The Code of Hammurabi was one of the earliest and most complete written legal codes and was proclaimed by the Babylonian king Hammurabi, who reigned from to B. Hammurabi expanded the city-state of Babylon along the Euphrates River to unite all of southern The Athenian philosopher Plato c. In his written dialogues he conveyed and expanded on the ideas and techniques of his teacher Socrates. The Academy he Live TV. This Day In History. History Vault. The Spartan Military Unlike such Greek city-states as Athens, a center for the arts, learning and philosophy, Sparta was centered on a warrior culture.
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Pericles The so-called golden age of Athenian culture flourished under the leadership of Pericles B. Code of Hammurabi The Code of Hammurabi was one of the earliest and most complete written legal codes and was proclaimed by the Babylonian king Hammurabi, who reigned from to B.
Plato The Athenian philosopher Plato c. Around BCE, it rose to become the dominant military power in ancient Greece. Given its military preeminence, Sparta was recognized as the overall leader of the combined Greek forces during the Greco-Persian Wars. Between and BCE, Sparta was the principal enemy of Athens during the Peloponnesian War, from which it emerged victorious, though at great cost. Political geography of ancient Greece: The map shows the political structure of Greece in the Archaic Age.
The Spartans were already considered a land-fighting force to be reckoned with when, in BCE, a small force of Spartans, Thespians, and Thebans made a legendary final stand at the Battle of Thermopylae against the massive Persian army during the Greco-Persian Wars.
The Greek forces suffered very high casualties before finally being encircled and defeated. One year later, Sparta led a Greek alliance against the Persians at the Battle of Plataea where their superior weaponry, strategy, and bronze armor proved a huge asset in achieving a resounding victory.
This decisive victory put an end to the Greco-Persian War, as well as Persian ambitions of spreading into Europe.
Despite being fought as part of a alliance, the victory was credited to Sparta, which had been the de facto leader of the entire Greek expedition. In the later classical period, Sparta fought amongst Athens, Thebes, and Persia for supremacy within the region. As a result of the Peloponnesian War, Sparta developed formidable naval power, enabling it to subdue many key Greek states and even overpower the elite Athenian navy. Sparta functioned under an oligarchy.
The state was ruled by two hereditary kings of the Agiad and Eurypontid families, both supposedly descendants of Heracles, and equal in authority so that one could not act against the power and political enactments of his colleague. Unique in ancient Greece for its social system and constitution, Spartan society was completely focused on military training and excellence. Its inhabitants were classified as Spartiates Spartan citizens who enjoyed full rights , Mothakes non-Spartan, free men raised as Spartans , Perioikoi freed men , and Helots state-owned serfs, part of the enslaved, non-Spartan, local population.
Male Spartans began military training at age seven. The training was designed to encourage discipline and physical toughness, as well as emphasize the importance of the Spartan state.
Special punishments were imposed if boys failed to answer questions sufficiently laconically i. At age 20, the Spartan citizen began his membership in one of the syssitia dining messes or clubs , which were composed of about 15 members each, and were compulsory. Here each group learned how to bond and rely on one another. The Spartans were not eligible for election to public office until the age of Eventually, a Greek man showed Xerxes a pass that allowed part of the Persian force to outmaneuver the Greeks and attack them on both flanks.
Leonidas was doomed. Many of the troops who were with Leonidas withdrew possibly because the Spartan king ordered them to. According to Herodotus, the Thespians decided to stay with the Spartans by their own free will. Leonidas then made his fateful stand and "fell fighting bravely, together with many other famous Spartans," Herodotus writes.
Ultimately, the Persians killed almost all of the Spartan troops. The helots the Spartans brought with them were also killed. The Persian army proceeded south, sacking Athens and threatening to break into the Peloponnese. A Greek naval victory at the Battle of Salamis halted this approach, the Persian king Xerxes going home and leaving an army behind that would later be destroyed.
The Greeks led by the now dead Leonidas had prevailed. When the threat from the Persians receded, the Greeks resumed their inter-city rivalries. Two of the most powerful city states were Athens and Sparta, and tensions between the two escalated in the decades after their victory over Persia. The situation was serious enough that Sparta called on allied cities for aid in putting it down.
When the Athenians arrived, however, the Spartans refused their help. This was taken as an insult in Athens and bolstered anti-Spartan views. The Battle of Tanagra, fought in B. At times, Athens appeared to have the advantage, such as the battle of Sphacteria in B.
It was the opinion that no force or famine could make the Lacedaemonians give up their arms, but that they would fight on as they could, and die with them in their hands," wrote Thucydides B. Translation by J. Dent via Perseus Digital Library. There were also periods when Athens was in trouble, such as in B. There has been speculation that the plague was actually an ancient form of the Ebola virus. Ultimately, the conflict between Sparta and Athens resolved itself on the sea.
While the Athenians had the naval advantage throughout much of the war, the situation changed when a man named Lysander was named commander of Sparta's navy. He sought out Persian financial support to help the Spartans build up their fleet. He convinced a Persian prince named Cyrus to provide him with money.
The prince "had brought with him, he said, five hundred talents; if this amount should prove insufficient, he would use his own money, which his father had given him; and if this too should prove inadequate, he would go so far as to break up the throne whereon he sat, which was of silver and gold," wrote Xenophon B.
With Persian financial support, Lysander built up his navy and trained his sailors. In B. He managed to catch them by surprise, winning a decisive victory and cutting off Athens' supply of grain from the Crimea. Athens was now forced to make peace on Sparta's terms.
They had to tear down their walls, confine their activities to Attica and as Lysander latter ordered submit to rule by a man body later called the "thirty tyrants. The "Peloponnesians with great enthusiasm began to tear down the walls [of Athens] to the music of flute-girls, thinking that that day was the beginning of freedom for Greece," wrote Xenophon. A series of events and missteps led Sparta from being the pre-eminent force in the Aegean to becoming a second rate power.
Shortly after their victory, the Spartans turned against their Persian backers and launched an inconclusive campaign into Turkey. Then in the following decades, the Spartans were forced to campaign on several fronts.
The "lower bricks became soaked and failed to support those above them, the wall began first to crack and then to give way," wrote Xenophon. The city was forced to surrender against this unorthodox onslaught. More challenges affected Spartan hegemony. Ultimately, however Sparta's downfall came, not from Athens, but from a city named Thebes. Even lower than the conquered population was a group called the helots. Helots were responsible for agricultural duties and other day-to-day tasks that supported the Spartans.
Spartan citizens required this support because they focused solely on athletic and military training, and politics. Two kings from two different families ruled Sparta. This ensured that when one king ventured out on a military campaign the other could continue to rule the city. A council of elders advised the kings in addition to serving as judges and hosting public assemblies.
Military activity was essential to Sparta. At the age of seven, boys left home to begin training at a military academy called an agoge a-go-je. At the academy, the boys lived communally with others in their age group. This was meant to prepare them for life in the army. Soldiers were trained as hoplites, or heavily armed foot soldiers. The Spartan army was known for its skill in on-land combat.
Sparta fought both foreign and neighboring adversaries. However, in B. Not long after, however, the two cities began fighting each other in the two Peloponnesian Wars to B.
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