The Spartan Warrior

The Ancients

History Hit

History

4.7 • 4.5K Ratings

🗓️ 9 December 2023

⏱️ 65 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

One of the most famed classes of soldiers from antiquity, the Spartan warrior has been immortalised in media today. Characterised as super soldiers, formidable fighters who would rather perish than surrender - their reputation truly did proceed them. But how accurate is this image - and does it correlate with what the ancient sources actually tell us?

In the second episode of our Sparta mini-series, Tristan welcomes Dr Roel Konijnendijk from the University of Oxford, to take a deep dive into the life of a Spartan warrior. Looking at their education, training, and familial expectations - how do you separate fact from fiction when it comes to the Spartans? And is it possible to know what their society was truly like?

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Transcript

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0:00.0	This is a passenger announcement. You can now book your train on Uber and get 10% back in credits to spend on Uber eats.
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0:20.0	Logically as journalists we have to go to the place of bombing to see what happened to interview people but honestly it is very risky.
0:28.0	Hello I'm David Knowles, host of Battle Lines, an original telegraph podcast.
0:32.6	Join me and our foreign correspondence on the ground
0:35.0	for the latest analysis on the Israel Hamas war.
0:37.6	We're in a new phase of fighting now in Gaza
0:39.7	before the Israeli military was targeting the Norse,
0:42.3	then they were moving south now it's everywhere
0:44.7	listen to battle lines every Friday on apple Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts In the equipment he devised for battle, like Kurgis included a red cloth because he believed
1:09.4	this to look least like women's clothing and to be most suitable for war.
1:14.4	And a bronze shield because it is very soon polished and tarnishes very slowly.
1:20.7	He also permitted men who were past their first youth to grow their hair long,
1:25.0	believing that it would make them look taller, more dignified, and more terrifying.
1:31.0	They wore their hair long as they ceased to be youths and particularly in times of danger
1:37.7	they took pains to have it glossy and well combed, remembering a certain saying of Lycurgis that a fine head of hair made the handsome more calmly still and the ugly more terrible.
1:50.0	It was a sight equally grand and terrifying when they marched in step with the rhythm of the flute,
1:56.7	without any gap in the line, and with no confusion in their souls, but calmly and cheerfully moving with the strains of their hymn into danger. Those were the words of the ancient historians Plutarch and Xenophon, describing one of the most
2:16.9	well-known classes of soldiers in Antiquity, The Spartan Warrior, popularized today in films, TV series, books and games,
2:26.0	the image of the Spartans as ancient super soldiers that always fought to the last
2:31.0	is one that is never far away. However, the truth is a bit more
	...

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