Plataea (Second Persian War)
Now that the Greeks had won a major naval victory over the Persians at Salamis, they were braver. Now they were all eager to fight the Persian army on land too. So in the spring of 479 BC, when Xerxes sent the Persian army back to Greece (he didn't come himself this time), the Greeks met the Persians in the battle of Plataea (plah-TAY-ah) (near Thebes, north of Athens). Again, the Greeks beat the Persians. This time, the Persians went home again and stayed there. The Greeks had won the Second Persian War!
To find out more about the Persian Wars, check out these books from Amazon.com or from your local library:
Oxford First Ancient History, by Roy Burrell and Peter Connolly (1997). Lively interviews and pictures make the ancient Mediterranean come to life. For middle schoolers.
A Brief History of Ancient Greece: Politics, Society, and Culture, by Sarah Pomeroy and others (2004). For college students.
The Greco-Persian Wars, by Peter Green (1998). A popular history of the wars.
The Greek and Persian Wars 499-386 BC, by Philip De Souza (2003).
The Persian Wars, by Herodotus. Straight from the Greek historian himself!
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