Spartiates

Spartiates

1. Privileged social class holding all political power

2. All equal under the law and all subject to the same training and discipline

3. There were rich and poor Spartiates, but there is some controversy over the existence of nobility

4. Lived by a high code of honour that involved courage, loyalty, endurance and obedience

5. Full-time soldiers owing total obedience to the state

6. Forbidden to engage in farming, trade and industry. These done by Helots and Perioikoi.

7. Original Dorian conquerors of Laconia.

8. Never numbered much more than 10,000

9. Sources!!!!

   • Xenophon - Spartan Society on the sysstition: "Lycurgus mingled the age groups in Sparta so that the younger learn much from the experience of their elders"
   • Plutarch - On Sparta (referring to the kleros): "Lycurgus persuaded the citizens to pool all the land and then redistribute it ... they would all live on equal terms with one another, with the same amount of property to support each."
   • Plutarch notes Sparta was broken into 9000 equal parts as kleros for the Spartiates - supporting the idea there was never much more than 10,000 Spartiates
   • Stephen Hodkinson: "a social and ritual system as part of which every citizen was compelled, especially during upbringing to accept a common public way of life”