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Leonidas, King of Sparta > 
Leonidas was a king of Sparta, the 17th of the Agiad line. He was one of the sons of King Anaxandridas II of Sparta, descendant of Heracles. He succeeded his half-brother Cleomenes I, probably in 489 or 488 BC. Leonidas married Cleomenes' daughter, Gorgo. In 480 the ephors sent Leonidas with the 300 men of an all-sire unit (soldiers who had sons to carry on their bloodline) and 6700 allies to hold the pass of Thermopylae against the army of Xerxes of Persia. (see Battle of Thermopylae). According to a contemporary story, Leonidas took only a small force because he was deliberately going to his doom: an oracle had foretold that Sparta could be saved only by the death of one of its kings. Instead it seems likely that the ephors supported the plan half-heartedly due to the festival of Carneia and their policy of concentrating the Greek forces at the Isthmus of Corinth.
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More on this Website >
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonidas_I
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Troy : The Trojan War
The Trojan War is the main issue of the Iliad by Homer, and its later sequence is described in the Aeneid by Virgil. The war took place between Achaeans and Trojans, and... |
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Darius The Great, King of Persia
Darius I: king of ancient Persia, whose reign lasted from 522 to 486. He seized power after killing king Gaumâta, fought a civil war (described in the Behistun inscriptio... |
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Xerxes I, Persian King
Persian king (486 – 465 BC) of the Achaemenian dynasty. The son of Darius I, he had been governor of Babylon before his succession. He ferociously suppressed rebellions i... |
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The Persian Wars
Series of conflicts fought between Greek states and the Persian Empire. The writings of Herodotus, who was born c.484 B.C., are the great source of knowledge of the histo... |
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Battle of Thermopylae
In the Battle of Thermopylae of 480 BC, an alliance of Greek city-states fought the invading Persian Empire at the pass of Thermopylae in central Greece. Vastly outnumber... |
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