Battle of Thermopyles (- 480)

The battles of Thermopyles in 480 av. J-C. opposes an alliance of the Greek quoted to the empire achéménide. It is one of the most famous feats of arms of the ancient Histoire. Seeing the lost battle, the king Léonidas of Sparte and 300 soldiers Spartans hold head with the enemy, in spite of a marked numerical inferiority.

The courage and the sacrifice of the thousand Spartans, Thébain S and Thespien S became legendary and were taken again many times by the popular culture.

The Persian invasion

The " large roi" Persia, Xerxès, wire of Darius Ier, did not want to undergo a new defeat against the Greeks, like his father with Marathon, ten years earlier.

After four years of meticulous preparation, he managed to join together a little more than 250.000 men (Hérodote announces a figure - certainly exaggerated - of 5 million, by counting the intendance, actually a few hundreds of thousands what is already considerable for the time). The Greece of North, terrified, folded under the shock and went.

The congress of Corinth

The Persian preparations obviously did not pass unperceived and a congress of the various Greek cities meets in Corinthe at the end of the autumn 481. For once, the immediate interests of Sparte and Athens merge. Athens fears the revenge on Persians for its former successes and Sparte notes that its large rival in the Peloponnese, Argos, is contacted by the envoys of Xerxès. All the large Greek cities, if one exclude Cyrène, Argos, Syracuse, Corcyre and Phocée, send representatives to the temple of Poséidon in Corinthe. Sparte, as most powerful of the cities, chairs the congress. A general reconciliation intervenes, such as for example between Athens and Égine, and 31 cities engage by oath in a defensive league against Persians and prepare quotas of soldiers. The command of the troops is entrusted to two Spartans, the king Léonidas I {{er}} for the infantrymen and Eurybiade for the Greek fleet. But during the winter 481/480, the Greeks tergiversate within countryside and to the conquest Thessalie by the Persian troops in spring 480 cannot be opposed.

The Greeks choose in August then, while Persians invade the Piérie, a very strong defensive position with the Thermopyles which orders the access to the Béotie and in central Greece. As for the fleet, it settles in the north of the Eubée in a place named the Artémision in order to prevent the Persian fleet from circumventing this position. Indeed, Persians, to keep the contact with their fleet, must take the only important road which passes by Thermopyles (“hot Doors”, because of the thermal springs which is there). There, between the gulf Maliaque and the mountain, the narrow roadway passes in a procession whose certain passages do not exceed 10 meters of width and is, moreover, barred by the vestiges of a wall built in zigzag. Lastly, the marshes are numerous and form an additional obstacle.

Between the 6000 men approximately available to Léonidas and the fleet of Eurybiade (with Thémistocle with the head of the quota of the Athenian ships, by far most), the connections are constant.

The storm of Artémision

With leaving Thessalie, the troops of Xerxès make movement towards the south. The infantrymen leave the city of Therma and arrive thirteen days later in the plain trachinienne (between the valley of Asopos and the city of Anticyre). The Persian fleet springs ten days after, so that the arrival of the terrestrial and naval troops is joint. Eurybiade, in front of the width of the Persian fleet, leaves Artémision and skirts the channel of Eubée to occupy the throttling of Chalcis, leaving Léonidas to the thank you of an unloading on its backs. But this operation, if it does not appear very daring, encourages Persians to progress more to the south that envisaged and to wet with the course Sépias, close to a rock and escarpée coast where they cannot tan their ships on the dry land and where the depth of water prevents many ships from firmly mooring. Violent a three days storm will destroy approximately 400 ships. Several thousands of men are drowned. The principal consequence is that Xerxès, although keeping the numerical superiority, is not any more able to divide its naval forces so as to convoy the army while delivering combat to the Greek fleet. In Chalcis, Eurybiade takes again confidence and goes up to take its guard in Artémision. But in spite of the storm, the Persian numerical superiority appears so imposing that Eurybiade and its assistant, the Adimantos Corinthian, make half-turn.

At this point in time Achéménès, one of the half-brothers of Xerxès and Admiral of the Persian fleet, detach a squadron of 200 ships and: 40000 men approximately to circumvent Eubée by the open sea while the remainder of the fleet settles with the damping of Aphètes, damping surer than that of the course Sépias. Prevented this diversion which prohibits to them the escape by the channel of Eubée in the south, and of this new damping, the Greeks try a takeover by force and launch an attack surprised on the Ioniens, combined Persians, and pour them about thirty ships before regaining their point of fastener of Artémision. Lastly, a new storm bursts and made new damage on a Persian fleet whose ships are on their anchors, whereas in Artémision the Greeks, with their practice, draw the ships on the dry land, which puts them at the shelter. Especially, this new storm causes the total destruction of the squadron sent to circumvent Eubée.

The battle and its consequences

Xerxès waits four days, thinking that the Greeks would flee of fear, but at the fifth day he realizes with stupor that they always hold head to him; irritated, it launches on them part of its army made up of Mèdes and Cissiens. Initially, on ground, the troops of Léonidas hold firmly their position in formation phalange in a procession and push back Persians, inflicting heavy losses. Xerxès decides to send its troops of elite the Mélophores taken along by Hydarnès which know soon the same fate as their allies not benefitting from their numerical superiority (in the too narrow procession) and less better armed than the Greeks (in particular of lances shorter than their adversaries). But Léonidas is betrayed by some Éphialtès, wire of Eurydémos, a citizen of Malia, which delivers to Persians the means of circumventing the Greek army, by the path of Anopée. Léonidas then decides to be sacrificed with the 300 Hoplites Spartans, like 700 soldiers of Thespies, to leave the Greeks time to organize their defense and with the army to withdraw itself in good order. The 400 combatants of Thèbes (probably of the hostages taken by Léonidas itself to make sure engagement at the side of the Greeks of this city) had also received the order to take part in this last action, but they desert on the first occasion (indeed as soon as the Spartans fold up themselves on the hillock they let them and will say to Persians which they are at their side, the latter leave them in life). The Greeks change strategy and advance out of their position, resist heroically around the king Léonidas Spartan who is killed. For its body the Spartans fight without slackening, and arrive while pushing back with eagerness the Persian attacks to recover it. Their numerical ineriority is increased with the arrival of Persians carried out by Ephialtès and Hydarnès. They are folded up with the little of weapons which remains to them (large knife, hands, teeth) on a hillock but the Persian intervention their is fatal and they all are massacred on order of Xerxès. At the conclusion of the battle this last orders that one decapitates Léonidas and that one puts his head at the end of a pile (strange thing since in this time Persians grant value to the heroic soldiers whom they fought). This battle became the emblem of Greek resistance to the invader and the spirit of sacrifice of the Spartans. At the top of Kolonós, theater of the ultimate resistance Spartan, on which a Mausolée was set up, an inscription of the poet Simonide de Céos (- 556 -467), commemorates this action:
Ὦ ξεῖν', ἀγγέλλειν Λακεδαιμονίοις ὅτι τῇδε κείμεθα, τοῖς κείνων ῥήμασι πειθόμενοι|Hérodote, 7,228

Goes, foreign, to say to Sparte that here we lie, faithful to its laws -->

Passer by, will say to Sparte which we died here to obey its laws

In the popular culture

Several artistic works celebrate this battle:

Songs

Books and written

  • Jean Malye, True story of Sparte and the battle of Thermopyles, beautiful letters, 2007.
  • Thermopylae of Constantin Cavafy
  • The Oracles , poem 25 of work Last Poems of Alfred Edward Housman
  • walls of fire of Steven Pressfield, historical novel
  • true the hisoire of Sparte and the battle of Thermopyles of Jean Malye, compilation of texts

Cartoons

Films

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