Who defeats the Persian at the Battle of Thermopylae?
Jun 26, 2020 · Considering this, who betrayed the Spartans in the battle of Thermopylae? In the 1962 film The 300 Spartans, Ephialtes was portrayed by Kieron Moore and is depicted as a loner who worked on a goat farm near Thermopylae. He betrays the Spartans to the Persians out of greed for riches, and, it is implied, unrequited love for a Spartan girl named Ellas.
Who survived the Battle of Thermopylae?
Jan 06, 2012 · Ephialtes – the traitor who gave Xerxes victory at Thermopylae Posted in Ancient History , Bravery , Famous battles , Historical articles , History , War on Friday, 6 January 2012 Click on any image for details about licensing for commercial or personal use.
What is the moral significance of the Battle of Thermopylae?
Feb 16, 2022 · How were the Greeks betrayed at the Battle of Thermopylae? For two full days of battle, the small force led by Leonidas blocked the only way through which the vast Persian army could pass. After the second day, a local named Ephialtes betrayed the Greeks by revealing a small path used by shepherds. He led the Persians behind the Greek lines.
What was the main purpose of the Battle of Thermopylae?
In Thermopylae …pass by the Greek traitor Ephialtes, outflanked them. Sending the majority of his troops to safety, Leonidas remained to delay the Persians with 300 Spartans, their helots, and 1,100 Boeotians, all of whom died in battle. Although the Persians won at Thermopylae and conquered central Greece, they suffered considerable losses…
Who plays the traitor in 300?
Theron is one of the characters in the movie 300. He betrayed his compatriots for the treasure of Xerxes. He was played by actor Dominic West. In the movie 300, he is shown to stand aside King Leonidas and the Persian Messanger.
Did the Ephors betray Sparta?
Ephialtes, who betrays the Greeks, is likewise changed from a local Malian of sound body into a Spartan outcast, a grotesquely disfigured troll who by Spartan custom should have been left exposed as an infant to die.Mar 12, 2007
Who was the real Ephialtes?
Yes. However, the real Greek traitor Ephialtes, a local shepard, was most likely not a horribly disfigured hunchback. Graphic novelist Frank Miller chose to alter Ephialtes' appearance in order to emphasize the practice of eugenics that is introduced early in the film.
Who won the battle of Thermopylae and why?
Perhaps better known today as “that battle from the movie 300,” the Battle of Thermopylae was an epic, three-day face-off between a small group of Greek soldiers and the massive Persian Army in 480 B.C. It's little spoiler to say the Greeks lost.Dec 19, 2020
How were the Spartans betrayed at Thermopylae?
In the 1962 film The 300 Spartans, Ephialtes was portrayed by Kieron Moore and is depicted as a loner who worked on a goat farm near Thermopylae. He betrays the Spartans to the Persians out of greed for riches, and, it is implied, unrequited love for a Spartan girl named Ellas.
How many Persians were at the Battle of Thermopylae?
*The combined totals for Greek armies is 6,300, although most modern estimates are around the 7,000 mark....Army sizes and compositions during the Battle of Thermopylae 480BCE.CharacteristicGreeks*PersiansSpartan helots (slaves)100-Mycenians80-Immortals**-10,000Total Persian Army (lower estimate)-70,0009 more rows•Apr 16, 2013
How did the Spartans fall?
Despite their military prowess, the Spartans' dominance was short-lived: In 371 B.C., they were defeated by Thebes at the Battle of Leuctra, and their empire went into a long period of decline.Sep 29, 2020
Where is Thermopylae today?
central GreeceThermopylae, Modern Greek Thermopýles, also spelled Thermopílai, narrow pass on the east coast of central Greece between the Kallídhromon massif and the Gulf of Maliakós, about 85 miles (136 km) northwest of Athens (Athína).6 days ago
Who won in the Persian War?
GreekWho won the Persian Wars? The alliance of Greek city-states, which included Athens and Sparta, won the Persian Wars against Persia from 490 to 480 BCE.Apr 6, 2016
Was the Battle of Thermopylae real?
The Battle of Thermopylae (/θərˈmɒpɪliː/ thər-MOP-i-lee; Greek: Μάχη τῶν Θερμοπυλῶν, Máchē tōn Thermopylōn) was fought between an alliance of Ancient Greek city-states, led by King Leonidas I of Sparta, and the Achaemenid Empire of Xerxes I. It was fought in 480 BC over the course of three days, during the second ...
Why did only 300 Spartans fight?
The Spartans may have only sent 300, not because of the Olympics or Carneia, but because they didn't wish to defend so far north, although it does seem unusual they would have sent a King if so.Oct 22, 2019
What battle ended the Persian Wars?
the Battle of MarathonHowever, while en route to attack Athens, the Persian force was decisively defeated by the Athenians at the Battle of Marathon, ending Persian efforts for the time being.
Who betrayed the Greeks at the battle of Thermopylae?
The mainly Spartan Greek troops were led by Leonidas. After three days of resistance against the Persian king Xerxes I and his huge army advancing south, the Greeks were betrayed and the Persians were able to outflank them.
Have the Ephors betrayed Sparta?
Betraying the Greeks, Ephialtes is also turned from a healthy local Malier into a Spartan outcast, a grotesquely deformed troll who, according to Spartan custom, should have been exposed as a child to die. According to Herodotus, Leonidas led an army of perhaps 7,000 Greeks.
How were the Greeks betrayed at the Battle of Thermopylae?
For two full days of battle, the small force led by Leonidas blocked the only way through which the vast Persian army could pass. After the second day, a local named Ephialtes betrayed the Greeks by revealing a small path used by shepherds. He led the Persians behind the Greek lines.
Who killed Xerxes?
In August 465 BC. AD, Artabanus, the commander of the royal bodyguard and the most powerful official of the Persian court, murdered Xerxes with the help of a eunuch, Aspamitres.
Who was the Spartan who betrayed Leonidas?
In the battle of Thermopylae, Leonidas and his brave 300 were the heroes – and Ephialtes of Trachis, the villainous traitor who betrayed the Spartan army, served as the villain.
What is the hunchback in 300 really?
Is the humpback traitor from the movie Ephialtes based on a real person? Yes. But the real Greek traitor Ephialtes, a local shepherd, probably wasn’t a terribly disfigured hunchback.
Who is the Greek traitor?
role in the passage of Thermopylae by the Greek traitor Ephialtes, overwhelmed them. Sending the majority of his troops to safety, Leonidas stayed behind to delay the Persians with 300 Spartans, their helots and 1,100 Boeotians, all of whom had perished in the battle.
Who led the battle of Thermopylae?
The Battle of Thermopylae ( / θərˈmɒpɪliː / thər-MOP-i-lee; Greek: Μάχη τῶν Θερμοπυλῶν, Máchē tōn Thermopylōn) was fought between an alliance of Ancient Greek city-states, led by King Leonidas I of Sparta, and the Achaemenid Empire of Xerxes I.
How many people died in the Battle of Thermopylae?
The Greek rearguard, meanwhile, was annihilated, with a probable loss of 2,000 men, including those killed on the first two days of battle.
What was the pass at Thermopylae suited to?
Tactically, the pass at Thermopylae was ideally suited to the Greek style of warfare. A hoplite phalanx could block the narrow pass with ease, with no risk of being outflanked by cavalry. Moreover, in the pass, the phalanx would have been very difficult to assault for the more lightly armed Persian infantry.
What was the last stand at Thermopylae?
Alternatively, the argument is sometimes advanced that the last stand at Thermopylae was a successful delaying action that gave the Greek navy time to prepare for the Battle of Salamis. However, compared to the probable time (about one month) between Thermopylae and Salamis, the time bought was negligible.
What was the Persian invasion?
The Persian invasion was a delayed response to the defeat of the first Persian invasion of Greece, which had been ended by the Athenian victory at the Battle of Marathon in 490 BC. By 480 BC, Xerxes had amassed a massive army and navy and set out to conquer all of Greece.
How many Spartans were there in the Battle of the Pass?
Furthermore, the numbers changed later on in the battle when most of the army retreated and only approximately 3,000 men remained (300 Spartans, 700 Thespians, 400 Thebans, possibly up to 900 helots, and 1,000 Phocians stationed above the pass, less the casualties sustained in the previous days).
Where was the Battle of Artemisium?
The battle took place simultaneously with the naval battle at Artemisium. It was held at the narrow coastal pass of Thermopylae ("The Hot Gates") in August or September 480 BC.
The Battle of Thermopylae
The invasion of the Persians into the Greek homelands set in motion the clash of the two greatest powers of the ancient world.
Aristodemus redeems himself in Sparta
The word “coward” was the worst insult for the supremely warlike Spartans. The coward was not punished, but he was treated as if he did not exist; he was invisible and no one would touch him.
Why did Herodotus choose Thermopylae?
The allied Greek land forces, which Herodotus states numbered no more than 4,200 men, had chosen Thermopylae to block the advance of the much larger Persian army. Although this gap between the Trachinian Cliffs and the Malian Gulf was only "wide enough for a single carriage", it could be bypassed by a trail that led over the mountains south of Thermopylae and joined the main road behind the Greek position. Herodotus notes that this trail was well known to the locals, who had used it in the past for raiding the neighboring Phocians.
Who played Ephialtes in The 300 Spartans?
In the 1962 film The 300 Spartans, Ephialtes was portrayed by Kieron Moore and is depicted as a loner who worked on a goat farm near Thermopylae. He betrays the Spartans to the Persians out of greed for riches, and, it is implied, unrequited love for a Spartan girl named Ellas.
Where did Athenades flee?
He then fled to Thessaly; the Amphictyons at Pylae had offered a reward for his death. According to Herodotus, he was killed for an apparently unrelated reason by Athenades ( Greek: Ἀθηνάδης) of Trachis, around 470 BC, but the Spartans rewarded Athenades all the same.
Who was the son of Eurydemus?
Ephialtes ( / ˌɛfiˈæltiːz /; Greek: Ἐφιάλτης, Ephialtēs; although Herodotus spelled it as Ἐπιάλτης, Epialtes) was the son of Eurydemus ( Greek: Εὐρύδημος) of Malis. He betrayed his homeland, in hope of receiving some kind of reward from the Persians, by showing the army of Xerxes a path around the allied Greek position at the pass of Thermopylae, which helped them win the Battle of Thermopylae in 480 BC.
What does the name Ephialtes mean?
Name. After the betrayal of Ephialtes, the name "Ephialtes" received a lasting stigma; it came to mean "nightmare" in the Greek language and to symbolize the archetypal traitor in Greek culture.
Overview
Battle
On the fifth day after the Persian arrival at Thermopylae and the first day of the battle, Xerxes finally resolved to attack the Greeks. First, he ordered 5,000 archers to shoot a barrage of arrows, but they were ineffective; they shot from at least 100 yards away, according to modern day scholars, and the Greeks' wooden shields (sometimes covered with a very thin layer of bronze) and bron…
Sources
The primary source for the Greco-Persian Wars is the Greek historian Herodotus. The Sicilian historian Diodorus Siculus, writing in the 1st century BC in his Bibliotheca historica, also provides an account of the Greco-Persian wars, partially derived from the earlier Greek historian Ephorus. Diodorus is fairly consistent with Herodotus' writings. These wars are also described in less detail by a number of other ancient historians including Plutarch, Ctesias of Cnidus, and are referred to …
Background
The Athenian city-states of Athens and Eretria had aided the unsuccessful Ionian Revolt against the Persian Empire of Darius I in 499–494 BC. The Persian Empire was still relatively young and prone to revolts amongst its subject peoples. Darius, moreover, was a usurper and had spent considerable time extinguishing revolts against his rule.
Prelude
The Persian army seems to have made slow progress through Thrace and Macedon. News of the imminent Persian approach eventually reached Greece in August thanks to a Greek spy. At this time of the year, the Spartans, de facto military leaders of the alliance, were celebrating the festival of Carneia. During the Carneia, military activity was forbidden by Spartan law; the Spartans had ar…
Opposing forces
. Top rank: Persian, Median, Elamite, Parthian, Arian, Bactrian, Sogdian, Chorasmian, Zarangian, Sattagydian, Gandharan, Hindush (Indians), Scythian. Bottom rank: Scythian, Babylonian, Assyrian, Arabian, Egyptian, Armenian, Cappadocian, Lydian, Ionian, Scythian, Thracian, Macedonian, Libyan, Ethiopian.
The number of troops which Xerxes mustered for the second invasion of Gree…
Strategic and tactical considerations
From a strategic point of view, by defending Thermopylae, the Greeks were making the best possible use of their forces. As long as they could prevent a further Persian advance into Greece, they had no need to seek a decisive battle and could, thus, remain on the defensive. Moreover, by defending two constricted passages (Thermopylae and Artemisium), the Greeks' inferior num…
Aftermath
When the Persians recovered Leonidas' body, Xerxes, in a rage, ordered that the body be decapitated and crucified. Herodotus observed that this was very uncommon for the Persians, as they traditionally treated "valiant warriors" with great honour (the example of Pytheas, captured off Skiathos before the Battle of Artemisium, strengthens this suggestion). However, Xerxes was known for hi…