Road station
Thermopylas
pass and fort
Thermopylas, the Hot Gates, gets only a plain station mark on the map, modest for the most famous pass in Greece, the narrow way between Mount Oeta and the Malian Gulf, named after its hot springs. Here in 480 BC the Spartans held the Persians until Ephialtes showed them a path round; the Gauls in 279 BC and the Romans against Antiochus the Third in 191 BC also turned the pass by the mountain tracks. Herodes Atticus embellished the baths at the springs, and river silt has since pushed the shore far out.