Ancient Greece · 378–338 BC
The Sacred Band of Thebes: an army of lovers
Dear reader,
In the fourth century BC, the city of Thebes built its elite fighting force on a simple idea: a man will fight hardest when the person he loves is standing beside him. The Sacred Band, as it was called, consisted of three hundred soldiers, arranged in a hundred and fifty pairs of lovers.
The idea worked. The Band helped Thebes defeat Sparta at Leuctra in 371 BC, and for more than thirty years it was the most respected unit in Greece. Then, at Chaeronea in 338 BC, it met the army of Philip II of Macedon and his young son Alexander, and it did not retreat. According to Plutarch, the men fell where they stood.
Plutarch also tells us what happened next. Philip walked the field after the battle and stopped at the place where the three hundred lay together. He wept, and said that anyone who suspected these men of doing or suffering anything shameful should perish.
In the nineteenth century, archaeologists excavated the ground beneath the stone lion that still marks the site. They found the remains of 254 men, buried in neat rows.
We are often told that tenderness makes men weak. History, it seems, never got the message. The Band was not brave in spite of love. It was brave because of it.
Back to back, then. Some people you trust without looking.
With love, from the messenger,
Boté