Videos to watch at home – Emit Repoons on a Mission

Dear 7E,

If you were a Spartan soldier, as you already know, you were trained from the age of seven to prefer death to defeat. This ideal was so ingrained in the citizens of Sparta that those who failed to attain it were despised. The life of a young male citizen from the age of 7 onwards was filled with rigorous training, constant hardship and ritual humiliation.

This makes our school sound like a refuge, where no one flogs anyone, bullying is not tolerated, let alone encouraged, and the only hardship is caused by teachers like me who ask you to learn and study when you’d rather play computer games. Compared to the Spartans, our school is like an Athenian outpost – but thankfully minus the slaves…

The 300 Spartans who held the pass at Thermopylae against the huge Persian army must surely have known that they were going to die. According to a Persian scout, they combed their hair in preparation for the battle and oiled their bodies. This apparent nonchalance in the face of certain death has become legendary.

For days these men stood against Xerxes’ army of 250,000 men and held the narrow pass against them. Realising that they must ultimately be defeated, however, the Spartan King Leonidas sent the Athenian army home. The heroic stand of the Spartan 300, however, allowed the Athenian army to return to Athens and evacuate the city before the Persians arrived.

The Athenians, as the beneficiaries of the Spartans’ courage, managed to regroup and defeat the Persians at sea.

The grateful Athenians commissioned Simonides to write an epitaph for the Spartans who had sacrificed their lives. He wrote: “Go tell the Spartans, passing stranger, that we lie here obedient to their laws.” In other words, these three hundred men had preferred death to defeat and a courageous last stand to a retreat; they had died honourably. In doing so, they had done their part in protecting Greek civilisation from the seemingly all-conquering Persian Empire.

1 Skim through these sources:

Sources on the life of the Spartans and the Battle of Thermopylae:

Spartans: http://www.ancientgreece.co.uk/sparta/home_set.html

Thermoplyae: http://ancienthistory.about.com/cs/weaponswar/p/blpwtherm.htm

Themophlyae: http://www.factbehindfiction.com/index_files/300TheBattleatThermopylae.htm

2 Tackle this quiz:

CLICK HERE FOR QUIZ ON FULL SCREEN

Sparta and the Battle of Thermopylae » test maker

3 Leave a comment in response to some or all of the following questions:

•What, if anything, do you find admirable about the Spartan way of life?

•What, if anything, would you criticise about the Spartan way of life?

•What were your reactions to the story of the Battle of Thermopylae?

For some reason this tapestry has always started me imagining a scene.

There are a number of Saxon women sitting around sewing the story of their Norman masters’ conquest over their land. Every so often a Norman comes to check on their work, but they speak rapidly in English to each other as they sew, since this is a language the Normans cannot understand (and would consider beneath them anyway). Perhaps the Saxon women loathed and resented these men who were suppressing and subjugating them, who had taken their land, built castles in strategic places and put down rebellions with such fury.

And yet, despite all this, these women couldn’t resist the opportunity to make something beautiful. Their fingers were nimble and skilful even while in their hearts they despised their new rulers.

Of course, this is just my imagination at work. It’s hard to be certain of what actually happened. Historians generally believe that the tapestry was commissioned by Normans and then created by Saxon women, but it has been argued that Norman women made it.

Whether my scene is true or not, the tapestry is a tribute to those women’s fingers and their skill. Here’s an irony for you: though made by women, there are only three women depicted in the actual cloth. Here is an animation of it from You-Tube:

Bayeux Tapestry– Watch more Videos at Vodpod.

Category: Videos to watch at home

“Then we will fight in the shade…”

Bayeux Tapestry Animation (and some more of Simon Schama’s history)