Compare And Contrast Women In Sparta And Athens

The cities of Athens and Sparta were both advanced for their time, but differed in their idea of appropriate women’s roles. While Spartan women were relatively important to the social and political spheres, women in Athens were considered nothing more than breeding machines to produce men for the society’s powerful army. Aside from the fact that both groups of women were married for the sole purpose of bearing children, there are hardly any similarities between the treatment of women in Sparta and Athens.
While Spartan women had no say in the man she married, she had more power in every other aspect of her life. She had influence on political affairs, interacted freely with other men and women, and could even become dominant figures in polyamorous