When the Persian power was extended to the Hellespont and its neighborhood, Miltiades, as prince of the Chersonese, submitted to King Darius; and he was one of the numerous tributary rulers who led their contingents of men to serve in the Persian army, in the expedition against Scythia.  Miltiades and the vassal Greeks of Asia Minor were left by the Persian king in charge of the bridge across the Danube, when the invading army crossed that river, and plunged into the wilds of the country that now is Russia, in vain pursuit of the ancestors of the modern Cossacks.  On learning the reverses that Darius met with in the Scythian wilderness, Miltiades proposed to his companions that they should break the bridge down and leave the Persian king and his army to perish by famine and the Scythian arrows.  The rulers of the Asiatic Greek cities, whom Miltiades addressed, shrank from this bold but ruthless stroke against the Persian power, and Darius returned in safety.

But it was known what advice Miltiades had given, and the vengeance of Darius was thenceforth specially directed against the man who had counselled such a deadly blow against his empire and his person.  The occupation of the Persian arms in other quarters left Miltiades for some years after this in possession of the Chersonese; but it was precarious and interrupted.  He, however, availed himself of the opportunity which his position gave him of conciliating the good-will of his fellow-countrymen at Athens, by conquering and placing under the Athenian authority the islands of Lemnos and Imbros, to which Athens had ancient claims, but which she had never previously been able to bring into complete subjection.

At length, in B.C. 494, the complete suppression of the Ionian revolt by the Persians left their armies and fleets at liberty to act against the enemies of the Great King to the west of the Hellespont.  A strong squadron of Phoenician galleys was sent against the Chersonese.  Miltiades knew that resistance was hopeless, and while the Phoenicians were at Tenedos, he loaded five galleys with all the treasure that he could collect, and sailed away for Athens.  The Phoenicians fell in with him, and chased him hard along the north of the AEgean.  One of his galleys, on board of which was his eldest son Metiochus, was actually captured.  But Miltiades, with the other four, succeeded in reaching the friendly coast of Imbros in safety.  Thence he afterward proceeded to Athens, and resumed his station as a free citizen of the Athenian commonwealth.

The Athenians, at this time, had recently expelled Hippias the son of Pisistratus, the last of their tyrants.  They were in the full glow of their newly recovered liberty and equality; and the constitutional changes of Clisthenes had inflamed their republican zeal to the utmost.  Miltiades had enemies at Athens; and these, availing themselves of the state of popular feeling, brought him to trial for his life for having been tyrant of the Chersonese.  The charge did not necessarily import any acts of cruelty or wrong to individuals:  it was founded on no specific law; but it was based on the horror with which the Greeks of that age regarded every man who made himself arbitrary master of his fellow-men, and exercised irresponsible dominion over them.