How were the Spartans putting conservative politics into action in their life within Sparta in the 370s before Leuctra? To what degree is Xenophon’s view a fair one? The Spartans were putting conservatism politics into action in their daily lives by continuing to follow the laws Lycurgus had laid out for them centuries before. Some such laws are the role of women, the role of sex, and the role of equality described in Xenophon’s ‘Constitution of Lacedaimonians’, written around the 370’s. However Xenophon’s view is not a totally fair one, considering his past military experiences with Spartans, as well as the fact that he was not a Spartan citizen and therefore only knew the official laws laid out to him.
Themistocles played an essential role in the Persian wars and was a key factor to Greek victory in these wars. He made this impact through his pre-war efforts, his leadership skills and his intelligence in tactics which is shown during the battle of Salamis. During his pre-war years, Themistocles came to the realisation that if Athens was to suceed in it's war efforts against Persia then it would need to greatly focus on the improval of it's naval force. Unsurprisingly, however, most Athenians disagreed with this idea as it would result in a weakened land military force and less money to the citizens of Athens. In order to persuade his fellow Athenians to support his idea of a strengthened naval force, Themistocles resorted to trickery.
Although in the no immediate repercussion came to the Athenians and the US, later they both faced rebellions. International laws were made to protect the weak and the ones unable to defend themselves from powerful conquerors. The Athenians and the US both violated
Explain the origins and activities of the Delian League The origins of the Delian League was to fight the Persians (offensive), to ensure that Greece was not attacked again. The League was slowly transformed into an Empire. The Delian League was established in 477BC. The aim of the League was ‘to compensate themselves for their losses by ravaging the territory of the King of Persia (Thucydides). De Ste Croix believes that the “prosklema” translated by traditional scholars such as Meiggs as simple “aims” actually had an imperialistic connotation, because prosklema was a “professional aim”.
It is apparent on how the Ancient Athenians executed Socrates after the series of attempts of his followers to destroy Democracy. It is also a Democracy of the Sword because of the Ancient Athenians view war as a necessity to protect Democracy, which they claim to be the model government for other Greek City-States to follow but eventually these wars destroyed Democracy. The Democracy of the United States of America during the 20th century, as I see it, is a Democracy of principles in a sense that Ideologies are dominant in the United States. There are four dominant Ideologies namely: liberal, conservative, libertarian and populist. I tend to think that the United States view the world as a political area and it is just a mere battle of principles of state governance.
We understand from Herodotus that the cause of the Ionian revolt was due to the decisions of certain individuals such as Aristagoras and Histeaus of Miletus, we know that Herodotus did not have a good view of the Ionians as he regarded them as lazy. However after the subjugation of Lydia by Croesus we can understand why the Ionians may have revolted, Miletus in return for complete subjugation was given very good terms in comparison to the rest of Ionia who were heavily taxed by Darius who introduced the Daric coin into Ionia, also Herodotus describes him as the shopkeeper due to his heavy taxes. Also we are shown by Herodotus that in Darius expedition to Scythia in 513 BC many Ionians were forced to fight for the Persian army, compulsory service in a foreign army would have caused resentment among the Ionians towards the Persians. Herodotus concentrates on individuals in his cause for the Ionian revolt, the story of the tattooed slave sent to Aristagoras shows us that maybe because of the Ionian revolt, Histeaus wanted to resolve his bad reputation being pro-Persian by making a story which would show him to be being part of the Ionian revolt. In Ionia and islands such as Samos and Naxos, there was a clear divide in attitude towards the Persians, Polycrates the tyrant of Samos was pro Persian like many of the tyrants in Ionia, and he sent 40 ships to help the Persian in their expedition to Egypt, as we know there was an uprising by a anti Persian party in Samos, this would show us that even before the Persian subjugation of Ionia there was a clear resentment to Persian occupation.
Although these traits are used to become a leader, the way one applies these traits can cause consequences. During the Peloponnesian War, Alcibiades was seen as a negative factor in the Athenian cause because of his pride, and overconfidence in himself. We encounter Alcibiades arrogance in Tides of War when he says “ we will take these cities as we took the islands of our empire” this shows Alcibiades over analyzing how strong
These critics, including Thucydides, believed that “the democracy had… driven them to sink more and more resources in a losing proposition” because they didn’t want to fail and in turn, an oligarchy was formed in June 411 8 But ultimately this same oligarchy disbanded, was replaced by another form of government, and eventually democracy prevailed. Democracy won out in the end for Athens which caused the other Greek city-states to want this type of government and look to Athens to help them. This proves that Athens was overall the schoolmaster of Greece, and utilized an advanced system to govern their people, despite critics’ complaints about
Now just like in the first war Sparta couldn’t do it alone; so they asked the Persians to help conquer Athens. They asked their own enemy for help. This truly was a good example of history repeating itself. Mainly because Spartans defeated the Persians on land and Athenians defeated them in the sea. This time Spartans defeated the Athenians on land and the Persians defeated the Athenians in the sea.
Tensions between the Peloponnesian League and the Delian League eventually led to the Peloponnesian war. Thucydides believed that Sparta was afraid of the growing power of Athens, which had essentially resulted in the creation of an Athenian empire. Sparta felt that Athens was meddling in their business, and Athens would not agree to avoid interference. After twenty-seven years of war, and the participation in one way or another of many of the city-states belonging to the two leagues, both Sparta and Athens were in ruins. Sparta claimed the victory, and the city-states continued their bickering and fighting.