Athens and Sparta were both greek cities and their people spoke a common language. In every other respect they were
different.
Athens rose high above the plain. It was a city exposed to the fresh sea breezes, determined to look at the world with the eyes of a happy child, Sparta, on the other hand, was built at the bottom of a deep valley, and used the surrounding mountains as a barrier against foreign thought. Athens was a city of busy trade. Sparta was an armed camp, where people were soldiersw for the sake of being soldiers. The people of Athens loved to sit in the sun and discuss poetry or listen to the wise words of a philosopher. The Spartans, on the other hand, never wrote a single line that was considered
literature, yet they knew how to fight, they enjoyed it, and they sacrificed all human emotions for their ideal of military preparedness. It is therefore obvious why Sparta has benn famed for its literature and philosophy.