for supporting the revolt. The Ionian revolt had severely threatened the stability of Darius's empire, and the states of mainland Greece would continue to threaten that stability unless dealt with. Darius thus began to contemplate the complete conquest of Greece, beginning with the destruction of Athens and Eretria. In the next two decades, there would be two Persian invasions of Greece, occasioning, thanks to Greek historians, some of the most famous battles in history. During the first invasion, Thrace, Macedon and the Aegean Islands were added to the Persian Empire, and Eretria was duly destroyed. However, the invasion ended in 490 BC with the decisive Athenian victory at the Battle of Marathon. After this invasion, Darius died, and responsibility for the war passed to his son Xerxes I. Xerxes then personally led a second Persian invasion of Greece in 480 BC, taking an enormous (although oft-exaggerated) army and navy to Greece. Those Greeks who chose to resist (the 'Allies') were defeated in the twin simultaneous battles of Thermopylae on land and Artemisium at sea. All of Greece except the Peloponnesus thus having fallen into Persian hands, the Persians then seeking to destroy the Allied navy once and for all, suffered a decisive defeat at the Battle of Salamis. The following year, 479 BC, the Allies assembled the largest Greek army yet seen and defeated the Persian invasion force at the Battle of Plataea, ending the invasion and the threat to Greece. The Allied fleet defeated the remnants of the Persian fleet in the Battle of Mycale near the island of Samos—on the same day as Plataea, according to tradition. This action marks the end of the Persian invasion, and the beginning of the next phase in the Greco-Persian wars, the Greek counterattack. After Mycale, the Greek cities of Asia Minor again revolted, with the Persians now powerless to stop them. The Allied fleet then sailed to the Thracian Chersonese, still held by the Persians, and besieged and captured the town of Sestos. The following year, 478 BC, the Allies sent a force to capture the city of Byzantion (modern day Istanbul). The siege was successful, but the behaviour of the Spartan general Pausanias alienated many of the Allies, and resulted in Pausanias's recall. Formation After Byzantion, Sparta was eager to end its involvement in the war. The Spartans greatly feared the rise of the Athenians as a challenge to their