Battle of Plataea other. The Allies initially adopted a strategy of blocking land and sea approaches to southern Greece. Thus, in August 480 BC, after hearing of Xerxes' approach, a small Allied army led by Spartan King Leonidas I blocked the Pass of Thermopylae, while an Athenian-dominated navy sailed to the Straits of Artemisium. Famously, the massively outnumbered Greek army held Thermopylae for three days before being outflanked by the Persians, who used a little-known mountain path. Although much of the Greek army retreated, the rearguard, formed of the Spartan and Thespian contingents, was surrounded and annihilated. The simultaneous Battle of Artemisium, consisting
Pleistarchus his tutor. It is unknown whether Pleistarchus was married. Pleistarchus' father King Leonidas perished in 480 BC at the Battle of Thermopylae. For the early part of Pleistarchus's reign, his uncle Cleombrotus acted as regent; after Cleombrotus's death in 479 BC, Pleistarchus's cousin Pausanias was regent. The successor of Pleistarchus was Pleistoanax, son of Pausanias. Pleistarchus Pleistarchus or Plistarch ( "Pleistarkhos"; died 458 BC) was the Agiad King of Sparta from 480 to 458 BC. He was born in 486 B.c. In Sparta, Greece. His family was Leonidas and Gorgo, who are uncles and nieces. He became king of Sparta