Were the Spartans autistic...

It depends where you're at. Most people do consider themselves natives of their state. We're all Americans, but I'm a native North Carolinian, for example. State identities hold much more weight in the US.

>They truly believed they were not natives
They weren't, and their fear of the helots was justifiable. Athens and Sparta finally went separate ways after they refused their help in suppressing a massive slave revolt that occurred almost instantly after Sparta was hit by an earthquake. Thucydides even accounts that one of their Kings had to tear them away from searching for survivors in the wreckage because the second the Spartans seemed weak the helots would be at their throats.
>They literally put every ounce of effort into training for war and fucking young boys.
Like hundreds of other warrior societies in history, except occasionally they put in an effort at appearing cultured.

Victor Davis Hanson's A War Like No Other is a great read that examines that the Athenian and Spartan's mindsets during the Peloponnesian War, and makes comparisons that even a wikipedia scholar like your average Veeky Forumstorian can understand.

What about Athens and literally all the other city states that defeated the persians? Some of them without being massacred in the thermopylae. Were Spartans just an average city but kinda isolated and with great propaganda?

Most people at that time preferred to believe they were not native.

Look at the history of Israel.

Then why do you constantly change states like it's nothing? To states that are more distant than several countries are between them. Or is this just a TV thing?

I consider myself a native. But I only view whites that have been here since before the revolution as natives

Different circumstances. Portraying themselves as "natives" was essential in rallying the Americans against the British tyranny, while by dehumanising their helots as native savages the Spartans justified their tyranny over them.
Gene Wolfe's take on it in The Soldier of the Mist is pretty interesting. I recommend it for anyone looking for accurate historical fiction.

Well unlike the Spartans, you're a liar.

And why do you think that?

>Were Spartans just an average city but kinda isolated and with great propaganda?

It wasn't propaganda, they were renowned for their slow action, to a fault.

>Talk about Athens
What about Themistocles and his fucking walls? What about his escape to the persians? Yes Spartans had corruption, but they were rightfully rooted out.

Fuck Athens. Athens' only way, in their own words, to beat the Spartans was a navy battle, they recognized they would never beat them on land and their only hope is that they (the spartans) couldn't train a navy, the spartans said the exact same thing except that they would train a navy and fuck them at sea, which they did.

Athens was a scheming scumbag city state and Sparta was simply more isolationist, but would involve themselves where they saw fit.

>except that they would wait until 1/3 or so of Athens died of a plague, started a war they didn't need to with Syracuse, lost said war against all hope and expectation, rebuilt their entire damn fleet anyway, and got down on their knees begging to suck Persian dick so they could finally build a competing fleet, which they did.

FTFY.

Not autistic so much as they got caught in a Machiavelli class trap.

They conquer the Messinians, enslave them en masse in an institional manner unlike the Greek norm. They need to keep these slaves loyal, or at least compliant. The slave underclass allows for a concentration of wealth big enough to support a professional warrior caste, which can justify itself by pointing out the need to keep the slaves suppressed. This system is generally stable, but it's also very rigid; you can't lose the warrior caste without risking slave revolt, and you can't get rid of the slaves because you can't support the warrior caste with it. So the system just comes trundling along forever, or at least until outside forces kick it over.

If you want to see a modern Sparta, look at North Korea, and you'll see a very similar state in some ways.

>all that ad hominem
Yet Athens still got rekt and is only thanks to the Spartans that the wretched city still stands.

Which account? Did you just read his Lacedaimonian Constitution or something?

I would suggest that if you want to understand 5th-4th century Sparta, then you must start by reading Herodotus, Thucydides, and then Xenophon's Hellenica.

Next, you can choose to continue with general history or delve into something else. If you want to continue with general history, I suggest that the next step is reading the relevant sections of Ploutarch's Lives. You could also read Xenophon's hagiography of Agesilaus. There are a lot of other texts that come to mind, such as Pausanius' travelogue, and there are gems in the 10 orators, but we're already over 1,000 pages of reading by this point.

If, after the Hellenica, you want to step
If you want to step away from the history angle a bit, then I recommend reading any of the relevant parts of Xenophon that you missed. Plutarch's Lykourgos is also good here, and there are large sections of his magna moralia that are helpful. Isocrates' Archidamos is fantastic for getting the feel of a stubborn irredentist Spartan. Aristotle and Plato both discuss Sparta in significant detail. Long sections of Spartan poetry exists; look up Tyrtaeus.

Honestly there's a lot of reading to do, even if you get rid of anything written after the 4rd c. BCE.

>starts shit they can't hope to finish using money stolen from their fellow Ionians
>act like complete savages, treat their subject-allies like helots despite swearing to free them from tyranny
>bitching when Apollo and Ares destroy their ass
The Eastern Greek City states were better off under Persia than Athens.

>not knowing what an ad hominem is.
You might find /int/ more suited to your level of discourse, user. The fact of the matter is that Sparta really had no way of winning the war outside of several acts of unplanned serendipity that they had no way of knowing or planning for. And if you're talking about the Persian wars, the Lacedemonians needed the Athenians as much as the Athenians needed the Spartans. It was Athenian diplomacy that kept the coalition intact over the winter, and the Athenians who were at the forefront of Salamis, without which any sort of victory would be impossible.

Am I wrong, or was Sparta the first constitutional, republican state in history?

>fucking young boys

THIS FUCKING MEME WILL NEVER DIE

Fucking young boys was illegal in Sparta during its height.

Source: Plato's Symposium. Xenophon's Constitution of the Lacedaimonians. Cicero's whatever (fuck latins & fuck you).

It was the Thebans and Eleans who dedicated their lives to sexually molesting boys.

how is a dual monarchy republican?

They had both the advantage of an army core that was devoted exclusively to war-fighting, and a reputation that made the part-time hoplite militias of their neighbors quake with fear. War, and this kind of fight in particular, is less about weapon strength or numbers than it is about morale, and persuading your men to stay in the fight and not quail, throw down their shields, and flee into the hills.

The martial reputation of the Spartans was at least as important as their actual skill at arms, which was itself (in the heyday) second to none. All the Argive hoplites in the world won't avail you a bit if they think they are facing unstoppable super-soldiers.

They still did it all the time. Source: Plutarch's lives, check out Agesilus.

You're reading way more into the text than is justified.

Plato and Xenophon are very clear: you could form a loving and close relationship with a youth and help him join the ranks of men, but it was illegal to fuck young boys.

Unless you are arguing that the Spartan citizenry did not live a regimented and closely monitored life, I think I can leave it at that. Spartan society had the capacity to enforce the law, and the law was that you couldn't be a sexual predator. You don't have any 4th/3rd c. source material to the contrary.

The Boeotians are the boy lovers; Thebans were literally the worst people in all of Hellas and even today their name is a byword for idiot.

>Puts every ounce of effort into military training
>Why did they last so long
Plutarch did not write even close to Sparta's height. He was also writing from a clearly Roman perspective, where boy fucking is totally rad.

>You might find /int/ more suited to your level of discourse, user.
From the wiki since oyu like wiki scholars so much.
>Ad hominem (Latin for "to the man" or "to the person"[1]), short for argumentum ad hominem, is where an argument is rebutted by attacking the character, motive, or other attribute of the person making the argument, or persons associated with the argument, rather than attacking the substance of the argument itself.[2]

>rebuilt their entire damn fleet anyway, and got down on their knees begging to suck Persian dick so they could finally build a competing fleet
You cannot honestly believe this holds any sort of weight and is anything but ad hominem, yeah?

Onto the rest, you can argue all you want about all these other historical facts, but totally disregard that it was the Spartans efforts at Thermopylae that earned them all renowned, as is the historical canon of the time it still is today. Thermopylae showed that the Greeks could not be defeated from a land invasion, they showed they would not be a pushover and to get into the heart of greece they would have to fight many more hard fought battles against well rooted in enemies. How are they going to get to Corinth by land, or get into Arcadia by land? It's essentially impossible if you face that much resistance in that area.

I mean do you forget the one thing after the Persian invasions the Spartans recommended was that they fortafy the areas behind Corinth as a last resort, to not build walls, which the Athenians disregarded quite snakely. It was to make the area which was best suitable to defend as determined by the land formations their main base of operations regarding any further Persian invasions.

Those are all dead

>Sparta really had no way of winning the war outside of several acts of unplanned serendipity that they had no way of knowing or planning for.
Wrong. Thucydides records that at the start of the War the Spartans were asking Corinth and their other naval allies to make them a fleet of more than three-hundred ships. They knew that they needed a navy to win, it's just that it was completely unrealistic of them to be able to acquire a navy in 431BC, therefore they did what Greeks always did and went and ravaged the enemy's fields.
>It was Athenian diplomacy that kept the coalition intact over the winter
And at the same time the Athenians jeopardised the future of Greece and it's cultural legacy by wanting to destroy Thebes. They weren't exactly the glue holding the Hellenic League together.

>198▶

*5th/4th c. source material, rather. Not that it matters, I'm not aware of any 3rd c. primary sources that contradict Plato & Xenophon.

>boy fucking

when will this meme die? This was always a vice of the cosmopolitan elite. It was never the norm in Greece, and plenty of Greek cities mocked those who indulged in it (Athenian elites) mercilessly.

Institutional pederasty was always a fringe and an exception, and the Romans were a good deal more conservative in temperament than the Greeks. The interest of the Roman was in who was fucking whom, not in some philosophically-based notion about the beauty of a pseudo-sexual relationship between an adult man and an adolescent boy.

>where boy fucking is totally rad.
Queen of Bithynia.

The elite were the only ones making art or writing tracts about it but we know from sources that everyone was doing it.

When will this "not all greeks" meme die.

I meant people that are descendant from them. If your ancestors crawled here after the country got going I don't consider you a native

Word it right next time if you don't want to sound retarded.

>Athens was a scheming scumbag city state and Sparta was simply more isolationist, but would involve themselves where they saw fit.

Nice way of misspelling: "Athens was a civilized unifying force among the Greeks and Sparta was simply a self-absorbed hermit kingdom, Machiavellian and perfidious towards everyone, even their allies."

Nah lad you are just autistic

"we know from sources"

cite them, then! Give me these primary sources that say that boy fucking was legal in Sparta during 5th/4th c. BCE.

I gave you 2 different sources from 4th. BCE showing that it was illegal in Sparta. One of those sources is literally a person that spent a significant amount of time and absolutely would know whether something was legal or not.

If Greeks in general were so thrilled with boy fucking, Xenophon would have said that Spartans were massive mega pedos. But he didn't. Because it was the Thebans who were known for touching children.

>Athens was a civilized unifying force among the Greeks
Read some history around the time of the onset of The Peloponnesian War. Athens was a large growing city-state which tried to place its influence where it didn't belong.

No, the fact that the elites were doing all the writing that has come down to us should tell you that the things they focused on (pederasty) were concerns particular to them. The hoi paloi were too busy keeping the farm going and siring children to have time left over for leisurely boyfucking.

You're reading the diary of a wealthy socialite and imagining that this was how the common man lived.

>Athens was a civilized unifying force
>Megara
>Melos
>Crete
>Samos
>Syracuse
>Corcyra after they got their hands on Athenian democracy
>Mytilene
>The Thracian poli
Yeah, I'm sure they all enjoyed the "unifying" civilisation that Athens so graciously bestowed upon them.

>Were the Spartans autistic?

1. AMONG SPARTANS, PREVALENCE OF PROTOAUTISM IS PROBABLE, BECAUSE SPARTANS WERE AN ARYAN PEOPLE; ORIGINAL ARYANS WERE NOT AUTISTIC, BUT THEIR COGNITIVE QUALITIES SURVIVE IN CONTEMPORARY NOBLE INDIVIDUALS, MANIFESTING IN OPTIMAL MANNER AS WHAT IS NOW TERMED "AUTISM".

2. SPARTANS WERE NOT NATIVE TO PELOPONNESOS.

3. SPARTANS DID NOT PRACTISE SLAVERY; HELOTS WERE NOT SLAVES, BUT A SOCIOLABOURAL CASTE.

4. SPARTANS DID NOT PRACTISE PEDERASTY; SPARTANS WERE THE ONLY HELLENIC PEOPLE THAT DID NOT PRACTISE PEDERASTY, WHICH, ALONG WITH NOT PRACTISING SLAVERY, IS ONE OF THE MANY CAUSES FOR THEIR HAVING BEEN SCORNED BY THE REST OF HELLENIC PEOPLES, PARTICULARLY BY THE ATHENIANS.

5. HOW IS THE FACT THAT SPARTA PERSISTED FOR AS LONG AS IT DID, SOMETHING UNBELIEVABLE, ACCORDING TO YOU?

What are you trying to add here?
I agreed with you.
Sure, "boy fucking" was a Roman elite thing, but Plutarch was a Roman elite.

>PREVALENCE OF PROTOAUTISM IS PROBABLE, BECAUSE SPARTANS WERE AN ARYAN PEOPLE
FUCK OFF VARG

?

>waah being in the league means I have to be loyal and diligent with my economic and military duties. Athens is a meanie for protecting the Aegean under near constant threat from Susa.
>What? The Spartans/Persians offer gold? Fuck the league!

>You're reading way more into the text than is justified.
Exactly how am I doing that? His relationship with Megabates is literally something that the court is giving him advice about. What conclusion other than "Nobody gave a shit about boy-fucking" do you draw from this?

>You don't have any 4th/3rd c. source material to the contrary.
And similarly, you don't have any 4th/3rd source material saying that people were actually punished for it, just that there was a law against it. Clearly, just because there was a law against something means nobody ever does it ever, which is why we don't have sexual predation in the modern world. Funnily enough, with a relative lack of sources you get problems like that.

So?

>Ad hominem (Latin for "to the man" or "to the person"[1]), short for argumentum ad hominem, is where an argument is rebutted by attacking the character, motive, or other attribute of the person making the argument, or persons associated with the argument, rather than attacking the substance of the argument itself.[2]
And since no argument was made, merely a statement of historical fact which I amended, ad hominem has no place.

Idiot.

>You cannot honestly believe this holds any sort of weight and is anything but ad hominem, yeah?
I can and will argue that it amply demonstrates that Sparta entered into the Peloponesean war with no way of actually winning it apparent at the time they started fighting, and basically lucked into victory on the backs of outsiders.

>imposing modern psychological classifications on foreign people from the distant past whose circumstances were wholly unlike our own

wew lad. if you are yourself autistic, cheers, but don't committ the classic historian's mistake of judging those from the past by modern standards

>splitting hairs about the helots

I suppose if you wanted to use a more precise historical term you would use "serf" but as has been pointed out before the distinction is largely academic

>Onto the rest, you can argue all you want about all these other historical facts, but totally disregard that it was the Spartans efforts at Thermopylae that earned them all renowned, as is the historical canon of the time it still is today
What exactly makes it a Spartan effort more than a Phocian or Arcadian effort? Each of them brought more hoplites than the Spartands did by over 3:1, if you believe Herodotus. Coriinth, Manitea, Tegea, Thebes, and Thespia also all brought more hoplites than the Spartans. But of course it was clearly the Spartans losing a battle here that SAVED GREECE FOREVER, and not say, Salamis where they weren't relevant, or even Platea, where they were again part of a coalition and was actually important.

>How are they going to get to Corinth by land, or get into Arcadia by land? It's essentially impossible if you face that much resistance in that area.
Why would they go by land if they have a fleet? And who was it that got rid of the fleet again?

>I mean do you forget the one thing after the Persian invasions the Spartans recommended was that they fortafy the areas behind Corinth as a last resort, to not build walls, which the Athenians disregarded quite snakely.
Yes, because giving up half of Greece, probably forever, is such a great plan.

>Thucydides records that at the start of the War the Spartans were asking Corinth and their other naval allies to make them a fleet of more than three-hundred ships.
Which they never could and never did provide. Hell, their entire league never had 200 trierimes at one point, and that's after the Persian aid.

>They knew that they needed a navy to win, it's just that it was completely unrealistic of them to be able to acquire a navy in 431BC, therefore they did what Greeks always did and went and ravaged the enemy's fields.
And it didn't work for 20 years. But the 21st time's the charm, right?

>And at the same time the Athenians jeopardised the future of Greece and it's cultural legacy by wanting to destroy Thebes.
People are mad at city-states that support the other side. Color me shocked.

There's barely any source material at all and you know it. Trying to draw a line saying that 3rd century guys are fine, but second century guys are all liars and know absolutely nothing is intellectually dishonest beyond belief.

Out of curiosity, does anyone here defend the Thebans? Literally the worst of all the Hellenic cities.

Whenever there was an opportunity to betray Hellas, they were on it immediately. Help the invading Persians? SIGN ME UP. Exacerbate the Peloponnesian War? SIGN ME UP. Try to have Athens totally demolished and the citizenry killed/enslaved at the end of the 5th century, an act that would have repercussions so terrible I cannot even type them out? SIGN ME UP. Antagonise everyone and turn everything to shit until you are finally btfo by Macedon and your city is burnt to the ground? SIGN ME UP.

Thebans are literal boy fucking retards who should have been collectively executed in the mid-5th century. I visited the modern city of Thebes and it is festering shit-hole, I have no idea why the place is still standing. Boeotian is still a byword for idiot today, and Thebans live down to that reputation in every single way. Unbelievable.

>swear to preserve the liberty of Greeks
>sign a treaty with the Persians
>suddenly Athenians start saying it's okay when we oppress you so we can build a shinny new city and fight the Spartans
>Athens' demagogues proudly declare themselves an empire
>"Why are you rebelling from our hegemony?! ;_;"
Come on. By 431 they were asking for it.

>And it didn't work for 20 years.
They only held consecutive invasions for six years, after that they wised up and started hitting the Athenians were it hurt, their colonies. Just look at Brasidas' campaign in Thrace, proof that 1) Athens' "allies" wanted to be liberated and 2) that Sparta actually had tactics that could bring Athens to the negotiating table before they made a fleet.
>People are mad at city-states that support the other side.
I didn't know the Thebans personally razed Athens. Wanting to destroy them just because they Medised was just petty. The Athenians had no right to do so and the rest of Greece put their foot down and told them to shut up.

Pindar.

>What exactly makes it a Spartan effort more than a Phocian or Arcadian effort?
Jesus boy, it's historical fact that it was the Spartans who left with 300 men were the first to go and knowing full well they were going to die they gathered the rest along the way.

>Why would they go by land if they have a fleet? And who was it that got rid of the fleet again?
God dam, why the fuck are you trying to argue something you know nothing about.

>And who was it that got rid of the fleet again?
Literally weather.

The Persian navy had just been rekt, but yeah lets use that for a fully fledged invasion into the greek islands!

>Yes, because giving up half of Greece, probably forever, is such a great plan.
What? One of the main things the Athenians did during the Persian war was literally abandon their whole city and live with the navy and fought of the Persians, are you this ignorant in history? The Speeches leading up the the peloponnesian wars call for disregard of property and love of life, because they are going to come to destroy our cities but we don't have to fight them at every corner. This is simply history and the Greeks fully knew that their cities could be rebuilt.

I am done with you.

Sure, Athens was arrogant and American-esque in their approach, but the fact remains. Spartan armies burning the Attic farmland every summer and retreating, plus sponsored uprisings here and there, even more so, while a persian fleet was already massing and standing by to pounce, were the recipe for the decline of the City-States in the long run.

Fine, get me your 2nd century bce source that says Spartans were on the same page as Thebans and Eleans when it came to boy fucking.

lmao I literally gave you 2 different 4th century texts that indicate that boy fucking wasn't acceptable in Sparta. You want a court document from Sparta indicating that someone was successfully prosecuted, too? Get your hand off it.

I'm still waiting for anything from you. At most, you've referred to a story wherein Agesilaus refuses a customary kiss from a persian that he loves. It's actually contained in Xenophon's Agesilaus as well as Plutarch's Agesilaus, so it is a 4th c. primary source, but it has nothing to do with boy fucking being acceptable in Sparta (the opposite, really). I'm guessing I shouldn't hold my breath.

Come on, both Athens and Sparta are equally responsible for shooting Greek independence in the foot. You can't drag the rest of the Greek world into a 20+ year war and except things to go back to normal at the end.

Ok. Can't argue with that.

>And since no argument was made, merely a statement of historical fact which I amended, ad hominem has no place.
Jeez man, you don't have to post. But yeah can I have your sources on "their knees to suck Persian dicks"

>I can and will argue that it amply demonstrates that Sparta entered into the Peloponesean war with no way of actually winning it apparent at the time they started fighting, and basically lucked into victory on the backs of outsiders.

Then you simply do not know history. The Spartans entered into the war knowing full well they would hand it to them and they did, that is why in their first invasion they were not even contested. I mean, you are trying to argue against history. You simply cannot. Try reading the speeches of Archidamus II.

>that Sparta actually had tactics that could bring Athens to the negotiating table before they made a fleet.
It's quite telling that the best such tactics could do was get a status quo ante bellum peace with Athens, even giving back Amphopolis (sp?) to Athens.

>I didn't know the Thebans personally razed Athens. Wanting to destroy them just because they Medised was just petty. The Athenians had no right to do so and the rest of Greece put their foot down and told them to shut up.
Who cares? At this point you're not analyzing, you're passing a moral judgment on people. That's not history, that's picking sports teams of people who are thousands of years dead.

>s boy, it's historical fact that it was the Spartans who left with 300 men were the first to go and knowing full well they were going to die they gathered the rest along the way.
First off
>Herodotus
>Historical fact
Secondly, of course, Herodotus says no such thing, just that they all gathered there. perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0126:book=7:chapter=202:section=1 perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0126:book=7:chapter=203:section=1
There is, of course, nothing saying that they knew it was a suicide mission heading out.

>God dam, why the fuck are you trying to argue something you know nothing about.
Pot, meet kettle. Assuming we believe Herodotus, the Persians still have a massive fleet, even after Artemesium and the storms, outnumbering the Hellenic one almost 2:1.

>The Persian navy had just been rekt, but yeah lets use that for a fully fledged invasion into the greek islands!
The Spartan "plan" to fortify the isthmus pre-dates the loss at Salamis and the loss of Persian amphibious capabilities.

>Bizarre strawman.
I literally do not know what you are trying to say with that last paragraph. It certainly bears no relation to my point that the Spartan plan of fortifying the isthmus is dumb.

>There is, of course, nothing saying that they knew it was a suicide mission heading out.
Are you dense?

O ye men who dwell in the streets of broad Lacedaemon!
Honor the festival of the Carneia!! Otherwise,
Either your glorious town shall be sacked by the children of Perseus,
Or, in exchange, must all through the whole Laconian country

Mourn for the loss of a king, descendant of great Heracles.

>the Persians still have a massive fleet, even after Artemesium and the storms, outnumbering the Hellenic one almost 2:1.
Jesus fucking christ you are still going. This doesn't fucking matter when you are leading an army and on two fronts you just got destroyed, even though you won, you understand what a pyrrhic victory is?

>I literally do not know what you are trying to say with that last paragraph. It certainly bears no relation to my point that the Spartan plan of fortifying the isthmus is dumb.
You understand how you think about it has no relation on the historical accuracy of these facts? lel? It just shows you have little to no understanding of this discussion if you think that it's "dumb" even though history shows Greeks are willing to throw away their property for the greater good.

I mean, you can simply stop, this isn't even remotely close to the initial issue anymore senpai, I wonder why?

I literally do not know why you would think I care that you think their plans are dumb, when it's simply history.

>Fine, get me your 2nd century bce source that says Spartans were on the same page as Thebans and Eleans when it came to boy fucking.

That is not what I'm saying, so please don't move the goalposts. I'm saying that there is every indication that they did in fact fuck boys and it was no big deal.

penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Plutarch/Lives/Agesilaus*.html

>Indeed, when Megabates once came up and offered to embrace and kiss him he declined his caresses. 6 The boy was mortified at this, and desisted, and afterwards kept his distance when addressing him, whereupon Agesilaüs, distressed now and repentant for having avoided his kiss, pretended to wonder what ailed Megabates that he did not greet him with a kiss. "It is thy fault," the king's companions said; "thou didst not accept, but didst decline the fair one's kiss in feature and trembling; yet even now he might be persuaded to come within range of thy lips; but see that thou dost not again play the coward." 7 Then, after some time spent in silent reflection, Agesilaüs said: "There is no harm in your persuading him; for I think I would more gladly fight that battle of the kiss over again than possess all the gold I have ever seen." Of such a mind was he while Megabates was with him, though when the boy was gone, he was so on fire with love for him that it were hard to say whether, had the boy come back into his presence, he would have had the strength to refuse his kisses.20

>You want a court document from Sparta indicating that someone was successfully prosecuted, too? Get your hand off it.
Why not? You've cited a constitution and a guy who is a known Lacedemoniaphile. That's like saying because Japan outlaws groping women on trains, and a weebaoo says he never saw it while visiting Japan, it doesn't happen. Do you not get how these are not great sources you're invoking?

>Jeez man, you don't have to post. But yeah can I have your sources on "their knees to suck Persian dicks"
livius.org/sources/content/thucydides/the-treaties-between-persia-and-sparta/

>Then you simply do not know history. The Spartans entered into the war knowing full well they would hand it to them and they did
They did not. Show me your source that Sparta's allies furnished 300 triremes.

>that is why in their first invasion they were not even contested
Their first invasion milled around in front of the long walls and did no actual harm to Athens. Hell, they couldn't even shut down the silver mines at Larium, outside the fucking walls.

They had about as much chance as Hitler did in 1940 after beating France of beating Britain.

>livius.org/sources/content/thucydides/the-treaties-between-persia-and-sparta/
Bro, you can stop at any time. This is all I'll give you. If you think you can use that language, hyperbole ad hominem and then try to justify it, you're a juvenile.

>Their first invasion milled around in front of the long walls and did no actual harm to Athens
A herp derp because they were trying to get them to come out and face them in battle, they didn't a herp derp.

>no chances in winning even though they aren't being fought

>They did not. Show me your source that Sparta's allies furnished 300 triremes.

Literally what? If you actually read any of the speeches I linked you, you would know the ocnses of the Spartans when they went to war, but yeah, according to you they entered the war knowing they would lose it. Right.

>They had about as much chance as Hitler did in 1940 after beating France of beating Britain.
okay.

>Mourn for the loss of a king, descendant of great Heracles.
Yes, I forgot how we should always believe every oracle ever and that every Hellene did in fact do so.

>. This doesn't fucking matter when you are leading an army and on two fronts you just got destroyed,
What the fuck are you talking about? They had not been "destroyed" by this point.

>, you understand what a pyrrhic victory is?
A victory obtained at such cost that it leaves the "victor" in a worse position than before they won it. Neither Artemesium nor Thermapolye were this.

>You understand how you think about it has no relation on the historical accuracy of these facts
What facts? Sparta's plan was to fortify the isthmus. They attempted to do this after the fall of Boetia and Attica. The Persians still had amphibious capabilities at this point, and could have just landed around the fucking fortification. That makes the Spartan plan dumb. Nothing you mentioned contradicted this or even suggests you understand it. You instead bring up an irrelevant tangent about how Athens abandoned their city, which has nothing to do with the point that the Spartan plan was foolish.

>It's quite telling that the best such tactics could do was get a status quo ante bellum peace with Athens
Again, circumstances. Sparta needed to have the Spartiates returned to be able to keep the confidence of their allies and for their very state to survive.
Also Amphopolis and the rest were handed over in name only, Athens had to recapture a lot of rebellious Thracian cities during the Peace of Nicias.
>you're passing a moral judgment on people.
That's literally Ancient Greek history. It's written so you can't read it without making moral judgements.

>Bro, you can stop at any time. This is all I'll give you. If you think you can use that language, hyperbole ad hominem and then try to justify it, you're a juvenile.
So you don't actually have a rebuttal. Good to know.

>A herp derp because they were trying to get them to come out and face them in battle, they didn't a herp derp.
It didn't work, they had to have known it wouldn't work, and therefore it was dumb.

>Literally what?
Literally, you stated upthread that
>Thucydides records that at the start of the War the Spartans were asking Corinth and their other naval allies to make them a fleet of more than three-hundred ships.
Asking is not getting. Show your source that the Spartans indeed got this fleet.

> If you actually read any of the speeches I linked you, you would know the ocnses of the Spartans when they went to war, but yeah, according to you they entered the war knowing they would lose it. Right.
What's a "ocnses"? And do you really not get how fire-eating speeches don't actually substitute for strategy, nor do they do anything to ameliorate Sparta's strategic weaknesses, liek how they can't actually strike a vital blow to Athens?

>okay.
I mean sure, Hitler could have beaten the UK if they had a plague that wiped out a third of their population, and then 20 years later he or his successors signed a treaty with American to come over and help them out furnishing the sort of fleet and invasion force he'd need to take it. Why didn't Germany plan on that in WW2?

That was me, not him. Anyway, that was in the context of Spartan plans at the beginning of the war, not how they won it.

>Again, circumstances. Sparta needed to have the Spartiates returned to be able to keep the confidence of their allies and for their very state to survive.
So? Circumstances are part of war. You don't just get to ignore them when they're inconvenient. What's next? I can just as easily and stupidly claim that Athens would win the war easily if they could magically keep their own hoplite forces armed mustered and ready year round instead of needing them home for planting and harvest. That kind of strategic flexibility would have made them invincible.

>Also Amphopolis and the rest were handed over in name only, Athens had to recapture a lot of rebellious Thracian cities during the Peace of Nicias.
And they did in fact do so, something they couldn't do when the Spartans were holding down the fort. To believe that the Spartans didn't know they were giving it up seems unfounded.

>Yes, I forgot how we should always believe every oracle ever and that every Hellene did in fact do so.
Oh so you're being retarded? Because that completely contradicted what you said before. Is this on purpose perchance?

>What the fuck are you talking about? They had not been "destroyed" by this point.
From their point of view they may as well have been, they were hollow victories.

>Neither Artemesium nor Thermapolye were this.
They most certainly were. I mean, even historically, after these battles and Salamis Xerxes withdrew, unrelated in your mind right?

>That makes the Spartan plan dumb. Nothing you mentioned contradicted this or even suggests you understand it. You instead bring up an irrelevant tangent about how Athens abandoned their city, which has nothing to do with the point that the Spartan plan was foolish.
Again, this has not one singular point on this argument at all. The Athenian counter was to build walls. I mean, there was no good fucking option. You are arguing with hindsight on apoint which has literally not one single bearing on the argument.

I'm actually done, can't wait to check the archives tomorrow and see your utterly retarded reply.

But that's just it, and the point I've been trying to make all thread. Spartan plans at the beginning of the war are ridiculously unfeasible, and couldn't possibly work. Someone mentioned a War Like No Other, and Hansen comes to the opinion that they knew they wouldn't work, and it was more or less a face saving thing of eventually settling for "Well, we're in Attica, they're not in Arcadia, so we win, let's go home and call it a draw."

They had no real means of decisively striking at Athens in 431; and the means that they eventually developed were not ones they could have foreseen at that time. They essentially lucked into victory.

-
So, you were just being a disingenuous arsehole when you called me "intellectually dishonest" for cutting off the sources at the 3rd rather than 2nd century? Great to know, I'll stop waiting for your mythical 2nd century primary source then.

-
As for your citation to Plutarch (no idea why you cite him rather than Xenophon), it is literally nothing more than a story of Agesilaus being in love with some young persian but refusing to even accept a customary kiss.

Agesilaus is obeying Spartan law, he is not even in Sparta at the time, and there is literally nothing in your story that suggests that it's acceptable to fuck boys in Sparta. Literally. Nothing.

-
Why don't I cite Spartan court records? Because they don't exist, and even if they did you would then ask me to get a certified copy of conviction.

I've cited two prominent 4th century authors, Plato and Xenophon. Both of them were reputable men who were in the right position to know the truth. Further, they were widely read. If they just made something up, it would be embarrassing for them personally, and it is bizarre that nobody (such as Aristotle) called them out on it.

Your argument about japanese people on a train is completely irrelevant. If your only point is that at least one Spartan citizen got away with fucking at least one boy in Sparta during the 5th century, then bravo.

If your point is to call them "boy fuckers" and pretend that "not all greeks" is a meme, then you have failed. You are going to have to actually come up with a relevant source to contradict two of the most prominent authors in 4th c. Hellas. As it stands, boy fucking was the domain of Thebans. Honestly, I'm starting to suspect that you are a theban-sympathiser.

>Oh so you're being retarded? Because that completely contradicted what you said before. Is this on purpose perchance?
No. You claimed that they all KNEW they were going to die. You did this by showing a Oracle prophecy. Show me how all those spartans were convinced that this was god's truth.

>From their point of view they may as well have been, they were hollow victories.
What "their point of view"? We have no point of view from the Persians, only what Herodotus attributes to them. Given how he apparently thought that the Persian invasion force numbered over 5 million people, I'm not exactly inclined to take his word for it.
>I mean, even historically, after these battles and Salamis Xerxes withdrew, unrelated in your mind right?
Nice goalpost moving. After Salamis Xerxes withdrew. Not after the previous two, where he was in fact still at the head of the column.

>Again, this has not one singular point on this argument at all.
Yes it does, dimwit. Le's go back to the beginning

I claim that it was Athenian naval victories at Salamis that make the war winnable.

You claim that I "forget the thing after the Persian invasion the Spartans recommend that they fortify the areas behind Corinth" (Spelling corrected).

I say it's a stupid plan.

Are we on the same page now?

> The Athenian counter was to build walls
Their counter was to build a wooden wall, a fleet. Which, you know, was actually decisive.

> I mean, there was no good fucking option.
Yes there was, fight the fleet. That was the weak point, as Greece could not supply an army as big as Xerxes and he needed constant resupply. That was apparent to guys like Themistocles, so it's clearly not something with the benefit of hindsight.

>I'm actually done, can't wait to check the archives tomorrow and see your utterly retarded reply.

You would be a lot more convincing if you told the truth last time you said you were done. Or if you could actually argue a point.

>So you don't actually have a rebuttal. Good to know.

Lol, I am saying you're wording of the argument is ad hominem and you are trying to say that it's factually accurate, those two points are not relevant, because I am going to read that article and there is going to be nothing about actual dick sucking, you know, because you're using ad hom in your argument. Seriously, you can stop at any time.

>>Literally what?
>Literally, you stated upthread that
>>Thucydides records that at the start of the War the Spartans were asking Corinth and their other naval allies to make them a fleet of more than three-hundred ships.
>Asking is not getting. Show your source that the Spartans indeed got this fleet.

Not me senpai. The rest of your argument is simply a circle-jerk and is simply historically inaccurate as the Athenian policy was to not engage them in open battle, because they would simply lose.

>the means that they eventually developed were not ones they could have foreseen at that time
This is where I have to disagree with you. Sure, promising the Persians the Ionian Greeks in exchange for the gold to build a fleet might've been a bitter pill to swallow in 431, but after years of war the Spartans were ready to accept it.
The same is true for their tactic of attacking Athens through "liberating" its tributaries instead of just marching into Attica.

They weren't as inflexible as you seem to believe. Sure, they weren't ready to try those tactics at the start of the war when all their young men were looking forward to a conventional Greek war, but claiming they just blundered around until victory feel into their laps is absolutely ridiculous. I believe that the Athenians own arrogance was a major cause of their eventual defeat, but the Spartans still had to "win" the war as much as they had to lose it.

>Or is this just a TV thing
For the most part, yes. People will always move to cities for more opportunities, but they'll always consider their home state to be where they're from.

Victor Davis Hansen is an irredeemable Theban sympathiser. Don't trust a word out of his fucking mouth, no matter how accessible and honest he seems. It's all fun and games until he starts claiming that Boeotians are salt of the earth people and that perhaps Thebes is a model city-state.

>How did a city-state like this last so long?
Through sharp wit.

Let me just get one last post in, for you. Here is the evolution of your argument and the shifting of your goal posts, I will try my best.

You started by asking what makes it more of a Spartan effort ()

I said how here, they started the march (you have ignored this) and they had an prohecy

you're rebuttal was that they don't believe in the prophecy and you now want proof that the spartans that went along believed ,like the bodyguard of the king would have a choice, anyway.

The rest was still arguing with hindsight. Forgetting that Xerxes literally pulled out to avoid being trapped in Greece. But yeah.

Bye.

>Lol, I am saying you're wording of the argument is ad hominem
Insulting someone while making an argument is not an ad hominem. An ad hominem is the substitution of a personal attack for an argument.

>those two points are not relevant, because I am going to read that article and there is going to be nothing about actual dick sucking, you know, because you're using ad hom in your argument. Seriously, you can stop at any time.
The words you're looking for are "exaggerations". They are not ad hominems. But in the interests of clarity, no, I did not mean that the Spartans were literally sucking Persian dicks. Rather, I meant it in what I thought was an easily understood metaphorical way: The treaties they signed with Persia in 412-411 amounted to a significant abnegation of Lacedemonian sovereignty, went out of their way to placate a historical enemy for a chance to defeat Athens, and undid decades of war and foreign policy at a stroke concerning the situation in Ionia.

>The rest of your argument is simply a circle-jerk and is simply historically inaccurate as the Athenian policy was to not engage them in open battle, because they would simply lose.
While waiting for the Spartans to tire of the war, sniping at their allies, and doing whatever well they damn pleased. They do not need to beat the Spartan army to win. Polities that are nervous don't do things like the Sicilian expedition.

>This is where I have to disagree with you. Sure, promising the Persians the Ionian Greeks in exchange for the gold to build a fleet might've been a bitter pill to swallow in 431, but after years of war the Spartans were ready to accept it.
I'm not seeing how that disagrees at all. Bitter pill or no, I can't think of anything to suggest anyone in Sparta was considering allying with the Persians (certainly not on those terms) to bring down Athens at the start of the war.

>but claiming they just blundered around until victory feel into their laps is absolutely ridiculous
Is it? They didn't know about the plague, had no possible way of knowing the plague could happen. They didn't know about unexpected Athenian defeats at things like Delium. They certainly weren't planning on the disastrous expedition in Syracuse and the almost overnight destruction of Athenian naval hegemony.

I'll admit, I'm hardly an expert on the subject, but I never got the impression of any real Spartan plan to win the war and break Athenian power, certainly not from the outset. It was a series of stopgap measures designed to solve the crisis of the moment, and taking advantage of almost supernal luck.

>Let me just get one last post in, for you. Here is the evolution of your argument and the shifting of your goal posts, I will try my best.
Oh, I was right.

>I said how here, they started the march (you have ignored this) and they had an prohecy
No, I didn't ignore it. I actually specifically refuted it, by citing to Herodotus.>Secondly, of course, Herodotus says no such thing, just that they all gathered there.

You can look up the pages yourself.

>you're rebuttal was that they don't believe in the prophecy and you now want proof that the spartans that went along believed ,like the bodyguard of the king would have a choice, anyway.
You claimed that they "knew" it was a death sentence by citing the prophecy. It's your responsibility to link the two.

>The rest was still arguing with hindsight
No, Themistocles's actions are definitely not with hindsight.

>Forgetting that Xerxes literally pulled out to avoid being trapped in Greece. But yeah.
After Salamis, not Artemesium.

>Bye.
Well, third time is the charm, but somehow I bet you'll be back.

Again, I think it's a bit simplistic to say, but the sources all show that Spartans were definitely reactors, not actors in the way the Athenians were. Still, I don't think it's actually possible to win a war with "luck." By 404BC the Spartans knew how to fight the Athenians through trial and error, while the Athenians did their best to shoot themselves in the foot.

>literal autist bleating about muh heritage calls someone else an autist
Pottery.

>Leftypol

the spartan monarchs actually had little power going off traditional readings of sources on sparta. in fact they were shorn of their power by the ephors i think and were more like hereditary commanders in chief who could be held accountable for their actions. of course it varied on the king and other historical developments in spartan institutions.

Spartans are super autistic.

>We are the strongest of the Hellenes and fuck Persians, Thracians, and anyone else who isn't part of the Dorian master race
>"Oh shit Athenian fleet is kicking our ass, Persia pls send fleets"

Nobody can say that 5th and 4th c. Spartan kings were absolute rulers, but it just seems odd to call something a republic when you have hereditary heads of state who also lead the army and have important legislative and judicial roles. You would sooner call the UK a republic.

If you're just saying that Sparta was broadly oligarchic, that it had a set constitution, and that there was some division of authority, then yes I agree.

*Agree that Spartan looked that way, that is. Not that it was the first state that could be called a Republic. I don't know exactly what "Republic" is supposed to mean.

they had a reason to fear the slaves

Maliciously underrated post

lmao

They were essentially general/priests.

I think the idea is they were leaders on the battlefield and in ceremonies, but political decision making tended to be a consensus among the oligarchs sort of thing

This.

Sparta was engineered to resist any social change. They had a system that worked and they killed the shit out of anyone attempting to modify it.