Sparta and Spartans in the Roman Empire

[Primus Pilus]

Out of curiousity, do you have a link to the site?

 

Click here and scroll down to the bottom. In the article there is no mention of an author, nor is a bibliography submitted; it is highly likely that the part about Spartan auxillia is a product of the writer's imagination. So we may in fact have been sent on a wild goose chase.

 

Either way, I am still going to scan some more sources.

 

Thanks for the link. I'm going to peruse some older documents to see if I can find any reference to Spartan auxilia at all, just for some verification.

 

(PS, I've edited the topic title to make more sense)

[DecimusCaesar]

Reading the link I noticed the author says:

 

"Spartan phalanxes met and defeated a force of raiding Visigoths in battle. That was the last noteworthy Spartan victory. Laconia was subsequently overrun by the Goths and the Huns."

 

is there a source for this? I never knew that the phalanx was still in use at this time. Would the Spartans have fought the battle themselves as a phalanx? I would have thought that the Roman garrisons of Limitanei in the country would have played part in the city's defence and not Spartan citizens engaging the Visigoths with 'old school' tactics. If it is real then thay is a very interesting anecdote and it goes to show how the Spartans still managed to retain their old ways despite centuries of living under Roman domination.

[WotWotius]

Reading the link I noticed the author says:

 

"Spartan phalanxes met and defeated a force of raiding Visigoths in battle. That was the last noteworthy Spartan victory. Laconia was subsequently overrun by the Goths and the Huns."

 

is there a source for this? I never knew that the phalanx was still in use at this time. Would the Spartans have fought the battle themselves as a phalanx? I would have thought that the Roman garrisons of Limitanei in the country would have played part in the city's defence and not Spartan citizens engaging the Visigoths with 'old school' tactics. If it is real then thay is a very interesting anecdote and it goes to show how the Spartans still managed to retain their old ways despite centuries of living under Roman domination.

 

I think, as established earlier, the author of the site in question has been leading us on. How could the Spartans military practices have survived for that long under the yolk of Roman rule? Maybe the military practices survived as a novelty for tourists visiting the city? I do not know.

 

I cannot seem to find any references to Spartans serving as auxillia; for that reason, I must announce my resignation from this wild goose chase.

[Primus Pilus]

I cannot seem to find any references to Spartans serving as auxillia; for that reason, I must announce my resignation from this wild goose chase.

 

Agreed, other than the Carthaginians using Spartan mercenaries, I'm not stumbling across anything specific regarding Roman auxilia either. I'm actually going to email the author of that site and ask him if he knows the specific source for his claim.

 

(Hey why not, I get the same kind of emails from people all the time )

 

[edit] nevermind, I can't find an email address.

[Leonida]

I think, as established earlier, the author of the site in question has been leading us on. How could the Spartans military practices have survived for that long under the yolk of Roman rule? Maybe the military practices survived as a novelty for tourists visiting the city? I do not know.

 

The book "Hellenistic and Roman Sparta" explores many of the questions raised in this thread. However, I do recall that the Spartans were initially prohibited by the Achean League to run their agoge, a practice that was re-instated under the Romans.

 

It also explains that far from "living under the yoke of Roman rule," the Spartans were largely autonomous in those days, retaining a good deal of freedom, due largely to her support of Rome against her hated enemies - ie, the rest of the Greeks.

 

I can't remember if there is anything specific on Spartan military practices during the Roman era, but I'll have a look when I get in from work.

 

Cheers

 

L

[DecimusCaesar]

Welcome to the Forums Leonida!

 

 

Thanks, i've been curious about Sparta under Rome ever since I read Paul Cartledge's The Spartans. He gives some impressions of Sparta under the Roman Empire but that section of the book seems almost an afterthought seeing as the main drive of the book is the Golden age of Sparta.

[Leonida]

Thanks for the welcome

 

Yes - if you want to know all about the Spartans AFTER the Golden age, then this is definitely the book to get. It's very academic and thus a bit to chew through, but there are some real gems there. The impression that we have, largely thanks to uninformed nonsense on the internet, was that Sparta went from Superpower to Backwater the day after Leuctra. It really didn't, though Sparta's "invincible" presitge was irreparably damaged after the battle, but what really relegated them to "mostly harmless" was the loss of control over the vast majority of the Messenians who had been providing Helot labour for ages.

 

Any road - Sparta, like many polies in the late-Republican era, was increasingly enmeshed in Roman high-politics, evidenced by the construction of a villa for visiting Roman diplomats circa 146 BC. Seutonius reveals that the Spartans were sponsored by the Claudii (from about 100BC), and later Cicero reveals that he was

[WotWotius]

Wow! Thank you for such a great wealth of information.

 

Is there anywhere I can get a copy of the book mentioned above?

[Leonida]

Wow! Thank you for such a great wealth of information.

 

Is there anywhere I can get a copy of the book mentioned above?

 

Amazon - whre else *lol*

 

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Hellenistic-Roman-...TF8&s=books

[DecimusCaesar]

Thanks Leonida! Your info managed to clear up a lot of misconceptions I had about Sparta under Rome. (I had no clue they still used the lochoi system.)

 

Thanks for the link as well!

[Leonida]

Thanks Leonida! Your info managed to clear up a lot of misconceptions I had about Sparta under Rome. (I had no clue they still used the lochoi system.)

 

Thanks for the link as well!

 

Well, let's not muddy the waters too much - I'm not sure that the lochoi system was in constant use. It was definately used as above - as I (via Cartledge) say for propaganda reasons. The book doesn't really go into specific unit make up (what I can see re-skimming through it anyway), but it does appear that Sparta was a client and had her own military (around the time of Augustus, it was not an inconsiderable force).

 

Cheers

 

L

[longbow]

and it would be worth mentioning at this point that the practice of the Lycurgan agoge was still alive and well in Sparta - even under the Christian emperors

 

Wasnt the Agoge just a tourist attraction by this time?a Roman Amphitheatre was built at Sparta at the time of Augustus to accomodate all the Roman tourists to the site.The Romans would watch the competetive dances and religius ceremony's the Spartans were famous for in the theatre and allso watch young boys being whipped (sometimes to death) in the Artemis Orthia!The whipping was supposed to represeant the rights of passage the boys went through in the Agoge.

I allways thought Sparta was a theme park for the sado tourists,long before the Christian emperors were on the scene.

 

Longbow

Edited October 2, 2006 by longbow

[Leonida]

and it would be worth mentioning at this point that the practice of the Lycurgan agoge was still alive and well in Sparta - even under the Christian emperors

 

Wasnt the Agoge just a tourist attraction by this time?a Roman Amphitheatre was built at Sparta at the time of Augustus to accomodate all the Roman tourists to the site.The Romans would watch the competetive dances and religius ceremony's the Spartans were famous for in the theatre and allso watch young boys being whipped (sometimes to death) in the Artemis Orthia!The whipping was supposed to represeant the rights of passage the boys went through in the Agoge.

I allways thought Sparta was a theme park for the sado tourists,long before the Christian emperors were on the scene.

 

Longbow

 

The word agoge means "upbringing" and entailed a little more than dancing and being whipped, so it's unlikely that it's sole purpose was to entertain sado tourists. It was banned in Sparta by the Achean League (politically astute move, that) and re-instated by the Romans. Its true to say that many Romans visited Sparta to watch some of these practices, but calling it a theme-park is really a rather simplistic way of looking at it.

 

Cheers

 

L

[longbow]

I know what the Agoge was,what im trying to say is by the time of Augustus the Agoge didnt exist in its former form.It wasnt a training school for boys from the age of seven to adulthood anymore,it was a recreation of rights of passage what the boys went through purely to satisfy Roman tourists.The Romans didnt watch the boys training for years and years,they watched them being punished to recreat the trials of the Agoge what the famous Spartan warriors went through many,many years before,hence the whipping.

 

Longbow

[Leonida]

I know what the Agoge was,what im trying to say is by the time of Augustus the Agoge didnt exist in its former form.It wasnt a training school for boys from the age of seven to adulthood anymore,it was a recreation of rights of passage what the boys went through purely to satisfy Roman tourists.The Romans didnt watch the boys training for years and years,they watched them being punished to recreat the trials of the Agoge what the famous Spartan warriors went through many,many years before,hence the whipping.

 

Longbow

 

I'd recommend that you read "Hellenistic and Roman Sparta" by Cartledge and Spawforth to gain a better understanding of Sparta and its practices during the period.

 

Cheers

 

L