Plutarch's
Life of Lycurgus, a work written more than 500 years after the time of Lycurgus, isn't a terribly reliable source, but it at least reflects what many of the Greeks thought about the earliest days of Sparta and the great Spartan law giver. The
abridged version here is well worth the 10 or fifteen minutes it will take you to read, as is this
version for children.. However, to get a better picture of Sparta, you should also read this
Sparta Reconsidered article.
Comment on either of these two sources here, noting what the source suggests is unusual in Spartan society and why that unusual feature may have well suited Spartan needs. If you comment on both linked selections, please put your responses in separate comments: you'll get extra credit for both.
The abridged version of Plutarch's "Life of Lycurgus" shows how Lycurgus was significantly different from other people and Spartan leadership in particular during his life. It tells the story of how Lycurgus was set to inherit the throne, but his brother's wife was pregnant when his brother died. She offers to get an abortion under the condition that Lycurgus marries her. He refuses and allows his nephew to become King. This decision would have been particularly strange in Spartan society, where it would have been more common for Lycurgus to do whatever he needed to in order to gain power. This ultimately plays out in not only Lycurgus' favor, but also in the favor of the people in Sparta. He gained such a positive reputation that he was asked to return to Sparta to be King. When he did, he made many changes to Spartan law as well as Spartan culture, growing the power of the Spartan senate in particular.
ReplyDeleteThe reconsidered article is pretty enlightening in that it talks about how Sparta's democracy predates Athens. This combined with the attempts to provide equality to women and even provide wealth equality. However, of course one of the points the article brings up is why this feels strange and surprising. That Sparta had preferred to put its legacy "in flesh". While it certainly didn't do that completely, as the article suggests, it somehow ended up with less recognition than Athens. As the article says, we kept teaching from Athenian records, or the detractors. Because all it seems most common knowledge comes from Athenian perceptions of Sparta, and not actual Spartan records. This feels weirder than most of the facts highlighted in the site.
ReplyDeleteI'm coming in here a little green concerning Sparta. Form the things Iv'e watched over the years, Sparta is depicted as a warring, very physical society--almost as intelligent barbarians. As I read the Sparta Reconsidered overview, there were a couple of things that I had never thought of or considered concerning Sparta. First, that Sparta had been the first recorded democracy in history. I don't remember learning about that while in school when I was younger. Secondly, Sparta was the only Greek city-state in which women enjoyed elementary rights such as the right to education, inheritance, and property. Both of these stood out to me as pretty innovative, especially for the that time period.
ReplyDelete-Jonathon Fargher