For the conference which gave rise to this volume I was asked to discuss ‘the development of Sparta’s distinctive institutions to the end of the sixth century’.1 The organisers’ suitably laconic formulation forms a good starting-point for discussion, since
it prompts some fundamental questions which might threaten to subvert any discussion of Archaic Sparta. First of all, do we have reliable information about the substance of Archaic Spartan institutions, let alone their development, in the period before
c. 500? Secondly, were Sparta’s society and institutions really distinctive compared with those of other poleis, or is that just
part of the Spartan myth? And, thirdly, even if there was some significant divergence, did it take place in the Archaic period, or only later in response to the very different challenges of the fifth century?
There have of course been studies which have tried to reconstruct the exact course of early Spartan history, relying upon late sources such as the pseudo-historical survey in Pausanias’ Guide to Greece (Books 3 and 4).2 Such approaches were
rightly and roundly condemned over thirty years ago in Chester Starr’s important article on ‘The Credibility of Early Spartan History’, with its ringing comment, ‘We are, I fear, sometimes in danger of becoming Hellenistic rumor-mongering historians’.3 But even Starr’s scepticism appears insufficient for certain more recent scholars, especially with regard to the
Classical sources. This issue is important because, apart from certain exceptional items of evidence from the Archaic period
itself, we are dependent upon Classical writers for our earliest detailed notions of the nature of Spartan society. Starr expressed his doubts about the evidence of Classical writers concerning Spartan history. But he was more sanguine about the relevance of their accounts of contemporary Spartan society to understanding her Archaic past, on grounds of their access to ‘information from the living structure of Spartan life and government which had been formed in earlier days’.4
This view, however, has recently come under increasing challenge on two basic grounds. The first concerns the well-known phenomenon of the Spartan mirage, that ‘compound of distorted reality and sheer imaginative fiction’, created from the fifth century onwards by non-Spartans of various (not always compatible) persuasions as support for their political or philosophical views of their own societies.5 Oswyn Murray has recently put the ancient historian’s problem in a succinct, if
perhaps extreme, form:
The Spartan system is known to us only in mythic form and from the outside: it is portrayed by a succession of non- Spartan observers as an ideal construct, heavily contaminated with the typical anthropological failings, of emphasis upon its otherness, its difference from the norm, and of its conformity to a system; there are basic problems in the observer status of everything we think we know about Sparta. As a consequence, we cannot date or follow the development of the Spartan progress towards a distinctive politeia or socio-political system.6
Several of these ideal constructs were, as I have recently argued, both aided and abetted by the Spartans themselves through their range of official and personal contacts with Greeks from other poleis.7 And this brings us to the second main ground for
scepticism about the relevance of Classical evidence to Archaic Spartan society: the Spartans’ own invention of their past, a phenomenon highlighted in a forthcoming article by Michael Flower.8 Flower argues that on a number of occasions in Spartan
history supposedly ancient socio-political practices, attributed to the lawgiver Lykourgos, were quite simply invented for contemporary political purposes.
The most systematic invention of an entire new matrix of Lykourgan customs, that of Kings Agis and Kleomenes in the late third century, does not of course affect the validity of the Classical sources, although it does affect the authenticity of information in later sources which has often been regarded as descriptive of Archaic and Classical institutions.9 The invention
of the Spartan past was, however, by no means restricted to the Hellenistic period. In the aftermath of the hotly contested debate in 404, when it was decided to admit the large amount of foreign currency acquired by Lysander into the polis for public use but to prohibit private ownership upon pain of death (Plut. Lys. 17.1–4), we can detect the emergence of two competing invented traditions. The first, reflecting the views of the dominant circle around King Agesilaos, associated the newly-established status quo with the unchanged laws of Lykourgos. The other, fiercely critical of the decision to admit the currency at all, claimed that Lykourgos had originally prohibited both private and public use of foreign coinage; this latter
tradition seems to have originated in the pamphlet written by the exiled former king, Pausanias, the opponent of both Lysander and Agesilaos.10 Notwithstanding their powerful influence upon subsequent historiography, it should be stressed that both
traditions were pure inventions, since it is clear that, in reality, foreign currency had long been in circulation in both private and public hands in the years before 404.11 Nor was this the only example of a influential invented tradition which originated
in this period. The tradition that the ephorate was not an original institution of Lykourgos, but a subsequent creation of King Theopompos, was almost certainly another invention by Pausanias (cf. Arist. Pol. 5.1301b19–21), and one which quickly found its way into the works of both Plato and Aristotle.12
The period of Spartan imperialism in the early fourth century was clearly an era of considerable conflict and transformation when invention of the past was especially likely to flourish. But controversy and change were hardly new factors in Spartan society, and there is every reason to consider the role of invented tradition in earlier periods. Flower asks,
Can we be sure that such typically Spartan customs as the expulsion of foreigners, the bans on manual crafts and foreign travel, wife-sharing, the civil disabilities for not marrying, the annual declaration of war against the helots and the
krypteia, really predate the fifth century?
He suggests that each of these practices may have originated as responses to novel conditions of the Classical period, but soon became portrayed as elements of the original Lykourgan politeia. The disruptive effect of Flower’s critique is potentially considerable. As he claims,
if the Spartans engaged in the invention of tradition as often and as profoundly as…suggested, then it is impossible for us to write a history of Spartan institutions which combines evidence from authors who lived in different centuries… because Spartan society was continually in a state of flux and was continually being reinvented. The only kind of Spartan history that one can write is one which traces the stages of development which Sparta went through.
Where does this dual challenge leave the project of analysing the development of Archaic Spartan institutions? Clearly, we must be aware of the possibility, even the likelihood, that information in Classical and later sources may not reflect the situation in the period before 500. Indeed, since much of our source material derives, either directly or ultimately, from periods of great social transformation—from the late fifth and early fourth centuries and from the ‘third-century revolution’—it is to be expected that these sources should reflect significant changes in discourse about Spartan affairs. It would, consequently, hardly be surprising if presentations of ‘ancient’ Spartan institutions differed from the reality of Archaic Sparta. It is clear, therefore, that information in the Classical sources cannot be treated as representing the outcome of some kind of uniform, linear development of Spartan society through the Archaic period. Indeed, since (to anticipate my arguments below) there is no reason to believe that the institutional development of Archaic Sparta somehow proceeded any less episodically, any less in terms of responses to novel situations, than it did in later periods, we should expect even our earliest sources to be subject to the same considerations.13 This can be seen even in the evidence of Herodotus, whom Starr wanted to view as a near-
pristine source of evidence for early Sparta, but whose writings clearly reflect the crystallisation of several ‘traditional’ Spartan values in the context of her reaction to the threat from Persia.14 Our problem is that without detailed evidence for most
of the Archaic period we cannot chart the process and timing of the introduction of particular traditions and practices in the way we sometimes can in later times.
Yet the dual challenge of the Spartan mirage and of the invention of tradition need not be regarded as a counsel of despair concerning our capacity to perceive the institutional character of Archaic Sparta. It is important here to make a distinction between the structure of the Spartan system and particular institutions and practices through which it was articulated. Flower has suggested that many of what we regard as typically Spartan practices may have been introduced at a comparatively late stage; but that does not mean that we need view the system in its essentials as a creation of the fifth century. For example, even if it is true that the annual declaration of war and the krypteia were new measures reflecting an unprecedented level of mistrust of the helots following the revolt of 464, that does not undermine the idea that Spartan citizen life had been economically reliant on the exploitation of the helots since at least the seventh century. Similarly, even if the Spartiates were not formally prohibited from engagement in manual crafts in Archaic times, as Cartledge has argued,15 no-one would
seriously doubt that their economic support came essentially from their landholdings or that the lives of the overwhelming majority of citizens were devoted principally to civic and military concerns.
A similar conclusion is in fact drawn by Murray, who, despite his doubts about observer status, does not doubt that we can identify the essential structures of the Spartan system or that we can assign the creation of those structures to the Archaic period. Moreover, although detailed institutional changes were undoubtedly made later in response to novel circumstances, what is notable, as he points out, is that the outcome was not dissonance with the existing structures, but an increasing perfection of the original system. Spartan society, in fact, fulfils precisely the conditions of rationality which Murray himself sets out:
If we can detect an increasing degree of coherence in a society through its reforms, and if the principles governing the social system become clearer through change, then we may say that the society itself displays a high degree of rationality, not merely in the sense of internal coherence, but also in the sense of a self-conscious recognition of the reasons for change and the consequences of institutional reform.16
New introductions of varying dates could all plausibly be attributed, alongside older structures, to the work of Lykourgos, precisely because they shared a common underlying rationality. Hence the fact that Spartan society in the Classical sources increasingly takes on the appearance of an ‘ideal type’.
In this sense, the challenge of the invention of tradition brings us, paradoxically, back to a position not too far from Starr’s, since Sparta’s Classical institutions, even if developed considerably in the fifth century, can be argued to inform us, through the element of common rationality, about the trends inherent in Archaic developments. One might even argue that the conscious search for occasions when the Spartans were impelled to invent new traditions in Classical times could be employed as a positive tool to define the scope and limits of changes in the Archaic period. So, although a systematic account of Archaic Spartan society is clearly impossible, we can, I would suggest, plausibly discuss the overall trends and character of her institutional development. It is these general aspects which I shall address in the rest of this chapter, focusing especially upon issues which have been the subject of recent debate.
I made the distinction earlier between the structure of the Spartan system and the particular institutions and practices through which it was articulated; and it is with the underlying structure that we need to start. I should make clear my opinion that, although several key elements of this structure undoubtedly emerged during the seventh and sixth centuries, profitable discussion of the precise circumstances of their emergence is precluded— at least within the restricted span of this chapter— by our chronic state of uncertainty over the exact chronology, and sometimes even the sequence, of the most basic events in early Spartan history. Similarly, the precise import of the ephorate of Chilon in the mid sixth century seems equally uncertain, despite several scholarly efforts to establish its significance as a period of internal change.17 Hence I shall concentrate instead
on the principles behind the emergence of the structure. This structure consisted of four fundamental aspects. First, a military system according to which full citizenship was extended to all adult male members of the community. That citizenship entailed membership of a guild of full-time hoplite warriors who, as a condition of membership, practised daily commensality in a number of mess groups. Secondly, an economic system which (originally, at least) provided each citizen with a minimum amount of land and an accompanying helot labour force to enable him to fulfil his compulsory mess contributions and devote himself fully to civic and military duties. Thirdly, a political system, promulgated in the so-called Great Rhetra (Plut. Lyk. 6), which gave the mass of citizens in assembly a formal role in decision-making, whilst retaining considerable influence in the hands of the kings and Gerousia. And, finally, a social and ritual system which marked out from birth to the grave the common, public way of life which every non-royal citizen was to lead.
These different elements may have had different origins and timetables of development, but they shared some essential common features. Each was created through the transformation of existing institutions. Warrior groups, male commensality and the exploitation of helot labour all predated their extension to the whole community, just as the kingships, Gerousia and assembly were already in existence before the promulgation of the Great Rhetra. Each element, moreover, was the product of conscious design. This is obvious in the case of the Great Rhetra; but it is equally true of the military and economic systems. The move to incorporate all Spartans within the warrior elite, and by implication to provide the poorer among them with sufficient landholdings, must have been a conscious decision. And, although the social and ritual system was clearly not created in its entirety at a single stroke and continued to be developed over the centuries, the act of combining age classes and other elements into a compulsory way of life could not have taken place without clear-sighted planning. The poetry of Tyrtaios also attests an explicit attempt to propound a new ethic which (in fr. 12 West) relates excellence in the phalanx to the life of the community and its common good.
The element of design should not, however, obscure the fact that these changes were conceived in a context of conflict. According to Aristotle, the contemporary evidence of Tyrtaios’ poem Eunomia gave evidence that ‘some people were so hard pressed by the war that they demanded a redistribution of land’ (Pol. 5.1306b37–1307a2); and, for what it is worth, the idea of conflict is also present in fifth-century sources. Herodotus (1.65) locates the transformation of Spartan institutions in a period of kakonomia; and Thucydides (1.18) refers to it as ‘the longest known period of faction’. One corollary is that, since the changes proceeded, as far as we know, by agreement rather than by revolution, they must have entailed compromises by which the changes were limited. We can see this in the Great Rhetra through which the Gerousia and kings retained important powers. We can see it, above all, in the provisions for property ownership and land tenure. Poorer Spartiates may have been given a sufficient minimum of land, but there was no general redistribution. Wealthy citizens retained their large estates, and the character of landholding retained the typical Greek pattern of private tenure and partible inheritance.18 Compromise is also
evident at the cultural level. The poems of Alkman around the end of the seventh century have often been interpreted as evidence for the development of a cultured, ‘aristocratic’ way of life.19 The great increase in numbers of dedications of
did not lead to any appreciable decline in the quality and quantity of more expensive dedications.20 These signs of
compromise tie in with our earlier observation that Spartan society in general attained increasingly higher levels of overall coherence with the further changes made in succeeding centuries. But in some spheres major anomalies remained throughout: the sphere of land tenure was not subjected to the forces of rationality and brought under direct state control with equal, inalienable kleroi until the late third century. Throughout the Archaic and Classical periods the anomaly of private landholdings worked by state-controlled helots remained firmly entrenched.
These observations lead on to the question of the relationship between the institutions characteristic of Sparta’s new social system and what are claimed to be comparable earlier institutions. This question has long been an area of considerable controversy, since there has always been a strong trend to regard Sparta’s historical institutions in terms of ‘survivals’ from earlier periods, as somehow more ‘primitive’ or ‘archaic’ and less the product of change than the institutions of other poleis. In my opinion, this approach should be firmly resisted.
First, there is the issue of the age classes. Robert Sallares has recently argued that the character of the Greek poleis was strongly influenced by their development out of what he sees as the age class societies of early Greece.21 In Sparta, he argues,
the influence was particularly strong, with practices such as wife-sharing and the penalties against bachelorhood originating not in Classical times owing to problems of manpower shortage, but much earlier as part of the exigencies of an age class society. Wife-sharing, he claims, originated as the collective claim of access which unmarried young men had to the wives of their age mates; penalties against bachelors as part of the peer pressure on those unmarried to acquire wives of their own. I find this most improbable, even if we were to grant, for argument’s sake, that early Sparta had once been a genuine age class society,22 in that it ignores the difference between social pressure and the state-imposed penalties of Classical times.