SPARTA[1]
Of all the city-states in Greece, two stand out from the others as
having played the leading part in Greek history. These two are
Athens, which most nearly approached the ideal city-state, and
Sparta, the foremost military state in Greece.
Sparta was the chief city in the peninsula in the south of Greece
called the Peloponnesus, or the Land of Pelops, one of the ancient
mythical heroes of that land. During the period of the Greek
migrations, the Peloponnesus was probably the last district to be
settled, and the tribes which came down into it were called the
Dorians. They invaded Laconia, of which the chief city was Sparta,
and settled it and the surrounding country. Only the citizens of the
city itself were called Spartans; those who owed allegiance to the
city, but who lived in the country outside were known as
Lacedaemonians.
Unlike most other Greek cities, which were well fortified and
defended by a citadel built on high ground, Sparta, "low-lying among
the caverned hills," had grown out of a group of villages and had
{76} no walls. But if she had no outward signs of security from her
foes, she had the mightiest warriors in Greece ready to defend her to
the utmost. Lycurgus, the wise man of Sparta, was once consulted as
to whether it would not be a wise thing to build a wall round the
city, and he answered those who came to him with the words: "The city
is well fortified which hath a wall of men instead of brick."
The Spartans were always afraid of attack from their slaves. These
had been the former inhabitants of the land and had been conquered
and made slaves by the Spartans. These slaves were called Helots;
they were severely and often cruelly treated by their masters, and
were always ready to revolt when opportunity came. This was one of
the reasons that made the Spartans spend more time than other Greeks
in military training. This common danger also had the result of
drawing all Spartans very closely together, and of making them
subordinate all other interests to the supreme duty of protecting the
state.
I. THE GOVERNMENT OF SPARTA: LAWS OF LYCURGUS
The Spartans always held Lycurgus to have been their great lawgiver,
though they never agreed as to when he lived. It is probable that
the laws were not made by one single lawgiver, but that many wise
men, whose names were unknown to later generations, had helped to
create the laws over a long period of time. As Lycurgus was the wise
man whose name was known to the Spartans, they came to look {77} back
to him as their only lawgiver, because it was by the government he
was supposed to have established and the laws he made that Sparta
became so great a state. He was the brother of a King of Sparta who
died leaving a child as his heir. Everyone thought that Lycurgus
would take the opportunity to seize the throne and make himself King,
but he declared that he would only rule until his nephew should be
old enough to become King. Some people, however, would not believe
this, and plots were made against his life. This decided Lycurgus to
leave Sparta for a time and to visit some other countries with the
intention of learning things from them that might be of use to his
own land. He went first to Crete, where,
having considered their several forms of government, and got an
acquaintance with the principal men amongst them, some of their
laws he very much approved of and resolved to make use of them in
his own country. From Crete he sailed to Asia, with design, as
is said, to examine the difference betwixt the manners and rules
of life of the Cretans who were very sober and temperate, and
those of the Ionians, a people of sumptuous and delicate habits,
and so to form a judgment. Lycurgus was much missed at Sparta,
and often sent for, "for kings indeed we have," the people said,
"who wear the masks and assume the titles of royalty, but as for
the qualities of their minds, they have nothing by which they are
to be distinguished from their subjects."
Lycurgus only, they said, knew both how to rule and how to make the
people obey him.
{78} So Lycurgus returned, but on his way he went to Delphi to
consult Apollo, and the oracle called him "beloved of God," and said
to him:
Lo, thou art come, O Lycurgus, to this rich shrine of my temple,
Beloved thou by Zeus and by all who possess the abodes of
Olympus. Whether to call thee a god, I doubt, in my voices
prophetic, God or a man, but rather a god I think, O Lycurgus.[2]
The oracle then went on to say "that his prayers were heard, that his
laws should be the best, and the commonwealth which observed them the
most famous in the world."
On his return to Sparta, the first thing Lycurgus did was to reform
the government. This was now to consist of three parts: the Kings,
the Senate or Council, and the Assembly. Sparta had always had two
Kings at a time, who succeeded each other from father to son. It was
they who had the right of commanding the army in war, they were
always accompanied by a bodyguard of specially picked men, at the
public sacrifices and games they had special seats of honour, and at
all banquets and feasts double portions of everything were served to
them. When it was necessary for the State to consult the Oracle, it
was one of the Kings who decided on the messenger to be sent.
The Senate or Council consisted of the two Kings who were members by
right of their birth, and of twenty-eight other men who were elected
as Senators {79} for life. Every candidate had to be sixty years
old, for Lycurgus believed that until a man had reached that age, he
was not wise enough nor fit enough to be
entrusted with the supreme authority over the lives and highest
interests of all his countrymen. The manner of their election
was as follows: the people being called together, some selected
persons were locked up in a room near the place of election, so
contrived that they could neither see nor be seen, but could only
hear the noise of the assembly without; for they decided this, as
most other affairs of moment, by the shouts of the people. This
done, the competitors were not brought in and presented all
together, but one after another by lot, and passed in order
through the assembly without speaking a word. Those who were
locked up had writing tables with them, in which they recorded
and marked each shout by its loudness, without knowing in favour
of which candidate each of them was made, but merely that they
came first, second, third, and so forth. He who was found to
have the most and loudest acclamations was declared senator duly
elected. Upon this he had a garland set upon his head, and went
in procession to all the temples to give thanks to the gods.
The duties of the Senate were to prepare all the laws and matters of
public interest which were to be brought before the general Assembly;
it acted as a court of justice for criminal cases, and its
deliberations carried great weight.
Every Spartan citizen over thirty years of age was a member of the
Assembly. It was the duty of the Spartans in the Assembly to give or
withhold {80} approval of all the matters brought before them by the
Senate. It was they who elected the Senators and all other
magistrates, and they declared war and made peace. In spite of this
Assembly of citizens, the government of Sparta was really in the
hands of the Senate, for the members of the Assembly might not
discuss the laws submitted for their approval, but only ratify or
reject them. At no time were the ordinary citizens given much
opportunity to speak at length in public. The Spartans did not like
long speeches, and Lycurgus believed that no one should be allowed to
talk much unless he could say a great deal that was useful and to the
point in a few words. This way of talking became so characteristic
of the men of Laconia, that it was called by their name, and even
today speech that is short and sharp and to the point is called
_laconic_. Many stories are told of this Spartan manner of speech.
King Leonidas said once to a man who was speaking about some
important matter, but at the wrong time and place, "Much to the
purpose, Sir, elsewhere"; and one who kept pressing for an answer to
the question "Who is the best man in Lacedaemon?" received as his
answer: "He, Sir, that is least like you."
Long after the death of Lycurgus, another special body of men was
elected to help in the government. These men were called Ephors, and
there were five of them. It was their business to watch the conduct
of the Kings, to see that the laws were all carried out and that
order and discipline were maintained in the state. Probably no other
Greek state would have submitted to such oversight, but the Spartans
were {81} well-disciplined and did not look upon such an office as
one that interfered in any way with their personal freedom. Plato,
writing long after of their authority, said that it was, "exceedingly
like that of a tyrant."
II. CUSTOMS IN SPARTA
Having established the government, Lycurgus next set himself to
introduce what he considered good customs amongst the Spartans. The
first thing he did was to re-distribute the land amongst the
citizens. He found that some were very rich and others poor, and he
determined that they should all live together sharing in everything
alike. So he divided the land into lots and distributed it equally
amongst all the citizens. After this had been done, and the time of
harvest had come, Lycurgus, "seeing all the stacks standing equal and
alike, smiled, and said to those about him, 'methinks all Laconia
looks like one family estate just divided among a number of
brothers.'"
During his travels in other parts of the world, Lycurgus had had
opportunities to compare rich states with poor ones, and he had
concluded that the richest were not always the best governed, and
that wealth did not always bring happiness. He was determined that
the Spartans should become good soldiers and that they should be
great in war, for he believed that simple habits and simplicity of
living were more easily acquired by a nation of warriors than by one
devoted only to peace. To this end he {82} wanted to have neither
rich nor poor in Sparta, but that all should be alike. Lycurgus,
however, was wise enough to know that some people would always manage
to make more money or to save more than others, so instead of
dividing up all the money in the state equally between everyone, he
commanded that all gold and silver coin should be called in, and
that only a sort of money made of iron should be current, a great
weight and quantity of which was but very little worth; so that
to lay up twenty or thirty pounds there was required a pretty
large closet, and, to remove it, nothing less than a yoke of oxen.
Not only did this prevent any one man from becoming too rich, but it
lessened the crime of theft in Sparta, for no one would want to steal
what was of no value.
This lack of money also resulted in doing away with luxuries; for
there was no more means of purchasing foreign goods; merchants
sent no shiploads into Laconian ports; no gold or silversmith,
engraver or jeweller set foot in a country which had no money, so
that luxury wasted to nothing and died away of itself.
Everything needed in their houses had to be made by the Spartans
themselves, with only the simplest tools, and the houses were roughly
built. The law required that the
ceilings of their houses should only be wrought by the axe, and
their gates and doors smoothed only by the {83} saw, and as no
man would furnish such plain and common rooms with silver-footed
couches and purple coverlets and gold and silver plate,
all Spartans grew accustomed to the plainest and simplest
surroundings.
It is reported that one of their Kings was so little used to the
sight of any other kind of work, that being entertained at
Corinth in a stately room, he was much surprised to see the
timber and ceiling so finely carved and panelled, and asked his
host whether the trees grew so in his country.
The last law made by Lycurgus to ensure simplicity of living was that
all Spartan men and youths should eat at common dining-tables, and
they were only allowed to eat such food as was permitted by the law.
Each table seated about fifteen men, who shared in providing the
food; each of them was "bound to bring in monthly a bushel of meal,
eight gallons of wine, five pounds of cheese, two and a half pounds
of figs and some very small sum of money to buy flesh and fish with."
All the food was prepared in a very simple manner, but "their most
famous dish was the black broth, which was so much valued that the
elderly men fed only upon that, leaving what flesh there was to the
younger." Other Greeks, however, thought this black broth very
disagreeable.
It was the custom that at any one table, only those should sit who
were friendly to each other. When a newcomer wanted to join a
certain table, all those already seated at it voted as to whether
they would {84} have him or not. An urn was passed round the table
and everyone present dropped into it a small ball of bread. Those
who voted for the newcomer dropped their balls without altering their
shape, those who voted against him flattened the ball with their
fingers before placing it in the urn. One flat ball was enough to
exclude a man from the table.
When dinner was over, "every man went to his home without lights, for
the use of them was on all occasions forbidden, to the end that they
might accustom themselves to march boldly in the dark."
III. SPARTAN EDUCATION
Lycurgus was determined that every Spartan should be so trained that
he might become a good soldier, and some of his most important laws
concerned the education of children. As soon as a child was born, he
was carried to
the elders of the tribe to which he belonged; their business it
was carefully to view the infant, and if they found it stout and
well-made, they gave order for its rearing, but if they found it
puny and ill-shaped, ordered it to be taken to a cavern on Mount
Taygetus, where it was left to perish, for they thought it
neither for the good of the child itself, nor for the public
interest that it should be brought up, if it did not, from the
very outset, appear made to be healthy and vigorous.
There was a belief in Sparta that wine was more strengthening than
water for a bath, and so the first bath a baby had was always in wine.
{85}
There was much care and art, too, used by the nurses; the
children grew up free and unconstrained in limb and form, and not
dainty and fanciful about their food; not afraid in the dark, or
of being left alone; without any peevishness or ill-humour. Upon
this account, Spartan nurses were often hired by people of other
countries.
At the age of seven, Spartan boys left their homes and their mothers,
and the State took charge of the rest of their education.
As soon as they were seven years old they were to be enrolled in
certain companies and classes, where they all lived under the
same order and discipline, doing their exercises and taking their
play together. Of these, he who showed the most conduct and
courage was made captain; they had their eyes always upon him,
obeyed his orders, and underwent patiently whatsoever punishment
he inflicted; so that the whole course of their education was one
continued exercise of a ready and perfect obedience. Reading and
writing they gave them, just enough to serve their turn; their
chief care was to make them good subjects, and to teach them to
endure pain and conquer in battle.
As they grew older, Spartan boys were taught to undergo all kinds of
hardships. They wore very little clothing, even in the cold of
winter, and one coat had to serve them for a year.
After they were twelve years old they lodged together in little
bands upon beds made of the rushes which grew by the banks of the
river Eurotas, which they were to break off with their hands
without a knife. The old {86} men had an eye upon them at this
time, coming often to the grounds to hear and see them contend
either in wit or strength with one another, and this seriously
and with much concern; so that there scarcely was any time or
place without someone present to put them in mind of their duty,
and punish them if they had neglected it.
Besides all this, there was always one of the best and honestest
men in the city appointed to undertake the charge and governance
of them; he again arranged them into their several bands, and set
over each of them for the captain the most temperate and boldest
of those they called Irens, who were usually twenty years old.
This young man, therefore, was their captain when they fought,
and their master at home, using them for the offices of his
house; sending the oldest of them to fetch wood, and the weaker
and less able, to gather salads and herbs and these they must
either go without or steal; which they did by creeping into the
gardens, or conveying themselves cunningly and closely into the
eating-houses; if they were taken in the act, they were whipped
without mercy, for thieving so ill and awkwardly. They stole,
too, all other meat they could lay their hands on, looking out
and watching all opportunities, when people were asleep or more
careless than usual.
If they were caught, they were not only punished with whipping, but
hunger too, for they were then reduced to their ordinary allowance,
which was purposely kept very small, in order to force them to use
cunning and skill if they wanted to add to it. "So seriously did the
Lacedaemonian children go about their stealing, that a youth having
stolen a young fox, and hid it under his coat, suffered it so to tear
{87} with its teeth and claws, that he died rather than let it be
seen."
In every way the Spartan youths as they grew up were severely
disciplined. Every year the older boys were whipped in public before
the altar of Artemis, in order to teach them to endure pain without
crying out, and it is said that some boys died under this whipping
rather than utter a complaint.
The Iren used to stay a little with them after supper, at which
time he would bid one of them sing a song, to another he put a
question which required an advised and deliberate answer; for
example, Who was the best man in the city? What he thought of
such an action of such a man? They accustomed them thus early to
pass a right judgment upon persons and things, and to inform
themselves of the abilities or defects of their countrymen.
Besides this, they were to give a good reason for what they said,
and in as few words as might be; he that failed of this, or
answered not to the purpose, had his thumb bit by his master.
Sometimes the Iren, did this in the presence of the old men and
magistrates, that they might see whether he punished justly or
not; and when he did amiss, they would not reprove him before the
boys, but, when they were gone, he was called to account, and
underwent correction, if he had run far into either of the
extremes of indulgence or severity.
Furthermore, in his desire firmly to implant in their youthful
souls a root of modesty Lycurgus imposed upon these bigger boys a
special rule. In the very streets they were to keep their two
hands within the folds of the cloak; they were to walk in silence
and without turning their heads to gaze, now here now there, but
rather to keep their eyes fixed upon the ground before them. And
{88} you might sooner expect a stone image to find a voice than
one of those Spartan youths; to divert the eyes of some bronze
statue were less difficult.[3]
Not very much time was spent by the boys in learning to read and
write; most of their education was given to their gymnastic training,
to running, jumping, boxing and wrestling, and to every kind of
exercise that would fit them to be brave and hardy soldiers. They
learnt some music, chiefly singing, but they only sang such songs as
would put life and spirit into them, and their battle songs were sung
with great enthusiasm.
During a war, the Spartan young men were treated a little less
severely than when in training at home. They were allowed to curl
and adorn their hair, to have costly arms and fine clothes. They had
better clothes, too, and their officers were not so strict with them.
They marched out to battle to the sound of music. "It was at once a
magnificent and terrible sight to see them march on to the tune of
their flutes, without any disorder in their ranks, any discomposure
in their minds or change in their countenance, calmly and cheerfully
moving with the music to the deadly fight."
Spartan discipline did not end when the boys and youths had become
men.
Their discipline continued still after they were grown men. No
one was allowed to live after his own fancy; but the city was a
sort of camp, in which every man had {89} his share of provisions
and business set out, and looked upon himself not so much born to
serve his own ends as the interest of his country.
[Illustration: A GIRL RACER. Early 5th Century B.C Vatican, Rome.]
The girls were educated at home, but, like the boys, they were given
a gymnastic training, and they learned to run and wrestle, to throw
the quoit and dart, and to be as strong and brave as their brothers.
As the Spartan boys were trained to become good soldiers, ready to
die for Sparta, so were the girls trained to become good wives and
mothers of Spartan men, and if they could not themselves die for
their country, to be willing to sacrifice those whom they loved the
best. Every Spartan when he went to war, carried a shield that was
so heavy that if he fled from the enemy, he would have to throw it
away, so it was considered a great disgrace to return home without
one's shield; if he died in battle the Spartan was carried home upon
it. The Spartan mothers knew this, and when they said farewell to
their sons who were setting out to war, they bade them return home
with their shields or upon them.
The Spartans held their women in great honour; they listened to their
counsel and often acted upon it. A lady of another city once said to
a Spartan, "You are the only women in the world who can rule men."
"With good reason," was the answer, "for we are the only women who
bring forth men."
Having established all these laws and customs, Lycurgus forbade the
Spartans to travel, for he was afraid that contact with foreign
people would teach them bad habits and make them discontented with
{90} their simple way of living. "He was as careful to save his city
from the infection of foreign bad habits, as men usually are to
prevent the introduction of a pestilence."
At last the time came when Lycurgus felt that his laws and customs
were firmly established, and that they were all familiar to the
people, but he was afraid that after his death they might be changed.
So he thought of a plan whereby he might make them last forever. He
called a special Assembly of the people together and told them that
everything was well-established, but that there was still one matter
on which he would like to consult the Oracle. Before he departed on
this journey, he made the two Kings, the Senate and the whole
Assembly take a solemn oath that they would observe his laws without
the least alteration until his return. "This done, he set out for
Delphi, and having first offered a sacrifice to Apollo, he asked the
god whether his laws were good and sufficient for the happiness and
virtue of his people." The Oracle answered that the laws were
excellent, and that the state which kept them should be greatly
renowned. Lycurgus sent this oracle in writing to Sparta, and then
having once more offered a solemn sacrifice, he took leave of his
friends, and in order not to release the Spartans from the oath they
had taken, he put an end to his own life, thus binding them to keep
his laws for ever. Nor was he deceived in his hopes, for Sparta
continued to be one of the greatest of the Greek states, so Plutarch
tells us, as long as she kept the laws of Lycurgus.
[1] Except where noted otherwise, all the quotations in this chapter
are from Plutarch: _Life of Lycurgus_.
[2] Herodotus, I.
[3] Xenophon: _Constitution of the Lacedaemonians_.
{91}