Dalla "triere leggera" alla "triere pesante": l'evoluzione della flotta ateniese tra Temistocle e Cimone

Information preserved by our sources about the trireme of the first part of the V century are scarce and often conflicting. Both Herodotus and Plutarch imply, according to traditions which are apparently incompatible, technical differences between Athenian and “Persian” triremes. I suggest an interpretation of avaiable data, stressing the peculiar features of the Themistoclean fleet. Based on this, Plutarch’s passage on the structural modifications introduced with the Cimonian fleet becomes clearer and substantially important under the tactical and strategic point of view. Two subsequent phases of the Athenian military navy are thus highlighted: Themistocles and Cimon, both innovators in their own way, promoted opposing conceptions of naval warfare, represented by two trireme patterns, of which it is possible to reconstruct the fundamental features.