Fodor's Expert Review Statue of Leonidas

Stop a moment and contemplate the statue of the stern Spartan leader. During the Second Persian War in the 5th century BC, with 30,000 Persians advancing on his army of 8,000, Leonidas, ordered to surrender his weapons, jeered, "Come and get them." For two days he held off the enemy, until a traitor named Efialtes (the word has since come to mean "nightmare" in Greek) showed the Persians a way to attack from the rear. When forced to retreat to a wooded knoll, Leonidas is said to have commented, "So much the better, we will fight in the shade." His entire troop was slaughtered.