Jean Ducat is the leading French authority on classical Sparta. Here is what is likely to be seen as his magnum opus. Ducat systematically collects, translates and evaluates the sources - famous and obscure alike - for Spartan education. He deploys his familiar combination of good judgement and uncompromising recognition of the limits to our knowledge, while drawing at times on aspects of French structuralism. This book is likely to become the definitive reference on its subject, while also informing and provoking the future work of others. Sparta was admitted by Greeks generally, even by its Athenian enemies, to be the School of Hellas. Ducat's work is thus a major contribution to our understanding of Greek ideas, and indeed to the history of education.
The Inspiration for Professor Kingsfield Discusses His Career, Teaching Methods Professional Issues and Other Subjects. Originally published: Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1942. xi, 164 pp. Spartan Education offers a fascinating account of Harvard Law School from the turn of the century to the 1940s, colorful sketches of his professors, Mr. Cadwallader and a summary of his "Spartan" approach to pedagogy. Warren also includes the texts of various addresses and articles dealing with Harvard, legal history, the American Bar and political topics. This is a reprint of the 1942 edition, which was strictly limited to 1000 copies. (Despite requests for additional copies, Warren refused to reissue the book. (He published an edition of extracts instead, however, in order to address these requests while keep his word.) "I believe in discipline. From boyhood days on, I have sought to discipline my own mind, pen, and tongue. And throughout my service on the Law Faculty I have sought to discipline the minds, pens, and tongues of the students. I have never suffered fools gladly, and regard such sufferance as mischievous. Therefore 'Spartan Education' seemed an appropriate title. As I review my life, I find the source of greatest satisfaction in my belief that there are today ten thousand men who are leading more useful and successful lives than they would be leading if my Spartan training had not played a substantial part in the molding of their minds; and that most, if not all, of them now recognize that to be the fact, and are grateful." -- Preface, ix Edward H. Warren [1873-1945] was a legendary professor at Harvard Law School. Known as "Bull" Warren for his aggressive (and often vicious) teaching methods, he was the primary model for Professor Kingsfield in John Jay Osborn, Jr.'s novel The Paper Chase. Warren attended Harvard College from 1891 to 1895 and Harvard Law School from 1897 to 1900, where his principal instructors were Ames, Gray, Smith and Thayer. After four years at Strong and Cadwalader, he joined the Harvard Law faculty, where he remained until his retirement.
The Gymnasium of Virtue is the first book devoted exclusively to the study of education in ancient Sparta, covering the period from the sixth century B.C. to the fourth century A.D. Nigel Kennell refutes the popular notion that classical Spartan education was a conservative amalgam of "primitive" customs not found elsewhere in Greece. He argues instead that later political and cultural movements made the system appear to be more distinctive than it actually had been, as a means of asserting Sparta's claim to be a unique society. Using epigraphical, literary, and archaeological evidence, Kennell describes the development of all aspects of Spartan education, including the age-grade system and physical contests that were integral to the system. He shows that Spartan education reached its apogee in the early Roman Empire, when Spartans sought to distinguish themselves from other Greeks. He attributes many of the changes instituted later in the period to one person--the philosopher Sphaerus the Borysthenite, who was an adviser to the revolutionary king Cleomenes III in the third century B.C.
This is the first book-length examination of Spartan women, covering over a thousand years in the history of women from both the elite and lower classes. Classicist Sarah B. Pomeroy comprehensively analyzes ancient texts and archaeological evidence to construct the world of these elusive though much noticed females. Sparta has always posed a challenge to ancient historians because information about the society is relatively scarce. Most existing scholarship on Sparta concerns the military history of the city and its heavily male-dominated social structure--almost as if there were no women in Sparta. Yet perhaps the most famous of mythic Greek women, Menelaus' wife Helen, the cause of the Trojan War, was herself a Spartan. Written by one of the leading authorities on women in antiquity, Spartan Women reconstructs the lives and the world of Sparta's women, including how their status changed over time and how they held on to their surprising autonomy. Proceeding through the archaic, classical, Hellenistic, and Roman periods, Spartan Women includes discussions of education, family life, reproduction, religion, and athletics.
"This is a book that scholars will read with pleasure, and a book from which advanced undergraduates and graduates will gain a sense of what Sparta was like as a culture, and (just as important) the nature and state of play of contemporary Spartan studies. And it will be accessible for the well informed lay reader as well."—Josiah Ober, author of Political Dissent in Democratic Athens "Paul Cartledge's aim, in this powerful collection of essays, is to shed light in dark places, to demythicize... Cartledge is shrewd, realistic, and far from starry-eyed. Over a quarter-century's exhaustive research, now updated, has gone into these densely documented and tightly argued essays. These Spartans, in the last resort, are exploitative slave-drivers, obsessed with keeping their serfs down (by annually killing off any resisters, among other things)... Modern idealizers of cold baths, black broth, mindless discipline and long route marches should read this book and, hopefully, have second thoughts."—Peter Green, author of Alexander to Actium
The history of Sparta is increasingly seen as important, not only for its own sake but also for understanding Athenian literature and the political history of numerous Greek states. Traditional approaches to Sparta are now being supplemented by contributions from archaeology and the social sciences. The renewed interest in Sparta is international. The volume includes, for the first time, original contributions from most of the world's leading authorities on Spartan history.
“Remarkable . . . [The author’s] crystalline prose, his vivacious storytelling and his lucid historical insights combine here to provide a first-rate history.” —Publishers Weekly Sparta has often been described as the original Utopia—a remarkably evolved society whose warrior heroes were forbidden any other trade, profession, or business. As a people, the Spartans were the living exemplars of such core values as duty, discipline, the nobility of arms in a cause worth dying for, sacrificing the individual for the greater good of the community (illustrated by their role in the battle of Thermopylae), and the triumph over seemingly insuperable obstacles—qualities often believed today to signify the ultimate heroism. In this book, distinguished scholar and historian Paul Cartledge, long considered the leading international authority on ancient Sparta, traces the evolution of Spartan society—the culture and the people as well as the tremendous influence they had on their world and even ours. He details the lives of such illustrious and myth-making figures as Lycurgus, King Leonidas, Helen of Troy (and Sparta), and Lysander, and explains how the Spartans, while placing a high value on masculine ideals, nevertheless allowed women an unusually dominant and powerful role—unlike Athenian culture, with which the Spartans are so often compared. In resurrecting this culture and society, Cartledge delves into ancient texts and archeological sources and includes illustrations depicting original Spartan artifacts and drawings, as well as examples of representational paintings from the Renaissance onward—including J.L. David’s famously brooding Leonidas. “A pleasure for anyone interested in the ancient world.” —Kirkus Reviews “[An] engaging narrative . . . In his panorama of the real Sparta, Cartledge cloaks his erudition with an ease and enthusiasm that will excite readers from page one.” —Booklist “Our greatest living expert on Sparta.” —Tom Holland, prize-winning author of Rubicon: The Last Years of the Roman Republic
Both in antiquity and in modern scholarship, classical Sparta has typically been viewed as an exceptional society, different in many respects from other Greek city-states. This view has recently come under challenge from revisionist historians, led by Stephen Hodkinson. This is the first book devoted explicitly to this lively historical controversy. Historians from Britain, Europe and the USA present different sides of the argument, using a variety of comparative approaches. The focus includes kingship and hegemonic structures, education and commensality, religious institutions and practice, helotage and ethnography. The volume concludes with a wide-ranging debate between Hodkinson and Mogens Herman Hansen (Director of the Copenhagen Polis Centre), on the overall question of whether Sparta was a normal or an exceptional polis.
Spartans: A New History chronicles the complete history of ancient Sparta from its origins to the end of antiquity. Helps bridge the gap between the common conceptions of Sparta and what specialists believe and dispute about Spartan history Applies new techniques, perspectives, and archaeological evidence to the question of what it was to be a Spartan Takes into account new specialist scholarship and research published in Greek, which is not readily available elsewhere Places Spartan society into its wider Greek context
