Each Spartan had a portion or ‘lot’ of land given to him, on the produce of which he and his family had to live. But citizen soldiers had no time to dig the ground, to sow, to reap, for all their days were spent in drill and military exercises. So their land was cultivated for them by the Helots, who had owned Laconia before the Spartans conquered them and took possession of their land.
The Helots were treated very much as slaves, although they had no taskmasters to drive them to their work. They were even allowed to own property. But they had many hardships to endure, and were always ready to rebel against their masters.
One of their greatest hardships was that their lives were never safe. For while the Spartans were being trained, they were often sent into the country with orders to kill any Helot who was suspected of wishing to rebel.
In time of war the Helots fought as light-armed troops. If they showed themselves brave and loyal in the service of the State, they were sometimes rewarded by being made free.
Once during the great Peloponnesian War between Sparta and Athens, of which you will read in this story, the Spartans believed that the Helots had plotted to rise against them. They determined that the rising should never take place, and to prevent it they did a cruel deed. For they chose two thousand of the bravest Helots, set them free, and gave them a great feast to celebrate the event. Then when the feast was over and the Helots had gone away to their homes, suspecting nothing, the Spartans ordered each of the two thousand freed men to be put to death. When the bravest were killed, the others were not likely to rebel.
The Spartan army became strong as Lycurgus had foreseen it would, if it were trained according to his strict methods. It conquered Peloponnesus, and for a time Sparta was the chief city in that land.
But there was one strange thing about these soldiers. Well as they had been trained, they could never learn how to attack or to take a town that was fortified. ‘Wall-fighting,’ as the Greeks called it, was beyond their power. Even an ordinary wall or fence would stop them in their victorious course. At sea too they were not nearly so successful as on land.
Sparta itself was not, like other Greek cities, surrounded by a wall. For when the citizens once sent to ask Lycurgus if it were necessary to enclose their city with a wall, his answer was, ‘The city is well fortified which hath a wall of men instead of brick.’
When, after many years, Lycurgus had finished his code of laws, he called the people together and told them that he was going to Delphi to consult the oracle on an important matter which concerned the State.
Before he set out he begged them, and also the two kings and the Senate, to take an oath to keep his laws unaltered until his return. This they gladly promised to do.