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Athens and sparta perspectives on women
Spartan women roles
Athens and sparta perspectives on women
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The main argument in the fourth chapter of Classical Sparta: Techniques Behind her Success is that inheritance, marriage and demography are closely linked to the viability of Spartan society. In this chapter there are several useful pieces of information about the lives and roles of women in Spartan society as it outlines the typical Spartan inheritance and marriage dowry systems which effect wealth distribution among Spartan citizens. Women had key roles within Spartan society which contributed to the city-state’s continued prominence throughout ancient Greece. Women had domestic responsibilities including the maintenance of homes and farms, while the typical Greek female responsibilities such as weaving were delegated to slaves. Girls were …show more content…
There was a general control of female marriage in Sparta much like the rest of Greece. Fathers would arrange marriages in order to create family alliances through blood tying and dowry exchanges. Although Sparta was a monogamist state there is evidence of wife sharing, if one woman’s fertility was considered exceptional and she produced warrior sons she could be shared by her husband with other men. There is even evidence of marriage between close kin to insure the production of good Spartan warriors. Divorce was a foreign concept to Sparta as it was only done under the direct orders from the Ephoroi. Hodkinson failed to express the importance that was placed in Spartan society on marriage as it was the adhesive that held family alliances and the Spartan economy …show more content…
The wealth among Sparta’s elite was steadily declining throughout the 5th and 4th centuries BCE and it was a problem that was recognized but not adequately addressed by the Spartan oligarchical leaders. Hodkinson explains that the rich leaders’ greed was one of the major reasons for Sparta’s declining Spartiate class. The rich in Sparta ignored the economic struggles of the lower classes because their own wealth was growing. This resulted in the shrinking of the Spartiate class within Sparta and was one of the reasons for the state’s eventual loss of control over surrounding
...litary end even the women in Sparta would have been affected by the military ways of life almost as much as the young men. From childhood they were being primed to raise a family, they were taught in the ways of mid wifery, learning the correct manner in teaching the future young men of Sparta and keeping themselves fit to produce fit children.
Males were expected to enter the agoge in order to train to become warriors, while women were expected to stay at home and raise the children. In regards to women and marriage, Diomache – Xeones’ cousin – made this statement: “…this is not a woman’s world, cousin. It never was and never will be.” (Pressfield, 293). In early Greek society, as was custom in many early societies, women were not technically able to choose their husbands. The men were to choose whom they desired to marry, and the women were simply ‘given away’ to that man. It was also undeniably important that parents give birth to a male child. While females did have a role in society, males were recognizably dominant within Spartan society. Women simply were not allowed to serve in the military at this point in history, so male heirs were needed to continue on as a successful warrior society. In Gates of Fire, the idea of male importance plays out through Dienekes and his family. Dienekes technically does not have a male heir, and therefore was not (originally) chosen to fight at Thermopylae. However, through a series of events, Dienekes deceives the krypteis into believing that he had a male child out of wedlock. While he did so to save the child (his nephew, it should be noted) from impending death, his decision had lasting repercussions: since he was believed to have a male heir, he was now eligible to be chosen to fight in the Battle at
Spartan women were allowed to own and control land. “Yet it does seem to be the case that Spartan daughters received as dowries one-half the amount of their parents’ property that their brothers received as inheritance.” (Pomeroy, Sarah B., Stanley M. Burstein, Walter Donlan, and Jennifer Tolbert Roberts. "Becoming a Spartan Woman." Ancient Greece: A Political, Social, and Cultural History. New York: Oxford UP, 1999. 143. Print) Whereas Athenian women only received one-sixth the amount that their brothers inherited. Spartan women inherited three times as more than their Athenian sisters. Spartan women were also allowed and even encouraged to be educated, whereas the education of Athenian girls was almost nonexistent. In Athens the majority of girls “… received merely a basic training in how to run the household, generally from their mothers. Girls may even have been discouraged from becoming literate in order to keep them “unspoiled.”( Garland, Robert. "The People." Daily Life of the Ancient Greeks. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1998. 103. Print.) Whereas in Sparta the girls were educated at the state’s expense. “Specific lines of development were prescribed for Spartan girls as much as they were for boys. The educational system for girls was also organized according to age classes. (Pomeroy, Sarah B., Stanley M. Burstein, Walter Donlan, and Jennifer Tolbert Roberts. "Becoming a Spartan Woman." Ancient Greece: A Political, Social, and Cultural History. New York: Oxford UP, 1999. 141. Print) Spartan women were also allowed more freedoms in the way that they dressed than their Athenian counterparts. “In earlier times Athenian women wore the peplos, a long heavy woolen garment which revealed little of the figure beneath. In the middle of the sixth century B.C., the peplos was replaced by a lighter and finer garment made of linen called
When discussing the Spartan economy it is essential that the structure of Spartan society is explained. This structure directly effects Spartan economic production and its primary agrarian focus. The social structure of ancient Sparta was made up of three classes of individuals, the Spartiates, the Perioikoi, and the Helots. The Spartiates were native Spartans, those who had ancestry back to the first inhabitants of the settlement. The Homoioi—peers and equals—were at the top of the social pyramid, they were citizens with full rights, Spartiates. It was strictly forbidden for the Spartiates to engage in any economic activity at any time, rather they were devoted to military service and training. Family life for a Spartiate was limited, a
Abstract: Texts, such as Oeconomicus, reveal that while men in Archaic Greek society had authority over their wives, they were too confident of their control, and once they taught women how to act and behave they granted women authority over the household or private sphere. This segregation of the public and private spheres allowed women control not only over the private sphere, but also some control over her own life.
Firstly, the rejection of luxury and avarice invariably results in a focus on military pursuits. Secondly, the apparent equality belies a vast slave network (common in antiquity, but the unique brutality of the Spartan kind can only bring to mind the Gulag). Lastly, intellectual sterility sets in. Sparta, intellectually, seems to be only good at cracking jibes (Athenian: “I can imitate a sparrow” Spartan: “So what, I have heard the real thing” upon approaching the walls of a city, a Spartan said, "What kind of women live here?"). Their poetry is stale and militaristic; their women are absolutely free; children are encouraged to steal; sex is made to resemble rape; parents mourn when their children return safe from war, and celebrate when they die: this is the weirdest state ever. The book “On Sparta” is a well written book as well is most of Plutarch’s
Sparta was a key city state which was located on the Peloponnesian Peninsula in southern Greek, which today is referred to as Laconia. Sparta is historically known for their strong military training, warfare tactics, and numerous victories. This city state included full citizens known as the Spartans, the helots, and the Perioeci. The men of Sparta had a main obligation to become strong warriors, fight with their brothers, and protect against any invasions or attacks. The helots where owned by city state of Sparta. They came from Messenia and were forced into slavery after being invaded by the Spartans in c.735. The helot’s responsibilities included farming, being of help if needed during battles, used as nurses, and for any other task that need to be accomplished. Unlike many traditional slaves, the Messenia’s were given certain leeway. They had
In Athens, women had no rights at all. The men would run the town, and women were left at home to keep the house clean and take care of children. If these ranks of society suddenly went away in these two Greek city-states, no one would know what to do. The citizens of Sparta would not know how to harvest fields or run a household because their whole lives were focused on either preparing them to fight in the military or actually going off to war. The Spartan military would probably also not be as strong because all men would not be required to fight.
Unlike other Greek city states, women played an integral role in Spartan society as they were the backbone of the Spartan economic system of inheritance and marriage dowry and they were relied upon to fulfill their main responsibility of producing Spartan warrior sons. These principle economic systems affected wealth distribution among Spartan citizens especially among the Spartan elite class. Spartan women led a completely different life than women in most other ancient Greek city states, as they were depended upon to maintain Spartan social systems. In a society where the state is more involved in home life women had freedom of movement and they were permitted to communicate with men who were not their husbands. Women had domestic responsibilities including the maintenance of homes and farms when the men were on campaign, while the typical Greek female responsibilities such as weaving were delegated to slaves. Girls were raised much like Spartan boys as they were made to go through physical training insuring their success in fulfilling their most important role in society, child-bearing. The few primary sources on Sparta and Spartiate women, namely Aristotle, Plutarch, Herodotus and Xenophon were historians who lived after the prominence of ancient Sparta; therefore, the facts regarding the women’s influence in social, economic and political issues must be carefully interpreted and analysed with help from secondary sources.
Women in the ancient world had few rights, they differed from country to country or, in the case of the women of Athens and Sparta, from city-state to the city-state. The women of the city-states of Athens and Sparta had profound differences in their roles in the political and the daily lives of their families and their cities. When it came to the difference in levels of power and the rights of women, Sparta was a leader in its time. At the same time, their rights as citizens were almost the same. While they did not take an active part in politics, they had opinions and ideas like women all over the world. Their thoughts, deeds, and opinions rarely recorded or if they were, the male historians or philosophers of the time recorded them. What were roles did the women in ancient Athens and Sparta? Were they citizens, did they have personal freedoms? On the other hand, did they in a time when the beginnings of democracy were happening were they less than a second-class citizen? The misogyny and patriarchal societies continued throughout the ancient and classical periods only beginning to change in the Hellenistic era.
Sparta was a city-state based on strict military ruling, at the age of seven a young Spartan would start out training and be trained into killing machines. When a Spartan baby is born, high elite Spartan soldiers would observe the baby to see if it was healthy and strong, if not the baby was ill and weak so it would be taken up a mountain and left there to die. This is just one example that shows how Sparta only wants a strong army and doesn't care about anything else. Strict rules of the government made it so that every Sp...
Much like world war two when men went away to serve in battle, the women took care of the property and managed the home. Spartan Husbands spent most of their time with other men in the military barracks; since the men were rarely home, the women were free to take charge of almost everything outside of the army (Fleck). Women owned forty percent of land in Spartan society. In comparison, Athenian law did not allow a woman to participate in a business transaction involving anything that’s value exceeded the sum of money equivalent to that needed to feed a family for five to six days. Thus, why Athenian women had no control in owning property. Also, if she wanted to buy groceries at the local market, she would needed the approval of a male guardian (father, brother, husband). An Athenian woman could have owned a slave, yet she would have a lacked the authority to sell them away. This power again was given to the males of the household. She might have had a claim to land as well, yet she would not even have had the right to use it let alone sell it. In ancient Athens, then, it is probably better to speak of rights and not of ownership when it comes to women’s
One of the greatest responsibilities a woman had in Classical Sparta was giving birth to the Spartan males. Through physical training when a young teen with the Spartan boys, the women needed to be healthy and strong to produce healthy children capable of going through the agoge training. “…By athleticism they made sure that their children would be up to the standard of physical fitness demanded by the Spartan system.” (H.Michell, Sparta). The Spartan mother would prepare the young Spartans prior to the agoge; she would have minimal interaction and supply minimal clothing and
According to research, the role of women in classical Greece was extremely limited. Men and women were segregated all over in the Greek society, even in the home (Source 9). Women were secluded in their homes to the point of not being able to leave their own quarters except on special religious occasions or as necessity dictated (Source 10). All women were tightly controlled and confined to the home to insure that their husbands were provided legitimate male heirs. Beyond this, women had no true value (Source 6). Clearly, male domination in Greek society was like enslavement to women. A marriage contract dated 92 B.C. can be located in Women's Life in Greece & Rome by Mary R. Lefkowitz and Maureen B. Fant which defines unacceptable behavior within the union of marriage. The document requires that both husband and wife be chaste within the context of the household, but although nothing prevents ...
A man's life in Sparta was lived in support of the State, every responsibility he had was directed to the benefit of Sparta. His purpose as a person was to defend and enlarge the nation as a warrior. His purpose as a husband and father was to strengthen the nation, "family life" was a tertiary concern at best, behind warrior status, warrior production and possibly even