11-26-2009, 02:37 AM
All good points Howard, and questions I'd love answers to. We know very little about all of these "middle" classes. After all we only have one reference to Hypomeiones. We do know that "worthy" foreigners were allowed citizenship from a very early date. The flip side of this is that resident aliens were kicked out of Sparta en masse at times. Even if Hypomeiones all derived from from families that lost franchise, there could be very many by the 4th-3rd century. Social pressures conspired to force Spartiates to have very few children, since late marriage and the need to split kleroi as inheritance were poor incentives for breeding- hence the official bonus for having many. Freed from this pressure, hypomeiones may have had many more children.
Paul M. Bardunias
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A Spartan, being asked a question, answered "No." And when the questioner said, "You lie," the Spartan said, "You see, then, that it is stupid of you to ask questions to which you already know the answer!"
MODERATOR: [url:2dqwu8yc]http://www.romanarmytalk.com/rat/viewtopic.php?t=4100[/url]
A Spartan, being asked a question, answered "No." And when the questioner said, "You lie," the Spartan said, "You see, then, that it is stupid of you to ask questions to which you already know the answer!"
