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Virtue & Power

Timeline

Sparta Timeline

A chronology of Sparta — from the Lycurgan order and the conquest of Messenia through its leadership against Persia and victory over Athens to its fall at Leuctra.

Sparta's history is the rise and fall of a unique military society — built on the Lycurgan discipline and the subjection of Messenia, dominant for a time, and broken when that foundation was lost.

  1. 9th–7th c. BCE

    The Lycurgan constitution and the agoge (traditional dating; historicity debated).

  2. c. 735–650 BCE

    The Messenian Wars; the conquest and enslavement of Messenia (the helots).

  3. 480 BCE

    Leonidas and the 300 at Thermopylae.

  4. 479 BCE

    Spartan-led victory over Persia at Plataea.

  5. 464 BCE

    Great earthquake and helot revolt.

  6. 431–404 BCE

    The Peloponnesian War against Athens.

  7. 425 BCE

    Spartan defeat and surrender at Pylos.

  8. 422 BCE

    Brasidas killed in victory at Amphipolis.

  9. 405 BCE

    Lysander destroys the Athenian fleet at Aegospotami.

  10. 404 BCE

    Sparta defeats Athens; the brief Spartan hegemony begins.

  11. 396–394 BCE

    Agesilaus campaigns in Asia against Persia.

  12. 371 BCE

    Epaminondas of Thebes shatters the Spartan army at Leuctra.

  13. 369 BCE

    Liberation of Messenia destroys the economic base of Spartan power.

  14. 195 BCE onward

    Sparta declines to a minor state; later a Roman tourist curiosity.

Sparta's discipline made it the most formidable infantry power of Greece, but its closed citizen body and its dependence on the helots left it unable to recover once Messenia was lost.