Compare and contrast the poleis of Athens and Sparta. How did two such different city-states emerge from the same general geographic region? Why did they end up going to war with one another?

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

ANSWER:
While in the same "country"(although the Greeks never developed the sense of country, but instead focused on the individual polis) and having a shared culture, language, and traditions, the Athenians and Spartans developed entirely separate ways of life. The Spartans became militarized and focused on building and maintaining an army, in part to sustain their domination of the enslaved populations in the southern Peloponnesus. They actively avoided trade, forbade currency or the accumulation of goods, and did not engage in the rhetoric or intellectual speculation that the Athenians found of primary importance. The Spartans similarly did not devote time to aesthetics such as poetry, theater, or art; pottery was to be functional, not relate to epics. By contrast, the Athenians quickly developed a humanist tradition, in part influenced by their exposure to other cultures in the process of colonization, the method they used to support their population. Athens had significantly less emphasis on the military, partly because their mountainous location provided a natural geographic defense (as opposed to Sparta's location in the plains of Laconia). Athenians developed an intellectual interest early on, in pre-Socratic explanations of the world around them, that led them to value intellectual curiosity and develop science, politics, and philosophy as their cultural mainstays. Ironically, Athens came to true democracy significantly later than Sparta, but it ultimately developed a reputation as the cradle of Western civilization because of that democracy. A key factor in the development of hostility between the two poleis came after the Persian Wars, in which Greek city-states came to depend on the Athenian navy (credited with saving Greece), which ultimately built an empire. Sparta, after rebuilding its strength, opposed incorporation into the Athenian Empire and made alliances with other city-states, eventually entering into the Peloponnesian War with Athens.