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Chapter 3
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Gates of Fire, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Cities, Identity, and Belonging
Faith and Divine Intervention
Warfare and Brotherhood
Fear, Courage, and Love
Kingship, Loyalty, and Freedom
Female Strength and Influence
Summary
Analysis
Xeo reflects on the horror of finding himself an orphaned refugee. He and Diomache do not, after all, go into the city. They reunite with Bruxieus the next day. Their city has been annihilated, and not just physically: “the very spirit of our nation, the polis itself, that ideal of mind called Astakos […] Without a city, who were we?”
Xeo and Diomache don’t know how to make sense of their identity without the city. It’s more than just a place, but an “ideal of mind”—a culture and a sense of self.
Themes
When the threesome comes upon a grief-stricken man burying his infant, the man remarks that they needed the Spartans. The Spartans, he says, would never have drifted around in a daze in the aftermath of such a catastrophe; “they move through horrors with clear eyes and unshaken limbs.”
Xeo hears about the Spartans for the first time—that there’s something distinct about their ability to handle horror and betrayal. In his own grief and homelessness, this makes a deep impression on him.
Themes
When they return to the family farmhouse, the Argives encamped there permit them to retrieve and bury Xeo’s parents. The Argives sing a hymn to Zeus. Right after that, the soldiers restrain Xeo and Bruxieus, take Diomache outside, and brutally rape her. Bruxieus has to carry her away. As they leave, one of the Argives gives them some wine and bread and urges them to flee to the mountains, or worse will happen to them.
This horrifying scene—the Argives’ seeming kindnesses coupled with savage brutality and violation—is meant to shock the reader, giving a sense of what warfare does to ordinary people. This event will impact both Diomache and her cousin for the rest of their lives.
Themes
