Kryptie

The kryptie (in Greek old κρυπτεία / krupteía , of κρυπτός / kruptós , “hidden, secret”) is a test of the education Spartan. The true nature of this test is prone to discussion among the historians.

Sources

Four late sources (as from fourth century BC) evoke this institution:

Plato

At Plato ( the Laws I, 633b-c), the Mégillos Spartan enumerates the various types of virtues practiced in his city. After the joint meals (Syssitie S), the practice of the Gymnastic and drives out it, it quotes “the endurance with the pain”. Among the exercises intended to acquire it, it evokes the brawls, the religious holiday of the Gymnopédies and the kryptie:

“There are also what is called the kryptie, exercise prodigiously painful and suitable to give endurance, and the practice to go flip-flop and to sleep without cover in winter, that to serve oneself without resorting to slaves, to wander during the night like the day through all the country. ”

Scholiaste of Plato

A Scholie of the passage of Plato insists above all on the aspect testing and solitary test.

Plutarque

Plutarque ( Life of Lycurgue , 28,3-7) evokes the sending of groups of young people, equipped with daggers and vivres, charged with killing the Hilotes:

“the chiefs sent to time to others the young people who seemed to him most intelligent in various places of the country: one gave them nothing, except daggers and vivres. The day, they dispersed in secret places and remained hidden without moving there; the night, they went down on the roads and égorgeaient the hilotes there that they could capture. Often also they traversed the fields and killed most robust and strongest. ”

(transl. Ozanam, 2001)

Héraclide Lembos

Héraclide Lembos (in france Hist. gr. , II, 210) speaks about forwardings out of weapons to kill Hilotes.

Interpretation

The texts do not agree on the solitary character or not of the test, nor on its level of severity (with or without vivres or food). Taking into account the difficulty of the experiment, it is probably reserved to young people more aguerris. It is certain that all did not make a success of the test. Perhaps the winners integrated the Hippeis , the elite of the civic army, but that is not certain.

Edmond Levy (1988) distinguishes two stages in the kryptie: first of all a selection, then a use of the kryptes, those which made a success of, against Hilotes, even with the war: Plutarque mentions in its Vie of Cléomène (28, 4) of the scouts kryptes at the time of the Bataille of Sellasia, in 222 av. J. - C..

The objective of the test is also not very clear. The scholiaste of Plato in fact a drive with the military life. Koechly (1835) and Wachsmuth (1844) could thus bring the cryptie closer to the Athenian Peripoloi (cf beautiful young man). Jeanmaire (1913) there rather sees a rite of initiation comparable with those existing in the secret societies (man-wolves and men panthers) of black Africa. It observes thus that “all the military history of Sparte protests against the idea to make to Hoplite Spartan a rampor of bush, climbing of rocks and walls. ” Pierre Vidal-Naquet (1981) looks further into this idea. According to him, the kryptie is not foreign with the hoplitic life, but its exact opposite:

the krypte is naked or slightly armed, the hoplite is heavily;
the krypte only saw or almost, the hoplite is member of the phalange;
the krypte eats what it finds, the hoplite takes part in the Syssitie S (obligatory banquets);
the krypte lives in the mountain, the hoplite in the plain;
the krypte saw the night, the hoplite the day;
the krypte kills by trick in ambush, the hoplite is a honest combatant, etc

It also brings the kryptie closer to the pederastic removal ( harpagê ) of the Crétois young person, brought by his lover to the countryside, in insulation, to drive out.

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