Year 2: Introduction to the Greek State: Sparta

 The Greek Polis

• Self governing autonomous society

Features

1. The acropolis - stronghold of community life
2. The town and city were built around the acropolis
3. The villages and countryside
4. The people of the city and countryside
5. The political, cultural, religious and economic life

Structure of Population

• Citizens [adult males] 43,000
• Women and children - 129,000
• Metics [foreign craftsmen] 28,000
• Slaves - 115,000

Citizenship Restrictions

• Adult males - varied depending on the city i.e: Athens = 18yrs; Sparta 30yrs
• Usually both parents had to be born in the city; sometimes only one was necessary

Obligations and Responsibility

• Every citizen was expected to take his political responsibility seriously and to take pride in the affairs of the polis
• This evoked strong feelings of patriotism
• Difficulties - joint union of the Hellenes

1. Geographical location
2. A need to be free and independent
3. Relations marked by commercial jealousies and rivalries, shifting alliances and interstate wars

Forms of Government

1. Monarchy [governance by kings]
2. Aristocracy [group of nobles]
3. Timocracy [group who owed their political power to wealth]

Overthrown Governments

• On many occasions the oligarchies were overthrown and a tyrant would seize control for a short time
• A tyrant would bring with him many benefits before being overthrown himself and replaced by another form of government, either:
• Oligarchy [where a select elite dew control political power] or
• Democracy [where all citizens have the right to vote, to make laws and be elected to official positions]

Sparta: Prehistory

• Sparta is heavily attested in the mythological canon
• Supposedly the first settlement was made by Lacedaemon, a son of Zeus and the nymph Taygete. He married Sparta, the daughter of Eurotas
• These names would then be co-opted by the Spartans - the city would be Sparta, the country Lacedaemon, the fertile river that flowed through the city Eurotas and the impassable mountains that protected the city Taygetos
• Sparta is central to the Trojan Wars. Helen of Troy was originally Helen of Sparta, and it was the Spartan King Menelaus who together with his brother Agamemnon led the Greeks to war
• The Dorian Invasions of the 11th Century BC brought down the Mycenaean civilisation, and with it Sparta slipped into the Dark Ages alongside the rest of Greece
• Herodotus and other classical scholars claim this had been prophesised, as the son of Heracles (Heraclidae) would return to claim their rightful lands
• The next major events attested in Sparta were their invasions of Messenia, and the enslavement of the Messenian population, who became the Helots
• Around the same time, tradition attests that a legendary lawgiver, Lycurgus, brought a sweeping new set of regulations to the Spartan way of life
• The Spartans collectively prescribed themselves to Lyrcurgus' regulations, focused on military training and personal excellence
• Sparta was born

The Poleis of Sparta [Lakedaemonia]

• Sparta itself was not a traditional city but was a collection of 5 villages:
1. Limnai
2. Pitana
3. Kynosaura
4. Mesoa
5. Amyklai
• The city was skirted by Mt Taygetos to the West and Mt Parnon to the East
• The river Eurotas flowed through the valley, providing rich, agricultural land

"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" - Thucydides 1.10

DVD Questions

1. What two things are the Spartans famous for?
• Frugality and fighting
2. What was the aim of the Spartan way of life?
• To create the perfect state
3. What was Sparta the first Greek city to do?
• To define the rights and duties of its citizens
4. What city did Agamemnon rule over?
• Mycenae
5. What percentage of land in Greece cannot be farmed?
• 70%
6. What mountains lied to the west of Sparta?
• Taygetos Mountains
7. What temple was built to honour "the legendary king and his wayward wife"?
• Menelaion, in honour of Menelaus and Helen
8. What did the city states of Greece in this period all have in common?
• They were governed by a set of mutually agreed laws and customs
9. How many kings did Sparta have?
• Two
10.  Who were the kings of Sparta supposedly descended from?
• Heracles
11. What does the word "Periocoi" mean?
• Those who live around
12. What does the word "Helot" translate into?
• Captives
13. How was slavery different in Sparta different than elsewhere in Greece?
• The Spartans enslaved other Greeks
14. Who was Tyrtaeus?
• A Spartan soldier and poet
15. Who served as the hoplites in Ancient Greece?
• The citizens
16. Why was hoplite warfare a "team effort"?
• The Phalanx, co-ordination, discipline and trust were vital
17. When were the Messenians finally enslaved by the Spartans?
• 650 BC
18. What was the aim of the Spartans after they had conquered Messenia? What would they model their society on?
• To create a utopia, modelled on the Hoplit

Sources for Ancient Sparta

• One key issue when studying Ancient Sparta is that they did not have a tradition of recording their history
• There are scant fragmentary papyrys from the 6th century of Spartan poets such as Tyrtaeus and Alcman, but that's about it
• Archaeology of Ancient Sparta has also only recently been conducted in any systematic fashion, and what we have found is minimal (there is a reason for that, but we'll get to that later)
• We are therefore left with one option: to use the wealth of written evidence about Sparta from their main rivals: Athens

Plutarch

• One chief source for Sparta is the historian/biographer/philosopher Plutarch
• He wrote a "biography" of Sparta's legendary lawgiver, Lycurgus, that transcends into a broad sociological study of Classical Sparta
• Plutarch was not a contemporary, wring around 120 AD, 500 years after the fall of Classical Sparta
• At this stage, Sparta was a popular tourist destination, where Romans would visit the city to see "Spartans" re-enact traditions from their glorious past - Plutarch himself says he visited Sparta as a tourist
• By this time Sparta had received wide academic study from other Greeks and the Romans, and Plutarch was able to draw upon this tradition to write his work. We know he used contemporary writers such as Xenophon, Thucydides, Aristotle and Plato

Xenophon

• Xenophon lived and wrote at the end of the Peloponnesian War in the late 5th century BC
• He was an Athenian and a student of Socrates, alongside Plato and Alcibiades
• Many of Athens' intellectuals at this stage were laconophiles - literally "Spartan Lovers" - they interpreted the failures of the Athenian democratic system through contrasting them with the seeming impervious system of the Spartans
• Following the Peloponnesian War, Xenophon served as a commander of a mercenary company known as the "Ten Thousand", who accompanied Cyrus the Younger in a civil war against  his brother, Artaxerxes II
• On his campaigns Xenophon endeared himself to the Spartan King Agesilaus and he later moved to Olympia in the Peloponnese to serve as a Spartan ambassador
• He almost definitely visited Sparta, and there is strong evidence his sons went through the agoge, Sparta's harsh educational programme
• His work, the "Politaea of the Spartans" is a systematic appraisal of most aspects of Sparta's society

Aristotle

• Aristotle was not an Athenian, but he was born in Stagira in Northern Greece
• However, he moved to Athens and studied under Plato in the 4th century BC
• At this stage, Sparta had crumbled under her own internal disorders, as well as a succession of military defeats
• The rose-tinted view of many laconophiles in Athens had therefore been shattered, and Aristotle made a clear break from his intellectual predecessors by viewing Sparta through a critical lens
• His work is a series of lecture notes that he delivered to his students

Other Sources

• Thucydides and Herodotus - both contemporaries to Classical Sparta who provide invaluable details
• Plato and Critias - two other students of Aristotle who made important philosophical notes on the Spartans
• Polybius - a second century BC Greek historian who interprets Sparta through a constitutional framework
• Tyrtaeus and Alcman - the two Spartan writers who offer us a sliver of a glimpse into the real Sparta
• Aristophanes - whose plays provide stereotype Spartans that show us how other Greeks viewed the Spartans
• Archaeology - to corroborate everything