The Ionians

Around 1000 B.C., right after the colonization of the Dorian, the Ionians came into mainland Greece. They traveled from Attica, Anatolia and other territories of Greece. They were the first to arrive mainland Greece who speaks the Greek language. It was believed that the Ionians are the creators and therefore the ancestors of the Mycenaean Culture. Before reaching Greece, the Ionians were under the power of the Persian Empire in Anatolia. When they settled in Greece, their status in the society was somewhat in concession because of their previous relation with Persia which is identified as enemy of the Greeks.

In terms of military, the mainstream of the Greek society consider the Ionians lax in comparison with the Dorian and other Greek military group. By year 450 B.C. during the time of Herodotus, the Greeks formulated a meticulous ethnological theory of its people and the Ionians were able to converge with the indigenous rudiments of prehistoric Greece.