Spartan Boys: Hebontes or Eirens

 Overview

• In most Greek cities young men became full adult citizens once they reached military age, usually around the age of twenty
• Spartans, however, entered a stage between the agoge and full adulthood, probably between 20 and c.30 years of age, which Xenophon saw as a unique feature of Spartiate life

Education Part One

• The young men (hebontes in Xenophon, eirens in Plutarch) participated in the syssitia
• They were liable to military service together with the older Spartiates
• They were not yet allowed to vote in the assembly or to marry and set up their own household

Education Part Two

• The hebontes were involved in musical performances (choruses, dance) at festivals
• They also participated in competitions - which means that training in musical as well as physical disciplines probably remained a regular part of their lives

Additional Roles

• We know that the hebontes played a role in the education of the younger boys, some in an official capacity as group leaders and supervisors, and presumably many more by forming personal relationships with particular boys

Xenophon as a Source

• In Xenophon's Spartan Constitution the life of the hebontes is characterised by intense competition
• He reports that the best were selected for a position in the elite corps of 300 hippeis (literally 'horsemen', but these did, in fact, fight with the infantry)
• All others remained in competition with each other and especially with those who had been singled out
• They watched each other's behaviour and Xenophon says that the rivalry was so intense that "they fought whenever they met"
• This period, therefore, meant further training in all aspects of an ideal Spartiate's life
• It allowed or even encouraged the young men to jostle for positions within Spartan society before they became full citizens

Spartan Education: Boys Activity

Find examples of the following:

• Tests of endurance
• Plutarch
• "women would test their baby’s constitutions by washing them in wine instead of water” – a test to see whether their baby is healthy and if so, the wine would make them stronger
• If the baby proved well-built and sturdy they instructed the father to bring it up. But if it was puny and deformed they dispatched it at the “place of rejection”.
• Boys had scant food to keep them from over-eating and had to steal to eat; if they were caught, they were punished not for stealing but for being an “unskilled thief” and would go hungry. 
• One story is that a boy was so determined not to be caught stealing a fox cub that he hid it under his cloak, letting his insides be clawed and ripped. Plutarch “witnessed many of them die under the lashes they received at the alter of Artemis Orthia."
• "the boys learned to read and write no more than was necessary"
• Xenophon
•  to not soften their feet, the boys "should harden them by going barefoot" as it would make it easier to climb, go downhill easier, and to be more swift
• The boys would also have to get past Spartans with whips to steal cheeses from the temple of Artemis Orthia, “to show that a brief moment of pain could bring enduring fame.” Lycurgus subjected growing boys to “the most demanding regime” and “as little free time as possible” to curb pride, insolence and temptation
• The boys had to go barefoot, so that they would become used to running, jumping and climbing without shoes. They also wore one garment all year to make them endure both heat and cold, and the Eirens were given enough food that no one overate or went “without experience of going short.” However, Lycurgus did let them steal to alleviate hunger, not because he could not provide for them but so that they would learn to stake out, sneak around and use spies, making them “more resourceful in obtaining the necessities of life and more prepared for war.”
• Plato
• “In addition, at the Gymnopaidiai, they have to show endurance, competing in the full heat of the summer.”
• “the endurance of pain – which is very much a feature of our society, in fighting by hand with each other, and in the ‘raids’ with many whippings resulting each time.”
• Competition between the boys
• Plutarch
• "Moreover, as they exercised boys were constantly watched their elders, who were always spurring them on to fight and contend with one another"
• The eirens would have boys judge each other and tell them who was best or strongest. A boy who did not answer was considered “as a sluggard whose mind showed not ambition to excel.”
• Boys were taught Laconian speech; Lycurgus had favoured short, sharp statements that expressed heavy ideas, so someone who babbled constantly would seem stupid as opposed to a boy who kept his mouth shut except to give sharp answers.
• Pausanias
• “They fight with fists, kick with their feet, bite, and gouge opponents’ eyes. I have just described the way they fight man to man: but they also charge at each other violently in a group and push each other into the water.”
• Ways of promoting comradery and equality
• Plutarch
• As soon as the boys reached 7, they would be distributed into troops and live together brought up together. They slept together by Squadron and troop on mattresses in which they made up for themselves.
• "The boys are accustomed to live, play and taught together all while learning how to live with one another."
• They were enthusiastic about song, which in style were “plain and unpretentious, while their subject matter was serious and calculated to mould character.”
• At festivals, the old men would sing first – “we were once valiant young men” – then the men in their prime – “but we are the valiant ones now; put us to the test, if you wish” – and finally the boys – “but we shall be far mightier.” Evidently even fun activities were meant to convince the boys to excel. The poets Terpander and Pindar portray the Spartans as “the most musical and the most warlike of people.”
• Xenophon
• “If an honourable man admired a boy’s character, and wished to become his friend in all innocence, and spend time with him, Lycurgus approved, and thought this was a very fine form of education. If however a man was clearly physically attracted to a boy, he saw this as a heinous disgrace, and ensured that there was no more physical love between men and boys as between parents and children or brother and brother. I am not surprised that many find this hard to believe (including Plutarch?) as many cities tolerate love between men and boys.”
• All the males were together referring 'himself as father, tutor and commander of each boy'- this rule promoted equality as then no one person would be better than everyone else.
• Kritias
• “Lakedaemonian boys drink just enough to bring the minds of all to cheerful optimism, their tongues to friendliness and restrained laughter…to eat and drink is appropriate to making them think and work, nor is there a day set aside for unrestrained drinking.”
• Custom to drink from the same wine cup and not to name people to drink their health.
• Ways of ensuring obedience and discipline to the state and its laws
• Plutarch
• ways of ensuring discipline and obedience, 'trained children to eat their food and not be fussy' ' not to be frightened of the dark or of being left alone' Desire to eliminate fear phobia and weakness to subscribe to culture of militarism and become toughest soldiers possible through obedience and discipline They had somebody to reprimand and punish the boy who slipped up.
• If a boy is caught, he receives many lashes of the whip for proving clumsiness.
• ‘the others kept their eyes on him, responded to his instructions, and endured their punishments from him, so that altogether this training served as a practice in learning ready obedience.’
• Plutarch, obedience: Captains of troops would punish the boys and they would accept it. “Their whole education was aimed at developing smart obedience, perseverance under stress, and victory in battle.”
• There was always someone nearby to reprimand the boys, and those two years older than them became their tutors (they were called eirens). They would serve the eirens meals like slaves and collect food. They eirens would punish boys in the presence of elders, and have to justify them if his punishments were too harsh or too light.
• Xenophon
• Lycurgus put a Paidonomos, a Spartan of the same class as those in power, in charge of the boys – he could “assemble the boys, inspect them and punish any faults severely. This official is also given a group of young men with whips for floggings when necessary; the result is considerable respect and obedience there.” If their instructors were gone, “any citizen nearby could give the boys whatever instructions seemed necessary and punish any misconduct.” As a result, all Spartans respected whoever was in charge.
• Lycurgus decreed that any boy who shirked his harsh training would lose all future privileges; thus, all other Spartans would make the boys do their duties so that they did not lose their privileges. The boys had to walk in silence, looking down, with hands inside their cloaks, to improve self-discipline – “you would be more likely to hear a stone statue speak.”
• If two Spartans were fighting, and a passer-by broke them up but they carried on, they were punished severely, so that “passion never becomes stronger than obedience to the laws.” “If a boy tells his father he has been beaten by another man, it is a disgrace for him to not beat him too.”
• Kritias
• they drink a moderate amount to to tie "their tongues to friendliness and restrained laughter"

Spartan Education System

 Overview

• Successful completion of the agoge was a prerequisite for Spartan citizenship. Public education was provided for girls as well as boys
• Spartan education was famed for its exceptional harshness and emphasis on physical skills and endurance. It was also characterised, however, by an astonishing degree of self-government, freedom and responsibility
• Furthermore, literacy in Sparta was higher than in any other Greek city-state, because only in Sparta was there a high degree of literacy among women as well as men. Spartan ("laconic") rhetoric style was admired throughout the ancient world, attesting to its high quality - a product of the agoge
• Spartan public education was the subject of extensive, and controversial, discussion even in the ancient world
• No other contemporary state provided for, and in fact required, its citizens to go through the same "upbringing" or agoge
• Unfortunately, because we must rely on descriptions of the system provided by outsiders, we have a kind of "mirror image" of the Spartan agoge
• Observers reported that which struck them as unique or different from education in their own cities, rather than reporting systematically about Sparta's system of education
• Equally distorting for the modern historian interested in Classical Sparta is the fact that most of our existing ancient sources in fact describe a Spartan educational system that was reinstituted in the Hellenistic period after what may have been nearly a century in abeyance
• It is often very difficult to distinguish "traditional" from "innovative" features of the described schooling
• Nevertheless, a number of characteristics of this education can be surmised

First Point

• It is important to note that collective education was considered so important that the  agoge was not only a compulsory prerequisite for citizenship, but all adult males bore an equal responsibility for rearing good citizens
• This was manifest in the laws that required boys in school to address all older men as "father" and gave any citizen the right to discipline a boy or youth under age
• All citizens were directly involved in the education of the next generation in another respects as well: at the age of 20, before being awarded citizenship at 21 and serving in the army, young Spartans acted as instructors in the agoge for their younger classmates
• Last but not least, despite the emphasis on public education, it would be absurd to think that parents did not take a very personal and intense interest in the education of their own offspring
• Numerous quotes demonstrate the pride and sense of personal accomplishment that Spartan mothers felt with regard to their sons

Second Point

• The principal goal of public education was to raise good future citizens
• One aspect of this goal is obvious: future citizens were by definition professional soldiers, and so the educational system very clearly sought to create physically hardened men, capable of enduring hardship, pain, and deprivation
• The emphasis of education was thus on athletic activities and military skills
• Less obvious and often overlooked by modern observers is the fact that the goal of producing good future citizens was not fulfilled by producing good soldiers alone
• Ideal future citizens were democratic, self-sufficient and independent. Thus, despite the harsh discipline, Sparta did not seek to break her youth or make them subservient
• Instead, they were taught democracy from the very start of their schooling - not in theory but in practice. On starting school at the age of seven, the boys were organized into units, teams, or "herds" - and elected their own leaders. Some sources suggest that they also "elected" their instructors from among the eligible 20 year olds