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Virtual Macedonia Bookstore - The Greco-Persian Wars
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List Price: $22.95
Our Price: $9.99
Your Save: $ 12.96 ( 56% )
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Manufacturer: University of California Press
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 938.03
EAN: 9780520203136
ISBN: 0520203135
Label: University of California Press
Manufacturer: University of California Press
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 356
Publication Date: 1998-10-15
Publisher: University of California Press
Studio: University of California Press
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Where Western military history begins
Comment: Those seeking to get firm knowledge of the starting point of the military history of the western world can do no better than Green's Greco-Persian Wars. Here we find masterful accounts of the battles that saved the ancient Greek city-states from Persian domination and secured the flowering of the classical Greek culture in the fifth century B.C.
Green succeeds in blending his academic background and skills as a narrative writer to give a good balance between scholarly accuracy and a compelling story. We get an exciting but thorough account of that most seminal of all battles: Marathon. Then, the time between Marathon and the main Persian invasion a decade later with the rise of the wily Themistocles and the silver strike at Laurium that enabled the Athenians to beef up their navy. Once the Persian horde moves to descend the peninsula, we have the famous 300 Spartans at Thermopylae, selling their lives dearly in a delaying action. Then, when the Persians approach Athens we have the famous evacuation to Salamis, and the trickery of Themistocles that leads to the bottling up of the larger but less mobile ships of Xerxes. Lastly, Green relates the account of Plataea, where the combined Greek forces defeat the remnant of the Persian army in Greece.
Green is critical of Herodotus in many areas, while at the same time having to rely on him as his sole source on many of the events he describes. Nevertheless, one might want to read Green before tackling Herodotus, in order to gain some appreciation of the context of Herodotus from the outset.
Customer Rating:
Summary: The Greco-Persian Wars
Comment: This is a good, solid, and necessarily, given the nature of our sources, Athenocentric account of the Greco-Persian Wars. That is not to say Green is uncritical of the sources; far from it. In fact he constantly evaluates all of the evidence, and arrives at common sense conclusions based on a deep knowledge of the material, biases of the source informants, and no less important, Greek topography and landscape. Several Amazon reviewers have noted that a working knowledge of Herodotus is necessary to appreciate this book. I'd dispute that, but some prior knowledge of Ancient Greek History and Geography is advisable. For a narrative that gives more consideration to the Ancient history novice, interested readers may wish to turn to Tom Holland's recent `Persian fire', which tells the story with some drama and may be more in tune with some contemporary sensibilities.
Green focuses on the crucial period between 490-479 B.C., though the earlier Ionian revolt is touched on by way of exploring the Persian Casus Belli. There is however no discussion of the subsequent foundation of the Athenian Thallasocracy, the battle of Eurymedon, or the Athenian expedition to Egypt. To Green's credit though, the often overlooked neutralization of the Persian Aegean fleet at Mycale is fully described. It's also a joy to encounter Greens trademark acid comments on certain protagonists, for instance describing one individual as a `sedulous lickspittle' and another as `that enigmatic and pliable trimmer'
Some areas of the text that may elicit criticism include passages that are novelistic in tone. These jar somewhat with an account that is otherwise fairly academic. We may forgive Green, however, in that his original publishers brief was to write a popular history, and the passages in question are few and far between. More seriously the several maps included in the book are not really adequate to deal with the sometimes exhaustive topographical descriptions and evaluations. There is also precious little discussion of Persian motivations beyond a general sense of Achaemenid predatory imperialism and what seems to me a naïve tradition that Xerxes was pressured into invading Greece by his greedy relatives. As Green suggests, `No Greek ever really understood the ethics of the Achaemenid gentleman', and from this book we are none the wiser beyond the often repeated Herodotean maxim of `ride, shoot and don't tell lies'. That, at the higher levels, there was widespread fraternization between well to do Greeks and Persians might belie the first of these assertions, and the devious nature of Persian negotiations and 5th column activities would tend to give the lie to the latter! Despite these possible drawbacks, readers wishing to know more about the Greco-Persian wars would do well not to overlook this book.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Highly recommended; exciting read with sound scholarship
Comment: This book was a very pleasant surprise. I expected a dry, academic work. But this book turns out to be a fascinatingly detailed military account of the Persian Wars that while written in an almost journalistically readable narrative style still has virtually every paragraph footnoted with solid sources.
Two revelations that came upon me in the book:
(1) While Thermopylae was highy inspirational for the Greeks - and the Spartan sacrifice a basis for rallying Greek morale - it was at the time strategically an unmitigated disaster for the Greek cause. The Greeks expected the Spartans and other Greek allied units to hold back the Persian horde for much, much longer than they actually did. The betrayal of the secret mountain pass cut short what had been intended to be a much longer holding action. The Greeks mobilizing to the south had to greatly speed up their preparations. Yet the defeat was truly inspirational. Green likens Thermopylae to the World War II "Miracle of Dunkirk" which, while inspirational, was overall a terribly disastrous setback for British arms.
(2) Cleisthenes created Athenian democracy not based on some ideological devotion to the cause of popular rule. Instead he was a grasping, power-hungry politican on the outs who contrived to regain power by radically expanding the franchise to a greatly expanded electorate who he basically bribed to elect him. He had no theory of democracy, but once the genie was out of the bottle he couldn't put it back in.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Good Book
Comment: Being a history fan, I decided that I need to learn more about the Greco-Persian Wars. This book was my first serious encounter with this part of history. It was not an "easy" read, but it is a fascinating story that is explained in extraordinary detail for such a small book. The author is a very intelligent academic & sometimes goes over the head of the average reader (he has a habit of using latin phrases for ellaboration, with the apparent assumption that all his readers have a basic understanding of latin. This is annoying for those of us who don't, but not a deal-breaker). One reviewer complained about the maps. He was correct, the maps aren't very easy to read. But, the author went into such great detail in the narrative that I'm guessing he didn't feel he needed much detail in his maps. Here's my final take: if you only have time to read one book about the Greco-Persian Wars, you will not go wrong with this one. You'll hear an even-handed & thorough account of the entire era.
Customer Rating:
Summary: biased garbage!
Comment: Obviously mr. peter green has some hostility toward the the persian (iranian)culture. Right at the intro, he goes on about how achaemenid persia gave no contribution to the world at all! well, for one, the persian court was a frequent learning place for the greek scholars for at least 200 years.(according to herodotus himself), postal system,tolerating free practice of religon and culture, no use of slavery, intricate governmet system(which completely was a failure when greeks attempted after alexander's barbaric conquest),pioneering army technological advances( check out "persian army" by nick sekunda), building great roads connecting the empire(two third of the known world then)... not to mention that alexander and the rest of the greeks burned down and destroyed alot of persian literature, and scentific recordings, alot of persian achievements were destroyed. Therefor, what is left today is known to be the greek's acheivements to their credits without a solid proof for the most part. only the battles that the greeks had won are grossly portrayed which to the iranians was nothing but an insignificant setback, untill the barbaric advances of alexander ofcourse. Even the bible praises cyrus, darius, xerxes, and artaxerxes for the humane, and generous actions of the persian emperors especially to the jews. mr. peter green get a clue! there was a reason that the persians were always envied by the greeks, and there was a reason that the greeks call the persian emperors lord of asia!
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Editorial Reviews:
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The long and bitter struggle between the great Persian Empire and a few Greek states, notably Athens, lasted from 490 to 479 B.C., reaching its high point with the extraordinary Greek victory at Salamis in 480. Peter Green brilliantly retells this historic conflict, evoking events the whole dramatic sweep of the events that the Persian offensive set in motion. 16 illustrations. 12 maps.
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