Thermopylæ

Thermopylæ (lit., 'the hot gates'), a famous pass leading from Thessaly into Locris, and the only road by which an invading army can penetrate from northern into southern Greece. It lies south of the present course of the river Spercheius, between Mount Ceta and what was anciently an impassable morass bordering on the Maliaç Gulf. In the pass are several hot springs, from which Thermopylæ probably received the first part of its name. Thermopylæ has won an eternal celebrity as the scene of the heroic death of Leonidas (q.v.) and his 300 Spartans in their attempt to stem the tide of Persian invasion (480 B.C.). Again, in 279 B.C., Brennus, at the head of a Gallic host, succeeded, through the same treachery that had secured a victory to Xerxes, in forcing the united Greeks to withdraw from the pass.