carefully, Leonidas.
They may be your last
as king.
Earth and water.
Madman.
You're a madman.
Earth and water.
You'll find plenty of both down there.
No man, Persian or Greek...
No man threatens a messenger.
You bring your crowns and heads
of conquered kings to my city steps.
You insult my queen.
You threaten my people
with slavery and death.
Oh, I've chosen my words
carefully, Persian.
Perhaps you should
have done the same.
This is blasphemy.
This is madness.
Madness ?
This is Sparta !!
Welcome, Leonidas.
We have been expecting you.
The ephors.
Priests to the old gods.
Inbred swine,
more creature than man.
Creatures whom even Leonidas
must bribe and beg.
No Spartan king has gone to war
without the ephors' blessing.
The Persians claim their forces
number in the milions.
I hope, for our sake,
they exaggerate.
But there's no question we face
the most masive army ever assembled.
Before your plan is heard,
what do you offer ?
We will use our superior
fighting skills,
and the terrain of Greece itself
to destroy them.
We will march north,
to the coast.
- We'll make sure...
- It is august, Leonidas.
The full moon approaches.
Tha sacred and ancient festival.
Sparta wages no war
at the time of the Carneia.
Sparta will burn !
Our men will die armed
and your women
and children will be slaves or worse.
Now, we will block
the Persian coastal assault,
by rebuilding the great
Phocian wall.
From now, we will funnel them
into the mountain pass
we call The Hot Gates.
Now, in that narrow corridor,
their numbers will count for nothing.
Wave after wave of Persian attack
would smash against Spartan shields.
Xerxes' losses will be so great,
his men so demoralized
he will have no choice
but to abandon his campaign.
We must consult the Oracle.
Trust the gods, Leonidas.
I'd prefer you trusted
your reason.
Your blasphemies have cost us
quite enough already.
Don't compound them.
We will consult the Oracle.
Diseased old mystics.
Worthless remnants
of the time
before Sparta's ascent
from darkness.
Remnants of a senseless
tradition.
A tradition even Leonidas
cannot defy.
For he must respect
the word of the ephors.
That is the law.
And no Spartan,
subject or citizen,
man or woman, slave or king
is above the law.
The ephors choose only
the most beautiful Spartan girls
to live amongst them
as oracles.
Their beauty is their curse.
For the old wretches
have the needs of men...
... and souls as black as hell.
Pray to the winds.
Sparta will fall.
All Greece will fall.
Trust not in men.
Honor the gods.
Honor the Carneia.
The king's climb down
is harder.
Pompous, inbred swine.
Worthless, diseased, rotten.
Corrupt.
Truly you're in the God King's
favor now.
Oh, wise and holy men.
Yes.
And when Sparta burns,
you shall bathe in gold.
Fresh oracles shall be delivered
to you daily,
from every corner
of the Empire.
Your lips gonna finish
what your fingers have started.
Has the oracle rogued you
of your desire as well ?
It will take more than the words
of a drunken adolescent girl
to rogue me of my desire
for you.
Then why is it distant ?
Because it seems now
I'am a...
... slave and captive
of luxurious old men.
The oracle's words can set fire
to all that I love.
So that is why my king
loses sleep
and is forced from
the warmth of his bed ?
There's only
one woman's words
that should affect
the mood of my husband.
Those are mine.
Then what must a king do
to save his world
when the very laws he has sworn
to protect force him to do nothing.
It is not a question of what
a Spartan citizen should do,
nor a husband, nor a king.
Instead ask yourself,
my dearest love:
What should a free man do ?
- This is all of them?
- As you ordered. 300.
All with born sons
to carry on