The 300 Spartans stood at the head of a force of approximately 7,000 other Greeks, not to mention their own helot slaves, who fought as light infantry.
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The origins of the château are obscure,Ballon & Helot-Lécroart 1985, p. 27. but it was probably initially constructed in the 1560sBallon & Helot-Lécroart 1985, p. 22. and purchased in 1606 by a courtier of Henri IV of France, Jean de Moisset,Ballon & Helot-Lécroart 1985, p. 22. who added to the château and acquired additional land for the expansion of the gardens.
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Willem Helot (27 October 1675 – 7 November 1749), was secunde and Acting Governor of the Cape Colony.
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Unlike other slaves in ancient Greece, the helot population was maintained through reproduction, rather than the purchase of more slaves. Because of this, helots were able to freely choose partners, and live in family groups, whereas other Greek slaves were kept in single-sex dormitories. Along with relationships with helot men, some helot women seem to have had children with Spartan men. These children were called mothakes, and were apparently free and able to gain citizenship - according to Aelian, the admiral Lysander was a mothax.
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The occupants of Aetha are the Wraith race. These fearsome and cadaverous beings have created a warped aristocratic society, with the ruling Wraith class living a life of opulence and excess while the "Helot" peasants live in filth and squalor. Unsurprisingly the ruling class is selfish and evil, throwing lavish masked balls within sight of the starving masses. The Wraith are shown to have vampiric characteristics, such as increased powers and vitality through drinking helot blood.
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Herakleides Lembos, Frag. 370,10 Dilts = Frag. 538 Rose. This lack of judicial protection is confirmed by Myron of Priene, who mentions killing as a standard mode of regulation of the Helot population.
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At the stage of paidiskoi, around the age of 18, the students became reserve members of the Spartan army. Also, some youths were allowed to become part of the Crypteia, a type of 'Secret Police', where the members were instructed to spy on the Helot population. They would also kill Helot slaves who were out at night or spoke about rebelling against the Government, to help keep the population submissive. The state supported this by formally declaring war on the Helots every autumn.
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The first helot attempt at revolt which is historically reported is that provoked by general Pausanias in the 5th century BC. Thucydides reports:Thucydides, 1.132, 4. > Besides, they were informed that he was even intriguing with the helots; and > such indeed was the fact, for he promised them freedom and citizenship if > they would join him in insurrection, and would help him to carry out his > plans to the end. These intrigues did not however lead to a helot uprising; Thucydides indeed implies that Pausanias was turned in by the helots (I, 132, 5 - ...the evidence even of the helots themselves.) Perhaps the promises made by Pausanias were too generous to be believed by the helots; not even Brasidas, when he emancipated his helot volunteers, offered full citizenship.Ducat (1990), p. 130.
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Certain young Spartan men who had completed their training at the agoge with such success that they were marked out as potential future leaders would be given the opportunity to test their skills and prove themselves worthy of the Spartan polity through participation in the Krypteia. Every autumn, according to Plutarch (Life of Lycurgus, 28, 3–7), the Spartan ephors would pro forma declare war on the helot population so that any Spartan citizen could kill a helot without fear of punishment. At night, the chosen kryptai (κρύπται, members of the Krypteia) were sent out into the countryside armed with knives with the instructions to kill any helot they encountered and to take any food they needed. They were specifically told to kill the strongest and best of the helots.
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Up to two ephors would accompany a king on extended military campaigns as a sign of control, and they held the authority to declare war during some periods in Spartan history. There were a total of seven ephors, consisting of the two kings and the five who were elected. According to Plutarch,Life of Lycurgus, 28, 3–7. every autumn at the crypteia, the ephors would pro forma declare war on the helot population so that any Spartan citizen could kill a helot without fear of blood guilt.
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This theoretically removed the strongest and most able potential rebels while keeping the general populace fit and efficient. What is more, the Spartans used helot women to satisfy the state's human personnel needs: the 'bastards' (nothoi) born of Spartan fathers and helot women held an intermediary rank in Lacedaemonian society (cf. mothakes and mothones below) and swelled the ranks of the citizen army. It is difficult to determine whether these births were the results of voluntary liaisons (at least on the part of the father) or part of a formal state program.
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The immediate objective of this unit was to seek out and kill vulnerable helot Laconians as part of the larger program of terrorising and intimidating the helot population. Less information is available about the education of Spartan girls, but they seem to have gone through a fairly extensive formal educational cycle, broadly similar to that of the boys but with less emphasis on military training. In this respect, classical Sparta was unique in ancient Greece. In no other city-state did women receive any kind of formal education.
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The main purpose of mothakes from a Spartan point of view was that they could fight in the Spartan army, and Sarah Pomeroy suggests that daughters of Spartan men and helot women would therefore have been killed at birth.
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Sparta, under the rule of a diarchy, suddenly gained wealth and culture with the "socio-economic basis" of classical Sparta emerging from this war and expansion.Dunstan, Ancient Greece. p.95 In 685 BC, a helot revolt caused a Second Messenian War.
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When the First Peloponnesian War broke out, Sparta was still preoccupied suppressing the helot revolt, hence its involvement was somewhat desultory. It amounted to little more than isolated expeditions, the most notable of which involved helping to inflict a defeat on the Athenians at the Battle of Tanagra in 457 BC in Boeotia. However they then returned home giving the Athenians an opportunity to defeat the Boeotians at the battle of Oenophyta and so overthrowing Boeotia. When the helot revolt was finally ended, Sparta needed a respite, seeking and gaining a five-year truce with Athens.
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According to Herodotus (IX, 28–29), helots were seven times as numerous as Spartans. Following several helot revolts around the year 600 BC, the Spartans restructured their city-state along authoritarian lines, for the leaders decided that only by turning their society into an armed camp could they hope to maintain control over the numerically dominant helot population.Thomas R. Martin, Ancient Greece: From Prehistoric to Hellenistic Times (Yale UP, 2000) pp. 66, 75–77 In some Ancient Greek city-states, about 30% of the population consisted of slaves, but paid and slave labor seem to have been equally important.
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Helot arrived at the Cape as a soldier in 1694 and Simon van der Stel employed him provisionally as an assistant and he was later permanently appointed to serve as assistant and chief clerk. In 1706 he was secretary of the Council of Policy and on 9 June 1707 he was promoted to assistant merchant. In April 1710 he was given the post of chief merchant, becoming secunde (second-in-command) at the Cape. After the death of Governor Louis van Assenburgh in 1711, Helot acted as Governor until the arrival of Maurits Pasques de Chavonnes on 28 March 1714.
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Working together, the 77th, the unorganized Spartan reserve, and the few Brotherhood militia units in the city suppress the Helot rioters and restore order. However, Lysander's father King Alexander, a longtime Lermontov ally, is killed when the palace is assaulted and he leads the Life Guard out to defend it. Crown Prince Lysander succeeds him. One of Skilly's officers, a nephew of Grand Senator Bronson who had been a field grade officer in the Helot Army and Skilly Thibodeau's lover, defects and informs Lysander and General Owensford that there is an atomic bomb somewhere in the capital.
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18 The necessary provisions (barley, cheese, onions and salted meat) were carried along with the army, and each Spartan was accompanied by a helot manservant.Connolly (2006), p. 44. Each mora marched and camped separately, with its own baggage train.Connolly (2006), pp. 46–47.
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In his reign Helos was taken, a place near the mouth of the Eurotas, the last independent hold of the old Achaean population, and the supposed origin of the term "helot".Pausanias, Description of Greece iii. 2. § 7, iv. 4. § 3, 5.
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His lust for power precludes his finding common ground with Lermontov, Blaine and Falkenberg. Bronson rejects the Admiral's attempt to broker a truce between him and Falkenberg's Mercenary Legion, and by extension planets like Sparta and other Lermontov allies. Instead, he sends supplies and advisors to organize the Helot forces and employs techno-ninja saboteurs from Meiji, a Japanese-settled planet that specializes in high technology, to infiltrate and corrupt the data systems on Sparta before an open revolt is launched, and at the direction of the Helot leadership, to conduct a program of judicious assassinations. Bronson's objective is to take over and control Sparta and its resources.
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Mothax (, mothax, pl.: μόθακες, mothakes) is a Doric Greek word meaning "stepbrother". The term was used for a sociopolitical class in ancient Sparta, particularly during the Peloponnesian War (431-404 BC). The mothakes were primarily either offspring of Spartiate fathers and helot mothers or children of impoverished Spartiates.
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Simultaneously, the population of Spartiate citizens declined. The absence of a formal census prevents an accurate assessment of the helot population, but estimates are possible. According to Herodotus, helots were seven times as numerous as Spartans during the Battle of Plataea in 479 BC.Herodotus. Histories, 9, 28–29.
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The Second Messenian War was the result of revolt by the helot population of Messenia, supported with the aid of the Argives. In an attempt to regain freedom, the Messenians invaded Laconia.Dunstan. Ancient Greece p.95 The first battle, the Battle of Deres, happened before the allies arrived.
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The 1811 German Coast Uprising in the Territory of Orleans was the largest rebellion in the continental United States; Denmark Vesey rebelled in South Carolina, and Madison Washington during the Creole case in the 19th century United States. Ancient Sparta had a special type of serf called helots who were often treated harshly, leading them to rebel. According to Herodotus (IX, 28–29), helots were seven times as numerous as Spartans. Every autumn, according to Plutarch (Life of Lycurgus, 28, 3–7), the Spartan ephors would pro forma declare war on the helot population so that any Spartan citizen could kill a helot without fear of blood or guilt in order to keep them in line (crypteia).
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Several theories exist regarding the origin of the name "helot". According to Hellanicus, the word relates to the village of Helos, in the south of Sparta.Hellanicos, Frag. 188 J. Pausanias thus states, "Its inhabitants became the first slaves of the Lacedaemonian state, and were the first to be called helots".Trans.
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Pausanias, 4, 24, 5. Nor does the text allow us to conclude that this was a failed uprising of helots, only that there was an attempt at escape. Additionally, a helot revolt in Laconia is unlikely, and Messenians would not likely have taken refuge at Cape Taenarus.Ducat (1990), p. 131.
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As the most defensible point in the surrounding territory, Ithome was the center of Messenian resistance to Sparta during the Messenian Wars in the 7th and 6th centuries BC. Ithome was also the center of the Helot revolt in 465 BC after an earthquake in Sparta. This revolt is the Third Messenian War.
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This practice was instigated to prevent the threat of a rebellion by the helots and to keep their population in check. According to Cartledge, Krypteia members stalked the helot villages and surrounding countryside, spying on the servile population. Their mission was to prevent and suppress unrest and rebellion. Troublesome helots could be summarily executed.
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The winners were hailed throughout Greece as champions of the oppressed. They carried their arms into Peloponnesus and at the head of a large coalition, permanently crippled the power of Sparta, in part by freeing many helot slaves, the basis of the Spartan economy. Similar expeditions were sent to Thessaly and Macedon to regulate the affairs of those regions.
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Sparta's sphere of influence in 362 BC is shown in yellow. Sparta never fully recovered from the losses that it suffered at Leuctra in 371 BC and the subsequent helot revolts. Nonetheless, it was able to continue as a regional power for over two centuries. Neither Philip II nor his son Alexander the Great attempted to conquer Sparta itself.
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This is the case of Plutarch in his Life of Cimon:Plutarch. Life of Cimon, 17, 8. the helots of the Eurotas River valley want to use the earthquake to attack the Spartans whom they think are disarmed. The intervention of Archidamus II, who calls the Lacedaemonians to arms, simultaneously saves them from the earthquake and the helot attack.
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While in prison, Cleomenes was found dead with his death being ruled as suicide by self-mutilation. He apparently convinced the helot guarding him into giving him a knife, with which he slashed his shins, thighs and belly in an especially brutal suicide.Herodotus, 6.75. He was succeeded by the elder of his surviving half- brothers Leonidas I, who then married Cleomenes' daughter Gorgo.
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Little is known of Lysander's early life. Some ancient authors record that he came from helot or even slave origins. Lysander's father was Aristocleitus, who was a member of the Spartan Heracleidae; that is, he claimed descent from Heracles but was not a member of a royal family. He grew up in poverty and he showed himself obedient and conformable.
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Helot was married twice. His first marriage took place in 1704, to Christina de Beer, the daughter of the Cape free burgher Jan Dirksz de Beer and his wife, Anna van Veldhuisen. Their three daughters, Wilhelmina, Anna Christina and Louisa Adriana, were baptised in 1705, 1707 and 1709 respectively. After Christina's death in 1709, he married Maria Engelbrecht on 27 July 1710.
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The helots were used as unskilled serfs, tilling Spartan land. Helot women were often used as wet nurses. Helots also travelled with the Spartan army as non-combatant serfs. At the last stand of the Battle of Thermopylae, the Greek dead included not just the legendary three hundred Spartan soldiers but also several hundred Thespian and Theban troops and a number of helots.
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This strategy seems to have been successful at least for Laconian Helots:Lévy, p. 12, with a warning that this evidence should not be worked too hard. when the Thebans ordered a group of Laconian helot prisoners to recite the verses of Alcman and Terpander (national poets of Thebes), they refused on the grounds that it would displease their masters.Plutarch. Life of Lycurgus, 28, 10.
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14 He taught both Latin and Greek, but specialised in ancient history and classical civilisation. Robert is a member of the Classical Association and the Joint Association of Classical Teachers. He also is the Managing Editor for Sparta - Journal of Ancient Spartan and Greek History.Sparta Journal Editorial Online In 2008, he released his first history novel, with title, Helot: A Story of Ancient Sparta ().
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Ballon & Helot-Lécroart 1985, pp. 22–26. The property was bought in 1633 by Cardinal Richelieu, who had the architect Jacques Lemercier remodel and enlarge the château, as well as the gardens and grounds. The château and grounds were renovated again in 1750 by Philippe Dullin de La Ponneraye. During the reign of Louis-Philippe, the buildings were demolished, and the estate was subdivided.
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Aristotle, Politics 1269b-1270a. All Spartan women, not just the richest, would have taken advantage of helot labour to perform the domestic tasks that elsewhere in Greece would have fallen to free women. Activities such as weaving, which were considered women's work elsewhere in Greece, were not considered fit for free women in Sparta. Therefore, women were more preoccupied with governance, agriculture, logistics and other sustenance tasks.
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Likewise, there is no provable connection between Grand Senator Bronson and the Helot rebels, though Falkenberg's Mercenary Legion knows he is supporting them. To end the Helot rebellion, the Fifth Battalion of Falkenberg's Mercenary Legion is sent to Sparta to create a standing army, something Sparta has never before needed. Commanding the Fifth is Major Peter Owensford, with Captain Ace Barton (the mercenary commander Falkenberg defeated on Tanith) as his second in command. They are joined by Dr. Caldwell Whitlock, a sociologist, analyst, and political historian from Earth who has been retained by the Spartan monarchy and Falkenberg as a political analyst and advisor; and Lieutenant Colonel Hal Slater, recently retired from the Legion due to injuries too severe for regeneration to fully repair, whose mission is to establish the Royal Spartan Military Academy and Royal Spartan War College, with the rank of Major General in the nascent Royal Spartan Army.
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Thyrea enters history as the location of the Battle of the Champions () between Argos and Sparta. According to Herodotus, Sparta had surrounded and captured the plain of Thyrea. When the Argives marched out to defend it, the two armies agreed to let 300 champions from each city fight, with the winner taking the territory. In 464 BCE when we hear of the Thyreans assisting the Spartans put down the helot uprising.
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In short, Grote writes that "the various anecdotes which are told respecting [Helot] treatment at Sparta betoken less of cruelty than of ostentatious scorn".Quoted by Cartledge, p. 151. He has been followed recently by J. Ducat (1974 and 1990),Partially followed by Lévy, pp. 124–126. who describes Spartan treatment of the Helots as a kind of ideological warfare, designed to condition the Helots to think of themselves as inferiors.
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During the same war and after the capitulation of the Spartans besieged in Sphacteria, the Athenians installed a garrison in Pylos composed of Messenians from Naupactus. Thucydides underlines that they had hoped to exploit the patriotism of the latter in order to pacify the region.Thucydides, 4.41, 2-3. Though the Messenians may not have triggered full-blown guerrilla warfare, they nevertheless pillaged the area and encouraged helot desertion.
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Fine, The Ancient Greeks, 556–59 Sparta entered its long-term decline after a severe military defeat to Epaminondas of Thebes at the Battle of Leuctra. This was the first time that a full strength Spartan army lost a land battle. As Spartan citizenship was inherited by blood, Sparta increasingly faced a helot population that vastly outnumbered its citizens. The alarming decline of Spartan citizens was commented on by Aristotle.
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That was done to keep the large helot population in check.Xenophon, Constitution of Sparta 15.6; Xenophon, Hellenica 2.3.9–10; Plutarch, Agis 12.1, 16.2; Plato, Laws 3.692; Aristotle, The Politics 2.6.14–16; A.H.M. Jones, Sparta The ephors did not have to kneel down before the Kings of Sparta and were held in high esteem by the citizens because of the importance of their powers and because of the holy role that they earned throughout their functions.
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Various sources mention such servants accompanying this or that Spartan. Plutarch has Timaia, the wife of King Agis II, "being herself forward enough to whisper among her helot maid- servants" that the child she was expecting had been fathered by Alcibiades, and not her husband, indicating a certain level of trust.Plutarch. Life of Agesilaus, 3, 1. According to some authors, in the 4th century BC, citizens also used chattel-slaves for domestic purposes.
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Medieval depiction of Sparta from the Nuremberg Chronicle (1493) Sparta never fully recovered from its losses at Leuctra in 371 BCE and the subsequent helot revolts. Nonetheless, it was able to continue as a regional power for over two centuries. Neither Philip II nor his son Alexander the Great attempted to conquer Sparta itself. Even during its decline, Sparta never forgot its claim to be the "defender of Hellenism" and its Laconic wit.
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The Athenian general Xenophon, for example, sent his two sons to Sparta as trophimoi. Also, the son of a helot could be enrolled as a syntrophos. if a Spartiate formally adopted him and paid his way; if he did exceptionally well in training, he might be sponsored to become a Spartiate.The Greek World By Anton Powell Spartans who could not afford to pay the expenses of the agoge could lose their citizenship.
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The Château de Rueil (formerly spelled Ruel, also referred to as the Château du Val de Ruel) was a 17th-century French château located in Rueil-Malmaison. It was especially famous for its gardens, created before those of Vaux-le- Vicomte and Versailles, and was the preferred residence of Cardinal Richelieu from at least 1633 (when he purchased it) until his death in 1642.Gady 2005, p. 341.Ballon & Helot-Lécroart 1985, p.
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Nabis' allegiance was secured by the fact that he had to surrender five hostages, amongst them his son, Armenas. The Romans did not restore the exiles, wishing to avoid internal strife in Sparta. They did, however, allow any woman who was married to an ex-helot but whose husband was in exile to join him.Livy 34.35 After the legions under Flamininus had returned to Italy, the Greek states were once again on their own.
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He also implies that the Spartan aristocracy were moved by the desire for wealth, based on a cultural floruit and some foreign goods dating to the Orientalizing Period found during the excavation of the temple of Artemis Orthia in Sparta. No such motives appear in the classical sources. As Dunstan points out, after about 600 BC Spartan luxuries were in deficit. The Spartan economy improved significantly with the inflow of dues from the new helot class of Messenia.
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498–502 The creator of the Spartan system of rule was the legendary lawgiver Lycurgus. He is associated with the drastic reforms that were instituted in Sparta after the revolt of the helots in the second half of the 7th century BCE. In order to prevent another helot revolt, Lycurgus devised the highly militarized communal system that made Sparta unique among the city- states of Greece. All his reforms were directed towards the three Spartan virtues: equality (among citizens), military fitness, and austerity.
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Ostensibly formed to secure Ireland against a French invasion, the Volunteer companies were soon arming and parading in support of the "inalienable rights" of Irishmen. In 1782 the convergence of Volunteers upon Dublin helped Henry Grattan secured London's recognition of Ireland's legislative independence. Drennan came to national attention with the publication in 1784 and 1785 of his Letters of Orellana, an Irish Helot. Addressed to his "fellow slaves", they were the earliest expressions of his support for radical constitutional reform.
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The problem of the captured or surrendered underclass Helot soldiers is dealt with in a fashion that again echoes Heinlein's ideas, this the one of being sent to Coventry. Those who do not accept Sparta's social contract will be given basic tools and sent to a large, uninhabited island to make their own way without government interference. It is suggested that after a few years, the survivors can try to work out a better deal. There remains the problem of preserving civilization, however.
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Gacy did several paintings of Glen, one of which appears on the cover of his album Hot, Horny and Born Again. Meadmore's most recent recording, Cowboy Songs For Lil Hustlers, produced by Steve Albini, continues in the vein set by Hot, Horny and Born Again. Glen continues to tour and perform as a three-piece in the style of these last two albums, which are a culmination of his unique style. Glen has performed and recorded with other artists and performers, including Helot Revolt.
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From around 560 BC, Sparta began to build a series of alliances with other Greek states, which became the Peloponnesian League: by 550, cities such as Elis, Corinth, and Megara would be part of the alliance. This series of alliances had the dual purpose of preventing the cities of the League from supporting the Helot population of Messenia, and of helping Sparta in its conflict with Argos, which in the archaic period was along with Sparta one of the major powers in the Peloponnese.
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Eurytus or Eurýtos was the name of a Spartan warrior, one of the Three Hundred sent to face the Persians at the Battle of Thermopylae in 480 BC. Eurytus and a companion, Aristodemus were stricken with an eye disease and ordered to return home. Eurytus turned back and ordered his helot attendant to lead him back to the battle. He entered the battle blind and was slain. Aristodemus returned to Sparta disgraced, but returned to fight at the battle of Plataea the following year.
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For instance, a large helot market was organized during the festivities at the temple of Apollo at Actium. The Acarnanian League, which was in charge of the logistics, received half of the tax proceeds, the other half going to the city of Anactorion, of which Actium was a part.Circa 216 BC. Inscriptiones Graecae IX 1², 2, 583. Buyers enjoyed a guarantee against latent defects; the transaction could be invalidated if the bought slave turned out to be crippled and the buyer had not been warned about it.
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465—Operations in Northern Greece: Athens' powers and desire for expansion grow. In 465, after cleruchizing the Chersonese, they tried to gain control of Thasos. Thucydides wrote that Sparta contemplated an invasion of Attica in order to help free Thasos. However, in the aftermath of a catastrophic earthquake and subsequent helot uprising in Sparta, no attack—if indeed such was projected—was launched. 461—The Debate in Athens over Helping Sparta: With a legion of Helots rebelling against Sparta, Athens offered Sparta their help by sending a force of 4,000 Hoplites to suppress the rebels.
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The number of helots in relation to Spartan citizens varied throughout the history of the Spartan state; according to Herodotus, there were seven helots for each Spartan at the time of the Battle of Plataea in 479 BC.Herodotus. Histories 9.10. Thus the need to keep helot population in check and prevent rebellion was one of the main concerns of the Spartans. Helots were ritually mistreated, humiliated and even slaughtered: every autumn the Spartans would declare war on the helots so they could be killed by a member of the Crypteia without fear of religious repercussion.
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This meant killing a Helot was not regarded as a crime, but a valuable deed for the good of the state. At the stage of hēbōntes, roughly age 20, the students became fully part of the syssitia and Spartan army, although they continued to live in barracks and to compete for a place among the Spartan hippeis, the royal guard of honor. At the age of 20, students were voted into one of the public messes. The voting was done by Spartan peers who were members of the mess and must be unanimous.
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One of these posts was near Pylos on a tiny island called Sphacteria, where the course of the first war turned in Athens's favour. The post off Pylos struck Sparta where it was weakest: its dependence on the helots, who tended the fields while its citizens trained to become soldiers. The helots made the Spartan system possible, but now the post off Pylos began attracting helot runaways. In addition, the fear of a general revolt of helots emboldened by the nearby Athenian presence drove the Spartans to action.
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Relations between the helots and their Spartan masters were sometimes strained. There was at least one helot revolt (c. 465–460 BCE), and Thucydides remarked that "Spartan policy is always mainly governed by the necessity of taking precautions against the helots."Thucydides (IV, 80); the Greek is ambiguous On the other hand, the Spartans trusted their helots enough in 479 BCE to take a force of 35,000 with them to Plataea, something they could not have risked if they feared the helots would attack them or run away.
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Prince of Sparta, page 281. The Helot field army is eventually destroyed by the Spartan Royal Army, the Brotherhood militias, and the Legion, working in concert under the leadership of Crown Prince Lysander, Brigadier General Ace Barton, and Major General Peter Owensford. The penultimate act of the Bronson campaign is an attempt to use the 77th Line Marine Regiment, whose colonel is loyal to Bronson, to force the Dual Monarchy to disavow, disarm, and turn over the Fifth Battalion of the Legion to them. King Alexander and King David of Sparta refuse this demand.
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The 77th has the support of the suborned Codominium Navy battle cruiser Patton, whose captain is an opportunist loyal to neither the Grand Admiral's nor Bronson factions. The presumption is that without the Legion, Sparta will not be able to resist the CoDominium forces. At the same time, Skilly launches a general uprising by Helot elements in the capital to destroy the government and take Sparta City while the Spartans are fighting the 77th. Skilly believes if she can take the city, the CoDominium forces will recognize her as the legitimate ruler of Sparta.
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South coast of Tassos/Greece The Thasian rebellion was an incident in 465 BC, in which Thasos rebelled against Athenian control, seeking to renounce its membership in the Delian League. The rebellion was prompted by a conflict between Athens and Thasos over control of silver deposits on the Thracian mainland, which Thasos had traditionally mined. The rebellion was eventually crushed, after a long and difficult siege, but not before Sparta had secretly promised to invade Attica in support of the Thasians. The Spartans were prevented from making good on this promise only by an earthquake in Laconia, which triggered a helot rebellion.
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Remains of ancient Cranii Cranii or Kranioi or Krane () was a Greek city on the island of Cephallenia, situated at the head of a bay on the western coast. Thucydides writes extensively about Cranii in his History of the Peloponnesian War. In 431 BCE, it joined the Athenian alliance, together with the other Cephallenian towns; in consequence of which the Corinthians made a descent upon the territory of Cranii, but were repulsed with loss. In 421 BCE the Athenians settled at Cranii helot deserters of Sparta and the Messenians who were withdrawn from Pylos on the surrender of that fortress to the Lacedaemonians.
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Since the helot population was not technically chattel, their population was reliant on native birth rates, as opposed to prisoners of war or purchased slaves. Helots were encouraged by the Spartans to impose a eugenics doctrine similar to that which they, themselves, practiced. This would, according to Greek beliefs of the period, ensure not only genetic but also acquired favourable characteristics be passed along to successive generations. Tempering these selective factors was the crypteia, during which the strongest and fittest helots were the primary targets of the kryptes; to select soft targets would be interpreted as a sign of weakness.
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The colonists soon subjugated the native Mariandynians but agreed to terms that none of the latter, now helot-like serfs, be sold into slavery outside their homeland. Prospering from the rich, fertile adjacent lands and the sea-fisheries of its natural harbor, Heraclea soon extended its control along the coast as far east as Cytorus (Gideros, near Cide), eventually establishing Black Sea colonies of its own (Cytorus, Callatis and Chersonesus). The prosperity of the city, rudely shaken by the Galatians and the Bithynians, was utterly destroyed in the Mithridatic Wars. It was the birthplace of the philosopher Heraclides Ponticus.
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1 Conflict between the states flared up again in 465 BC, when a helot revolt broke out in Sparta. The Spartans summoned forces from all of their allies, including Athens, to help them suppress the revolt. Athens sent out a sizable contingent (4,000 hoplites), but upon its arrival, this force was dismissed by the Spartans, while those of all the other allies were permitted to remain. According to Thucydides, the Spartans acted in this way out of fear that the Athenians would switch sides and support the helots; the offended Athenians repudiated their alliance with Sparta.
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Slave revolts occurred elsewhere in the Greek world, and in 413 BCE 20,000 Athenian slaves ran away to join the Spartan forces occupying Attica.Thucydides (VII, 27) What made Sparta's relations with her slave population unique was that the helots, precisely because they enjoyed privileges such as family and property, retained their identity as a conquered people (the Messenians) and also had effective kinship groups that could be used to organize rebellion. As the Spartiate population declined and the helot population continued to grow, the imbalance of power caused increasing tension. According to Myron of PrieneTalbert, p. 26.
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He made a novel application of the drunken helot plan, obtaining from a workhouse a 'lying boy' as an object lesson. His school 'prospered beyond his expectations', but the death of his wife (in 1774) for a time unmanned him. He tore himself away, 'leaving his scholars to shift for themselves', and 'secluded himself in a distant country' for 'many months'. He went to Buxton, according to some accounts; he never returned to Chelsea. In 1774 Benjamin Franklin 'took refuge from a political storm' in Williams's house, and became interested in his method of teaching arithmetic.
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Adkins and Adkins, Handbook, 105 During the mock battles, the young men were formed into phalanxes to learn to maneuver as if they were one entity and not a group of individuals. To be more efficient and effective during maneuvers, students were also trained in dancing and music, because this would enhance their ability to move gracefully as a unit.Adkins and Adkins, Handbook, 275 Toward the end of this phase of the agoge, the trainees were expected to hunt down and kill a Helot, a Greek slave. If caught, the student would be convicted and disciplined-not for committing murder, but for his inability to complete the murder without being discovered.
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As Spartan citizenship was inherited by blood, Sparta now increasingly faced a helot population that vastly outnumbered its citizens. The alarming decline of Spartan citizens was commented on by Aristotle, who viewed it as a sudden event. While some researchers view it as a result of war casualties, it appears that the number of citizens, after a certain point, started declining steadily at a rate of 50% reduction every fifty years regardless of the extent of battles. Most likely, this was the result of steady shifting of wealth among the citizen body, which was simply not as obvious until laws were passed allowing the citizens to give away their land plots.
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Skida devises complex operations against the Dual Monarchy, which the Legion is able to detect and defeat despite the Helots' advanced weaponry and sabotage campaigns. The Helots have off-planet assistance from Earth Prime in the form of military equipment and supplies up to and including surface-to-air missiles and direct induction teaching machines, former CoDominium Marine officers and noncoms, and the technoninjas from Meiji, who work for Bronson but have been instructed to accept Helot orders up to a point. Thibodeau's title within the revolutionary movement is Field Prime. There is no visible linkage between the Spartan Peoples Liberation Army and the NCLF, though the connection exists.
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In archaic Sparta, it would have been helot women who fulfilled this role, but later in Spartan history, especially after the emancipation of the Messenian helots, many of these women were likely personal slaves. Women in perioicic communities were presumably responsible for the domestic labour for their own household, just as women were elsewhere in the Greek world. Plutarch says in his Life of Lycurgus that due to the lack of money in ancient Sparta, and because of the strict moral regime instituted by Lycurgus, there was no prostitution in Sparta. Later on, when gold and silver was more available, prostitution seemed to have surfaced.
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A drastically dwindling population meant Sparta was overstretched, and by 395 BC Athens, Argos, Thebes, and Corinth felt able to challenge Spartan dominance, resulting in the Corinthian War (395–387 BC). Another war of stalemates, it ended with the status quo restored, after the threat of Persian intervention on behalf of the Spartans. The Spartan hegemony lasted another 16 years, until, when attempting to impose their will on the Thebans, the Spartans were defeated at Leuctra in 371 BC. The Theban general Epaminondas then led Theban troops into the Peloponnese, whereupon other city-states defected from the Spartan cause. The Thebans were thus able to march into Messenia and free the helot population.
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Cimon (; – 450BC) or Kimon (; , Kimōn) was an Athenian statesman and general in mid-5th century BC Greece. He was the son of Miltiades, the victor of the Battle of Marathon. Cimon played a key role in creating the powerful Athenian maritime empire following the failure of the Persian invasion of Greece by Xerxes I in 480479 BC. Cimon became a celebrated military hero and was elected to the rank of strategos after fighting in the Battle of Salamis. One of Cimon's greatest exploits was his destruction of a Persian fleet and army at the Battle of the Eurymedon river in 466 BC. In 462 BC, he led an unsuccessful expedition to support the Spartans during the helot uprisings.
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The massacre of Cape Taenarus, the promontory formed by the southernmost tip of Taygetus, is also reported by Thucydides:Thucydides, 1.128, 1. > The Lacedaemonians had once raised up some helot suppliants from the temple > of Poseidon at Taenarus, led them away and slain them; for which they > believe the great earthquake at Sparta to have been a retribution. This affair, recalled by the Athenians in responding to a Spartan request to exile Pericles--who was an Alcmaeonid on his mother's side--is not dated. Historians know only that it happened before the disastrous earthquake of 464 BC. Thucydides here is the only one to implicate the helots: Pausanias speaks rather about Lacedaemonians who had been condemned to death.
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Skilly, on the run following the destruction of the Spartan Peoples Liberation Army and the failure of the Helot rebellion in Sparta City, contacts the Spartan commanders, offering the location of the bomb in return for the government's lifting the price on her head and calling off the official search for her. King Lysander and General Owensford agree to do so, but unbeknownst to her it will make no difference. Two long-serving sergeants of the Legion with a highly developed sense of vendetta simply take leaves to accomplish privately what the government cannot do officially. It is implied that Skilly's head will shortly be brought in encased in a block of lucite.
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The event severely damaged Sparta's naval power but did not end its aspirations of invading further into Persia, until Conon the Athenian ravaged the Spartan coastline and provoked the old Spartan fear of a helot revolt."The Oxford Illustrated History of Greece and the Hellenistic World" p. 141, John Boardman, Jasper Griffin, Oswyn Murray After a few more years of fighting in 387 BC, the Peace of Antalcidas was established, according to which all Greek cities of Ionia would return to Persian control, and Persia's Asian border would be free of the Spartan threat. The effects of the war were to reaffirm Persia's ability to interfere successfully in Greek politics and to affirm Sparta's weakened hegemonic position in the Greek political system.
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Although it had won a hegemony over the Greek city-states from its leadership in the Persian Wars, the Spartan-led Peloponnesian League feared the growing power of the Athenian empire and worsened relations by repeated diplomatic affronts and demands. Wanting to deny any future Persian invasion a base from which to operate, Sparta had urged Athens, along with other Greek cities, to refrain from rebuilding their walls. However, suspecting a Spartan ploy and having already begun the work of construction, Athens employed subterfuge to delay the wheels of diplomacy until she could finish them. In 464 BC, suffering another Helot rebellion and failing to make progress in the siege against their stronghold Ithome, Sparta had asked for Athens' aid along with its other allies.
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The event severely damaged Sparta's naval power but did not end its aspirations of invading further into Persia, until Conon the Athenian ravaged the Spartan coastline and provoked the old Spartan fear of a helot revolt."The Oxford Illustrated History of Greece and the Hellenistic World" p. 141, John Boardman, Jasper Griffin, Oswyn Murray After a few more years of fighting, in 387 BCE the Peace of Antalcidas was established, according to which all Greek cities of Ionia would return to Persian control, and Persia's Asian border would be free of the Spartan threat. The effects of the war were to reaffirm Persia's ability to interfere successfully in Greek politics and to affirm Sparta's weakened hegemonic position in the Greek political system.
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This led to a serious decline in Sparta's military power, and the aim of Nabis reforms was to reestablish a class of loyal subjects capable of serving as well-equipped phalangites (operating in a close and deep formation, with a longer spear than the hoplites'). Nabis' liberation of the enslaved helots was one of the most outstanding deeds in Spartan history. With this action, Nabis eliminated a central ideological pillar of the old Spartan social system and the chief reason for objection to Spartan expansion by the surrounding poleis (city- states). Guarding against helot revolt had been, until this time, the central concern of Spartan foreign policy, and the need to protect against internal revolt had limited adventurism abroad; Nabis' action abolished this concern with a single stroke.
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By Thucydides's account (History of the Peloponnesian War, I.101–102), the Spartans were concerned that the Athenians would switch sides and assist the helots; from the Spartan perspective, the Athenians had an "enterprising and revolutionary character," and by this fact alone posed a threat to the oligarchic regime of Sparta. The Athenians were insulted, and therefore repudiated their alliance with Sparta. Once the uprising was put down, some of the surviving rebels fled to Athens, which settled them at Naupactus on the strategically important Corinthian Gulf. The alliance between Sparta and Athens was never revived, and disagreements continued to intensify until the outbreak of war in 460 BC. Since the Helot population used the earthquake as their opportunity to rebel, the Spartans were forced to wait to reform their society until after they had suppressed the Helots.
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During this long campaign, the Delian league gradually transformed from a defensive alliance of Greek states into an Athenian empire, as Athens' growing naval power intimidated the other league states. Athens ended its campaigns against Persia in 450 BC, after a disastrous defeat in Egypt in 454 BC, and the death of Cimon in action against the Persians on Cyprus in 450. As the Athenian fight against the Persian empire waned, conflict grew between Athens and Sparta. Suspicious of the increasing Athenian power funded by the Delian League, Sparta offered aid to reluctant members of the League to rebel against Athenian domination. These tensions were exacerbated in 462, when Athens sent a force to aid Sparta in overcoming a helot revolt, but this aid was rejected by the Spartans. In the 450s, Athens took control of Boeotia, and won victories over Aegina and Corinth. However, Athens failed to win a decisive victory, and in 447 lost Boeotia again. Athens and Sparta signed the Thirty Years' Peace in the winter of 446/5, ending the conflict.
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