Hey everyone, due to a copyright issue I had to mute a section of the video from 12:09 - 14:03. If you want to see the unedited version of it you can find it on watchnebula.com/historybuffs This is where I will upload all of my videos incase of any copyright issues. Really sorry guys.
The Spartan one-liner quip is known in modern times as a laconic phrase, named after the land of Laconia where the city stood. Unlike the philosophy loving Athenians who were very fond of hearing the sound of their own voice, Spartans were notorious for not speaking more than was absolutely needed. Thus, they acquired the reputation of being simpeltons, despite the fact that Sparta produced two of the classical seven sages of ancient Greece. Here are a few classics : The "If" answer to Phillip of Macedon that was mentioned here was preceded by another exchange. When Phillip sent a menacing letter to Sparta, asking whether he should come as friend or foe, the Spartans responded with "Neither". When a neighboring city that has suffred a drought sent a delegation to Sparta asking for help, the delegates made a long and winded speech before the Spartan assembly, imploring for aid. The Spartans retorted that the speech was so long that by the end of it they could no longer remember the begining. The next day the delegates returned with an empty flour bag, pointed at it and said "This bag needs flour". To this the Spartans answered that they need not have said "this bag" - but nonetheless agreed to provide aid. When a famous Spartan king was being pestered by a man asking who is the perfect Spartan, he annoyingly replied "He who is least like you". It was known that the Spartans discouraged theur people from travelling abroad, fearing they would be spoiled by the affluence and customs of other city states. When an Athenian haughtingly pointed this out to a Spartan, the latter replied "But you, when you come to Sparta, do not become worse, but better." Sometimes other Greeks paid back in kind. When a man from the Italian Greek city of Sybaris, known for it's love of fine dining, came to Sparta, he was invited to eat with the warriors in their mess hall and sample their famous "black broth" - Spartan blood soup made with onion and vinegar. Tasting it, the man proclaimed "Now i understand why Spartans are so fearless in the face of death. Any sane man would rather die a thousand times than live like this".
Messed up things basically all Spartans were very well educated the Agoie(however its spelled) didnt even mostly teach warfare it was mostly philosophy and history and math and such. They were far from simpletons just stoic
I always assumed that the historical and visual inaccuracies in 300 were meant to reflect how oral legends of antiquity would be embellished and exaggerated. As in, the way the events are depicted in 300 are similar to how the stories would be passed down around campfires and at Greek theaters.
@@risiwayne2067 lol No, bro. Actually they fought naked (and practiced sports naked too) because it makes you lighter and faster, and if you have a good looking body it can intimidates the enemy and influence them to make mistakes during combat. Not only Greeks, but there are descriptions of Celts, Vikings (shirtless berserkers) and Native Americans fighting naked ou half naked too.
totalwar179 I read somewhere that a Greek warrior (I believe it was a spartan) was shot with an arrow and what he said roughly translated to "I'm not afraid of dying, I'm just upset I was killed by such a cowardly weapon" lol
The runner/messenger ran from the battle of Marathon to Athens. It was 26 miles. Thats what marathons are based after. When he arrived in Athens he yelled "Nike" meaning 'victory'. Thats where Nike clothing named themselves.
The story is: After the battle, a single man bearing full armour was sent to Athens. When he arrived, he said only one word before he died: Νενικήκαμεν Meaning : we have won. And he died. The distance was about 42km so all marathons in the world come from this man. But, why full armour? He could just run without armour! The answer is simple: He didn't want to be seen as a defector. Too bad history didn't preserved his name. Yes, Nike comes from Νικη, Pepsi comes from πέψη=digestion, dexion, etc.
The Spartans were called "Lacedemonians" by their fellow Greeks. As you pointed out, they were known even in contemporary sources for their action movie-style one-liners. This type of witty terse response is called "Laconic Speech". Their society essentially successfully bred armies of Clint Eastwood clones that would do calisthenics and brush their hair before going into battle.
The main reason why the Persians had much less armour wasn't because of technological inferiority but because of their home territorys conditions and their tactics. Persia was mostly full of vast plains and deserts with a few mountain ranges and hills that have long since been safe from any sort of invasion, so their soldiers wore light armour and brought lighter weapons because they had to run and maneuver constantly in battles. This became a massive detriment to them whenever they invaded Greece because all of the battles there were in much smaller and tighter confines with mountains, hills, rivers, lakes and the very sea preventing them from being a mobile force, their preferred strategy and the strategy they've been equipped for.
Compare the topography that Persians had to traverse in order to eventually defeat Sparta & Athens...Later, the Viet Cong would successfully hold off larger American numbers in Vietnam using some of the same Spartan/Athenian guerilla tactics.
Pretty sure it also had a lot to do with the fact that the Persian army was largely made up of slaves who were under trained and thus not worthy of the cost of proper armor. The Persian army were forced into servitude for the most part, or face instant death. A lot of them probably didn't even speak the same language.
@@jacobandrewalexful the part about them speaking different languages is true since the persian empire encompassed a vast amount of territory and people, everything else you just said is completely false, while the persians at some different points (specifically after the rise of Islam and the arabian conquest of persia) did take part in slavery, throughout most of their history slavery was banned for persians and their vassals, even their religion heavily prohibited slavery, soldiers were given pay and land after retirement similar to the roman legionaries. During this time period it was the spartans who were the slavers, not the persians.
There is an entire story that took place once the Spatan lines broke. King Leonidas was killed very early on and the battle that ensued for his body is an entire story in itself.
Cool fact: "Thermopylae" translates as "hot gates" in Greek, its name coming from various sulphur springs in the area and was thought to be the entrance to Hades.
@@lelouchvibritannia4028 All this time I interpreted "Send them to Hades" to mean send to the underworld, when what they mean is "send them to the god of the dead" Cheers for clarifying.
Only 1% of people realise that 300 is so "whacky" because the whole film is told from Dilios' point of view, as an exaggerated story, or motivational speech to the men. It's such a misunderstood film. I think it's brilliantly original and memorable, with some great scenes.
It has big flaw as it shows "reality" being just as overblown and exaggerated than story being told. That means Greek soldiers at the end are just as chiseled and unarmored machomen instead of more realistic looking hoplites. Hard to sell idea of nested stories with obvious bias when there is no difference.
@The Knight Because Braveheart, while being a good movie in the sense that it's well acted, well directed, and well written, still tries to pass itself off as a fairly accurate account of Wallace's life and the rebellion against Edward the Longshanks, when it wasn't. 300 gets a pass because it isn't trying to be historically accurate, it's just telling an overglorified account of the real battle. Hell, in the first five minutes it straight up tells the audience that the entire film's story is being narrated by a Spartan after the battle has occurred, which is why Nick says it's historically authentic, since because Dilios is the one telling the story, it's only natural he'd play up the badassery of the Spartans while demonizing the Persians, and downplaying the role of the other Greek city-states who did fight alongside Leonidas, as well as the less savory aspects of life in Sparta.
1) Correct. 2) So we can prevent another one coming to power 3) Their tech was ass lets face it. Germany didnt reach Moskow only because of the bad weather condition and because at some point they had to fight besically an entire country, not even just the army.
the USSR didn't have vast numbers of people see the census debacle of 1936 and given the Germans could easily slaughter Russians at 5+:1 then its advantage in numbers was negated. soviet tech was very hit or miss and very much miss depending on political realities at the time also it had to simple because the soviet didn't have the skills for complex industrial management or logistics. it was miles worse than even the nazi state for favouring some outfit over another basically the soviets were lucky the british amd americans would help them out with tonnes of supplies while forcing the germans to strip away forces to fight on other fronts
6 лет назад+4
@@n1hilanth314 that they cant. Or appreciate irony.
@Odysseus W It was a mixture of both. In the siege of Stalingrad, tanks were produced on mass, some of them without paint. Yes, the winter helped, but the soviets relied on numbers. One of their tactics in tank warfare was to gang up on one tank.
@Odysseus W not really. It was also because of hitler's stubborness. He wanted his men to advance while his advicers warned him that marching trough snow without proper clothes is suicide (no pun intended). But yeah. Almost noone can beat the russian winter unless you are. Wait for it.......... The Mongols (Cue the mongoltage)
@Odysseus W well it was inevitable for ussr and germany to clash. In fact Stalin only accepted to sign the non-agression pact because his army in 1939 was weak due to the Great Purge which resulted in many experienced officers executed. Stalin was cofident that the Red Army could regain its former strength in 1941. And of course ,Hitler did not like the USSR and refused to let Stalin join the Axis even if Japan wanted them to. The tensions simply made a war betwen them like Thanos. Inevitable
fun fact, king Leonidas 1 was one of the few kings of Sparta to actually undergo spartan training. the King's First born son was exempt from the spartan training, and Leonidas, not being the first born was not exempt.
If I'm not mistaken Leónidas was around 50 years old when that battle occurred and not the 20-30 the movie showed. But I still absolutely love the movie idk why
Spartan women are actually more than just baby producers, they were super rich. When a spartan husband dies, which happens a lot to a warrior nation state, inherited his wealth, to his wife. And when that wife dies, her children inherited the wealth, and if one of the children are daughters, then they'll get it too. And when the daughters marry a man, with pockets full from inheritance money, when the man she married dies, she inherits his wealth. And this happens over generations, and women of sparta became very rich, and even the kings would make loans to the spartan women just to get by.
I think I remember reading that the males weren't allowed to fight until they had contributed to the gene pool of Sparta or something like that. Makes sense to secure the next generation when you're population tends to work in environments with such high staff turnover.
You're wrong actually. By the laws of Lycurgus, Spartan Peers were forbidden to have wealth as well as pursuing any profession other than that of a warrior. The only "wealth" would be the land which was also equally divided between all Peers. What you are saying could possibly be true in the later centuries of Sparta, when Spartans moved away from the laws of Lycurgus. However, that would never be true during the Classical Era of Greece. Thats what made the Spartans so feared and respected. They didn't focus on anything but War.
Thank you! Somebody who reads history. Also as a footnote, according to the accounts of Xenophon, the agogge was NOT homosexually inclined and that is not true about "boy loving" those were accounts made by those trying to discredit Sparta as Sparta was very marriage minded and family oriented as depicted by women given equal education, food, and status. What Gorgo said to a traveling Athenian woman who had little to no status that only real women produce Spartan men says it all. Did homosexuality exist in Sparta? Of course it did, but not as widespread as Athens or other City States.
Spartans had no wealth. the issue is being mentioned by Thucydides in the Peloponnesian War. The other thing is that, they were all living the same way, the life standards of the poor being no different from the life standards of the more well to do.
Sensorship. Now any mention of slaughtering indians is sensored. I don't know, they are trying to prevent racism or to avoid that the coloninists killed thousanfs of indians to be known.
I think Helots were mostly war-prisoners, so maybe the whole point is the Spartans would either win or die in combat, never to have the same fate as those people they were able to defeat and enslave
When a polis was described as free in the ancient Greek world, it meant under native rule and tradition, whether the local government were an oligarchy, democracy, monarchy, or something else.
Real masterpiece fo marketing: -Hey, dudes? -What? -You are enslaved, wanna be free? -You know, but I personally have nice job at kitchen, I have lots of food for myself,, nice place to live... -Sure you don't want to change it for tiny flat and eating garbage due to having hilariously low wage while being free without any real freedom, as we will still set hilarious rules to make you not being ale to do stuff? -Sure I want!
Few points to answer your questions brought up about Xerxes and the Persian Army. 1. Like all absolute monarchies, the Persian Empire suffered from civil war and unrest every time the King died. Quickly, the various satraps and royal heirs would struggle to claim the throne. Xerxes was one of the many contenders and had to defeat them before focusing on Greece. 2. The Persian army was not a professional force maintained by a centralized state, but a polyglot army of various regions and satraps with their own language, weapons, and styles of fighting. The King really controlled his elite guard of Persian Immortals that served as heavy infantry and at a high cost to the Persian monarch. It can partly explain the disorganized and inept performance of this massive army against the Greeks. 3. The Persians were victims of their own success. Having eliminated all enemies, they had no competition and became complacent like all empires throughout history. Rather than learn and adapt, Persian rulers and generals preffered to employ Greek mercenaries particularly Spartans. It was this hubris that would end.with Alexanders march a century later. 4. One thing you didn't mention that I hated about the movie was the total lack of acknowledgement for Athens part in Thermopolye. Without the Athenian navy harassing Persian supply ships and keeping the Persian fleet transporting troops around the pass, the Spartans would easily have been cut off and crushed quickly. I personally thought a scene with the Athenians saying the Spartans may rule on land, but Athens rules the waves would have been great. Also a forshadowing of the future war between Athens and Sparta.
1. Yes a bit with the Athenians would have been good, but they were waiting for the second film when they covered the most influential battle in the greco persian war. 2. Although Athens were the best at sea, sparta still crushed them in the Peleponnesian war
@@adametheridge2386 A war lasting 20 years with the Spartans eventually defeating Athens having to use Persian gold (as well as Persian Support) to buy a navy etc... could hardly be called 'crushing'. (Although I admit as well that Athenian arrogance did push a lot of Greek cities into the Spartan camp). Plus the Athenians kinda shot themselves in the foot with a disastrous invasion of Syracuse where they lost about 10,000 hoplites and many support troops, so for the final 10 years they were significantly weakened. And yet they still managed to defeat Sparta for most of that final ten year period, before finally capitulating.
@@lordvenusianbroon it can be called a decisive victory due to the fact that Athenian hubris and hot headedness led to their downfall, Sparta were the quicker to react, get the support of Persia and all the city states Athens dismissed, they were a lot more powerful and crushing when the moment came, and they crushed the Athenian land army, with barely any help at all from Persia. Athenians lost decisively, the final years were a crushing victory
@@adametheridge2386 Of course they won at the end, but 'crushing' to my mind is say, Germany crushing France in 1940, in a matter of weeks. In the case of the Peloponnesian war, it took Sparta decades and help from previous enemies of all Greece, the Persians, and as we both say, the hubris of Athens to finally get victory. This was an immensely drawn out victory that caused a lot of turbulence in Spartan society (i.e. see the effect of the end of the battle of Sphacteria on them) and there were moments they could have been defeated. Sparta should have won in the first year of the battle really to be crushing IMHO...but they couldn't figure out how to handle walls. (However to be fair that's okay, most Greeks at the time had huge problems with walled cities, it took Alexander the Great to really figure out how to handle city walls.) Both city states were really never that important afterwards anyway.
10 000 Spartan warriors were supposed to rule 100 000 Helots. So, how to make sure they wont get fed up being slaves and wont rebel (and basicly drown Spartans by numbers, since they wouldnt probably use narrow passage to eliminate their numbers advantage)? Well, they kept them terrified to the point where any Helot could consider himself/herself favourite of Fortune for every year he/she remained alive. Being an inhabitant of some city ruled by ancient Persia doesnt sound as bad in contrast to this...
actually it did happen, SORT of. just not under the rule of xerxes. according to Herodotus, xerxes didnt send anyone to get 'earth and water' because when Darius did it before, the athenians and the spartans threw the guy into a well/pit.... lol
@@jaylynnr4256 Athenians killed the messengers outright. Spartans threw them in the well where they can take as much earth and water as they wish like the absolute chads they were
The part referencing "if" was in fact the answer the spartans gave to Macedonian King Philip II, father of Alexander. And he actually left them be albeit pretty much unimportant for the rest of history
One of Alexander's generals defeated them at Megalopolis when they tried to rise up against Macedon rule. Then later down the line Rome turned Sparta into a tourist attraction.
@@colbyneblett8454 Actually what happened was originally that Sparta refused to join the League of Corinth under King Philip II deciding instead to remain independent. Then a few years after Alexander had taken the Macedonian and Corinth forces into Persia, Sparta decided to attack the acting and for all intense and purposes domestic Macedonian king Antipater who was appointed by Alexander to be his regent in Macedonian of which he already had experience doing when Philip went on his campaigns. Due to this only the domestic Macedonian forces under Antipater fought the Spartans at Megalopolis which resulted in Spartan defeat as by this point Sparta was a shadow of its former self having been surpassed by many other greek states. In the end Alexanders only relation to the battle/defeat of Sparta was simply just formally accepting surrender deals via Spartan ambassadors whilst still in Persia as Alexander had a far more formable foe and ambitions than a single greek city state. Additionally Alexander would also never return home.
Depends on how many, also they were technologically inferior to Germany but not enough to guarantee a lose in all conditions. And winter,never forget that damned winter.
It’s true though. Coming from Sparta myself, I always look up to the ancients, but I know that while we all admire them, none would be willing to be raised as one of them. Imagine living like a Navy SEAL from the age of 6, but in filthier conditions, and every year more and more of your possessions would be removed, where you’d see children be killed in training and that’d be normal and you’ll get some idea of what you’d be in for.
The movie 300 is what I imagine people imagined when they heard the stories how many ever years ago it was. Sitting at a campfire, and your crazy uncle telling you the story of 300. I can just imagine how epic it seemed. And was.
Well, you aren't wrong. That is, in fact, the way Frank Miller described the comic itself. It was never meant to be historically accurate in that regard, but rather the story of those events as conveyed to each other by Spartan children around the campfire. I understand the desire for historical accuracy in films, but context is important as well.
The part that was muted between 12:09 - 14:03 reads. " To destroy an army of forty thousand Aztecs that helped lead to the downfall of the mighty Aztec Empire. So what do I mean about the Greeks being technologically superior to the Persians, well let's look at their weaponry. Obviously I don't need to tell you that the Greeks didn't go into battle half-naked like in the movie, this in clearly all from the graphic novel. In real life Spartans were heavy infantry and wore armor made of bronze, they also carried shields made of strong wood and a thin sheet of bronze and when the Persians fired their arrows, they would literally just bounce off the Spartans shields and armor because they were made of cheap date palm wood. In contrast, the Persians wore little to no armor and the shields made out of a much thinner wood and some of them were even made out of bloody wicker which Spartan weapons had no problems what so ever in penetrating. So what's ready infuriating to me is that, the Persians know this! They fought the Greeks at Marathon and sustained heavy loses because of their inadequate weaponry, you think someone somewhere would have said something in ten years about their weapons needing an upgrade! But anyway the question still remains, how did an army of just three hundred Spartans and seven thousand other Greeks, hold off an army of nearly half a million for three days. Well another advantage the Greeks had was the strategic value of the landscape they chose to fight in and Thermopylae was perfect of that because it was narrow coastal passage with Aegean Sea on one side and a high vertical cliff on the other. Its natural bends and curves created perfect choking points were Xerxes massive numbers were just taken out the equation, no matter many soldiers he funneled into the pass, the better equipped and trained Spartans were able to hold their ground and inflict heavy casualties. This continued foe two days before the Spartans were finally defeated on the third". Man that took for forever, but I think it was worth it, tell me what you all think.
Spartans were real. They were so strong and trained that they were banned from Olympics.. But it wasnt just that it was also the military tactics of that time and the weapon difference between spartans and persians.
Well the Spartan's ability to manipulate time and go into "SLO MO" as you call it was the main reason they were such formidable warriors. The real reason that some children were killed during infancy is because they did not possess this gift. The Athenians possessed this same ability, but they instead used it to have long boring debates over strange concepts such as "Democracy" and "human rights"
They called it "bullet-time" and they knew in their final moments in battle, that it would look way sexier than anyone else that did it in trench coats. It's how their society flourished until it didn't.
Thank you for pointing out that, because it was narrated by Dilios, there is good reason to excuse the over-the-top nature of the battle. I remember coming to that conclusion myself and, like you, allowed me to like the film even more.
Hi! so, King Xerxes actually had to wait for 10 years because some parts of Egypt (which they had conquered) had rebelled. I just thought I may add this in there!
Plus Persians did what they come for. Burn down Athens as punishment for the rebellion back in anatolia. And majority of the army had left Greece after that
There is a fine lecture on youtube by Jonathan House called 'Why Germany lost: The Three Alibis'. It deals with the notion that it was Hitler, bad weather and the superior soviet numbers that defeated Wehrmacht in the East.
Well if Persia conquers Greece than that bribe will be much more useful, making them wealthier under the Persians. Thats not really a plot line from the movie, thats just me justifying the bribes.
A friend of mine is a Greek Cypriot who served as a tank commander for his national service. His regiments motto was some adaption of 'we will fight in the shade.'
You should have mentioned the immortals and how they were actually called the immortals not because they were hard to kill but because there were so many soldiers in their unit that they seemed to be immortal, everyone you killed was replaced immediately.
A year old, i know, but the thing about the immortals wasn't just that they had people to replace the fallen, but that they could relatively easily replace their elite force because of their awesome organisation and training of their military. The immortals were full time soldiers, not levied or hired.
One key decider was the famous Greek Phalanx formation of locked shields and long spears which proved invaluable not only for this battle, but also the eventual expansion of Alexander. The phalanx was so effective that it would remain so until the advent of the Roman Legion and its Manipular structure which was still in essense a form of the Phalanx. Even to this day, the phalanx is used in combat to some extent, seen extensively in crowd control tactics by police and paramilitary groups.
The phalanx is a great tactical formation with the appropriate equipment and in the correct location that provides a "single front", like Thermopylae, which was so good that it event prevent any possible counter-attack from its most vulnerable side: the right. However, in open terrain it can be easily overcome if attacked from more than 1 angle, since the formation prevented the warriors from turning their weapons to fight/defend in any angle other than directly upfront of the formation.
@@CruelestChris that was not the reason though. It was a bit of that plus that their society was more than 60% of slaves who rebelled all the time. They had very little army reserves ,hence why they usually stayed at home.
Alexander's Macedonian phalanx was actually pretty much an antithesis of Spartan warrior ideology. Spartans valued personal physical prowess and combat skill, while macedonian phalanx was relied on cooperation and drilling above all. Macedonians were lightly armored and in fact were designed in response to heavier armored infantry of other Greek states.
I see a lot of comments talking about how Nick didn't talk about this historical inaccuracy, or this historical inaccuracy, but if you watch the video Nick said how he wouldn't talk about all the historical inaccuracies because the movie's source material was a graphic novel and not history. Believe me, I know how inaccurate this movie is ;)
Without Herodotus, Frank Miller couldn't have made his graphic novel in the first place. We can be sure Herodotus took liberties with his work, since no one knew what military history was in the 5th century BC. Nevertheless, he wrote when Greeks who actually fought in the Persian Wars were still alive, so there has to be a lot of truth in his narrative.
Also when he was crossing into Greece across the hellespont (basically the bridge of land where Istanbul is) the bridge he made broke because of the current, so he killed all the engineers who built it and then threw a pair of shackles into the water
Not exactly true....The WWII Soviet didn't win by overwhelming numbers (as in overtaking a fortification defended by 10,000 with 100,000 troops), it was just that their numbers held out longer. It was more siege warfare with great assistance by mother nature which allowed the Soviet to prevail. The Soviet were waging a war of "Defense in Depth" or in other words, tactical retreat to effectively turn Germany's Blitz tactics into a weakness instead of an asset. In addition, once you get past the initial stages of the war the Soviet were in many cases technological peers or even superior to their German counterparts (Think T-34 tank, Ilyushin Il-2 ground attack airplane, SVT-40 rifle, among others).
@@hyfy-tr2jy german were pushing for only 5 winter days... how the fuck did it hurt them it was the russians who had to plow through snow to push out the nazis
I have always wondered why that was never corrected. She was Helen of Sparta, kept in Troy. I guess it just sounds better. I am from Texas. Don't let facts get in the way of a good story.
I really like how you gave the back ground of the Ionian Revolt. It is a pivotal part of the story and brings in characters like Miltiades who was hated due to his dictatorship methods and eventually ending with the battle of Marathon. Good job in giving the back story, if I remember my history Marathon was 40 years or so before Thermopylae. Another great misconception is that people actually believe there was only 300 Spartans at Thermopylae , Writings state the were other too like Arcadians. Leonidas may have only had 300 Spartans, but they did have allies with them.
I have made no claims about the dignity of selling out. I merely pointed out that the essence of your statement was that "selling out is bad, he won't, he needs to sell out."
You also forgot to mention how the infant spartans were bathed in wine, so the ones who survived supposedly had a better chance of becoming strong warriors. In addition during their trainning they used to drink blood(usually boar's) mixed with honey to supposedly develop stronger immune systems.
@@1991beachboy I studied Thracian culture but what I heard was mostly that no one really knows all that much about them. We have records of their small kingdom but not much more than that.
The Spartans of the Iliad were a different people than the Spartans of 300.Spartans of the Iliad were classic Greeks and were gone by the time the Dorian's conquered the same Spartan land. Taking the name of city Sparta for themselves.Though the country of the city of Sparta was named Laconia Dorian Spartans called themselves Spartans.
Drewster Junior college!! I think I got it right.The sons of Heracles or Hercules fought in Troy and all the tribes of the Dorian's claim to be decedents of Heracles.So some time passed between the Trojan War and the Battle of Thermopylae.maybe 1500 years?
haha i see you have a more in depth study of the dorians than i, but the iliad showed up in Greece's dark age, somewhere between 1000-8000 i think, while the Greco-Persian war was something around 500- 450
Michael Wyckmans Yes I looked up the the last stand of Thermopylae, it happened during the Bronze Age So I guess Troy happened during the Golden age or just after the golden age of Greece.
Can we talk about how one of the most amazing things about the second Persian invasion of Greece is the 2 unprecedentedly huge pontoon footbridge Xerxes built to move his army across the hellespont? Xerxes wasn't messing around.
Well, heck. His dad failed, he screwed it up twice, so....he had to have learned something by the 4th attempt. He did go through generals pretty quickly. Maybe he finally found his strategist.
@@sunitamosesesq source? Everything I've read says Persia had slaves especially in outlaying districts, but by and large did NOT rely on slavery. So what you claim is plausible, but unlikely. I'd love to see a source if you have one.
Herodotus wrote that Xerxes built on top of the boats a dirt path with walls in order for the animals not to spook by seeing the water; it still took Xerxes army with its entire entourage a whole week to cross the Dardanelles pontoon bridge.
Just some more things that he might have missed. Sparta sent only 300 not only concerns of helots revolting but due to several religious reasons where military action was illegal by spartan law. That's why he brought his closest gym buddies with him(bodyguards). There were somewhere around 7000 greek soldiers with 300 being spartans. Some greek defector told the Persians about a secret pathway around the pass which the Greeks also knew of and had a small force placed. Those men were caught by surprise and didn't defend the pass taking position somewhere else thinking the Persians were coming for them. Word came out. Leonidas held a council of war. He said those who wanted to leave can since it was going to be the last stand whilst being surrounded. About 3000 chose to leave whist all Spartans and spartan slaves that participated with some other greeks chose to stay knowing it was a fight to the death. One injured spartan was told by Leonidas to return to Sparta and tell of what happened there and their honorable last stand. When war continued the Greeks were putting up a great fight. Leonidas in the later part of the last stand was killed. In order to retrieve his body the spartan soldiers and slaves pushed back the Persian lines however were not able to get his body. His head was stuck on a spear. Eventually, every last one of them perished.
Xexes didn't think he was invading "Greece" because "Greece" wasn't a unified state, in theory or practise. Funny enough, the Persian Wars were the beginning of a collective Greek identity.
They were Greek in the same way that we could invade "South America", that wouldn't mean you invade Argentina and instantly Bolivia feels under attack too. There's absolutely a shared culture, but, crucially when we're talking about military invasion, not political unity.
You don't need a sovereign state to have a name for a place. The land was called Greece (Hellas) and Xerxes(like Darius before heim) wanted to make it his province. Regarding the very source of the Persian Wars, Herodotus' "Histories" (just a few quotes from book 5 which doesn't even refer to incidents in Greece!): "At this time the Greeks who were settled around them were for the most part Ionians, and after being taught the letters by the Phoenicians, they used them with a few changes of form. In so doing, they gave to these characters the name of Phoenician, as was quite fair seeing that the Phoenicians had brought them into Greece" "This was he whose daughter (if indeed the tale is true) Pausanias the Lacedaemonian, son of Cleombrotus, at a later day betrothed to himself, since it was his wish to possess the sovereignty of Hellas. After appointing Megabates general, Artaphrenes sent his army away to Aristagoras. " "Having been admitted to converse with Cleomenes, Aristagoras spoke thus to him: “Do not wonder, Cleomenes, that I have been so eager to come here, for our present situation is such that the sons of the Ionians are slaves and not free men, which is shameful and grievous particularly to ourselves but also, of all others, to you, inasmuch as you are the leaders of Hellas. Now, therefore, we entreat you by the gods of Hellas to save your Ionian kinsmen from slavery " And on to book 6: "Then Darius attempted to learn whether the Greeks intended to wage war against him or to surrender themselves. He sent heralds this way and that throughout Hellas, bidding them demand a gift of earth and water for the king. He despatched some to Hellas, and he sent others to his own tributary cities of the coast, commanding that ships of war and transports for horses be built." "So the cities set about these preparations. The heralds who went to Hellas received what the king's proclamation demanded from many of those dwelling on the mainland and from all the islanders to whom they came with the demand. Among the islanders who gave earth and water to Darius were the Aeginetans. The Athenians immediately came down upon them for doing this, for they supposed the Aeginetans to have given the gift out of enmity for Athens, so they might join with the Persians in attacking the Athenians. Gladly laying hold of this pretext, they went to Sparta and there accused the Aeginetans of acting to betray Hellas." "While Cleomenes was in Aegina working for the common good of Hellas, Demaratus slandered him, not out of care for the Aeginetans, but out of jealousy and envy. " "For in three generations, that is, in the time of Darius son of Hystaspes and Xerxes son of Darius and Artaxerxes son of Xerxes, more ills happened to Hellas than in twenty generations before Darius; some coming from the Persians, some from the wars for preeminence among the chief of the nations themselves." "ll this concerns and depends on you in this way: if you vote with me, your country will be free and your city the first in Hellas. But if you side with those eager to avoid battle, you will have the opposite to all the good things I enumerated." t's getting too common. Hellas/Greece as the objective of the war in almost every paragraph.
@Donald Mackay don't worry about him, by his name I would say that he's serbian. As a historian I've heard about their versions of "history" as they call it. Basically all of the important figures in history were, in one way or the other, serbians! Even the Nikola Tesla (born and raised Croat who never set foot on serbian soil) was deemed serbian. If we weren't in 21st century and didn't have internet it would be quite amusing... But now it's just sad... Ok maybe little funny! ;)
Never mind the bit when they can only havw that profession thanks to slaves and 2nd class citizens. Have a culture like that today, and they're called war mongers.
Should've also pointed out that Persians treated women well for an ancient society, unlike what was shown in 300 where the ambassador scoffs at the idea of a woman speaking freely.
Persians were the most advanced society in terms of treating women, religious freedoms, rule of law and such. However the entire movie is based on an old propaganda hence the idea is to raise the concept of good and bad, so they have to depict the Persians as evil.
Considering that the north-western Europeans looked to have more tolerance towards women once we found about them I'm guessing they have been such a society for quite a while. I'm only focusing on the ones that we know of though. We are not even sure if people lived in north western Europe back when Greeks were fighting the Persians.
It is and it's basically what ended up saving them. Sparta was becoming a backwards backwater by that point, the answer amused Alexander so he just didn't bother with them.
Not to be that guy but I think you don't really have much of a grasp on this historical subject. Xerxes didn't spend 10 years preparing to invade Greece. He had to put down a revolt in Egypt just before he went to fight the Greeks. Darius the Great's plan was nearly complete when he died, but as they do, people revolted. Not only that but the Persians were used to fighting everyone else in the world aside from Greeks with their current weapon system. They used a massive amount of archers supported by a rank or two of light infantry holding short spears and shields. The entire Persian strategy was to whittle enemies down with arrow fire and then use their massively superior cavalry to ride them down once they broke or flank with them. Obviously the Spartans at Thermopole had a massive advantage in positioning and equipment. However, you don't just change all your gear and tactics of your entire military when you are winning every other fight you get into. Plus, lets not forget who won at the Hot Gates. Also, best not to forget who ended up fighting for who in the future. Far more Greek hoplites ended up fighting for the Persians in future wars. Persia didn't need to bet the Greeks in open combat. They just paid them to kill each other which was a ludicrously effective strategy. The Persian army eventually lost to the Greeks in later years but in the end it did pretty much nothing to their power and afterwards they just bought Greeks like toys and smashed them against each other. It's tempting to demonize the Persians because of the whole Eastern vs Western thing but looking at the facts changes how the whole story goes. Not until Alexander the Great came along and really whooped the shit out of the Persians did they have much of a hiccup in their near world domination. Not to mention that by the time of Alexander's death he had taken up the dress, fashion, and manners of the Persian king of kings, in Civ they call that a cultural victory. :P Love your stuff! Keep it truckin'!
Yeah, the Persians kind of had an EMPIRE to run here. Engaging in a border war with some small squabbeling citystates because they supported a rebellion wasn't very high on their priority list. And they suffered more from bad weather and other bad luck than from the actual greeks the first time around.
Really as far as Persia was concerned the whole war with Greece was more of a footnote than a real event of any significance. Greece saw it has a huge deal though, which is why we think of it so highly today being able to trace much of today's Western culture back to Greece.
@@burnwankenobi803 that every movie that takes place in Ancient Greece, Rome, Troy and Egypt typically casts people with English, Australian, and Scottish accents for the roles. It's not bad thing but it's worth mentioning what a weird choice it is
I meant moreso that it makes the interaction between Leonidas and Ephialtes interesting since Leonidas foreshadows this happening and many people may not have picked up on that. Also, the meaning for Ephialtes doesn't come from the Athenian politician
12:05 You forgot to say that the Aztecs couldn't fight without their leader alive, who was killed by Cortés and his commanders. Then, the Aztecs troops started to run. A battle has to be analysed in all its aspects. Technological superiority doesn't always explain a military victory.
Moctezuma was held captive by Cortez, and was much later, while still captive, killed by his own people as he pleaded with them not to oppose the Europeans. Aztecs kept battling. It was the unarmed attendants of Atauhuallpa in Peru that panicked and ran when their emperor was captured at Cajamarca.
To all the people saying that history buffs is lying about Persia,watch the end of the video and learn that HB mentions the fact that 300 is based on the perspective of a Spartan warrior.
The coolest part is knowing that the original historian who recorded this battle would have LOVED this movie, seeing how over the top it is, and dramatic.
@@trentn1127 no, I meant that heavy armour was a disadvantage for a soldier when fighting in a field. It would have reduced mobility, it would have increased fatigue and I'm pretty sure it was very unpleasant to get a lot of sand in your armour during a storm.
@@makeromaniagreatagain9697 Ah I get you. Would imagine though that if they had the means to support arming their troops like that they would've, heavy armour doesn't really have much of an impact on mobility.
It must be pointed out that wicker shields aren't as weak as one might think. The way they were weaved made them extremely tough, so much so that they were even worn as padding. It was developed mostly as a product unique to the east where archery in warfare was more prominent, since wicker shields were excellent at blocking arrows. They were definitely not as effective as bronze shields, but they weren't trash. Eastern empires would continue to use wickerwork for centuries to come for a good reason. It was cheap and effective enough to do the job.
5:26 That is actually inaccurate. It wasn't the Athenians that sent that threat, it was the Macedonians. Take a look at Alexander the Great's empire, notice how Sparta isn't part of it.
Sparta wasn't part of it because they were an insignificant village by then. Thebes destroyed Spartan hegemony in Pelopensia and freed the helots. Sparta was a tiny town and tourist trap by time Rome controlled it. The version of the agoge he talks about in the video wasn't even real, it was pumped up at under Roman rule to entertain Romans that visited.
@@apgtimbough947 Wrong, while Sparta was not the powerhouse it had been before the Thebans defeated them they were still considered one of the major greek powers. Neither Philip or Alexander tried to conquer Sparta. Surely if they were as weak as you say they were than taking Sparta would be easy.
@@George-Hawthorne they never took it because there was no reason. Lacedonia was poor and lacked infrastructure. They were not leaders anymore. Alexander was far more concerned with Persia and Athens/Thebes and Philip thought at least the minor threat Sparta posed would keep southern Greece loyal. Sparta could barely field an army by that time. Hell, Alexander didn't even need to conquer them, they tried to rebel and were crushed, and that rebellion barely involved actual Spartans because their government and culture crippled their ability to repopulate. Persia provided the mercenaries and money. Alexander referred to the Spartans seiging Megaopolis as "battle mice" and it's described as the most pathetic of any revolt against Macedonian hegemony. And although Sparta had not joined the League of Corinth, they fully accepted Macedonian hegemony. They were vassals in all but name.
I can't believe you didn't mention the utter ridiculous manner in which Xerxes was portrayed and dressed. I mean they had him looking like some whacked out apocalyptic eunuch.
Also what people forget is that 300 is an embellished story told by a Spartan. So yes, things will be ridiculous at times. Its why alot of xerxes men looked like animals and monsters and why the Spartans had no chestplates or anything. As spartans would see their abs and muscles as their chestplates
@@savvyslie1833 ..I personally doubt that people from other lands dressed in their native clothing looked like animals or monsters to the Spartans or any other people. And the wearing of "chest plates" was not a common thing for the ordinary soldiers of that time anyway, Spartan or otherwise. It wasn't cheap you know.
@@nicholaspeti7495 Its supposed to be an exaggerated viewpoint of a stereotypical Spartan. I have never understood how the vast majority of people never understood that concept
@@savvyslie1833 .. Who says so, you ? And when did I mention a "Spartan" in what I said ? .. I only mentioned Xerxes, the Achaemenid and King of Kings,
![Felix "Unfair" | [Stray Kids : SKZ-PLAYER]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Oswujxm2Ag0/mqdefault.jpg)
Hey everyone, due to a copyright issue I had to mute a section of the video from 12:09 - 14:03. If you want to see the unedited version of it you can find it on watchnebula.com/historybuffs
This is where I will upload all of my videos incase of any copyright issues. Really sorry guys.
Really sorry, RUclips sucks
Yes the sound stopped at 12:08. Thank you for the heads up!
Maybe put copyright issues across screen... I actually clicked away the first time, second time watching; im now seeing this comment...
RUclips 2020
"Less than a thousand conquistadors were able to destroy an army of 40."
Huh, that's not so impressive. 😉
Leonidas: "SPARTAN'S, WHAT IS YOUR PROFESSION??!"
Spartans: "HOOO HOOO HOOO!!!"
Greeks: ".......owls?"
🤣🤣🤣🤣😭😭😭😭🤣🤣...
Thought i was the only one who still doesnt know what their profession was lmfaooo!
I thought they was pigeons.
Did someone say Athens?
Thats a north amerika indians warcry you know that ? People with brain would know it also Xerxes was PERSIAN NOT Afroamerican.
Spartans are greeks
The Spartan one-liner quip is known in modern times as a laconic phrase, named after the land of Laconia where the city stood. Unlike the philosophy loving Athenians who were very fond of hearing the sound of their own voice, Spartans were notorious for not speaking more than was absolutely needed. Thus, they acquired the reputation of being simpeltons, despite the fact that Sparta produced two of the classical seven sages of ancient Greece.
Here are a few classics :
The "If" answer to Phillip of Macedon that was mentioned here was preceded by another exchange. When Phillip sent a menacing letter to Sparta, asking whether he should come as friend or foe, the Spartans responded with "Neither".
When a neighboring city that has suffred a drought sent a delegation to Sparta asking for help, the delegates made a long and winded speech before the Spartan assembly, imploring for aid. The Spartans retorted that the speech was so long that by the end of it they could no longer remember the begining. The next day the delegates returned with an empty flour bag, pointed at it and said "This bag needs flour". To this the Spartans answered that they need not have said "this bag" - but nonetheless agreed to provide aid.
When a famous Spartan king was being pestered by a man asking who is the perfect Spartan, he annoyingly replied "He who is least like you".
It was known that the Spartans discouraged theur people from travelling abroad, fearing they would be spoiled by the affluence and customs of other city states. When an Athenian haughtingly pointed this out to a Spartan, the latter replied "But you, when you come to Sparta, do not become worse, but better."
Sometimes other Greeks paid back in kind. When a man from the Italian Greek city of Sybaris, known for it's love of fine dining, came to Sparta, he was invited to eat with the warriors in their mess hall and sample their famous "black broth" - Spartan blood soup made with onion and vinegar. Tasting it, the man proclaimed "Now i understand why Spartans are so fearless in the face of death. Any sane man would rather die a thousand times than live like this".
Why waste time say lot word when few word do trick?
- Kevin Malone, modern day Spartan
Messed up things basically all Spartans were very well educated the Agoie(however its spelled) didnt even mostly teach warfare it was mostly philosophy and history and math and such. They were far from simpletons just stoic
@@mondaysinsanity8193 It's Agogie/Αγωγή in greek, which basically means "education"
Excellent haha
So, Basically they were a bunch of smart asses.
"That's Gay". - Xerxes
"Yes, sir. Very gay. Very gay indeed. No doubt their gayness will lead to their defeat."
"Excellent, let's not dig into this any further...attack!"
El Viola Feos Xerces scissored Mrs. Garrison! 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Greek history in a nutshell "that's gay"
@Black Swag It's a South Park Episode
Favorite part of this vid review LOL
I always assumed that the historical and visual inaccuracies in 300 were meant to reflect how oral legends of antiquity would be embellished and exaggerated. As in, the way the events are depicted in 300 are similar to how the stories would be passed down around campfires and at Greek theaters.
yeah and this could be why they are nearly naked
the only relevant and intelligent reply in this entire video
@@risiwayne2067 Greek hoplites used to fight naked. You can see it in old Greek Pottery.
@@luiznunes1404 I don't think they fought naked, only the depiction of them are
Because for ancient greeks, nudity was a form of purity
@@risiwayne2067 lol No, bro. Actually they fought naked (and practiced sports naked too) because it makes you lighter and faster, and if you have a good looking body it can intimidates the enemy and influence them to make mistakes during combat. Not only Greeks, but there are descriptions of Celts, Vikings (shirtless berserkers) and Native Americans fighting naked ou half naked too.
Imagine training for all of this, and dying from a shot arrow.
totalwar179 I read somewhere that a Greek warrior (I believe it was a spartan) was shot with an arrow and what he said roughly translated to "I'm not afraid of dying, I'm just upset I was killed by such a cowardly weapon" lol
in the knee of all places
what do u think they would be trained to use their shields for other than ramming into enemies
Fun fact. King leonidas actually died from an arrow to the neck. Spartan soldiers tried to protect his body until they were eventually all killed.
Adam gamingcyclone You can't block every arrow lol
The runner/messenger ran from the battle of Marathon to Athens. It was 26 miles. Thats what marathons are based after.
When he arrived in Athens he yelled "Nike" meaning 'victory'. Thats where Nike clothing named themselves.
is the Nike part actually true?
Owen Easter Nike in Greek means victory yes
Owen Easter adidas name is also interesting
The story is: After the battle, a single man bearing full armour was sent to Athens. When he arrived, he said only one word before he died:
Νενικήκαμεν
Meaning : we have won. And he died.
The distance was about 42km so all marathons in the world come from this man.
But, why full armour? He could just run without armour! The answer is simple: He didn't want to be seen as a defector.
Too bad history didn't preserved his name.
Yes, Nike comes from Νικη, Pepsi comes from πέψη=digestion, dexion, etc.
Christos Kili His name was Philipides, i think.
The Spartans were called "Lacedemonians" by their fellow Greeks. As you pointed out, they were known even in contemporary sources for their action movie-style one-liners. This type of witty terse response is called "Laconic Speech".
Their society essentially successfully bred armies of Clint Eastwood clones that would do calisthenics and brush their hair before going into battle.
“Are you gonna present your sword or start whistling Eleftheria.”
Outlaw Iosephos Ualesos.
A fellow Dan Carlin fan I see
One of my favorite movie lines.
So
@@hardibridger5456 Really? My favourite was "Buzzards gotta eat, same as worms".
"That's gay!"
"Yes sir, very gay!"
XD I love you.
HAHAHA love you too mate!
+History Buffs That's gay!
+Azkamooski
;)
Alexandros Nicolaides ok
+Azkamooski
by " ;) " I ment I thought your comment was funny, not the other thing..if you were thinking that....
The main reason why the Persians had much less armour wasn't because of technological inferiority but because of their home territorys conditions and their tactics. Persia was mostly full of vast plains and deserts with a few mountain ranges and hills that have long since been safe from any sort of invasion, so their soldiers wore light armour and brought lighter weapons because they had to run and maneuver constantly in battles. This became a massive detriment to them whenever they invaded Greece because all of the battles there were in much smaller and tighter confines with mountains, hills, rivers, lakes and the very sea preventing them from being a mobile force, their preferred strategy and the strategy they've been equipped for.
Compare the topography that Persians had to traverse in order to eventually defeat Sparta & Athens...Later, the Viet Cong would successfully hold off larger American numbers in Vietnam using some of the same Spartan/Athenian guerilla tactics.
Pretty sure it also had a lot to do with the fact that the Persian army was largely made up of slaves who were under trained and thus not worthy of the cost of proper armor. The Persian army were forced into servitude for the most part, or face instant death. A lot of them probably didn't even speak the same language.
@@jacobandrewalexful the part about them speaking different languages is true since the persian empire encompassed a vast amount of territory and people, everything else you just said is completely false, while the persians at some different points (specifically after the rise of Islam and the arabian conquest of persia) did take part in slavery, throughout most of their history slavery was banned for persians and their vassals, even their religion heavily prohibited slavery, soldiers were given pay and land after retirement similar to the roman legionaries. During this time period it was the spartans who were the slavers, not the persians.
@@jacobandrewalexful there were no slaves in the Persian Army you fucking dumbass. They were all paid conscripts. Open a fucking history textbook
10 years
“This is 300!”
I feel robbed.
There is an entire story that took place once the Spatan lines broke. King Leonidas was killed very early on and the battle that ensued for his body is an entire story in itself.
Cool fact: "Thermopylae" translates as "hot gates" in Greek, its name coming from various sulphur springs in the area and was thought to be the entrance to Hades.
Not Hades, the Underworld. Hades is the Greek God of the Dead/Underworld.
@@lelouchvibritannia4028 All this time I interpreted "Send them to Hades" to mean send to the underworld, when what they mean is "send them to the god of the dead" Cheers for clarifying.
@@DraconicImperator No prob! 👍
Cool fact 2:
There were many battles at Thermopylae, this one only being the most famous. One was in WW2.
Fitting.
Spartans were actually greatly outmatched by one other particular fighting unit in the ancient world; the Florida man
LMFAO
dolphin fuckers ..
Can confirm.
Source: Am Floridian
News flash: Florida Man declares war on Spartans. The Spartans surrender immediately..
I concur👍
How did Xerxes get Elephants before Cersei?
Haha.. I was just about to comment "Back before Cersei became a cunt" but yours is much better
LOOOOL
UMMMM... REVERSE ALPHABETICAL ORDER DISBURSEMENT?
He didn't spend the budget on zombie polar bears that's why.
@@shindari lol
Did anyone else's audio go out at 12:08
Yes
Some copyright issue
Yea
yup
Yes
Only 1% of people realise that 300 is so "whacky" because the whole film is told from Dilios' point of view, as an exaggerated story, or motivational speech to the men. It's such a misunderstood film. I think it's brilliantly original and memorable, with some great scenes.
This right here. Same for the 2nd one which I feel is underrated simply because of the collective bias of the 1st being good.
It has big flaw as it shows "reality" being just as overblown and exaggerated than story being told. That means Greek soldiers at the end are just as chiseled and unarmored machomen instead of more realistic looking hoplites. Hard to sell idea of nested stories with obvious bias when there is no difference.
I always saw it as a film that comments on the nature of archetypes and ideologies and how they influence humanity.
1%?!?!? A lot of people realize that bro.
@The Knight Because Braveheart, while being a good movie in the sense that it's well acted, well directed, and well written, still tries to pass itself off as a fairly accurate account of Wallace's life and the rebellion against Edward the Longshanks, when it wasn't.
300 gets a pass because it isn't trying to be historically accurate, it's just telling an overglorified account of the real battle. Hell, in the first five minutes it straight up tells the audience that the entire film's story is being narrated by a Spartan after the battle has occurred, which is why Nick says it's historically authentic, since because Dilios is the one telling the story, it's only natural he'd play up the badassery of the Spartans while demonizing the Persians, and downplaying the role of the other Greek city-states who did fight alongside Leonidas, as well as the less savory aspects of life in Sparta.
"Number's alone can't guarantee victory"
Tell that to Stalin
I think he knew that by his famouse Quote "The death of one man is a tragedy, the death of millions is a statistic."
1) Correct. 2) So we can prevent another one coming to power 3) Their tech was ass lets face it. Germany didnt reach Moskow only because of the bad weather condition and because at some point they had to fight besically an entire country, not even just the army.
Apparently some people don't understand a joke
the USSR didn't have vast numbers of people see the census debacle of 1936 and given the Germans could easily slaughter Russians at 5+:1 then its advantage in numbers was negated.
soviet tech was very hit or miss and very much miss depending on political realities at the time also it had to simple because the soviet didn't have the skills for complex industrial management or logistics. it was miles worse than even the nazi state for favouring some outfit over another basically the soviets were lucky the british amd americans would help them out with tonnes of supplies while forcing the germans to strip away forces to fight on other fronts
@@n1hilanth314 that they cant. Or appreciate irony.
10:00
"That's gay"
My god that made me laugh
“Excellent. Let’s not look into this any furTHA.”
That’s gay
Yeah that’s pretty much there whole thing
"That's gay"
Reeeeeeal talk 🤣🤣🤣💀
...and that face :[
LOL, That made me laugh as well
"Numbers alone does not guarantee victory"
Laughs in USSR.
@Odysseus W It was a mixture of both. In the siege of Stalingrad, tanks were produced on mass, some of them without paint. Yes, the winter helped, but the soviets relied on numbers. One of their tactics in tank warfare was to gang up on one tank.
@Odysseus W not really. It was also because of hitler's stubborness. He wanted his men to advance while his advicers warned him that marching trough snow without proper clothes is suicide (no pun intended).
But yeah. Almost noone can beat the russian winter unless you are. Wait for it..........
The Mongols
(Cue the mongoltage)
@Odysseus W well it was inevitable for ussr and germany to clash. In fact Stalin only accepted to sign the non-agression pact because his army in 1939 was weak due to the Great Purge which resulted in many experienced officers executed. Stalin was cofident that the Red Army could regain its former strength in 1941.
And of course ,Hitler did not like the USSR and refused to let Stalin join the Axis even if Japan wanted them to.
The tensions simply made a war betwen them like Thanos. Inevitable
Remember Finland beat the shit out of USSR
Like half a million couldn't capture 10 miles without losing 20 men per minute
@@soheilnazari4553 And USSR still won.
“Yes your grace, very gay.”
"very gay indeed, your grace."
@@iliadnetfear2586 "No doubt their gayness will prove a decisive factor in winning this battle."
@@HalcyonSkies "Excellent, let's not look into this any further, Attack!"
Yes your grace very very very very gay it's so gay gayest than J
The most gay man on tictok
fun fact, king Leonidas 1 was one of the few kings of Sparta to actually undergo spartan training. the King's First born son was exempt from the spartan training, and Leonidas, not being the first born was not exempt.
If I'm not mistaken Leónidas was around 50 years old when that battle occurred and not the 20-30 the movie showed. But I still absolutely love the movie idk why
poor guy!
@@Blugater Gerrard Butler is not that age range
@@SantomPh king Leonidas was 60 when the battle took place, of course not Gerard Butler lol
@Kevin spacey beards and makeup.
Spartan women are actually more than just baby producers, they were super rich. When a spartan husband dies, which happens a lot to a warrior nation state, inherited his wealth, to his wife. And when that wife dies, her children inherited the wealth, and if one of the children are daughters, then they'll get it too. And when the daughters marry a man, with pockets full from inheritance money, when the man she married dies, she inherits his wealth. And this happens over generations, and women of sparta became very rich, and even the kings would make loans to the spartan women just to get by.
Also, if a male spartan did not marry from 25-35, they would need to pay an extra tax and not be allowed to certain celebrations.
I think I remember reading that the males weren't allowed to fight until they had contributed to the gene pool of Sparta or something like that. Makes sense to secure the next generation when you're population tends to work in environments with such high staff turnover.
You're wrong actually. By the laws of Lycurgus, Spartan Peers were forbidden to have wealth as well as pursuing any profession other than that of a warrior. The only "wealth" would be the land which was also equally divided between all Peers.
What you are saying could possibly be true in the later centuries of Sparta, when Spartans moved away from the laws of Lycurgus. However, that would never be true during the Classical Era of Greece. Thats what made the Spartans so feared and respected. They didn't focus on anything but War.
Thank you! Somebody who reads history. Also as a footnote, according to the accounts of Xenophon, the agogge was NOT homosexually inclined and that is not true about "boy loving" those were accounts made by those trying to discredit Sparta as Sparta was very marriage minded and family oriented as depicted by women given equal education, food, and status. What Gorgo said to a traveling Athenian woman who had little to no status that only real women produce Spartan men says it all. Did homosexuality exist in Sparta? Of course it did, but not as widespread as Athens or other City States.
Spartans had no wealth. the issue is being mentioned by Thucydides in the Peloponnesian War. The other thing is that, they were all living the same way, the life standards of the poor being no different from the life standards of the more well to do.
12minutes and 4 seconds the sound stopped.
A good 12 minutes though!
Starts back up at 14:05
Sensorship. Now any mention of slaughtering indians is sensored. I don't know, they are trying to prevent racism or to avoid that the coloninists killed thousanfs of indians to be known.
We live in a totalitarian state we just haven't realized it yet.
@@MrGone0608 bruh it wasn’t censorship, there was an issue with copyright
He forgot to mention how the spartans kept saying "freedom" countless times while themselves beeing slavers
So? it was about their freedom, not their slaves.
Desolate Justice what do you mean so? You don't see the irony?
I think Helots were mostly war-prisoners, so maybe the whole point is the Spartans would either win or die in combat, never to have the same fate as those people they were able to defeat and enslave
When a polis was described as free in the ancient Greek world, it meant under native rule and tradition, whether the local government were an oligarchy, democracy, monarchy, or something else.
Real masterpiece fo marketing:
-Hey, dudes?
-What?
-You are enslaved, wanna be free?
-You know, but I personally have nice job at kitchen, I have lots of food for myself,, nice place to live...
-Sure you don't want to change it for tiny flat and eating garbage due to having hilariously low wage while being free without any real freedom, as we will still set hilarious rules to make you not being ale to do stuff?
-Sure I want!
Few points to answer your questions brought up about Xerxes and the Persian Army.
1. Like all absolute monarchies, the Persian Empire suffered from civil war and unrest every time the King died. Quickly, the various satraps and royal heirs would struggle to claim the throne. Xerxes was one of the many contenders and had to defeat them before focusing on Greece.
2. The Persian army was not a professional force maintained by a centralized state, but a polyglot army of various regions and satraps with their own language, weapons, and styles of fighting. The King really controlled his elite guard of Persian Immortals that served as heavy infantry and at a high cost to the Persian monarch. It can partly explain the disorganized and inept performance of this massive army against the Greeks.
3. The Persians were victims of their own success. Having eliminated all enemies, they had no competition and became complacent like all empires throughout history. Rather than learn and adapt, Persian rulers and generals preffered to employ Greek mercenaries particularly Spartans. It was this hubris that would end.with Alexanders march a century later.
4. One thing you didn't mention that I hated about the movie was the total lack of acknowledgement for Athens part in Thermopolye. Without the Athenian navy harassing Persian supply ships and keeping the Persian fleet transporting troops around the pass, the Spartans would easily have been cut off and crushed quickly. I personally thought a scene with the Athenians saying the Spartans may rule on land, but Athens rules the waves would have been great. Also a forshadowing of the future war between Athens and Sparta.
1. Yes a bit with the Athenians would have been good, but they were waiting for the second film when they covered the most influential battle in the greco persian war. 2. Although Athens were the best at sea, sparta still crushed them in the Peleponnesian war
Didn't they make a whole movie about the athenian part?
@@adametheridge2386 A war lasting 20 years with the Spartans eventually defeating Athens having to use Persian gold (as well as Persian Support) to buy a navy etc... could hardly be called 'crushing'. (Although I admit as well that Athenian arrogance did push a lot of Greek cities into the Spartan camp). Plus the Athenians kinda shot themselves in the foot with a disastrous invasion of Syracuse where they lost about 10,000 hoplites and many support troops, so for the final 10 years they were significantly weakened. And yet they still managed to defeat Sparta for most of that final ten year period, before finally capitulating.
@@lordvenusianbroon it can be called a decisive victory due to the fact that Athenian hubris and hot headedness led to their downfall, Sparta were the quicker to react, get the support of Persia and all the city states Athens dismissed, they were a lot more powerful and crushing when the moment came, and they crushed the Athenian land army, with barely any help at all from Persia. Athenians lost decisively, the final years were a crushing victory
@@adametheridge2386 Of course they won at the end, but 'crushing' to my mind is say, Germany crushing France in 1940, in a matter of weeks. In the case of the Peloponnesian war, it took Sparta decades and help from previous enemies of all Greece, the Persians, and as we both say, the hubris of Athens to finally get victory. This was an immensely drawn out victory that caused a lot of turbulence in Spartan society (i.e. see the effect of the end of the battle of Sphacteria on them) and there were moments they could have been defeated. Sparta should have won in the first year of the battle really to be crushing IMHO...but they couldn't figure out how to handle walls. (However to be fair that's okay, most Greeks at the time had huge problems with walled cities, it took Alexander the Great to really figure out how to handle city walls.) Both city states were really never that important afterwards anyway.
the Spartans massacred the Helots ( Slaves/Serfs ) every year , Just because they were more numerous . Sparta was a state consumed by Paranoia .
10 000 Spartan warriors were supposed to rule 100 000 Helots. So, how to make sure they wont get fed up being slaves and wont rebel (and basicly drown Spartans by numbers, since they wouldnt probably use narrow passage to eliminate their numbers advantage)? Well, they kept them terrified to the point where any Helot could consider himself/herself favourite of Fortune for every year he/she remained alive. Being an inhabitant of some city ruled by ancient Persia doesnt sound as bad in contrast to this...
Sweet dreams 👋😂
Every Greek is paranoid 😂
@@ajvaronos500 Greeks fought for their freedom. If an enemy wants to slave you tell him ok. 👋😂
Dave Miles My Pappou (Greek Grandpa) Told me the same thing.
You mean kicking people into a seemingly bottomless pit while yelling "THIS IS " is not historically accurate?
actually it did happen, SORT of. just not under the rule of xerxes. according to Herodotus, xerxes didnt send anyone to get 'earth and water' because when Darius did it before, the athenians and the spartans threw the guy into a well/pit.... lol
@@jaylynnr4256 Athenians killed the messengers outright. Spartans threw them in the well where they can take as much earth and water as they wish like the absolute chads they were
@@Ballin4Vengeance That's just cruel tho, if the Romans had their messengers done like that, their cruelty will beyond imagination
@@bizybliztaverage9414 The persians were no humanitarians either… this is relatively tame for ancient times
The part referencing "if" was in fact the answer the spartans gave to Macedonian King Philip II, father of Alexander. And he actually left them be albeit pretty much unimportant for the rest of history
"Let those yokels play their games" was most likely the reasoning.
One of Alexander's generals defeated them at Megalopolis when they tried to rise up against Macedon rule. Then later down the line Rome turned Sparta into a tourist attraction.
It was Stephen Fry who claimed otherwise - did you expect him to be well-informed?
Yeah Alexander eventually came back and humbled them.
@@colbyneblett8454 Actually what happened was originally that Sparta refused to join the League of Corinth under King Philip II deciding instead to remain independent. Then a few years after Alexander had taken the Macedonian and Corinth forces into Persia, Sparta decided to attack the acting and for all intense and purposes domestic Macedonian king Antipater who was appointed by Alexander to be his regent in Macedonian of which he already had experience doing when Philip went on his campaigns. Due to this only the domestic Macedonian forces under Antipater fought the Spartans at Megalopolis which resulted in Spartan defeat as by this point Sparta was a shadow of its former self having been surpassed by many other greek states. In the end Alexanders only relation to the battle/defeat of Sparta was simply just formally accepting surrender deals via Spartan ambassadors whilst still in Persia as Alexander had a far more formable foe and ambitions than a single greek city state. Additionally Alexander would also never return home.
Ah yes. The movie that convinced every meathead at the gym that they were fractionally Greek.
a gay gladiator in their imagination
Absolute facts!!! 🤣🤣
banana403 spoken like a true soy boy 😂
@@Skenyon so you're one of them then, right on.
stfu bitch ass. I wanna have a body like Leonidas
"Numbers alone can't guarantee Victory"
Stalin: **doubt**
Jews: ...
Fish
Depends on how many, also they were technologically inferior to Germany but not enough to guarantee a lose in all conditions. And winter,never forget that damned winter.
Sandro The Necromancer the winter was just as rough for the Russians as it was for the Germans
@Cegesh Stalin lost the battle of Finland because every step in the boggy terrain caused huge losses and took them away from Berlin.
"i may as well have marched them up here, from what ive seen" best line in the film
"I don't like the Spartans."
*Athenian Boi spotted.*
It’s true though. Coming from Sparta myself, I always look up to the ancients, but I know that while we all admire them, none would be willing to be raised as one of them. Imagine living like a Navy SEAL from the age of 6, but in filthier conditions, and every year more and more of your possessions would be removed, where you’d see children be killed in training and that’d be normal and you’ll get some idea of what you’d be in for.
Alexander Angelus that’s an easy choice for a spartan
Ha 😁
MercySincere oh yea
MercySincere it wasn’t common at all so u can stfu
The movie 300 is what I imagine people imagined when they heard the stories how many ever years ago it was. Sitting at a campfire, and your crazy uncle telling you the story of 300. I can just imagine how epic it seemed. And was.
No
@@End-Result
*Welp, it's opposite day today.*
Well, you aren't wrong. That is, in fact, the way Frank Miller described the comic itself. It was never meant to be historically accurate in that regard, but rather the story of those events as conveyed to each other by Spartan children around the campfire.
I understand the desire for historical accuracy in films, but context is important as well.
Bruh, that deformed Spartan looks like a flood carrier lmao
@Belagerungsmörser the Sheep Cool. Thanks for the info.
I wonder if he explodes if you shoot him lol
XD
@Belagerungsmörser the Sheep despite countless hours of searching, I have not found a single indication of me asking
The part that was muted between 12:09 - 14:03 reads. " To destroy an army of forty thousand Aztecs that helped lead to the downfall of the mighty Aztec Empire. So what do I mean about the Greeks being technologically superior to the Persians, well let's look at their weaponry. Obviously I don't need to tell you that the Greeks didn't go into battle half-naked like in the movie, this in clearly all from the graphic novel. In real life Spartans were heavy infantry and wore armor made of bronze, they also carried shields made of strong wood and a thin sheet of bronze and when the Persians fired their arrows, they would literally just bounce off the Spartans shields and armor because they were made of cheap date palm wood. In contrast, the Persians wore little to no armor and the shields made out of a much thinner wood and some of them were even made out of bloody wicker which Spartan weapons had no problems what so ever in penetrating. So what's ready infuriating to me is that, the Persians know this! They fought the Greeks at Marathon and sustained heavy loses because of their inadequate weaponry, you think someone somewhere would have said something in ten years about their weapons needing an upgrade! But anyway the question still remains, how did an army of just three hundred Spartans and seven thousand other Greeks, hold off an army of nearly half a million for three days. Well another advantage the Greeks had was the strategic value of the landscape they chose to fight in and Thermopylae was perfect of that because it was narrow coastal passage with Aegean Sea on one side and a high vertical cliff on the other. Its natural bends and curves created perfect choking points were Xerxes massive numbers were just taken out the equation, no matter many soldiers he funneled into the pass, the better equipped and trained Spartans were able to hold their ground and inflict heavy casualties. This continued foe two days before the Spartans were finally defeated on the third". Man that took for forever, but I think it was worth it, tell me what you all think.
Thanks for doing this, was very confused
@@thumblads8714 You're welcome.
Thanks mate!
@@dimitrivaleschi9786 Your welcome.
Boss. Ty
“The more you sweat in training, the less you bleed in combat”
SWEAT FOR BLOOD!
Fun fact the Germans right before ww2 adopted that philosophy.
@@messageinthebottle1673 Don't Make My Right Hand Rise Again!
The whole idea of this movie, its an exaggerated story told by a soldier to encourage his men.
Spartans were real. They were so strong and trained that they were banned from Olympics..
But it wasnt just that it was also the military tactics of that time and the weapon difference between spartans and persians.
@@ChocolateTony No shit Spartans were real. When did he say that they weren't?
You know that that story is real tho?
@@mariosskaliotis3550 what story is real ? A gay looking man who wears golden underwear is shown as persian kimg lmao
@Aztec Warrior it is ancient greek history this is what we learn in amcient geek history
But just how historically accurate was the SLO MO?
What's that?
Well the Spartan's ability to manipulate time and go into "SLO MO" as you call it was the main reason they were such formidable warriors. The real reason that some children were killed during infancy is because they did not possess this gift. The Athenians possessed this same ability, but they instead used it to have long boring debates over strange concepts such as "Democracy" and "human rights"
Thomas Creamer wait so Chuck Norris is a descendant of Spartans
lefu About as accurate as a stormtrooper.
They called it "bullet-time" and they knew in their final moments in battle, that it would look way sexier than anyone else that did it in trench coats. It's how their society flourished until it didn't.
Thank you for pointing out that, because it was narrated by Dilios, there is good reason to excuse the over-the-top nature of the battle. I remember coming to that conclusion myself and, like you, allowed me to like the film even more.
Helen of Troy was from Mycenean Sparta. Long before the Dorians came and made Sparta into a warrior culture.
Bingo
Helen's Sparta was not the Cool Sparta
Helen of Troy was not FROM Sparta she was rather married to the king of Sparta
Helen of Troy is not even believed to be a real person.
What? My day is ruined.
+Madcapredcap
Except that there is no archaeological evidence of a Dorian invasion.
Hi! so, King Xerxes actually had to wait for 10 years because some parts of Egypt (which they had conquered) had rebelled. I just thought I may add this in there!
Sadly even people with a "history" name tag are braggers now
Plus Persians did what they come for. Burn down Athens as punishment for the rebellion back in anatolia. And majority of the army had left Greece after that
@@Loneaxe Yes, exactly
Tru, he had 10 years none the less to plan.... didn't really work out
@@Figgy_Jub what do u mean? spartan really just got exterminated...i say it work out
"Our arrows will blot out the sun!"
"Then we will fight in the shade"
Me: "Oh burn!"
too bad they all died
hpa2005 How is it a burn if it’s in the shade?
Sam Samani
died in glory fighting for their home
Yikes
That's Magneto!
Sound cuts out for anyone else or just me?
12:09 to 14:00
Same issue
Same
Yep!
Yes. That looks like the most replayed part of the video.
Yep! And it's happened in at least one other HB video.
Numbers don't beat superior tech?
Soviet Russia disagrees.
Mother Russia laughs at your feeble use of details and logic.
MORE CONSCRIPTS!!!
There is a fine lecture on youtube by Jonathan House called 'Why Germany lost: The Three Alibis'. It deals with the notion that it was Hitler, bad weather and the superior soviet numbers that defeated Wehrmacht in the East.
You are correct.
It was hilarious.
And you where an acident.
*where.
*acident.
I assume you are talking about WW2, the Russians always had better tanks then the Germans
“Spartans never die. They’re just missing in action.”
- Catherine Halsey from the ‘Halo’ series
Sierra- 259 Carter (Noble 1) said it to. Though that was just in the trailer
They're*
10,000 Subscribers With No Videos thanks for telling me. I was in a rush and had no time to think which one was the right response.
To be fair, it's a repeated line throughout the Halo media, almost like a mantra concerning the idea of the Spartans' invulnerability.
Mr. Gorog it is our line of gospel
There was inaccuracy that you forgot to mention, when the Oracle’s men were being bribed with coins, the Spartans did not use coin currency.
Nice. But i believe they were persian coins. Had xerxes face on em and everything.
??? I thought they used drachmae or aka drachma
That last line you said, my head said chocolate coins...and now I remembered a parody on my country...
Also, Ephors had nothing to do with the Oracle.
Well if Persia conquers Greece than that bribe will be much more useful, making them wealthier under the Persians. Thats not really a plot line from the movie, thats just me justifying the bribes.
A friend of mine is a Greek Cypriot who served as a tank commander for his national service. His regiments motto was some adaption of 'we will fight in the shade.'
You should have mentioned the immortals and how they were actually called the immortals not because they were hard to kill but because there were so many soldiers in their unit that they seemed to be immortal, everyone you killed was replaced immediately.
A year old, i know, but the thing about the immortals wasn't just that they had people to replace the fallen, but that they could relatively easily replace their elite force because of their awesome organisation and training of their military. The immortals were full time soldiers, not levied or hired.
Always 10,000, no more, no less
One key decider was the famous Greek Phalanx formation of locked shields and long spears which proved invaluable not only for this battle, but also the eventual expansion of Alexander. The phalanx was so effective that it would remain so until the advent of the Roman Legion and its Manipular structure which was still in essense a form of the Phalanx. Even to this day, the phalanx is used in combat to some extent, seen extensively in crowd control tactics by police and paramilitary groups.
The phalanx is a great tactical formation with the appropriate equipment and in the correct location that provides a "single front", like Thermopylae, which was so good that it event prevent any possible counter-attack from its most vulnerable side: the right.
However, in open terrain it can be easily overcome if attacked from more than 1 angle, since the formation prevented the warriors from turning their weapons to fight/defend in any angle other than directly upfront of the formation.
Heavy cavalry destroyed Spartan phalanxes. Alexander was great thanks to his heavy cavalry and anvil tactics.
@@CruelestChris that was not the reason though. It was a bit of that plus that their society was more than 60% of slaves who rebelled all the time. They had very little army reserves ,hence why they usually stayed at home.
Alexander's Macedonian phalanx was actually pretty much an antithesis of Spartan warrior ideology. Spartans valued personal physical prowess and combat skill, while macedonian phalanx was relied on cooperation and drilling above all. Macedonians were lightly armored and in fact were designed in response to heavier armored infantry of other Greek states.
This dude literally just copied and pasted this off wikipeida...
I see a lot of comments talking about how Nick didn't talk about this historical inaccuracy, or this historical inaccuracy, but if you watch the video Nick said how he wouldn't talk about all the historical inaccuracies because the movie's source material was a graphic novel and not history.
Believe me, I know how inaccurate this movie is ;)
That name
When Herodotus is one's main source there is bound to be an abundance of inaccuracies
+Caoimhin don't be too hard on Herodotus. He was more of a Shakespeare than an actual historian.
And also, you could spend hours doing just that. He did a pretty damn good job in a concise 15 minutes (or thereabout). :)
Without Herodotus, Frank Miller couldn't have made his graphic novel in the first place. We can be sure Herodotus took liberties with his work, since no one knew what military history was in the 5th century BC. Nevertheless, he wrote when Greeks who actually fought in the Persian Wars were still alive, so there has to be a lot of truth in his narrative.
14:04 sound comes back in
I wonder why
@ayitsdelli
Copyright bs
When xerxes lost a part of his navy to a storm, he was so pissed he ordered his men to whip the sea
Also when he was crossing into Greece across the hellespont (basically the bridge of land where Istanbul is) the bridge he made broke because of the current, so he killed all the engineers who built it and then threw a pair of shackles into the water
What a dick lol. Little known fact is from that day forward his men behind his back referred to him as "jerkceez " 🤣
According to Herodotus, who didn't like the Persians.
I'd be pissed too salami is good af
Αυτό δεν έγινε στην Σαλαμίνα αλλά στον Ελλήσποντο, όταν μία θύελλα διάλυσε την γέφυρα από καράβια που είχαν φτιάξει για να περάσει ο στρατός του
"numbers don't always win wars"
Soviet union: Hold my beer
Not exactly true....The WWII Soviet didn't win by overwhelming numbers (as in overtaking a fortification defended by 10,000 with 100,000 troops), it was just that their numbers held out longer. It was more siege warfare with great assistance by mother nature which allowed the Soviet to prevail. The Soviet were waging a war of "Defense in Depth" or in other words, tactical retreat to effectively turn Germany's Blitz tactics into a weakness instead of an asset. In addition, once you get past the initial stages of the war the Soviet were in many cases technological peers or even superior to their German counterparts (Think T-34 tank, Ilyushin Il-2 ground attack airplane, SVT-40 rifle, among others).
Soviet Union: "Our numbers will win this war"
Afghanistan: "Hold my beer"
@@akureng737 Afghans are muslim. They don't drink alcohol. They would say: Hold my tea, coffee, water or goats milk.
Russian officer: Send more men they'll run out of bullets soon
@@hyfy-tr2jy german were pushing for only 5 winter days... how the fuck did it hurt them it was the russians who had to plow through snow to push out the nazis
"helen of troy was from sparta"
no wonder it took them ten years to sack troy
I have always wondered why that was never corrected. She was Helen of Sparta, kept in Troy. I guess it just sounds better. I am from Texas. Don't let facts get in the way of a good story.
@@tcjohnson3437 Helen of Troy is a myth
@@karlbahena1733 And ? So is the King James bible. Doesn't mean you can't read it and discuss it. Whats your point ?
@@karlbahena1733 Troy did exist. Proof has been found
@@harris009ful Troy exist but not helen
I really like how you gave the back ground of the Ionian Revolt. It is a pivotal part of the story and brings in characters like Miltiades who was hated due to his dictatorship methods and eventually ending with the battle of Marathon. Good job in giving the back story, if I remember my history Marathon was 40 years or so before Thermopylae.
Another great misconception is that people actually believe there was only 300 Spartans at Thermopylae , Writings state the were other too like Arcadians. Leonidas may have only had 300 Spartans, but they did have allies with them.
all in all there was around 7K greeks
They were still greatly outnumbered, like 10-20 to 1
I think you've overlooked the *real* masterpiece: _Meet the Spartans_ .
Oh god that thing is pure crap
given how bad "300" is, even a piece of garbage like meet the spartans is kind of the better film, if only marginally.
@macsikar Mackay lol
That movie was fucking hilarious!
"About to shove my happy foot up yo ass"
"That's gay."-Xerxes2k15
"yes your grace very gay.Very gay indeed your grace"-Xexes commander 2k15
Bolololol XD I peed myself.
Fun Fact: 300 is only 15 minutes long if played at normal speed and not in *slow-motion.*
That's simply not true, it's 15 minutes shorter.
Jokes....ha
I too remember this joke when I first heard it in 2006.
Sam C you’re kinda slow
@@BlueScrew4 r/whoosh
Did you lose sound at 12:15?
Copyright
Illuminati
History channel needs to be in touch with you.
hell no, stay away from TV networks - no youtuber has ever transitioned into TV and did well
that's because those youtubers have sold out. This guy won't. Plus he needs to evole and make $
what part of evolving to make money is not selling out?
John Meyer you'd like to pay his bills?
I have made no claims about the dignity of selling out. I merely pointed out that the essence of your statement was that "selling out is bad, he won't, he needs to sell out."
"a fine thrust"
"exactly"
Me: [nearly chokes on chicken] "clearly I am not worthy"
Fun fact: the name Ephialtes(Εφιάλτης) in Greek means nightmare. After his betrayal, his name became the official word of horror dreams for a nation
"They did a little bit more than just bang their shields"..... Genius.
“Good thrust”
You also forgot to mention how the infant spartans were bathed in wine, so the ones who survived supposedly had a better chance of becoming strong warriors. In addition during their trainning they used to drink blood(usually boar's) mixed with honey to supposedly develop stronger immune systems.
That's just sick
@ *tips fedora* M'lady
we do it today also
Still more accurate than Pearl Harbour.
also, a better love story
titanic was a better love tragedy. like romeo and juliet.
I just realized that your videos fall into the category of videos that I am genuinely excited to see when released.
Thanks dude. It really pays off to hear you say that :)
It is great to see people talking of the Greeks in history.
Great thanks from a bulgarian historian.
Also the people who lived in your region of the times: The Thracians. They've also done their part but not talked about as much sadly
@@1991beachboy I studied Thracian culture but what I heard was mostly that no one really knows all that much about them.
We have records of their small kingdom but not much more than that.
The Spartans of the Iliad were a different people than the Spartans of 300.Spartans of the Iliad were classic Greeks and were gone by the time the Dorian's conquered the same Spartan land. Taking the name of city Sparta for themselves.Though the country of the city of Sparta was named Laconia Dorian Spartans called themselves Spartans.
Where did you learn that stuff bro?
Drewster
Junior college!! I think I got it right.The sons of Heracles or Hercules fought in Troy and all the tribes of the Dorian's claim to be decedents of Heracles.So some time passed between the Trojan War and the Battle of Thermopylae.maybe 1500 years?
haha i see
you have a more in depth study of the dorians than i, but the iliad showed up in Greece's dark age, somewhere between 1000-8000 i think, while the Greco-Persian war was something around 500- 450
+Cold Duck Trojan war was supposed to have taken place around 1300-1200 BC. So the difference would be about 750 years.
Michael Wyckmans
Yes I looked up the the last stand of Thermopylae, it happened during the Bronze Age So I guess Troy happened during the Golden age or just after the golden age of Greece.
Can we talk about how one of the most amazing things about the second Persian invasion of Greece is the 2 unprecedentedly huge pontoon footbridge Xerxes built to move his army across the hellespont? Xerxes wasn't messing around.
Well, heck. His dad failed, he screwed it up twice, so....he had to have learned something by the 4th attempt. He did go through generals pretty quickly. Maybe he finally found his strategist.
Xeres had abundant slave labor
@@sunitamosesesq source? Everything I've read says Persia had slaves especially in outlaying districts, but by and large did NOT rely on slavery. So what you claim is plausible, but unlikely. I'd love to see a source if you have one.
Herodotus wrote that Xerxes built on top of the boats a dirt path with walls in order for the animals not to spook by seeing the water; it still took Xerxes army with its entire entourage a whole week to cross the Dardanelles pontoon bridge.
@@sunitamosesesq ur probally talkig about the spartan..not the persia
Leonidas:SPARTANS!!!What is your profession!?
Spartans: Ahhoo!!Ahhoo!!
Athenians: You want to have a license for that??
Just some more things that he might have missed. Sparta sent only 300 not only concerns of helots revolting but due to several religious reasons where military action was illegal by spartan law. That's why he brought his closest gym buddies with him(bodyguards). There were somewhere around 7000 greek soldiers with 300 being spartans. Some greek defector told the Persians about a secret pathway around the pass which the Greeks also knew of and had a small force placed. Those men were caught by surprise and didn't defend the pass taking position somewhere else thinking the Persians were coming for them. Word came out. Leonidas held a council of war. He said those who wanted to leave can since it was going to be the last stand whilst being surrounded. About 3000 chose to leave whist all Spartans and spartan slaves that participated with some other greeks chose to stay knowing it was a fight to the death. One injured spartan was told by Leonidas to return to Sparta and tell of what happened there and their honorable last stand. When war continued the Greeks were putting up a great fight. Leonidas in the later part of the last stand was killed. In order to retrieve his body the spartan soldiers and slaves pushed back the Persian lines however were not able to get his body. His head was stuck on a spear. Eventually, every last one of them perished.
Fun fact only 299 Spartans died because 1 left
He was scared lmao
Actually 300 died because it was 300 plus leonidas. Not 299 plus leonidas. So the lone soldier was the 301st.
actually 300 Spartans did die because there was 301 Spartans then 1 left
Fun fact, it was never 300 Spartans.
@@nathanb.8114 fun fact: actually there was more than 300 bcauze some used cameras while they were in battle.
Xexes didn't think he was invading "Greece" because "Greece" wasn't a unified state, in theory or practise. Funny enough, the Persian Wars were the beginning of a collective Greek identity.
They were Greek in the same way that we could invade "South America", that wouldn't mean you invade Argentina and instantly Bolivia feels under attack too. There's absolutely a shared culture, but, crucially when we're talking about military invasion, not political unity.
The fuck is xexes
Freudian slip
You don't need a sovereign state to have a name for a place. The land was called Greece (Hellas) and Xerxes(like Darius before heim) wanted to make it his province. Regarding the very source of the Persian Wars, Herodotus' "Histories" (just a few quotes from book 5 which doesn't even refer to incidents in Greece!):
"At this time the Greeks who were settled around them were for the most part Ionians, and after being taught the letters by the Phoenicians, they used them with a few changes of form. In so doing, they gave to these characters the name of Phoenician, as was quite fair seeing that the Phoenicians had brought them into Greece"
"This was he whose daughter (if indeed the tale is true) Pausanias the Lacedaemonian, son of Cleombrotus, at a later day betrothed to himself, since it was his wish to possess the sovereignty of Hellas. After appointing Megabates general, Artaphrenes sent his army away to Aristagoras. "
"Having been admitted to converse with Cleomenes, Aristagoras spoke thus to him: “Do not wonder, Cleomenes, that I have been so eager to come here, for our present situation is such that the sons of the Ionians are slaves and not free men, which is shameful and grievous particularly to ourselves but also, of all others, to you, inasmuch as you are the leaders of Hellas. Now, therefore, we entreat you by the gods of Hellas to save your Ionian kinsmen from slavery "
And on to book 6:
"Then Darius attempted to learn whether the Greeks intended to wage war against him or to surrender themselves. He sent heralds this way and that throughout Hellas, bidding them demand a gift of earth and water for the king. He despatched some to Hellas, and he sent others to his own tributary cities of the coast, commanding that ships of war and transports for horses be built."
"So the cities set about these preparations. The heralds who went to Hellas received what the king's proclamation demanded from many of those dwelling on the mainland and from all the islanders to whom they came with the demand. Among the islanders who gave earth and water to Darius were the Aeginetans. The Athenians immediately came down upon them for doing this, for they supposed the Aeginetans to have given the gift out of enmity for Athens, so they might join with the Persians in attacking the Athenians. Gladly laying hold of this pretext, they went to Sparta and there accused the Aeginetans of acting to betray Hellas."
"While Cleomenes was in Aegina working for the common good of Hellas, Demaratus slandered him, not out of care for the Aeginetans, but out of jealousy and envy. "
"For in three generations, that is, in the time of Darius son of Hystaspes and Xerxes son of Darius and Artaxerxes son of Xerxes, more ills happened to Hellas than in twenty generations before Darius; some coming from the Persians, some from the wars for preeminence among the chief of the nations themselves."
"ll this concerns and depends on you in this way: if you vote with me, your country will be free and your city the first in Hellas. But if you side with those eager to avoid battle, you will have the opposite to all the good things I enumerated."
t's getting too common. Hellas/Greece as the objective of the war in almost every paragraph.
The Trojan War was the beginning of a collective Greek identity.
I can’t believe you still haven’t done Troy
omg my gosh, the BEST movie. yes do troy!
I just wish they killed off Paris and not menelaus
We don't know if war realy happend ...
@macsikar Mackay You mistook him saying the existence of the city vs. the actual war, they aren't mutually exclusive.
@Donald Mackay don't worry about him, by his name I would say that he's serbian. As a historian I've heard about their versions of "history" as they call it. Basically all of the important figures in history were, in one way or the other, serbians!
Even the Nikola Tesla (born and raised Croat who never set foot on serbian soil) was deemed serbian. If we weren't in 21st century and didn't have internet it would be quite amusing... But now it's just sad... Ok maybe little funny! ;)
anyone else audio cut off at 12:09
It got copyright claim
Yea 😢
@@Lopez03Eduardo. damn wtf. 😭
Didn't know his voice was copyrighted
No, the spanish fought against 40. That's the number according to history buff.
HB: “Numbers alone don’t guarantee victory.”
Soviet Union: *33.7 million deaths later*
Well you forgot a great winter that the germans didnt expect! xD
"A single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic." - Joseph Stalin
i mean they did win so...
yes because of huge deaths of civil population,so blame the ruthlessnes
The "Spartans, what is your profession?" line gives me absolute chills every time I see it.
Never mind the bit when they can only havw that profession thanks to slaves and 2nd class citizens. Have a culture like that today, and they're called war mongers.
"AWWWWWHOOO! AWWWWHOOO!"
Bobby Boucher: You sound like a big choo choo train
@nickys34 lol...wth are you going on about
Waterboy reference. Classic
There is no sound from 12:09 to 14:03
had to mute it cause it was flagged by someone in that part
@@beaverhead01 why it was flag? It's purely a educational video?
@@messageinthebottle1673 most likeley a song or music /or a voice over was copyright claimed
Your kidding me, so 1 minute 49 seconds had to be cut from this video all cause of a copyright claim?
Just watched almost all of your videos in one day, incredible quality. You just gained yourself a subscriber. Hat off to you, sir.
Thanks for subscribing!
History Buffs You're most welcome :) I shall be recommending this channel to my friends and work mates.
+MrRapidPotato Hell, I just watched three videos and I'm already subscribing!
same here as +MrRapidPotato.
I subscribed 1 minute into the first video I saw of yours
Should've also pointed out that Persians treated women well for an ancient society, unlike what was shown in 300 where the ambassador scoffs at the idea of a woman speaking freely.
The key words being 'for an ancient society'. They hadn't gotten to that level of fairness yet.
Persians were the most advanced society in terms of treating women, religious freedoms, rule of law and such. However the entire movie is based on an old propaganda hence the idea is to raise the concept of good and bad, so they have to depict the Persians as evil.
They had no slavery and were remarkably tolerant and accommodating to the people they conquered.
Considering that the north-western Europeans looked to have more tolerance towards women once we found about them I'm guessing they have been such a society for quite a while. I'm only focusing on the ones that we know of though. We are not even sure if people lived in north western Europe back when Greeks were fighting the Persians.
JoeRingo118 sorry, hit by accident
I thought it was Phillip of Macedonia who said,
"If I enter Laconia I shall burn Sparta to the ground."
To which he received the one word reply, "If"
It is
It is and it's basically what ended up saving them. Sparta was becoming a backwards backwater by that point, the answer amused Alexander so he just didn't bother with them.
No, Philip asked if the Spartans would rather him come to them as a friend or as an enemy, the response received was neither.
@@capidosia After looking it up, what I said is what he said.
The one word "If" gave rise to our word "Laconic"meaning brevity
of speech.
king Leonidas didn't say "THIS IS SPARTA!!!!" he said "GO DIG IT UP YOURSELVES!!!" upon pushing the Persians in
in my opinion way cooler!
Even if the line was wrong, the fact the scene is real is cool on it's own
"GO DIG IT UP YOURSELVES!!!" sounds way better
In Greek "Molon Lave"
Short,but cool!
They still need the set up of the Persians demanding tribute of "Earth (food) and water."
"Spartan women give birth to real men"
SOMEONE NEEDS A LOT OF ICE AND AN ENTIRE OCEAN TO COOL DOWN!
DAT BURN!!!
She really did say that. Just to an Athenian woman
Luckily, he has both in spades... [reverse burn intensifies]
Not to be that guy but I think you don't really have much of a grasp on this historical subject. Xerxes didn't spend 10 years preparing to invade Greece. He had to put down a revolt in Egypt just before he went to fight the Greeks. Darius the Great's plan was nearly complete when he died, but as they do, people revolted. Not only that but the Persians were used to fighting everyone else in the world aside from Greeks with their current weapon system. They used a massive amount of archers supported by a rank or two of light infantry holding short spears and shields. The entire Persian strategy was to whittle enemies down with arrow fire and then use their massively superior cavalry to ride them down once they broke or flank with them. Obviously the Spartans at Thermopole had a massive advantage in positioning and equipment. However, you don't just change all your gear and tactics of your entire military when you are winning every other fight you get into. Plus, lets not forget who won at the Hot Gates. Also, best not to forget who ended up fighting for who in the future. Far more Greek hoplites ended up fighting for the Persians in future wars. Persia didn't need to bet the Greeks in open combat. They just paid them to kill each other which was a ludicrously effective strategy. The Persian army eventually lost to the Greeks in later years but in the end it did pretty much nothing to their power and afterwards they just bought Greeks like toys and smashed them against each other.
It's tempting to demonize the Persians because of the whole Eastern vs Western thing but looking at the facts changes how the whole story goes. Not until Alexander the Great came along and really whooped the shit out of the Persians did they have much of a hiccup in their near world domination. Not to mention that by the time of Alexander's death he had taken up the dress, fashion, and manners of the Persian king of kings, in Civ they call that a cultural victory. :P
Love your stuff! Keep it truckin'!
very good comment!
Not to mention it wasn't simply 300 Spartans.
He mentioned 7000 other greeks
Yeah, the Persians kind of had an EMPIRE to run here.
Engaging in a border war with some small squabbeling citystates because they supported a rebellion wasn't very high on their priority list.
And they suffered more from bad weather and other bad luck than from the actual greeks the first time around.
Really as far as Persia was concerned the whole war with Greece was more of a footnote than a real event of any significance. Greece saw it has a huge deal though, which is why we think of it so highly today being able to trace much of today's Western culture back to Greece.
And the Spartans also spoke with English accents just like in Rome, Troy, and in every other gladiator flick.
SkullAngel002 might as well point out that leonidas was actually Gerard butler, what’s your point
@@burnwankenobi803 It explains the kilts :)
Rob K we are in violent agreement
@@burnwankenobi803 that every movie that takes place in Ancient Greece, Rome, Troy and Egypt typically casts people with English, Australian, and Scottish accents for the roles. It's not bad thing but it's worth mentioning what a weird choice it is
JonGon Productions cuz British ppl are legit
"Yes your Grace, very gay!" Holy shit this was hilarious.
Fun fact: Ephialtes' name, the traitor in 300, means nightmare in modern Greek. It's also used akin to Benedict Arnold or Judas in Greek culture.
Theo Sims True but Ephialtes got its meaning from another guy, a democratic Athenian politician
I meant moreso that it makes the interaction between Leonidas and Ephialtes interesting since Leonidas foreshadows this happening and many people may not have picked up on that. Also, the meaning for Ephialtes doesn't come from the Athenian politician
Theo Sims You was right, it's from επί + άλλομαι = jump upon
Odd name for an Arcadian shepherd but there you go...
12:05
You forgot to say that the Aztecs couldn't fight without their leader alive, who was killed by Cortés and his commanders. Then, the Aztecs troops started to run.
A battle has to be analysed in all its aspects. Technological superiority doesn't always explain a military victory.
Moctezuma was held captive by Cortez, and was much later, while still captive, killed by his own people as he pleaded with them not to oppose the Europeans. Aztecs kept battling. It was the unarmed attendants of Atauhuallpa in Peru that panicked and ran when their emperor was captured at Cajamarca.
@@paititi I didn't mean Moctezuma, but the Aztec general who was killed by Cortés.
Actually he forgot to mention that America was probably conquered by disease rathen than technology.
@@teymurasgarli9506 No, diseases don't win wars; alliances do. The Mexica got isolated. Nobody supported them anymore.
@@teymurasgarli9506 Moreover, he was talking about the Battle of Otumba, not the Conquest of America as a whole.
To all the people saying that history buffs is lying about Persia,watch the end of the video and learn that HB mentions the fact that 300 is based on the perspective of a Spartan warrior.
12:05 Why dose the audio cut out?
how about Das Boot?
Das Boot is very acurate, maybe better awful U-751 ;)
Yeah; the British captured the first Enigma, not the Yanks! At least get that right, Hollywood?!
"U-571" is fictitious, based loosely on a true story that had nothing to do with the Americans. The direct has since admitted fault.
Hello Poland.
fucking Hollywood, they would have you believe that fucking cowboy also won the west & ww 2 & the vietnam war single handed.
The coolest part is knowing that the original historian who recorded this battle would have LOVED this movie, seeing how over the top it is, and dramatic.
13:00
The thing is, Persia was a desert empire where heavy armour would have had a lot of disadvantages
Not really, was just a matter of the logistical difficulties of properly arming such a massive army at that point in history.
@@trentn1127 no, I meant that heavy armour was a disadvantage for a soldier when fighting in a field. It would have reduced mobility, it would have increased fatigue and I'm pretty sure it was very unpleasant to get a lot of sand in your armour during a storm.
@@makeromaniagreatagain9697
Ah I get you. Would imagine though that if they had the means to support arming their troops like that they would've, heavy armour doesn't really have much of an impact on mobility.
@@makeromaniagreatagain9697 your right . This is exactly what happend when arabs raided sasanid empire and bisans
Cunaxa
why did the audio just cut out like that
He should reupload this
I thought my internet had failed then thought my headphones had broke. Then thought my phone had actually broken!
Copyright claim
"When less then a 1,00 conquistadores were able to destroy and army of 40."
@Aiden Rutherford I legit had to reload the video a couple of times before i searched for this comment. I thought my computer was going on the fritz.
It must be pointed out that wicker shields aren't as weak as one might think. The way they were weaved made them extremely tough, so much so that they were even worn as padding.
It was developed mostly as a product unique to the east where archery in warfare was more prominent, since wicker shields were excellent at blocking arrows.
They were definitely not as effective as bronze shields, but they weren't trash. Eastern empires would continue to use wickerwork for centuries to come for a good reason. It was cheap and effective enough to do the job.
People always underestimate any kind of padded armour. Well hell in hollywood even plate steel can be pierced by butterknives haha
@Cegesh The scutum was made from layered sheets of wood. It was not wicker. Vegetius describes weighted wicker shields used in training, though.
"Then we'll fight in the shade" is an acutal line durin he battle of thermoplye
And also
Persian officer said "sparta lay down your weapon"
Leonidas/spartan soldie: come and get them.
Well according to Herodotus but he had a flare for the dramatic lol kinda like the Shakespeare of his day.
@@parzival9514 moldy labia
I thought durin was a Dwarf king or something.....
5:26 That is actually inaccurate. It wasn't the Athenians that sent that threat, it was the Macedonians. Take a look at Alexander the Great's empire, notice how Sparta isn't part of it.
Sparta wasn't part of it because they were an insignificant village by then. Thebes destroyed Spartan hegemony in Pelopensia and freed the helots. Sparta was a tiny town and tourist trap by time Rome controlled it. The version of the agoge he talks about in the video wasn't even real, it was pumped up at under Roman rule to entertain Romans that visited.
@@apgtimbough947 Wrong, while Sparta was not the powerhouse it had been before the Thebans defeated them they were still considered one of the major greek powers. Neither Philip or Alexander tried to conquer Sparta. Surely if they were as weak as you say they were than taking Sparta would be easy.
@@George-Hawthorne they never took it because there was no reason. Lacedonia was poor and lacked infrastructure. They were not leaders anymore. Alexander was far more concerned with Persia and Athens/Thebes and Philip thought at least the minor threat Sparta posed would keep southern Greece loyal. Sparta could barely field an army by that time. Hell, Alexander didn't even need to conquer them, they tried to rebel and were crushed, and that rebellion barely involved actual Spartans because their government and culture crippled their ability to repopulate. Persia provided the mercenaries and money. Alexander referred to the Spartans seiging Megaopolis as "battle mice" and it's described as the most pathetic of any revolt against Macedonian hegemony. And although Sparta had not joined the League of Corinth, they fully accepted Macedonian hegemony. They were vassals in all but name.
@@apgtimbough947 But surely Alexander would want to rule ALL of Greece given his excess megalomania.
Correct, I caught that mistake as well
I can't believe you didn't mention the utter ridiculous manner in which Xerxes was portrayed and dressed. I mean they had him looking like some whacked out apocalyptic eunuch.
he covered all of that with the way persian army and everything related was described
Also what people forget is that 300 is an embellished story told by a Spartan. So yes, things will be ridiculous at times. Its why alot of xerxes men looked like animals and monsters and why the Spartans had no chestplates or anything. As spartans would see their abs and muscles as their chestplates
@@savvyslie1833 ..I personally doubt that people from other lands dressed in their native clothing looked like animals or monsters to the Spartans or any other people. And the wearing of "chest plates" was not a common thing for the ordinary soldiers of that time anyway, Spartan or otherwise. It wasn't cheap you know.
@@nicholaspeti7495 Its supposed to be an exaggerated viewpoint of a stereotypical Spartan. I have never understood how the vast majority of people never understood that concept
@@savvyslie1833 .. Who says so, you ? And when did I mention a "Spartan" in what I said ? .. I only mentioned Xerxes, the Achaemenid and King of Kings,