Notes to Pages 24–25 157
and see Edmond Lévy, “La Kryptie et ses contradictions,” Ktèma 13 (1988): 245–53; Birgalias,
OES, 97–126 ; and Ducat, SE, 281–309, 319–32 (on which, see the judicious remarks of Paul Car-
tledge: NECJ 34:2 [May 2007]: 149–50). I am persuaded neither by Plutarch (Lyc. 28.12–13) that
Lycurgus could not have devised so brutal an institution and that it must therefore have been in-
vented after the great helot revolt of 465 nor by Jacqueline Christien, “Les Temps d’une vie,” Métis
12 (1997): 45–79 (at 70–72), that the institution was not invented until the liberation of Messenia,
and I suspect that it belongs in “the ghost year” between childhood and adulthood identified by
Tazelaar, “paides kai epheboi,” 127–53; Kukofka, “Die Paidískoi im System der spartanischen
Altersklassen,” 197–205; and Ducat, SE, 94–98. With regard to PLondon No. 187, see note 57, below.
- Lacedaemon for a time populous: Chapter 4 and Appendix 1, below. Completion of
agōgē ́, acceptance into sussıtíon, and citizenship: Xen. Lac. Pol. 10.7; Plut. Mor. 235b, 238e. Taking
up of allotment: Plut. Mor. 238e, Teles F3.15 [Hense], with Arist. Pol. 1271a26–36. Hupomeíones:
Xen. Hell. 3.3.6.
56.Composition of sussıtíon: Plut. Lyc. 12.3, Porph. Abst. 4.4. Cf. Schol. Pl. Leg. 1.633a, where
the number of members mentioned is ten, and Plut. Agis 8.4, where the reinstituted sussıtíon of the
late third century is to include hundreds of members. Blackball: Plut. Lyc. 12.9–11. Military func-
tion: consider Hdt. 1.65.6; Plut. Mor. 226d–e; Polyaen. 2.1.15, 3.11, in light of Xen. Cy r. 2.1.28. The
members were called tentmates [súskēnoı]: Xen. Lac. Pol. 7.4, 9.4, 15.5. See also Pl. Leg. 1.625c–626b,
633a, and Singor, “Admission to the Syssitia in Fifth-Century Sparta,” 67–89. Políteuma: Persaeus
FGrH 584 F2. Decorum: consider Critias Vorsokr.^6 88 B32–37; Xen. Lac. Pol. 5.2–8; Pl. Leg. 1.637a
(with 639d–e); Sosibius FGrH 595 F19; Dion. Hal. 2.23.3; Plut Lyc. 12, 25.4 (with Cleom. 9.1), Mor.
224d; and Ath. 141a–e in light of Nick R. E. Fisher, “Drink, Hybris and the Promotion of Harmony
in Sparta,” in CSTS, 26–50; Stefan Link, “ ‘Durch diese Tür geht kein Wort hinaus!’ (Plut. Lyk. 12,
8),” Laverna 9 (1998): 82–112; and Ephraim David, “Sparta’s Kosmos of Silence,” in SNS, 117–46.
Note also David, “Laughter in Spartan Society,” 1–4. See also Hdt. 6.84. - Néos until forty-five: Appendix 2, below. Magisterial inspection every ten days: Agathar-
chides of Cnidus F86 F10. Punished if found to be fat: Ael. VH 14.7. Nights spent with the sussıtíon:
Plut. Lyc. 15.7–9 with Xen. Lac. Pol. 1.5, Plut. Mor. 228a–b, Suda s.v. Lukoûrgos. Garrisons: H. W.
Parke, “The Evidence for Harmosts in Laconia,” Hermathena 46 (1931): 31–38. The institution of
the agronómoı devised by Plato (Leg. 6.762e–763c, 778d–779a) would appear to be a close imita-
tion of the arrangement described in a fragment surviving from an ancient medical work (PLon
don No. 187)—which was discussed long ago by Paul Girard, “Sur la Cryptie des Lacédémoniens,”
REG 11 (1898): 31–38, and “Krypteia,” in Dictionnaire des antiquités grecques et romaines d’après
les textes et les monuments, ed. Charles Victor Daremberg and Edmond Saglio (Graz: Akade-
mische Druck- und Verlagsanstalt, 1962–63), III:1 871–73, who confused the system of garrisons
and patrols described therein with the krupteía; and which has more recently been reexamined by
Ducat, SE, 309–19, who doubts whether it has to do with Sparta at all. With Girard, I believe that
the reference in the papyrus to Agesilaus as a Lákōn suggests that the subject is Lacedaemon.
While in his twenties and still an eırē ́n, if I am correct, a Spartan could expect to spend two years
in garrison duty and on patrol in the manner described. Without some such arrangement, it is
inconceivable that the Spartans could have maintained their dominion—particularly that in Mes-
senia (above, at note 54). Although the Athenian ephebes performed some functions comparable
to those performed by the Spartans doing garrison service (Aeschin. 2.167, Arist. Ath. Pol. 42.2–5),
they had more in common with the Spartans undergoing the krupteía: see Vidal-Naquet, “The
Black Hunter and the Origin of the Athenian Ephebia,” 106–28; John J. Winkler, “The Ephebes’
Song: Tragōidia and Polis,” in Nothing to Do with Dionysos? Athenian Drama in Its Social Context,
ed. John J. Winkler and Froma I. Zeitlin (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990), 20–62; and
Pierre Vidal-Naquet, “The Black Hunter Revisited,” PCPhS 212 (1986): 126–44. Cf. Arist. Pol.
1331a19–23, 1331b14–17, which is an adaptation of Spartan practice to the needs of a walled city.
58.Dion. Hal. Ant. Rom. 2.23.3. For the sussıtíon as a religious institution, note Alcman’s use
of the word thíasos in connection with the andreîon: F98 (PMG). - Hıppágretaı and hıppeîs: Xen. Lac. Pol. 4.3–4. See Hdt. 1.67.5, 8.124.3; Thuc. 5.72.4; Xen.
Hell. 3.3.9–11, 6.4.14 (where, with Stephanus, I read hıppeîs rather than híppoı); Ephorus FGrH
70 F149 (ap. Strabo 10.4.18); Dion. Hal. Ant. Rom. 2.13.4; Plut. Lyc. 25.6, Mor. 231b; Stob. Flor.
4.1.138 (Hense); Hesych. s.v. hıppagrétas. It is in this connection that one should read Pl. Prt.