It has been truly said that nowhere else in Greece do we find traces of that power exercised by women over their sons when arrived at manhood observed among Spartan mothers. When a woman of another country said to Gorgo, the wife of Leonidas, “You of Lacedæmon are the only women in the world that rule the men,” she replied, “We are the only women that bring forth men.”[212]
With our present knowledge respecting the influence and independence of the Spartan women, it is folly for certain writers to assert that married women were confined within the house and that only virgins appeared in public. There is some evidence going to prove that at Crete, at Sparta, and at Olympia, women were not only spectators at the Olympian games, but that they engaged personally in the chariot contests. According to an inscription in Della Cella, it is shown that women presided over the public gymnastic exercises in that town.
One very important fact going to show whence proceeded the reforms of Lycurgus is that the mandates of the oracle were supreme. The oracles controlled the rulers, but women always controlled or interpreted the oracles. The celebrated Rhetra of Lycurgus, in which unlimited authority is given to the people to reject or adopt the proposals of the king, was given according to the direction of the Pythian Apollo, whose mandates were interpreted by women.
In an earlier age the chiefs of the gentes were elected by all the people, and they held their office by virtue of their relationship to the leader of the gens, who was a woman. That the honour due to women was still recognized in Sparta is shown in the following from Plutarch in relation to the election of senators. The person who had received the loudest acclamations was declared duly elected, whereupon he was crowned with a garland, and a number of young men followed him about to extol his virtues. The women sang his praises and blessed his life and conduct. Two portions were set before him, one of which he carried to the gates of the public hall, where the women were in waiting to receive him. To the one for whom he had the greatest esteem he presented the portion, saying: “That which I received as a mark of honour I give to you.” The woman thus honoured “was conducted home with great applause by the rest of the women.”[213]