Classical Sparta functioned for years with a body of citizens who passed laws while co-existing with two contemporaneously sitting kings (a diarchy). Dr Philip Davies, Assistant Professor in Ancient Greek History, Faculty of Arts, University of Nottingham, joins the show to explain how government functioned in the Classical Spartan period (550-350 BCE).
Some topics explored
- Why the Classical Spartan period is considered to be approx. 550-350 BCE
- Written sources being the main type of source that scholars rely on to understand government in Sources that scholars rely on to understand this topic including writers such as Xenophon, Plutarch, Aristotle, Herodotus, Thucydides
- Almost all the sources not being from writers from Sparta and commentary about how scholars handle the different writers’ works
Listen to the episode
The episode can be streamed below and is also available on major podcast apps: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Amazon Music.
Show Notes
- Dr Davis is co-editor of the forthcoming volume Plutarch and Sparta (Classical Press of Wales, 2022) and author of the forthcoming monograph Standing Among the Spartans: Institutions and Status within the Spartiate Community (Bloomsbury Academic, 2022)
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