sparta is often hailed as more
progressive in comparison to the rest of
ancient greece sparta was a home of a
fierce army a comparatively liberal
environment for women and an
equality-based society these are only
but a few arguments used by fans of
sparta to hail it as superior over
athens
but was sparta such a utopian state or
was it built upon dirty creepy secrets
welcome to dunny history and today let's
find out what creepy things were normal
in ancient sparta
as much as zack snyder glorified the
portrayal of spartans as heroes of
ancient greece in many ways sparta was a
totalitarian state
the government of sparta had its fingers
in every household's pie and they like
to control how it tasted
even children were supposed to follow
the demands of the government whether
they liked it or not in fact every
spartan newborn boy was subject to a
sort of quality test like a product of a
manufacturing unit
immediately after birth spartan boys
were bathed in wine as they believed
this would make the baby stronger
after this weird bath the parents were
expected to visit garusia for their
baby's inspection now for those who do
not know garusia was one of the two
chief organs of the spartan government
also known as the council of elders the
council was entirely made up of men
aging over 60 which means the only
qualification to be on this important
branch of government was to beat the
average lifespan of sparta now picture
this the council was responsible for
deciding if a newborn child was worthy
of living or not now that doesn't shiver
your bones with how cold and apathetic
spartan society was maybe you should
take one of those are you a sociopath
tests
during the inspection of garusia the
elders would scrutinize the infant boy
for any kind of deformity disability or
any perceived weakness
basically these old senile senators were
looking for any reason to chuck the baby
out if they could however the test did
not end there if the baby would fail to
prove its fitness if the elder would
deem the baby unfit for spartan society
the baby boy had one more chance to
prove his medal
but don't raise your hopes just yet
because one can say that this test
belonged right next to a death sentence
for the test the parents were asked to
set the baby boy at the base of mount
tagatus all by itself for days if by any
stroke of luck the baby managed not to
die of hunger thirst extreme weather or
get eaten alive by a wild animal the
parents would come back to retrieve the
baby
as a reward for their dumb luck these
survivor babies would be welcomed back
in spartan society but it's not hard to
imagine how rarest of the rarest case
that would have been
sometimes if an infant was actually
fortunate he would be rescued by helets
the spartan word for slaves or
foreigners passing by before any harm
could come to them to be frank this was
a perhaps better outcome than the other
two spartan parents were known for their
tough love and a child's life was not
easy in sparta
sometimes before taking their child for
a customary inspection mothers would
bathe them again and again in wine
pretty much nearly waterboarding them in
hopes of making them tough enough to
pass the inspection
infants would also be left unattended
willingly by parents to make them
accustomed to the tough life sparta had
to offer
[Music]
now unfortunately spartan life did not
get any better as one grew up
in today's economy kids are scared to
leave their parents home at the age of
18 which has been sort of a tradition in
the american lifestyle
spartans were way sterner about not
keeping their kids at home for long in
fact they would kick their younglings
out as young as the age of seven now to
be fair they had no other choice as this
was the statewide mandate the male kids
were forcibly removed from their parents
home and were sent to begin the agoge
the ghost was a rigorous education and
training program that was mandatory for
all spartan male children except for the
firstborns of the ruling houses europe
hunted and angioten
after being removed from their parents
homes these seven-year-olds were
transferred to live in communal barracks
and were expected to behave like proper
soldiers apart from learning to read and
write they learn morality social
communication rhetoric poetry hunting
and survival skills but the program was
primarily aimed at turning these
adolescent kids into perfect spartan
warriors
they were spoon-fed loyalty to sparta
trained severely for martial conduct and
combat and expected to excel at stealth
and pain tolerance they were also
conditioned to never surrender no matter
the odds
the food was intentionally kept scarce
in the barracks so the boys would not
get out of shape
it was also done to force them to learn
to get accustomed to the hunger and
thirst that accompanied the martial
rations on the battlefield and it also
motivated them to steal food which would
improve their stealth tactics
though if one got caught in an attempt
to steal he would get severely beaten
and flogged not for stealing but for
being callous enough to get caught
spartan girls stayed with their families
even after the age of seven so they can
learn how to run a household from their
mother but that doesn't mean they were
not supposed to get educated the
education program was not so different
for them than from the boys but instead
of heavy martial training they were
taught dancing gymnastics javelin and
discus throwing which helped them to
bang both competitions at the heady and
games but do not think for a second that
this was the main objective of training
girls spartans believed that such
training helped them to become better
mothers in sparta both genders had a
clear divided responsibility males were
mandated to become soldiers and females
well they were mandated to birth more
soldiers they were nothing more than
parts of a machine
as if life in august wasn't hard enough
the teachers and administrators of this
program believed that bullying and
discord among students was the best way
to help them develop a personality they
would often look for opportunities to
start an argument among students and to
make them violent just because spartans
were warriors doesn't mean they had no
value for the virtue of wit
in fact a witty spartan was admired
among their peers but the agogi's job
was to create bards they were creating
hardcore soldiers so even though witty
remarks would be complimented they would
provoke the other student to reply to
one snarky remark physically fighting
and hazing were common sights in the
gosh every day one or two students would
sleep with a black eye a bruised leg or
a broken shoulder the teachers of a
gauge firmly believed that these
scuffles were a good means to eliminate
bad traits like weakness cowardice and
timidity among their students even
outside a gauge sparta's recreational
practices were all about pain and
endurance their version of a competition
was a contest of endurance known as
diamastogosis it involved adolescents
being flogged in front of an altar at
the sanctuary of artemis orthea this
annual practice was originally used as
both a religious ritual and a test of
the boy's bravery and resistance to pain
the winner was decided based on who
could endure the pain longest
but the creepy part was that there was
no upper limit to the torture or
flogging
as boys were brainwashed to resist as
long as possible the general ruling was
if somebody succumbed to pain or as we
say in common terms if he dies he dies
later when greece came under the rule of
the roman empire the horrible ritual
devolved into an outright blood sport by
the 3rd century a.d there was even an
amphitheater constructed so that scores
of tourists could cheer on the grizzly
ordeal
are you wondering who did the labor and
other necessary menial jobs for the
sustainability of society
every male resident was a soldier and
every female was busy breeding children
or taking care of the house their
solution was slaves or helits the
stratified society of sparta had all the
non-martial and non-political jobs
assigned to non-citizens
free non-citizens also called pirikoi
were designated for the merchandising
trade related professions
pellets or slaves were a state-owned
surf class who were doomed to do menial
jobs at the behest of the government now
mind you slaves were not allowed to be
owned privately in sparta similar to
communism today spartan society believed
in we over eye as in all property
including slaves were owned by the state
the helots were most likely the
indigenous people of laconia and nearby
messinia who were made into a slave race
after being conquered by invading dorian
people dorian was a collective term for
the macedonian tribes from the north who
conquered the peloponnese each helet was
assigned to work on the land of a
specific citizen but as they were owned
by the state their assigned master had
no rights to sell or liberate them
pellets had no political or voting
rights but they were allowed to marry
and had a limited right to own property
after paying their master his share
these slaves were accustomed to the
harsh and sadistic treatment from their
masters who considered slaves nothing
better than a toy or a pet
spartans loved to humiliate slaves any
chance they got slaves were often forced
to drink until they were intoxicated
enough that their actions while under
the influence could be used as a
demonstration to teach children about
the vices of drinking however sparta
knew their abuse and exploitation could
come back and bite them on the rear at
its peak sparta's pellet population
outnumbered its army by 7-1 on one hand
thanks to these many helits every
household in sparta had food on their
table on the other hand sparta's
government was aware that if helets
joined hands and rebelled not even aries
would be able to save sparta for spartan
authorities hellets or slaves were
nothing but tools for servitude
however if their population grew
exponentially they would be considered
pests so to deal with their pest problem
sparta conceived cryptia when the efibs
or younger men under marshall training
reached the age of 20 they were assessed
and marked for potential leadership
roles in the future these soon-to-be
leaders would get the opportunity to
test their medal by taking part of
cryptia a sort of secret police like the
gestapo of hitler's germany or the
guidance patrol of modern iran
it was a task force assigned to keep
watch overheld settlement and sniff out
any spark of rebellion
every fall season spartan efforts would
declare an unofficial war on the helots
and these young soldiers would get a
chance to impress their officers by
killing as many helmets as they could
this annual purge of slaves was aimed to
get rid of the strongest inspiring and
motivated slaves and at the same time
call their numbers so they could never
get strong enough to cause an uprising
soldiers participated in this culling
were considered elite in their ranks and
would gain notoriety when it came to
climbing the social ladder so what do
you think does this video change your
perception about mighty spartans which
other historical city or state would you
like us to cover in this series tell us
in the comments below and as always
thanks for watching nutty history
[Music]