Greece Should have Meadized: A Better Future Under Persian Rule
The Persian War is one of the most famous war over the world. It was the war between the Persian Empire and the Hellenic League which was consisted by numerous city-states in Ancient Greece. It happened between 527 and 479 B.C. The immediate cause of this war was that Athenians supported the Greeks in Anatolia, as known as Ionian Greek to have the rebellious against the Persian Empire. After the Hellenic League won two meaning battles: Marathon Battle and Salamis sea battle. The Greek navy had defeated the Persian Empire’s army over the sea. Finally the Hellenic League defeated the Persian Empire and therefore the whole Greece had their entered into a new era.
Most of people think this era is flourishing and the victory the Greek gained brings various great benefits. Greeks had gained great achievements in philosophy, literature and music. In addition, Athenians became more powerful and formed the Athenian Empire. And democracy which the politic system Athens used became more and more popular in this era. Furthermore, the victory made democracy not be strangled in its crib and paved the way for developments in the following centuries. However, the victory also caused many negative consequences in different aspects. These negative consequences not only influenced on the individuals, but also made the conflicts between city-states. This essay mainly argues if Greece had surrendered to Persians, it would gain a better future and become more prospering. There are three points from the politic system, the situation for women and slaves and wars and bloody events to support this opinion in the following paragraphs.
First of all, I think democracy in Ancient Athens which was the most popular politic system in Greece was not a good political structure in that era and the monarchy in the Persian Empire was fit to that era and it could bring more benefits than other polis in Greece whatever the oligarchy in Sparta or the tyranny in Corinth. One of the most important factors for the prosperity of democracy was during the Persian War, Athens played the big role and after the war, Athens started to organise the Delian League and became the leader in this league. Afterwards, Athens formed the Athenians Empire which Athens became the entity and other city-states were the vassal states because of Athens’ powerful military force and its position. Thus, democracy, this politic system got the opportunity to spread out and develop. In other words, the big-scale spread of democracy did not give credit to its effect but to the country which advocated this concept. Despite Athen advocated the democracy, but not all of citizens had the right of voting. Democracy was not available for everyone. According to the past several thousand years of human beings’ history, we can figure out many of empires which used the monarchy as the politic system were more successful and stabler than any other country which took other polis. For instance, the Persian Empire was one of the most classical examples of using the monarchy. Before having the Persian War with Greeks, the development of this empire was flourishing without any unrests. There was only big problem for all empires which took the monarchy relying on the emperor too excessively. Only the emperor in this empire could decide how to rule this country. It considerably depended on the ability of the emperor who held the reins of power. Back to democracy in Ancient Athens, the power of ruling the country was held in normal people. Here are two bad effects of democracy: One is delaying the working efficiency. If the country faced the deadly trouble, the rule of democracy still asked people to vote. This behaviour would cause missing the best timing to react. If not, the trait of democracy would not be embodied because even when people were facing the problem about their careers, they did not have the right to choose.The other one was “rotten apple in the barrel”. Athenians, who were famous for following democracy, always were leaded by some people who held the wild ambitions. Herd mentality played a big role in democracy. In 428-427 B.C, when a serious revolt which was led by the city-state of Mytilene happened on the island of Lesbos, Cleon stir citizens in Athens up to attack Mytllene. This battle was started without ration. Naturally, it brought out an agonising result. Additionally, the civil war on the island of Corcyra in 427 B.C which Athenians joined into also was plotted by some politicians with wild ambitions. In the politic system of democracy, every individual was easily influenced to follow lobbyists and people with the rhetor skill. After the comparison, democracy, which was gernerally acknowledged as the best polis in Greece, sounded such ordinary. Even the rest of other polis in Ancient Greece was not as good as democracy. There is the other special condition to the Persian empire and Athen: Persians in that era constituted a state including many different nations and ruled the whole empire as a federative state which any Satrapy (province/state) had their own internal policies, laws and religion. The core concept of the empire was religious and ethnical tolerance and freedom for people.Therefore, Athens could keep their original benefit if it wanted but also cleaned out rotten apple in the barrel because no empires wanted to see the land they have conquered becomes worse and worse. It absorb what is good and reject what is bad. The Persian Empire would respect the democracy as much as possible and if Athens met the big problem, the monarchy Persian Empire would instead Athens to make the decision. Briefly to say, Athens under Persian rule would have the backbone to develop and would not deviate. The stability of the politics in Athens would become stronger.
Secondly, normal people would gain more benefits after the Persian Empire conquered Greece. There were two groups of Greeks whose social positions became higher. They were slaves and women. Although the Persian Empire was generally acknowledged as an empire which used slavery, no evidence to prove there were slaves in the Persian Empire. Everyone knows the Persian Empire thrives without the slavery. What’s more, after Persians conquered one place, they just asked the citizens in this place to pay tribute to them annually. Besides, they did not have any other excessive requirements. In Greece, Sparta, which located at the southern of Greece, always was bothered by the Helots whom were the big part of labor force and slaves in Sparta. The ratio of Spartans and Helots was 1:4. It meant at that time, a large number of people were in the unfair living condition even Greece was in The Golden Era”. Helots revolted frequently, but finally they still were forcefully put down. Thus, from this degree, we can figure out the ideas of the Persian Empire were much more modern than any other king in Greece. So if the Persian Empire ruled this area, this region became peaceful and maybe its development tends toward to the modern society. This progress would become so precious. The ban of slaves was a step of the advanced ideology trend. And the other group was women who were treated unfairly until now. However, in the Persian Empire, women had similar social status with men. In the public occasion, women did not need to wear the veil which women used to cover their faces. They could own property. Women in Greece were not allowed to have the property even after their husbands’ death. If Persian women were in the name of their husbands or got the permissions of their husbands, they could manage their own undertakings. Although in the era of Darius the Great, women activities started to be limited, this part of women was still small and the rest of women did not be influenced a lot. Persian women were more respected and were more equal to men rather than greeks who did not gave any right to women and even did not count them as humans. Greeks men treated women as the goods especially in Sparta which the country upheld the force. Modern western culture and most of its ideas derived from Ancient Greece and the idea that women and men could not get the equal treat from Ancient Greece affected the current western society. Thus, part of responsibilities of the current women right issue should get credit to the victory which Ancient Greece got. If the origin of the western culture with the ideas about the equal treat to women and abolishing slavery, there would not the extremely tragic battle for slaves and no big-scale protest for the women right.
Finally, I want to talk about the following bloody war which happened in Ancient Greece.
The background of these following wars was that Athens and Sparta had cooperated in the fight against Xerxes’ great invasion of Greece in 480-479 B.C, until the middle of the fifth century B.C relations between two most powerful state of mainland Greece had worsen and opened hostilities erupted. Athens intended to organise all city-states in Greece and formed the Delian League which was consisted by Greek city-states besides the part on the Pelopennesia island. What’s more, Athens formed the Athenian Empire by using the members the Delian League in order to have the much more powerful military force to fight with the Pelopennesia League. The main reason of the conflict between these two tycoons was during the Persian War, Athens and Thebes who were in the lower class in Athens united against the Persians, this seemed to imply that Athens could be viewed as a single cohesive super-regional entity. The success in the war brought too much confidence and a super-wild ambition to Athens. Furthermore, after Sparta and Athens united to defeat the Persian Empire, Spartans had misgivings with Helots who were slaves of Spartans and always wanted to rebellion, Athenians lost their big enemy—Persians. Without the foreign aggression, Athens intended to expand out. Athens was the leading role in the Athenian Empire and asked other city-states which were members of this empire to pay the tribute. If someone city-state refused the tribute, Athens would use its advanced military force to attack and conquer it to colonise. This is the first negative consequence. Secondly, the rise of Thebes in Athens made the politic system disorder. As we all know, Athens’ polis was democracy. It means the decision which the most people supported carried out. Thebes, who occupied the biggest part of Athenians’ population, directly disordered the fairy of voting. When Thebes noticed more wars would bring more benefits such as gold, food and better living conditions, they decided to start more wars and nobody could stop it. The whole politic system was controlled by Thebes and this behaviour caused so much death. The third negative consequence was the big-scale war between two leagues: the Pelopennesia War. Athens used Corcyra ( Athens’ ally) to lure Corinth (Sparta’s ally) to provoke the conflict. Then, Potidaea and Megara( Sparta’s ally) joined into this conflict. At the end, Athens and Sparta, these two tycoons joined in and fought face to face. Despite this war which included almost Greek city-states made the great casualties, but the other effect that declined the culture in Athens and Pelopennesia was too heavy to afford. After this war, the prospering Greek culture began to fall down and Spartans met the Helots’ rebellion which was more vicious than before. The victory of the Persian War gave Greek people too many agonising results. But if Greece had meadized to the Persian Empire, there would be a better future for Greeks. The Persian Empire would get involved in this war in order to control the scale and the mortality rate of normal citizens because the scale of the war would cause that the annual tribute become less and the big-scale war would destroy the stability between vassal states. The Persian Empire would not permit its vassal states to have the civil war to lose the military force. In other words, Spartans army which was called the most powerful land army would be kept and these soldiers did not need to alert the Helots every moment beers the empire would shield them and give some help. Therefore, if the war was controlled in the small-scale, it would not decline Athens’ and Sparta’s cultures apparently as the Pelopenneisa War. If the Persian Empire was in charge of Greece, after the war, the empire would try to deal with the subsequent events such as the abolished field, the homeless labor force and the normal’s rebellion. Although they did these initiatively for the next year’s tribute, it still saved the country’s development. All of things the Persian Empire would do were for the tribute. It means Greece and the Persian Empire could be mutually beneficial.
To sum up, the first body paragraph argues that the monarchy in the Persian Empire was better than the democracy in Athens. The democracy made the situation in Athens chaos but the monarchy could bring the stability. The second body paragraph talks about women and slaves would gain better treat by Persians won the war. The Persian Empire could abolish the slavery to free slaves and raise the social status of women, even this behaviour would solve the current women right issue. The final body paragraph says Athens who were deceived by the desire which derived from the victory of the Persian War caused many bloody incidents and the Peolopeneesia War made two tycoons declined , their cultures started to walk on the downhill path. Persians could manage the events better after the war and improve the live quality of people in Greece.
In conclusion, not everything happened on the history stage was the best choice for the afterwards generation. The better future exists but unfortunately, sometimes we do not find the way.
