The Wooden Walls of Thermopylae Read online

  Pompous and offensive and typically Spartan but also oddly verbose. Where was the famous laconic application of brevity? We’d expected some attempt, at least the pretence of a friendly preamble. I looked towards Themistocles, he gave nothing away but I sensed he was troubled. But Leonidas had only just got warmed up.

  “We will construct a wall across the Isthmus of Corinth and invite all loyal Greeks to fight under our leadership; we will make a fortress of the Peloponnese and find space for our allies who have had to abandon their homelands. We will force the Great King to fight on ground of our choosing and on our terms …”

  Themistocles cut him off.

  “And how will you deal with the Great King’s fleet once it has simply sailed past your great and doubtless impregnable wall, King Leonidas?”

  There was an intake of breath from the Ephors; Leonidas, just begun on his peroration, looked daggers. Problem for him and the Ephors was that there was no answer to this question, at least not an answer that suited them. Something which couldn’t be said for the answer Themistocles gave to his own question.

  A number of years ago I gave an account of this exchange to young Herodotus to include in the stories he’s writing about our heritage. So I remember it pretty well, even if he has subsequently altered details to suit the flow of his narrative. He’s grown up into quite a clever man and got the main bits about Themistocles right, I’m pleased to say.

  “Kings, Ephors, noble Spartiates, forgive my interruption, I’m a simple plain speaking man and mean no offence but let me answer my question for you.”

  Unparalleled on the field of battle but totally unused to being contradicted in their brutal slave state, they were at a loss and Themistocles took his advantage.

  “Think on this, noble hosts: one of the problems with fleets is that walls don’t stop them. So, after the Great King has sailed his vast fleet past your wall, as he of course will, he is free to land his troops anywhere in your Peloponnese homeland. This presents you with a problem as you will be unable to disentangle your army from your great wall, which will of course be besieged by the other Persian army which General Mardonius will have marched unopposed across Greece. A Greece which you refused to defend. And what do you think happens then?”

  They didn’t need to think, it had already struck them. But Leonidas made an effort.

  “Is that not where your precious fleet earns its money, Themistocles?”

  “If there had been a plan to defend all of Greece and not just your patch then you’d be right, King Leonidas.”

  The implications of this reverberated through the chamber. But Themistocles, although on unfamiliar territory, was a master of this type of engagement and pressed his advantage. Helped I think by the nature of the Spartans, who respect little but do respect courage.

  “So, let me return to the answer of the question I posed.”

  I think Leonidas was torn between the desire to buy him a drink and the desire to kill him. I noted the chinless man adjusting his tunic now looked considerably more ill at ease.

  “Think for a moment, great leaders of Sparta. Reflect upon what will happen on the other side of your great wall in the Greek states abandoned to the Persians. Remember some of these states, like Thebes, have already agreed to accept the Great King. For states like these, the fall of Sparta and Athens cannot come too soon.”

  He smiled a cold and bitter smile. In the pause Leonidas said,

  “But Thebes is on the other side of the Isthmus; all the loyal Greeks will stand with us.”

  “You think so?”

  It was clear in the ensuing silence that neither Leonidas nor the Ephors were sure. Themistocles took a sip of wine then pressed on, but in a more gentle tone, like a father explaining the harshness of life to a disappointed child.

  “You see for me, I find it difficult to distinguish between loyal and disloyal Greeks. I merely see Greek states in a variety of difficult situations with hard choices to make.”

  Something was coming; in that room you could feel it like the silence before a summer storm, time seemed suspended waiting for whatever deal breaker or maker came next. Then the thunder.

  “Take Argos, for instance.”

  I swear I saw the muscles in Leonidas’s jaw tighten as he waited to hear the doom of his plans.

  “Argos, which is of course on the same side of the wall as you are.”

  He paused and smiled at them before moving to the point.

  “I have been speaking to an Argive friend, Uliades, a good man, a democrat, a man who wishes to fight with us. You Spartans are of course familiar with the political situation in Argos, your Peloponnesian neighbour. So you won’t need me to tell you how they still mourn the recent slaughter of the cream of their manhood by the army of Spartans led by your late king, Cleomenes. You know how they resent your dominance.”

  “Get to the point, Themistocles.”

  Leonidas shouted this, the storm was breaking. In the last moment of stillness Themistocles mused, as if to himself,

  “So I wonder how they’ll react when egged on by the betrayed Greeks the other side of the wall. I wonder which port they will make available to the Persian fleet. Perhaps Nauphlio would be best situated as it is halfway between the wall on the Isthmus and the city of Sparta. A port with plenty of land to disembark and deploy an army, near to the ancient Argive fortress of Tiryns. I’d consider this possibility very carefully if I were you. From there, they would cut your army off from Sparta itself.”

  “You can’t possibly know this.”

  “Oh, but I do, King Leonidas. I have it on very good account that the Great King has promised Argos hegemony of the Peloponnese after the defeat of Sparta. Not that it’s only the Argives you have to worry about.”

  I believe at that moment Leonidas considered drawing a blade and striking Themistocles, but he controlled himself sufficiently to snap.

  “Your fleet, it’s the job of your fleet to stop that. That’s what you promised. Listen Themistocles …”

  The storm had broken, now Themistocles was raising his voice.

  “If you defended Greece, not if you betrayed it. Like you did back at Mara …”

  He managed to choke back the words that might have ruined everything. Leonidas was still shouting.

  “You promised, gave your word you fucking Athenian renegade, you promised, you fucking promised. No one breaks their word to a Spartan and lives. No one.”

  “I can’t deliver the fleet on your terms. No Athenian will agree once you betray us. We will evacuate our city and sail to one of our colonies, maybe in Italy, and leave the Great King to you.”

  They were screaming at each other; no one else moved. But there was something final and deadly in Themistocles’s roar of anger.

  “They have two and a half million men, not even counting the traitors. Stick to your plan, the wall will be bypassed; you will fight alone, be betrayed and wiped out. Sparta will disappear.”

  In retrospect I sometimes think that maybe that would have been the best conclusion, but back then we needed them. Funnily enough the same thought must have pulled both Leonidas and Themistocles back from the brink. There was another silence and Themistocles possessed the subtlety to let Leonidas speak first.

  “So what do you want? What is your offer, Athenian?”

  The last word was spat out with venom; Themistocles ignored this.

  “I want to yoke the horses of Athens to the Spartan chariot. But; I need something from you that will enable me to do this. You must make, at least, a pretence of defending all Greece. You must send Spartan troops beyond the isthmus to slow the Persians down. Do that and we can build an alliance with most of the states that’ve sent delegates here. We can make it difficult for Thebes, Argos and the others to play the traitor. If it doesn’t work, you still have the option of retreating to ground of your own choosing; the isthmus wall if you want. But defend our soil first. I know how it could work. Do this and Athens will sacrifice itself for Greece.”


  It’s hard to tell how Spartans communicate. Sometimes they prevaricate for years. But not in that room. The kings looked at each other; the Ephors gently tapped their crooks on the ground. Only the chinless man seemed agitated, his eyes swivelling round the room. Then Leonidas stepped towards Themistocles and offered him his hand.

  In that one gesture he changed the fate of all Greece and sealed his own. That’s how it was done, reader, that’s how the histories that young Herodotus writes are really decided. I know, I was there. But it was a close run thing. A great reckoning in a small room. All that stuff in the assembly the next day, that was just a show; a satyr play; but it’s the way of the world that it’s always the sleight of hand that’s believed.

  So they shook hands like the heroes of Homer after a contest. I think there was genuine respect between them. Themistocles was sweating and I caught a fleeting memory of him hiding under the sheets at Brauron. Sometimes we have to be all things.

  There was to be one more twist, however. I can’t swear to it but I think it was the nearest a Spartan has ever come to a subtle joke. Leonidas asked,

  “So, we have your precious Athenian fleet then?”

  “Yes, we fight together.”

  “Together, yes. But as you agreed under Spartan command.”

  Themistocles had nowhere to go.

  “Yes.”

  “Well in that case let me introduce you to the commander of the Greek fleet.”

  He spoke one word; a name.

  “Eurybiades.”

  The chinless man walked across the chamber and proffered Themistocles his hand.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  So to the assembly of the Greeks. The great assembly. It was managed and choreographed like a play at the Dionysia. Except for the climax of course. No one saw that coming. But I get ahead of myself.

  The conference of those Greeks hoping to form an alliance, and some who didn’t, took place in a building the Spartans, with their customary self-aggrandisement, called the Hellenion. It was too small and shabby to deserve such a name and was cramped with poor acoustics. However, few of the delegates crammed in shoulder to shoulder worried much over that. The piece of theatre they witnessed once the prayers had been said and libations poured was far too dramatic to allow delegates the luxury of assessing their surroundings.

  What would happen had been arranged between Themistocles and the Spartan kings. It was proposed by some minor, toadying member of the Spartan Peloponnesian league, I forget which, that the leader of the Greek army to face the Persians would be Sparta. This was approved, as was expected, by all except the Argive delegation.

  Then the leadership of the fleet was raised. Themistocles took the rostra and in a short, high handed and provocative statement demanded that as most of the fleet would be Athenian it should have an Athenian leader. This drew the expected response from our rivals; Aegina and Corinth foremost.

  There followed a period of unseemly squabbling as insults were bandied back and forth. Then, as it seemed an impasse had been reached, Leonidas took to the rostra. No one was going to heckle him so he was heard in silence as he delivered the speech that I suspect Themistocles had written for him. It concluded with,

  “So I appeal to the Athenian delegates to put their rightful pride in their mighty fleet to one side and for the sake of unity and the freedom of all Greece, accept a non-Athenian as admiral of the fleet.”

  This was the cue for Themistocles to take the stage. With tears in his eyes he put on a display of such astonishing falsehood that I thought he’d have been shouted down. It was so obviously faked and staged that I’m surprised the gods didn’t strike him dead there and then. But no: the delegates loved it, cheered him to the rafters. Particularly the conclusion, a masterpiece of hypocrisy, where he said,

  “For me, fellow Greeks, as admiral of the Athenian fleet I realise it is my duty to put Greece before Athens. We have suffered for Greece before and will do so again. But let me make one suggestion: let the leader of the fleet be a Spartan so we have a unified command. I would proudly serve under a Spartan admiral.”

  Through the cheers that followed this, and before the puzzled eyes of the Aegiantians and Corinthians, Eurybiades was wheeled out to be greeted by embraces and tears of incredulous joy by Themistocles. Part of me wanted to throw up, but I suppose it solved things. And that’s the account you now know and should believe, reader. Pure theatre. It should have ended there, but in life there’s only so much that can be controlled.

  There was movement at the back of the room, an area where the least prestigious of the delegate’s entourage were promiscuously mixed. It was difficult to identify who spoke but there could be no misunderstanding the tone and nature of the question shouted at the stage. The significance was increased by the question coming from someone associated with the Thessalian delegation.

  Thessaly was on the direct line of march for the Persian army. It would be the front line soon; perhaps, as we debated here, it was already a war zone. The Thessalians were likely to offer earth and water to the Great King if their land wasn’t defended. But the question was far more subtle.

  “Can our noble Athenian ally tell us truthfully about the words of the oracle at Delphi that they have so recently received?”

  If there was one thing that we’d tried to keep secret in Athens, it was that message from the Gods: the one that quite explicitly stated that if we resisted the Persians we’d be wiped out. Themistocles tried to buy time to allow him to understand the nature of this threat, for threat it obviously was. But there was no time.

  “Let me refresh your memory, son of Neocles.”

  Then the Thessalian began to quote,

  “Leave, flee to the ends of the earth! Abandon your homes and the towering heights that ring your city.”

  Themistocles grew pale; I saw the Spartan kings direct anxious glances at each other but they had no time to intervene.

  “Has this jogged your memory, son of Neocles, or shall I give you a bit more? This section should be of interest to your allies.”

  He quoted again.

  “Nor is yours the only towered city he will obliterate.”

  This was enough for Leonidas.

  “Quiet, you have spoken out of turn. This is not the place to discuss the words of the Gods directed to a supplicant.”

  The man knew a threat when he heard one and shut up. But he’d achieved what had been intended: the room was spooked like a herd of wild horses by summer lightening. We never managed to get hold of the speaker, as he managed to lose himself in the crowd and slip away.

  Leonidas promised that a further approach would be made to the Delphic oracle. Then he uttered the leaving prayer, thus closing the conference with the promise that all the delegates would reconvene in spring at Corinth prior to the commencement of the fighting season.

  The delegates set off back to their states, in most cases more afraid than when they arrived and, as we know, several immediately made their peace with the Great King. I missed what happened next as the two kings and Themistocles convened behind closed doors. The taint of treachery was in the air and I suspected the hand of Metiochus at work.

  But the next day, a haggard and drawn Themistocles brought the small group of Athenians together. It was a very short meeting.

  “It has been decided that Athens will send a second party of supplicants to the oracle. Cleinias will return with the ships to Athens and speed up the preparation of our fleet. I will lead the supplicants. We leave at dawn.”

  So it was in this way I came to visit the most sacred and certainly the most frightening place in Greece: Delphi. Most sensible men stay as far from the occult as they can and for those desperate enough to approach the unworldly creatures who tend the shrines at Delphi and Dodona, the experience is neither comfortable nor reassuring. Themistocles occupied himself for the first hour of the journey cursing the stupidity of the religious city leaders having consulted the oracle in the first place.

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nbsp; It was clear from what he said there would be little religion in our visit: we were going to negotiate, if such a thing is possible, with the intermediary of the Gods. But, possible or not, we had to try it because what Greek army was going to march out to fight the Persians with the curse of the Gods hanging over it?

  We had plenty of time to ponder this on the march up country towards the Gulf of Corinth. From there we would slip on board a ship and cross the gulf to where the sanctuary sits high up beneath the cliffs on Mount Parnassus. We travelled in secrecy but I think were watched. Despite this we maintained an easy pace, lived well off the country, and benefited from the mountain air and fresh streams.

  The story of how the Athenians moved as supplicants towards the shrine carrying olive branches to placate the anger of great Apollo is well known. What’s not so well known is that the bit about the olive branches is the only bit that’s true and that was a ruse dreamt up by Themistocles to give the impression of piety. There was little piety in our expedition.

  But there is something at Delphi, the ancient centre of our world. Something difficult to explain, something otherworldly and unsettling. The God is there but not in the way we understand. I would never go back. For the same reasons that I won’t go back, I hesitate to write my full memory of the shrine. Some things are between us and the Gods. The Gods are seldom kind and never forgiving.

  It’s a hard slog uphill over rough ground and by the time we’d toiled up to the outer sanctuary where supplicants are received, weighed down by our bundles of olive branches, we were exhausted and sweating. The air was heavy and in the distance there was the faint rumble of thunder. We were admitted by a creature, male I think, muffled in a hood with a painted face. This was the first of a series of stages intended to disorientate the supplicant.

  I’ve heard that the process at the Acheron Necromanteion in the north, off the coast facing Corcyra, is worse. There the supplicant is drugged then follows the path of the dead. At least we were dealing with Lord Apollo, God of light and life.