The campaigning season of 479 opened to a sense of uneasy calm for the Persians a continuing drain of resources or a secure frontier in the west. The first forces to move were the naval on either side. The Egyptian marines had been left with Mardonius and the land forces. A high proportion of Greek vessels and their crews have been drawn from Asiatic Greece. On Alexander's empty-handed return, Mardonius at once determined to march south, urged on by his Thessalian friends, especially the Aleuadae of Larissa whose regime depended on him. In Boeotia the Thebans urged him to make his base among them, and to try what bribery could do. For the Athenians, Xanthippus proposed to remain and liberate the Chersonese. In the end the force divided, the Peloponnesians sailing home as they desired, while Xanthippus crossed to the Chersonese and began the siege of Sestus.
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