Passing on orders in the midst of a raging sea battle would have been impossible if not for the reforms introduced by Xanthippus. From the moment the man had returned from exile, Xanthippus had understood the fleet of allies was just too big, too cumbersome to command from any single vessel. The Spartan commander, Eurybiades, may have called himself the fleet navarch, but the truth was, his orders were answered only by his Spartan galleys and then usually lost in the constant shifting of individual captains. It had been Xanthippus who’d introduced flag signals and squadron commanders. Even then, they had endured the fiction that the Spartan was still in command, at least until Eurybiades had given an order for the fleet to abandon Athens and pull back to the Peloponnese.

On that night a week before, with visible reluctance, Themistocles had told the gathering of captains that he would not be obeying that order. Instead, Athens would be evacuated and the strait defended. Themistocles had informed a furious Eurybiades that his Spartan ships were free to leave, but if the Persians were not stopped by Salamis, they had open sea to the Peloponnese peninsula – home to Sparta and Corinth. A dozen Spartan ships could not stop eight hundred – unless they fought as part of the main fleet.

Themistocles had made his disobedience as gentle as possible, but there had been no room for misunderstanding. Athens had provided two hundred triremes and crews, freemen and freed slaves, anyone who could sit on a bench and row till his heart broke. Compared to the ships of Sparta, even the forty crews Corinth had provided, men of Athens were the fleet.

Themistocles watched a black banner raised above the deck, a long strip of cloth held on two dory spears lashed together. Word would spread as it was sighted. He and Xanthippus had agreed the signal, though only when there was no other option. He waited then, while the officers of his galley sought to avoid the fighting for a time. That was no small task, with so many Persian crews bent on their destruction. Before raising the flag, Themistocles had called six Athenian ships to his side, working them in the sort of small squadron formation Xanthippus had described. Whenever an enemy galley came too close, they attacked as a group. It was a successful tactic and Themistocles saw two more Persian ships rammed while he waited for a response. No one surfaced when Persian galleys rolled, showing their hulls to the sky. The oarsmen were chained in and the soldiers wore too much armour to struggle back to the surface.

Themistocles felt his heart thumping as time passed. War at sea was much slower than war on land. Below his feet, Athenian rowers leaned back, or slept, or slurped bean stew from bowls and drank heavily watered wine as a skin was brought round.