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More Than Just Warriors New Approaches To Sparta
More Than Just Warriors New Approaches To Sparta
roce 2014.
Českou verzi vydalo nakladatelství Mighty Boys s. r. o. v roce 2022.
První české vydání © 2022
Překlad:
Filip Štěpánek
Redakce:
Kateřina Veselá, Haseyo, Filip Štěpánek, Zuzana Štěpánková
Odborná redakce:
PhDr. Jan Souček, CSc.
Odpovědný redaktor:
Filip Štěpánek
Lettering, grafická úprava, předtisková příprava:
Radek Švarc
Konzultace, skautování:
Karel Chladil, Filip Mikolášek
Vytištěno v PBtisk a.s.
ISBN: 978-80-907931-3-2
Zvláštní poděkování:
PhDr. Jan Součkovi, CSc. za odborné korektury a konzultace.
Mgr. Pavlu Nývltovi Ph.D. za odborné konzultace, úpravu poznámkového aparátu, překlad Kynisky a další
neocenitelnou pomoc při redakci knihy.
Pavlu Cinkovi za konzultace překladu.
© 2022 Lemon Ink Ltd and Ryan Kelly. České vydání © 2022 Mighty Boys. Všechna práva vyhrazena. Žádná
část této knihy nesmí být reprodukována nebo jinou formou publikována bez předchozího výslovného
písemného souhlasu autorů.
Copyright © 2022 Lemon Ink Ltd and Ryan Kelly. All rights reserved. „Three,“ the Three logo(s), and all
characters, religions, and institutions herein and the likenesses, sigils, and/or logos thereof are trademarks
of Lemon Ink Ltd and Ryan Kelly, unless expressly indicated. „Image“ and the Image Comics logos are
registered trademarks of Image Comics, Inc. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmit-
ted in any form or by any means (except for short excerpts for journalistic or review purposes) without
the express written permission of Lemon Ink Ltd, Ryan Kelly, or Mighty Boys s.r.o. All names, characters,
events, organizations, religions, and locales in this publication are fictional. Any resemblance to actual
persons (living or dead), events, organizations, religions, or places, without satiric intent, is coincidental.
Representation: Law Offices of Harris M. Miller II, P.C. (rights.inquiries@gmail.com).
víc než jen válecníci:
nové prístupy
ke klasické sparte
Stephen Hodkinson
o
co si mužete cesky precíst o sparte
TROJKA je jedním z nejaktuálnějších umělec- všech Plútarchových Životopisů slavných
kých ztvárnění starověké Sparty. Slavné scény Řeků a Římanů, přeložených různými autory,
ze spartských dějin a mýtů se po stovky let vyšlo ve dvou dvousvazkových vydáních
těšily zasloužené pozornosti autorů soch, (Praha 1967, 20072 [Antická knihovna 74 a 76]).
obrazů a básní, ve 20. století inspirovaly Bez těchto historických a životopisných děl
i několik filmů. Jméno Sparty také nese více bychom o Spartě věděli pramálo, ale obraz,
než deset měst a vesnic ve Spojených státech který nabízejí, není zdaleka úplný, protože se
amerických a různé evropské (zejména) fotba- pochopitelně soustředí na jedinečné a dra-
lové kluby, ať už v Rotterdamu, v Praze, v Kolí- matické události. Těm se např. zřejmě dosti
ně nebo v Úpici. Nejen profesionální historiky úspěšně vyhýbal král Kleomenés II. (který
ale zajímá, jak to bylo se starověkou Spartou hraje tak velkou roli v TROJCE), protože o tom,
doopravdy. Jak je vlastně vůbec možné cokoli co během své šedesát let trvající vlády dělal,
tvrdit o společnosti, která zanikla před více nevíme téměř nic.
než dvěma tisíci lety? Neocenitelným zdrojem informací nejen
Velmi dlouho byly téměř jediným zdrojem o Spartě, ale i o Messénii (kam prchá ústřední
poznání Sparty texty, které se dochovaly TROJKA) jsou třetí a čtvrtá kniha bedekru, kte-
z antiky a které po staletí tvořily význam- rý sepsal Pausaniás a který česky vyšel v pře-
nou část vzdělání evropských elit. Nejvíce kladu Heleny Businské jako Cesta po Řecku
informací o Spartě nám nabízejí dějepisná (Praha 1973–1974 [Antická knihovna 20 a 23]).
díla, především Hérodotovy Dějiny (s prvky Jenže Pausaniás (podobně jako životopisec
etnografie, zeměpisu a kulturní antropologie), Plútarchos) psal až v době římského císařství.
Thúkýdidovy Dějiny peloponéské války, Xeno- Nepopisuje tedy klasickou Spartu. Zejména
fóntovy Řecké dějiny a jeho oslavný životopis pro messénské dějiny ovšem čerpal ze starší
krále Agésiláa (opakovaně zmiňovaného a tradice, o které víme jen díky němu.
nakonec i zobrazeného v TROJCE), Polybiovy O něco vzdálenější od realistického obrazu
Dějiny a Plútarchovy životopisy Sparťanů Lyk- klasické Sparty jsou diskuse o Spartě v politic-
úrga, Lýsandra, Agésiláa (ano, toho Agésiláa), kých pojednáních antických filosofů, zejména
Ágida a Kleomena. Všechny tyto texty jsou v Platónových dialozích Ústava a Zákony.
dostupné v českých překladech: Hérodota Oba tyto spisy do češtiny přeložil František
přeložil Jaroslav Šonka (Praha 1972, 20042), Novotný (Ústava: Praha 1921–20216; Zákony:
Thúkýdida Václav Bahník (Praha 1977), Xeno- Praha 1961–20164), Ústavu i Radislav Hošek
fóntovy Řecké dějiny Josef Hejnic (Praha 1982 (Praha 1993 [Antická knihovna 65]). Platónův
[Antická knihovna 46]) a jeho Agésiláa Václav žák Aristotelés se kritice spartského státního
Bahník (in: Xenofón, Vzpomínky na Sókrata, zřízení věnoval především ve druhé knize
Praha 1972 [Antická knihovna 15], s. 351–383), spisu Politika, který do češtiny přeložil Antonín
Polybia ve čtyřech svazcích Pavel Oliva (Praha Kříž (Praha 1939, 19982, 20093; první dvě knihy
2008–2012 [Antická knihovna 78–81]) a sebrání jsou dostupné i v překladu Milana Mráze,
More than just Warriors:
New Approaches to Classical Sparta
Stephen Hodkinson
Introduction: Three
Kieron Gillen’s graphic novel Three was written in reaction to the glorification of the Spartans’
martial valour in Frank Miller’s comic book 300 (1998) about the battle of Thermopylae in 480 BC.
At Thermopylae a Spartan-led coalition of Greek infantry defended a narrow pass against a much
larger invading Persian army. At the battle’s conclusion a core of the Greek forces centred around
300 Spartans fought to the death, while the bulk of the army retreated to safety. Appalled by
Miller’s references to the Spartans as symbols of Greek freedom, Gillen responded, ‘You hunted
slaves!’.
Drawing on this response, Three views the Spartans from an unusual perspective: the
perspective of their slaves, the helots. The ‘Three’ in the novel’s title, the novel’s central
characters, are three helots: two men (Klaros and Terpander) and one woman (Damar). Their
view of their Spartan masters is far less glorious than Miller’s view in 300. However, Three does
not give us only the helots’ perspective. It also takes us into the minds of the Spartans
themselves, showing their perspectives on the events in the novel’s story. These Spartan
perspectives are also far less glorious than in 300, because the Sparta in Three is not Sparta at
the height of its fame in 480 BC, leading the Greeks’ resistance against the Persian invasions. It is
Sparta during its period of decline, over a hundred years later, in 364 BC. At this date Sparta had
recently lost its position of leadership in the Greek world following its defeat by Thebes at the
battle of Leuktra in 371. Even worse, in 370 it had lost half of its own territory, the region of
Messenia, along with Messenia’s numerous population of helots. In short, the Spartans were now
in a state of crisis and weakness, a condition reflected in their attitudes and behaviour throughout
Gillen’s graphic novel.
Gillen’s depiction of the Spartans deliberately runs against the grain of popular modern notions
of Sparta. In this essay I will discuss some standard popular images of Sparta. I will also outline
how recent research has transformed our understanding of Spartan society and explain some of
the new views that experts currently hold.
2
positive and negative views of Sparta typically share one belief. Whether glorifying or condemning
the character of Spartan life, both generally agree that it had an overwhelmingly military focus.
This idea that Sparta was a militaristic society is a product of political and intellectual
developments since the late 18th century. In Renaissance and early modern Europe most thinkers
viewed Sparta as an ideal ancient society whose civil and military elements were well balanced.
That all changed during the American and French revolutions. In America, the Founding Fathers
rejected Sparta as a suitable model for their new federal constitution, on the grounds that
Sparta’s warriors lacked any individual liberty. In France, idolisation of Sparta and its martial
orientation was blamed for the excesses of the Terror, in which large numbers of victims were
executed by guillotine. In early 19th century Britain, liberal and radical political thinkers turned to
classical Athens as their ancient model for making British politics more democratic. In contrast,
they viewed Sparta as a military camp rather than a political community or civil society. Later in
the century, Sparta became associated in contemporary thought with the rising military power of
Prussia and Imperial Germany. In his book The Principles of Sociology (1876), the sociologist
Herbert Spencer linked Sparta with the contemporary states of Prussia and Russia as examples of
the ‘Militant type of society’. In the 20th century these linkages were intensified by international
conflicts. During World War II, British propagandists associated their war against Germany with
Athens’ conflict with Sparta in the Peloponnesian war (431-404 BC). Sparta was portrayed as a
reactionary militaristic land power, like Nazi Germany, and was compared to savages who live for
war. In the USA, under the presidency of Ronald Reagan in the 1980s, intelligence analysts
regularly used Sparta as an analogy for Soviet Russia, as an ancient example of a similarly
militaristic but economically fragile society.
To sum up: the idea that Sparta was a militaristic society is based not on impartial academic
study, but on modern political trends which have led commentators across the political spectrum
to portray the Spartans as solely devoted to war. I shall argue below that this widespread
consensus about Spartan militarism is historically mistaken, that it is a ‘modern mirage’. This
mirage has bridged the divide between intellectual and popular culture, becoming commonplace in
books aimed at wider audiences, in popular histories, and in general popular publications. We can
see this in the three works of modern ‘Recommended Reading’ which Frank Miller gives at the end
of the graphic novel 300: The Hot Gates (1965), a travelogue by the novelist William Golding; The
Battle for the West (1980), a popular history by the writer and broadcaster Ernle Bradford; and
The Western Way of War (1989), an academic work by the neoconservative historian Victor Davis
Hanson. All three works depict the Spartans in the exclusively martial terms that dominate their
portrayal in Miller’s graphic novel and Snyder’s film.
In Three Kieron Gillen follows this militaristic image of Sparta to a certain extent, in order to
provide a better connection for audiences whose knowledge of Sparta derives mainly from 300.
However, Three also includes scenes which indicate that war was not the only important aspect of
Spartan life and that not all Spartans subscribed to their supposed martial code. In the rest of this
essay I will explain how in historical reality Spartan life was about far more than just war.
3
Were the Spartans primarily warriors?
Modern accounts typically depict the Spartans as professional soldiers whose lives were primarily
devoted to war and training for war. This idea is based on the fact that, unlike most citizen-
soldiers in other Greek states, the Spartans did not have to work for their living because their
landed estates were farmed by their helot slaves. It is supposed, therefore, that they were free to
train and fight full-time as their sole occupation. However, there are significant differences
between the Spartans and professional soldiers.
First, unlike professional soldiers, the Spartans did not make their living through military
employment. They were not paid and fed by the state in both war and peace. On the contrary, the
Spartans had to fund themselves from the produce of their private estates. More than that, they
had to pay dues to the state in the form of monthly food contributions to the common messes
where they ate their evening meals.
Secondly, the Spartans were only part-time soldiers. The proportion of time that a rank-and-
file Spartan spent on active service was normally less than 10%. It rose above 20% only during
two brief periods in the early fourth century BC when they had to man garrisons in central Greece.
Rank-and-file Spartans were never sent abroad on Sparta’s lengthy imperial campaigns between
413 and 386 BC. Instead, Sparta used a combination of allies, mercenaries and freed helots
commanded by a small number of Spartan officers. Active military service was less important than
certain other civic obligations. For example, these Spartans who lived in the village of Amyklai
(one of the five Spartan villages) would leave the army and go home to attend the Hyakinthia
festival, even during campaigns. Men who fathered three sons were given the reward of
permanent exemption from military service.
Thirdly, the proportion of time that Spartans spent on peacetime training at home was also
limited. Our best information comes from Xenophon, an exiled Athenian who knew Sparta well in
the early fourth century. His accounts of Spartan daily life in his Hellenika (a history of Greece
from 411 to 362 BC) make no mention of military training, but indicate that the Spartans spent
large amounts of time pursuing other activities: doing business in the Agora (the public square
and market place), socialising with their friends and patrons, and supervising labour on their
estates. This last activity shows that having helot slaves to farm their estates did not leave the
Spartans free from economic concerns: the helots’ labour required regular supervision. More than
that, a Spartan’s retention of his citizen rights depended on making his food contributions to his
common mess; if he failed to do so, he lost his citizen rights. Therefore, Spartans had to devote
time and effort to estate management and other economic business; also to social interactions
that could increase his family’s wealth, such as through advantageous marriages.
Fourthly, the fact that Spartans spent much of their time on socio-economic activities
dovetailed with the unspecialised nature of Spartiate military training. Like most Greek armies,
the Spartans’ training focused mainly on physical fitness, through exercise in the gymnasium,
through athletics or through hunting on foot. These were the standard leisure pursuits of all Greek
4
elites. There is no evidence that the Spartans undertook specialised training such as weapons-
handling practice (the Greeks generally believed that hand-to-hand fighting skills came naturally)
or mock combat training.
The only specialised skills training mentioned by Xenophon was elementary marching drill.
Xenophon comments that the Spartans could perform manoeuvres which drillmasters elsewhere
thought difficult; but he states that the drills themselves were easily learned because, since each
file was self-sufficient, each man simply had to follow the man in front. His account fits well with
the composition of the army. What we loosely call the ‘Spartan’ army was actually a
‘Lakedaimonian’ army. The army comprised not just the Spartans but also another group of
Lakedaimonians, the Perioikoi, who were free inhabitants of some 30-plus communities scattered
around Sparta’s large territory. In fact, the Perioikoi contributed some 50-70% of the army’s
heavy-armed hoplite infantry. Most Perioikoi were working farmers or fishermen whose
opportunities for collective peacetime training were limited. Their effectiveness as soldiers
depended on the whole army – including the Spartans – using a basic skillset of marching drill
which required minimal training, but which often gave Sparta’s armies the edge. (Note that Three
deliberately omits the Perioikoi because it would have over-complicated the story of helots and
Spartans.)
The other key to Sparta’s normal – though never total - military superiority was an unusually
stratified command structure for a Greek army, comprising four ranks of officers under the king,
each leading units of decreasing size down to the smallest unit (the enomotia), some 30-plus
strong. Thucydides’ account of the battle of Mantinea in 418 marvelled at its efficiency:
All orders required follow the same route and arrive quickly, as nearly the whole
Lakedaimonian army… comprises officers under officers, and responsibility for
action is widely shared (book 5, chapter 66).
This command structure along with the drill training enabled King Agis to perform an
unprecedented mid-battle manoeuvre, when he wheeled his whole remaining military forces round
to aid their defeated left wing, converting a probable draw into a decisive victory.
Their attention to drill and to their command structure shows that the Spartans’ military ethos
was one of soldierly discipline, not a ‘warrior-hero’ mentality. At the start of the battle of
Mantinea, the Lakedaimonians’ controlled advance to the rhythm of pipes contrasted with their
enemies’ disorganised rush into battle. At the end of the battle they pursued their fleeing enemies
in a similar controlled manner, neither very long nor far.
A final point about Spartan war-making is that some of its most iconic sayings are historically
very dubious. Modern novels and films like 300 frequently depict the supposed saying of the
Spartan mother who urged her son to return from battle ‘either with this [shield] or on this’: i.e.
either carrying his shield home in victory or being carried home on his shield after his glorious
death. However, the textual and archaeological evidence shows that, during the peak of Spartan
power from c. 550 to 371 BC, no dead soldier was ever brought back to Sparta. Fallen soldiers
were always buried in communal tombs on the battlefield or in nearby friendly territory; and all
5
the Spartans’ battles were fought at some distance from Sparta itself. The mother’s alleged saying
is found only in one very late source, Plutarch’s Sayings of Spartan Women. It is either a complete
invention or it may have applied to the period of Sparta’s decline after 370 BC, when it was
sometimes invaded and some battles were fought close to Sparta itself.
Another dubious saying is King Leonidas’ alleged response ‘MOLON LABE’, supposedly made to
King Xerxes at the battle of Thermopylae. Once again, it is found only in one late source,
Plutarch’s Sayings of Spartans, almost 700 years after the battle. In Plutarch’s work it is not even
a spoken saying, but part of a written correspondence between Leonidas and Xerxes. If Leonidas
genuinely did use his famous phrase, it was not through a 300-style shouted response, but in a
formal diplomatic letter.
‘MOLON LABE’ of course implies an ethos of fighting to the death. The 300 at Thermopylae did
fight to the death, but subsequent Spartan forces never emulated their behaviour. In 425 BC
around 120 Spartans and their perioikic comrades surrendered when trapped and surrounded on
Sphakteria island. At Lechaion in 390, a Lakedaimonian division fled rather than face an
overwhelming Athenian force. At Leuktra in 371, four divisions retreated during their defeat by the
Thebans. The survivors of Leuktra faced public shame, as shown in a panel in Chapter 2 of Three.
But, as one of the ephors recounts in their argument with King Kleomenes, the Spartan state
treated them more pragmatically. King Agesilaos II was appointed as lawgiver and ruled that the
laws should sleep for one day, so they escaped legal punishment. By this period Spartan numbers
had declined so low (to under 1,000) that the state needed to keep these men as citizens to
preserve what was left of its military strength. Three imagines the ill-feeling caused by the impact
of Agesilaos’ decision. Kleomenes’ criticises his fellow-king for regularly ignoring the law. After he
is outlawed as a trembler, Arimnestos complains: ‘How many of the men who stood in judgement
over me ran from the Thebans?’ But, as with the sanctions applied against the historical
Aristodemos after Thermopylae, Sparta could afford to punish the fictional cowardice of one man
in a way that they couldn’t afford to punish several hundred.
6
customs’ which the historical Spartans had never practised in the classical period. Many of these
so-called ‘Spartan customs’ were described several centuries later in the writings of Plutarch (c.
AD 50 -120). As we have seen in the case of the supposed martial sayings of Leonidas and the
Spartan mother, much of Plutarch’s so-called ‘information’ about Sparta is actually ‘fake news’.
But because of the sheer volume of Plutarch’s writings about Sparta, modern scholars have often
treated them as true rather than admit that Plutarch gives us little reliable historical information.
In what follows I will endeavour to go beyond the mirage to explain how recent historians have
painted a more realistic picture of Sparta and its constituent populations.
The helots
Since Kieron Gillen’s Three views Sparta from the viewpoint of its slave population, the helots, we
should start with them. At the peak of its power Sparta controlled a territory of some 8,500 km2,
spanning two regions separated by the Taygetos mountain range: its home region of Lakedaimon
(modern Lakonia) and the neighbouring region of Messenia to the west. The process by which the
Spartans gained control of Lakedaimon/Lakonia in unclear, but they acquired Messenia through
military conquest in the eighth or seventh century BC. In both regions the Spartans seized the
most fertile areas for their private estates and turned the local populations into their helot slaves.
The helots were forced to cultivate the lands of individual Spartans, herd their livestock, and
deliver half of the produce to their Spartan masters. The prelude in the opening pages of Three
shows a group of helots gathering in the olive crop; and the story proper begins with the three
central helot characters working on a Spartan rural farm, in this case a farm owned by a Spartan
woman who is later identified as the chariot-horse owner Gyrtias. However, by the date at which
Three is set, 364 BC, the Spartans had lost control of Messenia, whose former helot populations
were now living as free Greeks. The novel’s action therefore takes place in Lakonia, where
Spartan control still prevails. Once the three helots flee their farm in the Chrysapha basin in
eastern Lakonia, their aim is to head for safety in free Messenia
One issue on which recent research has abandoned earlier views is the question of the helots’
status. It used to be thought that the helots were owned collectively by the Spartan state. (
This opinion was connected to the old view that the Spartans’ estates were public rather than
private property, on which see below.) However, the classical sources typically present the helots
as privately owned by individual Spartans, although the terms of this private ownership were
subject to state regulation – as with many items of private property in modern societies.
Therefore, as Gillen explains in his ‘Historical Footnotes’, when the helots are first introduced on
page 2, they are described as ‘owned by men’, but also as bearing ‘the state’s fetters’. The
personal control that Spartan owners exercised over their helots is indicated when Terpander
refers to ‘my mistress’ and later when Gyrtias refers to him as ‘that helot I arranged to send’ to
the farm.
In Three the estate on which the central helot characters are working, along with several other
helots, is depicted as an isolated farmstead rather than part of a hamlet or village. This depiction
7
matches the evidence of an intensive archaeological survey whose coverage included the
Chrysapha basin, the Laconia Survey conducted by the British School at Athens. For the classical
period, the archaeologists discovered 46 sites within the 70 km2 of the survey area, most of them
small sites which were probably just single farmsteads. In contrast, another survey (the Pylos
Regional Archaeological Project), which covered the area of western Messenia some 70 km distant
from Sparta, discovered only four definite classical sites in the 40 km2 of its survey area, including
one large site which was clearly a significant village. The differences between the helot habitations
in the two survey areas probably reflect the contrast between a rural area near to Sparta where
the Spartans could easily intervene (as they do near the start of Three) and a distant area where
Spartan intervention was infrequent and the helots had more scope to organise themselves into
village communities. But even single farmsteads were probably often organised hierarchically,
with one helot placed in a position of responsibility for managing the estate and its workers. In
Three, that is the position of Terpander, as is indicated when the Spartans burst into the helots’
dwelling and Arimnestos asks him ‘Are you first amongst lessers?’.
Do these practical aspects of the helots’ settlement patterns and work organisation have any
implications for one of the major controversies about helot-Spartan relations? Scholars have long
disagreed about how serious a threat the helots posed to the Spartans and (not quite the same
thing) to what extent the Spartans perceived them as a threat. The fact that groups of helots
working on particular estates probably had some kind of internal structure might suggest the
potential for local helot self-organisation, especially in Messenia where groups of helots working
on different farms probably lived together in village communities. The existence of such helot self-
organisation might seem to pose a potential threat of revolt against Spartan rule.
However, the key question is whether such helot self-organisation extended beyond individual
local communities to a wider regional level which might enable helots in different parts of Spartan
territory to unite in revolt. Recent research on the development of a regional identity in Messenia
has shown that a common identity was quite late to develop. It first becomes evident only during
the revolt of the late 460s BC, one episode from which – the annihilation of Arimnestos and his
300 Spartans – Terpander recounts in his storytelling in Chapter 1 of Three. It seems likely that
the common Messenian identity displayed during this revolt was initiated less by the helots than
by the rebels from two perioikic communities, Thouria and Aithaia, who participated in the revolt.
After the rebels were allowed to leave Messenia as part of a peace settlement, there is no
evidence for an ongoing common identity among the remaining populations in Messenia. The
sources which describe Messenia’s eventual liberation from Spartan control in 370 BC portray it as
the work of an invading foreign army supported by only a small local contribution. So there is no
definite evidence that the helots posed a permanent threat to their Spartan masters. They
became a threat only at moments of unusual Spartan weakness. The late 460s revolt, for
example, was stimulated by an earthquake which devasted Sparta and killed many Spartans and
their families.
8
The Spartans’ own perceptions of the helots seem to match this picture. The historian
Thucydides plays up the Spartans’ fears; but he is writing about a period of Spartan vulnerability,
the Peloponnesian war, when the Athenians often made raids on Sparta’s territory. In contrast,
the two other main contemporary historians, Herodotus and Xenophon, mostly portray the
Spartans as not particularly fearful about the helots. In one particular episode in his Hellenika, an
account of the failed conspiracy of Kinadon, Xenophon depicts a scene in the Agora in which about
70 Spartans are outnumbered by over 4,000 non-Spartans, followed by a scene in which
individual Spartans are similarly outnumbered by a mass of helot labourers on their country
estates. Yet as part of this episode Xenophon also reveals that the Spartans went about their daily
lives unarmed, apparently little worried by this vast numerical imbalance. (Their behaviour
contrasts with that of American gun lobby activists who invoke the Spartans in support of their
right to carry arms.) These points about the Spartans’ normal lack of fear of the helots are
important, because the Spartans’ alleged need for security against the helots has often been
advanced in support of the idea that they devoted their lives to military concerns: a view of
Spartan life which I challenged earlier.
Finally, helots frequently participated in Spartan military campaigns. They always served as
personal attendants to Spartan soldiers. At Thermopylae these helot attendants died alongside
their 300 Spartan masters, as Terpander reminds the Spartans in Chapter 5. At Plataea, the final
battle of the Persian Wars in 479 BC, 35,000 helots served as light-armed troops. During the
Peloponnesian war, contingents of helots fought in several battles as heavy-armed hoplites. They
fought so successfully that the Spartans created a new standing force of freed helots, the
neodamodeis, who served in place of Spartan hoplites on distant campaigns. Finally, 6,000 helots
volunteered to defend Sparta against the enemy invasion of 370 BC, in return for the Spartans’
offer of their freedom. [SPOILER ALERT: in Three, Klaros is one of the helots who had responded
to that offer and fought for the Spartans, just six years before the story’s fictional date – but the
aftermath had not turned out as he had hoped.] All this reminds us that, though they were
exploited brutally by the Spartans, the helots were not merely passive victims, but made active
contributions to Sparta’s history. Whether supporting Sparta or in revolt, the helots were active
historical agents.
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marine resources. One of these coastal perioikic communities, Gytheion, to the south of Sparta,
served as the official dockyard for Sparta’s small navy. It was also an important trading port.
Many Perioikoi were also involved in crafts and trade, which were prohibited to the Spartans.
The key point about the Perioikoi is that they were fellow members, alongside the Spartans, of
the ethnic group of Lakedaimonians (in Greek, Lakedaimonioi). Nowadays, we write or say that
‘the Spartans’ did this or that; but ancient writers almost always described such actions as being
done by ‘the Lakedaimonians’. This reflected official usage: the city of Sparta was often called
‘Lakedaimon’ and ‘the Lakedaimonians’ was the official designation of the Spartan state, parallel
to ‘the Athenians’ or ‘the Corinthians’. In the case of military campaigns this usage was accurate
since, as we noted above, the Perioikoi contributed some 50-70% of the army’s hoplites. The
Spartans (in Greek, Spartiatai) almost never fought alone without the Perioikoi.
Of the three main groups in Spartan society (helots, Perioikoi and Spartans), the Perioikoi are
the most obscure because – despite their important military role – they are the least well attested
in both the literary sources and the archaeological evidence. In fact, they are hard to distinguish
archaeologically since they shared a common material culture with the Spartans. This shared
material culture reflects their normal position of solidarity with the Spartans. It may well be that,
scattered around the length and breadth of Sparta’s territory, the perioikic communities played an
important role in keeping an eye on the helots, in a way that the Spartans themselves, resident in
the city of Sparta, could never do. Hence it was a significant matter when, in the 460s, the
perioikic communities of Thouria and Aithaia abandoned their allegiance to Sparta and joined the
Messenian helots in revolt. For the most part, other perioikic communities remained continuously
loyal to Sparta. During the enemy invasion of 370 BC, Gytheion successfully resisted a three-day
attack, though some other Perioikoi refused to help defend Sparta and some even fought for the
enemy.
The one group other than the helots and Spartans that does make an appearance in Three is
the Skiritai, represented by a single individual, the scout Aristodemos, who plays an important
role in Chapters 3 and 4. As indicated in my ‘Conversation’ with Kieron Gillen, the Skiritai
inhabited the region called the Skiritis, to the north of Lakonia bordering Arkadia. They retained a
separate identity and semi-privileged position within the Lakedaimonian army. They had the
honour of occupying the army’s left wing. They guarded the perimeter of the army’s camp at
night. They marched in front of the Spartan king, probably acting as scouts, which is how
Arimnestos addresses Aristodemos when they first meet. By the fictional date of Three, part or all
of the Skiritis had been removed from Spartan control, so Aristodemos appears as a free agent
hiring out his services to allcomers.
10
shortly after birth and which reverted to the state on his death. However, contemporary sources
show that in reality Spartan landholdings were always unequal and that they were privately
owned. Landowners were not allowed to sell their lands, but they had the right to pass them onto
their children (who would share the inheritance), or to give or bequeath them to another person.
Women could also own land: Aristotle states that they held almost two-fifths of the territory. Girls
could inherit land from their parents, either as sole heiresses (when there were no sons) or (when
there were sons) through their right to a share in the inheritance: a daughter had the right to half
a son’s share. A girl was often given her share of the inheritance as a dowry on her marriage
rather than waiting until her parents’ death. As mentioned earlier, Spartans devoted much time
and effort to preserving their property. In Three the wealthy Spartan woman Gyrtias, faced with
the cowardice and disgrace of her only son, wishes that they had had another son; but, she
comments, ‘that would have split the estates’, making each son only half as wealthy.
For poor Spartan families, splitting the estates could prove disastrous if it reduced their sons’
landholdings to a level where they could not provide their compulsory food contributions to their
common mess. That would mean losing their legal status as Spartans and becoming ‘Inferiors’.
For wealthy families, splitting the estates could mean that their sons could no longer afford to
indulge in the expenditures essential to a high social status. We normally associate the word
‘Spartan’ with living an austere lifestyle without luxuries; and it is true that the Spartans’
everyday lifestyle was quite basic. As Thucydides said, the rich adopted a lifestyle as much as
possible like that of the many. This meant wearing simple clothing, drinking moderately and
eating plain food in the messes. But wealthy Spartans could use their surplus wealth in other
ways, in particular by breeding horses that competed in the elite sport of chariot-racing.
One inscription found on the Spartan acropolis contains an image of a four-horse chariot in
motion, followed by a text in which a certain Damonon lists a long series of chariot-race and
horse-race victories won by himself and his son at several religious festivals within Spartan
territory. Other wealthy Spartans competed outside Sparta at the Olympic Games. Unlike
Damonon, who drove his own chariot, these Olympic competitors were simply the horses’ owners.
These Spartan owners won the four-horse chariot race at seven of the eight Olympic Games held
between 448 and 420 BC. This achievement was not confined to Spartan men. In 396 and 392 BC
the Olympic four-horse chariot race was won by a Spartan woman, Kyniska, sister of King
Agesilaos II, the first woman ever to do so. Kyniska’s victory inspired other Spartan women to
keep horses and enter and win at the Olympics. Three captures this trend through the wealthy
Gyrtias, who prefers her horses to her disgraced son and boasts that they ‘will soon be bound for
Olympia. They will race. And if I am any judge, this year they will win’. (364 BC was an Olympic
games year.) To celebrate their victories, Spartan chariot-race winners commissioned expensive
bronze personal statues made by leading foreign sculptors which they placed in the sanctuary at
Olympia. Kyniska was no exception: part of the marble base of her monument, adorned with a
celebratory inscription, can be seen in the Olympia Museum.
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Women’s ownership of two-fifths of the land and engagement in chariot racing raises the
question of their wider position in Spartan society. It is often claimed that Spartan women were
exceptionally liberated compared with women in other Greek states. This is true to a certain
extent. Spartan girls enjoyed a public upbringing outdoors, involving physical exercise and
competitions, which was more empowering than the secluded indoors upbringing of girls in other
Greek states. But we must be careful not to ignore aspects of women’s lives that remained under
male control. Women’s empowerment derived from their prominent roles within their families and
within the state, not from personal freedom to do as they liked. Take the case of Kyniska. Her
celebratory inscription begins by proclaiming her family background, that her father and brothers
were kings of Sparta, before she mentions her chariot-race victory. Indeed, Xenophon claims that
she was persuaded to engage in chariot racing by her brother Agesilaos, who wanted to discredit
the successes of male chariot victors as an unmanly achievement dependent solely on wealth.
Kyniska’s success thus served the interests of her male kinsman.
In fact, the outdoors physical upbringing of Spartan girls was aimed not at giving them
personal freedom but at making them fit for childbirth. Moreover, although their property
ownership and inheritance rights could give women considerable importance within their
households after they were married, they brought constraints for unmarried girls, making them
valuable commodities in the marriage market whom their parents used for forging dynastic
alliances or concentrating family property. A young woman’s marriage was decided by her father.
Aristotle states that it was the father who betrothed an heiress in marriage; and, if he died before
doing so, her nearest kinsman could either marry the heiress himself or give her to a man of his
choice.
A woman’s reproductive potential could be used for dynastic purposes even after her marriage.
A Spartan who did not wish to take a wife, but who still wanted to father citizen children, could
approach a married man and ask to borrow his wife for purposes of reproduction. According to
Xenophon, husbands were keen on these arrangements because their wives would produce sons
who counted as part of the kin group and added to its power, but who would have no claim to
inherit a husband’s property (their inheritance would come from their biological father). At first
sight, this arrangement seems to be decided entirely by the men; there is no mention of the
wife’s consent. However, Xenophon adds that women were also keen because it gave them charge
of two households. But a woman’s ability to enter this second relationship was not purely her own
choice; it also depended on her husband's consent.
Spartan men had greater personal autonomy in their sexual and reproductive behaviour,
although they too were not entirely without restrictions. Men could sexually exploit their female
helot slaves. Evidently, they frequently did so: male ‘bastards’ (in Greek, nothoi) were a
recognised group in Spartan society who were given certain privileges short of citizenship. Unlike
women, however, men were limited to one Spartan heterosexual partner at a time: if a man
wished to take a second wife, he had to divorce his existing wife first. (He could apparently
divorce his wife without her consent.) Again, in contrast to women, men were legally obliged to
12
marry, probably by age 30. Those who failed to do so were fined and subjected to official public
humiliation. Being unable to find a husband and bear citizen children was also shameful for a
woman, but this was a matter of social not legal disgrace.
These sanctions raise the question of how much control the Spartan state exercised over its
citizens’ lives. As we saw earlier, Sparta has sometimes been likened to totalitarian societies like
Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia. Plutarch, writing several centuries later, claims that the
Spartans’ public lives left them no free time and were devoted solely to service of the community.
It is true that all male citizens had to live a common public lifestyle. This started at age 7 with the
boys’ public upbringing. It continued in adulthood with their mandatory enrolment in a common
mess of about 15 men, where they dined on most evenings for the rest of their lives. and with
their liability for military service until age 60. Citizens were also expected to participate in many
other common rituals, such as religious festivals and choral singing and dancing. However, this
common lifestyle was not imposed from above by a faceless public authority. Instead, it was a
lifestyle agreed and chosen by the Spartans themselves. Active participation in this communal
lifestyle was regarded by citizens as a privilege. Exclusion from it was social death.
Contrary to Plutarch’s claims, the shared lifestyle did not mean that the state micromanaged
the everyday lives of Spartan citizens. As we saw earlier, Xenophon’s contemporary accounts of
Spartan daily life in the early fourth century paint a very different picture. He portrays individual
Spartans as going about their everyday lives in an independent manner, pursuing their private
affairs (doing business, socialising, and managing their estates) according to their personal daily
schedules — as did citizens in other states.
The Spartans also accepted that what went on inside a citizen’s private household lay outside
state control. Dionysios of Halikarnassos states that, ‘as for what took place inside their homes
they neither worried about it nor kept watch over it, holding that each man's house door marked
the boundary within which he was free to live as he pleased’. Indeed, some philosophers criticised
Sparta’s laxness in failing to control its citizens’ domestic activities. According to Plato’s Republic,
they ‘entrench themselves within the walls of their homes’, where ‘they can spend lavishly on
their wives and anything else they choose’.
In fact, the influence of the family spread beyond their private households into the operation of
public institutions. Sparta had the only compulsory public system of boys’ education in any Greek
state. (Note that the standard modern term for this education, agoge, is inaccurate: no
contemporary Greek source in the classical period ever used the word agoge to describe the boys’
upbringing.) However, this public education formed only part of a boy’s upbringing, the part
focused on physical training. Alongside it, though largely ignored by the sources, stood a normal
Greek education in reading, writing, oral expression and music, probably taught by teachers
privately paid by Spartiate families, as in other Greek states. Contrary to popular belief, literacy
was the norm for Spartan citizens.
A similar public-private partnership also applied to the common messes. As we have seen, the
messes were a compulsory public institution, to which all citizens had to belong or lose their
13
citizen rights. Yet each individual mess regulated its own activities. Each mess made its own
choice about which young Spartans aged 20 to elect (or reject) as new members. Discussions in
the mess were secret, immune from state scrutiny. Individual messmates could make extra
personal donations of foodstuffs from hunting or from their private estates. Moreover, each
messmate’s continuing membership rested on his private economic capacity to provide the core
food contributions.
This public-private partnership even applied to the organisation of the army. The men who
dined together in the mess also fought together in the smallest unit of the army, the enomotia.
Consequently, the allocation of young Spartans to particular army units was determined, not in a
top-down manner by the state or its generals, but in a bottom-up manner by rank-and-file
members of each common mess, as they made their choices about which young men to elect to
dine with them in their mess and fight with them in their enomotia. This is yet another indication
that Sparta was not a totalitarian militaristic state, but a society in which ordinary Spartans played
an important role in determining how its institutions operated; a society whose army recruitment
was determined not by military factors, but by civic considerations, by whom you wished to eat
and drink with for the rest of your life.
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