Molon labe
Greek phrase and motto, a classical expression of defiance, according to Plutarch addressed to the Persian King Xerxes by the Spartan King Leonidas before the Battle of Thermopylae (480 BC)
Molṑn labé (Greek: μολὼν λαβέ, transl. "come and take [them]") is a Greek phrase attributed to Leonidas I of Sparta during his written correspondence with Xerxes I of Persia on the eve of the Battle of Thermopylae in 480 BC. A classical expression of defiance, it is among the Laconic phrases reported by the Greek historian Plutarch, and is said to have been Leonidas's response to Xerxes's demand that the Spartan army lay down their weapons and surrender to the Persian army during the second Persian invasion of Greece.
Grammar
The phrase "molṑn labé" is in the Classical Greek of Plutarch, and does not necessarily reflect the Doric dialect that Leonidas would have used. The form ἔμολον is recorded in Doric as the aorist for εἷρπον, "to go, come".
The classical pronunciation is [mo.lɔ᷆ːn la.bé], the Modern Greek pronunciation [moˈlon laˈve].
The phrase is participial, and the translation would be "when you come, take it!" This use of the participle is known as the circumstantial participle in the grammar of classical Greek, i.e. the participle gives a circumstance (the coming) attendant on the main verb (the taking). It is a form of hypotaxis, where English would use parataxis, the conjunction of two verbs, "come and take". This construction normally (but not always) occurs within narrative literature.
The first word, μολών (molṓn, "having come"), is the aorist active participle (masculine, nominative, singular) of the Greek verb βλώσκω (blṓskō, "to come").
The aorist stem is μολ- (from a verbal root reconstructed as *melh₃-, *mlō-, "to appear").
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Molon labe” as greek phrase and motto, a classical expression of defiance, according to Plutarch addressed to the Persian King Xerxes by the Spartan King Leonidas before the Battle of Thermopylae (480 BC). Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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The subject matters to the people & ideas register because the source frames it as greek phrase and motto, a classical expression of defiance, according to Plutarch addressed to the Persian King Xerxes by the Spartan King Leonidas before the Battle of Thermopylae (480 BC). Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jan 17, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q257296.
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This entry incorporates text from “Molon labe” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.