History ArtisticLicenseHistory / ThreeHundred

* Gerard Butler, Sullivan Stapleton and company fight in leather underwear, while the historical Greeks didn't step on the battlefield without several kilograms of bronze body armor. This is actually AdaptationalModesty from the comic book, where the Spartans occasionally fight completely naked except for their cape and helmet. Miller took this from Greco-Roman art, where gods and heroes were often depicted nude to symbolize their inherente power, beauty and badassery.

* The only forces depicted for Greece at the films's Thermopylae are the 300 Spartan hoplites, an Arcadian skirmisher contingent that contributes for a small part of the battle, and some Phocian forces that are referred to but never shown. In reality, the battle featured over 4000 troops on the Greek side (according to Herodotus, which is almost surely a lower estimate). Aside from Leonidas and his 300 ''hippei'', their army included large masses of Mycenaeans, Corinthians, Thespians and people from around Thermopylae. To be fair, several of those peoples are mentioned to have joined Leonidas and company in the graphic novel, but only the Thespians are ever shown on page.

* In real life, Sparta didn't save the day in a huge BigDamnHeroes moment at Salamis. Not only they had been a part of the allied fleet since the beginning, they had almost no navy at the time and their contribution to the Greek fleet had been less than 5% of the forces present according to Herodotus (ironically, Sparta wouldn't have a proper fleet until the Persian themselves gave them one in order to fight the Athenians during the Peloponnesian Wars). The victory at Salamis was a team effort, and it was accomplished by capitalizing on the Persian AttackAttackAttack approach to lure their ships into the straits. Xerxes's admirals believed they were cornering the Greeks by blocking the straits's exits, but they were really getting into a trap where they were pinned and destroyed.

* The real Ephors weren't priests or any kind of oracular staff as portrayed in the film, but a council of secular Senators who ran the Spartan government. They were also citizens elected by popular assembly, not an endogamic caste as Dilios labels them as. This is particularly odd since the Sparta from film also showcases a laic, more normal-looking citizen council which would have been identical to the Ephors from real life.

* Leaving aside the debate about whether Xerxes was a tyrant, the films' contrast between the "freedom-loving" Greece and the "proslavery" Persia is an unrealistic coup of BlackAndWhiteMorality. In reality, both countries supported and allowed for slavery in one form or another, just like every other nation in the world at the time, so that specifical topic was the least of the Greeks's moral worries. If anything, the ''Persians'' were probably the most freedom-loving of the two, as official slavery was forbidden in the Achaemenid Empire (except for war prisoners) and their governors generally disliked the very concept (there's a reason Xerxes' ancestor Cyrus the Great is revered in UsefulNotes/{{Judaism}}: he freed its people from the much more shackle-happy Babylonians). However, all Persian subjects were formally called "slaves" of the king (''bandaka'') and the latter had over them several of the rights a Greek master had over his slaves, including the right to take their very lives at will, so the Greeks's impression that they were fighting a slavemaster emperor wasn't completely baseless, only exacerbated. The fact that the Persian troops were apparently driven to battle by officers cracking whips probably only worsened the Greeks's already paranoid views on their empire.

* The real Ephors weren't priests or any kind of oracular staff as portrayed in the film, but a council of secular Senators who ran the Spartan government. They were also citizens elected by popular assembly, not an endogamic caste as Dilios labels them as. It's particularly odd since the actual Ephors are a big part of the plot.

* Much of what is known of Spartan culture, especially their TrainingFromHell is apocryphal at best, and propaganda at worst. Almost no first hand accounts from the period have survived and Spartans did not write their own history prior the Hellenistic period. Most of what we know of them otherwise comes entirely through the writing of other Greeks, and contained very little about the exact culture of Sparta. Later accounts mentioning those traditions often lack sources, and it's known that towards their later days, Sparta (who by that point was but a shadow of its former self in terms of power) played up that reputation, as it would draw people to visit and study there, particularly from Rome. Much of what is popularly known about Spartan culture and practices comes from the writings of Plutarch, who lived in the 1st Century AD. And while Plutarch did visit Sparta, most of the traditions he wrote about were no longer practiced in those days (if ever). Indeed 5 centuries separate Plutarch from the Sparta of the Persian Wars. And some of the things he wrote about would be from a ''millenia'' before his time.

* The real Ephors weren't priests or any kind of oracular staff as portrayed in the film, but a council of secular Senators who ran the Spartan government. They were also citizens elected by popular assembly, not an endogamic caste as Dilios labels them as.

* There were actually two Spartan survivors of the 300: [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aristodemus_of_Sparta Aristodemus]] and [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pantites Pantites]]. The former had an eye infection and was sent home along with another soldier suffering the same illness, Eurytus, while the latter was on an embassy to Thessaly and did not return in time for battle. Both were disgraced upon their return to Sparta, Aristodemus because Eurytus decided to return and fight despite his own blindness (he went to battle guided by a Helot) and Pantites because he didn't hurry up enough. Aristodermus regained some degree of honor by dying in the Battle of Plataea in a berserk charge, while Pantites preferred to hang himself. Nothing of this happens in the film, where the only survivor is Dilios; he could be considered a CompositeCharacter of Aristodemus and [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pausanias_(general) Pausanias]], Leonidas's nephew and leader of the Greek forces in Plataea.

* In the scene after Leonidas was born, the film shows an elder examining on a clifftop him while the narrator states that he would have been discarded if he was "small, or puny, or sickly", and then pans to the bottom and shows a number of baby bones. While Ancient Sparta did commit eugenic infanticide, they tested the baby by bathing him in wine and exposing him to the elements on a mountain, and babies that failed the test would be left to die there rather than being thrown off a cliff. Some children didn't even die, and instead were adopted by and raised as Helots.

* Much of what is known of Spartan military culture, especially their TrainingFromHell is apocryphal at best, and propaganda at worst. Almost no first hand accounts from the period have survived. Later accounts mentioning those often lack sources, and it's known that towards their later days, Sparta played up that reputation, as it would draw people to study there, particularly from Rome.

* Dilios is inspired and based on the Spartan soldier [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aristodemus_of_Sparta Aristodemus]], who was ordered to return to Sparta. Where Dilios lost an eye, Aristodemus was infected with an eye disease and was unable to fight. However, he was not the only one with and his fellow infectee chose instead to stay and fight rather than return to Sparta. Because of that, Aristodemus was branded a coward, the worst punishment a Spartan soldier could receive. He was participating at Plataea, where he charged the Persian lines in a berserker rage. He was redeemed, but not awarded any special honors.

* Leaving aside the debate about whether Xerxes was a tyrant, the films' contrast between the "freedom-loving" Greece and the "proslavery" Persia is an unrealistic coup of BlackAndWhiteMorality, if not a literal inversion of their historical policies. In reality, both countries supported and allowed for slavery in one form or another, just like every other nation in the world at the time, so that topic was the least of the Greek's moral worries. If anything, the Persians were the most freedom-loving of the two on the paper, as official slavery was forbidden in the Achaemenid Empire, except for war prisoners, and their governors generally disliked the concept (there's a reason Xerxes' ancestor Cyrus The Great is revered in UsefulNotes/{{Judaism}}: he freed its people from the much more shackle-happy Babylonians). However, all Persian subjects were formally called "slaves" of the king (''bandaka'') and the latter had several of the rights a Greek master had over his slaves, so [[ValuesDissonance this]], along with some military policies of the Achaemenid Empire, might have helped to place the Greeks [[PoorCommunicationKills under the wrong impression]] they were fighting an enemy much more proslavery than themselves.
* As listed in the Characters entry below, the Achaemenid Empire was one of the first secular societies that stuck for centuries. The god-like characterization of Xerxes is entirely inaccurate as such belief would be blasphemous to UsefulNotes/{{Zoroastrianism}}. The King and the ethnic Persians venerated Ahura Mazda and the other subjects whatever divinity they liked, which was another reason why Hebrews quite liked the Persian Empire, who liberated them from the clutches of the Babylonians in the process of conquering Babylon itself.

* The Persian army has black officials, sub-Saharan tribes and what seem to be Chinese gunpowder grenadiers, but none of those regions was a part of the Achaemenid Empire. The Africans might actually be a clever GeniusBonus, though, as at the time the Greeks were simultaneously in another war with the African-Phoenician power of Carthage, who ''did'' reach sub-Saharan Africa through the travels of their navigator [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanno_the_Navigator Hanno]], and a [[EnemyMine possible secret alliance between Carthaginians and Persians]] has been discussed through the years. However, it would not be any less of an artistic license in case of being so, because Carthage operated mainly in Berber Africa and probably had few to no sub-Saharans on its payroll. (Portraying Carthaginians as having plenty of black men among them is an error that many, many other historical productions commit as well.)

* While the historical Spartan soldiers did have their reasons to be derisive towards the rest of the Greek armies (most of them were neither professional nor as disciplined as theirs) the films give the impression that they were the only Greek nation skilled at frontal war: out of the rest, the Arcadians are lightly armed skirmishers only good for ambushes, while the Athenian soldiers are tough but decidedly inferior to their Spartan homologues. Actually, most Hellenic nations were capable to form competent phalanges, and some of them, like Thebes and Macedonia, were or became ''better'' at it than Sparta. In fact, Leonidas was happy to trust the front lines to their many allies at Thermopylae in a rotating movement, as by doing so they avoided attrition and he allowed for some rest for his own troops.

* The films portray the Greek ships as smaller and more maneuverable than their Persian equivalents, which in reality was exactly the opposite: the Greeks ships were big, cumbersome and manned by unexperienced sailors, so they typically put their trust more in their ship-borne hoplite marines to board and capture the enemy ships than in any inherent sailing advantage.

* The Athenians running into Marathon in a Gaul-style open field charge is just as jarring as the Spartans dueling freely in the Thermopylae. In real life, they did charge in a sort of previously unseen move in order for their slow-moving phalanx to not be picked apart by Persian archers, but it was a tight, controlled march in formation and not a wild individual race. As a result, the heavy phalanx-based Atehian hoplites overpowered the light Persian infantry and provided no room for the Persian cavalry to maneuver on the crowded beach. Had the actual battle been fought like the one in the movie, the Athenian forces would have likely been swarmed and obliterated by the defenders. (It's somewhat justified by the narration saying that Themistocles has the Greeks charge while the Persians are still unloading their troops, leaving them without their horses and without a lot of their troops being able to get off.)

* [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artemisia_I_of_Caria Artemisia]] wasn't a warrior brought up from slavery, but the queen of the Persian colony of Caria. Also, while she really served at Artemisium and Salamis and was in charge of a relatively huge part of the Persian fleet (the forces of Cos, Nysiros, Calyndos and her own personal ships), she was not the fleet's supreme commander: she shared command with Xerxes's younger brothers, Achaemenes and Ariabignes.

* Darius didn't invade Athens because he was "annoyed by Greek freedom"; he did it because Athens and Eretria had supported a revolution (the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ionian_Revolt Ionian Revolt]]) in territories of his empire that were formerly Greek colonies, like Aeolis, Cyprus and Caria. The Athenians' reason to oppose Darius came from some years before, when they had asked the Persians for help to get rid of the tyrant Hippias only for the Persians to tell them to suck it up.

* The storm that destroys part of the Persian fleet did happen, but it took place in the coast of Magnesia, which crosses into ArtisticLicenseGeography for being just too far to be watched from Thermopylae as in the film. Said fleet had nothing to do with the battle, either, because the Persian army that attacked the pass actually [[https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/71/Thermopylae_%26_Artemisium_campaign_map.png came from land]] after crossing Macedonia and Thessalia, not from the sea, which was blocked by the Greek navy in Artemisium. In fact, this deviation could be considered a PlotHole between ''300'' and ''Rise of an Empire'': the presence of Persian ships in the Malian gulf would mean Themistocles's defense in Artemisium had been bypassed, but this never happens in the films, as Themistocles only loses his blockade the same day Leonidas and his people are killed.

* Leonidas's LastStand happened historically, but under different circumstances. He didn't sacrifice himself to inspire the rest of Greek states to mobilize to war like in the film, as they were already fighting along with him. Instead, when Leonidas realized the Persians would flank them thanks to Ephialtes, he ordered the other city-states' armies to retreat while his own forces and Demophilus's (along with an extra Theban contingent that wanted to surrender) remained behind to give them more time to escape. The trope played there, thus, wasn't a ThanatosGambit, but a YouShallNotPass. However, it's recorded in sources that the Oracle of Delphi told the Spartans their king's death would be necessary to win the war, so it's possible that Leonidas decided to offer his life at least partially out of religious fervor.

* As listed in the Characters entry below, the Achaemenid Empire was one of the first secular societies that stuck for centuries. The god-like characterization of Xerxes is entirely inaccurate as such belief would be blasphemous to UsefulNotes/{{Zoroastrianism}}. The King and the ethnic Persians venerated Ahura Mazda and the other subjects whatever divinity they liked, which was another reason why Hebrews quite liked the Persian Empire.

''Film/ThreeHundred'' and ''Film/ThreeHundredRiseOfAnEmpire'' are obviously not meant to reflect true history. In fact, historical records of the event are already believed to be rather sensationalized and greatly embellished. Creator/ZackSnyder and Creator/FrankMiller also drew inspiration from ancient artwork, which, much like Hollywood, glamorizes battles of the past. Audiences have loved muscle-bound, half-naked supermen kicking the snot out of each other [[OlderThanTheyThink for a while]], after all.

* The second film features a [[RatedMForManly fistfight in midst of the Athenian senate]], something that would have been disgraceful to both parties in real life and not casually dismissed as in the film.

* The Persian army has black officials, sub-Saharan tribes and what seem to be Chinese gunpowder grenadiers, but none of those regions was a part of the Achaemenid Empire. The Africans might actually be a clever GeniusBonus, though, as at the time the Greeks were simultaneously in another war with the African-Phoenician power of Carthage for the control of Sicily, and a [[EnemyMine possible secret alliance between Carthaginians and Persians]] has been discussed through the years. However, it would not be any less of an artistic license in case of being so, because Carthage operated mainly in Berber Africa and probably had few to no blacks or sub-Saharians on its payroll (this is an error that many, many other historical productions commit as well).

* The Persian army shows sub-Saharan African tribes and what seem to be Chinese gunpowder grenadiers, but none of those regions was a part of the Achaemenid Empire. The Africans might actually be a clever GeniusBonus, though, as at the time the Greeks were simultaneously in another war with the African-Phoenician power of Carthage for the control of Sicily, and a [[EnemyMine possible secret alliance between Carthaginians and Persians]] has been discussed through the years. However, it would not be any less of an artistic license in case of being so, because Carthage operated mainly in Berber Africa and probably had few to no sub-Saharians on its payroll (this is an error that many, many other historical productions commit as well).

* Gerard Butler, Sullivan Stapleton and company fight in leather underwear, while the historical Greeks didn't step on the battlefield without several kilograms of bronze body armor. This is actually AdaptationalModesty from the comic book, where the Spartans fight completely naked except for their cape and helmet. Miller took this from Greco-Roman art, where gods and heroes were often depicted nude to symbolize their inherente power, beauty and badassery.

* The Immortals weren't disfigured masked men who dressed in black and fought with dual sabers. According to historians, they were just better armored versions of the regular ''sparabara'' infantry, that is, dudes wielding wicker shields and spears (among other many weapons) and clad in the Persian empire's clear colors. Sources don't mention any mask, although they might have worn a Persian tiara that covered their faces.

* The real [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ephialtes_of_Trachis Ephialtes]] was neither a Spartan nor deformed, but just a greedy Malian who sold out the Greeks out of opportunism. He wasn't even a warrior, but a shepherd or a farm worker (this point is not clear).

* Another important character AdaptedOut, this time on the Greek side, was [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demophilus_of_Thespiae Demophilus]], the leader of a contingent of 700 Thespians (more than twice than Leonidas's forces) who refused to retreat and died there along with the Spartans. As with the previous examples, they also appeared in ''The 300 Spartans''.

* The storm that destroys part of the Persian fleet did happen, but it took place in the coast of Magnesia, too far to be watched from Thermopylae. It had nothing to do with the battle, either, because the Persian army that attacked the pass actually [[https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/71/Thermopylae_%26_Artemisium_campaign_map.png came from land]] after crossing Macedonia and Thessalia, not from the sea, which was blocked by the Greek fleet in Artemisium. In fact, this deviation could be considered a PlotHole between ''300'' and ''Rise of an Empire'': the presence of Persian ships in the Malian gulf would mean Themistocles's defense in Artemisium had been previously bypassed, but this never happens in the films, as Themistocles only loses his blockade the same day Leonidas and his people are killed.
* The only forces depicted for Greece at the films's Thermopylae are the 300 Spartan hoplites, an Arcadian skirmisher contingent that contributes for a small part of the battle, and some Phocian forces that are referred to but never shown. In reality, the battle featured over 4000 troops on the Greek side (according to Herodotus, which is almost surely a lower estimate). Aside from Leonidas and his 300 ''hippei'', their army included large masses of Mycenaeans, Corinthians, Thespians and people from around Thermopylae.

* Leaving aside the debate about whether Xerxes was a tyrant, the films' contrast between the "freedom-loving" Greece and the "proslavery" Persia is an unrealistic coup of BlackAndWhiteMorality, if not a literal inversion of their historical policies. In reality, both countries supported and allowed for slavery in one form or another, just like every other nation in the world at the time, so that topic was the least of the Greek's moral worries. If anything, the Persians were the most freedom-loving of the two on the paper, as official slavery was forbidden in the Achaemenid Empire, except for war prisoners, and their governors generally disliked the concept (there's a reason Xerxes' ancestor Cyrus The Great is revered in UsefulNotes/{{Judaism}}: he freed its people from the much more chain-happy Babylonians). However, all Persian subjects were formally called "slaves" of the king (''bandaka'') and the latter had several of the rights a Greek master had over his slaves, so [[ValuesDissonance this]], along with some military policies of the Achaemenid Empire, might have helped to place the Greeks [[PoorCommunicationKills under the wrong impression]] they were fighting an enemy much more proslavery than themselves.

* The Persian army shows sub-Saharan African tribes and what seem to be Chinese gunpowder grenadiers, but none of those regions was a part of the Achaemenid Empire. The Africans might be actually a clever GeniusBonus, though, as at the time the Greeks were simultaneously in another war with the African-Phoenician power of Carthage for the control of Sicily, and a [[EnemyMine possible secret alliance between Carthaginians and Persians]] has been discussed through the years. However, it would not be any less of an artistic license in case of being so, because Carthage operated mainly in Berber Africa and probably had few to no sub-Saharians on its payroll (this is an error that many, many other historical productions commit as well).

* Gerard Butler, Sullivan Stapleton and company fight in leather underwear, while the historical Greeks didn't step on the battlefield without several kilograms of iron body armor. This is actually AdaptationalModesty from the comic book, where the Spartans fight completely naked except for their cape and helmet. Miller took this from Greco-Roman art, where gods and heroes were often depicted nude to symbolize their inherente power, beauty and badassery.

* The [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspis aspis]] shield was not a single piece of metal as portrayed in the film. It was composed of a ''wooden'' base merely coated in iron. Ironically, the Athenian aspis from the sequel are surely shown to be made of wood, only without the metal coating.
* Athenian shields are portrayed as very plain wooden pieces in contrast to the metal-covered, lambda-decorated Spartan ones. In real life, Athenians used the same kind of shield and were way more artistic in their decorations than Spartans: they often painted Athena's little owl or Medusa's head on them in order to symbolize their city and scare enemies away.

* In the film version of the Battle of Artemisium, the Athenian fleet executes an interesting-looking wheel formation to cut with their agile prows any frontal enemy advance. Considering that Greeks ships were actually the least experienced and maneuverable ones in real life, this tactic would have probably been suicidally complex for them to attempt, and would have only got them tangled and turned into easy targets for the expert Persian navy. Herodotus describes the Greek formation as a side-to-side crescent, not a wheel, and they apparently broke it quickly in order to charge. The Greek defense was not as efficient as shown in the film, either; even although they did repel the Persians for the duration of the battle, the Greeks got technically the shorter end of the stick because the losses were happening in even numbers despite the vastly different sizes of their armies (the Persian navy was so numerically superior that it could afford much more losses than the small Greek fleet).

* Gorgo's role is amped up in both films, particularly in the second, where she leads personally the Spartan fleet. Historical examples of Greek women assisting in wars do exist, like [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydna Hydna]], who helped to sabotage the Persian fleet before Salamis, but most Greeks didn't like females getting directly involved with warfare. They even offered a prize of 10,000 drachmas for Artemisia's capture only because she was a woman general.

* Scyllias was a real life person, being apparently the father of the aforementioned Hydna, and his own swimming feat apparently happened as well, but his character and circumstances were a bit different. He wasn't an Athenian lieutenant in an undercover mission as portrayed in the film, but a mercenary from Scione who deserted from the Persian army and brought information about their fleet to the Greek camp. Sources did say he was a renowned diver who swam all the way from a Persian ship in Aphetae to the coast of Artemisium, which amount to ten miles, nothing less (although Herodotus believed he actually came on a stolen boat). Him having a male son named Calisto is another addition.

* The incident in which the Spartans threw their Persian emissaries to a well did happen, at least according to Herodotus, but not during Xerxes's reign. It happened during his father Darius's, and its outcome was hardly limited to Sparta, as Athenians did the same, although they were characteristically delicate enough to judge the messengers before tossing them to the pit. As Xerxes knew these events, he omitted Athens and Sparta when he sent messengers to the Greek cities.
* The Battle of Thermopylae happened during the Carnea just as portrayed in the film, but the Ephors weren't secretly working for Xerxes and had the right priorities, so they allowed Leonidas to send a full-fledged military expedition. That said, they ''did'' forbid him once to do so due to the Carnea, although it happened during the Battle of Marathon, not Thermopylae.
* The only forces depicted for Greece at the films's Thermopylae are the 300 Spartan hoplites, an Arcadian skirmisher contingent that contributes for a small part of the battle and some Phocian forces that are referred to but never shown. In reality, the battle featured over 4000 troops on the Greek side (according to Herodotus, which is almost surely a lower estimate). Aside from Leonidas and his 300 ''hippei'', their army included large masses of Mycenaeans, Corinthians, Thespians and people from around Thermopylae.

* Leonidas's LastStand happened historically, but under different circumstances. He didn't sacrifice himself to inspire the rest of Greek states to mobilize to war like in the film, as they were already fighting along with him. Instead, when Leonidas realized the Persians would flank them thanks to Ephialtes, he ordered the other city-states' armies to retreat while his own forces and Demophilus's remained behind to give them more time to escape. The trope played there, thus, wasn't a ThanatosGambit, but a YouShallNotPass. However, it's recorded in sources that the Oracle of Delphi told the Spartans their king's death would be necessary to win the war, so it's possible that Leonidas decided to offer his life at least partially out of religious fervor.

* The film version of Xerxes burns Athens to the ground after his victory at Thermopylae, which is in historical sources, but modern historians greatly theorize that it might have been Greek propaganda, as Xerxes had no reason to destroy a city of significant strategic value ([[LampshadeHanging which is noted by Artemisia herself in the film]]). On the other hand, Herodotus himself claimed that burning the city was the entire objective of the campaign, a punitive action over Athenian's role in the aforementioned Ionian Revolt, which is why Xerxes preferred to withdraw with most of his forces after losing at Salamina (leaving Mardonius to continue the effort) instead of risking himself.
* The film shows the Greek fleet destroyed in Artemisia's bombing tactics, and they only avoid a Persian victory because Artemisia's own fleet is affected too by the attack. It is underlined by this way that both Leonidas and Themistocles fail at containing the Persian invasions in their respective terrains. In real life, although suffering hard losses, the Greeks actually held at the straits of Artemisium while Leonidas failed at the Hot Gates. They only retreated when the Thermopylae pass was taken and thus defending the nearby sea became irrelevant. (Although it has been argued the much larger Persian fleet would have ended up overpowering the Greeks by sheer attrition sooner or later, so Leonidas's defeat might have actually avoided theirs.) The Greek fleet then sailed to Athens and helped to evacuate it.

* In real life, Sparta didn't save the day in a huge BigDamnHeroes moment at Salamis. Not only they had been a part of the allied fleet since the beginning, they had almost no navy at the time and their contribution to the Greek fleet had been less than 5% of the forces present according to Herodotus (ironically, Sparta wouldn't have a proper fleet until the Persian themselves gave them one in order to fight the Athenians during the Peloponnesian wars). The victory at Salamis was a team effort, and it was accomplished by capitalizing on the Persian AttackAttackAttack approach to lure their ships into the straits. Xerxes's admirals believed they were cornering the Greeks by blocking the straits's exits, but they were really getting into a trap where they were pinned and destroyed.

* Leaving aside the debate about whether Xerxes was a tyrant, the films' contrast between the "freedom-loving" Greece and the "proslavery" Persia is an unrealistic rapt of BlackAndWhiteMorality, if not a literal inversion of their historical policies. In reality, both countries supported and allowed for slavery in one form or another, just like every other nation in the world at the time, so the topic was the least of the Greek's moral worries. If anything, the Persians were the most freedom-loving of the two on the paper, as official slavery was forbidden in the Achaemenid Empire, except for war prisoners, and their governors were generally lenient about this (there's a reason Xerxes' ancestor Cyrus The Great is revered in UsefulNotes/{{Judaism}}: he freed its people from the much more chain-happy Babylonians). However, all Persian subjects were formally called "slaves" of the king (''bandaka'') and the latter had several of the rights a Greek master had over his slaves, so [[ValuesDissonance this]], along with some military policies of the Achaemenid Empire, might have helped to place the Greeks [[PoorCommunicationKills under the wrong impression]] they were fighting an enemy much more proslavery than themselves.
* As listed in the Characters entry below is that the Achaemenid Empire was one of the first secular societies that stuck for centuries. The god-like characterization of Xerxes is entirely inaccurate as such belief would be blasphemous to UsefulNotes/{{Zoroastrianism}}. The King and the ethnic Persians venerated Ahura Mazda and the other subjects whatever divinity they liked, which was another reason why Hebrews quite liked the Persian Empire.

* The film shows Leonidas hunting alone in the mountains as a young boy as a training. This has a real basis, the Spartan training regime of [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agoge agoge]], only that boys weren't sent alone to hunting trips, but in small groups, as they were expected to care for each other and learn how to function as an organized team just like they would do on the battlefield.
* The fact that a Spartan used "boy lover" as an insult against an Athenian (like in the first film) or vice versa (like in the second) would be ironic at least, as both cities were solidly into the Greek concept of [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pederasty_in_ancient_Greece boy love]]. The main difference is that Spartans apparently saw it in a more spiritual light (according to Xenophon, they believed that relationships between men and boys should be based in love and friendship, not only in physical attraction or political interest) while Athenians considered it an educational and political tool (they enforced the "erastes" and "eromenos", a homoerotic form of StudentAndMasterTeam). However, sources like Plutarch and Aelian state young male lovers were legal in Sparta regardless of the city's opinion about it, and it is even believed that Sparta was actually one of the first cities to formalize this, so it is kind of a moot point.
* The second film features a [[TestosteronePoisoning fistfight in midst of the Athenian senate]], something that would have been disgraceful to both parties in real life and not casually dismissed as in the film.
* The Persian army shows sub-Saharan African tribes and what seem to be Chinese grenadiers, but none of those regions was a part of the Achaemenid Empire. The Africans might be actually a clever GeniusBonus, though, as at the time the Greeks were simultaneously in another war with the African-Phoenician power of Carthage for the control of Sicily, and a [[EnemyMine possible secret alliance between Carthaginians and Persians]] has been discussed through the years. However, it would not be any less of an artistic license in case of being so, because Carthage operated mainly in Berber Africa and probably had few to no sub-Saharians on its payroll. This is an error that many other historical productions commit as well.

* The film's treatment of Greek military tactics is inconsistent at the best and fantastic most of the time. The portrayed Spartans occasionally do execute their historical [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phalanx phalanx formation]], most notably at the first moments of the battle, when pushing the Persians off the cliff, or when extracting an enraged Artemis from the battlefield. However, barring these instances, they usually break formation completely and engage their opponents in stylized individual duels with yards of space between each other. In real life, phalangic teamwork was not only the Greeks' main strength in Thermopylae (aside from the [[GeoEffects natural terrain]]), but also one of the lead factors of their victory at the Greco-Persian wars. Had they chosen to fight the way it is choreographed, the Battle of Thermopylae would have lasted a single day and [[TheBadGuyWins guess who would have won]].

* While the historical Spartan soldiers did have their reasons to be derisive towards the rest of the Greek armies (most of them were neither professional nor as disciplined as theirs) the films give the impression that they were the only Greek nation skilled at frontal war: out of the rest, the Arcadians are lightly armed skirmishers only good for ambushes, while the Athenian soldiers are tough but decidedly inferior to their Spartan homologues. Actually, most Hellenic nations were capable to form competent phalanges, and some of them, like Thebes and Macedonia, were or became ''better'' at it than Sparta. In fact, Leonidas was happy to trust the front lines to their many allies at Thermopylae in a rotating movement, as by doing so they avoided attrition and he allowed for some rest for his own troops.

* While Persia did use war elephants (though not war rhinos), these were never deployed at Thermopylae, among other things because the narrow terrains would have screwed them the exact way it is shown in ''300'' shortly after their arrival. On the other hand, they used cavalry, which is absent from the film.

* Scyllias was a real life person, and his swimming feat apparently happened as well, but his character and circumstances were a bit different. He wasn't an Athenian lieutenant in an undercover mission as portrayed in the film, but a mercenary from Scione who deserted from the Persian army and brought information about their fleet to the Greek camp. Sources did say he was a renowned diver who swam all the way from a Persian ship in Aphetae to the coast of Artemisium, which amount to ten miles, nothing less (although Herodotus believed he actually came on a stolen boat).

* Darius didn't invade Athens because he was "annoyed by Greek freedom"; he did it because Athens and Eretria had supported a revolution (the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ionian_Revolt Ionian Revolt]]) in territories of his empire that were formerly Greek colonies, like Aeolis, Cyprus and Caria. The Athenians' reason to oppose Darius came from some years before, when they had asked the Persians for help to get rid of the tyrant Hippias, only for the Persians to tell them to suck it up.

* The only forces depicted for Greece at the films's Thermopylae are the 300 Spartan hoplites and an Arcadian skirmisher contingent that contributes for a small part of the battle. In reality, the battle featured over 4000 troops on the Greek side (according to Herodotus, which is almost surely a lower estimate). Aside from Leonidas and his 300 ''hippei'', their army included large masses of Mycenaeans, Corinthians, Thespians and people from around Thermopylae.

* The Spartan soldiers show an utter disdain for the Ephors and the supernatural in general. However, by ancient Greek standards, Spartans were exceptionally religious; they obeyed Carnea to a fault and would have never dared to mock priests or festivals.
* Conversely, the real Ephors weren't priests or any kind of oracular staff as portrayed in the film, but a council of secular Senators who ran the Spartan government. They were also citizens elected by popular assembly, not an endogamic caste as Dilios labels them as.
* The battle happened during the Carnea just as represented in the film, but the Ephors weren't secretly working for Xerxes and had the right priorities, so they allowed Leonidas to send a full-fledged military expedition. That said, they ''did'' forbid him once to do so due to the Carnea, although it happened during the Battle of Marathon, not Thermopylae.
* Sparta was run by two hereditary kings who held equal power and were in turn judged by the ephors. There were two royal families descended by the twin brothers Evrysthenes and Proklis, who were the leaders of the Dorians, a Greek tribe, who had invaded Sparta some 600 years before the Persian wars. Going to just one of them is pointless, and even if he did accede, he'd probably be branded a traitor and thrown out of the city immediately.
* The Spartans were far from a rural, freedom-loving society they are portrayed as, and they definitely weren't against "mysticism and tyranny". In reality, they were a deeply religious, militaristic, desigual society where a minority lived by continually and ruthlessly repressing the majority of the population. The latter, called helots, were essentially slaves [[note]]There were distinct differences from slavery in other places, such as 1800s America, but the concept is close enough.[[/note]] who worked the land to produce the food so that the former could spend all their time fighting wars and oppressing them (during some periods, a Spartan had the right to murder helots with impunity). At the end of the day, the Spartans fought the Persian empire not out of any altruistic or progressive political goal, but basically because they were in Xerxes's path just like the rest of the Greek states. Creator/FrankMiller himself acknowledged he omitted the nastiest aspects of Sparta in order to make easier for the reader to root for them.

* The fact that a Spartan used "boy lover" as an insult against an Athenian (like in the first film) or vice versa (like in the second) would be ironic at least, as both cities were solidly into the Greek concept of [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pederasty_in_ancient_Greece boy love]]. The main difference is that Spartans apparently saw it in a more spiritual light (according to Xenophon, they believed that relationships between men and boys should be based in love and friendship, not only in physical attraction or political interest) while Athenians considered it an educational and political tool (it is well recorded that they enforced the "erastes" and "eromenos", a homoerotic form of StudentAndMasterTeam). However, sources like Plutarch and Aelian state young male lovers were legal in Sparta regardless of the city's opinion about it, and it is even believed that Sparta was actually the first city to formalize this.

* Leaving aside the debate about whether Xerxes was a tyrant, actual slavery was much less common in Achaemenid Persia than in "freedom-loving" Greece (there's a reason Xerxes' ancestor Cyrus The Great is revered in UsefulNotes/{{Judaism}}: he freed its people from the much more slavery-happy Babylonians). However, all Persian subjects were formally called "slaves" of the king (''bandaka'') and ''[[ValuesDissonance that]]'' [[PoorCommunicationKills played a role]] in fueling Greek resistance to Persia.
* Another element listed in the Characters entry below is that the Achaemenid Empire was one of the first secular societies that stuck for centuries. The god-like characterization of Xerxes is entirely inaccurate as such belief would be blasphemous to UsefulNotes/{{Zoroastrianism}}. The King and the ethnic Persians venerated Ahura Mazda and the other subjects whatever divinity they liked. Another reason why Hebrews quite liked the Persian Empire. Incidentally this may have been one of the reasons why the Asian Greek colonies didn't put much effort in rebelling: StatusQuoIsGod and being voluntary vassals in a secular and prosperous empire has many advantages.

* The film's treatment of Greek military tactics is inconsistent at the best and fantastic most of the time. The portrayed Spartans occasionally do execute their historical [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phalanx phalanx formation]], most notably at the first moments of the battle, when pushing the Persians off the cliff, or when extracting an enraged Artemis from the battlefield. However, barring these instances, they usually break formation completely and engage their opponents in stylized individual duels with yards of space between each other. In real life, phalangic teamwork was not only the Greek's main strength (aside from Thermopylae's [[GeoEffects natural terrain]]), but also one of the lead factors of their victory at the Greco-Persian wars. Had they chosen to fight the way it is choreographed, the Battle of Thermopylae would have lasted a single day and [[TheBadGuyWins guess who would have won]].

* While the historical Spartan soldiers did have their reasons to be derisive towards the rest of the Greek armies (most of them were neither professional nor as disciplined as theirs) the films give the impression that they were the only Greek nation skilled at frontal war: out of the rest, the Arcadians are lightly armed peltasts only good for ambushes, while the Athenian soldiers are tough but decidedly inferior to their Spartan homologues. Actually, most Hellenic nations were capable to form competent phalanges, and some of them (like Thebes and Macedonia) were or became ''better'' at it than Sparta. In fact, Leonidas was happy to trust the front lines to their many allies at Thermopylae in a rotating movement, as by doing so they avoided attrition and he allowed for some rest for his own troops.

* The dory spear, the primary weapon of Greek hoplites, was NOT thrown. Despite Leonidas and his men shown throwing theirs with ease, these spears were too heavy and too long to be thrown. They did use regular javelins, but those were shorter and lighter.
* Greeks actually had a kind of double-headed battle axe, the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labrys labrys]], as it is shown at the Battle of Marathon in the second film. However, it seems that its usage was mostly ceremonial and limited to the Minoan territory; it had no place in the tight formation warfare used by Greek hoplites.

* The Persian army shows sub-Saharan African tribes and what seem to be Chinese grenadiers, but none of those regions was a part of the Achaemenid Empire. The Africans might be actually a historical bonus, as at the time the Greeks were simultaneously in another war with the African power of Carthage for the control of Sicilia, and a possible secret alliance between Carthaginians and Persians has been discussed through the years. (However, it would not be any less of an artistic license in case of being so, because Carthage operated mainly in the Berber Africa and probably had few to no sub-Saharians on its payroll. This is an error that many other historical productions commit as well.)
* While Persia did have war elephants (though not war rhinos), these were never deployed at Thermopylae, among other things because the narrow terrains would have screwed them the exact way it is shown in ''300'' shortly after their arrival. On the other hand, they used cavalry, which is absent from the film.

* Gorgo's role is amped up in both films, particularly in the second, where she leads personally the Spartan fleet. Historical examples of Greek warrior women do exist, but most Greeks didn't like females getting involved with warfare. They even offered a prize of 10,000 drachmas for Artemisia's capture only because she was a woman general.

* Darius didn't invade Athens because he was "annoyed by Greek freedom"; he did it because Athens and Eretria had encouraged a revolution (the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ionian_Revolt Ionian Revolt]]) in territories of his empire that were formerly Greek colonies, like Aeolis, Cyprus and Caria. Similarly, he wasn't present at the Battle of Marathon and certainly was not killed by Themistocles. He died well after it and in different circumstances, so Xerxes didn't invade Greece by the desire to avenge his father, but merely to follow up with his campaign.

** Another element listed in the Characters entry below is that the Achaemenid Empire was one of the first secular societies that stuck for centuries. The god-like characterization of Xerxes is entirely inaccurate as such belief would be blasphemous to UsefulNotes/{{Zoroastrianism}}. The King and the ethnic Persians venerated Ahura Mazda and the other subjects whatever divinity they liked. Another reason why Hebrews quite liked the Persian Empire. Incidentally this may have been one of the reasons why the Asian Greek colonies didn't put much effort in rebelling: StatusQuoIsGood and being VoluntaryVassals in a secular and prosperous empire has many advantages.
* Leonidas sneering at the Athenians as "boy-lovers" is...unlikely. While the Athenians certainly did believe that a relationship with an older man was a healthy influence on a growing boy, they thought the ''Spartans'' went a bit overboard with the whole gay thing.

* Leaving aside the debate about whether Xerxes was a tyrant, actual slavery was much less common in Achaemenid Persia than in "freedom-loving" Greece (there's a reason Xerxes' ancestor Cyrus is revered in UsefulNotes/{{Judaism}}: he freed its people from the much more slavery-happy Babylonians). However, all Persian subjects were formally called "slaves" of the king (''bandaka'') and ''[[ValuesDissonance that]]'' [[PoorCommunicationKills played a role]] in fueling Greek resistance to Persia.

The embellishment is heavily implied as part of the Greek propaganda even during the first film.

''Film/ThreeHundred'' and ''Film/ThreeHundredRiseOfAnEmpire'' are obviously not meant to reflect true history. In fact, historical records of the event are already believed to be rather sensationalized and greatly embellished. Creator/ZackSnyder and Creator/FrankMiller also drew inspiration from ancient artwork, which, much like Hollywood, glamorizes battles of the past. Audiences have loved muscle-bound, half-naked supermen kicking the snot out of each other for [[OlderThanTheyThink a while]], after all. The embellishment is heavily implied as part of the Greek propaganda even during the film.

On the other hand, Snyder did state rather audaciously that the history presented in the film is [[DanBrowned 90% "accurate, although the visuals are pretty crazy"]]. However, none of these explain a few details listed there.

* Gerard Butler, Sullivan Stapleton and company fight in leather underwear, while the historical Greeks didn't step on the battlefield without several kilograms of iron body armor. This is actually AdaptationalModesty from the comic book, where the Spartans fight completely naked except for their shield, cape and helmet. Miller took this from Greco-Roman art, where gods and heroes are often depicted as nude for symbolic reasons.

* The Spartans are shown fighting with a cutlass-like sword probably meant to be the historical Greek [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Makhaira makhaira]], although with a design that takes visibly a bit from the South East Iberian [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcata falcata]] for RuleOfCool reasons. In real life, the Greeks used a small, straight sword called [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xiphos xiphos]], which was more useful behind a shield wall, and Spartans were notable for using xiphos ''smaller'' than other Greeks for increased practicality.

* The Persian army shows sub-Saharan African tribes and what seem to be Chinese grenadiers, but none of those regions was a part of the Achaemenid Empire. Conversely, they did have war elephants (though not war rhinos), but these were never deployed at Thermopylae, among other things because the narrow terrains would have screwed them the exact way it is shown in ''300'' shortly after their arrival. On the other hand, they used cavalry, which is absent from the film.

* The second film features a fistfight in midst of the Athenian senate, something that would have been disgraceful to both parties in real life and not casually dismissed as in the film.
* Leaving aside the debate about whether Xerxes was a real tyrant, actual slavery was much less common in Achaemenid Persia than in "freedom-loving" Greece (there's a reason Xerxes' ancestor Cyrus is revered in Judaism). However, all Persian subjects were formally called "slaves" of the king (''bandaka'') and ''[[ValuesDissonance that]]'' [[PoorCommunicationKills played a role]] in fueling Greek resistance to Persia.

* While the historical Spartan soldiers did have their reasons to be derisive towards the rest of the Greek armies, the films give the impression that they were the only Greek nation skilled at frontal war: out of the rest, the Arcadians are lightly armed peltasts only good for ambushes, while the Athenian soldiers are tough but decidedly inferior to their Spartan homologues, who are basically a metal wall even when in the sea. Actually, most Hellenic nations were capable to form competent phalanges, and some of them (like Thebes and Macedonia) were or became ''better'' at it than Sparta. In fact, Leonidas and company were happy to trust the front lines to their many allies at Thermopylae in a rotating movement, as by doing so they avoided attrition and allowed for some rest for their own troops.
* The Spartans are shown fighting with a cutlass-like sword probably meant to be the historical Greek [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Makhaira makhaira]], although with a design that takes visibly a bit from the South East Iberian [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcata falcata]] for RuleOfCool reasons. In real life, the Greeks used a small, straight sword called [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xiphos xiphos]], which was more useful behind a shield wall, and Spartans were notable for using xiphos smaller than other Greeks for increased practicality.

* Greeks actually had a kind of double-headed battle axe, the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labrys labrys]], as it is shown at the Battle of Marathon in the second film. However, it seems that its usage was mostly ceremonial and was limited to the Minoan territory; it had no place in the tight formation warfare used by Greek hoplites.
* Athenian shields are portrayed as very plain wooden pieces in contrast to the metal-covered, lambda-decorated Spartan ones. In real life, Athenians used the same kind of shield, and they were way more artistic in their decorations than Spartans: they often painted Athena's little owl or Medusa's head on them in order to symbolize their city and scare enemies away.
* The films portray the Greek ships as smaller and more maneuverable than their Persian equivalents, which in reality was exactly the opposite: the Greeks ships were big, cumbersome and manned by unexperienced sailors, so they trusted more in their ship-borne hoplite marines to board and capture the enemy ships than in any inherent sailing advantage.

* In the film version of the Battle of Artemisium, the Athenian fleet executes an interesting-looking wheel formation to cut with their agile prows any frontal enemy advance. Considering that Greeks ships were actually the least experienced and maneuverable ones in that battle, this tactic would have probably been suicidally complex for them to attempt in real life, and would have only got them tangled and turned into easy targets for the expert Persian navy. Herodotus describes the Greek formation as a side-to-side crescent, not a wheel, and they apparently broke it quickly in order to charge. The Greek defense was not as efficient as shown in the film, either; even although they did repel the Persians for the duration of the battle, the Greeks got technically the shorter end of the stick because the losses were happening in even numbers despite the vastly different sizes of their armies (the Persian navy was so numerically superior that it could afford much more losses than the small Greek fleet).

* Scyllias was a real life person, and his swimming feat apparently happened as well, but his character and circumstances were a bit different. He wasn't an Athenian lieutenant in an undercover mission as portrayed in the film, but a mercenary from Scione who deserted from the Persian army and brought information about their fleet to the Greek camp. Sources did say he was a renowned diver who swam underwater all the way from a Persian ship in Aphetae to the coast of Artemisium, which amount to ten miles, nothing less (although Herodotus believed he actually came on a stolen boat).

* The only forces depicted for Greece at the films's Thermopylae are the 300 Spartan hoplites and an Arcadian skirmisher contingent that contributes for a small part of the battle. In reality, the battle featured over 4000 troops on the Greek side (according to Herodotus, which is a lower estimate). Aside from Leonidas and his 300 ''hippei'', their army included large masses of Mycenaeans, Corinthians, Thespians and people from around Thermopylae.

* For what we know, Xerxes and Leonidas never had a face-to-face talk; most of Xerxes's lines from said scenes are recorded by Herodotus as coming from a simple Persian messenger. Similarly, Themistocles and Artemisia never met each other on the battlefield, although they ''could'' have possibly met in Artaxerxes I's court after Themistocles and his family were exiled from Greece.

* The film shows the Greek fleet destroyed in Artemisia's bombing tactics, and they only avoid a Persian victory because Artemisia's own fleet is affected too by the attack. It is underlined by this way that both Leonidas and Themistocles fail at containing the Persian invasions in their respective terrains. In real life, although suffering hard losses, the Greeks actually held at the straits of Artemisium while Leonidas failed at the Hot Gates. They only retreated when the Thermopylae pass was taken and thus defending the nearby sea became irrelevant. (Although it has been argued the much larger Persian fleet would have ended up overpowering the Greeks by sheer attrition sooner or later, so Leonidas's defeat might have even avoided theirs.) The Greek fleet then sailed to Athens and helped to evacuate it.

* Leaving aside the debate about whether Xerxes was a real tyrant, actual slavery was much less common in Achaemenid Persia than in "freedom-loving" Greece. However, all Persian subjects were formally called "slaves" of the king (''bandaka'') and ''[[ValuesDissonance that]]'' [[PoorCommunicationKills played a role]] in fueling Greek resistance to Persia.

* In the scene after Leonidas was born, the film shows an elder examining on a clifftop him while the narrator states that he would have been discarded if he was "small, or puny, or sickly", and then pans to the bottom and shows a number of baby bones. While Ancient Sparta did commit eugenic infanticide, they tested the baby by bathing it in wine and exposing it to the elements on a mountain, and babies that failed the test would be left to die there rather than being thrown off a cliff. Some children didn't even die, and instead were adopted by and raised as Helots.

* The second film features a fistfight in midst of the Athenian senate, something that would have been disgraceful to both parties in real life.
* Actual slavery was much less common in Achaemenid Persia than in "freedom-loving" Greece. However, all Persian subjects were formally called "slaves" of the king (''bandaka'') and ''[[ValuesDissonance that]]'' [[PoorCommunicationKills played a role]] in fueling Greek resistance to Persia.

* While the historical Spartan soldiers did have reasons to be derisive towards the rest of the Greek armies, the films give the impression that they were basically the only allied nation skilled at frontal war: out of the rest, all of the Arcadians are lightly armed peltastas only good for ambushes, while the Athenian soldiers are tough but decidedly inferior to their Spartan homologues, who are basically a metal wall even when in the sea. Actually, most Hellenic nations were capable to form competent phalanges, and some of them (like Thebes and Macedonia) were or became better at it than Sparta. In fact, Leonidas and company were happy to trust the front lines to their many allies at Thermopylae in a rotating movement, as by doing so they avoided attrition and allowed for some rest for their troops.

* Athenian shields are portrayed as very plain wooden pieces in contrast to the metal-covered, lambda-decorated Spartan ones. In real life, Athenians were way more artistic in their shield decorations than Spartans: they often painted Athena's little owl or Medusa's head on them in order to symbolize their city and scare enemies away.

* The Immortals weren't disfigured masked men who dressed in black fought with dual sabers. According to historians, they were just better armored versions of the regular sparabara infantry, that is, dudes wielding wicker shields and spears (among other many weapons) and clad in the Persian empire's clear colors. Sources don't mention any mask, although they might have worn a Persian tiara that covered their faces.
* The Athenians running into Marathon in a Gaul-style open-field charge is just as jarring as the Spartans dueling freely in the Thermopylae. In real life, they did charge in a sort of previously unseen move in order for their slow-moving phalanx to not be picked apart by Persian archers, but it was a tight, controlled march in formation and not a wild individual race. As a result, the heavy phalanx-based Atehian hoplites overpowered the light Persian infantry and provided no room for the Persian cavalry to maneuver on the crowded beach. Had the actual battle been fought like the one in the movie, the Athenian forces would have likely been swarmed and obliterated by the defenders. (It's somewhat justified by the narration saying that Themistocles has the Greeks charge while the Persians are still unloading their troops, leaving them without their horses and without a lot of their troops being able to get off.)
* In the film version of the Battle of Artemisium, the Athenian fleet executes an interesting-looking wheel formation to cut with their agile prows any frontal enemy advance. Considering that Greeks ships were actually the least experienced and maneuverable ones in that battle, this tactic would have probably been suicidally complex for them to attempt in real life and would have only got them tangled and turned into easy targets for the expert Persian navy. Herodotus describes the Greek formation as a side-to-side crescent, not a wheel, and they apparently broke it quickly in order to charge. The Greek defense was not as efficient as shown in the film, either; even although they did repel the Persians for the duration of the battle, the Greeks got technically the shorter end of the stick because the losses were happening in even numbers despite the vastly different sizes of their armies (the Persian navy was so numerically superior that it could afford much more losses than the small Greek fleet).

* Gorgo's role is amped up in both films, particularly in the second, where she leads personally the Spartan fleet. Actually, Greeks didn't like females getting involved with warfare; they even offered a prize of 10,000 drachmas for Artemisia's capture only because she was a woman general.

* Scyllias is also a real character, and his swimming feat apparently happened as well, but his character and circumstances were a bit different. He wasn't an Athenian lieutenant in an undercover mission as portrayed in the film, but a mercenary from Scione who deserted from the Persian army and brought information about their fleet to the Greek camp. Sources did say he was a renowned diver who swam underwater all the way from a Persian ship in Aphetae to the coast of Artemisium, which amount to ten miles, nothing less (although Herodotus believed he actually came on a stolen boat).
* The real Xerxes was a Zoroastrian, meaning that he would have considered the idea of declaring himself god-king blasphemy. This was actually born of a misunderstanding of the process of ''[[KneelBeforeZod proskynesis]]'', which the Greeks viewed as only being acceptable for a god. In other words, the Persians didn't treat their ruler as a god- but the Greeks ''thought'' they did. Similarly, his court of magi and priests being ordered to "turn him into a god" would have been even more shocked, if not downright offended at the request.

* The incident in which the Spartans threw their Persian emissaries to a well did happen, at least according to Herodotus, but not during Xerxes's reign. It happened during his father Darius's, and its outcome was hardly limited to Sparta: Athenians did the same, although they were characteristically delicate enough to judge the messengers before tossing them to the pit. As Xerxes knew these events, he omitted Athens and Sparta when he sent messengers to the Greek cities.

* Leonidas's LastStand happened historically, but under different circumstances. He didn't sacrifice himself to inspire the rest of Greek states to mobilize to war like in the film, as they were already fighting along with him. Instead, when Leonidas realized the Persians would flank them thanks to Ephialtes, he ordered the other city-states' armies to retreat while his forces and Demophilus's remained behind to give them more time to escape. The trope played there, thus, wasn't a ThanatosGambit, but a YouShallNotPass. Interestingly enough, though, it's recorded in sources that the Oracle of Delphi told the Spartans their king's death would be necessary to win the war, so it's possible that Leonidas decided to offer his life at least partially out of religious fervor.
* There were actually two Spartan survivors of the 300: [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aristodemus_of_Sparta Aristodemus]] and [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pantites Pantites]]. The former had an eye infection and was sent home along with another soldier suffering the same illness, Eurytus, while the latter was on an embassy to Thessaly and did not return in time for battle. Both were disgraced upon their return to Sparta, Aristodemus because Eurytus decided to return and fight despite his own blindness (he went to battle guided by a Helot) and Pantites because he didn't hurry up enough. Aristodermus regained some degree of honor by dying in the Battle of Plataea in a berserk charge, while Pantites preferred to hang himself. Nothing of this happenes in the film, where the only survivor is Dilios; he could be considered a CompositeCharacter of Aristodemus and [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pausanias_(general) Pausanias]], Leonidas's nephew and leader of the Greek forces in Plataea.

* The film shows the Greek fleet destroyed in Artemisia's bombing tactics, and they only avoid a Persian victory because Artemisia's own fleet is affected too by the attack. It is underlined by this way that both Leonidas and Themistocles fail at containing the Persian invasions in their respective terrains. In real life, although suffering hard losses, the Greeks actually held at the straits of Artemisium while Leonidas failed at the Hot Gates. They only retreated when the Thermopylae pass was taken and thus defending the nearby sea became irrelevant (although it has been argued the much larger Persian fleet would have ended up overpowering the Greeks by sheer attrition sooner or later, so Leonidas's defeat might have avoided theirs). The Greek fleet then sailed to Athens and helped to evacuate it.

''Film/ThreeeHundred'' and ''Film/ThreeHundredRiseOfAnEmpire'' are obviously not meant to reflect true history. In fact, historical records of the event are already believed to be rather sensationalized and greatly embellished. Creator/ZackSnyder and Creator/FrankMiller also drew inspiration from ancient artwork, which, much like Hollywood, glamorizes battles of the past. Audiences have loved muscle-bound, half-naked supermen kicking the snot out of each other for [[OlderThanTheyThink a while]], after all. The embellishment is heavily implied as part of the Greek propaganda even during the film.

The ''300'' movies are obviously not meant to reflect true history. In fact, historical records of the event are already believed to be rather sensationalized and greatly embellished. Creator/ZackSnyder and Creator/FrankMiller also drew inspiration from ancient artwork, which, much like Hollywood, glamorizes battles of the past. Audiences have loved muscle-bound, half-naked supermen kicking the snot out of each other for [[OlderThanTheyThink a while]], after all. The embellishment is heavily implied as part of the Greek propaganda even during the film.