is the movie 300 true? were the greeks really much better fighters than persian?

Question

i would like to know if the greek were really the best warriors of their time and were they really that better compare to the persians as shown in the movie 300?

Answer 1

The movie 300 itself is pure fiction, history dramatized by contemporary stylings found in a comic book. Spartans really were top-notch soldiers. Remember, your question is not techincally false. After all, all Spartans are Greeks but not all Greeks are Spartans. In regards to Sparta, their whole society revolved around the military unlike the nations neighboring Sparta. This would include longer years of enlistment, earlier years to start training, more power in the military, harder training, etc. The Persian immortal however, is very hard to really describe in terms of fighting. Herodotus, the Greek historian, is the only one to make records of a unit called the "immortal". Even the Persians did not record such a military unit. There was a similar unit called the Anûšiya, that resembles the description of an immortal. Herodotus may have confused the word for Anauša which means immortal. However, assuming the Persian immortal is real, they would be much similar to a Spartan. The immortals always consisted of 10,000 men, shouldone have died or been injured, they were immediately replaced. Trained from childhood, selected amongst the best child warriors, good with a bow, etc. The immortals were essentially equal to the spartans. In 300 however, the depiction of the battle of Thermopylae is somewhat accurate. The immortals, although on par with the spartans in terms of conditioning, were no match for the phalanx created by the spartans. The immortals then won the day by flanking the phalanx and attacking from the unprotected side.
The Greeks as a collective whole, were not the greatest fighters. Spartans were greater fighters (you after all are confusing the two if you are relying on the movie. [remember my statement at the beginning?] the Greeks did retreat and used numerous "militia" type soldiers) than the rest of the Greeks. It is hard to say though whether the immortals were better. The phalanx was what let the Spartans fight for so long and kill thousands of Persians, but it was still defeated in the end. You should rely on your own opinion in this case due to lack of some evidence. After all, history is only as good as what we can look back upon.

Answer 2

The movie is silly, but the history is there. Better fighters, by the way, has little if anything to do with it. If you look at a modern picture of the area, the road is now about where the shore was then. The space was very restricted, so numbers really didn't count, since only a few could be brought to bear at a time.
The other thing you never see in the movies is the actual use of the phalanx. With spears and almost no sword work, it was more a big shoving match that might last for hours than anything else. You only saw about three seconds of that in the movie. And there was the usual drivel about "freedom," but the 300 Spartans had eight or nine hundred slaves with them for logistical support, including carrying the food, drink, and armor. The warriors would not have worn their armor in a long walk across half of Greece.

Answer 3

They were the best trained of the time. They trained for war froman early childhood. However they also had superior armor and weapons.
The Persians did not have heavy armor making the Spartans nearly impervious to the weapons of Persia. Also there is no historical proof of the Persian monsters or elephants etc from the movie. There is an older movie "The 300 Spartans" that may show a more accurate account of what happened.
The History channel has some very good information on this battle. The last stand of the 300.

Answer 4

The movie is only partially true, A Spartan contingent of 300 and about 1600 others held off a Persian Army of over 100,000, some estimates claim as high as 1 million . Greece at the time was a confederation of city states, Sparta being part of this confederating. The Spartans were a very unique group, they were raised from birth to be warriors. The only possession they were allowed was their weapons and armor, the Spartans were truly elite fighters, and the General placed them in the best place for them to fight. an area were their art of fighting was at it best, they denied the Persians the use of their Cavalry & Archers.
What was Heroic about the battle is that the Spartans knew in time that they were undone, but the choose to die, and buy time for the rest of Greece to raise an army to combat the Persian invasions, rather than retreat. The Greek Alamo.

But as far as the movie, it was ashame that they did not make it more historically accurate.

Answer 5

Good question, but you don't really have a good answer yet. Spartans were Greeks, so you have phrased your question correctly. Sparta was NOT part of the Roman Empire in 480 BC when the Battle of Thermopylae was fought. The movie is a chimera - a composite animal with different body parts. The warrior culture of the Spartans was TRUE. They DID start at a very young age and were trained only for war. The work in Sparta was done by a slave population of people called Helots who outnumbered the Spartans. To keep their workers in line, they had to be the best of warriors. They were clearly the best of their day. They were professionals. They did nothing else. They were physically tough, skilled with weapons, disciplined in battle, and probably as fearless as they are portrayed. BUT, there is also a comic book flavor to the movie which should be obvious. There were no huge trained killer rhinoceros tanks. Xerxes would not have been dressed only in jewels. That part is fantasy. 300 Spartans probably did die to a man, and they did hold off a larger force for a couple of days with the narrow pass and another thousand or so Greek allies helping considerably. They died because they stayed as the rearguard and refused to surrender. It's a terrific story of history, but the fantasy part takes away from the real valor of the real men who fought there. Added note - Krimson and especially Donnell above added their answers while I was writing, slow typist that I am, and they do have good answers.

Answer 6

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RE:
is the movie 300 true? were the greeks really much better fighters than persian?
i would like to know if the greek were really the best warriors of their time and were they really that better compare to the persians as shown in the movie 300?

Answer 7

The facts are disputed, so it's hard to tell.

For example, modern-day scholars on the subject speculate strongly that the numbers were exaggerated. The movie tells us that is was "300 Spartans Vs. 1 Million Persians" when in fact it was 7,000 Greeks (300 of them were Spartans) against a quarter of a million Persians (250,000 est.).

The Greeks *did* win the battle against great odds, regardless, but the Persians *did* manage to conquer many lands as well.

So you can't really say who's better than who. They're all great warriors.

Answer 8

The Greeks were not better fighters nor better equipped. By rights, they should have been wiped out by Persia, not once, but on at least 3 occasions (I'm speaking beyond just the Battle of Thermopylae). The fact that they were not has more to do with their persistence and determination than with any superiority in equipment, training or tactics. The Persians WERE the great power of the day. I once heard a university professor describe Greece as Vietnam to Persia's USA - in other words, they were a thorn in the heel that just wouldn't go away. The Greeks ultimately won because they were fighting for their homeland, while Persian soldiers were mostly conscripts from disparate lands that were fighting what they must have considered an unimportant war.

Answer 9

no.
the Spartans were the elite warriors of the Greek states. the Greeks were soldiers and draftees (during an emergency).
the Persians were very accomplished and skilled in battle. they're armor was terrible compared to Greeks and the strategy of the Spartans to use their shields and swords to mow people down was brilliant. but the Persians had big numbers for replacements. no way 300 Spartans and 2000 Greeks could hold back hundreds of thousands of Persians.
the movie 300 was based on a comic book that was based on a real event in history. i doubt the Persians included freaks in their army any more than Spartans or Greeks.
the purpose of the last stand was to hold back the Persian army until the full force of Greece could get together to fight the enemy. they knew the 300 wouldn't survive that's why they only picked men that had fathered children already.
the spartans weren't exactly heroes though because of their practice of pederasty and the fact that they had slaves and then claimed they were fighting for freedom. they had tests for graduation that included raping a woman and killing a slave without getting caught.
they did engage in homosexual sex but that wasn't viewed as something abnormal in greek or roman society. they still had to get married to reproduce more children, back then marriage was just a contract to have children and take care of them, it wasn't about love.

Answer 10

It's a fantasy movie based on historical facts.

Legends said that enemy soldiers tremble when they saw the crimson cloaks of the Spartans.

The 300 Spartans is fact, Spartans are top-notch soldiers is fact, training Spartan childrens fact, the immortals are fact and they're the elite force of Persia but there are not old geezers wearing mask like you see in the movie, Spartans wear armor unlike in the movie, the traitor who told that there is a way around is fact. No Spartan survived during the last phase of the battle is fact.

Nowaday historians claimed that the Persian numbers during that battle was exaggerated.