Imagine the warriors of Greece’s Sparta, once the most feared soldiers in the ancient world, reduced to performing for crowds of Roman tourists.
This isn’t fiction—it’s the mostly forgotten historical reality of what happened to Sparta after its military might collapsed, while Rome was marching across Greece. The same powerful city-state that produced the legendary 300 warriors who stood against the Persian Empire eventually became an amusement park for Romans.
The most fascinating aspect is that this is not a metaphor or a historical exaggeration. The Romans quite literally transformed Sparta into a spectacle with viewing stands and scheduled performances for its visitors.
The fall of Greece’s mighty city of Sparta
Sparta had quite a journey from military superpower to tourist attraction, one of history’s most dramatic transformations, if not degradations. After reaching the zenith of its power in the 5th century BC, Sparta began slowly declining, accelerating after its defeat by Thebes at the Battle of Leuctra in 371 BC. By the time Rome conquered Greece in 146 BC, Sparta was already a shadow of its former self, far from the mighty and fearsome superpower of the ancient world.
Nonetheless, Sparta’s decline was not ordinary, like nothing else. What happened next was remarkable. Rather than fading into obscurity like so many other former powers, Sparta reinvented itself by using the legendary past that made the city famous across the Mediterranean and beyond to its benefit. The Romans deeply admired the Spartan discipline and military power and were fascinated with experiencing what remained of this legendary Greek city. As a result, Sparta gradually turned from a declining city-state into a living museum where the once-traditional Spartan way of life became a spectacle performed for visitors.
This radical transformation was deliberate. Archaeological evidence shows that Romans invested a lot of money in infrastructure to accommodate tourists visiting Sparta to witness what they believed were authentic Spartan traditions. The city that had once refused to build defensive walls because of its confidence in its warriors now built viewing stands for tourists.
The most famous attraction in Roman Sparta was undoubtedly the ritual flogging ceremony at the sanctuary of Artemis Orthia. In earlier periods, this had been a serious religious ritual where young Spartan men were whipped at the goddess’s altar as a test of discipline and strength. Under Roman rule, however, this practice became more of a bloody spectacle, one of the many adored by the Romans.
Archaeological evidence reveals that the Romans constructed something resembling a theater around the altar of Artemis Orthia specifically for visitors. In this way, they could comfortably watch young men being flogged and enjoy the entertainment. This structure, described by some archaeologists as a “small circus,” effectively converted a once-sacred religious site into an amphitheater where tourists could enjoy the display of Spartan strength—or at least what was presented as such.
The tourism industry of Sparta during Roman times
Consider this for a moment: Romans traveled significant distances to sit in an amphitheater and watch young men being whipped in what was presented by both the authorities and the locals as an authentic Spartan tradition. One could understandably argue that this resembles modern tourists flocking to see “authentic” cultural traditions modified for mass consumption in many popular tourist destinations in Greece today. The irony is striking—the culture that once prided itself on discipline and austerity became a mass public spectacle, bringing significant revenue to a city that used to be content with less rather than more.
Theatres existed throughout the ancient Greek world, but Sparta’s Roman-era theater became one of the city’s largest and most significant structures. Its scale suggests it wasn’t built for local use but rather to accommodate the significant number of visitors coming to experience what legendary Sparta had to offer.
Visitors to Sparta today can still see this theatre, which dates to the 1st century BC. While much of ancient Sparta lies in ruins, the theatre remains visible today, reminding us of how Rome reshaped this historic city for its own purposes, including tourism.
Beyond the physical infrastructure, the Romans developed what we might today call a “tourism industry” around Sparta. Various performances of supposedly authentic Spartan customs and traditions were staged for visitors who would travel for days to enjoy these spectacles. However, by the time of the Roman Empire, what visitors experienced in Sparta was less an authentic continuation of Spartan culture and more a performance of what Romans expected Spartan culture to be.
Visiting Sparta was popular for wealthy Romans, combining entertainment with historical education. Roman writers like Cicero and Seneca often referenced Sparta in their works, showing us that Roman interest in everything related to Sparta never faded.