Sparta was a prominent
city-state in
Laconia
Laconia or Lakonia ( el, Λακωνία, , ) is a historical and administrative region of Greece located on the southeastern part of the Peloponnese peninsula. Its administrative capital is Sparta. The word ''laconic''—to speak in a blunt, c ...
in
ancient Greece. In antiquity, the city-state was known as Lacedaemon ( grc, , Lakedaímōn, label=none), while the name Sparta referred to its main settlement on the banks of the
Eurotas River
The Eurotas ( grc, Εὐρώτας) or Evrotas (modern Greek: ) is the main river of Laconia and one of the major rivers of the Peloponnese, in Greece. The river's springs are located just northwest of the border between Laconia and Arcadia, at ...
in the
Eurotas valley of Laconia, in south-eastern
Peloponnese
The Peloponnese (), Peloponnesus (; el, Πελοπόννησος, Pelopónnēsos,(), or Morea is a peninsula and geographic regions of Greece, geographic region in southern Greece. It is connected to the central part of the country by the Isthmu ...
. Around 650 BC, it rose to become the dominant
military land-power in ancient Greece.
Given its military pre-eminence, Sparta was recognized as the leading force of the unified Greek military during the
Greco-Persian Wars, in rivalry with the rising naval power of
Athens. Sparta was the principal enemy of
Athens during the
Peloponnesian War
The Peloponnesian War (431–404 BC) was an ancient Greek war fought between Athens and Sparta and their respective allies for the hegemony of the Greek world. The war remained undecided for a long time until the decisive intervention of th ...
(431–404 BC), from which it emerged victorious after the
Battle of Aegospotami. The decisive
Battle of Leuctra against
Thebes in 371 BC ended the
Spartan hegemony, although the city-state maintained its
political independence until its forced integration into the
Achaean League in 192 BC. The city nevertheless recovered much autonomy after the
Roman conquest of Greece
Greece in the Roman era describes the Roman conquest of Greece, as well as the period of Greek history when Greece was dominated first by the Roman Republic and then by the Roman Empire.
The Roman era of Greek history began with the Corinthian ...
in
146 BC
__NOTOC__
Year 146 BC was a year of the pre-Julian Roman calendar. At the time it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Lentulus and Achaicus (or, less frequently, year 608 '' Ab urbe condita''). The denomination 146 BC for this year has be ...
and prospered during the
Roman Empire, as its antiquarian customs attracted many Roman tourists. However, Sparta was sacked in 396 AD by the
Visigothic king
Alaric, and underwent a long period of decline, especially in the
Middle Ages, when many of its citizens moved to
Mystras.
Modern Sparta is the capital of the southern Greek region of Laconia and a center for processing citrus and olives.
Sparta was unique in ancient Greece for its
social system and
constitution, which were supposedly introduced by the semi-mythical legislator
Lycurgus
Lycurgus or Lykourgos () may refer to:
People
* Lycurgus (king of Sparta) (third century BC)
* Lycurgus (lawgiver) (eighth century BC), creator of constitution of Sparta
* Lycurgus of Athens (fourth century BC), one of the 'ten notable orators' ...
. His laws configured the Spartan
society to maximize military proficiency at all costs, focusing all
social institutions on
military training
Military education and training is a process which intends to establish and improve the capabilities of military personnel in their respective roles. Military training may be voluntary or compulsory duty. It begins with recruit training, proceed ...
and physical development. The inhabitants of Sparta were stratified as
Spartiates (citizens with full rights),
mothakes (free non-Spartiate people descended from Spartans),
perioikoi
The Perioeci or Perioikoi (, ) were the second-tier citizens of the ''polis'' of Sparta until 200 BC. They lived in several dozen cities within Spartan territories (mostly Laconia and Messenia), which were dependent on Sparta. The ''perioeci'' ...
(free non-Spartiates), and
helots (state-owned enslaved non-Spartan locals). Spartiate men underwent the rigorous ''
agoge
The ( grc-gre, ἀγωγή in Attic Greek, or , in Doric Greek) was the rigorous education and training program mandated for all male Spartan citizens, with the exception of the firstborn son in the ruling houses, Eurypontid and Agiad. The wor ...
'' training regimen, and Spartan
phalanx brigades were widely considered to be among the best in battle.
Spartan women enjoyed considerably more
rights than elsewhere in
classical antiquity.
Sparta was frequently a subject of fascination in its own day, as well as in
Western culture following the revival of classical learning. The admiration of Sparta is known as
Laconophilia.
Bertrand Russell wrote:
Sparta had a double effect on Greek thought: through the reality, and through the myth.... The reality enabled the Spartans to defeat Athens in war; the myth influenced Plato's political theory, and that of countless subsequent writers.... heideals that it favors had a great part in framing the doctrines of Rousseau, Nietzsche, and National Socialism
Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hit ...
.
Names
The
ancient Greeks used one of three words to refer to the Spartan city-state and its location. First, "Sparta" refers primarily to the main cluster of settlements in the valley of the
Eurotas River
The Eurotas ( grc, Εὐρώτας) or Evrotas (modern Greek: ) is the main river of Laconia and one of the major rivers of the Peloponnese, in Greece. The river's springs are located just northwest of the border between Laconia and Arcadia, at ...
. The second word, "Lacedaemon" (), was often used as an adjective and is the name referenced in the works of
Homer and the historians
Herodotus and
Thucydides. The third term, "Laconice" (), referred to the immediate area around the town of Sparta, the plateau east of the Taygetos mountains, and sometimes to all the regions under direct Spartan control, including
Messenia.
The earliest attested term referring to Lacedaemon is the
Mycenaean Greek , ''ra-ke-da-mi-ni-jo'', "Lakedaimonian", written in
Linear B
Linear B was a syllabic script used for writing in Mycenaean Greek, the earliest attested form of Greek. The script predates the Greek alphabet by several centuries. The oldest Mycenaean writing dates to about 1400 BC. It is descended from ...
syllabic script,
the equivalent of the later
Greek , ''Lakedaimonios'' (
Latin: ''Lacedaemonius'').
Herodotus seems to use "Lacedaemon" for the
Mycenaean Greek citadel at
Therapne
Therapne ( grc, Θεράπνη) was a town in ancient Laconia, within the territory of Sparta.
According to Greek mythology, its name comes from a daughter of Lelex. The place was distinguished for housing the Menelaion, a temple to Menelaus, w ...
, in contrast to the lower town of Sparta. This term could be used synonymously with Sparta, but typically it denoted the terrain in which the city was located. In Homer it is typically combined with epithets of the countryside: wide, lovely, shining and most often hollow and broken (full of ravines), suggesting the
Eurotas Valley. "Sparta" on the other hand is described as "the country of lovely women", an epithet for people.
The residents of Sparta were often called Lacedaemonians. This epithet utilized the plural of the adjective Lacedaemonius (Greek: ; Latin: ''Lacedaemonii'', but also ''Lacedaemones''). The ancients sometimes used a
back-formation, referring to the land of Lacedaemon as ''Lacedaemonian country''. As most words for "country" were feminine, the adjective was in the feminine: ''Lacedaemonia'' (, ''Lakedaimonia''). Eventually, the adjective came to be used alone.
"Lacedaemonia" was not in general use during the classical period and before. It does occur in Greek as an equivalent of Laconia and Messenia during the Roman and early Byzantine periods, mostly in
ethnographers and
lexica
A lexicon is the vocabulary of a language or branch of knowledge (such as nautical or medical). In linguistics, a lexicon is a language's inventory of lexemes. The word ''lexicon'' derives from Koine Greek language, Greek word (), neuter of () ...
of place names. For example,
Hesychius of Alexandria's ''Lexicon'' (5th century AD) defines Agiadae as a "place in Lacedaemonia" named after Agis. The actual transition may be captured by
Isidore of Seville
Isidore of Seville ( la, Isidorus Hispalensis; c. 560 – 4 April 636) was a Spanish scholar, theologian, and archbishop of Seville. He is widely regarded, in the words of 19th-century historian Montalembert, as "the last scholar of ...
's ''Etymologiae'' (7th century AD), an
etymological dictionary. Isidore relied heavily on
Orosius
Paulus Orosius (; born 375/385 – 420 AD), less often Paul Orosius in English, was a Roman priest, historian and theologian, and a student of Augustine of Hippo. It is possible that he was born in '' Bracara Augusta'' (now Braga, Portugal), t ...
' ''Historiarum Adversum Paganos'' (5th century AD) and
Eusebius of Caesarea
Eusebius of Caesarea (; grc-gre, Εὐσέβιος ; 260/265 – 30 May 339), also known as Eusebius Pamphilus (from the grc-gre, Εὐσέβιος τοῦ Παμφίλου), was a Greek historian of Christianity, exegete, and Christia ...
's ''
Chronicon'' (early 5th century AD), as did Orosius. The latter defines Sparta to be ''Lacedaemonia Civitas'', but Isidore defines Lacedaemonia as founded by Lacedaemon, son of Semele, which is consistent with Eusebius' explanation. There is a rare use, perhaps the earliest of "Lacedaemonia", in
Diodorus Siculus
Diodorus Siculus, or Diodorus of Sicily ( grc-gre, Διόδωρος ; 1st century BC), was an ancient Greek historian. He is known for writing the monumental universal history ''Bibliotheca historica'', in forty books, fifteen of which su ...
' The Library of History, but probably with (‘’chōra’’, "country") suppressed.
Lakedaimona was until 2006 the name of a
province in the modern Greek
prefecture
A prefecture (from the Latin ''Praefectura'') is an administrative jurisdiction traditionally governed by an appointed prefect. This can be a regional or local government subdivision in various countries, or a subdivision in certain international ...
of
Laconia
Laconia or Lakonia ( el, Λακωνία, , ) is a historical and administrative region of Greece located on the southeastern part of the Peloponnese peninsula. Its administrative capital is Sparta. The word ''laconic''—to speak in a blunt, c ...
.
Geography
Sparta is located in the region of Laconia, in the south-eastern
Peloponnese
The Peloponnese (), Peloponnesus (; el, Πελοπόννησος, Pelopónnēsos,(), or Morea is a peninsula and geographic regions of Greece, geographic region in southern Greece. It is connected to the central part of the country by the Isthmu ...
. Ancient Sparta was built on the banks of the
Eurotas, the largest river of Laconia, which provided it with a source of fresh water. The
Eurotas valley was a natural fortress, bounded to the west by
Mt. Taygetus (2,407 m) and to the east by
Mt. Parnon (1,935 m). To the north, Laconia is separated from
Arcadia
Arcadia may refer to:
Places Australia
* Arcadia, New South Wales, a suburb of Sydney
* Arcadia, Queensland
* Arcadia, Victoria
Greece
* Arcadia (region), a region in the central Peloponnese
* Arcadia (regional unit), a modern administrative un ...
by hilly uplands reaching 1000 m in altitude. These natural defenses worked to Sparta's advantage and protected it from sacking and
invasion. Though landlocked, Sparta had a vassal harbor,
Gytheio, on the
Laconian Gulf.
Mythology
Lacedaemon (Greek: ) was a
mythical king of Laconia.
[.] The son of
Zeus by the nymph
Taygete, he married
Sparta, the daughter of
Eurotas, by whom he became the father of
Amyclas In Greek mythology, Amyclas ( grc, Ἀμύκλας) refers to two individuals:
* Amyclas, a mythical king of Sparta. Pausanias, 10.9.5
*Amyclas, a Theban prince as the son of King Amphion and Niobe, daughter of Tantalus.Apollodorus, 3.5.6 He peris ...
,
Eurydice, and Asine. As king, he named his country after himself and the city after his wife.
[ He was believed to have built the sanctuary of the Charites, which stood between Sparta and Amyclae, and to have given to those divinities the names of ]Cleta
In Greek mythology, Cleta (; Ancient Greek: Κλήτα ''Klḗtā'' means 'the glorious') was one of the Charites (Graces).
The Laconia, Lakedaemonians, say that the Charites are two, who gave them the names of Cleta and Phaenna. Her name means "r ...
and Phaenna. A shrine was erected to him in the neighborhood of Therapne
Therapne ( grc, Θεράπνη) was a town in ancient Laconia, within the territory of Sparta.
According to Greek mythology, its name comes from a daughter of Lelex. The place was distinguished for housing the Menelaion, a temple to Menelaus, w ...
.
Tyrtaeus, an archaic era Spartan writer, is the earliest source to connect the origin myth of the Spartans to the lineage of the hero Heracles; later authors, such as Diodorus Siculus
Diodorus Siculus, or Diodorus of Sicily ( grc-gre, Διόδωρος ; 1st century BC), was an ancient Greek historian. He is known for writing the monumental universal history ''Bibliotheca historica'', in forty books, fifteen of which su ...
, Herodotus, and Apollodorus
Apollodorus (Ancient Greek, Greek: Ἀπολλόδωρος ''Apollodoros'') was a popular name in ancient Greece. It is the masculine gender of a noun compounded from Apollo, the deity, and doron, "gift"; that is, "Gift of Apollo." It may refer to: ...
, also made mention of Spartans understanding themselves to be descendants of Heracles.
Archaeology of the classical period
Thucydides wrote:
Suppose the city of Sparta to be deserted, and nothing left but the temples and the ground-plan, distant ages would be very unwilling to believe that the power of the Lacedaemonians was at all equal to their fame. Their city is not built continuously, and has no splendid temples or other edifices; it rather resembles a group of villages, like the ancient towns of Hellas, and would therefore make a poor show.
Until the early 20th century, the chief ancient buildings at Sparta were the theatre, of which, however, little showed above ground except portions of the retaining walls; the so-called Tomb of Leonidas, a quadrangular building, perhaps a temple, constructed of immense blocks of stone and containing two chambers; the foundation of an ancient bridge over the Eurotas; the ruins of a circular structure; some remains of late Roman fortifications; several brick buildings and mosaic pavements.[
The remaining archaeological wealth consisted of inscriptions, sculptures, and other objects collected in the local museum, founded by Stamatakis in 1872 and enlarged in 1907. Partial ]excavation
Excavation may refer to:
* Excavation (archaeology)
* Excavation (medicine)
* ''Excavation'' (The Haxan Cloak album), 2013
* ''Excavation'' (Ben Monder album), 2000
* ''Excavation'' (novel), a 2000 novel by James Rollins
* '' Excavation: A Memo ...
of the round building was undertaken in 1892 and 1893 by the American School at Athens. The structure has been since found to be a semicircular retaining wall of Hellenic origin that was partly restored during the Roman period.[
In 1904, the ]British School at Athens
, image = Image-Bsa athens library.jpg
, image_size = 300px
, image_upright=
, alt=
, caption = The library of the BSA
, latin_name=
, motto=
, founder = The Prince of Wales, later Edward VII, called the foundation meeti ...
began a thorough exploration of Laconia
Laconia or Lakonia ( el, Λακωνία, , ) is a historical and administrative region of Greece located on the southeastern part of the Peloponnese peninsula. Its administrative capital is Sparta. The word ''laconic''—to speak in a blunt, c ...
, and in the following year excavations were made at Thalamae, Geronthrae Geronthrae or Geronthrai ( grc, Γερόνθραι), or Geranthrae or Geranthrai (Γεράνθραι), also written as Gerenthrae or Gerenthrai (Γερένθραι), was a town of ancient Laconia, situated in a commanding position upon the southwest ...
, and Angelona near Monemvasia. In 1906, excavations began in Sparta itself.[
A "small circus" (as described by Leake) proved to be a theatre-like building constructed soon after 200 AD around the altar and in front of the Temple of Artemis Orthia. It is believed that musical and gymnastic contests took place here, as well as the famous flogging ordeal administered to Spartan boys ('' diamastigosis''). The temple, which can be dated to the 2nd century BC, rests on the foundation of an older temple of the 6th century, and close beside it were found the remains of a yet earlier temple, dating from the 9th or even the 10th century. The votive offerings in clay, amber, bronze, ivory and lead dating from the 9th to the 4th centuries BC, which were found in great profusion within the precinct range, supply invaluable information about early Spartan art.][
In 1907, the location of the sanctuary of Athena "of the Brazen House" (Χαλκίοικος, Chalkioikos) was determined to be on the ]acropolis
An acropolis was the settlement of an upper part of an ancient Greek city, especially a citadel, and frequently a hill with precipitous sides, mainly chosen for purposes of defense. The term is typically used to refer to the Acropolis of Athens, ...
immediately above the theatre. Though the actual temple is almost completely destroyed, the site has produced the longest extant archaic inscription in Laconia, numerous bronze nails and plates, and a considerable number of votive offerings. The city-wall
A defensive wall is a fortification usually used to protect a city, town or other settlement from potential aggressors. The walls can range from simple palisades or earthworks to extensive military fortifications with towers, bastions and gates ...
, built in successive stages from the 4th to the 2nd century, was traced for a great part of its circuit, which measured 48 stades or nearly (Polyb. 1X. 21). The late Roman wall enclosing the acropolis, part of which probably dates from the years following the Gothic raid of 262 AD, was also investigated. Besides the actual buildings discovered, a number of points were situated and mapped in a general study of Spartan topography, based upon the description of Pausanias.[
In terms of domestic archaeology, little is known about Spartan houses and villages before the Archaic period, but the best evidence comes from excavations at Nichoria in Messenia where postholes have been found. These villages were open and consisted of small and simple houses built with stone foundations and clay walls.
]
Menelaion
The Menelaion is a shrine associated with Menelaus, located east of Sparta, by the river Eurotas, on the hill Profitis Ilias (Coordinates
In geometry, a coordinate system is a system that uses one or more numbers, or coordinates, to uniquely determine the position of the points or other geometric elements on a manifold such as Euclidean space. The order of the coordinates is sig ...
: ). Built around the early 8th century BC, the Spartans believed it had been the former residence of Menelaus. In 1970, the British School in Athens started excavations around the Menelaion in an attempt to locate Mycenaean remains in the area. Among other findings, they uncovered the remains of two Mycenaean mansions and found the first offerings dedicated to Helen
Helen may refer to:
People
* Helen of Troy, in Greek mythology, the most beautiful woman in the world
* Helen (actress) (born 1938), Indian actress
* Helen (given name), a given name (including a list of people with the name)
Places
* Helen, ...
and Menelaus. These mansions were destroyed by earthquake and fire, and archaeologists consider them the possible palace of Menelaus himself.
Excavations made from the early 1990s to the present suggest that the area around the Menelaion in the southern part of the Eurotas valley seems to have been the center of Mycenaean Laconia. The Mycenaean settlement was roughly triangular in shape, with its apex pointed towards the north. Its area was approximately equal to that of the "newer" Sparta, but denudation has wreaked havoc with its buildings and nothing is left of its original structures save for ruined foundations and broken potsherds.[
]
History
Prehistory, "dark age" and archaic period
The prehistory of Sparta is difficult to reconstruct because the literary evidence was written far later than the events it describes and is distorted by oral tradition.[Herodot, Book I, 56.3] The earliest certain evidence of human settlement in the region of Sparta consists of pottery dating from the Middle Neolithic period, found in the vicinity of Kouphovouno some two kilometres () south-southwest of Sparta.
This civilization seems to have fallen into decline by the late Bronze Age, when, according to Herodotus, Macedonian tribes from the north (called Dorians by those they conquered) marched into the Peloponnese and, subjugating the local tribes, settled there. The Dorians seem to have set about expanding the frontiers of Spartan territory almost before they had established their own state. They fought against the Argive Dorians to the east and southeast, and also the Arcadia
Arcadia may refer to:
Places Australia
* Arcadia, New South Wales, a suburb of Sydney
* Arcadia, Queensland
* Arcadia, Victoria
Greece
* Arcadia (region), a region in the central Peloponnese
* Arcadia (regional unit), a modern administrative un ...
n Achaeans to the northwest. The evidence suggests that Sparta, relatively inaccessible because of the topography of the Taygetan plain, was secure from early on: it was never fortified.
Nothing distinctive in the archaeology of the Eurotas River Valley identifies the Dorians or the Dorian Spartan state. The prehistory of the Neolithic, the Bronze Age and the Dark Age (the Early Iron Age) at this moment must be treated apart from the stream of Dorian Spartan history.
The legendary period of Spartan history is believed to fall into the Dark Age. It treats the mythic heroes such as the Heraclids
The Heracleidae (; grc, Ἡρακλεῖδαι) or Heraclids were the numerous descendants of Heracles (Hercules), especially applied in a narrower sense to the descendants of Hyllus, the eldest of his four sons by Deianira (Hyllus was also ...
and the Perseids, offering a view of the occupation of the Peloponnesus that contains both fantastic and possibly historical elements. The subsequent proto-historic period, combining both legend and historical fragments, offers the first credible history.
Between the 8th and 7th centuries BC the Spartans experienced a period of lawlessness and civil strife, later attested by both Herodotus and Thucydides. As a result, they carried out a series of political and social reforms of their own society which they later attributed to a semi-mythical lawgiver, Lycurgus
Lycurgus or Lykourgos () may refer to:
People
* Lycurgus (king of Sparta) (third century BC)
* Lycurgus (lawgiver) (eighth century BC), creator of constitution of Sparta
* Lycurgus of Athens (fourth century BC), one of the 'ten notable orators' ...
. Several writers throughout antiquity, including Herodotus, Xenophon, and Plutarch have attempted to explain Spartan exceptionalism as a result of the so-called Lycurgan Reform
Xenophon, Constitution of the Lacedaimonians, chapter 1
Classical Sparta
In the Second Messenian War, Sparta established itself as a local power in the Peloponnesus and the rest of Greece. During the following centuries, Sparta's reputation as a land-fighting force was unequalled. At its peak around 500 BC, Sparta had some 20,000–35,000 citizens, plus numerous helots and perioikoi. The likely total of 40,000–50,000 made Sparta one of the larger Greek city-states; however, according to Thucydides, the population of Athens in 431 BC was 360,000–610,000, making it much larger.
In 480 BC, a small force led by King Leonidas (about 300 full Spartiates, 700 Thespians, and 400 Thebans, although these numbers were lessened by earlier casualties) made a legendary last stand at the Battle of Thermopylae
The Battle of Thermopylae ( ; grc, Μάχη τῶν Θερμοπυλῶν, label=Greek, ) was fought in 480 BC between the Achaemenid Persian Empire under Xerxes I and an alliance of Greek city-states led by Sparta under Leonidas I. Lasting o ...
against the massive Persian army, led by Xerxes. The Spartans received advance warning of the Persian invasion from their deposed king Demaratus, which prompted them to consult the Delphic oracle. According to Herodotus, the Pythia
Pythia (; grc, Πυθία ) was the name of the high priestess of the Temple of Apollo (Delphi), Temple of Apollo at Delphi. She specifically served as its oracle and was known as the Oracle of Delphi. Her title was also historically glossed i ...
proclaimed that either one of the kings of Sparta had to die or Sparta would be destroyed. This prophecy was fulfilled after king Leonidas died in the battle. The superior weaponry, strategy, and bronze
Bronze is an alloy consisting primarily of copper, commonly with about 12–12.5% tin and often with the addition of other metals (including aluminium, manganese, nickel, or zinc) and sometimes non-metals, such as phosphorus, or metalloids such ...
armour of the Greek hoplite
Hoplites ( ) ( grc, ὁπλίτης : hoplítēs) were citizen-soldiers of Ancient Greece, Ancient Greek Polis, city-states who were primarily armed with spears and shields. Hoplite soldiers used the phalanx formation to be effective in war with ...
s and their phalanx fighting formation again proved their worth one year later when Sparta assembled its full strength and led a Greek alliance against the Persians at the Battle of Plataea
The Battle of Plataea was the final land battle during the second Persian invasion of Greece. It took place in 479 BC near the city of Plataea in Boeotia, and was fought between an alliance of the Greek city-states (including Sparta, Athens, C ...
in 479 BC.
The decisive Greek victory at Plataea put an end to the Greco-Persian War
The Greco-Persian Wars (also often called the Persian Wars) were a series of conflicts between the Achaemenid Empire and Greek city-states that started in 499 BC and lasted until 449 BC. The collision between the fractious political world of the ...
along with Persian ambitions to expand into Europe. Even though this war was won by a pan-Greek army, credit was given to Sparta, who besides providing the leading forces at Thermopylae and Plataea, had been the de facto leader of the entire Greek expedition.
In 464 BC, a violent earthquake occurred along the Sparta faultline destroying much of what was Sparta and many other city-states in ancient Greece. This earthquake is marked by scholars as one of the key events that led to the First Peloponnesian War.
In later Classical times, Sparta along with Athens, Thebes, and Persia were the main powers fighting for supremacy in the northeastern Mediterranean. In the course of the Peloponnesian War
The Peloponnesian War (431–404 BC) was an ancient Greek war fought between Athens and Sparta and their respective allies for the hegemony of the Greek world. The war remained undecided for a long time until the decisive intervention of th ...
, Sparta, a traditional land power, acquired a navy which managed to overpower the previously dominant flotilla of Athens, ending the Athenian Empire. At the peak of its power in the early 4th century BC, Sparta had subdued many of the main Greek states and even invaded the Persian provinces in Anatolia (modern day Turkey), a period known as the Spartan hegemony.
During the Corinthian War
The Corinthian War (395–387 BC) was a conflict in ancient Greece which pitted Sparta against a coalition of city-states comprising Thebes, Athens, Corinth and Argos, backed by the Achaemenid Empire. The war was caused by dissatisfaction with ...
, Sparta faced a coalition of the leading Greek states: Thebes, Athens, Corinth, and Argos. The alliance was initially backed by Persia, which feared further Spartan expansion into Asia. Sparta achieved a series of land victories, but many of her ships were destroyed at the Battle of Cnidus by a Greek-Phoenician mercenary fleet that Persia had provided to Athens. The event severely damaged Sparta's naval power but did not end its aspirations of invading further into Persia, until Conon the Athenian ravaged the Spartan coastline and provoked the old Spartan fear of a helot revolt.["The Oxford Illustrated History of Greece and the Hellenistic World" p. 141, John Boardman, Jasper Griffin, Oswyn Murray]
After a few more years of fighting, in 387 BC the Peace of Antalcidas was established, according to which all Greek cities of Ionia
Ionia () was an ancient region on the western coast of Anatolia, to the south of present-day Izmir. It consisted of the northernmost territories of the Ionian League of Greek settlements. Never a unified state, it was named after the Ionian ...
would return to Persian control, and Persia's Asian border would be free of the Spartan threat.[ The effects of the war were to reaffirm Persia's ability to interfere successfully in Greek politics and to affirm Sparta's weakened hegemonic position in the Greek political system. Sparta entered its long-term decline after a severe military defeat to Epaminondas of Thebes at the Battle of Leuctra. This was the first time that a full strength Spartan army lost a land battle.
As Spartan citizenship was inherited by blood, Sparta increasingly faced a helot population that vastly outnumbered its citizens. The alarming decline of Spartan citizens was commented on by Aristotle.
]
Hellenistic and Roman Sparta
Sparta never fully recovered from its losses at Leuctra in 371 BC and the subsequent helot revolts. In 338, Philip II invaded and devastated much of Laconia, turning the Spartans out, though he did not seize Sparta itself. Even during its decline, Sparta never forgot its claim to be the "defender of Hellenism" and its Laconic wit. An anecdote has it that when Philip II sent a message to Sparta saying "If I invade Laconia, I shall turn you out.", the Spartans responded with the single, terse reply: , "if". When Philip created the League of Corinth on the pretext of unifying Greece against Persia, the Spartans chose not to join, since they had no interest in joining a pan-Greek expedition unless it were under Spartan leadership. Thus, upon defeating the Persians at the Battle of the Granicus, Alexander the Great sent to Athens 300 suits of Persian armour with the following inscription: "Alexander, son of Philip, and all the Greeks except the Spartans, give these offerings taken from the foreigners who live in Asia".
Sparta continued to be one of the Peloponesian powers until its eventual loss of independence in 192 BC. During Alexander's campaigns in the east, the Spartan king Agis III
Agis III (Greek: ) was the eldest son of Archidamus III, and the 21st Eurypontid king of Sparta.
Life
Agis was the son of King Archidamus III () and the grandson of Agesilaus II (), who belonged to the Eurypontid dynasty, one of the two royal fam ...
sent a force to Crete in 333 BC to secure the island for the Persian interest. Agis next took command of allied Greek forces against Macedon, gaining early successes, before laying siege to Megalopolis in 331 BC. A large Macedonian army under general Antipater
Antipater (; grc, , translit=Antipatros, lit=like the father; c. 400 BC319 BC) was a Macedonian general and statesman under the subsequent kingships of Philip II of Macedon and his son, Alexander the Great. In the wake of the collaps ...
marched to its relief and defeated the Spartan-led force in a pitched battle. More than 5,300 of the Spartans and their allies were killed in battle, and 3,500 of Antipater's troops. Agis, now wounded and unable to stand, ordered his men to leave him behind to face the advancing Macedonian army so that he could buy them time to retreat. On his knees, the Spartan king slew several enemy soldiers before being finally killed by a javelin. Alexander was merciful, and he only forced the Spartans to join the League of Corinth, which they had previously refused.
During the Punic Wars
The Punic Wars were a series of wars between 264 and 146BC fought between Roman Republic, Rome and Ancient Carthage, Carthage. Three conflicts between these states took place on both land and sea across the western Mediterranean region and i ...
, Sparta was an ally of the Roman Republic. Spartan political independence was put to an end when it was eventually forced into the Achaean League after its defeat in the decisive Laconian War by a coalition of other Greek city-states and Rome, and the resultant overthrow of its final king Nabis, in 192 BC. Sparta played no active part in the Achaean War in 146 BC when the Achaean League was defeated by the Roman general Lucius Mummius. Subsequently, Sparta became a free city Free city may refer to: Historical places
* Free city (antiquity) a self-governed city during the Hellenistic and Roman Imperial eras
* Free imperial city, self-governed city in the Holy Roman Empire subordinate only to the emperor
** Free City of ...
under Roman rule, some of the institutions of Lycurgus
Lycurgus or Lykourgos () may refer to:
People
* Lycurgus (king of Sparta) (third century BC)
* Lycurgus (lawgiver) (eighth century BC), creator of constitution of Sparta
* Lycurgus of Athens (fourth century BC), one of the 'ten notable orators' ...
were restored, and the city became a tourist attraction for the Roman elite who came to observe exotic Spartan customs.
In 214 AD, Roman emperor Caracalla, in his preparation for his campaign against Parthia, recruited a 500-man Spartan cohort
Cohort or cohortes may refer to:
* Cohort (educational group), a group of students working together through the same academic curriculum
* Cohort (floating point), a set of different encodings of the same numerical value
* Cohort (military unit), ...
('' lokhos''). Herodian described this unit as a '' phalanx'', implying it fought like the old Spartans as hoplites, or even as a Macedonian phalanx. Despite this, a gravestone of a fallen legionary named Marcus Aurelius Alexys shows him lightly armed, with a pilos-like cap and a wooden club. The unit was presumably discharged in 217 after Caracalla was assassinated.
An exchange of letters in the deutero-canonical
The deuterocanonical books (from the Greek meaning "belonging to the second canon") are books and passages considered by the Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Oriental Orthodox Churches, and the Assyrian Church of the East to be ...
First Book of Maccabees
The First Book of Maccabees, also known as First Maccabees (written in shorthand as 1 Maccabees or 1 Macc.), is a book written in Hebrew by an anonymousRappaport, U., ''47. 1 Maccabees'' in Barton, J. and Muddiman, J. (2001)The Oxford Bible Comme ...
expresses a Jewish claim to kinship with the Spartans:
The letters are reproduced in a variant form by Josephus. Jewish historian Uriel Rappaport notes that the relationship between the Jews and the Spartans expressed in this correspondence has "intrigued many scholars, and various explanations have been suggested for the problems raised ... including the historicity of the Jewish leader and high priest
The term "high priest" usually refers either to an individual who holds the office of ruler-priest, or to one who is the head of a religious caste.
Ancient Egypt
In ancient Egypt, a high priest was the chief priest of any of the many gods rever ...
Jonathan
Jonathan may refer to:
*Jonathan (name), a masculine given name
Media
* ''Jonathan'' (1970 film), a German film directed by Hans W. Geißendörfer
* ''Jonathan'' (2016 film), a German film directed by Piotr J. Lewandowski
* ''Jonathan'' (2018 ...
's letter to the Spartans, the authenticity of the letter of Arius to Onias, cited in Jonathan's letter, and the supposed 'brotherhood' of the Jews and the Spartans." Rappaport is clear that "the authenticity of he reply
He or HE may refer to:
Language
* He (pronoun), an English pronoun
* He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ
* He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets
* He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...
letter of Arius is based on even less firm foundations than the letter of Jonathan".
Spartans long spurned the idea of building a defensive wall
A defensive wall is a fortification usually used to protect a city, town or other settlement from potential aggressors. The walls can range from simple palisades or earthworks to extensive military fortifications with towers, bastions and gates ...
around their city, believing they made the city's men soft in terms of their warrior abilities. A wall was finally erected after 184 BCE, after the peak of the city-state's power had come and gone.
Postclassical and modern Sparta
In 396 AD, Sparta was sacked by Visigoths under Alaric I
Alaric I (; got, 𐌰𐌻𐌰𐍂𐌴𐌹𐌺𐍃, , "ruler of all"; c. 370 – 410 AD) was the first king of the Visigoths, from 395 to 410. He rose to leadership of the Goths who came to occupy Moesia—territory acquired a couple of decades ...
.
According to Byzantine sources, some parts of the Laconian region remained pagan
Paganism (from classical Latin ''pāgānus'' "rural", "rustic", later "civilian") is a term first used in the fourth century by early Christians for people in the Roman Empire who practiced polytheism, or ethnic religions other than Judaism. ...
until well into the 10th century. The Tsakonian language
Tsakonian or Tsaconian (also Tzakonian or Tsakonic, Greek and Tsakonian: , ) is a highly divergent modern variety of Greek, spoken in the Tsakonian region of the Peloponnese, Greece. Tsakonian derives from Doric Greek, being its only extant va ...
still spoken in Tsakonia is the only surviving descendant of the ancient Doric language. In the Middle Ages, the political and cultural center of Laconia shifted to the nearby settlement of Mystras, and Sparta fell further in even local importance. Modern Sparta was re-founded in 1834, by a decree of King Otto of Greece.
Structure of Classical Spartan society
Constitution
Sparta was an oligarchy. The state was ruled by two hereditary kings of the Agiad and Eurypontid families, both supposedly descendants of Heracles and equal in authority, so that one could not act against the power and political enactments of his colleague.[
The duties of the kings were primarily religious, judicial, and military. As chief priests of the state, they maintained communication with the Delphian sanctuary, whose pronouncements exercised great authority in Spartan politics. In the time of Herodotus c. 450 BC, their judicial functions had been restricted to cases dealing with heiresses ( epikleroi), adoptions and the public roads (the meaning of the last term is unclear in Herodotus' text and has been interpreted in a number of ways). Aristotle describes the kingship at Sparta as "a kind of unlimited and perpetual generalship" (Pol. iii. 1285a), while ]Isocrates
Isocrates (; grc, Ἰσοκράτης ; 436–338 BC) was an ancient Greek rhetorician, one of the ten Attic orators. Among the most influential Greek rhetoricians of his time, Isocrates made many contributions to rhetoric and education throu ...
refers to the Spartans as "subject to an oligarchy at home, to a kingship on campaign" (iii. 24).[
Civil and criminal cases were decided by a group of officials known as the ]ephors
The ephors were a board of five magistrates in ancient Sparta. They had an extensive range of judicial, religious, legislative, and military powers, and could shape Sparta's home and foreign affairs.
The word "''ephors''" (Ancient Greek
...
, as well as a council of elders known as the Gerousia. The Gerousia consisted of 28 elders over the age of 60, elected for life and usually part of the royal households, and the two kings. High state decisions were discussed by this council, who could then propose policies to the ''damos'', the collective body of Spartan citizenry, who would select one of the alternatives by vote.
Royal prerogatives were curtailed over time. From the period of the Persian wars, the king lost the right to declare war and was accompanied in the field by two ephors. He was supplanted by the ephors also in the control of foreign policy. Over time, the kings became mere figureheads except in their capacity as generals. Political power was transferred to the ephors and Gerousia.[
An assembly of citizens called the Ekklesia was responsible for electing men to the Gerousia for life.
]
Citizenship
The Spartan education process known as the ''agoge
The ( grc-gre, ἀγωγή in Attic Greek, or , in Doric Greek) was the rigorous education and training program mandated for all male Spartan citizens, with the exception of the firstborn son in the ruling houses, Eurypontid and Agiad. The wor ...
'' was essential for full citizenship. However, usually the only boys eligible for the ''agoge'' were Spartiates, those who could trace their ancestry to the original inhabitants of the city.
There were two exceptions. ''trophimoi The ''trophimoi'' (Greek: τρόφιμοι, students or pupils, from τροφός ''trophós'' food) were children of non-Spartan citizens (perioeci or foreigners), who underwent Spartan education.
The ''trophimoi'' were temporarily adopted by a ...
'' or "foster sons" were foreign students invited to study. The Athenian general Xenophon, for example, sent his two sons to Sparta as trophimoi. Also, the son of a helot could be enrolled as a ''syntrophos'' if a Spartiate formally adopted him and paid his way; if he did exceptionally well in training, he might be sponsored to become a Spartiate. Spartans who could not afford to pay the expenses of the ''agoge'' could lose their citizenship.
These laws meant that Sparta could not readily replace citizens lost in battle or otherwise, which eventually proved near fatal as citizens became greatly outnumbered by non-citizens, and even more dangerously by helots.
Non citizens
The other classes were the perioikoi
The Perioeci or Perioikoi (, ) were the second-tier citizens of the ''polis'' of Sparta until 200 BC. They lived in several dozen cities within Spartan territories (mostly Laconia and Messenia), which were dependent on Sparta. The ''perioeci'' ...
, free inhabitants who were non-citizens, and the helots,[''Ancient Greece'' By ]Sarah B. Pomeroy
Sarah B. Pomeroy is an American Professor of Classics.
Early life and education
Sarah Pomeroy was born in New York City in 1938. She attended the Birch Wathen School, taking Latin and ancient history among other subjects. She graduated high sch ...
, Stanley M. Burstein, Walter Donlan, Jennifer Tolbert Roberts state-owned serfs
Serfdom was the status of many peasants under feudalism, specifically relating to manorialism, and similar systems. It was a condition of debt bondage and indentured servitude with similarities to and differences from slavery, which developed ...
. Descendants of non-Spartan citizens were forbidden the ''agoge''.
Helots
The Spartans were a minority of the Lakonian population. The largest class of inhabitants were the helots (in Classical Greek / ''Heílôtes'').
The helots were originally free Greeks from the areas of Messenia and Lakonia whom the Spartans had defeated in battle and subsequently enslaved. In contrast to populations conquered by other Greek cities (e.g. the Athenian treatment of Melos), the male population was not exterminated and the women and children turned into chattel slaves. Instead, the helots were given a subordinate position in society more comparable to serfs in medieval Europe than chattel slaves in the rest of Greece. The Spartan helots were not only agricultural workers, but were also household servants, both male and female would be assigned domestic duties, such as wool-working. However, the helots were not the private property of individual Spartan citizens, regardless of their household duties, and were instead owned by the state through the ''kleros'' system.
Helots did not have voting or political rights. The Spartan poet Tyrtaios
Tyrtaeus (; grc-gre, Τυρταῖος ''Tyrtaios''; fl. mid-7th century BC) was a Greek elegiac poet from Sparta. He wrote at a time of two crises affecting the city: a civic unrest threatening the authority of kings and elders, later recalled ...
refers to Helots being allowed to marry and retaining 50% of the fruits of their labor. They also seem to have been allowed to practice religious rites and, according to Thucydides, own a limited amount of personal property.
Initially, helots couldn't be freed but during the middle Hellenistic period, some 6,000 helots accumulated enough wealth to buy their freedom, for example, in 227 BC.
In other Greek city-states, free citizens were part-time soldiers who, when not at war, carried on other trades. Since Spartan men were full-time soldiers, they were not available to carry out manual labour. The helots were used as unskilled serf
Serfdom was the status of many peasants under feudalism, specifically relating to manorialism, and similar systems. It was a condition of debt bondage and indentured servitude with similarities to and differences from slavery, which developed ...
s, tilling Spartan land. Helot women were often used as wet nurses. Helots also travelled with the Spartan army as non-combatant serfs. At the last stand of the Battle of Thermopylae
The Battle of Thermopylae ( ; grc, Μάχη τῶν Θερμοπυλῶν, label=Greek, ) was fought in 480 BC between the Achaemenid Persian Empire under Xerxes I and an alliance of Greek city-states led by Sparta under Leonidas I. Lasting o ...
, the Greek dead included not just the legendary three hundred Spartan soldiers but also several hundred Thespian
Thespian may refer to:
* A citizen of the Ancient Greek city of Thespiae
* An actor or actress
** Thespis, the first credited actor
* A member of the International Thespian Society
The International Thespian Society (ITS) is an honor society ...
and Theban troops and a number of helots.
There was at least one helot revolt (c. 465–460 BC) that led to prolonged conflict. By the tenth year of this war the Spartans and Messenians had reached an agreement in which Messenian rebels were allowed to leave the Peloponnese. They were given safe passage under the terms that they would be re-enslaved if they tried to return. This agreement ended the most serious incursion into Spartan territory since their expansion in the seventh and eighth centuries BC. Thucydides remarked that "Spartan policy is always mainly governed by the necessity of taking precautions against the helots." On the other hand, the Spartans trusted their helots enough in 479 BC to take a force of 35,000 with them to Plataea, something they could not have risked if they feared the helots would attack them or run away. Slave revolts occurred elsewhere in the Greek world, and in 413 BC 20,000 Athenian slaves ran away to join the Spartan forces occupying Attica. What made Sparta's relations with her slave population unique was that the helots, precisely because they enjoyed privileges such as family and property, retained their identity as a conquered people (the Messenians) and also had effective kinship groups that could be used to organize rebellion.
As the Spartiate population declined and the helot population continued to grow, the imbalance of power caused increasing tension. According to Myron of Priene
Myron of Priene was the author of an historical account of the First Messenian War, from the taking of Ampheia to the death of Aristodemus. The dates of his work cannot be ascertained accurately, but it belongs in all probability to the Alexandr ...
of the middle 3rd century BC:
Plutarch also states that Spartans treated the helots "harshly and cruelly": they compelled them to drink pure wine (which was considered dangerous – wine usually being cut with water) "...and to lead them in that condition into their public halls, that the children might see what a sight a drunken man is; they made them to dance low dances, and sing ridiculous songs..." during ''syssitia
The syssitia ( grc, συσσίτια ''syssítia'', plural of ''syssítion'') were, in ancient Greece, common meals for men and youths in social or religious groups, especially in Crete and Sparta, but also in Megara in the time of Theognis of ...
'' (obligatory banquets).
Each year when the Ephors took office, they ritually declared war on the helots, allowing Spartans to kill them without risk of ritual pollution. This fight seems to have been carried out by ''kryptai'' (sing. κρύπτης ''kryptēs''), graduates of the ''agoge'' who took part in the mysterious institution known as the ''Krypteia
The Crypteia, also referred to as Krypteia or Krupteia (Greek: κρυπτεία ''krupteía'' from κρυπτός ''kruptós'', "hidden, secret"), was an ancient Spartan state institution involving young Spartan men. It was an exclusive element of ...
''. Thucydides states:
The helots were invited by a proclamation to pick out those of their number who claimed to have most distinguished themselves against the enemy, in order that they might receive their freedom; the object being to test them, as it was thought that the first to claim their freedom would be the most high spirited and the most apt to rebel. As many as two thousand were selected accordingly, who crowned themselves and went round the temples, rejoicing in their new freedom. The Spartans, however, soon afterwards did away with them, and no one ever knew how each of them perished.
Perioikoi
The Perioikoi came from similar origins as the helots but occupied a significantly different position in Spartan society. Although they did not enjoy full citizen-rights, they were free and not subjected to the same restrictions as the helots. The exact nature of their subjection to the Spartans is not clear, but they seem to have served partly as a kind of military reserve, partly as skilled craftsmen and partly as agents of foreign trade. Perioikoic hoplites served increasingly with the Spartan army, explicitly at the Battle of Plataea
The Battle of Plataea was the final land battle during the second Persian invasion of Greece. It took place in 479 BC near the city of Plataea in Boeotia, and was fought between an alliance of the Greek city-states (including Sparta, Athens, C ...
, and although they may also have fulfilled functions such as the manufacture and repair of armour and weapons, they were increasingly integrated into the combat units of the Spartan army as the Spartiate population declined.
Economy
Full citizen Spartiates were barred by law from trade or manufacture, which consequently rested in the hands of the Perioikoi.[ This lucrative monopoly, in a fertile territory with a good harbors, ensured the loyalty of the perioikoi. Despite the prohibition on menial labor or trade, there is evidence of Spartan sculptors, and Spartans were certainly poets, magistrates, ambassadors, and governors as well as soldiers.
Allegedly, Spartans were prohibited from possessing gold and silver coins, and according to legend Spartan currency consisted of iron bars to discourage hoarding.] It was not until the 260s or 250s BC that Sparta began to mint its own coins. Though the conspicuous display of wealth appears to have been discouraged, this did not preclude the production of very fine decorated bronze, ivory and wooden works of art as well as exquisite jewellery, attested in archaeology.
Allegedly as part of the Lycurgan Reforms in the mid-8th century BC, a massive land reform had divided property into 9,000 equal portions. Each citizen received one estate, a ''kleros'', which was expected to provide his living. The land was worked by helots who retained half the yield. From the other half, the Spartiate was expected to pay his mess (''syssitia'') fees, and the ''agoge'' fees for his children. However, nothing is known of matters of wealth such as how land was bought, sold, and inherited, or whether daughters received dowries. However, from early on there were marked differences of wealth within the state, and these became more serious after the law of Epitadeus
Epitadeus was an early 4th-century BC Spartan ephor, who strengthened conservative class distinctions by allowing gifts of land to independent citizens (Spartiates). This 4th century rhetra allowed the Spartiatai to dispose of their private land a ...
some time after the Peloponnesian War
The Peloponnesian War (431–404 BC) was an ancient Greek war fought between Athens and Sparta and their respective allies for the hegemony of the Greek world. The war remained undecided for a long time until the decisive intervention of th ...
, which removed the legal prohibition on the gift or bequest of land. By the mid-5th century, land had become concentrated in the hands of a tiny elite, and the notion that all Spartan citizens were equals had become an empty pretence. By Aristotle's day (384–322 BC) citizenship had been reduced from 9,000 to less than 1,000, then further decreased to 700 at the accession of Agis IV
Agis IV ( grc-gre, Ἄγις; c. 265 BC – 241 BC), the elder son of Eudamidas II, was the 25th king of the Eurypontid dynasty of Sparta. Posterity has reckoned him an idealistic but impractical monarch.
Family background and accession
Agi ...
in 244 BC. Attempts were made to remedy this by imposing legal penalties upon bachelors, but this could not reverse the trend.
Life in Classical Sparta
Birth and death
Sparta was above all a militarist state, and emphasis on military fitness began virtually at birth. According to Plutarch after birth, a mother would bathe her child in wine to see whether the child was strong. If the child survived it was brought before the Gerousia by the child's father. The Gerousia then decided whether it was to be reared or not.[ It is commonly stated that if they considered it "puny and deformed", the baby was thrown into a chasm on Mount Taygetos known euphemistically as the ''Apothetae'' (Gr., ''ἀποθέται'', "Deposits"). This was, in effect, a primitive form of eugenics. Plutarch is the sole historical source for the Spartan practice of systemic infanticide motivated by eugenics. Sparta is often viewed as being unique in this regard, however, anthropologist Laila Williamson notes: "Infanticide has been practiced on every continent and by people on every level of cultural complexity, from hunter gatherers to high civilizations. Rather than being an exception, then, it has been the rule." There is controversy about the matter in Sparta, since excavations in the chasm only uncovered adult remains, likely belonging to criminals and Greek sources contemporary to Sparta does not mention systemic infanticide motivated solely by eugenics.
Spartan burial customs changed over time. The Archaic Spartan poet Tyrtaeus spoke of the Spartan war-dead as follows:
]Never do his he war-dead's
He or HE may refer to:
Language
* He (pronoun), an English pronoun
* He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ
* He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets
* He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...
name and good fame perish,
But even though he is beneath the earth he is immortal,
Young and old alike mourn him,
All the city is distressed by the painful loss,
and his tomb and children are pointed out among the people,
and his children’s children and his line after them.
When Spartans died, marked headstones would only be granted to soldiers who died in combat during a victorious campaign or women who died either in service of a divine office or in childbirth. These headstones likely acted as memorials, rather than as grave markers. Evidence of Spartan burials is provided by the Tomb of the Lacedaimonians in Athens. Excavations at the cemetery of classical Sparta, uncovered ritually pierced kantharoid-like ceramic vessels, the ritual slaughter of horses, and specific burial enclosures alongside individual 'plots'. Some of the graves were reused over time.[Christesen, P. (2018). The typology and topography of Spartan burials from the Protogeometric to the Hellenistic period: rethinking Spartan exceptionalism and the ostensible cessation of adult intramural burials in the Greek world. ''Annual of the British School at Athens'', ''113'', 307-363.]
In the Hellenistic Period, grander, two-storey monumental tombs are found at Sparta. Ten of these have been found for this period.
Education
When male Spartans began military training at age seven, they would enter the ''agoge
The ( grc-gre, ἀγωγή in Attic Greek, or , in Doric Greek) was the rigorous education and training program mandated for all male Spartan citizens, with the exception of the firstborn son in the ruling houses, Eurypontid and Agiad. The wor ...
'' system. The ''agoge'' was designed to encourage discipline and physical toughness and to emphasize the importance of the Spartan state. Boys lived in communal mess
The mess (also called a mess deck aboard ships) is a designated area where military personnel socialize, eat and (in some cases) live. The term is also used to indicate the groups of military personnel who belong to separate messes, such as the o ...
es and, according to Xenophon, whose sons attended the ''agoge'', the boys were fed "just the right amount for them never to become sluggish through being too full, while also giving them a taste of what it is not to have enough."[Xenophon, Spartan Society, 2] In addition, they were trained to survive in times of privation, even if it meant stealing. Besides physical and weapons training, boys studied reading, writing, music and dancing. Special punishments were imposed if boys failed to answer questions sufficiently " laconically" (i.e. briefly and wittily).
Spartan boys were expected to take an older male mentor, usually an unmarried young man. According to some sources, the older man was expected to function as a kind of substitute father and role model to his junior partner; however, others believe it was reasonably certain that they had sexual relations (the exact nature of Spartan pederasty
Pederasty in ancient Greece was a socially acknowledged romantic relationship between an older male (the ''erastes'') and a younger male (the ''eromenos'') usually in his teens. It was characteristic of the Archaic and Classical periods. The in ...
is not entirely clear). Xenophon, an admirer of the Spartan educational system whose sons attended the ''agoge'', explicitly denies the sexual nature of the relationship.
Some Spartan youth apparently became members of an irregular unit known as the ''Krypteia
The Crypteia, also referred to as Krypteia or Krupteia (Greek: κρυπτεία ''krupteía'' from κρυπτός ''kruptós'', "hidden, secret"), was an ancient Spartan state institution involving young Spartan men. It was an exclusive element of ...
''. The immediate objective of this unit was to seek out and kill vulnerable helot Laconians as part of the larger program of terrorising and intimidating the helot population.
Less information is available about the education of Spartan girls, but they seem to have gone through a fairly extensive formal educational cycle, broadly similar to that of the boys but with less emphasis on military training. Spartan girls received an education known as ''mousikē''. This included music, dancing, singing and poetry. Choral dancing was taught so Spartan girls could participate in ritual activities, including the cults of Helen and Artemis. In this respect, classical Sparta was unique in ancient Greece. In no other city-state did women receive any kind of formal education.
Military life
At age 20, the Spartan citizen began his membership in one of the ''syssitia
The syssitia ( grc, συσσίτια ''syssítia'', plural of ''syssítion'') were, in ancient Greece, common meals for men and youths in social or religious groups, especially in Crete and Sparta, but also in Megara in the time of Theognis of ...
'' (dining messes or clubs), composed of about fifteen members each, of which every citizen was required to be a member.[ Here each group learned how to bond and rely on one another. The Spartans were not eligible for election for public office until the age of 30. Only native Spartans were considered full citizens and were obliged to undergo the training as prescribed by law, as well as participate in and contribute financially to one of the ''syssitia''.
Sparta is thought to be the first city to practice athletic nudity, and some scholars claim that it was also the first to formalize pederasty. According to these sources, the Spartans believed that the love of an older, accomplished aristocrat for an adolescent was essential to his formation as a free citizen. The '']agoge
The ( grc-gre, ἀγωγή in Attic Greek, or , in Doric Greek) was the rigorous education and training program mandated for all male Spartan citizens, with the exception of the firstborn son in the ruling houses, Eurypontid and Agiad. The wor ...
'', the education of the ruling class, was, they claim, founded on pederastic relationships required of each citizen, with the lover responsible for the boy's training.
However, other scholars question this interpretation. Xenophon explicitly denies it, but not Plutarch.
Spartan men remained in the active reserve until age 60. Men were encouraged to marry at age 20 but could not live with their families until they left their active military service at age 30. They called themselves "''homoioi''" (equals), pointing to their common lifestyle and the discipline of the phalanx, which demanded that no soldier be superior to his comrades.[Readers Companion Military Hist p. 438. Cowley] Insofar as hoplite
Hoplites ( ) ( grc, ὁπλίτης : hoplítēs) were citizen-soldiers of Ancient Greece, Ancient Greek Polis, city-states who were primarily armed with spears and shields. Hoplite soldiers used the phalanx formation to be effective in war with ...
warfare could be perfected, the Spartans did so.
Thucydides reports that when a Spartan man went to war, his wife (or another woman of some significance) would customarily present him with his aspis
An aspis ( grc, ἀσπίς, plural ''aspides'', ), or porpax shield, sometimes mistakenly referred to as a hoplon ( el, ὅπλον) (a term actually referring to the whole equipment of a hoplite), was the heavy wooden shield used by the infa ...
(shield) and say: "With this, or upon this" (Ἢ τὰν ἢ ἐπὶ τᾶς, ''Èi tàn èi èpì tàs''), meaning that true Spartans could only return to Sparta either victorious (with their shield in hand) or dead (carried upon it). This is almost certainly propaganda. Spartans buried their battle dead on or near the battle field; corpses were not brought back on their shield. Nevertheless, it is fair to say that it was less of a disgrace for a soldier to lose his helmet, breastplate or greaves than his shield, since the former were designed to protect one man, whereas the shield also protected the man on his left. Thus, the shield was symbolic of the individual soldier's subordination to his unit, his integral part in its success, and his solemn responsibility to his comrades in arms – messmates and friends, often close blood relations.
According to Aristotle, the Spartan military culture was actually short-sighted and ineffective. He observed:
It is the standards of civilized men not of beasts that must be kept in mind, for it is good men not beasts who are capable of real courage. Those like the Spartans who concentrate on the one and ignore the other in their education turn men into machines and in devoting themselves to one single aspect of city's life, end up making them inferior even in that.
One of the most persistent myths about Sparta that has no basis in fact is the notion that Spartan mothers were without feelings toward their off-spring and helped enforce a militaristic lifestyle on their sons and husbands. The myth can be traced back to Plutarch, who includes no less than 17 "sayings" of "Spartan women", all of which paraphrase or elaborate on the theme that Spartan mothers rejected their own offspring if they showed any kind of cowardice. In some of these sayings, mothers revile their sons in insulting language merely for surviving a battle. These sayings purporting to be from Spartan women were far more likely to be of Athenian origin and designed to portray Spartan women as unnatural and so undeserving of pity.[ ]
Agriculture, food, and diet
Sparta's agriculture consisted mainly of barley, wine, cheese, grain, and figs. These items were grown locally on each Spartan citizen's kleros and were tended to by helots. Spartan citizens were required to donate a certain amount of what they yielded from their kleros to their syssitia, or mess. These donations to the syssitia were a requirement for every Spartan citizen. All the donated food was then redistributed to feed the Spartan population of that syssitia. The helots who tended to the lands were fed using a portion of what they harvested.
Marriage
Plutarch reports the peculiar customs associated with the Spartan wedding night:
The custom was to capture women for marriage... The so-called 'bridesmaid' took charge of the captured girl. She first shaved her head to the scalp, then dressed her in a man's cloak and sandals, and laid her down alone on a mattress in the dark. The bridegroom – who was not drunk and thus not impotent, but was sober as always – first had dinner in the messes, then would slip in, undo her belt, lift her and carry her to the bed.
The husband continued to visit his wife in secret for some time after the marriage. These customs, unique to the Spartans, have been interpreted in various ways. One of them decidedly supports the need to disguise the bride as a man in order to help the bridegroom consummate the marriage, so unaccustomed were men to women's looks at the time of their first intercourse. The "abduction" may have served to ward off the evil eye, and the cutting of the wife's hair was perhaps part of a rite of passage that signaled her entrance into a new life.
Role of women
Political, social, and economic equality
Spartan women, of the citizenry class, enjoyed a status, power, and respect that was unknown in the rest of the classical world. The higher status of females in Spartan society started at birth; unlike Athens, Spartan girls were fed the same food as their brothers.[Xenophon, Spartan Society, 1] Nor were they confined to their father's house and prevented from exercising or getting fresh air as in Athens, but exercised and even competed in sports. Most important, rather than being married off at the age of 12 or 13, Spartan law forbade the marriage of a girl until she was in her late teens or early 20s. The reasons for delaying marriage were to ensure the birth of healthy children, but the effect was to spare Spartan women the hazards and lasting health damage associated with pregnancy among adolescents. Spartan women, better fed from childhood and fit from exercise, stood a far better chance of reaching old age than their sisters in other Greek cities, where the median age for death was 34.6 years or roughly 10 years below that of men.
Unlike Athenian women who wore heavy, concealing clothes and were rarely seen outside the house, Spartan women wore dresses ( peplos) slit up the side to allow freer movement and moved freely about the city, either walking or driving chariots. Girls as well as boys exercised, possibly in the nude, and young women as well as young men may have participated in the Gymnopaedia ("Festival of Nude Youths").
Another practice that was mentioned by many visitors to Sparta was the practice of "wife-sharing". In accordance with the Spartan belief that breeding should be between the most physically fit parents, many older men allowed younger, more fit men, to impregnate their wives. Other unmarried or childless men might even request another man's wife to bear his children if she had previously been a strong child bearer. For this reason many considered Spartan women polygamous or polyandrous. This practice was encouraged in order that women bear as many strong-bodied children as they could. The Spartan population was hard to maintain due to the constant absence and loss of the men in battle and the intense physical inspection of newborns.
Spartan women were also literate and numerate, a rarity in the ancient world. Furthermore, as a result of their education and the fact that they moved freely in society engaging with their fellow (male) citizens, they were notorious for speaking their minds even in public. Plato, in the middle of the fourth century, described women's curriculum in Sparta as consisting of gymnastics and mousike (music and arts). Plato praised Spartan women's ability when it came to philosophical discussion.
Most importantly, Spartan women had economic power because they controlled their own properties, and those of their husbands. It is estimated that in later Classical Sparta, when the male population was in serious decline, women were the sole owners of at least 35% of all land and property in Sparta.[ The laws regarding a divorce were the same for both men and women. Unlike women in Athens, if a Spartan woman became the heiress of her father because she had no living brothers to inherit (an '' epikleros''), the woman was not required to divorce her current spouse in order to marry her nearest paternal relative.][Pomeroy, Sarah B. ''Goddess, Whores, Wives, and Slaves: Women in Classical Antiquity''. New York: Schocken Books, 1995 pp. 60–62]
Historic women
Many women played a significant role in the history of Sparta. Queen Gorgo
Gorgo (; el, Γοργώ ; fl. 480 BC) was a Spartan woman and wife to King Leonidas I (r. 489–480 BC). She was the daughter and the only known child of Cleomenes I, Leonidas' half-brother and King of Sparta (r. 520–490 BC). Gorgo was also the ...
, heiress to the throne and the wife of Leonidas I, was an influential and well-documented figure. Herodotus records that as a small girl she advised her father Cleomenes Cleomenes may refer to:
* one of several kings of Sparta:
** Cleomenes I (c. 520 – c. 490 BC)
** Cleomenes II (370–309 BC)
** Cleomenes III (236–219 BC)
* Cleomenes of Naucratis (died 322 BC), Greek administrator
* Cleomenes the Cynic (c. 30 ...
to resist a bribe. She was later said to be responsible for decoding a warning that the Persian forces were about to invade Greece; after Spartan generals could not decode a wooden tablet covered in wax, she ordered them to clear the wax, revealing the warning. Plutarch's '' Moralia'' contains a collection of "Sayings of Spartan Women", including a laconic quip attributed to Gorgo: when asked by a woman from Attica why Spartan women were the only women in the world who could rule men, she replied "Because we are the only women who are mothers of men". In 396, Cynisca, sister of the Eurypontid king Agesilaos II, became the first woman in Greece to win an Olympic chariot race. She won again in 392, and dedicated two monuments to commemorate her victory, these being an inscription in Sparta and a set of bronze equestrian statues at the Olympic temple of Zeus.
Laconophilia
Laconophilia is love or admiration of Sparta and its culture or constitution. Sparta was subject of considerable admiration in its day, even in rival Athens. In ancient times "Many of the noblest and best of the Athenians always considered the Spartan state nearly as an ideal theory realised in practice." Many Greek philosophers, especially Platonists, would often describe Sparta as an ideal state, strong, brave, and free from the corruptions of commerce and money. The French classicist François Ollier
François () is a French masculine given name and surname, equivalent to the English name Francis.
People with the given name
* Francis I of France, King of France (), known as "the Father and Restorer of Letters"
* Francis II of France, King ...
in his 1933 book ''Le mirage spartiate'' (The Spartan Mirage) warned that a major scholarly problem is that all surviving accounts of Sparta were by non-Spartans who often excessively idealized their subject.[Hodkinson, Stephen "The Imaginary Spartan ''Politeria''" pp. 22–81 from ''The Imaginary Polis: Symposium, January 7–10, 2004'' edited by Mogens Herman Hansen, Copenhagen: Danske Videnskabernes Selskab, 2005 p. 222.] No accounts survive by the Spartans themselves, if such were ever written.
With the revival of classical learning in Renaissance Europe, Laconophilia re-appeared, for example in the writings of Machiavelli. The Elizabethan English constitutionalist John Aylmer compared the mixed government of Tudor England to the Spartan republic, stating that "Lacedemonia asthe noblest and best city governed that ever was". He commended it as a model for England. The philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau contrasted Sparta favourably with Athens in his '' Discourse on the Arts and Sciences'', arguing that its austere constitution was preferable to the more sophisticated Athenian life. Sparta was also used as a model of austere purity by Revolutionary and Napoleonic France.
A German racist
Racism is the belief that groups of humans possess different behavioral traits corresponding to inherited attributes and can be divided based on the superiority of one race over another. It may also mean prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism ...
strain of Laconophilia was initiated by Karl Otfried Müller
Karl Otfried Müller ( la, Carolus Mullerus; 28 August 1797 – 1 August 1840) was a German scholar and Philodorian, or admirer of ancient Sparta, who introduced the modern study of Greek mythology.
Biography
He was born at Brieg (modern Brze ...
, who linked Spartan ideals to the supposed racial superiority of the Dorians, the ethnic sub-group of the Greeks to which the Spartans belonged. In the 20th century, this developed into Fascist
Fascism is a far-right, Authoritarianism, authoritarian, ultranationalism, ultra-nationalist political Political ideology, ideology and Political movement, movement,: "extreme militaristic nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and pol ...
admiration of Spartan ideals. Adolf Hitler praised the Spartans, recommending in 1928 that Germany should imitate them by limiting "the number allowed to live". He added that "The Spartans were once capable of such a wise measure... The subjugation of 350,000 Helots by 6,000 Spartans was only possible because of the racial superiority of the Spartans." The Spartans had created "the first racialist state". Following the invasion of the USSR, Hitler viewed citizens of the USSR as like the helots under the Spartans: "They he Spartans
He or HE may refer to:
Language
* He (pronoun), an English pronoun
* He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ
* He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets
* He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...
came as conquerors, and they took everything", and so should the Germans. A Nazi officer specified that "the Germans would have to assume the position of the Spartiates, while... the Russians were the Helots."
Certain early Zionists, and particularly the founders of Kibbutz
A kibbutz ( he, קִבּוּץ / , lit. "gathering, clustering"; plural: kibbutzim / ) is an intentional community in Israel that was traditionally based on agriculture. The first kibbutz, established in 1909, was Degania. Today, farming h ...
movement in Israel, were influenced by Spartan ideals, particularly in education. Tabenkin, a founding father of the Kibbutz movement and the Palmach
The Palmach (Hebrew: , acronym for , ''Plugot Maḥatz'', "Strike Companies") was the elite fighting force of the Haganah, the underground army of the Yishuv (Jewish community) during the period of the British Mandate for Palestine. The Palmach ...
strikeforce, prescribed that education for warfare "should begin from the nursery", that children should from kindergarten be taken to "spend nights in the mountains and valleys".
In modern times, the adjective "Spartan" means simple, frugal, avoiding luxury and comfort. The term " laconic phrase" describes the very terse and direct speech characteristic of the Spartans.
Sparta also features prominently in modern popular culture, most famously the Battle of Thermopylae
The Battle of Thermopylae ( ; grc, Μάχη τῶν Θερμοπυλῶν, label=Greek, ) was fought in 480 BC between the Achaemenid Persian Empire under Xerxes I and an alliance of Greek city-states led by Sparta under Leonidas I. Lasting o ...
(see Battle of Thermopylae in popular culture
The Battle of Thermopylae in 480 BCE was a last stand by a Greek army led by King Leonidas I of Sparta against an Achaemenid Persian army led by Xerxes I during the Second Persian invasion of Greece. There is a long tradition of upholding the sto ...
).
Notable ancient Spartans
* Agesilaus II – king
* Agis I – king
* Agis II – king
* Chilon
Chilon of Sparta ( grc, Χείλων) (fl. 6th century BC) was a Spartan and one of the Seven Sages of Greece.
Life
Chilon was the son of Damagetus, and lived towards the beginning of the 6th century BC. Herodotus speaks of him as contemporary ...
– philosopher
* Chionis
The sheathbills are a family (biology), family of birds, Chionidae. Classified in the wader order Charadriiformes, the family consists of one genus, ''Chionis'' with two species. They breed on subantarctic islands and the Antarctic Peninsula, an ...
(7th century BC) – athlete
* Clearchus of Sparta
Clearchus or Clearch ( grc, Κλέαρχος; 450 BC – 401 BC), the son of Rhamphias, was a Spartan general and mercenary, noted for his service under Cyrus the Younger.
Biography
Peloponnesian War
Born about the middle of the 5th century ...
– mercenary in the army of the Ten Thousand.
* Cleomenes I – king
* Cleomenes III – king and reformer
* Cynisca (4th century BC) – princess and athlete
* Gorgo – queen and politician
* Helen
Helen may refer to:
People
* Helen of Troy, in Greek mythology, the most beautiful woman in the world
* Helen (actress) (born 1938), Indian actress
* Helen (given name), a given name (including a list of people with the name)
Places
* Helen, ...
– princess in the Trojan War
* Leonidas I (c. 520–480 BC) – king, commander at the Battle of Thermopylae
The Battle of Thermopylae ( ; grc, Μάχη τῶν Θερμοπυλῶν, label=Greek, ) was fought in 480 BC between the Achaemenid Persian Empire under Xerxes I and an alliance of Greek city-states led by Sparta under Leonidas I. Lasting o ...
* Lycurgus
Lycurgus or Lykourgos () may refer to:
People
* Lycurgus (king of Sparta) (third century BC)
* Lycurgus (lawgiver) (eighth century BC), creator of constitution of Sparta
* Lycurgus of Athens (fourth century BC), one of the 'ten notable orators' ...
(10th century BC) – lawgiver
* Lysander (5th–4th century BC) – general
* Menelaus – king during the Trojan War
* Nabis – king
* Xanthippus of Carthage – Spartan mercenary in the First Punic War
See also
* List of ancient Greek cities
A ''list'' is any set of items in a row. List or lists may also refer to:
People
* List (surname)
Organizations
* List College, an undergraduate division of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America
* SC Germania List, German rugby union ...
Notes
References
Sources
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Further reading
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* David, Ephraim. 1989
"Dress in Spartan Society"
''Ancient World'' 19:3–13.
* Flower, Michael A. 2009. "Spartan 'Religion' and Greek 'Religion. In ''Sparta: Comparative Approaches''. Edited by Stephen Hodkinson, 193–229. Swansea, UK: Classical Press of Wales.
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* Hodkinson, Stephen, and Ian MacGregor Morris, eds. 2010. ''Sparta in Modern Thought''. Swansea, UK: Classical Press of Wales.
* Low, Polly. 2006. "Commemorating the Spartan War-Dead". In ''Sparta and War''. Edited by Stephen Hodkinson and Anton Powell, 85–109. Swansea, UK: Classical Press of Wales.
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* Rabinowitz, Adam. 2009. "Drinking from the Same Cup: Sparta and Late Archaic Commensality". In ''Sparta: Comparative Approaches''. Edited by Stephen Hodkinson, 113–191. Swansea, UK: Classical Press of Wales.
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Former populated places in Greece
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Locations in Greek mythology
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States and territories disestablished in the 2nd century BC
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