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Biographies: Leonidas I of Sparta
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Leonidas I was one of the two kings of Sparta during the invasion of Xerxes. Leonidas is also one of Sparta’s most well known kings because of the sacrifice at Thermopylae.
Leonidas’ early life was mostly uneventful, for a Spartan any way. At an unknown date Leonidas was born to Anaxandrias II of Sparta. If Spartan princes were treated any better then the other youths we do not know, given the fact that the Spartans did not leave much in the form of written records. It likely that Leonidas was put through the same rigorous boot camp starting at age seven and ending at age 20 as other youths followed by more training until age 30. Leonidas probably had some special training attached to this because he was to be one of the kings.
We get the first real mention of Leonidas in 490 B.C. In 490 Leonidas became a king when his half brother Cleomenes I died. As a political move Leonidas married his niece Gorgo, whom was reputed as being able to see the future, according to Herodotus. We know nothing about Leonidas’ reign as king, or what he did between then and 480, when Xerxes invaded with his huge army.
In 480 B.C. Xerxes embarked on a campaign of revenge. Xerxes knew at the time of his ascension that his father, Darius the Great, had viewed Greece as a security hazard to the Achaemenid Empire. In 480 B.C. Xerxes decided to get revenge for the defeat of his father at Marathon 10 years earlier and he set out with the biggest army of the time, followed by a similarly sized navy and headed for Greece. In Greece it was all too clear what Xerxes was doing and at a conference of sorts in either Delphi or Athens the Greeks had to find a way to give the united city-states time to form up an army. Leonidas told the assembled that he could take a force of 300 Spartans and a mass of armed helots (arming helots was a very rare act in Sparta) to the pass of Thermopylae to give the others time to assemble. On the spot the Thebans and Thespians declared that some of their forces would join the Spartans at Thermopylae. It was widely believed that Leonidas promised such a small force because an oracle told him that a king of Sparta must die to save Greece. Today a lot of people believe that the ephors (Spartan men 60 years old and up who formed a council capable of vetoing a king) were only willing to give so many men. So it was that a force of 7,000 men marched off from their respective city-states to block the pass of Thermopylae.
At Thermopylae when Xerxes saw the Greek force he reportedly laughed. At the start of the first day’s fighting at Thermopylae Herodotus wrote that an emissary came to demand that the Greeks give up their weapons. Leonidas gave him a simple answer “Come and get them!” and the battle began. Due to the narrow nature of the pass that the Spartans and other Greeks wedged themselves into the Persians could not use their superior numbers, this proved to be perfect for the Greeks, whose heavily armed hoplites could take down several of the lightly armed and armored Persians without worry of being flanked or overwhelmed. As a result the Persians got slaughtered. At the beginning of the second day another emissary went to Leonidas, telling him that “Our archers will fire so many arrows that they will block out the sun” Leonidas told him “Good, then we’ll fight in the shade!” The second day would turn into a repeat of the first, but this time with the 10,000 Immortals fighting the Spartans instead of rank-and-line troops. At the end of the day a Greek deserter named Ephialites (whose name now means terror in Greek) came to Xerxes and offered to show him a way to flank the Greek forces. At the beginning of the third day Leonidas noticing that Persians were flanking his troops through the pass divided his forces, for what reason we do not know, and told the remaining 300 Spartans, 700 Thespians, and 400 Thebans to “Eat a hearty breakfast men, for tonight we dine in Hades!” In the ensuing bloodbath all of the Spartans and Thespians died, the Thebans are said to have surrendered to Xerxes. It is said that during the fighting the Spartans attempted to rescue the body of Leonidas, but due to the mass of Persians surrounding them they were unable to. After the battle Leonidas’ body was taken to Xerxes who mutilated it and presented the body as an example of what would happen to those that resist. The sacrifice at Thermopylae ended up galvanizing the Greeks instead of disheartening them, leading to Xerxes’ ultimate defeat at their hands. When the Spartans got Leonidas’ body back they buried it with full battle honors, it is said that there was much wailing and mourning over the body, something that Spartans did not normally do.
In conclusion while we do not know much about Leonidas I of Sparta, he is remembered to this day as the epitome of Spartan bravery, courage, and fighting spirit. This is all summed up by the epitaph on Leonidas’ tomb “Go tell the Spartans, stranger passing by, that here obedient to there laws we lie” |
User Comments:
| Paal_101
:: January 31 2005 |
Wow! Great eulogy to a true hero Joshua!  |
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| Mythos_Ruler
:: January 31 2005 |
I was Leonidas in a former life.  Though, more likely just an annonymous Thespian hoplite.  |
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| Phoenix-TheRealDeal
:: February 2 2005 |
| Really good and interestng article, Josh. |
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| FirePowa8
:: December 10 2005 |
| About the "Good, then we shall fight in the shade!" comment, we seem to now know that it was Dienekes who replied with that, rather than Leonidas himself. And apparently, Dienekes laughed at his own optimistic joke, despite the fact that he was going to slaughter 500 Persians over the next two days. :-D |
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| Cthulhu
:: November 13 2007 |
“Go tell the Spartans, stranger passing by, that here obedient to there laws we lie”
Another inconsistency. This text can be seen at the original (ancient) monument at Thermopylae in Greece and not on Leonidas tomb. It is a strophe from an Athenian poet. |
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| Cthulhu
:: November 13 2007 |
Much more interesting. Not only did Leonidas offer to bring armed Helotes, but he is rumoured to have been a supporter for reforms concerning Helotes by granting them some sort of citizenship instead of their traditional status.
There is also another interesting story about Leonidas. When inviting the inhabitants of the Thermopylae region to join him he wrote his message on the sort of cloth that Greeks used to sent invitations for a party. |
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