Instituta Laconia
Plutarch
Plutarch. Moralia, Vol. III. Babbitt, Frank Cole, translator. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press; London: William Heinemann Ltd., 1931 (printing).
The boys in Sparta were lashed with whips during the entire day at the altar of Artemis Orthia, frequently to the point of death, and they bravely endured this, cheerful and proud, vying with one another for the supremacy as to which one of them
could endure being beaten for the longer time and the greater number of blows. And the one who was victorious was held in especial repute. This competition is called The Flagellation, and it takes place each year.[*](There are many references to this practice, which seems to have been kept up even in Plutarch’s time according to his Life of Lycurgus, chap. xviii. (51 b). Cf. also his Life of Aristeides, chap. xvii. (329 d); Xenophon, Constitution of Sparta, 2. 9; Müller, Frag. Hist. Graec. iii. p. 458 (Nicolaus Damasc., Frag. 114); Lucian, Anacharsis, 38; Philostratus, Apollonius, vi. 20, who explains the custom as originating in earlier human sacrifice, but on this see J. G. Frazer in his commentary on Pausanias, iii. 16. 10. Among Latin writers Cf., for example, Cicero, Tusculan Disputations, ii. 14 (34).)One of the noble and blessed privileges which Lycurgus appears to have secured for his fellowcitizens was abundance of leisure. In fact it was not permitted them to take up any menial trade at all; and there was no need whatever of making money, which involves a toilsome accumulation, nor of busy activity, because of his having made wealth wholly unenvied and unhonoured. The Helots tilled the soil for them, paying a return which was regularly settled in advance. There was a ban against letting for a higher price, so that the Helots might make some profit, and thus be glad to do the work for their masters, and so that the masters might not look for any larger return.[*](Cf.Moralia, 214 a, supra, and the note; Xenophon, Constitution of Sparta, 7. 1-6; Isocrates, Busiris, 20; Müller, Frag. Hist. Graec. iii. p. 458 (Nicolaus Damasc. Frag. 114); Josephus, Against Apion, ii. 229; Aelian, Varia Historia, vi. 6; Athenaeus, 657 d.)
It was forbidden them to be sailors and to fight on the sea. Later, however, they did engage in such battles, and, after they had made themselves masters of the sea, they again desisted, since they observed that the character of the citizens was deteriorating sadly. But they changed about again, as in all else. For example, when money was amassed for the Spartans, those who amassed it were condemned
to death; for to Alcamenes and Theopompus, their kings, an oracle[*](Cf. Leutsch and Schneidewin, Paroemiographi Graeci, i. p. 39 and i. p. 201, and the references there given; also Diodorus, viii. 12. 5, and Plutarch, Life of Agis, chap. ix. (799 b).) had been given: Eager desire for money will bring the ruin of Sparta. Yet, nevertheless, when Lysander had taken Athens, he brought home much gold and silver, and they accepted it, and bestowed honours on the man.As long as the Spartan State adhered to the laws of Lycurgus and remained true to its oaths,[*](To abide by his laws until he should return. Plutarch’s Life of Lycurgus, chap. xxix. (57 d).) it held the first place in Greece for good government and good repute over a period of five hundred years.[*](Ibid. 58 a; Cf. also Diodorus, vii. 12. 8.) Rut, little by little, as these laws and oaths were transgressed, and greed and love of wealth crept in, the elements of their strength began to dwindle also, and their allies on this account were ill-disposed towards them. But although they were in this plight, yet after the victory of Philip of Macedon at Chaeroneia,[*](In 338 b.c.) when all the Greeks proclaimed him commander both on land and sea, and likewise, in the interval following, proclaimed Alexander, his son, after the subjugation of the Thebans,[*](In 335 b.c.) the Spartans only, although they dwelt in an unwalled city, and were few in number because of their continual wars, and had become much weaker and an easy prey, still keeping alive some feeble sparks[*](An echo from Plato, Laws, 677 b.) of the laws of Lycurgus, did not take any part in the campaigns of these or of the other kings of Macedon who ruled in the interval following, nor did they ever enter the general congress or even pay tribute. So it was,
until they ceased altogether to observe the laws of Lycurgus, and came to be ruled despotically by their own citizens, preserving nothing of their ancestral discipline any longer, and so they became much like the rest, and put from them their former glory and freedom of speech, and were reduced to a state of subjection; and now they, like the rest of the Greeks, have come under Roman sway.