Battle of Thermopylae
Image taken from wikipedia.org
The Persian Empire was the largest empire of its time. They controlled the Middle-East and parts of Asia. To the west was Greece, a group of city-states on one giant piece of land. The Persians sought to expand their empire by invading and conquering this area. Hoping not to shed more blood than necessary, emissaries were sent to the cities to negotiate a reasonable submission to the Persians. Many cities accepted, however Sparta was different. King Leonidas marched his troops down to the coast and made a stand against the invading Persians at the pass of Thermopylae. If the Persians took this pass, there would be nothing in their way from conquering the rest of Greece.
So for many days, thousands of Greek soldiers held off wave after wave of attacks from Persian soldiers. The battle seemed to be going in their favor, until the Spartans were betrayed by one of their own. This traitor named Ephialtes showed the Persians a route around the Greek line of defense. This effectively sealed the fate of the Greeks. They were almost totally annihilated after being outflanked by the Persians. Only two Greek soldiers survived the battle. This event was the basis for the 2007 film 300.
