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Text Box: private feuds and animosities, and were reunited in a common admiration of virtue.” (Plutarch’s Lives, Lycurgus). Well, that is one way of looking at what Lycurgus accomplished. The society with which Lycurgus began was basically a democracy. It is known as Sparta. Lycurgus persuaded the people that since there were those who owned great tracts of land, and many more who owned but little land, and great numbers who owned no land, that all the land should be divided into equal parcels. That each man should have a certain number of parcels, each woman a smaller number of parcels, and each child a smaller yet number of parcels, each set being deemed of size sufficient to grow crops sufficient for a man, a woman, and a child respectively. This did not fully equalize the society because it did not effect the monetary wealth or the movable or chattel based wealth. Lycurgus therefore persuaded the populace to change the money system, collecting all the gold and silver coin and exchanging that money base for a money base of iron. He made the iron based coins so large and of so little value as to make use of the iron based coins impractical. In effect, if under the old money system a loaf of bread could have been purchased for one tenth of a silver coin weighing but a few ounces, under his new money system that same loaf of bread would cost an entire iron coin weighing several hundred pounds. The purpose was to make it virtually impossible for the wealthy to utilize their wealth, especially since foreign merchants would not accept the iron coins but only silver or gold, and therefore would not enter into trade with the populace. By these tactics and measures Lycurgus established a closed system and society which he ruled while seeming to persuade through democratic practices. In actuality this was the first large scale occurrence of totalitarianism established through democratic tyranny - where a single or small group of

Text Box: people persuaded the majority of a democratic citizenry to take the property of those who had been more industrious, or whose ancestors had been more industrious, to steal the property of the more industrious and re-distribute it to the less industrious. Today we recognize this structure as a totalitarian regime operating under the guise of democratically established socialistic communalism (communism). Lycurgus’ system was complete with small internal societies - today they would be termed cells - to which admission was granted only by unanimous consent under secret ballot. Well, actually the practice was when voting on whether or not to admit a new member the members would roll little balls of bread and toss them into a pot filled with water carried on the head of one of the members. Those who approved accepting the new member would roll the ball round. Those who opposed would flatten the ball before tossing it into the pot. One flat ball and the applicant was rejected. Anyone who revealed anything which was discussed in a meeting was fortunate to receive exile from the group as his punishment. His system of laws was just as innovative. Termed Rhetras, meaning divine sanctions and revelations, the laws were never to be written down, but were to be learned and ingrained in one’s personality and character and verbally handed down generation to generation. Of course, if laws are not written down, a totalitarian ruler finds it much more simple to do what ever he desires than were he forced to at least appear to maintain adherence to what was written. It is a lesson well learned by a certain President of the United States of America who, knowing he would be unable to obtain approval by the United States Senate for many of his appointees, appointed these people as Czars with unlimited authority in areas of his choosing - all in contravention of the Constitution of the united States of America. In his wisdom Lycurgus decided that to insure the good education of their youth, he and the other leaders would regulate marriages and even

Text Box: conceptions and birth - and so they did. A married women could conceive by men other than their husband, and a married man was not limited to sexual relations with his wife. Unmarried men and women were encouraged to participate in nude processions and dances - especially in the spring and summer. When they desired to marry the man was lead into an unlighted room in the dark of night for sexual relations with his wife - it often being that husband and wife did not know what the other’s face looked like until years after marriage. The children were looked upon as not belonging to their parents but as belonging to the entire community. Homosexuals were not left out of the celebrations, but had their own processions and dances in the fall and winter. When a child was born it was brought before examiners of its particular tribe and examined for fitness. If it was deemed fit it was allocated an unassigned portion of land for its sustenance. If it was deemed to be less than excellent it was abandoned in the Apothetae, a chasm in the Taygetus. When a child attained seven years of age it was taken from its parents and reared in a communal home, actually a military company. Children were trained to bear allegiance to their company rather than towards their family. Since Lycurgus and his companions effectively controlled all these military companies, their total control over the entire country was virtually assured. As the country became more militarily strong and more firmly under the control of Lycurgus and his supporters there evolved a policy of discouraging strangers from visiting or living in the country. Not because foreigners might learn some secrets of the country but because foreigners might introduce some ideas or concepts contrary to the order which Lycurgus and his companions had established. Eventually it became policy - remember the laws were not written - that should a citizen express ideas contrary to the order established by Lycurgus, that citizen

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