For most of its history, the

ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic pe ...

city-state A city-state is an independent sovereign city which serves as the center of political, economic, and cultural life over its contiguous territory. They have existed in many parts of the world since the dawn of history, including cities such as ...

Sparta Sparta ( Doric Greek: Σπάρτα, ''Spártā''; Attic Greek: Σπάρτη, ''Spártē'') was a prominent city-state in Laconia, in ancient Greece. In antiquity, the city-state was known as Lacedaemon (, ), while the name Sparta referr ...

in the Peloponnese was ruled by kings. Sparta was unusual among the Greek city-states in that it maintained its kingship past the Archaic age. It was even more unusual in that it had two kings simultaneously, who were called the ''archagetai'', coming from two separate lines. According to tradition, the two lines, the

Agiads For most of its history, the ancient Greek city-state of Sparta in the Peloponnese was ruled by kings. Sparta was unusual among the Greek city-states in that it maintained its kingship past the Archaic age. It was even more unusual in that it ha ...

(, ) and Eurypontids (, ), were respectively descended from the twins Eurysthenes and

Procles In Greek legends, Procles ( el, Προκλῆς, "the renowned") was one of the Heracleidae, a great-great-great-grandson of Heracles, and a son of Aristodemus and Argia. His twin was Eurysthenes. Together they received the land of Lacedaemon aft ...

, the descendants of

Heracles Heracles ( ; grc-gre, Ἡρακλῆς, , glory/fame of Hera), born Alcaeus (, ''Alkaios'') or Alcides (, ''Alkeidēs''), was a divine hero in Greek mythology, the son of Zeus and Alcmene, and the foster son of Amphitryon.By his adoptiv ...

, who supposedly conquered Sparta two generations after the

Trojan War In Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans ( Greeks) after Paris of Troy took Helen from her husband Menelaus, king of Sparta. The war is one of the most important events in Greek mythology and ...

. The dynasties themselves, however, were named after the twins' grandsons, the kings Agis I and Eurypon, respectively. The Agiad line was regarded as being senior to the Eurypontid line.Cartledge, Paul, ''The Spartans'', Vintage Books, 2003. Although there are lists of the earlier purported Kings of Sparta, there is little evidence for the existence of any kings before the middle of the sixth century BC or so. Spartan kings received a recurring posthumous hero cult like that of the similarly Doric kings of Cyrene.Pindar and the cult of heroes. By Bruno Currie Page 245 . The kings' firstborn sons, as heirs-apparent, were the only Spartan boys expressly exempt from the

Agoge The ( grc-gre, ἀγωγή in Attic Greek, or , in Doric Greek) was the rigorous education and training program mandated for all male Spartan citizens, with the exception of the firstborn son in the ruling houses, Eurypontid and Agiad. The ...

; however, they were allowed to take part if they so wished, and this endowed them with increased prestige when they ascended the throne.

Legendary kings of Sparta

Ancient Greeks named males after their fathers, producing a patronymic with the infix ''-id-''; for example, the sons of

Atreus In Greek mythology, Atreus ( , ; from ἀ-, "no" and τρέω, "tremble", "fearless", gr, Ἀτρεύς ) was a king of Mycenae in the Peloponnese, the son of Pelops and Hippodamia, and the father of Agamemnon and Menelaus. Collectively ...

were the Atreids. For royal houses, the patronymic was formed from the name of the founder or of an early significant figure of a dynasty. A ruling family might thus have a number of dynastic names; for example, Agis I named the Agiads, but he was a Heraclid and so were his descendants. If the descent was not known or was scantily known, the Greeks made a few standard assumptions based on their cultural ideology. Agiad people were treated as a tribe, presumed to have descended from an ancestor bearing its name. He must have been a king, who founded a dynasty of his name. That mythologizing extended even to place names. They were presumed to have been named after kings and divinities. Kings often became divinities, in their religion.

Lelegids

The Lelegid were the descendants of Lelex (a

back-formation In etymology, back-formation is the process or result of creating a new word via inflection, typically by removing or substituting actual or supposed affixes from a lexical item, in a way that expands the number of lexemes associated with the ...

), ancestor of the Leleges, an ancient tribe inhabiting the Eurotas valley before the Greeks, who, according to the mythological descent, amalgamated with the Greeks

Lacedaemonids

The Lacedaemonids contain Greeks from the age of legend, now treated as being the Bronze Age in Greece. In the language of mythologic descent, the kingship passed from the Leleges to the Greeks. :''Years with no dates (only "''c.''") are unknown''

Atreids

The Atreidai (Latin Atreidae) belong to the Late Bronze Age, or the Mycenaean Period. In mythology, they were the

Perseides In Greek mythology the Perseides, "those born of Perseus" and Andromeda, are the members of the House of Perseus, descended, according to Valerius Flaccus through Perse and Perses. After the Greek Dark Ages, tradition recalled that Perseus and ...

. As the name of

is attested in Hittite documents, this dynasty may well be protohistoric. :''Years with no dates (only "''c.''") are unknown''

Heraclids

The Spartan kings as Heracleidae claimed descent from

, who through his mother was descended from Perseus. Disallowed the Peloponnesus, Hercules embarked on a life of wandering. The Heracleidae became ascendant in the Eurotas valley with the

Dorians The Dorians (; el, Δωριεῖς, ''Dōrieîs'', singular , ''Dōrieús'') were one of the four major ethnic groups into which the Hellenes (or Greeks) of Classical Greece divided themselves (along with the Aeolians, Achaeans, and Ioni ...

who, at least in legend, entered it during an invasion called the Return of the Heracleidae; driving out the Atreids and at least some of the Mycenaean population. Pauly-Wissowa III,1, 0067

:''Years with no dates (only "''c.''") are unknown''

Agiad dynasty

The dynasty was named after its second king, Agis.

Eurypontid dynasty

The dynasty is named after its third king Eurypon. Not shown is

Lycurgus Lycurgus or Lykourgos () may refer to: People * Lycurgus (king of Sparta) (third century BC) * Lycurgus (lawgiver) (eighth century BC), creator of constitution of Sparta * Lycurgus of Athens (fourth century BC), one of the 'ten notable orators' ...

, the lawgiver, a younger son of the Eurypontids, who served a brief regency either for the infant Charilaus (780–750 BC) or for Labotas (870–840 BC) the Agiad. Currently known two lists of kings: ''According to

Herodotus Herodotus ( ; grc, , }; BC) was an ancient Greek historian and geographer from the Greek city of Halicarnassus, part of the Persian Empire (now Bodrum, Turkey) and a later citizen of Thurii in modern Calabria (Italy). He is known fo ...

, VIII: 131'' ''According to Pausanias, III, 7: 5-6''

Sole kings

The

Achaean League The Achaean League ( Greek: , ''Koinon ton Akhaion'' "League of Achaeans") was a Hellenistic-era confederation of Greek city states on the northern and central Peloponnese. The league was named after the region of Achaea in the northwestern P ...

annexed Sparta in 192 BC.

Notes and references

;Notes ;References

Bibliography

* Paul Cartledge, ''Sparta and Lakonia, A Regional History 1300–362 BC'', London, Routledge, 2002 (originally published in 1979). * The Cyclopædia, Volume 20. By Abraham Rees. Pag
157
(List of kings of Sparta on pg
164
. * Sir William Smith
A New Classical Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography, Mythology, and Geography
Partly Based Upon the Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology. Harper & Brothers, 1851. * Sir William Smith
Abaeus-Dysponteus
J. Murray, 1890. * Sir William Smith. A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology
Earinus-Nyx
J. Murray, 1876. * William Smith (Ed.) A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology
Oarses-Zygia
J. Murray, 1880.

External links

Livius

by Jona Lendering {{DEFAULTSORT:List Of Kings Of Sparta Rulers of Sparta Sparta, Kings Greece history-related lists