Historia Civilis
Published 11 Sep 2017Patreon | http://historiacivilis.com/patreon
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Website | http://historiacivilis.comSources:
The Constitution of the Spartans, by Xenophon: http://amzn.to/2j7JXTB
The Moralia, by Plutarch: http://amzn.to/2gNMYHU
Parallel Lives: The Life of Lycurgus, by Plutarch: http://amzn.to/2xS29nI
Politics, by Aristotle: http://amzn.to/2wMq5ss
Rhetoric, by Aristotle: http://amzn.to/2xS3niO
Laws, by Plato: http://amzn.to/2wLpsiN
On the Republic, by Cicero: http://amzn.to/2j7Flgg
The Histories, by Herodotus: http://amzn.to/2xdH4a7
The Spartan Regime, by Paul A. Rahe: http://amzn.to/2vPmRqS
Property and Wealth in Classical Sparta, by Stephen Hodkinson: http://amzn.to/2xdV7MS
The Rise of Athens, by Anthony Everitt: http://amzn.to/2j69uMS
Persian Fire, by Tom Holland: http://amzn.to/2vPyCxEWe are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.
Music:
“Air Hockey Saloon,” by Chris Zabriskie
“Candlepower,” by Chris Zabriskie
“CGI Snake,” by Chris Zabriskie
“Heliograph,” by Chris Zabriskie
“Hallon,” by Christian Bjoerklund
From the comments:
Temporary Fakename
3 years ago
You know, i thought the Roman political system was pretty odd and arcane. But the Spartans have a dual monarchy that has absolute power, except when it doesn’t, an elected Senate that is chosen partially randomly that can pass whatever the hell they want with a public assembly and punish kings, except when an all-male aristocracy decided no, a female aristocracy that is overwhelmingly rich but can’t vote, and a population so terrified of its own slaves that it ritually committed atrocities against them. Compared to that Roman politics look simple and elegant.
I found the presentation quite interesting and informative, but I felt that some discussion of the differences between the terrible plight of the Helots and the not-quite-free status of the Perioikoi was merited. I also felt that the final segment on the eventual decline of Sparta missed a major factor — Spartan military defeats in the Battle of Leuctra in 371 BC and the Battle of Mantinea in 362 BC — but reading down in the comments, I saw someone else had already brought this up:
xelena
2 years ago (edited)
This is a good video, but is missing a super important point at the end: The cause for the decline of Spartan power was its defeat by Epaminondas of Thebes and his freeing of Messenia (the land of the Helots). He also founded Messene in Messenia and Megalopolis in Arcadia for the Helots, which became a powerful check to Sparta. Spartan power never recovered from this death blow to its slave economy and continued to wither away into the nothingness you describe.Epaminondas is mostly forgotten today, but he was one of the greatest men of antiquity. It was him and Pelopidas who put to bed the myth of Spartan invincibility and freed an entire people who had been enslaved for centuries. So in a way, the crippling blow did come from other Greeks, and the Helots did participate in it.
