Xerxes' Bridge of Boats

Xerxes’ bridge of boats was the double pontoon crossing the Persian king built across the Hellespont in 480 BC to march his army from Asia into Europe for the invasion of Greece. Herodotus (Histories 7.33 to 7.36) records that a first pair of bridges was destroyed by a storm, after which Xerxes had the strait scourged; the rebuilt bridges near Abydos used penteconters and triremes lashed with flax and papyrus cables, planked and railed. The crossing took seven days and nights and became the emblem of imperial overreach.