Their commitment to eugenics in the interest of militarism rendered them functionally extinct, and they were ultimately brought down by freer and more fecund people.
The Dorian Spartan period lasted about 1000 years. Everything eventually decays and ends…
Winning the Peloponnessian war allowed them to hold decadence and rapidly decayed them from within. Spartan King Agis IV tried to reimplement that Lycurgian measures to take down their growing oligarchy, but was killed instead.
The internal rot had nothing to do with their militarism.
It had everything to do with their militarism. The Spartan system of military caste rule built on helot subjugation only really began in the Archaic period (and certainly didn’t last 1,000 years) and fell apart when that system, which was mainly built around local slave suppression, overextended itself in the frequent wars of the 5th century BC. There were about 5,000 Spartiates able to face the Persians at Platea, and only 700 or so when they were destroyed at Leuktra a century later. They couldn’t replace themselves fast enough.
The archaic period of Sparta was almost 800 BC and they fewer absorbed in 200 BC, so the documented period is about 600 years… when Lycurgus came in the early Archaic period they had already been around in the dark ages for centuries. He transmuted their implosion. If the dark ages are included (which they should be just because they aren’t documented well doesn’t mean they didn’t exist… Rome is counted all the way from monarchy through republic through empire). So Dorian Sparta lasted at least 1000 years including the archaic period. Sure they didn’t replace fast enough but low replacement rates are a result of holding decadence ie conquering Athens. They had many examples of quite high replacement rates even if some culling occurred during the agoge.
The suppression of the Helots served two purposes… 1) to have the “other” as a foil of what they were not, though they could have made that the Athenians. 2) it freed them up to be able to train with less focus on menial labor
I agree they were a little too strict about the helots but it’s not important to the militarism. A major issue i see was not passing land with earned titles and allowing an oligarchy to form with land accumulation and eventually decadence which merged into the timeframe of the war with Athens.
Their commitment to eugenics in the interest of militarism rendered them functionally extinct, and they were ultimately brought down by freer and more fecund people.
The Dorian Spartan period lasted about 1000 years. Everything eventually decays and ends…
Winning the Peloponnessian war allowed them to hold decadence and rapidly decayed them from within. Spartan King Agis IV tried to reimplement that Lycurgian measures to take down their growing oligarchy, but was killed instead.
The internal rot had nothing to do with their militarism.
It had everything to do with their militarism. The Spartan system of military caste rule built on helot subjugation only really began in the Archaic period (and certainly didn’t last 1,000 years) and fell apart when that system, which was mainly built around local slave suppression, overextended itself in the frequent wars of the 5th century BC. There were about 5,000 Spartiates able to face the Persians at Platea, and only 700 or so when they were destroyed at Leuktra a century later. They couldn’t replace themselves fast enough.
The archaic period of Sparta was almost 800 BC and they fewer absorbed in 200 BC, so the documented period is about 600 years… when Lycurgus came in the early Archaic period they had already been around in the dark ages for centuries. He transmuted their implosion. If the dark ages are included (which they should be just because they aren’t documented well doesn’t mean they didn’t exist… Rome is counted all the way from monarchy through republic through empire). So Dorian Sparta lasted at least 1000 years including the archaic period. Sure they didn’t replace fast enough but low replacement rates are a result of holding decadence ie conquering Athens. They had many examples of quite high replacement rates even if some culling occurred during the agoge.
The suppression of the Helots served two purposes… 1) to have the “other” as a foil of what they were not, though they could have made that the Athenians. 2) it freed them up to be able to train with less focus on menial labor
I agree they were a little too strict about the helots but it’s not important to the militarism. A major issue i see was not passing land with earned titles and allowing an oligarchy to form with land accumulation and eventually decadence which merged into the timeframe of the war with Athens.