THIS ISSPARTA!

• Sparta was a military culture

• The entire Spartan culture went towards developing and fielding a strong army

• This was to preserve itself as well as to keep down the helots

SPARTAN CULTURE

• Helot -Land-bound serfs that worked Spartan land (if all the citizens are going to be soldiers, somebody’s gotta be the farmers).

• Were from the surrounding land of Laconia and Messenia that they conquered.

• Owned by the state and not individual masters and the masters couldn’t sell them

• Sparta got half of the helot’s crops

• Significantly outnumbered the citizens.

• The potential threat they presented was another reason why the Spartans had such a potent army (gotta keep ‘em down) and the Spartans were reluctant to fight too far from Sparta lest the helots act up

SPARTAN CULTURE

• Engaged in pederasty (what we would now call pedophilia).

• Older men were expected to have erotic loving relationships with boys (and were fined if they didn’t). This was also a mentor relationship.

• With the Spartans, it was a “chaste” pederasty – actual coitus was not allowed, but other behavior was.

• Even in this, self-control was paramount.

• Many other city-states engaged in pederasty of some form or another and those forms also changed over time. They were all officially stamped out by the Roman emperor Justinian

To help ensure the physical superiority of their people, babies were bathed in wine shortly after birth. If they survived, they were taken to elders. If the elders deemed the baby unfit, it was left exposed to die on a hillside (other city-states practiced exposure).

• Children were taught at home until they were seven and they began their training

• Exercises for them and all ages were always done in the nude… and oiled up

• At 13, they were dropped off in the woods in groups with nothing and had to survive (without theft)

SPARTAN MILITARY

SPARTAN MILITARY• Began military service at 20

• Soldiers were not allowed to trade or hold non-military occupations.

• These were done by a class called the periokoi, free non-citizen inhabitants of Sparta.

• Exercised full rights and duties of citizens at 30.

• Weren’t free from military service until 60.

• Were more independent than in

other city-states.

• Learned reading and writing and girls were also given similar harsh physical training to the boys (many domestic tasks were left to the helots and periokoi)

• Girls also received same amount and quality of food as boys, which wasn’t the case everywhere.

• Could own and control property and FARM

SPARTAN WOMEN

• could overtake husband’s property while he was at war. Were expected to defend it too and to put down revolts.

• Were not rushed into sex and bearing children and were not forced or compelled to marry men considerably older than them.

• Husbands also allowed other men to bed their wives and produce children. May have practiced polyandry.

SPARTAN WOMEN

THE LAST STANDOF THE 300

• Sparta also fought many wars against Athens, these wars became known as the Peloponnesian Wars

• Athens and her allies formed the Athenian League

• Sparta led the Peloponnesian League These wars are the main example of Greece’s constant inner conflict

• Eventually Greece was weakened by all the war going on between Greeks

• Sparta and Athens became allies only to defeat the Persian invasion of Xerxes

• Sparta was eventually left weak by

• constantly battling other Greek City-States and putting down Helot revolts

• The Macedonians then ascended from the north and conquered all of the great Greek City-States including Athens and Sparta

• The Macedonians were led by Philip II, father to Alexander the Great More info on Philip II