Professor Polly Lowe

That means that Athens ends up with a monopoly on military power, which reduces the ability of other states to resist Athens.

So we know a little bit.

Again, this is almost entirely from what Thucydides tells us.

And it's a very, very compressed account because after all, this isn't, strictly speaking, what he's meant to be talking about.

So we can't blame him completely.

But we know that there are operations against Persia.

So it's not the case that they completely forget about the war against Persia.

So they go up to the north.

The region, now it's in northern Greece, if you go to Thessaloniki and headed east from there along the coast heading towards Turkey.

There's a place up there called Aion, which was occupied by the Persians.

It's strategically very important.

It's at the mouth of an important river, which gives access to timber.

which is a vital resource, particularly if you want to build ships and also precious metals.

The Athenians, that's one of their first operations.

They kick the Persians out of there and claim it as an Athenian possession.

Then there are further operations in Western Anatolia against the Persians.

And then heading down that coast and a bit further east again, culminating, and we're maybe skipping a bit far ahead of your narrative, in the battle at the Eremitan River.

So we're down into the 460s by that point.

Which is a land-sea battle against the Persians, which...

Yes, I think that's fair to say.