Darius I and the Genesis of a War
WHENEVER THE CONFLICT BETWEEN THE ancient Greeks and Persians comes under discussion, almost invariably it is the Persians who are thought of as the aggressor—the villain of the piece who get their comeuppance at the hand of a nobler foe—the triumph of a small nation winning an unlikely victory against overwhelming odds. Most of us are Eurocentric in outlook, siding with the fledging European nation that provided us our first democracy. In addition, our view of history is often coloured by the attitudes, biases and prejudices of our sources. So is our view of the Persian Empire unreasonably influenced by viewpoints antagonistic to their rule?
