Greeks had distinguished between themselves and 'those who spoke other languages'; other civilized societies had done the same. Now two notions were added to the factual description. One of hostility, the
other of superiority. There was something indecent in the idea that a Greek should work on equal terms with a 'barbarian' (one who spoke another language). Practical Greeks did not allow the idea to affect their
behaviour. But many exploited it in immediate propaganda, and in the end it was only one who had exploited it to the utmost, Alexander the Great, who began dimly to see that it was absurd.
But the military superiority was real. In some extraordinary way 10,000 or so Greek hoplites had routed a great mass of Persians. It did not need a sophisticated military mind to draw the conclusion that a
hoplite phalanx, even if only moderately well trained, could win against cavalry, archery, or any other sort of infantry however armed or brigaded. Spartans were brought up to believe that they were the finest
soldiers in the world, but even Spartans must have been encouraged by the Athenian success.
The third result was even more important. Cleisthenes had recognized a change in Athenian attitudes and exploited it against other aristocrats by devising a social and political system which, either by accident
or Cleisthenic design, gave scope for further enormous changes of mood. But traditional habits of thought do not die overnight; in 507 most aristocrats will still have been behaving as they had always behaved.
More importantly, most ordinary Athenians will in many respects have continued to behave as they always had. Some few aristocrats and rather more ordinary folk felt otherwise. By 480 the army was still
commanded and the city administered by the old ruling class, but its absolute control over Athenian minds was beginning-we stress 'beginning'-to be blunted. Such movements are subtle and hard to plot even
when evidence is abundant; they are not only gradual, they are irregular. When evidence is sparse and the atmosphere at start and finish impossible to catch with any precision, when men do not talk explicitly
about shifts of this kind, we can only register the fact and look for any clues there are. Aristotle, with characteristic shrewdness, remarks that victory at Marathon gave the Athenian people political confidence.
His illustration is the fact that in the decade after Marathon the Athenians first made use of a curious institution, ostracism, another Cleisthenic invention, which allowed the assembly to decide every year to
send, should it wish, one of its political figures into temporary ten-year exile without loss of property. The explicit reason for the first three ostracisms was suspicion of treachery in 490, but Aristotle is surely
right to think that courage to exercise power is as significant as the occasion for its exercise.
Whether this same surge towards democracy lay behind another constitutional change of these years we cannot say. In 487 direct election to the archonship was replaced by a system which combined election
with the use of lot. Was this a conscious 'democratic' move? (Lot was a great feature of the developed democracy.) In the long run the ten generals (normally elected one from each tribe) came to replace the
archons as the chief officers of state: desire for elected efficiency overcame principle. But long-term results are frequently not foreseen. We can only note the coincidence of time. The issues are obscure, as are
those of the following years, and not only in domestic politics. It would be wrong to assume that, as they saw the tail of the Persian fleet scurrying home in 490, all, or even many, Athenians concentrated on the
likelihood that the Persians would return.
Boeotia, increasingly united under its leading city, Thebes, posed no problem. Persuaded by King Cleomenes to share in his unhappy campaign against Athens in about 506, the Boeotians had been soundly
thrashed. Nor any longer did Sparta itself. During the nineties her preoccupation was with the Peloponnese, with Argos, on which Cleomenes inflicted a terrible defeat at Sepeia about 494, nearer home with her
own helots, who attempted a revolt (of uncertain date and duration), and nearer still with the quarrel between her kings, which led to Demaratus' -withdrawal to Persia. Moreover, at some point she committed
herself in principle to the anti-Persian cause and even sent out her army to Marathon- though it arrived only in time to congratulate the Athenians on their success.
But there was another enemy. The rich, commercial island of Aegina, its triangular peak clearly visible some 20 miles from Athens' harbour at Phaleron, was a hostile rival as soon as Athens turned her attention
seriously to the sea. There had been one early war. Now, about 500, began a period of conflict or threats of conflict which lasted through the eighties. How many Athenians felt in 489 that Persian flight had left
them free to deal with a more immediate enemy?
There is an interesting clue. In 482 an exceptionally rich vein of silver was discovered in the Attic mines at Laurium. There was debate on the use of the profits. One side, led very probably by Aristides,
nicknamed 'the Just', a hero of Marathon (he was elected archon in 489), later to distinguish himself in the crisis of 480/79 and to organize the Delian League in 478, argued for a simple distribution among the
citizens. Others, whose spokesman was Themistocles, felt otherwise. Themistocles was renowned for his cleverness (some did not use the word in a friendly sense) and foresight. Foresight he had certainly
shown when as archon in 493 he had begun to fortify a new and safer harbour at Piraeus, and would show afterwards when he tried to warn and literally fortify Athens against the threat of Spartan jealousy. In
482 he argued that the windfall should be used, not for largesse but for the building of a fleet, 200 warships ('triremes'), which would, as it turned out, be the backbone of Greek resistance to the Persian navy.
But that was not his point at the time. He urged instead that a fleet was needed against Aegina, a point which at least reveals the priorities among his audience. Was this deception, or may even his foresight have
been a bit blunted by what Pericles later described as 'the eyesore of the Piraeus'-Themistocles' new Piraeus?
The Persians felt no need of foresight, only determination to get their revenge. The Great King, Darius, -was fond of Greeks (witness Histiaeus; above, p. 39) but not of Greeks who defeated him, and
immediately after Marathon he began to prepare for a greater onslaught. But the plans were thwarted by a revolt in Egypt (487) and Darius' death soon after. Revenge was left to his son, Xerxes. Egypt was
brought to order in 485, and the great scheme could be resumed.
Let us remember the situation. Persia held North Africa as far as Cyrenaica, while beyond that was the friendly Phoenician colony of Carthage, itself pressing on the Greeks of Sicily. Persia held the north coast
of the Aegean as far as Macedon. Persia held Asia Minor and the offshore islands of the Aegean. Mainland Greece was a very small nut between the teeth of a mighty nutcracker. It never ceases to amaze that it
should have been thought to merit the attention it was given. Darius' pride had been injured (but it had already suffered once in southern Russia without similar reaction); his queen, Atossa, was said to have
coveted the services of Greek handmaidens; Xerxes may have been touched with megalomania, but none of these things seems to justify the effort-or the risk.