Instituta Laconia

Some used to assert that whosoever among the foreigners would submit to such discipline as was enjoined by the constitution in accordance with the programme of Lycurgus might become a member of the division assigned to him at the beginning.[*](There is no doubt that some foreigners resided for a time at Sparta: Alcibiades, for example.)

The selling of anything was not permitted;

but it was their custom to use the neighbours’ servants as their own if they needed them and also their dogs and horses, unless the owners required them for their own use. And in the country, if anyone found himself lacking anything and had need of it, he would open an owner’s storehouse and take away enough to meet his need, and then replace the seals and leave it.[*](Cf. Xenophon, Constitution of Sparta, 6. 3-4; Aristotle, Politics, ii. 5.)

In wars they used red garments for two reasons: first, the colour they thought was a manly colour, and second, the blood-red hue causes more terror in the minds of inexperienced. Also, if anyone of them receive a wound, it is advantageous that it be not easily discovered by the enemy, but be unperceived by reason of the identity of colour.[*](Cf. Xenophon, Constitution of Sparta, 2. 3; the scholium on Aristophanes, Acharnians, 319; Aelian, Varia Historia, vi. 6; Valerius Maximus, ii. 6. 2.)