The Ionian Revolt
The Ionian Revolt erupted in 499 BCE when Aristagoras, tyrant of Miletus, encouraged the Ionian Greek cities to throw off Persian domination. The immediate trigger was a failed expedition against Naxos, which Aristagoras had proposed to the Persian satrap Artaphernes. Facing disgrace, Aristagoras chose rebellion instead. Aristagoras sailed to mainland Greece seeking support. Sparta refused, but Athens sent twenty ships and Eretria sent five — a fateful decision that Darius I of Persia would not forget. In 498 BCE the Ionians and their allies marched inland and burned Sardis, the satrapal capital, though the citadel held. The burning of Sardis enraged Darius and gave the Persian war a moral dimension of revenge. Persian forces gradually reasserted control. They defeated the Ionian fleet at the Battle of Lade in 494 BCE, where Samian and Lesbian ships deserted, collapsing the rebel coalition. Miletus was then besieged, captured, and its population enslaved or deported — an act of exemplary punishment that shocked the Greek world. Herodotus records that an Athenian playwright was fined for producing a tragedy about the fall of Miletus because the audience wept too openly. By 493 BCE the revolt was over. The Persian general Mardonius then reorganized Ionian governance, paradoxically replacing tyrants with democratic constitutions in the subject cities. The revolt failed militarily but succeeded in provoking Persian westward expansion, making the later invasions of Greece almost inevitable.
- Year: 499 BCE
- Category: Military
