Executive authority lay in the hands of five ephors. Appointed by the assembly, they held office for one year and could not be reelected. They wielded great (and somewhat sinister) powers, and played a role not altogether unlike that of the political commissars who accompanied officers in the Red Army. They had a judicial function, and could levy instant fines. They could depose, imprison, and bring to trial any official, including a king (in which latter case they sat in judgment alongside the other king and the council of elders). They also negotiated with foreign embassies and expelled unwelcome foreigners. They chaired the assembly and implemented its decisions. When a king led an army abroad, two ephors accompanied him to oversee his behavior. Once a year they formally declared war on the helots, so that killing them would not be illegal and a religious pollution.
The Spartans were terrified that their helots would rise again against them and believed that the most efficacious means of preventing this was through wholesale oppression. A secret police called the crypteia (literally “hidden things”) was tasked with ensuring peace and quiet in Messenia. Its members were recruited from the brightest and best of the younger generation, and only those willing to serve were likely to obtain senior public posts in later life. According to Plutarch, the ephors from time to time sent out into the countryside young Spartiates in the crypteia, equipped only with daggers and basic rations. “In the daytime they scattered into obscure and out of the way places, where they lay low and rested. At night they came down into the roads and murdered every helot they came across.” Often they even went into the fields where helots were working and cut down the strongest and best of them.
On one occasion in the fifth century it is reported that the helots were invited to volunteer names of those who had shown bravery on the battlefield and deserved to be given their freedom. Two thousand helots were singled out, crowned with wreaths, and ushered in procession around the sanctuaries of the gods. But then a little while later they all disappeared and were secretly liquidated. No one ever found out how they had met their ends.
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At the head of Spartan society stood two kings from separate royal families, the Agiad and the Eurypontid, who reigned simultaneously. This was a unique arrangement in Greece and its purpose is unclear, although the existence of an alternative may have constrained an autocratically minded monarch from stepping out of line. Over time the kings saw their powers diminish. As a rule they could not initiate policy, although a man with a talent for politics could win over the gerousia and the assembly to his way of thinking. As noted, executive authority became the prerogative of the ephors.
In military affairs, however, the kings remained supreme. One or other of them led the Spartan army and wielded absolute power on the battlefield. They were accompanied by a bodyguard of one hundred horsemen and could summarily execute any soldier for cowardice or treason. However, they were liable to prosecution for mishandling campaigns and a number of kings were convicted of bribery.
A king had another equally weighty and demanding duty. As religious leaders, he and his colleague were responsible for relations with the gods. They often consulted the oracle at Delphi and conducted frequent ceremonies on behalf of the state. Before setting out on a military campaign a king sacrificed to the gods to make sure that the enterprise had their approval. He did so again when crossing Sparta’s frontier, and sacrificed daily while on campaign and before a battle.
These matters were taken very seriously. A commander would not advance against an enemy if the omens were unfavorable—for example, unusual signs on an animal’s liver. The king might have to sacrifice again and again before getting the right result; in the meantime his men were forced to stand idly by. An earthquake or an eclipse was enough to send a Spartan army marching home.
In peacetime kings had comparatively little to do—except for enjoying their wealth. They owned large estates and were the only Spartans who were permitted to be rich; they were the first to be served at public banquets and were given double portions. They were entitled to decide whom heiresses should marry—a profitable occupation, we may surmise—and adoption ceremonies had to take place in their presence.
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The takeover of Messenia made Sparta the most powerful of the Greek city-states and its opponents thought twice before meeting their army in the field. But it was not naturally predatory or expansionist. Its primary concern was to control the Peloponnese and, above all, to ensure that the helots were broken in and docile. So far as the wider Hellenic world was concerned it had no particular ambitions, except that it expected—and received—a general acknowledgment of its superiority. Its formidable army could repel all comers and its constitution seemed to many outside observers to be a fine example of eunomia, or “good order and stability under just laws.”
Sparta would have liked nothing better than to be left alone, but its interests were to be challenged in future years by its polar opposite and rival, the changeable and creative city of Athens.
3
The Persian Mule
Even today Delphi is an astounding place. The town is a series of headlong terraces perched dangerously on the limestone slopes of Mount Parnassus in central Greece. In classical times, it was almost inaccessible. Pausanias, the author of a guidebook to ancient Greece, who wrote in the second century A.D., walked along the craggy path that was the only way into the town. He found it hard going. He observed: “The highroad to Delphi gets more precipitous and becomes difficult even for an active man.”
It was here that the classical world’s leading oracle was located. Oracles were shrines where mortals could consult the immortals who warned, guided, and rewarded their worshippers. There were at least eight on the Greek mainland and many more around the Eastern Mediterranean. They were popular with foreigners, or “barbarians,” as well as true Hellenes.
Once the visitor was inside the town he found himself on the Holy Way, a street that wound its course uphill towards the great temple of Apollo. He passed numerous Treasuries: these were stone buildings, looking like tiny temples, with columns and pediments, where grateful states stored votive gifts to the god, often one tenth of the spoils of a military victory—gold or silver artifacts, tripods, and bullion. They were decorated with brightly painted sculpture and with metal ornaments, as was typical of Greek architecture. Everywhere stood statues of prizewinning athletes in their hundreds. Paintings celebrated antique myths and great historical events.
The temple itself was a fine marble structure, partly resting on bedrock and partly on a specially built platform. On its walls three inscriptions were carved, which summed up basic principles of the good and fulfilled life. They were “know yourself,” “nothing in excess,” and, somewhat cynical advice to steer clear of rash pledges, “make a promise and ruin follows.”
We are told that beneath the cella or inner room was a small secret chamber, the adyton (Greek for “inaccessible”), where the omphalos stood, a stone object that represented the center or “navel” of the earth. Its surface was covered with the carving of a knotted net and it had a hollow center widening towards the bottom.
The temple was managed by a priest who was recruited from Delphi’s ruling elite. He served for life. The position was one of high prestige, but the incumbent was not expected to live a particularly virtuous life. He was assisted by five hosioi (or holy ones), and one or more prophetae, who may have had some role in interpreting or explaining the god’s messages.