Women in ancient Sparta their wealth. He attributed the state's precipitous fall during his lifetime, from being the master of Greece to a second-rate power in less than 50 years, to the fact that Sparta had become a gynocracy whose women were intemperate and loved luxury. All Spartan women, not just the richest, would have taken advantage of helot labour to perform the domestic tasks that elsewhere in Greece would have fallen to free women. Activities such as weaving which were considered women's work elsewhere in Greece were not considered fit for free women in Sparta. Therefore, women were more preoccupied with governance, agriculture,
Women in ancient Sparta therefore were not accorded any special status for their death. Sparta did however place particular emphasis on religion, it could be argued more than any other Greek city state, and therefore it was women who died in the service of the state by worshiping Sparta's deities who were honored with inscribed tombstones. Spartan women's clothing was simple and notoriously short. They wore the Dorian peplos, with slit skirts which bared their thighs. The Dorian peplos was made of a heavier woolen material than was common in Ionia, and was fastened at the shoulder by pins called "fibulae". When running races,