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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dr. Strangemonkey" data-source="post: 1731071" data-attributes="member: 6533">A generation is traditionally counted as 20 years.  And those 60 years were years the Athenian 'system' never had.Athens being more the one to cow opponents/allies and Sparta being seen more as the hope for Greek liberty from the Athenian oppressor.  Reading some Thucydides should clear up any doubts on this point.Sparta failed to maintain supremacy not because of any specific demographic problems so much as the Greek world expanded into larger and more robust areas, such as Thrace and Macedonia, who didn't feel as much of a compulsion to look to Sparta as an ally or threat, and new techniques in the use of the Phalanx that they couldn't easily follow.They lost battles to Phillip and he freed the Helots, but even when the rest of Greece lay under the subjugation of Alexander they were never a conquered state and went on to win two wars against the argives.Though small, they were among the last Greek states conquered by the Romans.  So they seemed to do pretty well for themselves.True, Athens is the capital of Greece but to make the argument that that has anything to do with the might and wisdom of the classical Athenians is sophistry.  You might claim that they imparted a certain romance to the township, but the relationship between romance and sophistry is well documented.Athens is and was in a great location for a city, that's why it was old even during the time Sparta's greatness and possessed odd and independent customs, ethnicities, and histories from the rest of Greece.  It's also why the city was able to survive the valiant but foolish pride of its classical inhabitants.</blockquote>

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