Although both technically had equal power, when Leonidas came to the throne, succeeding Cleomenes in the Agiad dynasty, Gorgo managed to elevate her husband over the other king Leotychidas in terms of influence and decision-making. When it arrived, neither the kings nor the five ephors advisors to the kings elected by the citizens knew what to make of the seemingly blank slab, until Gorgo advised Leonidas to clear the wax from the wood. There are several instances mentioned in the histories in which she is present in council giving advice to the kings or assembly.
And, while other Spartan queens had been accused of adultery notably Helen , Gorgo is repeatedly portrayed as virtuously rejecting unwanted advances. But then, she is famously cited as having stated that only Spartan women produced real men … so maybe no one else was worthy.
According to the later historian Plutarch, aware that his death was inevitable when the Spartans marched north, Gorgo asked her husband what he wanted her to do. It is likely that, both before and after the Persians invaded, Gorgo travelled throughout Greece helping Leonidas rally the Greek city-states to a common defense. Gorgo in Athens must have been a sensation; after all, in Athens it was considered scandalous for a woman — married or not — to be seen in public … and Gorgo was driving a chariot through the streets.
Even more scandalous if while riding about she wore traditional Spartan female attire, consisting of a short, thin skirt and tunic with arms and legs bare, while Athenian women wore heavy clothing that concealed everything save face, feet and hands.
Spartan women at the time enjoyed a status and respect unknown by their gender in the rest of Greece, and no doubt Leonidas and Gorgo made the most of that in their negotiations, alternating shock with charm. There is no record of her own demise. His second wife gave birth to the future Cleomenes I who was thus his eldest son.
However, his first wife became pregnant, and eventually gave birth to three sons, including Leonidas I. In either case, there appears to have been some tension between the eldest son and his half-brothers, resolved only by the former's death or murder [2] and the accession of Leonidas I at once his half-brother and his son-in-law.
Gorgo's mother is unknown, but she was probably Spartan by birth. Both Xenophon and Plutarch in his Life of Lycurgus , the law-giver for Sparta mention that Spartan society was concerned with blood purity, with avoidance of intermarriage with the rest of the population the helots and others, possibly of Achaean stock , and with marriages of heiresses.
Little about Gorgo's childhood is known, although she was probably raised like other Spartan girls of noble family, encouraged in daily physical exercise to strengthen her body, and reared to be married off to an older Spartan husband who would see little of her. For more on the life of Spartan women, see Plutarch. Cleomenes followed her advice. Her father died under mysterious circumstances, possibly killed by his two surviving half-brothers.
He was considered insane, possibly because of his interest in the world outside Sparta an interest not shared by other Spartans who followed the dictates of Lycurgus. His "insanity" did not prevent him from being chosen king, but it was possibly a cause of his downfall. Presumably, after Cleomenes's death, his only child Gorgo became his sole heiress. She was apparently already married in the late s in her early teens to her half-uncle Leonidas I. Gorgo's most significant role came during the aftermath of the Battle of Thermopylae BC , when her husband Leonidas I was killed in battle along with Spartans and many other Greeks.
According to Herodotus's Histories, a message from Demaratus arrived at Sparta after the Battle of Thermopylae; it was a warning that Greece was going to be invaded by Xerxes. In order to pass enemy lines without suspicion, the message was written on a wooden plate and covered with wax.
The daughter and only child of King Cleomenes I, she was raised from a young age to be a strong woman who was capable of ruling Sparta. King Cleomenes was said to have held her opinion in high regard and even heeded her advice from a young age.
No one knows for certain, though, the exact date of her birth. It is estimated to have been between and B. We do know that even though Spartan women were held in high esteem in the culture, very few historical writers of the time mentioned them specifically by name. Herodotus, one of the top historical writers of Ancient Greece, did mention her. In fact, she was one of the few women that he did mention in his writings. From what we can gather, her upbringing was similar to most Spartan women and she was well educated and thought to be physically beautiful.
According to Herodotus, Gorgo advised her father not to trust Aristagoras of Miletus, a foreign diplomat, when she was just a child. She thought that trusting him would have a corrupting influence on the Spartans. The amazing thing is, her father listened!
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