Mani Peninsula - Where The People Descended From Spartans

Long isolated from the rest of Greece, the Mani peninsula is home to a clannish community that claims warrior heritage. BBC describes the Mani peninsula as having “jagged, rocky cliffs jut from the Peloponnese at the southernmost tip of mainland Greece, forcing the landscape to heave and billow like ocean waves. From the steep hilltops, stone houses resembling small castles stand with their backs to the colossal Taygetos mountains and look out over the stoic Ionian Sea.”

It is also the land where a clannish community lives, called the Maniots, who are believed to descend from the Spartans, the legendary warriors of Ancient Greece.

“Nearly three millennia ago, when Ancient Greece was made up of ‘polis’, or individual city-states, much of the Peloponnese belonged to Ancient Sparta and its allies. Unlike the people of rival city-state Athens, who were artists and philosophers, the Spartans were fighters; boys were said to begin military training at age seven, challenging one another in physical competition before becoming full-time soldiers at the age of 20.”

To read this article in full, please visit: BBC