Miletus soon fell after the victory of Ladé, and the Phoenician fleet was then employed for some time in chastising the islanders who had taken part in the revolt, and in reducing various towns upon the European shores of the Hellespont, the Propontis, and the Bosphorus, including Perinthus, Selymbria, and Byzantium.[14288] Miltiades, the destined hero of Marathon, narrowly escaped capture at the hands of the Phoenicians at this time, as he fled from his government in the Thracian Chersonese to Athens. The vessel which bore him just escaped into the harbour of Imbrus; but his son, Metiochus, who was on board a worse sailer, was less fortunate. The Phoenicians captured him, and, learning who he was, conveyed him to Darius at Susa, where he was well treated and became a naturalised Persian.[14289]
After the Ionian revolt had been completely put down and avenged, the states subject to Persia, and the Phoenicians among them, enjoyed a brief period of repose. But soon the restless spirit which possessed all the earlier Persian monarchs incited Darius to carry his warlike enterprises into “fresh fields and pastures new.” From the eastern coast of the Ægean Sea he looked out towards a land possessing every attraction that soil or clime could offer, fertile, rich in minerals, and with many excellent harbours, well watered, abounding in corn and wine and oil, in wooded hillsides, and in productive plains. According to Herodotus,[14290] he had already explored the strength and weakness of the region by means of a commission of Persian nobles, who had surveyed all the shores of Greece from the decks of Phoenician ships. The result was that he coveted the possession of the land thus made known to him, and came to a fixed resolution that he would add it to his territories.
There were two modes by which Greece might be approached from Asia. Bridges of boats could be thrown across the Bosphorus or the Hellespont, mere salt rivers, scarcely more formidable than the streams of the Euphrates and the Tigris. In this way Europe could be invaded in force, and the army sent across the straits, could pursue its way along the shore till it reached the rich plains of Thessaly, and from Thessaly passed into Boetia, Attica, and the Peloponnese. Or a fleet, with a land force on board, might proceed from Asia Minor across the Ægean, where the numerous islands, scattered at short intervals, seemed to have been arranged by nature as stepping-stones, whereby the adventurous denizens of either continent might cross easily into the other; and a landing might be suddenly effected near the very heart of Greece without a tenth part of the trouble that must be taken if the other line of route were pursued. In either case the attendance of a fleet would be necessary. If the more circuitous route were pursued, a powerful squadron must attend the march of the army along the shore, to convey its supplies; if the direct route were preferred, a still larger fleet would be necessary for the conveyance, not only of the supplies, but of the army itself. Darius gave a trial to each of the two plans. In the year B.C. 492 he sent a fleet and army under Mardonius by way of the Hellespont and the European coast; but this expedition met with severe disasters, the fleet being shattered by a storm off Mount Athos, and the land force greatly damaged by a night attack on the part of the Thracians.[14291] Two years later he dispatched the famous expedition under Datis and Artaphernes, which took its course through the islands, and landed perhaps 200,000 men on the plain of Marathon,[14292] but being there defeated by Miltiades, returned hastily to Asia by the sea route. The fleets employed on both these occasions were numerous,[14293] and appear to have been collected from several of the Persian maritime states;[14294] the proportion which the several contingents bore one to another is not stated, but there can be little doubt that the Phoenicians contributed the greater number. We have no details of the conduct of the Phoenicians on either occasion, beyond a casual notice that in the expedition of Datis and Artaphernes one of their vessels plundered the temple of Delium on the Boeotian coast opposite Chalcis, carrying off from it an image of Apollo plated with gold.[14295] The superstition of Datis deprived them of this valuable booty; but we may safely conclude from the anecdote that, while rendering service to Persia, the keen-witted mariners took care not to neglect their own material interests.
In the third and greatest of the expeditions conducted by Persia against Greece, the Phoenicians are found to have played a very important and prominent part. Even before the expedition commenced, a call was made upon them in connection with it for services of an unusual character. The loss of the fleet of Mardonius off Mount Athos induced Xerxes to determine on cutting a ship-canal through the isthmus which joins Athos to the mainland; and his passion for great and striking achievements caused him to project the construction of a double bridge of boats across the Hellespont. Phoenician technical skill was invoked for the furtherance of both objects. At Athos they worked in conjunction with the maritime states generally, but showed an amount of engineering knowledge far in advance of their fellow-labourers. The others attempted to give perpendicular sides to their portions of the excavation, but found the sides continually fall in, and so (as Herodotus observes) “had double labour."[14296] The Phoenicians alone knew that the sides must be sloped at an angle, and, calculating the proper slope aright, performed their share of the task without mishap. At the Hellespont the Phoenicians had for co-partners the Egyptians only, and the two nations appear to have displayed an equal ability.[14297] Cables were passed from shore to shore, made taut by capstans and supported by an almost continuous line of boats; planks were then laid upon the cables, and covered with brushwood, while a thick layer of earth was placed upon the top. A solid causeway was thus formed, which was guarded on either side by bulwarks of such a height that the horses which crossed the bridge could not see over them; and thus the cavalry and the sumpter beasts passed from one continent to the other without a suspicion that they had ever had anything but terra firma under them. The structure served its purpose, but was not found strong enough to defy even for a year the forces of the winds and waves. Before the return of Xerxes, towards the close of B.C. 480, the autumnal gales had broken it up; and the army which accompanied him had to re-cross the strait in a number of separate ships.[14298]
The fleet which Xerxes collected to accompany his land army and take part in his great expedition amounted, it is said, to a total of 1207 vessels.[14299] Of these the Phoenician triremes were at once the most numerous and the best. While Egypt furnished 200 ships, Cyprus 150, Cilicia, Ionia, and the Hellespontine Greeks 100 each, and the other maritime nations, all together, 257, Phoenicia singly contributed no fewer than 300.[14300] The superiority of the Phoenician vessels was sufficiently shown, first by the regatta at Abydos, which was won by a Sidonian trireme;[14301] next, by the preference of Xerxes for Phoenician over other vessels;[14302] and, thirdly, by the position assigned them at Salamis, where care was taken to pit them against the Athenians,[14303] who were recognised as superior at sea to all the other Greeks. If the Phoenician prowess and naval skill did not succeed in averting defeat from the Persians, we must ascribe it first to the narrowness of the seas in which they had to engage the enemy; and, secondly, to the still greater prowess and skill of their principal antagonists, the Athenians, the Eginetans, and the Corinthians.
In the naval combats at Artemisium, the Egyptians, according to Herodotus,[14304] were considered to have borne off the palm on the Persian side; but Diodorus assigns that honour to the Sidonians.[14305] At Salamis the brunt of the conflict fell on the Phoenician contingent, which began the battle,[14306] and for some time forced the Athenian squadron to beat a retreat, but was ultimately overpowered and forced to take to flight, after suffering great losses. A large number of the ships were sunk; several were taken by the Greeks; comparatively few escaped from the battle without serious injury.[14307] Xerxes, however, who from his silver-footed throne on Mount Ægaleos surveyed the scene,[14308] but, amid the general turmoil and confusion, could ill distinguish the conduct of the several contingents, enraged at the loss of the battle, and regarding the Phoenicians as answerable for the unhappy result, since they formed the nucleus and chief strength of the fleet, laid the whole blame of the failure upon them, and, on some of the captains appearing before him to excuse themselves, had them beheaded upon the spot.[14309] At the same time he also threatened the other Phoenician commanders with his vengeance, and so alarmed them that, according to Diodorus,[14310] they quitted the fleet and sailed away to Asia.
This harsh and unjust treatment seems to have led to an estrangement between the Persians and the foremost of the naval nations subject to them, which lasted for fifteen years. The Persians naturally distrusted those whom they had injured, and were unwilling to call them in to their aid. The Phoenicians probably brooded over their wrongs, and abstained from volunteering an assistance which they were not asked to furnish. The war between Persia and Greece continued, and was transferred from Europe to Asia, but no Phoenicians are mentioned as taking part in it. The Phoenician ships retired from Samos on the approach of the Greek fleet under Leotychides.[14311] No Phoenicians fought at Mycale. None are heard of as engaged at Sestos, or Byzantium, or Eïon, or Doriscus, or even Phaselis. It was not until—in B.C. 465—the war passed from the Ægean to the southern coast of Asia Minor, and their dependency, Cyprus, was threatened, that the Phoenicians again appeared upon the scene, and mustered in strength to the support of their Persian suzerain.
The Persian fleet which fought at the Eurymedon is said to have consisted of three hundred and forty vessels, drawn from the three subject nations of the Phoenicians, the Cyprians, and the Cilicians.[14312] It was under the command of Tithraustes, a son of Xerxes. Cimon, who led the fleet of the Athenians and their allies, attacked it with a force of 250 triremes, of which Athens had furnished the greater number. The battle was contested with extreme obstinacy on both sides; but at length the Athenians prevailed, and besides destroying a large number of the enemy’s vessels, took as many as a hundred with their crews on board. At the same time a land victory was gained over the Persian troops. The double exploit was regarded as one of the most glorious in the annals of Greece, and was commemorated at Delos by a tablet with the following inscription:—[14313]
Since first the sea Europe from Asia severed,
\ And Mars to rage ‘mid humankind began,
Never was such a blow as this delivered
\ On land and sea at once by mortal man.
These heroes did to death a host of Medes
\ Near Cyprus, and then captured with their crews
\ Five score Phoenician vessels; at the news
All Asia groaned, hard hit by such brave deeds.
It is scarcely necessary to follow further in detail the services which Phoenicia rendered to Persia as her submissive and attached ally. For the space of about seventy-five years from the date of the engagement at the Eurymedon (B.C. 465-390), the Phoenicians continued to hold the first place among the Persian naval states, and to render their mistress effective help in all her naval enterprises. They protected Cyprus and Egypt from the Athenian attacks, bore their part in the war with Amyrtæus and Inaros, and more than once inflicted severe blows upon the Athenian navy.[14314] It was his command of a Phoenician fleet amounting to nearly a hundred and fifty triremes which enabled Tissaphernes to play so influential a part in Asia Minor during the later years of the Peloponnesian war. It was the presence of their ships at Cnidus which, in B.C. 394, turned the scale between Athens and Sparta, enabling the Athenians to recover the naval supremacy which they had lost at Ægos-Potami. It was the appearance of a Phoenician fleet in Greek waters[14315] which, in the following year, gave an opportunity to the Athenians to rebuild their “Long Walls,” alarmed Sparta for her own safety, and extorted from her fears—in B.C. 387—the agreement known as “the Peace of Antalcidas.” Persia owed to her Phoenician subjects the glory of recovering complete possession of Asia Minor, and of being accepted as a sort of final arbiter in the quarrels of the Grecian states. From B.C. 465 to B.C. 392 Phoenicia served Persia with rare fidelity, never hesitating to lend her aid, and never showing the least inclination to revolt.