The Spartans.
Tough, terrifying, and fearless.
These guys are not to be messed with because they always mean business when they’re marching
down the battlefield.
So far, the only thing most of us know about them is what we’ve seen in the movies: their
face off with the Persian Empire and the 300 soldiers that sacrificed their lives to protect
their freedom.
I don’t think the movies give us a full look on how life really was like for any Spartan
man or woman.
So in the video, we are going to talk about why
it was really really tough being a Spartan.
Number Ten: Tough Love
Infanticide is not uncommon in the ancient
world.
The Greeks and Romans have had their share in committing this deplorable act for various
reasons.
However, when it came to the Spartans, the introduction of the individual into their
society starts the moment he or she comes out of the womb.
Organized and managed by the state itself, all Spartan infants were brought to a council
of inspectors who will examine the child for any sign of physical defects.
Should an infant possess any sort of malformation or physical disability, they were left to
die.
Plutarch, an ancient historian, claims that the “ill-born” infants were tossed from
the height of Mount Taygetus where they would plummet to their deaths.
Modern historians, however, have dismissed this claim as pure myth.
What was likely was that these infants were left out in the wild to die from exposure
due to the elements or, if they are lucky, to be rescued by strangers and adopted into their
families.
Those who do pass the initial examination of the council aren’t out of the woods just
yet.
In order to find out if they are healthy and to test their constitutions, these infants
are bathed in wine instead of water.
Also in this society, a crying infant was frequently ignored and little children are commanded not to fear
the darkness or solitude.
This may be completely unacceptable in modern society but in the days of the Spartan, foreigners
and invaders sought and strongly preferred Spartan women because of their skills as nurses
and sitters as well as their brand of disciplining a child through tough love.
Number Nine: In The Army Now
It never gets easy or better for a Spartan
child as he grows up.
Spartan boys, in particular are taken away from their parents at the age of 7 and placed
in a strict, military-style education program called the “Agoge”, living in communal
barracks.
This system was designed to mold them into soldiers , skilled warriors, and upstanding
citizens of the state.
Aside from book-learning, these boys were educated in athletics, hunting, and warfare.
By the time they reach the age of twelve, these “soldiers-to-be” moved to the next
step of their education as they are deprived of all clothing except for a red cloak.
They were then forced to sleep outside and expected to make their own beds from whatever they
may find in the wild.
To also ready them for life in the battlefield, they were encouraged to hunt, scavenge, and
even steal their food.
However, if they were caught, the reprimand came in the form of floggings.
Spartan girls endure an almost similar kind of education.
While the boys are groomed into loyal and fearsome soldiers of the state, Spartan girls
are expected to grow up into strong women who can bear children for their state.
They were allowed to remain with their families but they are subjected to rigorous and equally
strict programs.
They are taught how to read and write as well as practiced dance, gymnastics, the javelin,
discus throwing, and many other arduous physical activities to make them physically strong
for the role of motherhood.
Number Eight: Just Like Regular School, but Worse
Spartans are among the most literate and intelligent races in the ancient world.
Children are early on schooled on reading, writing, poetry, and rhetoric.
However, this was just one part of the strict educational regimen Spartan children endured
every day.
The Agoge was also a place where Spartan boys were subject to hazing from their peers and
elders.
The reason behind it was to toughen them and groom them into soldiers.
It was a necessary form of “encouragement” to benefit their development as warriors and
upstanding citizens.
On normal days, fights and arguments would be instigated by instructors themselves as
part of their curriculum.
Basically bullying was encouraged.
The system of the Agoge was designed to train these youth into enduring hardships and be
resistant to almost any kind of abuse hurled their way.
Any sign of cowardice or timidity is met with teasing and, most of the time, physical violence
from their peers and superiors.
Spartan girls were also encouraged to participate in this ritualized hazing.
One example comes in the form of public humiliation.
On special occasions like religious or state ceremonies, Spartan girls will sing
songs in front of Spartan dignitaries about the boys in the Agoge.
If a boy was performing poorly in the school, he was either singled out from or seriously
ridiculed in the song in order to shame him into stepping up his performance.
Talk about throwing some serious shade!
Number Seven: A Pledge of Allegiance From their birth to their very last breath,
Spartan men were expected to be lifelong soldiers and fiercely loyal to their state because,
as terribly gruelling the Spartan educational system was, the only option for your Spartan
men was to become a soldier if he wished to become an equal among other citizens of Sparta.
This was an edict from a Spartan lawmaker called Lycurgus who prevented Spartan men
from legally choosing any occupation other than serving in the military: a commitment
that would last for decades until they were allowed to retire at the age of 60 but even
so, their retirement places them on reserve duty and can be called on anytime by the state.
Any other occupation such as farming, food production, and trade were left entirely to
the class of free non-citizens as well as a class called Helots enslaved by
the Spartan state.
Ironically, the Helots made up the majority of the Spartan population and were known to
revolt from time to time, a reason why Spartans devoted themselves, almost religiously, to
building a strong military.
Numer Six: The Spartan Diet If you think your trainer is giving you a
hard time about what you should be eating, check out what the Spartans eat.
It is no secret that Spartans are among the most fit races to have walked this earth.
I mean, come on, you can see this guy's abs through a trench coat!
This is due to the fact that they take physical fitness rather seriously and have an almost
religious devotion to proper diet.
Citizens who are overweight are publicly ridiculed and shamed; and, in extreme cases, banished
form the state just for their physical appearance.
This extreme discipline on fitness and diet starts when a Spartan man enters the Syssitia,
a military style mess and commune for citizens who have completed the main phase of the Agoge,
at the age of 21.
The Syssitia is a Spartan’s replacement for a nuclear family of 15 citizens each,
in which they would spend a number of years until the age of 30.
Wine was a staple in the Spartan diet but they are strict about having a little too
much to drink, believing that drunkenness is a shameful state for a Spartan to be in.
In order to steer Spartan youth away from being drunk, their elders would force slaves
to get wasted to show the negative effects of alcohol.
Number Five: Hunter’s Instincts From the age of 18, a Spartan man is considered
as a true soldier and was called an “Eiren” or “Adult Citizen”.
However, like any kind of military organization, the Spartan army has a separate branch reserved
only for those who have performed exceptional.
This arm is called the Krypteia or the Spartan secret service.
This group only accepts exceptional individuals into their fold and,
also, only accepts Spartan men who are not above the age of 30.
This special branch of the military is particularly cruel when it comes to training its soldiers
as it required their initiates to kill before they are let in.
This bloody process was oftentimes started by an elected Spartan leader.
Upon entering into office, he would declare war on the helots and provoke them into revolts.
This declaration would then make the killing of them [Helots] perfectly legal from the perspective
of the state’s judiciary.
Once an order was passed, these initiates will be sent out to into Helot camps armed only
with daggers and ambush them in the dark.
Number Four: Spartan Bromance
A Spartan soldier’s life was with his other soldiers.
It comes as no surprise that given the strict education and training they had at an early
age, Spartans are conditioned to treat his brothers-in-arms as his nuclear family.
They are, however, allowed to marry and many do so when they are living communally at the
Syssitia because it is a requirement that Spartans should sire children.
Though they may be married, soldiers are not allowed to live with their spouses.
“Equals”, or soldiers who are at the age of 30 above, were allowed to be with their
wives but being an Equal was not easily granted.
While a soldier may be considered one once he reaches the appropriate age, he may lose
it anytime if he does something that disgraced himself or the state.
Number Three: King and Country Like any ancient civilization, the Spartans
were ruled by a monarch.
What sets the Spartans apart from other monarchies, however, is that they have two kings who share
the throne.
A diarchy is not entirely uncommon in ancient civilizations but they can be rare.
In the case of Sparta, the two kings were descended from the royal families of the Agiads
and Eurypontids.
By sometime around the 6th centaury BC, an arrangement was made in order to allow a diarchy to exist
that allowed one king to remain in the city to rule and the other to lead military campaigns
away from the State.
For example, Leonidas was from the Agiad Family and he marched and commanded an army on his
campaign to Thermopylae while Leotychidas, from the Europtynid Family, concerned himself
with the internal matters of the State despite being an accomplished and respected general
himself.
Another unique Spartan quality to their monarchy was that their kings are not immune from common
civilian laws and the social conventions of the state in spite of their royal lineage.
They are also known to exercise a form of democracy where representatives were placed
in political positions and legislature as well as a fully functioning judiciary system.
Any infraction from Spartan law or custom by the king is prosecutable with the state’s laws.
In one example, King Archidamus who committed the “crime” of marrying a thin, petite
woman that lawgivers deemed inappropriate because their union could only produce “kinglets”
and not real kings.
He was then heavily fined by the state.
Number Two: Love in the Age of Sparta Back in the day, marriages were political
arrangements between states and countries in order to preserve their alliances or to
forge new ones.
It was the safest and surest way to also secure new territory and expand an army.
Spartans, however, have a different view of marriage.
For one, there seems to be no clear record of Spartans marrying outside their race.
It was known that they have a distaste of the Greeks and the Athenians, and are extremely
suspicious of foreigners and their motives.
And spartan marriages serve a more utilitarian function in their entire society in order
to create offspring.
Love and true affection are looked down upon and are seen as signs of weakness that can
put an individual to shame.
Each Spartan
is expected to marry an individual of great physical condition with the belief that perfection
will spawn perfection; although such is not always the case.
Number One: The Greatest Sin Spartan soldiers were expected to fearlessly
fight to the very last man and to his very last breath.
With a well-trained and highly skilled military, the Spartans have made a name for themselves
in history as one of the most ferocious armies in the world.
Surrender was never an option to any Spartan soldier and any sign of it from a soldier
is severely shamed by the military and the state.
To live and die for Sparta is the Spartan soldier’s mantra and laying down arms to
an enemy was viewed as the epitome of cowardice.
In an account by Herodotus, there were two soldiers who missed out on the famous battle
of Thermopylae.
When they returned home, they were disgraced and shamed.
Later on, one of the soldiers hanged himself and the other was only redeemed himself after he died
fighting in a later battle.
Spartan women, especially mothers, also share this responsibility to uphold the values of
their state.
Mothers have been known to tell their own children to return home with their shield or on it.
Only when a soldier died in battle can he be considered as having completed his duty
as a citizen; and, by Spartan law, only two classes of people were allowed to have their
names inscribed upon a tombstone: women who died in childbirth or men who fell in battle.
I guess if you were born into this society,
this really sounds, uh, normal to you.
So us looking at it now, we were like this is, this is impossible.
We - we can't possibley, I mean, I rarely go to the gym. How can I
be expected to, you know, live in the wilderness with a red cape?
That's why these were some of the ferocious warriors in history.
You know I bet you it wouldn't be long until somebody actually invents the Spartan workout.
Which is basically, yea, in the winter you're just going to go into the woods.
And survive for a month.
All right guys, thank you so much for watching the video. I'll see ya later.