what started the persian wars?

Answer 1

Xxerxes. He started expending his empire westwards & met with resistance from the Ionians (Greek settlers in Asia Minor) who wrere helped by the Greek city-states.

In revenge, he invaded Greece with the aim of taking punitive actions.

Answer 2

The Persian King (I forget his name) conquered a bunch of territory that encompasses basically the whole region that is now from Egypt to Pakistan and up into Turkey (called Ionia at the time). The Persians are the ancestors of modern Iranians if you must know. The King set up a system called Satraps, where he let the individual conquered lands worship as they pleased and everything in exchange only for loyalty and taxes (very generous for the ancient world). The Greeks had colonies there in Ionia that were loyal to their native city-states, but the Persians came in and subjugated the colonists, but they revolted with mainland city-state support via sea transporting supplies. This angered King Darius, who sent a naval armada which landed at Marathon, where the Greek army defeated them by using the terrain to deny them the use of their cavalry. Later, I forget how much time elapses but less than a decade for sure, King Xerxes, Darius' son, goes overland through northern Turkey and across into northeastern Greece, hugging the coast, with the largest army supposedly ever to march, with a matching navy to scout and supply the ground troops. There, in Northeastern Greece, there is only a narrow strip of passable land that hugs the coast, with huge steep cliffs on both sides, and then the ocean. Here fews Greeks could hold off a larger army, which they did. This is the battle of Thermopylae. The Spartans lead the assault with only 300 men, and they all stay and die so that the homeland Greeks can have time to better prepare. It took I think 3-4 days of Xerxes time, so it definitely helped to bring Xerxes defeat. However, his large army does get through and does burn Athens to the ground, but in the end they leave Greece for good after naval battle at Salamis forces ground forces to leave.

Answer 3

Persian power. If they were weak, they would not have invaded Greece. As well, there was constant interaction with Greece, so the Persians were well aware of the Greeks.