Leonidas I
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40 free Leonidas I trivia questions with answers — history quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Leonidas I reigned in Sparta for barely a decade, yet a few days in 480 BC made him one of the most famous figures in Greek history. He led a small allied army to the narrow pass of Thermopylae, held it against the vast invasion force of the Persian ruler Xerxes, and died there with his rearguard. The story has been retold ever since, in ancient histories, poems, novels, comics and films. This quiz collects the fun facts people most often look for about him: where his name comes from, how he came to the throne, the family around him, what he is supposed to have said to the enemy, how the battle was lost, and what became of his body and his memory. It also covers the modern Leonidas of cinema, comics and monuments, and the places where the screen version parts from the ancient accounts. It suits history fans, students of ancient Greece, and anyone who watched 300 and wondered how much of it was true. Every answer comes with a short explanation.
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Q 01The film 300 shows Leonidas kicking a Persian envoy into a pit; what did Sparta really do to Persian heralds?
Threw them down a well
Threw them down a well: when the heralds of Darius came asking for earth and water, Sparta told them to fetch both from the bottom. Athens threw its Persian heralds into a pit.
Q 02A Persian scout sent to spy on Leonidas's Spartans at Thermopylae was amazed to find them doing what?
Combing their hair
Combing their hair was what Spartans did before risking their lives, an exiled Spartan king explained to Xerxes. The Persian ruler had found the scout's report laughable.
Q 03Told that Persian arrows would blot out the sun, a Spartan at Thermopylae joked his side would fight where?
In the shade
In the shade, said the soldier Dienekes, who called the warning good news. Plutarch, writing centuries later, gave the same joke to Leonidas himself.
Q 04A chocolate maker called Leonidas, with the Spartan king on its logo, was founded in 1913 in which country?
Belgium
Belgium is home to the brand, started by a confectioner of Greek heritage named Leonidas Kestekides. His nephew later picked the warrior king's image to honour those roots.
Q 05The name of Leonidas, the Spartan king who fell at Thermopylae, can be read as 'son of' which animal?
A lion
A lion is what Leon means in Greek, and Leonidas was named after his grandfather Leon. Strictly, the name means 'descendant of Leon'.
Q 06Thermopylae, the coastal pass where Leonidas made his last stand, has a Greek name meaning what?
Hot Gates
Hot Gates refers to the sulphur springs that still rise beside the pass. Greek myth also placed one of the entrances to the underworld there.
Q 07Told by Xerxes to hand over his weapons, Leonidas reportedly answered 'Molon labe', meaning what?
Come and take them
Come and take them is the usual translation of the two Greek words, first recorded centuries later by Plutarch. They are inscribed beneath his bronze statue at the pass.
Q 08Which Scottish actor trained for four months to play a muscular King Leonidas in the 2006 film 300?
Gerard Butler
Gerard Butler said he wanted to look really strong, so he followed a high-intensity workout before shooting. The part is often described as his breakthrough role.
Q 09Which athletic festival, with its sacred truce, was under way when Leonidas marched north to Thermopylae?
The Olympic Games
The Olympic Games were on, so the Greek allies sent only advance guards and meant to follow in force. A Persian general was later astonished to hear the winners' prize was an olive wreath.
Q 10Which elite Persian corps of 10,000 did Xerxes send against Leonidas on the first day at Thermopylae?
The Immortals
The Immortals earned the name because every man lost was replaced at once, keeping the unit at full strength. Even they could not break the Greek line in the narrow pass.
Q 11Leonidas belonged to a Spartan royal house that claimed descent from which Greek mythical hero?
Heracles
Heracles was the claimed forefather of Sparta's royalty, through descendants said to have conquered the city. Leonidas was counted as the 17th king of his house.
Q 12Which local Greek betrayed Leonidas by showing the Persians a mountain path around the pass at Thermopylae?
Ephialtes
Ephialtes hoped Xerxes would reward him, but he got nothing and ended up with a price on his head. He fled to Thessaly and was later killed in an unrelated quarrel.
Q 13Before Thermopylae, which famous oracle warned that Sparta must lose either its city or its king?
Delphi
Delphi gave the warning in verse, and Leonidas is said to have marched north convinced he would not come back. Sparta mourned a king, and the city survived.
Q 21Which Spartan woman, remembered for her sharp advice, married her half-uncle Leonidas and bore his heir?
Gorgo
Gorgo first appears in the ancient accounts as a girl of eight or nine, warning her father not to let a visitor's bribes corrupt him. He took her advice and sent the man away.
Q 22Expecting to die at Thermopylae, Leonidas is said to have picked for his 300 only Spartans who had what?
Living sons
Living sons would carry on each family's name, the usual reading of his choice. Three hundred was the customary size of a Spartan king's guard.
Q 23When Leonidas sent most allies away from Thermopylae, 700 men from which Greek city refused to leave?
Thespiae
Q 14Which director filmed Leonidas's last stand almost entirely against bluescreens for the 2006 hit 300?
Zack Snyder
Zack Snyder shot the film in sixty days inside a studio, then had more than 1,500 visual effects shots fill in the skies and landscapes around the actors.
Q 15Sparta in the time of Leonidas had an unusual form of monarchy; what set it apart from other Greek states?
Two kings ruled jointly
Two kings ruled jointly, one from each of two rival royal families said to descend from twin brothers. Leonidas shared the throne with a king named Leotychidas.
Q 16In 1941, Allied troops held Thermopylae, the pass where Leonidas fell, against which invading country?
Germany
Germany was delayed there by Australian and New Zealand troops for long enough to cover a British evacuation. They fought mere metres from the ancient battlefield.
Q 17The terse wit of Leonidas's Spartans gave English which adjective, taken from their home region's name?
Laconic
Laconic comes from Laconia, the region around Sparta, whose people were known for blunt replies. Asked by Philip of Macedon if he should come as friend or foe, they said: 'Neither.'
Q 18Which Greek historian left the main surviving account of Leonidas at Thermopylae, in Book VII of his Histories?
Herodotus
Herodotus, often called the Father of History, was a small child when the battle was fought. One scholar says we write Thermopylae's history with him or not at all.
Q 19A religious festival made Sparta's army miss which 490 BC battle, a decade before Leonidas fought?
Marathon
Marathon was won by Athens almost alone, because Spartan law forbade marching to war during the festival. The same holiday is why Leonidas took only a small force north.
Q 20On his way to face Leonidas, Xerxes reportedly had which stretch of water whipped for wrecking his bridges?
The Hellespont
The Hellespont was given three hundred lashes, and fetters were thrown into it, after the first bridges' cables snapped. A second pair of bridges carried the army across.
Thespiae's 700 hoplites, under a general named Demophilus, stayed and died with the Spartans. A monument to them was unveiled near the Spartan one in 1997.
Q 24After Thermopylae, what did a furious Xerxes reportedly order done to the corpse of Leonidas?
Beheaded
Beheaded, with the head set on a stake: the order was seen as sacrilege. Earlier his men had driven the Persians back four times to recover the body.
Q 25A monument to Leonidas was unveiled in 2009 in Brunswick, a suburb of which Australian city?
Melbourne
Melbourne's Brunswick is nicknamed the suburb of the Spartans, after the many migrants from the Sparta region who settled there in the 1950s and 1960s.
Q 26Which comic book creator, inspired by a 1962 film he saw as a boy, made Leonidas the hero of the series 300?
Frank Miller
Frank Miller drew every page as a double-page spread, with painted colours by Lynn Varley. The five-issue series won three Eisner Awards in 1999.
Q 27Which 2018 video game opens with a prologue in which Leonidas fights the Persians at Thermopylae?
Assassin's Creed Odyssey
Assassin's Creed Odyssey then jumps forward to a mercenary hero who is the king's grandchild and who fights with his spear.
Q 28Leonidas's wife is credited with decoding a secret warning of Xerxes's invasion that was hidden beneath what?
A layer of wax
A layer of wax covered the wooden tablet, so it looked blank until she told the Spartans to scrape it clean. The sender was an exiled Spartan then at the Persian court.
Q 29Which Athenian statesman proposed holding Thermopylae under Leonidas while a fleet blocked the nearby straits?
Themistocles
Themistocles led the Athenian ships at Artemisium during the battle. When the pass fell the fleet pulled back to Salamis, where it later smashed the Persian navy.
Q 30Leonidas's nephew Pausanias avenged Thermopylae a year later by winning which decisive land battle?
Plataea
Plataea destroyed the army Xerxes had left behind in Greece and ended the invasion. Pausanias commanded as regent, ruling on behalf of the dead king's heir, who was still a child.