Sparta, Argos, and the Achaian League in Plutarch’s Parallel Lives

This article sets out to investigate how the ‘foreign’ policy of Sparta, that of Argos, and that of the Achaian League were influenced by the memory of the border wars between Argos and Sparta. It also aims at examining the extent of the Achaians’ management of internal and external borders and how this was influenced by the memory of these border wars. Important to note for this analysis are three factors. First, an explicit distinction will be made between how these memories were described in Plutarch’s biographies; secondly, how this was done in his sources; and thirdly, how other sources portray these events to have played out in real life.