Leonidas’ Death: A Turning Point
in Spartan History
The historical record for the period of Leonidas’ life
covered in this novel is notably more complete than that for the first
two books in this trilogy. The assassination of the Persian
ambassadors, the Battle of Marathon and Sparta’s role in it,
the suicide of Cleomenes I, the dispatch of two Spartan sacrificial
envoys to Persia, Leonidas’ election to command the combined
Greek land forces and the appointment of Eurybiades to command the
combined Greek naval forces in 480, and, of course, the Battle of
Thermopylae, are all recorded historical events. (Readers
familiar with Steven Pressfield’s Gates of Fire may
be astonished to learn that there is not a trace of historical evidence
for the more than twenty wars he describes Sparta fighting against her
neighbors during the reign of Leonidas. Sparta was, in fact,
at peace with all her neighbors, including Argos, for the entire decade
of Leonidas’ reign.) Last but not least, almost all
the quotes attributed to Leonidas come from this period of his life and
provide substantial insight into his personality.
Likewise, four of the key events involving Gorgo – the deciphering of
Demaratus’ message, her rebuff of an importunate admirer with
reference to “not being able to play even a female
role,” her remarks about Spartan men and women, and her
leave-taking from Leonidas – are recorded in history.
Based on this skeleton of facts, I have developed the substance of this
novel. The novel weaves a logical story out of the isolated
facts, but it is also an interpretation of the known facts.
Furthermore, the interpretation is one based on knowledge of Spartan
history before and after Leonidas. Given the sharp contrasts
between archaic Sparta, with its international orientation and artistic
flowering, and classical Sparta, with its declining population and
xenophobia, I have consciously made Leonidas’ death a turning
point in Spartan history. My Leonidas is conceived as the
incarnation and advocate of Sparta’s archaic traditions and
virtues; his domestic opponents, including his twin brother (completely
unfairly and without historical basis, but for the sake of literary
effect), foreshadow the degeneration of Sparta into a bigoted and
militaristic state.
This interpretation is not arbitrary. There are a number of
indications in the historical record that give credence to my thesis
that Leonidas was well traveled and open-minded. First and
foremost is the fact that Leonidas was elected commander of all Greek
land forces by the independent representatives of all Greek states that
chose to defy Persia in 481. This was not merely an
acknowledgement of Sparta’s military primacy. Three
years later, the same cities rejected his nephew Pausanias, who had
just won the battle of Plataea, and his co-monarch Leotychidas, who had
commanded the Spartan forces at another victory, Mycale.
The sacrifice of the Thespians at Thermopylae, which represented a much
higher – indeed devastating – loss compared to population size than the
sacrifice of the three hundred Spartans, is likewise best explained in
terms of personal loyalty to Leonidas. Thespiae had no
alliance or other form of affinity with Sparta. It was not
any more threatened than were other city-states in Boiotia.
Thespiae did, however, demonstrate after Thermopylae a
powerful ethos of “victory or death” – as was notably
demonstrated at the Battle of Delium during the Peloponnesian War.
Other historical events too often ignored or viewed only in isolation
have contributed to my interpretation of Leonidas as well.
Key among these is the Spartan response to Marathon. A great
deal has been written and speculated about Sparta’s curious
delay in responding to the Athenian plea for aid. Too little
attention has been paid to the fact that what amounted to the entire
active Spartan army (two thousand men) marched north in 490 without a
king in command. Certainly no king is named. At the
time, this was very much against Spartan tradition and requires an
explanation. Speculation about helot revolts (for which there
is only the barest of inferential evidence) does not explain this
fact. A domestic leadership crisis (Cleomenes was either
still in Arkadia or already raving mad, and Leotychidas was in exile)
would explain both the delay in responding and the eventual dispatch of
an active army without a king in command. Leonidas, an Agiad
prince, who was by this time a mature man and experienced in war and
would shortly afterward became king, is the most likely candidate as
Sparta’s commander.
This in turn would explain how Leonidas won the respect and trust of
Athens and Plataea. The Athenian leadership would have been
very frustrated by Sparta’s refusal to respond immediately,
but they would have been thankful to the commander who turned up – ahead
of expectations – after marching an army 120 miles in less than three
days. Furthermore, if Leonidas had commanded the troops
Sparta sent to Marathon, it would explain why ten years later he was
obsessed with getting to Thermopylae in time – even if he had only an
advance guard of three hundred men.
Insinuations that Leonidas played a part in his
half-brother’s death are almost unworthy of comment.
There is not a shred of evidence to support the thesis beyond
the naked fact that Leonidas succeeded his brother. But he
could have done that at any time after Dorieus’ departure
from Sparta. Why, if Leonidas was a power-hungry man capable
of fratricide, did he serve his half-brother loyally for thirty years
before suddenly deciding to murder him? And where was Gorgo
while her husband killed her father? Are we to assume that
she suddenly turned patricidal? Or that she kept her mouth
shut? Gorgo? Ancient historians blamed
Cleomenes’ madness on either a curse of the Gods or excessive
drinking. Modern historians ought to be familiar enough with
paranoid schizophrenia to realize that Cleomenes’
behavior – including his self-mutilation – is completely consistent with
this serious mental illness.
There is no evidence that Leonidas’ ascension was challenged
by his other brother, his twin Cleombrotus. The rivalry
between the brothers is an invention of my own for literary purposes.
That said, we do have a curious quote attributed to Leonidas
that inspired my interpretation. According to Plutarch,
“When someone said to him: ‘Except for being king,
you are not at all superior to us,’ Leonidas, son of
Anaxandridas and brother of Cleomenes, replied: ‘But were I
not better than you, I should not be king’”
(Plutarch, “Sayings of Spartans,” 225).
For a man who had not been heir apparent to his father and
had gone through the agoge, it seems unlikely that Leonidas was
referring to his royal blood alone. I think the response
suggests confidence that he had proved himself superior to others.
That, in turn, hints at some kind of a domestic power
struggle. By making Leonidas a twin who had to convince the
Spartan Assembly that he is the rightful king, I do justice to this
exchange. My Leonidas is king not just by virtue of his
bloodlines (Cleombrotus has the same bloodlines), but because he has
demonstrated superior capabilities that induced his fellow citizens to
raise him up above his twin.
Tellingly, another quote attributed to Leonidas is his refusal to
accept the crown of “all Greece” from Xerxes with
the argument: “If you knew what is honorable in life, you
would avoid lusting after what belongs to others.”
This response does not suit the kind of man who would have killed for
the throne―most especially not a man who would kill his own brother and
father-in-law for the throne. If Leonidas had been ambitious
and greedy (like Pausanias or Lysander after him), he would have
accepted Xerxes’ offer! Certainly his answer
underlines the fact that he believed himself entitled to the Agiad
throne – not something he would have felt if he had stolen it, by murder
or otherwise. I believe a combination of legitimacy through
birth and popular acclaim based on his achievements fits best with the
known record of Leonidas.
There is no historical basis for the smallpox epidemic I
describe. However, there was apparently a considerable delay
between the murder of the Persian ambassadors and Sparta’s
decision to send two men to Persia as human sacrifices. I
felt this delay could best be explained by some kind of catastrophe
that could only be interpreted as divine displeasure . An epidemic had
the virtue of being drawn out―and so, in contrast to an earthquake or
flood, it would likely lead the Spartans to believe their
envoys’ offer to the Gods would still be relevant by the time
they reached Susa. The names of the Spartan envoys are
recorded, as are the verbal exchanges between them and the Persian
satrap Hydarnes and with Xerxes himself.
Although not explicit in the historical record, it also seemed logical
that if envoys went to the Persian court, they would encounter
Demaratus there – and thereby become the means of bringing
Demaratus’ message back to Sparta. The delivery of
that message, scratched on the wooden back of a folding wax writing
tablet, is described in Herodotus (7:239). Herodotus states
that at first no one could make sense of the blank tablets, until Gorgo
suggested that the message was hidden under the wax. That she
was present when the significance of the tablet was being discussed
reinforces my interpretation of Gorgo as a partner to Leonidas, not
just his brood mare.
Eurybiades is also a historical figure. He really did have
command of Sparta’s small contingent of ships (twelve at
Artemisium and twenty at Salamis), as well as being appointed commander
of the combined fleet of ships fighting the Persians in 480-479
BC. He was not personally elected as was Leonidas, but the
allies refused Athenian leadership of their fleet – despite the fact that
Athens provided by far the largest number of ships (nearly two hundred).
The allies specifically asked Sparta to provide a naval commander.
This is highly significant, because it suggests that at this
time Sparta was considered a naval power capable of providing competent
leadership at sea. It is important to remember that Athens
was not a significant sea power in the sixth century BC, and it did not
build its massive fleet until the discovery of silver in Laurium in 483
BC. In short, in 480, Athens was a parvenu naval power. The
naval powers of the sixth century had been Corinth and Aegina.
They preferred Spartan command to Athenian command, probably
out of deep-seated suspicion of their trade rival Athens, but they
would not have accepted Spartan naval leadership if Sparta had been
perceived as utterly incompetent and incapable. This is what
led me to hypothesize a Spartan fleet-building policy under Leonidas.
Except for his role at Artemisium and Salamis, Eurybiades appears to
play no role in history. It is important that he was
Spartiate, which supports my thesis that under Leonidas, if not before,
there were opportunities for Spartiates to gain experience in naval
warfare. The fact that he was replaced as naval commander by
Leotychidas the following year further suggests that at least briefly,
in the post-Salamis era, naval command attained exceptional
prestige. Then again, Leotychidas never distinguished himself
with military valor, and so he may simply have preferred to face the
Persians at sea, where the bulk of the fighting inevitably fell to the
far more numerous Athenians and other allies, than to face the Persians
on land, where he would be expected (but unable) to live up to the
reputation of Leonidas.
The other reforms I have attributed to Leonidas tie in with this
hypothesized naval policy. Triremes required oarsmen, and
rowing a warship is notoriously back-breaking, tedious, stinking
work. It was so unpleasant that it was seen as punishment in
later centuries, when criminals would be condemned to “the
galleys.” The image of slaves chained to the
oar-banks is one we carry around with us from films like Ben-Hur.
In fact, however, in the ancient world, particularly in ancient Greece,
the crews of warships were predominantly citizens.
This was because no city could afford to entrust the
maneuverability and speed of their fighting ships to anyone who did not
have a stake in the outcome of an engagement.
This clearly raised a problem for Sparta. We know that
Sparta’s population was in sharp decline in the period after
Thermopylae, probably due to a combination of a devastating earthquake
in 465 BC and attrition in the brutal war with Athens that began in
459. Although Spartiates commanded ships and fleets during
this war, eventually defeating mighty Athens in the naval battle of
Aegospotami in 405 BC, Spartiates did not man the oars of
Lacedaemon’s (eventually victorious) ships.
The most probable source of competent seamen was the perioikoi
residents of Lacedaemon, many of whom were probably merchants and could
have had a seafaring tradition going back centuries.
Perioikoi towns, unlike landlocked Sparta, were often located
on the coast (Epidauros Limera, Boiai, Kardamyle, Asine, Pylos, and, of
course, Gytheon, to name only a few). On the other hand,
perioikoi hoplites were an important component of Lacedaemonian land
armies. The perioikoi element equaled that of the Spartiates
at Plataea. This suggests that the perioikoi elite did not
greatly outnumber the Spartiates themselves. However, there
might have been poorer perioikoi who, like Athens’ poorer
citizens, manned the Lacedaemonian fleet. Given the fact that
Sparta’s fleet never reached the dimensions of
Athens’, it is conceivable that all manpower for the
Lacedaemonian fleet came from the perioikoi. This would
explain the trustworthiness of the crews, and would fit the notion that
ancient Greek warships were manned by free men.
But we also know that revolutions do not occur when people are
generally content or when they are most oppressed and exploited.
On the contrary, revolutions or uprisings are most likely to
occur when a long period of rising living standards and political
expectations is abruptly ended by economic or political
crisis. No more than fifteen years (and possibly as early as
ten years) after Leonidas’ death, the only documented helot
revolt in Spartan history occurred. It occurred before the
start of the Peloponnesian War, and so cannot be attributed to the
impact of that conflict. The timing of that revolt needs to
be explained. While the confusion and loss of Spartiate life
caused by the Great Earthquake might have been the opportunity that
the helots seized, their dissatisfaction – and the period of rising
living standards and expectations that had been sharply
disappointed – had to predate it.
My hypothesis is that during Cleomenes’ reign the helots had
enjoyed a slow but steady increase in living standards, which
accelerated under Leonidas and was combined with rising political
expectations. We know that later in Sparta’s
history, various popular leaders played with schemes to allow some
helots to earn or buy their freedom. Some of these measures
were eventually implemented. There is nothing inherently
absurd about Leonidas entertaining such notions. Any Spartan
politician with the foresight to appreciate naval power might also have
looked to the most numerous class in the Lacedaemonian population for
manpower. If Leonidas had introduced laws that opened
opportunities for helots to earn their freedom, he would almost
certainly have enjoyed huge popularity among the helots – which would in
turn explain how a Spartan army could risk mobilizing her entire
citizen population and deploying it outside of Lacedaemon, with a force
of thirty-five thousand helots in attendance as light troops, during
the Plataean campaign. If these thirty-five thousand helots
had been in any way untrustworthy, they would have posed a greater risk
than the Persians themselves, and they would never have been taken out
of Lacedaemon.
In the post-Leonidas era, however, helot hopes and expectations must
have been abruptly shattered, leading to the explosive situation that
culminated in the revolt. This is another reason why I have
postulated a conservative faction in Spartiate society that, after the
death of Leonidas and his closest companions at Thermopylae, takes
control of the Spartan government. We certainly know that
Pausanias was not a paragon of virtue nor popular for long, while
Leotychidas’ performance was consistently dismal.
The historical justification for including a chapter with Gorgo in
Athens is found in Plutarch’s “Sayings of Spartan
Women.” On the one hand, Plutarch records that
“a stranger in a finely embroidered robe” made
advances to her, earning the rebuke that he
“couldn’t even play a female role.”
While a stranger might have been in Sparta and (somewhat
incredibly) risked making advances to the Spartan queen, Gorgo could
hardly have retorted with a reference to “playing a female
role” based on experience in Sparta alone. Sparta
had no theater at this time. If Gorgo rebuffed an importunate
stranger by implying he looked like an actor playing a female role in a
play, her remark implies that she had seen drama performed
elsewhere – presumably in Athens, where theater was becoming popular at
this time.
More convincing, however, is the fact that Gorgo’s famous
quip about Spartan women being the only ones who gave birth to men was,
according to Plutarch, in answer to “a woman from
Attica.” Since women from Attica weren’t
supposed to be seen outside the women’s quarters of their own
homes, it is far more likely that Gorgo was in Attica (Athens) than
that an Athenian woman was in Sparta. Together, these quotes
gave me the courage to add a chapter with Gorgo in Athens, because I
think it is important to remind readers about the deplorable status of
Athenian women. The misogyny of ancient Athens is one of the
most despicable of its qualities, and should not be brushed aside or
ignored.
The account of Thermopylae in this novel is based first and foremost on
Herodotus. I follow his very explicit statement that Leonidas
and his three hundred were sent “in advance of the main
army” (Histories,
7:206), and I have seen no convincing evidence that Leonidas was
abandoned or betrayed by his home government, as modern accounts
suggest. According to Herodotus, “The intention
was, when the Karneia was over (for it was that festival that prevented
the Spartans from taking the field in the ordinary way), to leave a
garrison in the city and march with all the troops at their
disposal” (Histories,
7:206). He explicitly states that the only thing that
prevented the planned deployment of the full Spartan army was the fall
of Thermopylae much sooner than expected.
Herodotus tells us about the four-day delay before the Persians
attacked, during which a Persian scout observed the Spartans exercising
naked and combing their hair, which Herodotus claims induced Xerxes to
send for Demaratus. Allegedly, Demaratus explained that this
was “normal” for the Spartans when preparing to fight.
Note that Herodotus’ Demaratus says the Spartans
were preparing to fight, not to die. There is absolutely no
evidence in Herodotus that Leonidas or his men viewed their deployment
as a suicide mission that would inevitably end in death for all.
Herodotus records that Xerxes waited four days before attacking and
that, losing his patience on the fifth day, he sent the Medes in to
clear the Pass, in expectation of easy victory. Herodotus
claims Xerxes sent the Cissians in after the Medes failed, and then
ordered the Immortals into the Pass late on the first day, after the
Persian troops had suffered very serious casualties in heavy, all-day
fighting. The tradition that Xerxes had a throne set up so he
could watch the battle and that he jumped up three times in the course
of the day “in terror for his army” also goes back
to Herodotus’ account (Histories,
7:212). Herodotus states explicitly that the Spartans
“had their losses, too, but not many.” He
also describes the fighting in relays by city-state, and provides no
details of the second day beyond that it was like the first, with heavy
losses for the Persians.
Notably, Herodotus claims the Spartans employed various
“feints” to outfight their
“inexperienced” enemy. Unfortunately, the
only one he describes is that the Spartans would “turn their
backs in a body and pretend to be retreating in confusion, whereupon
the enemy would pursue them with a great clatter and roar, but the
Spartans, just as the Persians were on them, would wheel and face them
and inflict in the new struggle innumerable casualties” (Histories,
7:212). While experts on hoplite warfare doubt that this
maneuver is possible, I prefer to follow Herodotus, who wrote his
account in the same century that Leonidas died and after interviewing
survivors of the Persian wars.
Herodotus explicitly states that Leonidas fought further forward on the
third day than on the two previous days, but the wheeling motion I
describe on the third day of the battle is not explicitly
described. It may well be too complicated for hoplite warfare
at this time. On the other hand, it is only when describing
the third day of battle that Herodotus explicitly mentions that many
Persians “fell into the sea” (Histories, 7:223).
This inspired me to imagine a slightly different tactic than
used previously – if only to enliven the storytelling.
Herodotus also makes no mention of the night raid, but other ancient
sources refer to it. It seemed a very logical thing for
Leonidas to order, once he realized that his position was at risk and
that he might not be able to fulfill his mission of holding the Pass
until the full Spartan army could deploy. More important, it
makes for a great story. I couldn’t resist including it.
According to Herodotus, “There was a bitter struggle over the
body of Leonidas; four times the Greeks drove the enemy off, and at
last by their valor rescued it.” This account has
been challenged by modern historians, who feel it is too reminiscent of
the Iliad.
Maybe. But Leonidas’ men were raised on the Iliad and saw
themselves as the heirs of the Iliad’s heroes. I
think that as Leonidas’ friends and subjects, they would have
felt compelled by the tradition of the Iliad to retain
control of his corpse for as long as they had breath in them.
Herodotus records the fate of Aristodemos (the only survivor) and
Eurytus, who fought blind. He says the bravest Spartans,
after Leonidas himself, were Dienekes (who is sometimes credited with
the remark about “fighting in the shade”) and the
brothers Alpheus and Maron. The bravest Thespian, he says,
was Dithyrambus, but the Thespians were commanded by Demophilus (Histories, 7:222).
The fact that Xerxes ordered Leonidas’ head
displayed on a stake for his entire army to see as they marched past is
also a detail provided by Herodotus. There would have been
hundreds of thousands of witnesses of this fact (unlike many other
details Herodotus includes), and so this detail can be considered
verified history, more than almost anything else in his entire account.