The Battle of Thermopylae was the first main event in what is generally termed the Second Persian War. Its political origin is to be found in the events of the First Persian War,when Xerxes' father, King Darius I of Persia, or Darius the Great, invaded Greece for the first time and was defeated by Athens at the Battle of Marathon in 490 BC.
Earth and water
Just prior to that battle Darius had sent heralds around to the Greek states offering the opportunity to submit,which would avoid war and make them eligible for blandishments from the king.As was customary, this was signaled by asking for "earth and water", betokening their submission, which was duly kept by the assiduous bureaucrats of the Persian Empire. The Athenians responded at that time by throwing the emissaries into a pit, and the Spartans by throwing others into a well, with a suggestion to dig it out for themselves.
Congress of Corinth
Consequently, when Xerxes sent the envoys around again just prior to the Battle of Thermopylae he omitted Athens and Sparta. Support gathered around these two leading states. A congress met at Corinth in late autumn of 481 BC,and a confederate alliance of Greek city-states was formed. It had the power to send envoys asking for assistance and to dispatch troops from the member states to defensive points after joint consultation. Herodotus does not formulate an abstract name for the polity, such as "congress" or "alliance", but calls them simply "οἱ Ἕλληνες" (the Greeks) and "the Greeks who had sworn alliance" (Godley translation) or "the Greeks who had banded themselves together" (Rawlinson translation). Sparta and Athens had a leading role in the congressbut interests of all the states played a part in determining defensive strategy. Little is known about the internal workings of the congress or the discussion during its proceedings. Only 70 of the approximately 700 Greek cities sent representatives.
Vale of Tempe
The congress first sent a force of 10,000 Greeks including hoplites and cavalry to the vale of Tempe, through which they believed the Persian army would have to pass. There is no mention of any Spartans. The force did include Lacedaemonians led by Euanetus, not of the Spartan royal family, and Athenians under Themistocles. Warned by Alexander I of Macedon that the vale could be bypassed elsewhere and that the army of Xerxes was overwhelming the Greeks decided not to try to hold there and vacated the vale.
Greek strategy
The allied Greeks judged that the next strategic choke point where the Persian force could be stopped was Thermopylae. They decided to defend it and send a fleet to Artemision, a naval choke point, as Xerxes' army was being supplied and supported by sea. Using the fleet, Xerxes' army might have crossed Maliacos bay and outflanked the Greek army; in the words of George Grote: "... the occupation of the northern part of the Euboean strait was indispensable to prevent the Persian fleet from landing troops in the rear of the defenders of Thermopylae."
The Greek high strategy is confirmed by an oration later in the same century:
But while Greece showed these inclinations [to join the Persians], the Athenians, for their part, embarked in their ships and hastened to the defence of Artemisium; while the Spartans and some of their allies went off to make a stand at Thermopylae, judging that the narrowness of the ground would enable them to secure the passage.
Carneia festival
Herodotus writes:
The force with Leonidas was sent forward by the Spartans in advance of their main body, that the sight of them might encourage the allies to fight, and hinder them from going over to the Medes, as was likely they might have done had they seen that Sparta was backward. They intended presently, when they had celebrated the Carneian Festival, which was what now kept them at home, to leave a garrison in Sparta, and hasten in full force to join the army. The rest of the allies intended to act similarly; for it happened that the Olympic Festival fell exactly at this same period. None of them looked to see the contest at Thermopylae decided so speedily; wherefore they were content to send forward a mere advance guard. Such accordingly were the intentions of the allies.
During the Carneia, military activity was forbidden by Spartan law. At the Battle of Marathon, the Spartans had arrived too late because of this requirement. On this occasion, the ephors decided the urgency was sufficiently great to justify an advance expedition under one of its kings (Leonidas), which can be used to roughly determine the time of year. The Carneia took place in a late summer month (July, August or September) from the 7th to the 15th ending with a full moon.
The oracle
The legend of Thermopylae as told by Herodotus has it that Sparta consulted the Oracle at Delphi before setting out to meet the Persian army. The Oracle is said to have made the following prophecy in hexameter verse:
O ye men who dwell in the streets of broad Lacedaemon!
Either your glorious town shall be sacked by the children of Perseus,
Or, in exchange, must all through the whole Laconian country
Mourn for the loss of a king, descendant of great Heracles.
Marry a good man
The overall commander of Greek forces was now Leonidas, who was generally admired.Herodotus writes that he was convinced he was going to certain death, as his forces were not adequate for a victory, and so selected only men with living sons.Plutarch mentions in his Sayings of Spartan Women that, after encouraging him, Leonidas' wife Gorgo asked what she should do on his departure. He replied, "Marry a good man, and have good children."
Arrival of the Persians
Competing ideologies
Herodotus attests a conversation that took place early in the expedition between Xerxes and Demaratus, an exiled Spartan king under his employment. Xerxes asked Demaratus whether he thought that the Greeks would put up a fight, for in his opinion neither the Greeks nor even all peoples of Europe together would be able to stop him because they were disunited. Demaratus replied:
First, they will never accept conditions from you that bring slavery upon Hellas; and second, they will meet you in battle even if all the other Greeks are on your side. Do not ask me how many these men are who can do this; they will fight with you whether they have an army of a thousand men, or more than that, or less.
Xerxes laughed at this answer, claiming that "free men" of any number would never be able to stand against his army which was unified by a single ruler, and that obedience to one single master would make his troops extremely courageous, or they would be led into battle "by the whip" even against an army of any size. He added that "even if the Greeks have larger numbers than our highest estimate, we still would outnumber them 100 to 1". He asserted that his army contained men who would gladly fight with three Greeks at once and that Demaratus was talking nonsense.To this Demaratus answered:
I would most gladly fight with one of those men who claim to be each a match for three Greeks. So is it with the Lacedaemonians; fighting singly they are as brave as any man living, and together they are the best warriors on earth. They are free, yet not wholly free: law is their master, whom they fear much more than your men fear you. They do whatever it bids; and its bidding is always the same, that they must never flee from the battle before any multitude of men, but must abide at their post and there conquer or die.
The final decision
On the Persian army's arrival at Thermopylae, Greek troops instigated a council meeting. Some Peloponnesians suggested withdrawal to the Isthmus and blocking the passage to Peloponnesus. They were well aware that the Persians would have to go through Athens in order to reach them there. The Phocians and Locrians, whose states were located nearby, became indignant and advised defending Thermopylae and sending for more help. Leonidas and the Spartans agreed to defend Thermopylae.
Combing their long hair
Meanwhile, the Persians entered the pass and sent a mounted scout to reconnoiter. The Greeks allowed him to come up to the camp, observe them, and depart. When the scout reported to Xerxes the size of the Greek force and that the Spartans were indulging in calisthenics and combing their long hair, Xerxes found the reports laughable. Seeking again the counsel of Demaratus, Xerxes was told that the Spartans were preparing for battle and that it was their custom to adorn their hair when they were about to risk their lives. Demaratus called them "the bravest men in Greece" and warned the Great King that they intended to dispute the pass. He emphasized that he had tried to warn Xerxes earlier in the campaign, but the King had refused to believe him. He added that if Xerxes ever managed to subdue the Spartans, "there is no other nation in all the world which will venture to lift a hand in their defence" (Rawlinson translation).
Come and get them
Xerxes remained incredulous, finding it unbelievable for such a small army to contend with his own. Plutarch informs that he then sent emissaries to the Greek forces. At first, he asked Leonidas to join him by offering the kingship of all Greece. Leonidas answered: "If you had any knowledge of the noble things of life, you would refrain from coveting others' possessions; but for me to die for Greece is better than to be the sole ruler over the people of my race." Then Xerxes asked him more forcefully to surrender their arms. To this Leonidas gave his noted answer: Μολὼν Λαβέ, "Come and get them".
We shall fight in the shade
Despite their extremely disproportionate numbers, Greek morale was high. Herodotus writes that when Dienekes, a Spartan soldier, was informed that Persian arrows would be so numerous as "to blot out the sun", he responded with a characteristically laconic remark, "So much the better, we shall fight in the shade."
Battle
Failure of the frontal assault
Xerxes waited four days for the Greek force to disperse. On the fifth day he sent Medes and Cissians, along with relatives of those who had died ten years earlier in the battle of Marathon, to take the Greeks prisoner and bring them before him. They soon found themselves in a frontal assault. The Greeks had camped on either side of the rebuilt Phocian wall. The wall was guarded and the Greeks fought in front of it.
Details of the tactics are scant. Diodorus says "the men stood shoulder to shoulder" and the Greeks were "superior in valor and in the great size of their shields." The formation being described is the standard Greek phalanx, a wall of overlapping shields and layered spear points, which would only have been effective if it spanned the width of the pass. Herodotus says that the units for each state were kept together. The small shields and shorter spears of the Persians were not a match for the superior armament of the Greek hoplites.The Greeks killed so many Medes that Xerxes is said to have started up off the seat from which he was watching the battle three times. According to Ctesias, the first wave was "cut to pieces" with only two or three Spartans dead.
According to Herodotus and Diodorus, the king, having taken the measure of the enemy, threw his best troops into a second assault on the same day: the Immortals, an elite corps of 10,000 men.Ctesias tells a totally different story, that Xerxes sent another 20,000 troops against the Greeks, after the first 10,000 under Artapanus were defeated. They also failed to open the pass even though they were flogged by their leaders to press on. Although there might have been 10,000 Medes, the Immortals were only 10,000 and as elite troops it would not have been necessary to flog them. On the second day Xerxes sent, according to Ctesias, another 50,000 men to assault the pass, but again they failed. Xerxes at last stopped the assault and withdrew to his camp, totally perplexed.
Encirclement of the Greeks
Late on the second day of battle, as the Persian king was pondering what to do next, he received a windfall: a Malian Greek traitor named Ephialtes informed him of a path around Thermopylae and offered to guide the Persian army. Ephialtes was motivated by the desire of a reward. For this act, the name of Ephialtes received a lasting stigma, coming to mean "nightmare" and becoming the archetypal term for a "traitor" in Greek.
In Herodotus, Xerxes sends his commander Hydarnes to flank the pass with the men under his command, but he does not say who those men are. Hydarnes commanded the Immortals, but they had been cut to pieces the day before. Ctesias tell a different story, asserting that 40,000 troops were sent around the pass conducted by the leaders of the Trachinians. The stories can be reconciled by presuming that Hydarnes was given overall command of an enhanced force including what was left of the Immortals, but it is only a presumption. The path led from east of the Persian camp along the ridge of Mt. Anopaea behind the cliffs that flanked the pass. It branched with one path leading to Phocis and the other down to the Gulf of Malis at Alpenus, first town of Locris. Leonidas had stationed 1,000 Phocian volunteers on the heights to guard that path.
Their first warning of the approach of the Persians at daybreak was the rustling of oak leaves. Herodotus says that they jumped up and were greatly amazed. Hydarnes was perhaps as amazed to see them hastily arming themselves as they were to see him and the Persian forces. He feared that they were Spartans, but was enlightened by Ephialtes and proceeded by firing "showers of arrows" at them. The Phocians retreated to the crest of the mountain to make their stand, but the Persians took the left branch of the pass to Alpenus and hence circled behind the main Greek force.
Last stand of the Greeks
Learning that the Phocians had not held, Leonidas called a council of war at dawn. Some Greeks argued for withdrawal, while others pledged to stay. After the council, many of the Greek forces did choose to withdraw. Herodotus believed that Leonidas blessed their departure with an order, but he also offered the alternative point of view that those retreating forces departed without orders.The Spartans had pledged themselves to fight to the death. However, a contingent of about 700 Thespians, led by general Demophilus, the son of Diadromes, refused to leave with the other Greeks, but cast their lot with the Spartans.
The Greeks this time sallied forth from the wall to meet the Persians in the wider part of the pass in an attempt to slaughter as many Persians as they could. They fought with spears until every spear was shattered and then switched to xiphoi (short swords). In this struggle, Herodotus states that two brothers of Xerxes fell: Abrocomes and Hyperanthes. Leonidas also died in the assault and they fought over his body, the Greeks taking possession.
Receiving intelligence that Ephialtes and the Immortals were advancing toward the rear, the Greeks withdrew and took a stand on a hill behind the wall. The Thebans "moved away from their companions, and with hands upraised, advanced toward the barbarians..." (Rawlinson translation), but a few were slain before their surrender was accepted. The king later had the Theban prisoners branded with the royal mark. Of the remaining defenders Herodotus says: "Here they defended themselves to the last, those who still had swords using them, and the others resisting with their hands and teeth; ...." Tearing down part of the wall, Xerxes ordered the hill surrounded and the Persians rained down arrows until the last Greek was dead. In 1939 the archaeologist, Spyridon Marinatos, excavating at Thermopylae found large numbers of Persian bronze arrowheads on Kolonos Hill, changing the identification of the hill on which the Greeks died from a smaller one nearer the wall.
Aftermath
When the body of Leonidas was recovered by the Persians, Xerxes, in a rage against Leonidas, ordered that the head be cut off and the body crucified. Herodotus observes that this was very uncommon for the Persians, as they had the habit of treating "valiant warriors" with great honor (the example of Pytheas captured earlier off Skyros also suggests that). However, Xerxes was known for his rage, as when he had the Hellespont whipped because it would not obey him.
Xerxes was curious as to what the Greeks were trying to do (presumably because there were so few numbers) and had some Arcadian deserters interrogated in his presence. The answer was that all the other men were participating in the Olympic Games. When Xerxes asked what the prize for the winner was, "an olive-wreath" came the answer. Upon hearing this, Tigranes, a Persian general, said: "Good heavens, Mardonius, what kind of men are these that you have pitted against us? It is not for money that they contend but for glory of achievement!" (Godley translation).
After the Persians' departure, the Greeks collected their dead and buried them on the hill. A stone lion was erected to commemorate Leonidas.Forty years after the battle, Leonidas' bones were returned to Sparta where he was buried again with full honors and funeral games were held every year in his memory.
The simultaneous naval Battle of Artemisium was a stalemate, whereupon the Athenian navy retreated. The Persians were now in control of the Aegean Sea and all of peninsular Greece as far south as Attica. The Spartans prepared to defend the Isthmus of Corinth and the Peloponnese, while Xerxes went on to sack Athens, whose inhabitants had already fled to the island of Salamis. In September, the Greeks defeated the Persians at the naval Battle of Salamis, which led to the rapid retreat of Xerxes. The remaining Persian army, left under the charge of Mardonius, was defeated in the Battle of Plataea by a combined Greek army again led by the Spartans, under the regent Pausanias.
