Describing the shower of arrows at Thermopylae falling so thick and fast that they blot out the sun’s light. Leonidas, the Spartan king, fell with his men after a path around the pass they were defending was betrayed to the Persians. But for that betrayal it might have been among the greatest David Beats Goliath victories. Â
It did however leave us with an unbeatable one-liner of defiance: when the Persians pointed out how overwhelming their force was and invited the Greeks to lay down their arms in surrender, their redoubtable leader is said to have told them to ‘come and get them’. Â
Leonidas fell with his men in a hail of sun-darkening arrows…
Source: Justin Marozzi, The Man Who Invented History: Travels with Herodotus (London: John Murray, 2009), p. 17
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