Expansion of Macedonia under Philip II a significant problem, blocking the main route into Greece. However, a second route into central Greece was available. In 480 BC, during the Battle of Thermopylae, the Persian king Xerxes had sent his army via a mountain track (the "Anopea") to outflank the pass. From this track, on the western side of Mount Kallidromon, another road led off and descended in Phocis. In 480 BC, a thousand Phocian troops were stationed above Thermopylae to guard the road and prevent a Persian assault on Phocis (though they notably failed to prevent the Persians using "Anopea"). However, in 339 BC, the Greeks
Methuselah Foundation the organization. The initiative was named after the 300 Spartans who held the pass at Thermopylae in 480 BC during the Greco-Persian Wars. In addition, in 2015, the foundation began memorializing The 300 donors with a monument at St. Thomas Island in the U.S. Virgin Islands. On September 16, 2006, Peter Thiel announced a pledge of $3.5 million to the Methuselah Foundation and the SENS program to "support scientific research into the alleviation and eventual reversal of the debilities caused by aging." In January 2018, the anonymous principal of the Pineapple Fund donated $1 million to the Methuselah Foundation. Methuselah