Theban sacred band hoplite

Now, Thebe's elite Sacred Band phalanx is particularly interesting. It consisted of 150 pairs of male lovers, one lover and one beloved trained to fight in a traditional Greek phalanx. That's a 300 man phalanx folks. The couples were an ingenious way of solidifying the will of the phalanx, since dying would be seen as preferential over fleeing and living with the shame of being responsible for the death of your beloved.
Theban heavy infantry was renowned not for this fact, but because they could defeat the 'invincible' Spartan infantry at equal or greater numbers, and in fact led to the crippling of ancient Sparta, freeing the Helot slaves that allowed it's warrior culture to exist.
At the battle of Tegyra the Sacred Band, 300 strong, defeated a Spartan army over twice its size. At the battle of Leuctra the Theban army (Sacred Band included) defeated the Spartans, who were again nearly double the strength of the Thebans.
Thebes and its sacred band was eventually destroyed by Macedon during Phillip II's takeover of Greece.