The History of Sparta in the Roman Period

In the Roman period there is this desire to present themselves as being the equals to their forebears right and how that gets expressed differs from polis to polis because the different polis have different reputations. The Spartans were held up as being kind of amongst the most pious of the Greeks and that's the thing that they kind of promote to outsiders. This kind of this whipping contest takes place in the context of a religious festival and a ritual which is related to these kind of myths of militarism yeah that were promoted around the time. I think it is really in the Roman period that we begin to see the reification of so many of those kind of tropes around the Spartan mirage