12-11-2009, 11:49 PM
P.J. Stylianou in his Oxford Classical Monograph A Historical Commentary on Diodorus Siculus Book 15 (Clarendon Press, 1998) has a fairly extensive discussion about the Spartan hippeis on p. 290-294. His discussion is quite detailed and incorporates material from a wide range of ancient sources. He summarizes his conclusions (p. 293) as follows: "The 300 hippeis were an ancient 'Lycurgan' institution meant to encourage healthy rivalry among young Spartans. Once they had indeed been hippeis, but were no longer; they merely kept the title (Strabo 10 C 481-2). Once they had numbered 300, but from the middle of the 5th century to the latest they could no longer do so. However, the name, the 300 hippeis, was retained. It was not their function to act as a royal bodyguard by nature of their office. Yet in elitist Sparta (and this was an elitism based only partly on merit; birth and wealth almost certainly counted for more) the eminent men who fought with the king must largely have coincided with the hippeis, past and present." In short, he sees the hippeis as a group of youths (actually 20-30 years old) elected from the spartiate population, numbering 300 until population decline (at least of spartiates) made this unattainable, using a title left over from an equestrian past and with current and former members dominating royal bodyguards of varible strength which were perhaps gathered in a somewhat ad hoc manner for each campaign. I don't know if this is any kind of final word (is anything when it comes to scanty ancient data?), but it's worth consideration in light of his high level of research.
It\'s only by appreciating accurate accounts of real combat past and present that we can begin to approach the Greek hoplite\'s hard-won awareness of war\'s potential merits and ultimate limitations.
- Fred Eugene Ray (aka "Old Husker")
- Fred Eugene Ray (aka "Old Husker")
