Significant population increase in Aegean Greece; early forms of urbanisation. Traditional date for the first Olympic Games. Earliest examples of Greek writing with the new script; Greek pottery at Al Mina. Greek trading post established at Pithekoussai. First Greek settlements established in Magna Graecia; beginning of the colonisation movement. Most likely period when Homer and Hesiod were composing epic poetry. The early development of phalanx fighting. The first tyrannies emerge in Aegean Greece. Some oligarchic political structures emerge in some cities; first records of lyric and elegiac poetry. Further development and spread of the polis structure; bodies with restricted political involvement of non-aristocratic free men begin to emerge. The colonisation movement slows; more than 1,000 settlements now established. Croesus becomes king of Lydia and conquers the Asiatic Greek cities soon afterwards. Cyrus the Great becomes king of Persia. Cyrus the Great and the Persians conquer Lydia and the Asiatic Greek cities. Polycrates tyrant of Samos. Darius becomes king of Persia. Democracy established in Athens with the reforms of Cleisthenes. Greco–Persian Wars. Ionian Revolt. Battle of Marathon. Xerxes becomes king of Persia. Battles of Thermopylae and Salamis. Battles of Plataea and Mycale. | 
