🟠 LIKE THE SPARTANS DO

“He (Agathocles of Syracuse) proceeded, after the example of Dionysius, who had subdued many cities of Italy, to cross over into that country. His first enemies there were the Bruttii, who, at that period (around 300 BC), seem to have been the bravest and most powerful people of the country, and to have been extremely ready to attack their neighbours; for they had driven the inhabitants of many of the Greek cities from Italy, and had conquered in war the Lucanians their founders, and made peace with them on equal terms; such being the fierceness of their nature, that they had no respect even for those to whom they owed their origin. The Lucanians were accustomed to breed up their children with the same kind of education as the Spartans; for, from their earliest boyhood, they were kept in the wilds among the shepherds, without any slaves to attend them, and even without clothes to wear or to sleep upon, that, from their first years, they might be accustomed to hardiness and spare diet; having no intercourse with the city. Their food was what they took in hunting, and their drink milk or water. Thus were they prepared for the toils of war.”

Justin