Siege of Eretria - Aftermath

Aftermath

After staying at Eretria for a few days, the Persians made their way down the coast towards Attica. The Persians dropped the captured Eretrians off on the island of Aegilia, before landing at the bay of Marathon in Attica. The Persians' next target was Athens. However, the Athenians had marched out from Athens to meet the Persians, and blocked the exits from the plains of Marathon. After several days of stalemate, the Athenians finally resolved to attack the Persians, winning a famous victory at the ensuing Battle of Marathon. After the battle, the remaining Persians fled to their ships, picked up the Eretrians from Aegilia, and then sailed back to Asia Minor, thereby ending the campaign, and the first Persian invasion of Greece.

When the Persian fleet arrived in Asia Minor, Datis and Artaphernes took the Eretrians before Darius in Susa. The Eretrians were not harmed by Darius who decided to settle them in the town of Ardericca in Cissia. They were still there, using their own language and customs, when Herodotus wrote his history, and were encountered by Alexander the Great during his conquest of Persia a further century later.

In the meanwhile, Darius began raising a huge new army with which he meant to completely subjugate Greece; however, in 486 BC, his Egyptian subjects revolted, indefinitely postponing any Greek expedition. Darius then died whilst preparing to march on Egypt, and the throne of Persia passed to his son Xerxes I. Xerxes crushed the Egyptian revolt, and very quickly restarted the preparations for the invasion of Greece. The epic second Persian invasion of Greece finally began in 480 BC, and the Persians met with initial success at the battles of Thermopylae and Artemisium. However, defeat at the Battle of Salamis would be the turning point in the campaign, and the next year the expedition was ended by the decisive Greek victory at the Battle of Plataea.