Christopher Tuplin | Session 5 of the Battle of Plataea Conference

Searching for Persian Perspectives on Plataea

Christopher J. Tuplin (University of Liverpool)

The full version of my paper (which there will not be time to present in full in the online session) embraces four main sections. (1) Some Greek versions of Persian perspectives on Plataea. Aeschylus and Ctesias have nothing significant to offer. Herodotus constructs a version heavily focused on Mardonius: this makes IX chime in general and specific terms with the opening of VII and deals with defeat by shifting blame to the dead leader. Dio of Prusa sketches a version which deals with defeat by denying its existence, a proposition with precedents in Herodotus. (2) Documents we do not have and people we perhaps cannot find addresses some texts that ostensibly have nothing whatsoever to say about Plataea or Xerxes’ version. These include Xerxes’ daiva inscription (a novel description of imperial suppression of disorder), documentary texts from Persepolis (business as usual in the imperial heartland), and business documents from Babylonia (a tantalising sign of Mardonius?) The last item prompts a wider search for Plataea-actors in non-Greek documents and raises a methodological question about Herodotean silences. (3) Edges of Empire argues that imperial frontier ideology is inscribed in the army that fought at Plataea. (4) addresses Perso-centric depiction of conflict with Greeks in early gem- and seal-stone images and provides the first public discussion of a remarkable new addition to the catalogue of such items.