Sparta: A Social Experiment

If you could live in a society where everyone was socially and economically equal, would you want to?

Where does this history begin?

Lycurgus

Dates : Archaic Greece c. 700-500 BCE

The Way of Life

Basileus

Colonization vs. Agriculture

Xenophobia

Opposite of Athens

Where was Sparta?See p. 92 of Ancient Greece for map In the south, on the Laconian plain

A Cruel and Gloomy Reign

Burn, rape and pillage

Helots 10:1

Avoid uprisings

Who ruled Sparta?

Two hereditary kings, 1st among equals Ran the military

Societal Organization Top- Kings

Upper Middle – Citizens

Lower Middle - Perioikoi

Bottom - Helots

Plato: “The organization of your state is that of an army camp, not a town.”

Spartan Government

Kings

Gerousia

Assembly

Ephors

Lifestyles of the Spartan Citizen

Laconic

No jewelry

No precious metals

Only necessary possesions

Values of the Spartan Citizen Unquestioning

Obedience

Courage

Indifference to pain, cold or heat

Contempt for other civilizations

How did they live? As invincible warriors. From cradle to deathbed

Military caste

Never risked a battle they thought they could not win

Only distinction is military honor in battle

What is Spartan Culture?

Imagine a world where everything is subordinate to war . . .

What is Spartan art?

Poetry incites warriors to fight

Music was for war and religion

Even art depicts the gods in chains

Spartan vs. Non Spartan Poetry

Is anything worth dying for? If so, what? “Shove your shield in the face of the enemy,

hating life and embracing death’s dark spirits like the sun’s rays . . .” Tyrtaeus

“Some Thracian is flaunting the shield I left thoughtlessly by the brush, an flawless piece. So what? I saved myself.” Archilochus

Spartan “Childhood”

Only necessary schooling

Provoked to fight Taken from home at

seven Put in herds Only necessary food

and clothes

“To bring these things they steal, some going into gardens and others insinuating themselves dangerously and cautiously into the men’s messes. If anyone is caught, he is given many lashes with the whip”

Helots – Sparta’s Problem

Constantly feared uprising

Spartan boys spied on them

Attacked them regularly

Had to keep standing army to maintain them

The Krypteia

Secret warfare tactics “this is another form

of training for war: they sent each one out naked and ordered him to wander outside in the mountains for a year, maintaining himself by theft and avoiding detection

Spartan Lore

Philip of Macedon: “If I enter Laconia, I will level Sparta to the ground.”

Spartan reply: “If.”