The Spartan Agoge. In the 7th century BCE existed a Spartan named Lycurgus. Lycurgus became the Seer and lawgiver of Sparta; he organised his society and Polis into a type of Military Proletariat run of course by a King. Even without a head of state, Spartan men were expected to protect and defend Sparta, and for this to work Lycurgus demolished the walls of Sparta making it the only city without walls and the idea behind this was that they were not needed and that Spartan Men were the real Metaphysical walls of Sparta. Lycurgus instituted Agoge. Agoge was the training program every Spartan male was forced to go through from the age of seven! No such people had a structure in the ancient world. The Agoge was divided into three levels; paides (ages 7-17), paidiskoi (ages 17-19) and hebontes (ages 20-29). Spartan women were encouraged to humiliate and criticize the men in their training; this was important to the training because it helped to produce healthy minded men and motivate them to train harder. One of the most physical activities Spartan Men had to endure was Penkration. Penkration is Greek Marshial Arts; this deadly sport is a combination of now-a-days boxing and wrestling; think of MMA except with little regulations and the opponents fought naked. We can only imagine and speculate the actual nature of this training; but what good is training if we can't test it in real life circumstances? The Battle of Thermopylae between 300 Spartans and ten thousand Persians is living proof of Agoge. Should modern day Societies implement Agoge?
