Sparta Flash Card #1: - The Cohen Curricula



Sparta Flash Card #46: Everyday Life: Marriage Customs | |

|Historian |Evidence |Relationship to other |

| | |Syllabus dot points |

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|Xenophon |Lycurgus ... | |

| |" ... thought that female slaves were competent to furnish clothes; and, considering that the | |

| |PRODUCTION OF CHILDREN WAS THE NOBLEST DUTY OF THE FREE, he enacted ...that the female should | |

| |practice bodily exercise no less than the male sex..." ".....He ordained that a man should think | |

| |it shame to be seen going in to his wife, or coming out from her. When married people meet in this| |

| |way, they must feel stronger desire for the company of one another...and produce more robust | |

| |offspring.... | |

| | | |

| |."....He took from the men the liberty of marrying when each of them pleased, and appointed that | |

| |they should contract marriages only when they were in full bodily vigor, deeming this injunction | |

| |also conducive to producing excellent offspring..." | |

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| |"An old man should introduce to his wife whatever man in the prime of life he admired for his | |

| |bodily and mental qualities, so that she might have children by him... " | |

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| |"He also assigned some of the grown-up boys as ‘whip-bearers’ so that they might inflict whatever | |

| |punishment was necessary (on younger boys), so that the great dread of DISGRACE, and great | |

| |willingness to obey, prevailed among them. Lycurgus, though he did not give the boys permisson to | |

| |take what they wanted without trouble, DID GIVE them the liberty to steal certain things to | |

| |relieve the cravings of nature; and he made it honorable to steal as many cheeses as possible... "| |

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| |"He taught the children from a desire to render them more dexterous in securing provisions, and | |

| |better qualified for warfare." | |

| | | |

| |"...I must also say something of the boys as objects of affection, for this likewise has some | |

| |reference to education.... Lycurgus thought proper, if any man (being himself such as he ought to | |

| |be) admired the disposition of a youth, and made it his purpose to render him a faultless friend, | |

| |and to enjoy his company, to bestow praise on the boy; and he regarded this as the most excellent | |

| |kind of education..." | |

| | | |

| |"Lycurgus prohibited free citizens from having anything to do with business.... they should not | |

| |desire wealth with a view to sensual gratification. At Sparta the citizens pay strictest obedience| |

| |to the magistrates and the laws. Lycurgus did not attempt to establish such an ‘Excellent Order of| |

| |Things’ (EUNOMIA) until he had brought the most powerful men in the state to be of the same | |

| |opinion as he was with regard to the constitution... OBEDIENCE is of the greatest benefit, as well| |

| |in a State as in an army anda family..." | |

| | | |

| |"An honorable death is preferable to a dishonorable life.... At Lacedaemon everyone would be | |

| |ashamed to allow a coward into the same tent as himself,or allow him to be his opponent in a match| |

| |at wrestling...." | |

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| |"Lycurgus also imposed on his countrymen an obligation, from which there is no exception, of | |

| |practising every kind of political virtue; for he made the privileges of citizenship EQUALLY | |

| |available to all those who observed what was commanded by the Laws, without taking any account | |

| |either of bodily weakness or limited financial means; but if anyone was too lazy to do what the | |

| |Laws demanded, Lycurgus commanded that he should no longer be counted among the number of ‘equally| |

| |privileged citizens’ (the HOMOIOI)." | |

| |Marriage | |

|BOS 1 | | |

| |A Spartan equal was not allowed to marry until age of 30, when he could leave the barracks. The | |

| |women could be younger. | |

| |After wedding – for historians know nothing of the ceremony – the bride had her hair cut short | |

| |like a boys and she dressed in a man’s cloak and sandals. | |

| |The point of these customs not clear – seems possible that the man’s clothes were supposed to show| |

| |that the women had submitted to control of husband. | |

| |It was vital to the Spartans that marriages should produce children – thus adopting the custom | |

| |that if a couple had no children, it was considered quite proper for a man to invite a younger man| |

| |to sleep with his wife in hope that the union would produce a child. | |

| |So important were children to the state that various penalties were attached to bachelorhood. | |

| |Child had to also be healthy – as soon as a baby was born, it was washed in wine because Spartans | |

| |believed (quite wrongly) that a weak or sick child would simply die if washed in wine, whereas a | |

| |strong child would be strengthened still more. | |

| |A child who survived the wine test had to be then accepted by the city. – The father had to take | |

| |his child before certain elders whose job it was to decide whether the baby was likely to grow up | |

| |strong or weak, as someone who was crippled would be unable to help the Equals maintain their | |

| |warrior way of life. | |

| |If elders decided that the baby looked strong enough, they declared that it could be brought up as| |

| |a citizen. - It was at this point that an estate was thus granted to the future warrior. | |

| |If they felt the baby was too weak or saw that it was deformed, they ordered that it should be | |

| |left to die in a chasm by near-by mountains. | |

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| |Sources on marriage | |

| |Both Plutarch and Xenophon suggest that the nature of marriage practices and households was | |

| |designed to make young Spartans of either gender look forward to marriage and the production of | |

| |children rather than to recoil from it or see it as a burden | |

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| |Plutarch tells us of the marriage ceremony | |

| |Women get married by being abducted, not when they are small and under-age but when they are in | |

| |their prime and ripe | |

| |When the bride has been abducted the bridesmaid, takes hold of her and shaves her hair off…dresses| |

| |her in a man’s cloak and sandals and puts her to be on a pallet alone and in the dark | |

| |Then the bridegroom slips quietly into the room…unloosens her girdle and raising her up, carries | |

| |her over to the bed | |

| |After spending a short amount of time with her, he departs discreetly to wherever he was | |

| |previously accustomed to spend the night in order to bed down with the rest of him comrades | |

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| |marriage customs | |

| |no evidence for Perioikoi or helot marriage | |

| |marriage was often arranged | |

| |women married around 18, men late twenties | |

| |girls had dowries | |

| |before marriage a women only feast took place | |

| |For Spartan women a marriage was a non-ceremonial event. She was abducted in the middle of the | |

| |night by her husband to be, her head was shaved, and she was made to wear men’s clothing. From | |

| |here on she would only meet with her husband for the sole purpose of conceiving children. | |

| |This manner in which marriage occurred led to many wives to husband or many husbands to a wife | |

| |Spartans believed that a women should not be married until she is of “full bloom and ripe”. At | |

| |this age she could enjoy the sexual intimacy, other wise it was considered an act of violence | |

| |married to a man around 4-5 years older as opposed to many years older which other Greek women | |

| |were forced into | |

| |man had to sneak out of the barracks in order to see his wife | |

| |Wife sharing occurred. Husbands would lend their wives to single men to produce children | |

| |no such thing as adultery | |

| |marriage was kept secret until wife was pregnant, if not permission to remarry | |

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