A Spartan Hoplite
The Spartan military were the armed forces of the city-state of Sparta and the Peloponnesian League of Ancient Greece. Sparta was renowned for its superior land army during the Classical era, as Spartan boys were given a militaristic upbringing in the agoge program (from ages 7 to 29). Spartan boys were purposefully underfed in order to force them to learn foraging and looting (however, they were whipped if caught), they forged close bonds with older soldiers from the age of 12 (with some sources inferring that they engaged in forced homosexual relationships), boys became army reservists at age 18, they were ordered to take part in the Cull of the Helots every autumn (massacring Sparta's slaves), they became full members of the army at age 20, they would gain entry into a mess hall by the age of 30, and, after the age of 30, they were allowed to marry and become full citizens. This created the most powerful land army in all of Ancient Greece, distinguishing itself during the Greco-Persian Wars (especially at the famed Battle of Thermopylae in 480 BBC) and during the Peloponnesian War (when the Spartans defeated Athens to acquire hegemony over the Greek world). The agoge waned in the 3rd century BC but was reinvigorated in the 220s BC and following the Achaean War of 146 BC.
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