[HN Gopher] Sayings of Spartan women
___________________________________________________________________
Sayings of Spartan women
Author : redwoolf
Score : 125 points
Date : 2021-09-09 14:12 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (penelope.uchicago.edu)
(TXT) w3m dump (penelope.uchicago.edu)
| orange_joe wrote:
| It's worth mentioning that Spartan women held huge amounts of
| wealth due to the violence within their society (men's wealth
| would be inherited by their wives who would then remarry).
| According to Aristotle (who is very biased) the women lived lives
| of luxury. The point of this is that the women who extol the
| violence of men have a material self interest in the deaths of
| their men (minimally as a class, potentially individually).
| dustintrex wrote:
| Some of the 5% of Spartan women who were full citizens,
| perhaps. However, Sparta was an _extremely_ unequal society,
| with some 85% either slaves or helots (also slaves, but owned
| by the state, not individuals).
| marcosdumay wrote:
| Well, that goes for every commentary on ancient societies.
| Unless it's explicitly about slaves and outcasts, it's about
| the at most 10% of the society that wasn't.
|
| At some point the Romans got more people to participate on
| their society, but that's centuries after any of that.
| rsynnott wrote:
| Sparta's demographic makeup was deeply weird even for the
| time. There's a decent summary here:
| https://acoup.blog/2019/08/23/collections-this-isnt-
| sparta-p... (tl;dr: >95% of people in Sparta were some sort
| of underclass, almost all slaves. By contrast, about 60% of
| people in Athens were an underclass, of which 70% slaves)
| TchoBeer wrote:
| Do you have a source for this?
| YeGoblynQueenne wrote:
| It's true. Just read any hisoty source for any historical
| period before modern times. See how many accounts you can
| find about the lives of "common people", which usually
| means slaves, serfs, etc. Even in modern times, you hear
| about Churchill or Lincoln, but where are the stories of
| the carpenters, or farmers, the milk maids or the nurses,
| the midwives or the factory workers? Who remembers their
| names, what they achieved, what they held dear, who they
| loved and married, and how they died?
|
| Most of hisotry is about the people that hold all the
| power in their hands and most of the time their great
| deeds is to crush everyone else underfoot. We learn the
| dates and placenames of the great battles where king so-
| and-so defeated king such-and-such, but do we ever hear
| the names of the hundreds or thousands of their men who
| left their families and land to go and die a sad,
| senseless death?
| 1123581321 wrote:
| This is eloquent but silly. There is a lot of good
| research, and popular accounts of it, on the effects of
| population-level status and trends on historical events.
| Given the article topic I would suggest starting with
| Property and Wealth in Classical Sparta.
| https://www.amazon.com/dp/1905125305?tag=fivebooks001-20
| brazzy wrote:
| > Unless it's explicitly about slaves and outcasts, it's
| about the at most 10% of the society that wasn't.
|
| This is absolutely not true. Pretty much no other society
| in history actually held more than 80% of the population
| enslaved like Sparta did. Rome certainly never did, nor did
| the other Greek states of the era.
| orange_joe wrote:
| The named women aren't helots and it's unlikely the unnamed
| women would be helots either. I was under the impression The
| only group we refer to as Spartan are that minority
| population of elites as the rest were referred to as helots
| (who were also unable to serve in their military)
| at_a_remove wrote:
| Their sayings do have a rather "disposable" view of their sons.
| I suppose it is the equivalent of that loathsome White Feather
| movement, which had a too-significant overlap with the
| Suffragettes of the time.
| datameta wrote:
| Would you mind expanding upon this?
| SyzygistSix wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_feather
| datameta wrote:
| It seems that a primary supporter of the White Feather
| movement was a key member of the _anti_suffrage movement:
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Augusta_Ward
|
| So, I am interested what sort of overlap with the
| Suffrage movement the parent commenter was talking about.
| chalst wrote:
| It's worth noting that Aristotle was not a disinterested
| commentator on Sparta: he loathed the relatively high amount of
| freedom Spartan women had compared to Athenian women, and went
| out of his way to argue that when bad things happened to Sparta
| it had resulted from this.
|
| See, e.g., http://jsphfrtz.com/aristotles-interpretation-of-
| spartan-wom...
| orange_joe wrote:
| Yeah, he was super biased. For a number of reasons. I just
| kept it as a parenthetical because I think it's fair to
| assume that they were relatively wealthy, more equal and
| powerful than their contemporaries, even if Aristotle is
| likely overstating the extent of these differences.
| kleiba wrote:
| ...and then there's Schopenhauer:
| https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/483552-the-cheapest-sort-of...
| platz wrote:
| > a man is proud of his own nation, it argues that he has no
| qualities of his own of which he can be proud; otherwise he
| would not have recourse to those which he shares with so many
| millions of his fellowmen
|
| seems like an overstep
| sto_hristo wrote:
| Not quite that much according to my observations. All the
| nationalists where i'm from are bunch of literal morons that
| can't do much useful things beyond clenching fists and
| shouting $country greatest in the world, everyone other
| country run by little girl.
| Miraste wrote:
| Schopenhauer is one of history's biggest assholes, it's like
| his whole thing. No one liked him even when he was alive.
| new_guy wrote:
| You'd be an asshole too if no-one liked you.
| YeGoblynQueenne wrote:
| And if you were an asshole, no-one would like you, too.
| cafard wrote:
| Well, Nietzche liked Schopenhauer at least until after
| _Untimely Reflections_ was published.
|
| Schopenhauer certainly could bad-mouth anyone or anything.
| But remembering him for that is like remembering Dijkstra
| for the put-downs of Basic or Fortran rather than for his
| constructive work.
| scns wrote:
| Have to concur, sadly. I don't take advice on ethics from a
| man who kicked the woman, who took care of his house, down
| the stairs.
| Miraste wrote:
| And that was ethically consistent for Arthur because he
| didn't view women as people.
| rootlocus wrote:
| Couldn't find a definitive source for this. Wikipedia
| states it was a neighbour who wouldn't leave his entrance
| so he pushed her out of the way. She then sued him
| claming she was violently assauled, had become paralyzed,
| and was unable to work. He was found guilty and he paid
| her pension 15 years until she died.
| YeGoblynQueenne wrote:
| Schopenhauer is a twisted firestarter. See picture.
| jezclaremurugan wrote:
| Obligatory - https://acoup.blog/2019/08/29/collections-this-isnt-
| sparta-p...
|
| Not as glorious as it is made out to be..
| rootlocus wrote:
| How can the highest rated and lowest rated comments (at this
| moment) be the exact same thing?
| [deleted]
| rgvr wrote:
| I don't understand the point of changing words like "many" to
| "mony" or "man" to "mon". I mean if you're anyway writing the
| entire thing in modern day English then why do this.
|
| Is it just for the effect of it I.e., making it look
| sophisticated? or is it some kind of attempt at retaining the
| originality/authenticity?
| retrac wrote:
| Some people take the Sapir-Whorf theory too seriously:
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_relativity
| gpvos wrote:
| In what sense is that connected to the above?
| rebuilder wrote:
| Isn't this a site for people who take some things too
| seriously?
| pvg wrote:
| It's supposed to be conveying some kind of regional
| accent/dialect, I think. A bit from the same translation:
|
| _A Spartan, being asked if the road into Sparta were safe,
| said, That depends on what kind of a mon ye are; for the lions
| gang about where they wull, but the hares we hunt over that
| land. "_
|
| Edit: poking around the translation some, it looks like it's
| supposed to represent the Doric Greek dialect.
|
| https://i.imgur.com/Di0nGS9.png
| thwave wrote:
| Correct. The translated sentence ("my son was a gude and
| honourable mon, but Sparta has mony a mon better than him.")
| does ends with two distinctly Doric words: teno (there, i.e.
| in Sparta) karronas (stronger/better), instead of the Attic
| ekei kreittonas.
| jnsie wrote:
| > "my son was a gude and honourable mon, but Sparta has
| mony a mon better than him."
|
| On a sidenote, this sounds northern irish to me. Think
| Daniel Day-Louis in The Boxer
| pvg wrote:
| Thanks! Fascinating that the translator chose to represent
| the dialectal bits explicitly with a contemporary dialect,
| even though the style of the translation is not all
| contemporary. And the contemporariness makes the intent
| hard to understand without reading a bunch of footnotes (or
| ancient Greek) only a few decades later.
| anigbrowl wrote:
| Per the heading, it is a scan of an old book which itself seems
| to be a collection of older texts. The weird spellings are
| consistent with English representations of Scottish speech
| patterns, and might have been intended to communicate to the
| original audience that the Spartans' general gruffness and
| aggression were comparable to that of Scots.
| stult wrote:
| I think I vaguely recall the explanation from a classics course
| many, many, many years ago, but I can't find a source without
| investing a ton more effort, so take this with a grain of salt:
| IIRC, Plutarch wrote the sayings in intentionally archaic (for
| his time) Greek. He lived hundreds of years after Sparta had
| disappeared as a power in the ancient world, so he could have
| intended it to demonstrate the great antiquity of the
| quotations, or he could have done so to paint the Spartans as
| rough-around-the-edges rustics. The translation attempts to
| mimic this effect by translating the archaic-sounding Greek as
| archaic-sounding English.
| Applejinx wrote:
| To me it sounded like suddenly they were Rastafarians. Or
| perhaps Rastas out of the William Gibson novel, Neuromancer?
| I've read that more recently than I've read the history of
| Bob Marley and the Wailers, because I still have Neuromancer
| but sold Catch A Fire (I should go buy another copy, it was a
| very good book).
|
| I doubt any of this was the intent.
| pvg wrote:
| Imagine the movie _300_ except voiced in the style of
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6wtj04dJ_g
| nerdponx wrote:
| I figured those were OCR errors or something. How would this
| help maintain originality?
| duskwuff wrote:
| No, this is intentional. Here's the original book on the
| publisher's own web site:
|
| https://www.loebclassics.com/view/plutarch-
| moralia_sayings_s...
|
| There's a footnote on that part "Cf. the note on _Moralia_ ,
| 190 B, _supra_ ", but I'm not sure what that's referencing.
| thwave wrote:
| This footnote refers to Sayings of Kings and Commanders[0],
| another text of Plutarch, but is not related to the
| translation.
|
| [0] https://www.loebclassics.com/view/plutarch-
| moralia_sayings_k...
| pvg wrote:
| That's 190 C. It might be this bit about Doric
| somethingorother
|
| https://i.imgur.com/oV88mWG.png
| luxpir wrote:
| From a British perspective, this is pretty clearly a faux-Scots
| interpretation for that earthy feel the author must have
| thought was warranted. Appropriated with all the confidence
| only the English can muster. I may be way off base, but those
| are first impressions.
|
| > aither clear yersel' of this or stop yer living.
|
| A few stereotypical Scots markers there. And "mony" and "mon"
| are Northern features from Derby to Scotland in various
| pockets. Dying out altogether now, of course, becoming the
| homogenised transatlantic factory line English we're all so
| excited to speak nowadays. Can I get a tea with milk to go?
| Cheers!
| tokai wrote:
| Hm, all most all of them are horrible. It's so impressive to me
| that we still proclaim Sparta as something worthwhile of praise
| when it was an awful inhumane culture and society that didn't
| even last that long.
| steve76 wrote:
| It's awesome. Lycurgus of Sparta is a legendary law giver. It's
| illegal to be poor. It's illegal to be a victim. Fastest way to
| solve poverty or crime.
|
| Do you judge all societies equally? The Waring States of China,
| or African barbarity, much more brutal. They get a pass because
| you want a forced ambiguity and amorality.
| mountainb wrote:
| Sparta's the model for Thomas More's Utopia.
| mc32 wrote:
| Aside from Sports (where competition is the whole point outside
| of the Ivy League), Sparta is always portrayed as cruel and
| inhumane, deservedly so. On the other hand, they were,
| apparently, good at waging war one way or another.
|
| I've not seen it associated with philosophy and civilization as
| Athens was, among others.
| jacobmischka wrote:
| According to Deveraux (article series linked in another
| comment) they weren't even good at that!
| forgetfulness wrote:
| They had a professional officer corps and drills. In fact,
| that's mostly what the Spartiate class was really.
|
| Since other city states had armies comprised of the gentry
| donning a suit of armor when needed, it made a lot of a
| difference in that context.
|
| Well it turns out that you can have a worthwhile society
| while also having a professional officer corps and drills,
| it's just that the Spartans didn't.
| cabalamat wrote:
| Indeed. They were good are producing high-quality
| individual infantrymen. But (1) there weren't very many of
| them, and (2) there's a lot more to winning wars than how
| tough your infantry are.
|
| I'm reminded of Adolf Hitler and Hideki Tojo who both
| thought that Americans were only interested in money and
| sex, decadent, undisciplined and unmilitaristic (all true,
| to some extent), and that therefore they'd be easy to beat
| in a war. It didn't quite work out for them!
| clairity wrote:
| > "...Sports (where competition is the whole point outside of
| the Ivy League)..."
|
| the point of sports in the ivy league is also competition,
| whether they're able to be as competitive as other leagues or
| not.
| mc32 wrote:
| You could be right and I might be wrong. I get the feeling
| for them it's more focused on sportsmanship and fellowship
| than adversarial competition.
|
| If the focus were on winning then they'd recruit like the
| other schools for their sports teams (pac10, bigEast, etc.
| I know some have expanded and names have changed)
| clairity wrote:
| perhaps a greater percentage of ivy athletes play for
| "the love of the sport", as something less than 1% of all
| college athletes will go on to a professional career (and
| few of those will by ivy leaguers), but competition is
| certainly still central. folks who go to exclusive
| schools tend to be quite competitive, practically by
| definition. winning and being competitive are certainly
| not the same though. these athletes want to win, even if
| they're at a disadvantage and don't win as often as the
| big sports schools. note also that ivy leaguers tend to
| do better at sports in which money hasn't heavily
| distorted the playing field.
|
| the problem for ivies with respect to recruiting (for
| winning) is the academic admissions floor, not money
| (harvard and yale having two of the biggest endowments in
| history) nor necessarily even an aversion to cheating and
| corruption. top athletes are too conspicuous not to draw
| outsized scrutiny in that regard, and tarnishing the
| brand that way just isn't worth it.
| dragontamer wrote:
| Sparta was good at fighting, but bad at war!
|
| Spartans were known to have terrible logistics, they couldn't
| field an army for more than a year. Back then, most armies
| needed to live off the fat of the land and/or have huge
| supply trains to remain effective, and Spartans had neither
| skillset. (When talking Bronze age tactics: this was the key
| advantage of slingers, who could craft their sling-bullets
| from clay and rocks found near the battle areas. Mass
| production and distribution of arrows was still not mastered
| in the 1000 BC-era or so)
|
| As such, Spartans would "gloriously" run into a few battles,
| declare themselves superior, then go home. While the enemies
| would just keep marching towards their target, sustainably
| pressing forward.
|
| Its like watching an expert Sprinter battle a Marathon
| Runner. War is a marathon, not a sprint. Consider the Persian
| armies that fought against the Greeks: thousands of miles
| away from home.
|
| In contrast, Spartans fought on their home turf and barely
| were able to do so effectively. Sure, they won a lot of
| battles, but holding back the Persian army required more than
| just winning a battle here or there.
|
| ----------
|
| That's why the Athenians worshiped Athena: the goddess of
| wisdom _and_ war. They realized that waging war was both an
| issue of might and intelligence. Intelligence to move your
| supplies and organize them so that your armies can stay in
| the field longer than your enemies.
|
| --------
|
| That being said: the Marine Corps glorify the Spartan way of
| thinking, because the USA's Marine Corps are designed to be
| the spearhead of battle.
|
| The Army is more about logistics. Its got less glory but is
| more practical. They don't glorify the Spartan way.
| Applejinx wrote:
| Makes sense. It's like a perfect metaphor for imbalances
| between individualism and collectivism.
|
| Seems like Sparta internalized personal valor so intensely
| that the only collective good they could possibly
| understand, was to project the whole country as an imagined
| heroic individual, and then try to individually triumph in
| the name of that country.
|
| Meanwhile, there's a lot of countries out there with more
| of an interest in community spirit and collective action. I
| daresay there's good metaphors for leaning too far in that
| way, as well, but Sparta did get wrecked in the end by the
| collectivists, who quite simply out-organized them and
| provided better support for their soldiers.
|
| If honor dictates you have to jump over the ten foot wall
| ALONE, you ain't doing it, and humbler people who build a
| human pyramid and lift up those not good at climbing...
| their whole army's gonna be on the other side of that wall,
| anytime they want.
| dragontamer wrote:
| As far as I can tell, the modern world has left the realm
| of "individual vs collectivism" and is more about
| "individual vs collective vs collective-of-collectives".
|
| There's nothing wrong with the Marines being the modern
| Sparta, because the Marines are just one team in our
| team-of-teams of the military. Marines + Army work on the
| same projects together, so the Marines can be the
| "unsustainable elite fighting force", while the Army can
| hold the zones after the Marines have done initial
| combat.
|
| From this perspective, individuals glorifying combat
| works in the context of the Marines. If the Marines were
| alone, they'd fall just like Sparta did way back in the
| Greek days: but that's not really an issue today. The
| Army will inevitably help out whatever conflicts the
| Marines get into.
|
| So the "different cultures", the different stories that
| these communities have, work out in the context of the
| team-of-teams that make up today's military.
|
| --------
|
| Society has advanced a lot in the last 3000 years. We
| know that we can build a community similar to the
| Spartans. The questions we have today aren't "good vs
| bad", but more about "where is the proper place this
| philosophy should be in our greater society?".
| Applejinx wrote:
| Yes, absolutely. If we need Spartans, and we have that
| larger perspective, we can make not only the Spartans,
| but also the context for them to exist in. You've got it
| exactly right.
| rsynnott wrote:
| > It's so impressive to me that we still proclaim Sparta as
| something worthwhile of praise
|
| Do we? I thought it was fairly well-known to be extremely
| nasty.
| NoGravitas wrote:
| It remains extremely popular with chuds, who actually _want_
| our society to be nastier than it already is.
| AlgorithmicTime wrote:
| The Spartans are the OG practitioners of Master Morality, as
| Nietsche would put it. That which is good is that which is
| useful, that which is bad is that which is harmful. Cowardice
| and the like are harmful, therefore they are bad.
|
| This is in contrast with the reigning slave morality of our
| times.
| AdmiralAsshat wrote:
| Anyone noticed the html filename is
| "sayings_of_spartan_women*.html"? That asterisk in the filename
| doesn't cause the webserver to explode?
| Taywee wrote:
| It really shouldn't. An asterisk is perfectly legal in a
| filename and in a URL path. It is a special shell character,
| but if your webserver is looking up static files via the shell,
| you need a different webserver pronto.
| gjsman-1000 wrote:
| The essential philosophy of Sparta: Survival of the fittest.
| sto_hristo wrote:
| I guess they needed more fitness then.
| brazzy wrote:
| ...as long as he's from the ruling caste, that is.
| ponow wrote:
| ... a caste originating as the most fit, no doubt
| brazzy wrote:
| ...the most fit to rule, according to their own criteria,
| certainly.
| goodpoint wrote:
| If by "fittest" you mean "lucky enough to be born into the
| ruling class".
| wly_cdgr wrote:
| They sound like a fun bunch
| intrepidhero wrote:
| An awful lot of those sayings are extolling "willingness to
| commit violence" as a virtue. That's not the sort of society I
| think we should emulate.
| wutbrodo wrote:
| There's a novel twist on this particular selection too.
| Glorifying violence and being callous about its consequences is
| even more abhorrent from a position where you're guaranteed not
| to suffer the direct consequences.
| emadabdulrahim wrote:
| Doesn't it depends on the context? Defending an elderly from
| assault or protecting one's family from a reckless person is
| violence in the name of virtue.
| xgb84j wrote:
| While violence is sometimes justified, I think it's still
| better to build a society that tries to solve its problems
| without violence or prevents problems that can only be solved
| with violence.
|
| When you have reckless people attacking the elderly you need
| better psychological healthcare and a better social system to
| prevent that.
|
| I understand your point and in a narrow context it's
| definitely true, but in a larger context you can prevent most
| violence by changing society.
| refurb wrote:
| What about the people that are violent, not because of
| mental illness, but because well, they want to cause others
| pain?
| xgb84j wrote:
| Many of these people are heavily traumatized. Charles
| Manson for example was mistreated by his mother and in
| prison. If there were better child protective services
| and a more humane prison system in place, he might never
| have done what he did.
|
| Most people doing evil things are in part doing these
| evil things as a result of their circumstances. By
| changing their circumstances through social programs you
| reduce violence and make everyone happier as a result.
|
| You can argue that blaming violence on circumstances
| ignores people's own responsibility, but I believe that
| better social and medical programs are still worth it
| because they attack the part of the root cause society
| can influence most easily.
| Applejinx wrote:
| Rule of law and systemic governance will always be more
| practical to manage this, than dependence on heroic
| vigilante justice to meet an evil individual with a
| heroic individual, on the spot and ready to act.
|
| There's a variety of reasons for this, but one of 'em is
| that in a condition of systemic governance, there's some
| societal pressure against the kind of sadism you mention.
| In a world like Sparta, it's hard to tell the heroes from
| the villains, and anybody might lash out at any time.
| Even the quotes given, spell out situations where random
| violence was just a part of everyday, expected life. This
| causes tensions and grudges.
| narrator wrote:
| A lot of those quotes make me think that they thought they were
| so much better than everyone else that their downfall was
| chiefly caused by believing their own propaganda. This hubris,
| which the Athenians always warned about, has caused many
| empires to fall throughout history.
| Taywee wrote:
| Who is suggesting we emulate it? Can't things just be
| interesting historically?
| Applejinx wrote:
| Yes. It's worth study. Especially since, all the world over,
| we've got resurgence of Spartan attitudes towards virtue,
| valor, and violence.
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| There's a subset of people who think (or at least act like
| they do) anything short of a strong condemnation of something
| they don't like is an endorsement.
|
| Usually you see these people pop up when discussing societal
| norms in the 3rd world but they do pop up frequently enough
| to be noticed when discussing history.
| Double_Cast wrote:
| Potential violence != actual violence.
|
| The potential to commit violence can be reframed as strength.
| It's useful because it grants you negotiating leverage,
| regardless of whether you are the aggressor or defender. Can't
| defend yourself? Vae victis.
| intrepidhero wrote:
| The capability to commit violence might be a strength in a
| world where violence is an unfortunate necessity, ie for
| defense of the common good. But unless it's paired with
| wisdom and _reluctance_ (as the opposite of the willingness
| noted above and gleefully promoted by adherents to the
| Spartan mythos) that capability is mostly the tool of
| tyranny.
| [deleted]
| steve76 wrote:
| Don't you have a store to loot and a city to burn and a murder
| rate to double and a terrorist nation to build?
|
| One criticism I do have is it's all about dying, as in, losing.
| We lack a clarity. It's easier than most people think. Light
| those people up. Have skill. Be cagey. But don't kid yourself.
| You're dealing with animals who lack your compassion. Your past
| victim-hood means nothing, just blood in the water. The people
| who do claim it wins popularity and softness works have fooled
| you and the most malicious ones of them all. They actively seek
| your destruction. This isn't kindergarten!
| duxup wrote:
| There's very much a cultist / opressive / disturbing aspect
| from the bits of quotes and history that have been passed on.
| herio wrote:
| On the topic of Spartan societey in general, a really good read
| is https://acoup.blog/category/collections/this-isnt-sparta/ by
| Dr. Bret Deveraux.
|
| Long read but well worth it for interested people.
| RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote:
| It is a very interesting series. However, I think he
| understates classic Spartan military prowess.
|
| If you look at Deveraux's list of military victories and
| defeats, you will see a lot of the defeats came after the
| Peloponnesian war. I believe even Greek sources talked about
| how Spartan society became softer after winning the
| Peloponnesian war.
|
| Also, the Spartans were famous for their army not their navy.
|
| If you take the list and remove naval battles and battles
| fought after the Peloponnesian War, you end up with something
| like 12 victories and 4 defeats with is a 75% win rate which is
| likely pretty impressive all things considered.
| lq313c wrote:
| He also points out that the Spartans fought primarily against
| much weaker opponents, making their military prowess not so
| impressive. If I constantly pick fights against children, my
| win rate would be quite high as well.
| klipt wrote:
| But isn't "all their opponents were weaker" just another
| way of saying "Sparta was unusually strong"?
| nsajko wrote:
| No.
| ianbicking wrote:
| Great series! I came out with the feeling that the Spartans
| were like the genteel Antebellum plantation owners of Greece:
| seemingly noble and stoic, but in reality terribly cruel,
| corrupted, and decadent.
| gadders wrote:
| I always thought the tactics of the Krypteia against the
| helots looked similar to the KKK.
| kybernetikos wrote:
| I had been thinking about fantasy stories and what the
| maximumly evil evil empire you could write in a story and
| still have it somewhat believable. After reading that, I
| think Sparta is probably it, if not a little beyond it.
| rsynnott wrote:
| SM Stirling's Draka, an attempt at a maximally evil empire,
| borrowed quite a lot from the Spartans, presumably for this
| reason. Though they were a lot more competent, which was
| always one of Sparta's major failings.
| abecedarius wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Domination SF novels
| inspired in part by Sparta.
| ianbicking wrote:
| Honestly a lot of colonial rule feels pretty awful too, and
| with a similar flavor.
|
| Yet something about Sparta seemed worse. Maybe because they
| maintained a kind of stability of oppression for so long,
| or maybe it's my own biases and the fact that oppressed and
| oppressor were both white and more-or-less of the same
| culture. Or is it inevitable that this kind of oppression
| also must be supported by ideologically denigration of the
| oppressed? But is denigration even enough, do you also need
| separation, the sense that the oppressed are a different
| people? That is, did the Spartan ruling class look down on
| the helots as not just inferior but alien? If so then the
| class differences may have had all the same attributes as
| race and racism but without skin color differences.
| naravara wrote:
| > Honestly a lot of colonial rule feels pretty awful too,
| and with a similar flavor.
|
| I suspect what makes colonialism feel less shocking is
| that most of the cruelty happens "out there" and the day-
| to-day activities that promulgate it were usually done
| with native man-power in those regions. Like one faction
| there that was elevated above the others and made to do
| the dirty work.
|
| The primary beneficiaries aren't forced to see and live
| with it and very few of them ever have to go and get
| their hands dirty. This is all sustained by a set of
| narratives and beliefs back home that sanitize these
| activities and depict the foreign populations as being
| not sophisticated enough for self-government or appeals
| to reason. They were either childlike and ignorant or
| inherently violent martial races.
|
| Sparta, in contrast, had a hereditary elite that does its
| own dirty work up close and didn't seem to be engaged in
| any self-deception about the moral status and
| intellectual capabilities of their slaves.
| rsynnott wrote:
| > Yet something about Sparta seemed worse.
|
| Very few other slave societies _had kids ritualistically
| kill the slaves as part of their education_ (there's
| maybe some wiggle room on whether this actually happened
| or was mythical, but it's _definitely_ part of the
| popular view), so there's that.
|
| Sparta was also an oddity just in the sheer size of the
| slave class; under 5% of the population was fully free.
| Few if any other slave societies had that sort of ratio.
|
| > That is, did the Spartan ruling class look down on the
| helots as not just inferior but alien?
|
| Yes; they were 'foreigners' (they were originally, at
| least mythically, inhabitants of a neighboring city
| state). They also had a separate discriminated class for
| Spartans who'd been stripped of civil rights; these
| weren't viewed as the same.
| lifeisstillgood wrote:
| He recently appeared in the EconTalk podcast and its worth
| hearing too (will find the link). But they touched on Sparta
| and the thing that struck me was just how unequal - something
| like 5% or less of the population of Sparta (and it was a big
| state by Greek standards), only 5% were "free" - everyone
| else was a Slave.
|
| The level of violence to stop that becoming an uncontrolled
| uprising must have been huge.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| Modern Gulf emirates have a similar ratio of citizens to
| guest workers. Western profesionnals are treated with
| respect, but manual workers from India or Philippines are
| basically slaves in everything but name.
|
| How the history repeats itself, this time among hi-tech
| skyscrapers.
| hutzlibu wrote:
| When the gangsters keep the papers of the workers, the
| lines do indeed get blurry.
|
| But it is still quite a difference between exploiting
| someone weaker and actually owning a person and be
| legally able to do anything with him or her.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| I would say that one is _de facto_ slave if their
| superiors can rape or kill them without legal
| repercussions.
| hutzlibu wrote:
| I would agree to that.
|
| They still would have to fear, that someone leaks the
| video of it - and some superior needs a scapegoat to
| punish, because _everyone here_ respects human rights
| etc.
|
| A legally owned slave, was legally OK to be raped or
| killed. And ok to proudly tell everyone about it.
| brezelgoring wrote:
| >They still would have to fear, that someone leaks the
| video of it
|
| Is it really a deterrent, though? You said yourself that
| it'd be scapegoated and its not like they depend on good
| PR to keep their goodies, they own the country after all.
|
| Also I can't help but wonder what these people talk about
| behind closed doors, do they really play by the same
| rules you and I would be held accountable to behind
| closed doors?
| hutzlibu wrote:
| "they own the country after all."
|
| They still need good relationships with the west. Open
| slavery would not be tolerated.
| NateEag wrote:
| I suspect it would, at least until the dependency on
| Middle Eastern oil is gone.
|
| Humans are amazing at justifying actions. There's a whole
| school of ethical thought devoted to it (utilitarianism).
| lelandfe wrote:
| Been meaning to turn this one into a PDF to read on the train.
|
| I wonder if he's ever considered publishing that or some of his
| other long reads. A low estimate has This Isn't Sparta at 130
| pages. Images take that higher.
| unemphysbro wrote:
| His econtalk appearance was great:
|
| https://www.econtalk.org/bret-devereaux-on-ancient-greece-an...
| YeGoblynQueenne wrote:
| That is a very biased article that is playing up all the
| aspects of Spartan society that modern audiences would find
| repulsive for internet likes. At the end of the day it is not
| unlike the film it criticises (300) except it's going all the
| way to the other end and painting a portrait of a grim, evil
| empire.
|
| It is good to keep in mind that pretty much all ancient
| societies had norms and customs that we find repulsive today,
| from pederasty, to slavery, including sexual slavery, to
| killing of female children, to depriving women of all human
| rights and treating them as chattel. Sparta sounds particularly
| bad if one does not know much about the ancients. Otherwise
| they sound somewhat ordinary and only a bit more up themselves
| than others.
| baybal2 wrote:
| > to depriving women of all human rights and treating them as
| chattel.
|
| A wife was a chattel, as per law, up until the 20th century
| in a number of European countries.
| estaseuropano wrote:
| I read the entire series and can't agree with your assessment
| at all. Yes he was very critical of Spartan society, but I
| feel he very clearly demonstrates through various sources why
| he has these views, e.g. highlighting that most of what we
| hear, see and might admire about Sparta is true only for 3%
| of the population (spartiates), while the vast majority are
| lower classes and in particular slaves (helots). And even
| those 'good things' might not be true.
|
| I'd be interested where you disagree on substance.
| YeGoblynQueenne wrote:
| Note that this is from memory but, for example, the author
| of the linked blog posts makes an outrageous distinction
| between the free people of "Sparta", which he calls
| "Spartiates" and all "Spartans" which includes the helots.
| This is were your expression "3% of the population
| (spartiates)" comes from.
|
| That is an outrageous distinction that is not found in any
| ancient or modern source. It appears to be something that
| the author completely made up in order to support his
| revisionist interpretation of the history of ancient
| Sparta.
|
| First, there is no way to make a distinction between
| "Spartan" and "Spartiate" in the Greek language. In Greek,
| ancient and modern, a person who lives in, or is from, a
| place called "Sparta" is a "Spartiates", i.e. "Spartiate".
| "Spartiates" is most commonly latinised as "Spartan",
| sometimes as "Spartiate", but there is no semantic
| difference between the two.
|
| Second, there is no modern source I'm aware of, other than
| the linked series of blog posts, and certainly no ancient
| source that refers to the helots as "Spartans",
| "Spartiates", "Lacedaemons", or anything else but "helots",
| or simply the slaves of the Spartans. This is because
| ancient authors only ever refer to helots when they want to
| point out how cruel were the Spartans (which obviously must
| exclude the helots themselves from the group of "Spartans")
| and don't really care about them, or their fate, otherwise.
| So the idea that the population of "Sparta" was mostly made
| up of slaves is a figment of the author's imagination.
|
| It is true that the slaves of the Spartans were (many) more
| than the Spartans, but this is also true of most other
| Greek city-states, where manual labor was performed by
| slaves and many citizens owned more than one slave. In
| fact, other Greeks did not treat their own slaves with any
| less cruelty than the Spartans. For example, the main
| source of richess of classical Athens was the silver mined
| from the mines of Lavrion where thousands of slaves,
| including children, were made to work in conditions that we
| would, today, rightly find revolting.
|
| From memory again, there were other errors, all of which
| were the result of the author trying to play up historical
| themes for clicks, but I would have to re-read the series
| of posts to remember. In any case my recommendation is to
| turn to primary sources if one is interested in the history
| of Sparta. Read Thucydides, read Plutarch, read Xenophon,
| read Plato, read Aristotle, read Herodotus even, but keep
| in mind that everyone who wrote about Sparta had a
| political affiliation, either to Sparta, or to the enemies
| of Sparta, and in any case ancient historians were not
| always 100% accurate.
| nsajko wrote:
| > outrageous distinction between the free people of
| "Sparta", which he calls "Spartiates" and all "Spartans"
| which includes the helots
|
| > That is an outrageous distinction that is not found in
| any ancient or modern source. It appears to be something
| that the author completely made up in order to support
| his revisionist interpretation of the history of ancient
| Sparta.
|
| Terms like "Spartiate" are standard.
| JackFr wrote:
| Yes, the ancients were very different from us. But Sparta was
| special even to contemporaries. And it was special ways that
| are especially appalling to modern sensibilities. It's
| dishonest to ignore that.
| fishtoaster wrote:
| Iirc that series addresses this critique in some depth,
| pointing out that sparta was particularly awful even by the
| standards of other greek states. Another interesting bit was
| how it's historically rare for slave-owning societies to have
| more than 50% of their population enslaved. Since sparta was
| closer to 80% enslaved people, they relied on particularly
| brutal methods to keep down the regular slave revolts, making
| them considerably crueler than their contemporaries.
| hutzlibu wrote:
| The implications of 80% enslaved people are indeed very
| harsh.
|
| Which makes this
|
| "painting a portrait of a grim, evil empire."
|
| quite accurate.
|
| I cannot find much noble ideals in the "glorious" spartans.
| [deleted]
| throwaway20371 wrote:
| > Another interesting bit was how it's historically rare
| for slave-owning societies to have more than 50% of their
| population enslaved
|
| Probably worth noting, then, that in 1860, South Carolina
| and Mississippi had over 50% population enslaved, and four
| more states over 40% population enslaved.
|
| Considering that American-owned slaves were treated much
| crueler on average than Ancient slave populations, I'm
| curious whether Spartans were more or less like Americans
| in this regard. A glorious empire built on brutality and
| moral superiority.
| thaumasiotes wrote:
| > Considering that American-owned slaves were treated
| much crueler on average than Ancient slave populations
|
| What?
| TimTheTinker wrote:
| OP speaks the truth. At least since the Roman empire,
| there has been no form of slavery in the Western world
| anywhere near as brutal as American slavery. (not to
| exclude the East or the Arab world, I just don't know
| enough to comment on them)
|
| In the Roman empire, selling oneself as a slave was even
| seen as a last resort when capital was urgently needed
| (like when a debt repayment was ordered by a magistrate
| and a person didn't have enough money and fungible
| possessions to pay it). Slaves could also buy their
| freedom, and were sometimes even given their freedom as a
| gift.
|
| Of course, there were cruel masters as well as kind ones.
| But prior to the African slave trade, the _institution_
| itself wasn 't remotely as brutal or morally abhorrent,
| because it wasn't built on a social commitment to racism.
|
| American racism was fueled in part by the abhorrent
| belief that Africans were of a separate _race_ (i.e.
| subspecies) that was inferior in a Darwinian sense, thus
| dehumanizing them in people 's minds. This sentiment
| appears sometimes in 1800s American literature. (And if I
| may say so, I think it bears a remarkable resemblance to
| some Nazi antisemitic propaganda.)
| wavefunction wrote:
| >there has been no form of slavery in the Western world
| anywhere near as brutal as American slavery
|
| Absolutist statements like this rarely seem to hold
| true.[0] American slavery is European slavery as well.
| Europeans (both countries and individuals) benefited
| extremely handsomely from enslaving people in Africa and
| bringing them to their colonies in America. And even
| after they had finally outlawed slavery for themselves
| just a few scant decades before the US did, they kept
| buying that affordable slave-produced cotton and sugar
| and coffee and etc. from the Americas.
|
| [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_medieval_Euro
| pe
| thaumasiotes wrote:
| > Slaves could also buy their freedom, and were sometimes
| even given their freedom as a gift.
|
| Again, this is not a difference between ancient slavery
| and American slavery. Why do you mention it?
|
| > Of course, there were cruel masters as well as kind
| ones. But prior to the African slave trade, the
| institution itself wasn't remotely as brutal or morally
| abhorrent, because it wasn't built on a social commitment
| to racism.
|
| Now it seems like you're specifically trying not to
| respond to the claim that American slaves received
| _crueler treatment_ than ancient slaves did.
| Larrikin wrote:
| You're arguing that exceptions and rare occurrences in
| American slavery are equivalent to the norms in Rome and
| for some reason trying to make American slavery seem like
| it really wasn't all that bad.
|
| Your style of responding also makes it seem like you're
| arguing the point that slavery wasn't all that bad in the
| US from a very specific view point
| OrvalWintermute wrote:
| > ...At least since the Roman empire, there has been no
| form of slavery in the Western world anywhere near as
| brutal as American slavery. (not to exclude the East or
| the Arab world, I just don't know enough to comment on
| them)
|
| So, you launch a massive generalization, and attempt to
| walk it back by opting out most of the world (Asia, the
| middle east/Arab World, but making no mention of Africa,
| or Oceania). While we broadly view slavery as a
| despicable practice, please don't practice selective
| historical revisionism to minimize the barbaric suffering
| experienced to this day in some countries, and the
| astronomical death rates in the sugar plantations.
|
| Examples from _Historical Context: American Slavery in
| Comparative Perspective_ [1]
|
| _" Death rates among slaves in the Caribbean were one-
| third higher than in the South, and suicide appears to
| have been much more common. Unlike slaves in the South,
| West Indian slaves were expected to produce their own
| food in their "free time," and care for the elderly and
| the infirm."(_
|
| _" The largest difference between slavery in the South
| and in Latin America was demographic. The slave
| population in Brazil and the West Indies had a lower
| proportion of female slaves, a much lower birthrate, and
| a higher proportion of recent arrivals from Africa. In
| striking contrast, southern slaves had an equal sex
| ratio, a high birthrate, and a predominantly American-
| born population"._
|
| _" Slavery in the United States was especially
| distinctive in the ability of the slave population to
| increase its numbers by natural reproduction. In the
| Caribbean, Dutch Guiana, and Brazil, the slave death rate
| was so high and the birthrate so low that slaves could
| not sustain their population without imports from Africa.
| The average number of children born to an early
| nineteenth-century southern slave woman was 9.2--twice as
| many as in the West Indies."_
|
| Additionally, you have ignored that slavery is _still
| active_ in a number of countries [2], [3], [4], [5]
|
| Slavery is a practice worthy of contempt, still
| practiced, and modern.
|
| [1] Historical Context: American Slavery in Comparative
| Perspective https://www.gilderlehrman.org/history-
| resources/teaching-res...
|
| [2] https://www.mic.com/articles/82347/the-world-s-worst-
| countri...
|
| [3] https://face2faceafrica.com/article/slavery-africa-
| today/3
|
| [4] https://www.theclever.com/15-countries-where-slavery-
| is-stil...
|
| [5] https://www.latimes.com/world/la-xpm-2013-oct-17-la-
| fg-wn-sl...
| cmrdporcupine wrote:
| Roman slaves at least had a path to freedom. Or a good
| portion of them did. Many (not majority) became citizens
| eventually (or their children did) and many in fact
| became quite prosperous. Their slavery wasn't based on
| racial status, but on class, and slavery wasn't
| considered genetically predetermined, but a product of
| status and conquest. "Graduation" out of slavery was
| actually possible.
|
| American slavery being built on "race" and white
| supremacy offered no such path. Even "mixed race"
| descendants suffered. Even after slavery was abolished,
| former slaves were (and often are) still treated
| abhorrently.
| stickyricky wrote:
| Rome lasted for 2,100 years. I'm not sure you can
| generalize the quality of life of a free person, let
| alone a slave.
|
| > Roman slaves at least had a path to freedom
|
| You need to be specific. Are we comparing Connecticut in
| 1784 AD to Gaul in 50 BC? Or Connecticut in 1783 AD to
| Gaul in 59 BC? Because the two comparisons are very
| different.
| thaumasiotes wrote:
| > "Graduation" out of slavery was actually possible.
|
| This is also true of American slaves.
|
| > Their slavery wasn't based on racial status, but on
| class, and slavery wasn't considered genetically
| predetermined, but a product of status and conquest.
|
| So is this. You think the child of a free black was
| enslaved?
| Hizonner wrote:
| > This is also true of American slaves.
|
| Bullshit. By the 19th century (which is the century
| everybody talks about) it was almost legally impossible
| to free a slave in the American south (things like, say,
| a $200 tax in Florida... which was more money than most
| people saw in a year).
|
| Even when possible it was essentially never done.
|
| > So is this. You think the child of a free black was
| enslaved?
|
| In many of the US slave states, if you were a free black
| person, regardless of who your parents were, you had to
| either leave the state within a fixed time, or you would
| be enslaved. So, yes.
| metalliqaz wrote:
| enslaved to whom?
| chuckee wrote:
| > Considering that American-owned slaves were treated
| much crueler on average than Ancient slave populations
|
| Not as cruelly as Arab-owned slaves (the trans-Saharan
| slave trade started in 650 AD, which is pretty close to
| ancient). Despite importing as much or more slaves than
| _both_ Americas, there is barely any Black presence in
| North Africa. Try to imagine why.
|
| Source: https://courses.lumenlearning.com/atd-tcc-
| worldciv2/chapter/...
| YeGoblynQueenne wrote:
| The idea that "Sparta" was close to "80% enslaved people"
| is confused and I hold the author of the linked article
| responsible for not clarifying the confusion.
|
| "Sparta" is the name of the principal city of the city-
| state of Lacedaemon, which comprised the regions of Laconia
| and Messinia in the Peloponnese. The inhabitants of the
| city of Sparta are in ancient sources referred to as
| Lacedaemones ("Lakedaimones") and are the people we, in the
| modern day, know as as Spartans or Spartiates
| ("Spartiatai").
|
| The people inhabiting the greater area of the Lacedeamonian
| city-state, the inhabitants of the settlements in Laconia
| and Messinia, were never referred to in any ancient text as
| "Spartans" or "Lacedaemones" and they were only referred
| to, to the extent they were ever mentioned, as "helots"
| ("eilotai") or, simply, as the Spartans' slaves. Any
| reference to those people as "Spartans", let alone
| "Lacedaemones" is a modern invention and only serves to
| deepen the confusion I highlight here. In fact, I am only
| aware of a single modern "source" that commits this
| confusing error: the blog post linked above. If we were to
| give those people a modern name devoid of political
| connotations, that would be "Lacones" ("Lakonai") or
| "Messinians" ("Messenoi"), the inhabitants of the regions
| of Laconia and Messinia.
|
| So it makes no sense to say that "Sparta" was "80% enslaved
| people" or the other errors committed in the linked
| article. It might make sense to say that "Laconia and
| Messinia (resp. Lacedaemon) was 80% enslaved people",
| although that would greatly weaken the intended invective
| against _Spartans_. It would certainly make sense to point
| out that Spartans, i.e. the inhabitants of the city of
| Sparta, had a huge number of slaves in proportion both to
| their own numbers and in comparison to the number of slaves
| of other Greek city-states of the same historical
| period(s), but again that would not be a proper attack on
| the myth of Sparta, which is what is intended. Of course it
| makes every sense to point out the cruelty of _Spartans_ ,
| but in that case, if we call the helots "Spartans", also,
| the confusion only deepens.
|
| All such nuance is left out of the article linked above
| which makes it very, very misleading and confuses people
| who are used to getting their knowledge of history from
| second- third- and further- hand accounts, like the one in
| the linked article, or the movie 300, etc. Unfortunately
| once something is elevated to mythical status there is
| nothing more profitable than to tear it down, even if this
| tearing down is based on the same poor knowledge of history
| that allowed it to be elevated in the first place.
| nsajko wrote:
| Sparta can also refer to the entire state. I think you're
| making a fuss out of nothing.
|
| Also, Sparta wasn't just Spartiates and helots, you're
| forgetting about mothakes and perioikoi.
| spaced-out wrote:
| >The idea that "Sparta" was close to "80% enslaved
| people" is confused and I hold the author of the linked
| article responsible for not clarifying the confusion.
|
| ...
|
| >The people inhabiting the greater area of the
| Lacedeamonian city-state, the inhabitants of the
| settlements in Laconia and Messinia, were never referred
| to in any ancient text as "Spartans" or "Lacedaemones"
| and they were only referred to, to the extent they were
| ever mentioned, as "helots" ("eilotai") or, simply, as
| the Spartans' slaves.
|
| He's referring to the entire Spartan state, which at that
| time included Messinia. It's accurate to say it was
| composed of ~80% enslaved people. That's clear if you
| read the article. The fact that most helots were from
| other ethnic groups doesn't change the fact that they
| were living under the rule of the Spartan state.
| [deleted]
| YeGoblynQueenne wrote:
| There is no such thing as "The entire Spartan state".
| There is (well, was) the city-state of Lacedaemon and the
| city of Sparta. The two are confused because Lacedaemon
| is often synechdochically called "Sparta" and the people
| of the city of Sparta are usually called "Lacedaemones"
| in ancient sources. But the people in Laconia and
| Messinia (not just Messinia) were "helots", not
| "Spartans", not "Lacedeaemones" and not anything else.
|
| So if you want to say that the people who lived in
| Laconia and Messinia were the slaves of the Spartans,
| which we call the helots, and that there many more times
| more helots than there were Spartans, then you're
| welcome, because that is accurate. But to say that
| "Sparta was closer to 80% enslaved people" as the OP
| says, is false.
| watwut wrote:
| We do criticize contemporary societies too. We talk about
| aspects like unfair justice system, inequality, corruption,
| sexism and such.
|
| We do talk about contemporary totalitarian societies and near
| part totalitarian societies.
|
| The expectation that we will heroise past society, to feel
| good, to make them sound awesome, is on itself a bias.
| [deleted]
| jacknews wrote:
| The Spartan culture perished.
| at_a_remove wrote:
| Most did.
| UncleOxidant wrote:
| How many cultures from that era still remain?
|
| I'm thinking Jewish culture (though it's not monolithic),
| that's about the only one I can think of whose customs,
| traditions, etc. still remain today.
| abhishekjha wrote:
| Hindu/Vedic culture is still kicking.
| DFHippie wrote:
| The Zoroastrians and Buddhists as well. Perhaps the Yazidis
| should be counted in that number as well. And certain
| elements of aboriginal cultures -- I'm thinking of the
| Rainbow Serpent -- go back tens of thousands of years.
| throwdecro wrote:
| And yet here we are reading their best jokes, many centuries
| later.
|
| > One woman, observing her son coming towards her, inquired,
| "How fares our country?" And when he said, "All have perished,"
| she took up a tile and, hurling it at him, killed him, saying,
| "And so they sent you to bear the bad news to us!"
| some_random wrote:
| Reminder that Spartan society was nightmarishly abusive to every
| single member from its slave class to its ruling class in the
| name of military supremacy, which they failed at. The only thing
| they were truly successful at was propaganda, which still
| dominates the way they are looked at today.
| timwaagh wrote:
| Sounds an awful lot like what I perceived from the media of the
| Islamic state. I think it's a kind of mentality that, though
| brave, needs to be stamped out thoroughly.
| _dain_ wrote:
| Whereas Athenian and other Grecian culture was admired and spread
| across the Roman empire after it was militarily conquered,
| Sparta's fate was humiliating. They were turned into a kind of
| human zoo. The old training rituals continued, but mainly as a
| tourist attraction for wealthy Roman aristocrats to ogle at.
| fouc wrote:
| > Being asked by a woman from Attica, "Why is it that you Spartan
| women are the only women that lord it over your men," she said,
| "Because we are the only women that are mothers of men."
| inglor_cz wrote:
| > When a foreigner made advances in a mild and leisurely way,
| she pushed him aside, saying, "Get away from here, you who
| cannot play a woman's part either!"
|
| This, on the other hand, would offend a lot of contemporary
| sensibilities.
| IncRnd wrote:
| I found that one humorous, as well.
| mordnis wrote:
| I wonder if such comments were intended offensive jokes or they
| really thought they were superior.
| speeder wrote:
| Explaining that one: 1. Spartans were proud of their men. 2.
| Sparta despite being very extreme compared to other Greek
| cities in a lot of things, was an exception regarding women
| role in politics, in the sense in Sparta was acceptable to
| hear women opinion (women still had no formal power, but they
| were allowed to talk to men about politics, while on Athens
| for example this was forbidden).
| motohagiography wrote:
| Given the alternative to prevailing militarily was typically
| slavery or dispersement and homogenization into the conquering
| society, I can see why these ideas were treated as important. As
| a proxy for meaning now? Spartan myths and ideals are a fun
| mythology and aesthetic for some and a straw man for others, so
| any discussion in the present is going to play out on party
| lines.
| RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote:
| I don't think Sparta was as cruel and callous as portrayed.
|
| I think our view of Sparta is influenced by two main things:
|
| 1. Spartan propaganda. It was in Sparta's interest to portray
| themselves as crazy, devoted warriors who relished the thought of
| dying for their country. How would you feel going up against a
| bunch of guys who would rather die on the field of battle than go
| home in defeat and have their own mothers kill them.
|
| 2. We actually don't have surviving first person Spartan
| accounts. Most of what we know about the Spartans comes from
| others- mainly the Athenians. Now the Athenians as bitter rivals
| to the Spartans also found it in their interest to portray the
| Spartans as crazy warrior psychopaths.
|
| We know from history that the Spartans actually lost battles.
| Also in those battles, there were a lot of Spartan survivors who
| actually surrendered. In addition, we actually have no historical
| record of any mass killings of losing soldiers by their mothers.
|
| So take what you read about Spartan warriors with a huge grain of
| salt.
| chalst wrote:
| Xenophon was an Athenian, but he was positively disposed
| towards Sparta and had seen military service under Spartan
| commanders. He's probably our best source.
|
| https://www.csun.edu/~hcfll004/sparta-a.html
| slibhb wrote:
| Ditto for Thucydides, another Athenian who had a positive
| view of Sparta.
| pacman2 wrote:
| I have read a comparison about the structure of the Spartan
| society, basically consisting mostly of slaves like no other
| culture that used slave labor. Today we know what early
| experience of violence may do to a person and as far as I now,
| Spartans hat to kill one helot to be finally admitted into
| adult Society.
|
| So we get two things.
|
| 1. A worrier based elite society, consisting basically of
| psychopaths
|
| 2. A society structure that seem more to resemble a
| concentration camp with guards.
| dustintrex wrote:
| Sparta was, if anything, _more_ cruel and callous than
| portrayed, it 's just that it was mostly the underclasses that
| were at the receiving end.
|
| You are right in that they weren't particularly good at
| fighting though.
| p1mrx wrote:
| So we're basically reading ancient _Chuck Norris facts_?
| kwere wrote:
| *Steven Seagall
| baud147258 wrote:
| > Spartan propaganda
|
| Sparta milked the Thermopylae battle a lot, presenting
| themselves as defender of Greek independence against foreign
| invaders, sometime even as they were taking money from them to
| pay for their wars against other Greek cities
| JasonFruit wrote:
| Why are these Spartans using Scottish dialect?
| rdmond wrote:
| Spartans spoke a different dialect of Greek (Doric) than the
| Athenians (Attic) and it used to be fairly common to translate
| bits of Doric as if they had been spoken by a Scottish
| Highlander.
| JasonFruit wrote:
| That's an interesting choice. I wonder if they perceived a
| cultural similarity... you've given me something to look
| into.
| greesil wrote:
| Myke Cole has written a new book on Spartan society and military,
| The Bronze Lie:
|
| https://www.amazon.com/Bronze-Lie-Shattering-Spartan-Suprema...
|
| His previous work on the Roman legion vs the Greek phalanx was
| very interesting and well-researched.
|
| https://www.amazon.com/Legion-versus-Phalanx-Struggle-Suprem...
| meheleventyone wrote:
| His fiction books are great as well.
| gadders wrote:
| As the quotes come via Plutarch, I'd like to recommend Plutarch's
| Parallel Lives - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parallel_Lives
|
| He gives a biography of one famous Roman and one famous Greek and
| compares them.
| gjsman-1000 wrote:
| The cruel irony of this was that despite how friendly their
| society was toward violence (as seen by these quotes)... they
| weren't particularly awesome at fighting for it.
| antattack wrote:
| Lets keep in mind that quotes that survived someone had deemed as
| worth repeating to perpetuate certain prestige, status or idea.
| Plus, it's all filtered by time, people and politics,
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