Their capital was captured after The Battle of Thermopylae, so with long odds, the Athenians decided to put it all on the line at the Battle of Salamis.

In the summer of BC 481, a delegation from Athens arrived at Delphi in central Greece to consult with the oracle of Apollo. The Sanctuary was always crowded with people seeking advice from the god, or perhaps a glimpse into an uncertain future. The oracle was located in the temple of Apollo, a building perched on a slope that was reached by a winding Sacred Way. The Sacred Way was lined with splendid marble buildings, including treasuries where votive offerings and other objects of value were stored.

It was a magnificent display, mute but eloquent testimony to the shrine’s fame and influence, but the Athenians were in no mood for sightseeing. King Xerxes of Persia was making preparations to invade Greece; even now his forces were marshaling and a mighty armada was being assembled. Nine years earlier, the Athenians had defeated a Persian invasion force at Marathon sent by Xerxes’ father, Darius. It was a setback Xerxes was not likely to forgive, much less forget. It was clear Athens was going to be a special target of the Great King’s ire.

Apollo’s prophecies were given substance through a medium called the Pythia. Accounts differ slightly, but apparently she was seated on a tripod near the omphalos (navel), a stone that was said to mark the center of the world. Some say she chewed laurel leaves, others that she inhaled burning laudanum, or even breathed vapors issuing from a rock cleft. Whatever means were used, the Pythia fell into a trance, and while in the trance babbled incoherently. These ravings were messages from Apollo, and were duly recorded by nearby priests for translation.

A Grim Future for Greece

Aristonice the Pythia took her seat, separated from the Athenian petitioners by a veil. She soon fell into a stupor, then began raving in a voice that none could understand. The gibberish was carefully recorded, and when the message was translated it was far from comforting. “Leave your homes,” it began, “and fly to the ends of the earth.” The message continued that “all is lost,” and prophesied that “many shrines of the gods” would meet a “fiery destruction.”

The Athenians’ blood ran cold; here was a dire prediction of utter ruin. Stomachs knotted with anxiety, faces downcast, they left the temple in a state of deep depression. But one, Timon, a man who lived in Delphi and probably was attached to the Temple of Apollo in some way, told the Athenians to try again. If they returned with an olive branch, a token of supplication, maybe Apollo would reconsider his harsh words.

Is There any Hope?

They did as advised, and Aristonice delivered a second prophecy. It was the last lines that gained the most attention. “Wide-seeing Zeus grants to Athena, triton-born, that the wooden walls alone remain unbreached.… O divine Salamis! You shall destroy the children of women.…”

The second prophecy offered a glimmer of hope, but as usual the words were ambiguous and subject to interpretation. What, for example, were the “wooden walls”? The salvation of Athens, and Greece itself, might well rest on the right answer.

The Athenian leader Themistocles was to become a central figure in the debate over the interpretation of the prophecy. A leading proponent of naval power, Themistocles was certain the “wooden walls” meant a powerful Athenian fleet. In fact, if Athens had a fleet at all it was due to the courage and persistence of this one man.

When Athens triumphed over the Persians in BC 490 most Athenians believed the threat was over. Persia was far away, and the bloody nose the “barbarians” had received at Marathon seemed to end the matter once and for all. But Themistocles was unconvinced the Persians were gone for good. He believed Athens’ salvation, and ultimately all of Greece’s as well, would be in sea power. But beyond the Persian threat, there are indications he dreamed of Athens as the hub of a great empire, where trade and tribute would flow into the city from every part of the Mediterranean world.

In the BC 480s Themistocles was instrumental in developing the port of Piraeus, about four miles from Athens. Work was put in hand to build a naval arsenal and harbor facilities, but progress was slow. In November, BC 486, King Darius died and was succeeded by his son Xerxes. In the later years of his reign Darius had been preoccupied by a revolt in Egypt and other matters, but never lost the idea of wreaking vengeance on the Greeks and adding them to his empire. Now it was up to his son to carry these projects to their conclusion.

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Themistocles had a clear-sighted policy of naval development—the problem was how to make it a reality. Athens was engaged in an off-again, on-again war with nearby Aegina, an island in the Saronic Gulf some 19 miles (30 km) away. The Athenian fleet was second-rate at the time, at one point mustering only 50 triremes.

Serendipity, or a Gift From the Gods?

Clearly something had to be done—but first there was the problem of finance. Ships can be expensive, and Athens lacked the resources for a full-scale building program. But in BC 483-482, in the very nick of time, there was a major silver strike in the state mines at Laurium. This was a bonanza indeed, the financial foundations of Athens’ future greatness, and produced a coinage so stable Athenian money became common throughout the Aegean.

A conservative politician named Aristides proposed that the silver profits be distributed among the citizen body, with each man getting 10 drachmas. Themistocles was aghast; he wanted the money to be poured into a shipbuilding program. If Aristides’ proposal carried the day, a defenseless Athens might soon have cause to regret their shortsightedness, but then it would be too late.

The issue of the silver profits had to be decided by the ekklesia or Assembly by majority vote. The Assembly was a large, potentially fractious body, and a politician needed to be eloquent to influence it. Themistocles knew the Persians were a distant threat to most Athenians, so any arguments about a defensive/offensive fleet were bound to fall on deaf ears. However the stalled war with Aegina was on everyone’s mind—after all, Aegina was in the neighborhood, and naval actions against the recalcitrant island had been embarrassing failures. Themistocles urged a naval buildup in the context of the Aeginian war and won the day.

6000 Votes to Banish a Man

Conservative elements were still not convinced, grumbling that he had “degraded the people of Athens to the rowing pad and oar.” Aristides and his faction were bound to stir up trouble, so Themistocles decided to remove his rival. In short order an ostrakophoria or ostracism vote was arranged. If a man were ostracized he would be banished from the city for 10 years. No other penalties were imposed, and his citizenship and property remained intact. The names of candidates for ostracism were scratched on potsherds; it took six thousand such votes to banish a man. In BC 482 Aristides was ostracized, thus removing a major barrier to the Themistoclean naval program.

By the spring of BC 480 the Athenian navy boasted some two hundred triremes, making it the greatest power in Hellas. The trireme was the battleship of its day, propelled by three banks of oars and armed with a powerful bronze ram in the prow to hole and sink enemy vessels. Around this time Themistocles had won election to the Board of Generals for the year BC 480-479. As a strategos(general) he would be in a position to influence events. Earlier, in BC 481, a “Hellenic League” of various Greek states had assembled at the Isthmus of Corinth. Differences were settled and at least an embryonic unity achieved. The League Congress broke up, only to reassemble in BC 480 on the eve of the Persian invasion.

By now (about mid-480) the Persians had assembled a multinational army that patriotic Greek historians such as Herodotus reckoned at two million or so. Most modern historians disagree, placing Xerxes’ army at around 180,000 to 200,000, which was still a mighty host for the period. The Great King also had a huge fleet at his command which Herodotus numbered at 1,207 warships and three thousand transport vessels. Even allowing for propaganda inflation, Xerxes possessed a formidable fleet, because even though the Persians were not seafarers, many of their subject peoples were quite at home in Mediterranean waters. Xerxes’ armada included Ionian Greek and Phoenician ships, and it was said the Egyptian squadron was also among the best ever to put to sea.

When the Athenian delegation returned from Delphi people debated the interpretation of “wooden walls.” Older, more conservative people were sure that the defense should center around the Acropolis, which had once been encircled by a wooden wall. The Acropolis (“upper city”) was the high summit were the Temple of Athena Polis (“Athenia of the City”) was located, a building that housed the sacred wooden statue of the goddess. Since Athena was the patron and protector of Athens it seemed inconceivable she would let her sanctuary be violated.