Spartan Women Research Paper

This made it so they could control what they knew and who they looked up to. They were also not allowed to participate in government until they were 30. In document D it says that they weren't allowed to travel so they wouldn’t learn foreign and uncivil ways. This shows that the strengths do not outweigh the weaknesses because they were controlled and only taught the “Spartan” way.

Because of this they created a military like society. Everything was controlled by their government. Sparta may have had weaknesses in their education but their were more positive than negative parts. The strengths of Spartan education did outweigh the weaknesses because they trained Spartan boys for war and battle, women were also trained, and Spartan babies, from birth, were expected to be healthy.

The Spartans reverence to Lycurgus’s laws help set up a society base on militarism and conservative values. They as a society denying full social and political equality to all men, who allowed females, have social equality. The system in which Lycurgus left the Spartans denied both a democracy and a chance of a tyrant to gain control over the Spartans.

The role of the Athenian women was different compared to the role of a Spartan woman. In Athens, there were different classes of women; the women had very little choices open to them (Bailey). The women were not able to vote nor own/sell anything of great value (Bailey). The respectable women were not allowed to walk around town unless it was to a neighbor’s house or a religious service (Bailey). The women were at home and had to take care of the household and the children.

Her response here shows that Spartan women were brought up to be tough like their male counterparts. Spartan women had more freedoms than the Athenians. For example, unlike the “housebound life of the Athenian matron” , Spartan women were able to go out in public and even interact with other men. Despite both being Greek, women had very different roles to play in their societies. These differences

Pomeroy explains the life style and ways of Spartan women and the rise to be known and important as the Spartan men. Naturally, we think of Spartan women fierce, brave, queens, and pure. Spartan women took advantage of each opportunity that was heading their way and conquered it with no fear in their hearts. Those women are viewed today as a “force” not to be reckoned with. Pomeroy describes these women as, “Be the kind of woman that when your feet hit the floor each morning, the devil said, “Oh no, she’s up!”

Council of Elders suggested laws for Members of the Assembly to vote for, they could only vote for yes or no. Differing from Athens, Spartans schools mainly taught wrestling, boxing, foot racing, and gymnastics. Spartan women are almost ranked the same as men, they learn basic fighting skills enough to defended themselves when invaders came instead of doing household like Athenian women. Slaves in Sparta are mostly people from others city-states because their land are taken by Sparta for goods and they had to work for Sparta as slaves. Slaves are killed for any reasons that Spartans thought it is the right to eliminate

In Athens, women were mostly secluded from many things. They could not vote, leave the house without permission from their husband, and more. In Sparta, the rules for women were much more lenient. Spartan women would train with the men and could own land. In both Sparta and Athens, women could marry and raise children.

After all, the women that lived there were granted more rights than most that lived elsewhere. They also allowed girls to get an education. They had a pretty good social structure as well with full citizens at the top, noncitizen in the middle, and slaves at the bottom. Probably one the most renowned facts of Sparta is their military strength. The army was incredible, they even beat Athens in the Peloponnesian War.

(Doc B) Due to the fact that Athens taught women basic domestic skills this allowed men to focus on the advancement of the economic climate, such as trade on the Aegean Sea because they didn’t need to worry about their homes. “Finally, the citizen boys entered a military training camp for two years, until the age of twenty. Foreign metics and slaves were not expected to attain anything but a basic education in Greece, but were not excluded from it either.” (Doc H)

To be a loyal and disciplined warrior was exactly what Sparta needed and it’s what Sparta was built on. This was the basis of their concept of Arete. The women of Sparta also had their own expectations from Sparta. They were the ones who were to bear the children that would be trained.

Women were thought of as dependents of the father or husband. Women lived in gynaeceum: women’s quarters where they could oversee the running of the home and have very little contact with the male world (O’Pry, 2012). Spartan women, on the other hand, seem to have a bit more freedom and were able to own property. Sparta allowed for women to get educated in the same manner as the males. Sparta had a laid back culture and men were to serve in their military.

Sadly, most of how women lived away from their husbands’ world and how they interacted with other female companionship remains a mystery. Even the Olympic Games were under a males only policy, with the exception of a small event women held in honor of Hera in Olympia . Contrary to most ancient cities and popular belief, some women in ancient Greece were actually able to hold more than just the title of housewife. Although they were still secondary to men, in some Greek city-states, such as Sparta, women held much more freedom and a larger role in society .

For starters, the Spartans lived a frugal, non-luxurious lifestyle, devoting most of their time to the military, while the Athenians lived a more simple, peaceful lifestyle. The second difference between Spartans and Athenians are that Athenians focused on transforming the citizens into educated individuals while the Spartans focused on transforming the citizens into strong, courageous individuals. The third difference is that men only had to serve in the military for 2 years in Athens while men in Sparta basically served in the military for thirty years of their life, training as soldiers before they were even a teenager. The fourth and final difference is all about the rights women had at Sparta and Athens. At Sparta, women were a bit more independent.

Clearly, Sparta and Hellenistic women had more freedom and social rights than Athens women. The reason of how this phenomena occurred might be that at that period of time, Athens had the largest population of Attica. This indicates that the in this male community in Athens, the males could carry on almost all of the responsibilities of a society while the women could just stay at home and serve the men while they took part in public life. However, in Sparta and the Hellenistic era which there were not so much people around, women’s role would be more than simply taking care of household and children, they would need to shoulder some responsibility for their society, which brought along freedom and rights for