The end of the Spartan army has someone responsible: the Sacred Battalion of Thebes. 300 loving and gay soldiers who formed an elite troop almost impossible to defeat.

The fearsome Spartans, perhaps the most feared and prepared army of Ancient Greece, met their end at the hands of a handful of gay and equally prepared warriors who have gone down in history as the Sacred Battalion of Thebes. We tell you his story!

This brave battalion of soldiers was made up of about 150 couples of gay warriors and lovers, 300 in total, who were the elite of their city’s army.

No one for half a century was able to defeat them and they are responsible for the end of the dominance of the Spartan army, which they defeated in the Battle of Leuctra in 371 BC after 200 years under their rule.

Each couple of the Sacred Battalion of Thebes was made up of an older soldier and a younger one, they were lovers and they say that the secret of their victories was that no soldier left his lover stranded or alone on the battlefield, which It united them as an army even more.

They were a very united force and almost impossible to defeat. This elite troop was created by a Theban military noble named Gorgidas, but its true leader was Epaminondas. His was the victory in the Battle of Mantinea against Athens, Sparta and other rival Greek cities.

The 300 gay warriors who defeated the Spartans in battle

The end of the Sacred Battalion of Thebes was at the hands of another historical hero, Philip II of Macedonia and his son Alexander the Great, who devastated them in the Battle of Chaeronea. But even in defeat, no Theban soldier abandoned his battle post or surrendered.

The Sacred Battalion was buried on the same battlefield and, years later, the monument known as the Lion of Chaeronea was built over its common grave. There in the 19th century, archaeologists found the skeletons of 254 men arranged in seven rows.