James Baquet The details of one battle that took place during the first Persian invasion of Greece are largely forgotten, but one event peripheral to the battle suggested a sporting event popular today. I’m talking, of course, of the Battle of Marathon. In 492 B.C., the Persians invaded Greece. This was one of the first attempts by Darius I, King of Persia, to subjugate the mainland Greeks after they had assisted unsuccessful rebels in Ionia, in Asian Minor. After the Ionians were put down, Darius considered Athens to be unfinished business. He was so enraged that — lest he accidentally calm down — he charged one of his servants to tell him three times before dinner every day: “Master, remember the Athenians!” It was the Persian custom to demand “earth and water” of conquered peoples, a symbolic offering of the land and its fruits as a sign of submission. Most Greek city-states were weak, and complied. But Sparta threw the messengers into a well; Athens threw them rather into a gorge, saying that when they hit the bottom, they could dig the earth and water out for themselves. Though the Persians far outnumbered them, the Greeks — and pre-eminently the Athenians — drove the invaders out of the mainland (though they returned 10 years later), preserving their autonomy. The Battle of Marathon was the final encounter in the Persian invasion, taking place on a plain north of Athens in 490 B.C. It ended with an Athenian victory — without the help of Sparta. And this is where the stuff of legends enters the story. The Athenians had sent a runner, Pheidippides, who in two days ran the 225 kilometersfrom Marathon to Sparta to ask for assistance. He was refused. Meanwhile, after the battle, the Athenian army covered the 40 kilometers back to Athens in a forced march, to counter any further moves on the city by the Persians. The two events were later conflated. Instead of the run to Sparta, Pheidippides was said to have run the 40 kilometers from Marathon to Athens, announced “We have won!” and died of exhaustion. When the modern Olympics games were created in 1896, a “marathon race” was included, and modern runners have participated in “marathons” ever since. Vocabulary: Which words above mean: 1. cooperated 2. independence 3. merge, made into one 4. small canyon 5. commanded, required 6. bring into submission 7. unless 8. coincidental, secondary 9. material, source 10. something that remains to be done | 