Year 12 Ancient - Xerxes/Persian Wars Sources

Just a quick post. I have compiled some of the most relevant chunks of Herodotus, to provide some quotes on Xerxes and the Persian Wars.

You can access them here.

All the best in Monday's exam, I'm sure you'll all do wonderfully!

Year 12 Ancient/Modern - Poll Results

Hurray! The biggest voting numbers yet! I guess it could have something to do with the assessments last week...(which I hope went well, by the way...)

When it came to Hitler's biggest mistake in WW2 - 69% of you said it was his invasion of the USSR. Certainly, that would be the view of most modern historians.

As for the most interesting battle in the Persian Wars - 71% of you went with Thermopylae. That must be The 300 effect. 19% of you voted for Salamis, and the rest went with Marathon. Surprise, surpise - nobody voted for Artemisium, Plataea, or Mycale.

Year 12 Ancient - Exam Advice

Year 12 Ancient students will have their next assessment on Wednesday, in the double lesson. As you know, the format is as follows:

Time Allowed: 70 minutes

Part 1: 25 marks (35 minutes)
Essay question on the Persian Wars, using 'assess' or 'explain'.

Assess = make a judgement of value
Explain = relate cause and effect, make the relationships between things evident, provide why and/or how

So the question will ask you to make some sort of judgement about some aspect of the Persian Wars. Make sure you know:

• the causes and background of the conflict (persian expansion, Ionian Revolt)
  
• the details of the six major battles
• the contribution of Themistocles, Leonidas, Eurybiades, and Pausanias
• why the Greeks won and the Persians lost (you can find a sample essay on this dot point here)
  

Part 2: 25 marks (35 minutes)
10-mark question on Xerxes' rise to prominence (spend about 15 minutes on this)
Make sure you know:

• his family background
• his career before becoming king
• how he became king

15-mark question assessing his reign/career (spend about 20 minutes on this)
Make sure you know:

• his achievements/failures as a builder/engineer, a religious leader, a warrior, an administrator, and as king
• ancient and modern assessments of his reign

We will go through some practice questions on Tuesday. Any questions, send me an email. Good luck!

Year 12 Ancient - Past Exam Questions: Xerxes and Persian Wars

I have created a Word document that has the HSC exam questions on Xerxes and the Persian Wars from the 2004-2007 papers. They should give you an idea of how the questions are worded, and what content area is tested. You can download or view it here.

As you can see, the breakdown is this:

Xerxes' relationships with Persians/non-Persians 2007
Xerxes' achievements as king 2007
How Xerxes became King 2006, 2004
Xerxes' attempts to expand Persia 2006, 2004
Xerxes' personal background 2005
Xerxes' building program 2005
Xerxes' impact on Greece and Persia 2005
Xerxes' influence in his lifetime 2004

Assess the importance of naval battles 2007
Assess the contribution of Miltiades and Leonidas 2006
Evaluate the contribution of Themistocles 2005
Assess the significance of two military events 2004

Year 12 Ancient - Notes on Plataea and Mycale

You can access the class notes on Plataea and Mycale here. They are a bit brief but will serve as a foundation...

Year 12 Ancient - Salamis Documentary

Hi Salamis experts - here is the video we watched in class today, courtesy of the History Channel:

Year 12 Ancient/Modern - Poll Results

Here are the results of the latest polls:

62% of you thought that Persian expansionism was to blame for the Greco-Persian Wars

...and...

75% of you thought that Hitler's boldest foreign policy move was the recoccupation of the Rhineland.

New polls up soon.

Year 12 Ancient - Xerxes Biographies

You will notice as we study this intriguing ancient king, that just about every account is biased against him. Either he was a greedy, tyrannical, stupid, vain, and hubristic man, or the sources we have are wildly anti-Persian.

While reading about Xerxes, always bear in mind - he ruled for 20 years, and had some major successes within his kingdom, despite his defeats in the Greco-Persian Wars: putting down three revolts, and building the great city of Persepolis, as well as extending the empire to the east.

Here are some of the online biographies I have found:

A short and comprehensive account of his life at biographybase.com

An anti-Xerxes article at sacklunch.net

An extract from the Histories, by Herodotus, about the incident where Xerxes allegedly had the sea whipped 300 times, to punish it for a storm that destroyed his bridge...

Year 12 Ancient - Miltiades and Marathon

Below is the PowerPoint on the life of Miltiades, and his part in securing the Greek victory at Marathon in 490BC.

Miltiades – Hero of Marathon

Uploaded on authorSTREAM by tomgriffith | Upload your own presentation

Year 12 Ancient/Modern - Poll Results

The polls for this week have closed, and the results are as follows:

Equal numbers (37%) said that The 300 was either absolutely rubbish, or a great action film. So the critics are divided...

Half of you said that the Nazis' most effective tool for controlling society was propaganda, with only a couple going for the other options.

New polls up soon.

Year 12 Ancient - Persian Wars Powerpoint

Ancient Historians - here is our first PowerPoint on the Greek World 500-440BC, a summary of the Persian Wars, with some brief info on each of the six battles:

Marathon
Thermopylae
Artemisium
Salamis
Plataea
Mycale


Uploaded on authorSTREAM by tomgriffith

You can download it here.

Year 12 Ancient - Persian Wars Introduction

I have found a good summary of the Persian Wars, written by Richard Hooker, on this website.

Here is the first paragraph, to whet your appetite...

Like the Trojan War, the Persian Wars were a defining moment in Greek history. The Athenians, who would dominate Greece culturally and politically through the fifth century BC and through part of the fourth, regarded the wars against Persia as their greatest and most characteristic moment. For all their importance, though, the Persian Wars began inauspiciously. In the middle of the sixth century BC, the Greek city-states along the coast of Asia Minor came under the control of the Lydians and their king, Croesus (560-546 BC). However, when the Persians conquered the Lydians in 546 BC, all the states subject to the Lydians became subject to the Persians. The Persians controlled their new subject-states very closely; they appointed individuals to rule the states as tyrants. They also required citizens to serve in the Persian army and to pay fairly steep taxes. Smarting under these new burdens and anxious for independence, the tyrant of Miletus, Aristagoras, began a democratic rebellion in 499 BC. Aristagoras was an opportunist. He had been placed in power by the Persians, but when he persuaded the Persians to launch a failed expedition against Naxos, he began to fear for his life. So he fomented a popular rebellion against the Persians and went to the Greek mainland for support. He went first to the Spartans, since they were the most powerful state in Greece, but the Spartans seem to have seen right through him. When he approached the Athenians, they promised him twenty ships. In 498 BC, the Athenians conquered and burned Sardis, which was the capital of Lydia, and all the Greek cities in Asia Minor joined the revolt. The Athenians, however, lost interest and went home; by 495 BC, the Persians, under king Darius I (521-486 BC), had restored control over the rebellious Greek cities...
(click here to read the rest of the article)