In 480 BC, Xerxes the Great, the fourth king of the Achaemenid Empire, launched the largest invasion the Greek world had yet faced. Xerxes’s father Darius I had already attempted to subdue Greece but was defeated at the Battle of Marathon in 490 BC. Xerxes inherited both the empire and the unfinished ambition.
After suppressing revolts in Egypt and Babylon, he spent years preparing a massive expedition. Bridges of boats were constructed across the Hellespont (modern Dardanelles), and a canal was dug through the Athos peninsula to prevent naval disasters like the one that had wrecked an earlier Persian fleet.
The Battle of Salamis by Wilhelm von Kaulbach (1804-1874).
In the spring of 480 BC, Xerxes crossed into Europe with what ancient sources describe as an immense multinational army drawn from across the Persian Empire. Many Greek states submitted without resistance. Others—most notably Athens and Sparta—formed a defensive alliance.
The first major stand came at the Battle of Thermopylae, where a small Greek force led by Leonidas I attempted to block the Persian advance. After several days of fighting, the Greeks were outflanked and defeated. Around the same time, the Persian navy engaged the Greeks at Artemisium.
With central Greece exposed, Xerxes marched south and captured Athens. Despite these victories, Xerxes struggled to control the sea. The Greek fleet, commanded in large part by Athenian leadership, lured the Persian navy into the narrow straits near Salamis.
At the Battle of Salamis (480 BC), the larger Persian fleet was defeated by the more manoeuvrable Greek ships. The loss was a strategic blow. Concerned about supply lines and the safety of his bridges across the Hellespont, Xerxes returned to Asia, leaving a substantial army behind under Mardonius.
Credit: Wikimedia Commons
At the same time, the Persian general Artabazus was operating in the north with a large force—Herodotus says 60,000 men—tasked with securing the region and suppressing resistance.
Many cities in Chalcidice had submitted to Persia, but one city in particular refused to submit: Potidaea.
Potidaea stood on the narrow isthmus of the Pallene peninsula in Chalcidice, commanding access to the fertile lands and maritime routes of the northern Aegean. Though originally founded by Corinth, it had come under Athenian influence and was strategically important to both sides.
Herodotus reports that the Persians suspected the people of Potidaea of plotting rebellion. The suspicion, he says, arose because the Potidaeans had shown signs of disloyalty and were believed to be conspiring with other Greeks.
Artabazus therefore marched against the city and decided to lay siege to it. The Persians encamped and waited, expecting either surrender or an opportunity to storm the city. The decisive moment came when the Persians noticed an unusually extreme low tide. Herodotus emphasizes that the sea withdrew farther than anyone had ever seen before. A broad stretch of seabed was suddenly exposed.
Map of ancient Chalcidice, showing peninsula of Pallene and Potidaea. Credit: Wikimedia Commons
Seeing what appeared to be an opportunity, the Persian troops advanced across the newly uncovered ground, intending to approach the city walls from that direction. Then, without warning, the sea returned in a great surge, far more violently than ordinary tides.
Herodotus describes it as a massive wave that swept back over the exposed seabed, drowning many of the Persian soldiers who had ventured out. Those who could not swim perished. The force of the water caused chaos and heavy losses. The Persian assault collapsed instantly.
The phenomenon described by Herodotus matches the classic sequence of a tsunami: an initial withdrawal of water followed by a destructive surge. While earlier tsunamis undoubtedly occurred, this is the earliest known written record of one.
Modern geological studies suggest that the tsunami could be caused by a submarine earthquake in the Aegean, as this region is indeed prone to seismic sea waves. The narrow topography of the Gulf of Thermaikos and the Chalkidiki peninsulas could have amplified such an event.
To the Greeks, the tsunami was no random event. Herodotus frames it as divine justice. He reports that the Persians had desecrated temples and statues of Poseidon earlier in their campaign. Poseidon, god of the sea and earthquakes, was believed to have exacted vengeance.
The story, if true, is a remarkable one. A rare and catastrophic natural phenomenon struck at precisely the moment when an invading army was most vulnerable. A city on the brink of subjugation was spared not by reinforcements or superior arms, but by the sudden violence of the sea.
After the seize failed, Artabazus abandoned the effort and withdrew. Potidaea retained its freedom, and was able to send a contingent of 300 men to the Greek league that fought at Plataea.
At the Battle of Plataea, the Persian land army under Mardonius was decisively defeated by a coalition of Greek forces led primarily by Sparta. On the same day, the Persian fleet suffered another defeat at Mycale in Asia Minor.
These twin losses ultimately broke Persian power in mainland Greece and effectively ended the invasion.
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