9.18 Oligarchy in Sparta

Life was simple in Sparta. Most decisions were made for you. If you were a Spartan boy, the state would take you from your family at the age of seven. You would spend more than 20 years training for and serving in the professional army. If you were a girl, you would be raised for the sole purpose of bearing strong children for the state.

Other Greeks regarded Sparta with a mix of fear and admiration. In contrast to democratic Athens, Sparta felt like an army camp, its male citizens obligated to full-time military training. Its government was an odd mixture of monarchy, oligarchy, and democracy. People in city-states such as Athens were amused by Sparta’s strange customs. They were also frightened by its growing power.

Sparta was a city-state on the Peloponnesian Peninsula. The center of Sparta was inland, so Sparta was not a sea power. Neither was it a democracy. Sparta was ruled by two kings who served as military leaders. The kings headed Sparta’s governing body, the council of elders. The council included 28 men over the age of 60. This oligarchy was the true government of Sparta.

Sparta did have a democratic assembly made up of some free adult males, but it had only about 9,000 citizens, compared to about 45,000 in Athens. The Spartan assembly also had far less power than the Athenian assembly. It could pass laws, but the council had to approve them.

However, the Spartan assembly did have one important power. It elected five ephors. An ephor (EH for) was responsible for the day-to-day operation of the government. The five ephors made sure that the kings and the council acted within the limits of Spartan law. Ephors could remove a king who broke the law.

In the early 400s BCE, the helots launched a violent revolt. Although the Spartans put down the revolt, they lived in fear of further unrest. The helots outnumbered them.

The Spartans faced a choice. They could give up control of the helots and the food they produced, or they could strengthen their control by turning Sparta into even more of a military state. A military state is a society organized for the purpose of waging war.

The Spartans chose the second option. Not only did they emphasize the military even more than before, they also tried to control the helots through terror. Every year, the ephors declared war on the helots. This gave any Spartan the right to kill any helot without fear of punishment. At the same time, secret police watched over the helots.

Because of their history of conquest and their need to control the helots, Spartans valued military discipline. Even today, the adjective spartan means “highly disciplined or lacking in comfort.” Unlike Athenians, Spartans did not value luxury goods or beautiful buildings.

When they left the school system, Spartan men faced another test. In order to become full citizens, they had to gain entry to a men’s club of soldiers. If they failed, they became “inferiors” who would never gain citizenship and would live as outcasts.

Men who won election to a men’s club became known as “equals.” They had full citizen rights. This included membership in the assembly and the right to a piece of state-owned land worked by helots. At age 60, an equal became a candidate for election to the council of elders.

Spartan women were raised to be strong and vigorous. They participated in sports. By staying fit, they could have healthy babies who would grow into good soldiers.

Spartan women had a good deal of freedom and responsibility because their husbands spent almost their entire lives away at military camp. Spartan women were responsible for raising future soldiers for the state, so they had greater independence than women had in other Greek city-states.

The discipline and training of Spartan life created a powerful army and a stable government. But Spartan society feared individual differences and change. The Spartans valued people who fit in, not those who stood out.

Unlike the Spartans, the Athenians valued individual expression and new ideas. Athenian democracy evolved over time. Sparta’s rigid oligarchy and society changed very little. These differences led the Greek historian Thucydides to describe the Athenians as “addicted to innovation.” In contrast, he viewed the Spartans as having “a genius for keeping what you have got.” The opposing values of Athens and Sparta helped create tensions between the two city-states.

Economically, Sparta and Athens were very different. Because of their lack of natural resources, neither city-state was able to produce enough food to feed its growing population. Athens, however, had vast amounts of silver and relied on trade to obtain food for its citizens. Sparta relied on conquest and slave labor in the conquered territories to obtain its food. When food was scarce, the Athenians traded with others to get what they needed, while the Spartans conquered more territory.

Athenian leader Pericles believed that Athenian democracy was far superior than life in Sparta. Pericles was the leader of Athens during the Peloponnesian War against Sparta (431-404 BCE). He tried to raise morale by contrasting the two cities in his famous funeral oration.