Leonidas I

""Come and get them""

- Leonidas' recorded the response to King Xerxes' offer to surrender their weapons Leonidas (died 480 BC) was a Greek warrior king of the city-state of Sparta. He led the Spartan forces in the Second Persian War and is remembered for his death at the Battle of Thermopylae. Leonidas was the son of Anaxandridas II of Sparta, and thus belonged to the Agiad Dynasty, who claimed descent from the hero Heracles.

Xerxes waited 4 days to attack, hoping for the Greeks would disperse. Finally, on the 5th day the Persians would attack. Leonidas and the Greeks repulsed the Persians' frontal attacks for the fifth and sixth days. rougly killing 20,000 of the enemy troops. The Persian Elite Special Forces known to the Greeks as "the Immortals" was held back. and the two of Xerxes' brothers (Abrocomes and Hyperanthes) died in battle. On the seventh day (August 11), a Malian Greek traitor named Ethialtes, led the Persian general Hydarnes by a mountain track behind the Greeks. At that point Leonidas sent all Greek troops remaining and remained with his 300 Spartans, 900 Helots, and 700 Thespians who refused to leave. The Thespians stayed out of their own will, declaring that they would not abandon Leonidas and his followers. Their leader was Demophilus, son of Diamodrus, and as Herodotus writes, "Hence they lived with the Spartans and died with them".

Of the small Greek force, attacked from both sides, all were killed except for the Thebans, who surrendered. Leonidas was killed, but the Spartans retrieved his body and protected him. Herodotus says that Xerxes' orders were to have Leonidas' head cut off and put on a stake and his body crucified. This was considered sacreligious.