After capturing the hot springs pass, the Persian army drove straight in and directly attacked the Greek capital of Athens. However, the city of Athens was empty, and there was no shadow of a person. Xerxes was furious and ordered a fire, and the beautiful and rich city of Athens was burned to the ground in an instant.
So where did the inhabitants of the city of Athens go? It turned out that greece at that time had a prophecy of the sun god: the fate of Greece could only be saved by wooden walls! The outstanding athenian naval commander Timistocles believed that the wooden wall of the sun god referred to as a large ship, so it was suggested that all women and children should take a boat to hide, and all the men should take a warship and concentrate on the bay of Salami Just when the Persian army directly attacked Athens, the Persian navy also came to the outer port of Athens, Pirius, and the two armies echoed each other, and there was a great tendency to flatten Greece.
In the face of the land and water attack of the Persian army, the Greek fleet concentrated in the Gulf of Salami south of the city of Athens was shaken. Seeing that the fighter plane was about to be lost, Timistocles was anxious. Suddenly, he came up with a clever plan, summoned one of his personal guards, handed him a secret letter, and asked him to go to the Persian king to inform him that the Greek navy was floating in the heart, did not dare to fight, and wanted to escape from the gulf. Xerxes saw the secret letter and immediately ordered the bay to be sealed off and not to let a boat go.
While the Greeks were arguing over whether to fight or flee, a general who had opposed Timistocles suddenly burst in through the door and shouted, "Stop debating and get ready for battle!" The Persians have completely surrounded us.
The crowd saw that it was only then that they were determined to obey Timistokeley's orders. The Greek fleet, forced to a desperate situation, according to the command of Timistokli, quickly set up a position, determined to fight to the death, perhaps god was interested in helping the Greeks, originally the Persian navy had 3 times more warships than greece, but before the battle began, the Persian navy encountered the wind twice during the encirclement operation, and half of the warships were shattered with the wind. After the battle began, the performance of the battleships on both sides was quickly revealed. Athens' new three-tier warships were small, fast, and maneuverable, while Persia's old sail-hanging warships were large and slow. Timistokli used the advantage of his ship's small speed to defeat the Persian fleet, with no power to fight back.
Xerxes stood at the top of the hill and witnessed the naval battle from beginning to end. He thought he had won the battle, and when he saw these 8 hours of fierce fighting, his fleet was completely destroyed, and he couldn't help but regret it. The Persian Navy was defeated, the army's logistical supplies were immediately lost, and Xerxes had to retreat. The Battle of salami's Gulf was the most important battle in the entire Hippo-Persian War, stopping Persia's annexation of Greece. In 449 BC, the Greek army completely defeated Persia on the island of Cyprus, and the two sides concluded a peace treaty, ending the Greek-Persian War that lasted for about half a century.
Years of war caused great disasters in Persia, and forced conscription and heavy taxes made people desperate and revolt. All this weakened the military strength of the Persian Empire, and there were constant coups within the court, and the local governors took the opportunity to monopolize military and political power, and often joined forces to rebel.
In 334 BC, Alexander, the king of Macedon, invaded Persia, and the formerly brave Persian army became vulnerable and gradually retreated. In 30 BC, the last emperor of the Persian Empire was killed in exile and the Persian Empire collapsed.