[He]… considered his new life… better than his old life among the Romans, and the reasons he gave were as follows: … The conditions of [Roman] subjects in time of peace [is worse than war]”. So this shows that the Romans did not want to be Roman and that they would rather be captured then live under the Roman

Barbarians was a nickname given by the Romans to the various Germanic tribes, the settled Gauls, and the raiding Huns because of their ferocious way of invading other tribes and empires. Barbarians is a word given to a human who is perceived to be either uncivilized or primitive. The barbarians during this ancient time frame, were able to conquer and defeat many empires for many years because of their very strong and inhumane use of brute force to get the job done and strike fear in peoples minds.

One of the invaders were the Huns. According to a document written by a Roman historian, the Huns were defined as savagery. The Huns were like wild animals. They barely got off their horses, which made a battle between an army fighting on foot easier to win. The Huns weren’t the only invaders who invaded the Roman Empire. There were the Vandals, Visigoths, Saxons and the Angles. All of these invaders had the advantage to conquer the Empire, since the Roman army were quite easy to destroy. It was said that without these invaders, there was a chance that the Roman Empire would be able to last a bit longer than when it

Barbarians simply meant foreigners. By the 1200 “barbarian” was a much more negative term referring to people who lived beyond the reach of civilization, people who were savage, evil. The Mongols were barbaric with the amount of land they conquered, laws, and punishments. The barbarians were barbaric in many different ways.

Based on what I’ve read I don’t believe that there is an honest yes or no answer to the question, “Can these nomads be called barbarians?” According to Salvian, a Christian priest, he says, “.. almost all barbarians, at least those who are of one race and kin, love each other, while the Romans persecute each other.” However, many of these reads go into detail about the nomadic people never sparing the people of which they conquered or went to war with, and killing them all off one by one. As for the change over time; there was one. After the fall of Rome when the nomadic people took over around 476 CE they kept the same Roman customs, but began introducing nomadic ways of life that, over time, turned out to not be barbaric at all. Over the course of many years you will see the Romans perspective of the nomads and their culture began to change over the course of many years, and after the Fall of Rome.

In 480 BC, when the Persian horde, estimated by some historians to range from 300,000 to 1.7 million soldiers, landed on the shores of Thermopylae, the Persian King Xerxes sent emissaries to the leaders of the Greek city-states demanding their surrender and patronage to the Persian Empire (Frye, 2006). Despite the massive threat that was encamped on the shores off the Gulf of Maliakos in small town known as Trachis, the Greeks refused. Sparta, known for their superior military might, were chosen by the Greek leaders to lead a coalition of Greek warriors to defend their homeland from the invading Persian army (Frye, 2006).

The definition of civilization or whether a culture is considered civilized or not has been argued throughout the course of history. Groups such as the Mongols, the ethnic groups surrounding the Roman Empire, and just about every group of people not part of a large, unified, strong empire in ancient history especially, has been thought of by their “superior” empire peoples as barbaric and uncivilized. Through the comparison of Tacitus’s Germania, and Sima Qian’s Account of the Xiongnu, it has been established that Tacitus paints a the Germans as a simple, and barbaric uncivilized group of people, whereas Sima Qian looks at the Xingu as barbarians, but respects them as a power a bit more. This is in regards to how children are trained, military tactics used, traditional family life, and the availability and use of resources of these certain ethnic groups. Although there are some similarities between Tacitus and Sima Qian’s portrayal of different ethnic groups, there were also some distinct differences between the ways both authors portrayed their enemy neighbors. Specifically, Sima Qian does not try to show his bias of superiority of the Han Chinese Empire as much as Tacitus’s more blatant belief that the Roman Empire is far superior to the Germanic tribes in the north. Stronger groups tend to look down on the weaker groups over the course of history, and while I don’t find any civilization mentioned in these readings to be necessarily

Similar to the Roman Empire the Persian Empire stretched across vast lands without any serious rivalry. At the height of the empire it stretched across, not only, Asia, from the Aegean to the Indus River, but also included part of the continent of Africa. We get the word, Persia, from the Greek word Parsa meaning, “Above reproach”. The Persians unlike most other Empires would be ruled under a benevolent ruler. This would bring a large amount of cultural diffusion to the Empire. The empires history is separated into three historical periods: Old Persia (600-300 B.C.E), Middle Persia (300-800 B.C.E.) and modern Persia (800-Present). The height or the Empire was reached around 500 B.C.E. (Ancient and Medieval History

When most people hear the word “Barbarian” they often think about the negative things that barbarians have done instead of the positive things that barbarians have done. It is stated in the section titled “Were the Barbarians a Negative or Positive Factor,”