Sparta

Ancient Sparta is well known for their soldiers and certainly has made for a lot of great movies. No doubt they were always far outnumbered but won anyway. The reason their army was so amazing is that boys that appeared to have promise mentally and physically were pressed into service at the age of seven and as long as they remained healthy would serve until they were 45. This included living in barracks the whole time so if someone got married he couldn't live with his wife. The army's mentality was that the soldiers first love be their brothers in arms so they would fight harder to protect each other. They were educated in all kinds of different subjects including math and philosophy so they weren't just a bunch of barbarians.


I won't go into the details because there are many, but the most interesting thing about the Spartans in my opinion was their system of government. All citizens had a say in running the country. There was a supreme council that included five new members each year that were based on random drawls (there were around 8,000 citizens). This way no one would have a political career and have to play political games to get elected or re-elected. No one would try to hitch their livelihood wagon so to speak on to one particular person because no one had a clue who would end up with influence the coming year. Their system of government wasn't perfect as it ultimately failed but I find it very interesting.