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There is a little narrow passageway with the mountains on one side and the water on the other through which the Persians had to go to reach Athens. This pass is called Thermopylae, and you might guess what Thermopylae means if you notice that the first part is like Thermos bottle, which means hot bottle. As a matter of fact, Thermopylae meant Hot Gateway and was so named because this natural gateway to Greece had hot springs near by.
The Greeks decided that it was best to stop the Persians at this gate—to go to meet them there first before they reached Athens. In such a place a few Greek soldiers could fight better against a much larger number.
It also seemed wise to send picked Greek troops to meet the Persians, the very best soldiers in Greece with the very bravest general to lead them.
The Spartan king, who was named Leonidas—which in Greek means like a lion was chosen to go to Thermopylae, and with him seven thousand soldiers—seven thousand soldiers to block the way of two million Persians! Three hundred of these were Spartans, and a Spartan was taught that he must never surrender, never give up. A Spartan mother used to say to her son:
“Come back with your shield or on it.”
When Xerxes found his way blocked by this ridiculously small band of soldiers, he sent his messengers ordering them to surrender, to give themselves up.
What do you suppose Leonidas replied?
It was what we should expect a Spartan to answer, brief and to the point; that is, laconic . He said simply:
“Come and take us.”
As there was nothing left for Xerxes to do but fight, he started his army forward.
For two days the Persians fought the Greeks, but Leonidas still held the pass, and the Persians were unable to get through.
Then a Greek traitor and coward, who thought he might save his own life and be given a rich prize by Xerxes, told that king of a secret path over the mountains by which he and his army might slip through and get around Leonidas and his soldiers who blocked the way.
The next morning Leonidas learned that the Persians had found the secret path and were already on the way to pen him in from behind. There was still a chance, however, for his men to escape, and Leonidas told all those who wanted to do so to leave. Those who remained knew that the fight was absolutely hopeless and that it meant certain death for all of them. In spite of this, however, one thousand men, including all the three hundred Spartans stood by their leader, for, said they:
“We have been ordered to hold the pass, and a Spartan obeys orders, and never surrenders, no matter what happens.”
There Leonidas and his thousand men fought to the bitter end until all except one of their number was killed.
The gateway to the city of Athens was now open, and things looked very bleak for the Greeks, for there was nothing to prevent the Persians from marching over the dead bodies of Leonidas and his men straight on to Athens.
The Athenians, wondering what was to happen to them, hurriedly went to the oracle at Delphi and asked what they should do.
The oracle replied that the city of Athens itself was doomed, that it would be destroyed, there was no hope for it, but that the Athenians themselves would be saved by wooden walls.
This answer, as was usually the case in whatever the oracle said, was a riddle, the meaning of which seemed hard to solve. Themistocles, however, said that he knew the answer. You remember that it was he who had been working so hard to have a fleet of ships built. Themistocles said that the oracle meant these ships when it spoke of the wooden walls.
The Athenians, following the supposed advice of the oracle, left their city as Themistocles told them and went on board the ships, which were not far away, in a bay called Salamis.
The Persian army reached Athens and found it deserted. They burned and destroyed the city as the oracle said. Then they marched on to the Bay of Salamis, where the Athenians were on board the ships. There, on a hill overlooking the bay, Xerxes had a throne built for himself so that he could sit, as if in a box at the theater looking at a play, and watch his own large fleet destroy the much smaller one of the Greeks with all the Athenians on board.
Xerxes on his throne watching Battle of Salamis
The Greek fleet was commanded, of course, by Themistocles. His ships were in this narrow bay or strait of water, somewhat in the same way that the soldiers of Leonidas had been in the narrow valley at Thermopylae.
Themistocles, seeing that the Bay of Salamis looked somewhat like the Pass of Thermopylae, had an idea. He made believe he was a traitor like the traitor at Thermopylae and sent word to Xerxes that if the Persian fleet divided and one half stayed at one end of the strait and the other half closed off the other end of the strait, the Greeks would be penned in between and caught as in a trap.
Xerxes thought this a good idea, so he gave orders to have his ships do as Themistocles had suggested. But Xerxes, sitting smiling on his throne, had the surprise of his life. The result was just the opposite of what he had expected. With the Persian fleet separated in two parts, the Greeks in between could fight both halves of the divided fleet separately, and the space was so narrow that the Persians’ ships got in the way of each other and rammed and sank their own boats.
The Persian fleet was completely beaten, and the proud and boastful Xerxes, with most of his army and all the navy that was left, made a hasty retreat back to Persia the way they had come.
This was the last time the Persians ever tried to conquer little Greece.
If Themistocles had not had his way and built such a strong fleet, what do you think would have become of Athens and Greece!