Why The Spartans Avoided Comfort | 60 Seconds History

Among the many city-states of ancient Greece, Sparta had the most martial reputation. Its citizens know to reject comfort and luxury in favor of hardship, deprivation and constant military training. But why did the Spartans avoid comfort? Well, according to the historian Xenophon, Spartans believed resilience was born from deprivation. By conditioning themselves to endure hardship in peacetime, they would be better able to withstand the demands of war. Spartan citizens were also wary of the corrupting influence of luxury. Excess comfort, they believed, led to moral decline, Historians such as Herodotus noted that this austere discipline was admired and sometimes feared by other Greek states. The Spartans further believed that visible wealth would undermine unity. While Spartan society was deeply unequal overall, with helot slaves and non-citizens forming the lower orders, maintaining relative equality within the elite citizen class was seen as vital to cohesion and loyalty. And Sparta's reputation itself became a weapon of psychological warfare. If enemies believed Spartans were unbreakable and indifferent to hardship, they might hesitate to challenge them at all. But Spartan austerity also had a practical purpose. The small class of landowning citizens had to remain constantly ready to suppress the far larger helot slave population. Their harsh way of life was as much about internal control as external power. This created huge problems following heavy military losses, particularly Sparta's catastrophic defeat to Thebes at Loictra in 371 BC. The loss of 60% of its citizen soldiers there made Sparta unable to field a large army ever again, without risking massive slave rewards, effectively relegating the city to a second-rate Greek power. Now as always, thank you for watching and if you enjoyed the video, please like, comment, subscribe and become a channel member to support our work.