Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume II.djvu/128

 112 LACONIA. jriven by Lycnrgns, and that 3000 were added by kins; Polydorus at the end of the First Messenian War ; others supposed that the original number of 4500 was doubled by Polydorus. (Plut. I. c.) From these statements attempts have been made by modern writers to calculate the population of Laconia, and the relative numbers of the Spartans and the Perioeci ; but Mr. Grote has brought forward strong reasons for believing that no such division of the landed property of Laconia was ever made by Lycurgus, and that the belief of his having done so arose in the tliird century before the Christian era, when Agis attempted to make a fresh division of the land of Laconia. (Grote, Hist, of Greece, vol. ii. p. 521.) In any case, it is impossible to determine, as some ■writers have attempted, the lands which belonged respectively to the Spartans and the Perioeci. All that we know is, that, in the law proposed by Agis, the land bound by the four limits of Pellene, Sellasia, Malea, and Taygetus, was divided into 4500 lots, one for each Spartan ; and that the remainder of Laconia was divided into 15,000 lots, one for each Perioecus (Plut. Agis, 8.) With respect to the population of Laconia, we have a few isolated statements in the ancient writers. Of these the most important is that of Herodotus, who says that the citizens of Sparta at the time of the Persian wars was about 8000 (vii. 234). The number of the Perioeci is nowhere stated ; but we know from Herodotus that there were 10,000 of them present at the battle of Plataea, 5000 heavy- armed, and 5000 light-armed (is. 11, 29) ; and, as there were 5000 Spartans at this battle, that is five- eighths of the whole number of citizens, we may venture to assume as an approximate number, that the Perioeci at the battle may have been also five- eighths of their whole number, which would give 16.000 for the males of full age. After the time of the Persian wars the number of the Spartan citizens gradually but steadily declined ; and Clinton is pro- bably right in his supposition that at the time of the invasion of Laconia, in b. c. 369, the total num- ber of Spartans did not exceed 2000 ; and that Isocrates, in describing the original Dorian con- querors of Laconia as only 2000, has probably adapted to the description the number of Spartans in his own time. (Isocr. ranath. p. 286, c.) About 50 years after that event, in the time of Aristotle, they were scarcely 1000 (Aristot. Pol. ii. 6. § 11); and eighty years still later, in the reign of Agis, B. c. 244, their number was reduced to only 700 (Plut. Agis, 5.) The number of Helots was very large. At the battle of Plataea there were 35,000 light-armed Helots, that is seven for every single Spartan (Herod, ix. 28.) On the population of Laconia, see Clinton, F. H. vol. ii. p. 407, seq. From B. c. 547 to b. c. 371, the boundaries of Laconia continued to be the same as we have men- tioned above. But after the overthrow of her supre- macy by the fatal buttle of Leuctra, the Spartans were successively stripped of the dominions they had acquired at the expense of the Messenians, Arca- dians, and Argives. Epaminondas, by establishing the independent state of Messenia, confined the Spartans to the country east of Jlount Taygetus ; and the Arcadian city of Megalopolis, which was founded by the same statesman, encroached upon the Spartan territory in the upper vale of the Enrotas. While the Thebans were engaged in the Sacred War, the Spartans endeavoured to recover some of their territory which they had thus lost ; LACONIA. but it was still further circumscribed by Philip, the father of Alexander the Great, who deprived the Spartans of several districts, which he assigned to the Argives, Arcadians, and Messenians. (Polyb. ix. 28 ; Paus. iv. 28. § 2.) After the establish- ment of the Achaean League their influence in the Peloponnesus sank lower and lower. For a short time they showed unwonted vigour, under their king Cleomenes, whose resolution had given new life to the state. They defeated the Achaeans in several battles, and seemed to be regaining a portion at least of their former power, when they were cheeked in their progress by Antigoiuis Doson, whom the Achaeans called in to their assist- ance, and were at length completely humbled by the fiital battle of Sellasia, b. c. 221. (^Dict. of Biofjr. art. Cleomenes.') Soon afterwards Sparta fell into the hands of a succession of usurpers ; and of tliese Nabis, one of the most sanguinary, was com- pelled by T.' Quiuctius Flamininus, to surrender Gy- thium and the other maritime towns, which had sided with the Romans, and were now severed from the Spartan dominion and placed under the protec- tion of the Achaean League, b. c. 195. (Strab. viii. p. 366 ; Thiriwall, Hist, of Greece, vol. viii. p. 326.) The Spartans were thus confined almost to the valley in which then- Dorian ancestors had first settled, and, like them, were surrounded by a number of hostile places. Seven years afterwards, b. c. 188, Sparta itself was taken by Philopoemen, and annexed to the Achaean League (Plut. Phil. 16; Liv. xxxviii. 32 — 34) ; but this step was displeasing to the Romans, who viewed with apprehension the further increase of the Achaean League, and accordingly en- couraged the party at Sparta opposed to the interests of the Achaeans. But the Roman conquest of Greece, which soon followed, put an end to these disputes, and placed Laconia, together with the rest of Greece, under the immediate government of Rome. Whether the Lacedaemonian towns to which Flamininus had granted independence were placed again under the dominion of Sparta, is not recorded ; but we know that Augustus guaranteed to them their indepen- dence, and they are henceforth mentioned under the name of Eleuthero-Lacones. Pausanias says there were originally 24 towns of the Eleuthero-Lacones, and in his time there were still 18, of which the names were Gythium, Teuthrone, Las, Pyrrhicus, Caenepolis, Oetylus, Leuctra, Thalamae, Alagonia, Gerenia, Asopus, Acriae, Boeae, Zaras, Epidaurus Limera, Brasiae, Geronthrae, Marios. (Paus. iii. 21. §7.) Augustus showed favour to the Spartans as well as to the Lacedaemonians in general ; he gave to Sparta the Messenian town of Cardamyle (Paus. iii. 26. § 7) ; he also annexed to Laconia the Mes- senian town of Pharae (Paus. iv. 30. § 2), and gave to the Lacedaemonians the island of Cythera. (Dion Cass. liv. 7.) At the end of the fourth century of the Christian era, Laconia was devastated by the Goths under Alaric, who took Sparta (Zosim. v. 6). Subsequently Slavonians settled in the country, and retained pos- session of it for a long time ; but towards the end of the eighth century, in the reign of the empress Irene, the Byzantine court made an effort to recover their dominions in Peloponnesus, and finally suc- ceeded in reducing to subjection the Slavonians in the plains, while those in Laconia who would not submit were obliged to take refuge in the fastnesses of jlt. Taygetus. When the Franks became masters of Laconia in the 13th century, they found upon