A king told to hand over his weapons, who replied 'come and take them'
Molon labe — the reply attributed to Leonidas by Plutarch.
History · Ancient world
The Battle of Thermopylae
480 BC
Second Persian invasion of Greece
A small Greek force under the Spartan king Leonidas held a narrow coastal pass in central Greece for three days against Xerxes' invading army, until a local man showed the Persians a mountain track around the position. The rearguard was annihilated, but the delay — and the simultaneous naval action at Artemisium — bought time for the Greek fleet and made the defenders immortal.
How to spot them
- ▸Clue patterns: a narrow pass, hot springs, a traitor named Ephialtes, a rearguard of 300
- ▸'Go tell the Spartans' — the epitaph attributed to Simonides of Ceos
- ▸Fought at the same time as the naval Battle of Artemisium
- ▸The Greek name means 'hot gates'
What happened
'Then we shall fight in the shade' — the answer to a warning about arrows blotting out the sun
Attributed by Herodotus to the Spartan Dienekes.
A local shepherd who showed the invaders a mountain path for a reward, and whose name became a Greek word for traitor
Ephialtes of Trachis.
'Go tell the Spartans, stranger passing by, that here obedient to their laws we lie'
The epitaph on the monument at the pass, attributed to the poet Simonides of Ceos.
The 700 men of Thespiae who stayed to the end and are routinely left out of the story
Along with about 400 Thebans, who according to Herodotus surrendered.
A naval battle fought simultaneously a few miles up the coast, and abandoned when the pass fell
Artemisium, off northern Euboea.
Quick-fire facts
- •It was fought in 480 BC at the pass of Thermopylae ('hot gates') in central Greece, named for its sulphur springs.
- •The Greek force was led by Leonidas I of Sparta; the invading army was led by the Persian king Xerxes I, son of Darius.
- •The famous 300 were Spartiates; they fought alongside several thousand other Greeks, notably 700 Thespians who stayed for the last stand.
- •Ephialtes of Trachis betrayed the Anopaea path, allowing the Persian Immortals to outflank the Greeks on the third day.
- •The Phocians guarding the mountain path were brushed aside; Leonidas dismissed most of the army and stayed with the rearguard.
- •Simonides of Ceos wrote the epitaph for the dead; a modern monument at the pass carries it.
- •The naval Battle of Artemisium was fought at the same time; the Greek fleet withdrew when the pass fell.
- •Athens was evacuated and burned; the Persian fleet was defeated at Salamis later the same year, and the army at Plataea in 479 BC.
- •Herodotus is the main source; he claims Persian numbers in the millions, which modern historians scale down drastically.
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Sources
- Herodotus — The Histories, Book VII
- Encyclopaedia Britannica — Battle of Thermopylae
- Paul Cartledge — Thermopylae: The Battle That Changed the World