The Battle of Salamis
With defeat at Thermopylae, the inconclusive naval battle at Artemision, and Xerxes’ Persian army on the rampage, the Greek city-states faced an unprecedented attack, one which threatened their very existence. The tide would turn, though, in September 480 BCE at the Battle of Salamis in the Saronic Gulf, a naval battle which would rank as one of the greatest and most significant in antiquity. Overcoming superior numbers with daring tactics and sheer determination, the allied Greek forces won a freedom which would allow a never-before-seen period of artistic and cultural endeavour which would form the foundations of Western culture for millennia.
