The Education Of Sparta

First of all, the general view promoted both by Sparta and her enemies was that it was a state education. Thucydides has Pericles say in his funeral speech to the Athenians during the Peloponnesian War that the Spartans train up their children to harden themselves and live for the state. In contrast, he says, the Athenians are just as strong and brave on a very different educational system. In fact, he claims that they are better than the Spartans, for the Spartans, when they go to war, always bring along their allies, whereas the Athenians, often as not, fight alone. He claims that no force from another Greek city has ever defeated a full Athenian force in fair battle.

Leaving aside the question of whether the Athenians were the great fighters that they said, what was the Athenian education? Initially, there was nothing formal, with children staying in the household until they were seven. Plato recommended training them from birth, but his description of a boy child as being wild and unruly as an animal indicates that his fellow citizens did the opposite with their young children.