Leonidas, King of Sparta

Leonidas was a hero of ancient Greece whose conduct at the Battle of Thermopylae has become a byword down the centuries for selfless heroism against overwhelming odds.

Born in around 521 BC, Leonidas (the name means “lion-like”) was one of the sons of King Anaxandridas of Sparta. He became king himself in 491 BC, succeeding his half-brother Cleomenes.

The invasion of Greece by the Persians under Xerxes, in 480 BC, led to Leonidas’s determination to make a stand against the enemy. He chose 300 Spartan warriors who themselves had sons, so as not to risk the extinction of their families. On his march he was joined by troops from other cities, so his total force was around 7000 before he reached the pass of Thermopylae in August or September (accounts differ).

Thermopylae (the “hot gates”) was of huge strategic importance because it consisted of a very narrow route between a mountain and a morass, and was the only way of gaining access to southern Greece from the north, which the Persian force of at least 100,000 men was seeking to do.

As told by the historian Herodotus some fifty years after the event, Leonidas’s army was able to hold the Persians at bay for two days, inflicting massive casualties on them. However, a traitor named Ephialtes told the Persians about a mountain path that enabled them to skirt round the Greek army and then attack them from the rear.

On hearing of this move, Leonidas realised the hopelessness of his position. He dismissed all the troops except his own Spartans (men from Thespis and Thebes also volunteered to remain) and made a frontal attack on the Persians who confronted him, with the sole aim of selling Greek lives as dearly as possible. In the desperate battle that ensued, Leonidas was an early faller. His body was rescued by the Greeks, and the place where he fell was later marked by a stone lion.

Despite the defeat, the Greeks were emboldened by the courage and self-sacrifice of Leonidas and his men, and redoubled their efforts to repel the invading Persians, which was achieved after the naval victory at Salamis the following month.

Leonidas’s story has inspired military campaigners down the centuries, as well the 2007 movie “300” directed by Zack Snyder, which was itself based an earlier comic-book mini-series.

Alexander the Great was to find himself in the opposite situation to Leonidas during his own invasion of Persia in 330 BC. Unable to force through the narrow pass of the Persian Gate, Alexander sought, and found, a local guide to show him a mountain path by which he could take his men to a position from which he could attack the defenders from behind. 

© John Welford