Misha Glenny
speaker
1,410 appearances
21 recordings
1 series
first heard May 2026
last heard 5d ago
Misha Glenny’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 21 in all, peaking in Jul 2026 with 6.
Appearances
In 478 BCE, the Greco-Persian Wars had seen a series of armed conflicts for over 20 years.
After the defeat of a second Persian invasion, a league of cities across Greece came together.
They formed a new alliance, led by Athens, an alliance which we now call the Delian League.
In the following decades, Athens used the Delian League to grow its own wealth and formidable naval power.
But cities who tried to leave the alliance found themselves violently put down and their lands confiscated.
What began as a cooperative alliance sworn to fight back and defend Greeks against the Persian Empire gradually started to seem like it may have created another imperial power, the Athenian Empire.
And Paul, it's to you I want to come first to give us, if you can, a sense of the geopolitical landscape of this period.
What did Greece look like and what did the Persian Empire look like?
Okay, so why the name Delian League?
It comes from the island of Delos where the alliance was established, but why was Delos, it's quite a small island, why was it chosen?
So, Polly, what was the Delian League actually for?
What were its concrete aims?
So Paul mentioned that the Allies all committed to an alliance with Athens, but not with each other.
So what was Athens' intentions by creating this alliance?
Leah Lazar, the Delian League, the Athenian Empire.
Can you unpick these terms for us?
Was it described as such at the time?
And would you call it an empire, what Athens created?
So you think that Athens knew what it was doing from the very beginning, in slight contrast to what Polly was saying, that there's some confusion?
Yes, I have to say, when I first read about it, it struck me it was rather like a protection racket, the whole thing, that if you don't join in and deliver money or whatever, we will take you over.
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