Agesilaos had initially considered ending up whimpering and writhing on the ground, whilst tears flooded from his sensuous blue eyes, to have been the most shameful action he had ever perpetrated. The whole event had been considerably worsened by acting in such a debasing way in front of his adult supervisor, or ‘paidonomos’, and the other fourteen members of his angele, including his tormentor, Lysanoridas, and new friend, Eudamidas. However, 14 year-old Lysander had subsequently kindly disabused the younger boy of this viewpoint.

Seeing the deeply distressed Agesilaos squirming in agony on the ground in front of his paidonomos and the other 7 year-old members of his angele, all but one of whom were laughing merrily at the sight of the newcomer’s anguish, Lysander had immediately rushed to the boy’s aid. His action instantly stimulated Eudamidas, who was naked like his new friend after his own more successful wrestling match, to do the same.

Despite the expectation that ephebes should quietly individually endure the routine sufferings they would inevitably experience during their training, or ‘agoge’, in order to toughen them, there was no proscription against friends helping each other when one was in real distress. In fact, close co-operative camaraderie within each angele was positively encouraged, whilst in contrast intense competition between packs in each age group was fostered in order to offer the boys regular stiff challenges.

Meanwhile, competition between different age groups was not actively sought and so friendships between older and younger males were also considered beneficial for military camaraderie and to assist personal development. It was believed that the less mature would benefit from the companionship and advice of someone more experienced, whose leadership skills would also hopefully gain from such mentoring.

Such attitudes went to the extent that the eventual development of homosexual couplings was encouraged. As within the famed Theban Sacred Band, such relationships were believed to be conducive to producing good warriors, as surely no young man, youth or boy would want to display cowardice in front of his lover.

The founder of the Spartan constitution, Lycurgus, had strongly advocated such homosexual liaisons, declaring, about young men, youths and pubescent or older boys, that "No-one who does not have a masculine friend in his bed can be a good citizen!" Such relationships were also encouraged by the unavailability of females for males who, until they attained the age of thirty, were resident in barracks, or were practising or actually indulging in warfare elsewhere, and were simultaneously prohibited from marrying.

Up to the age of thirty, most Spartan males possessed lovers amongst the ranks of their fellow warriors and ephebes, who were living with them in the military barracks or elsewhere. In this sexual environment, pederasty between young and even mature men and pubescent or older boys was at least as common as homosexuality involving youths.

Given such ethos, the paidonomos did not prevent Lysander and Eudamidas coming to the aid of the obviously extremely anguished Agesilaos. Although the adult supervisor knew that he was expected to treat the newcomer with exceptional hardness, he also had a remit to encourage such displays of camaraderie by boys who were not members of a rival angele of the same age group.

In contrast, Lysanoridas was naturally unhappy at this sudden turn of events. Agesilaos had obviously quickly acquired a friend in the bigger Eudamidas and, more worryingly, the sympathy of Lysander, who was the most respected boy in the ephebe barracks, despite his ‘mothakes’ status.

Lysander was the prefect of his own angele of 14 year-old ephebes, which was a status he had won by successfully eventually challenging and fighting a larger bully who had first held the position during their early years in the barracks. It was a testament to the victor’s amicability and leadership skills that the loser was now one of his closest friends.

Lysander had subsequently proved himself to be the most able and courageous boy in his age group. He was also someone who could often compete successfully in various challenges against older, bigger and more experienced ephebes, who therefore respected the 14 year-old and did not try to bully or otherwise intimidate him.

Despite the encouragement of camaraderie between age groups, bullying of younger boys by older was still very common and ignored by the adult supervisors. Such frequent events were just regarded as another method of trying to toughen ephebes through their reactions to the incidents.

Lysander had also displayed his leadership abilities by transforming his angele, which had previously been considered one of the weakest amongst their age group, to being clearly the strongest. In fact, the pack of fifteen 14 year-olds was considered by the adult supervisors to be developing into an elite unit, which should never be split up.

Lysanoridas possessed one mental comfort, as he observed clear embryonic companionship developing between Agesilaos, Lysander and Eudamidas. The prefect fully appreciated that, although the latter two boys could advise their friend and assist his recovery from distress, their help could not extend to fighting the 7 year-old’s battles for him.

Barracks’ ethos meant that Lysander could not intimidate Lysanoridas into desisting from harassing Agesilaos. Although the older boy could normally try to bully the younger prefect if he wanted, doing so in order to make someone else’s life easier was considered unethical.

Similarly, Eudamidas, of whom Lysanoridas was wary because of his clear fighting ability, was not supposed to join with the more diminutive Agesilaos in order to challenge Lysanoridas as a pair. Personal disputes were expected to be resolved between individuals.

If Lysander and Eudamidas were to remain honourable in their conduct, which both were determined to do, their involvement in trying to stop Lysanoridas’ future bullying of Agesilaos therefore had to be restricted only to practical advice. The 7 year-old prefect was fully aware of this situation, as he watched the very early stages of the close friendships between the three boys develop.

Lysanoridas’ only concern therefore, in respect of his aspirations to make Agesilaos’ life as an ephebe miserable, was the quality of the advice given by Lysander and Eudamidas. The prefect also judged that such pointers could not in the immediate future be so good that they would overcome the obvious significant physical differences between himself and the more diminutive boy he wanted to bully, who had experienced a much softer upbringing.

As the freshly naked Agesilaos again waited to be beaten, this time whilst tied to an apple tree, his recall of his conversation with Lysander of 8 days previously caused him to remember the older boy’s initial advice. The astute 14 year-old had somehow perceptively realised that the younger anguished ephebe had suddenly become more pained by his display of errant emotions in front of others than his actual physical agony

"Don’t worry about shedding a few tears, ephebe," Lysander had therefore suggested, whilst gently holding the crying boy in his arms, "as I think that anyone would display such weakness after being beaten as you have just been, especially at your young age." "In fact, I myself was sobbing all the time when being flogged as a 7 year-old ," the older cadet unashamedly continued, "and I still shed the odd tear when my paidonomos decides that I’m due punishment, which he occasionally does inflict. Eye dampness is a natural reaction that’ll reduce but never entirely go away, never mind how hardened you become. So don’t fret about it!"

"Now," Lysander then asked, as Agesilaos’ tears suddenly began to dry up, "do you think that you could stand up with my assistance and that of your other friend here so that I can see what damage has been inflicted on you?" The younger boy was still speechless, although how much this lack of vocal response was a residual effect of his recent excruciating punishment or was caused by shock that such a handsome older ephebe was taking a kind interest in him, was indeterminable.

Consequently, as a result of his speechlessness, Agesilaos simply nodded positively, indicating that he was at least prepared to attempt to regain his feet with the help of Lysander and Eudamidas. Meanwhile, his own paidonomos, the sneering Lysanoridas and another twelve members of his angele looked on with interest but without interference.

With the assistance of Lysander and Eudamidas, Agesilaos was subsequently brought painfully to a standing position, where the older boy, attired in his coarse red woollen tunic, then carefully checked the welfare of the scarlet bottom and scrotum of the younger naked ephebe. "There’s no serious damage," the 14 year-old eventually thankfully announced, whilst ultimately examining some delightful but currently very anguished genitalia, "and I’ve some decent herbal slave that’ll soon heal the soreness to both your bum and balls!"

Agesilaos, whose excruciation from Lysanoridas’ ultimate hit had been such that he had thought that his agonised testicles might have been irreparably damaged, was naturally pleased to hear the announcement that he had not been converted into a eunuch. The boy was also later content to be aided by Lysander and Eudamidas to hobble to the otherwise empty hut of the older ephebe’s angele.

Here, whilst Eudamidas retrieved his own tunic and that of Agesilaos, Lysander carefully and gently applied the promised salve to the pert but currently red and hot curves of the hurt 7 year-old’s normally very pleasant bottom and to his nicely rotund but presently scarlet scrotum. As the older boy proceeded, he successfully averted an immense temptation to try to kiss better the two damaged scenes. He sadly fully appreciated that custom dictated that such pleasures should await the youngster’s advent to puberty.

As the autumnal day had remained sunny and warm, Lysander, Agesilaos and Eudamidas, now all attired, subsequently ventured, at suggestion of the eldest, to the quiet banks of the nearby River Eurotas. This watercourse was named after an early king of Laconia, father-in-law of Sparta’s founder, Lacedaemon, and was fed by water flowing off the mountain ranges that surrounded the city on three sides.

The three boys then reclined and chatted on the riverbank, with Agesilaos lying on his side to avoid contact between his sore bottom and the grassy ground. The main topic of their later long conversation was Lysander’s initial advice to the younger ephebes as to how they could successfully survive their early life in the barracks.

Unfortunately, perhaps because of his continuing hurt, or awe at being assisted by such a boy as Lysander, Agesilaos subsequently appeared not to have absorbed some of the older ephebe’s wise counsel. This unfortunate fault seemed to be evidenced by his capture 8 days later by the farm manager, whilst attempting to steal a few apples from the man’s orchard.

Agesilaos had apparently forgotten the advised tips for success in such ventures. Such recommendations emphasised the need for careful guileful pre-planning, including quick escape options in case anything went wrong, and suggested co-ordinated partnerships and not individual action.

Agesilaos, motivated by the hunger resulting from the basic ephebe diet of deliberately insufficient black ‘zamos’ broth and a proud desire to win the respect of his new friends and peers, had embarked upon his dangerous escapade alone, without telling anyone of his plans. If the boy had confided in Lysander, he would have been advised that his proposal was too simplistic and was bound to fail.

Lysander’s gloomy assessment would have focused on the nature of the scheduled target and the fact that the prospective initiate thief was lacking in full mobility because he was still becoming accustomed to going permanently barefoot. Agesilaos had chosen a farm that was too near the military barracks and the manager therefore would not only be well accustomed to raids on his produce by ephebes but also have prepared excellent counter-measures to trap all but the most fit and skilled cadets.

Agesilaos’ plan had simply been to venture into the orchard stealthily and then run away as quickly as he could with the stolen goods. However, the young and inexperienced boy had not expected the place to be patrolled by huge hounds, which not only rapidly detected the young intruder and sounded the alarm through loud barking but also subsequently helped to entrap him.

The very large and vicious-looking dogs were trained not to bite without orders but Agesilaos did not know this fact. Consequently, after the terrified boy was soon surrounded by four of the hounds, and saw the fangs in their open, loudly barking and saliva-drooling jaws, he became motionless, not daring to move.

Agesilaos was therefore easily caught by the subsequently arriving farm manager and his pair of helot helpers. Evidence of what the ephebe, whose role as a cadet was identifiable from his sparse red woollen tunic, had been perpetrating was still present in the petrified boy’s hands, in the form of the rosy apples he had earlier plucked.

As the farm manager subsequently approached the rear of the naked and bound Agesilaos and aimed his whittled rod at the boy’s vulnerable bare back, he commented "I hope this beating will teach you something, brat. The lesson to be learnt is that you should leave my produce alone in future, or I promise that you’ll suffer much worse than this flogging!" An audible whoosh, followed by a anguished yelp, then signalled that the man’s first hit had been accurately and agonisingly delivered.

During Agesilaos’ first-ever beating, at the hands of Lysanoridas, who for one so young had proved very adept at using a leather crop to hit the bottom of a similarly-aged boy, the 7 year-old had been unable to prevent himself from uttering muted moans and shedding tears. The ephebe’s reaction now, to each stinging blow from the farm manager’s improvised but highly effective implement of chastisement, which did not just concentrate on his victim’s buttocks, was shamefully similar.

The farm manager first proceeded to rain blows on Agesilaos’ upper back and then advanced each subsequent hit slowly downwards. The boy’s whole rear, including the backs of his legs, was later to bear the marks of his comprehensive beating, including particularly sore indented bruises created by slightly protruding remnants of supposedly whittled away branch offshoots.

During the painful punishment process, there were only two modicums of comfort for the regularly yelping and continuously sobbing Agesilaos. Firstly, given Lysander’s comments of 8 days previously, the boy felt less ashamed at shedding copious tears. Secondly, unlike Lysanoridas, the farm manager was not a sadist but was just a man performing his duty. He therefore did not seek to increase his young victim’s agony by beating him with such slow deliberation that the 7 year-old could fully experience the pain of each blow before the next was delivered. The busy adult, whose time was precious to him, especially now, during the annual harvest, instead performed his task with rapidity.

Consequently, Agesilaos’ penance was quickly concluded, although about twenty vivid red stripes, gradually darkening in hue to various shades of brown, were evident on his back, buttocks and the rear of his legs. Despite the relative mercy granted by the speed of the punishment, the concluding agony induced in the boy’s body was also immense.

"Release the thieving brat and let him go," the farm manager subsequently instructed of his two helots, after delivering the twenty vicious and accurately spread hits to Agesilaos’ rear. The manager then began to walk away from the scene with his hounds, after picking up the boy’s discarded tunic.

After being released from being tied to the apple tree, and seeing that the farm manager was departing with the young ephebe’s new sole garment, the tearful Agesilaos managed to shout a request between his sobs. "Please, Sir," the naked boy asked, "can I have my tunic back?"

Without turning his back to look again at Agesilaos, the retreating farm manager answered "No you can’t, brat. I’m requisitioning your tunic for my own children!"

With such a reply, the farm manager was not revealing personal cruelty but rather selfish practicality. The tunic might only be basic and sparse but the garment was new and made from good quality wool. The item would therefore partially compensate him for the trouble that ephebes from the nearby barracks frequently caused him. Despite his best efforts, fitter, older and more experienced and capable cadets than Agesilaos still successfully managed to steal some of his produce.

"But, Sir," the even more tearful Agesilaos shouted in desperation, "you’re condemning me to death. I won’t be allocated another tunic to compensate for my loss until this time next year. I won’t survive the winter if I have to be permanently naked!"

"That’s your problem not mine," the farm manager retorted, whilst still not looking back at the distraught Agesilaos. The man then advanced out of range of hearing the boy’s subsequent desperate shouted entreaties.

(Ephebe barracks, near Sparta, Laconia, Greece, later same day)

Despite Agesilaos’ tender years, the naked boy was astute enough to appreciate quickly that his desperate pleas would not persuade the farm manager to change his mind about confiscating the 7 year-old’s tunic. The lachrymose young hurting ephebe therefore eventually began to make his way back to the military barracks, where was bound by honour to report the humiliating failure of his attempt to steal apples and his associated literally painful capture.

Agesilaos’ failure would, of course, have been obvious anyway from the loss of his tunic and the clear marks of a severe beating on his rear. However, the honourable boy would have confessed his recent sad experiences even if such proof had not been evident.

The hungry Agesilaos appreciated that he would suffer further punishment for his shameful lack of success, as well as being refused any rations whatsoever for several days. Nevertheless, thought of not returning to his new harsh life as an ephebe also never entered the essentially very brave child’s mind. The 7 year-old had wanted to live like a normal Spartan boy of his age and he knew that such sufferings formed an integral part of such an existence.

Nevertheless, public nudity, outside the ephebe barracks or exclusively male gymnasia, was not usual for a Spartan boy. Consequently, the abashed Agesilaos took great care to try to conceal his naked form behind the likes of trees and shrubbery, whilst he skirted the path and then fairly busy road, which led him back to the military complex that was now his home.

Only a few travellers along the road managed to spot a young boy with a red face and beaten rear hurrying along in attempted obscurity on one side of the route to Sparta before Agesilaos eventually ran through the gates of his barracks. The brave and honourable 7 year-old then proceeded to report his recent distressing failure to his paidonomos.

As Agesilaos tried to find his paidonomos within the busy barracks, he had to pass many other ephebes. Although these other cadets were accustomed to seeing naked and recently beaten boys’ bodies, many still sniggered at the sight of the 7 year-old, especially as most recognised his identity.

After Agesilaos finally located his paidonomos and made his confession, the adult instructor confirmed the boy’s fate. "You’ll not be awarded a fresh tunic, and so will go naked until you somehow rectify the problem without the help of others," the man announced. "You’ll also go five days without rations," he added, "and you’ll imminently suffer, whilst bound to one of the punishment stakes on the parade ground, another beating in front of the other members of your angele and any other ephebe who cares to watch!"

"In view of the damage already perpetrated on your rear," the paidonomos continued, "the front of your body, including your genitals, will receive the twenty-five blows from my crop!"

(Ephebe barracks, near Sparta, Laconia, Greece, shortly afterwards)

A very happy Lysanoridas had been summoned by the paidonomos to escort and tie Agesilaos to the punishment stake before assembling the other members of his angele to watch the imminent spectacle. As soon as the appalled Eudamidas heard what was about to happen and why, the boy made a detour to collect the equally aghast Lysander before making his way to the parade ground.

Consequently, Lysander had the opportunity to speak briefly to Agesilaos before the paidonomos, who today would personally beat the miscreant 7 year-old, arrived on the scene. Strictly, conversation with the condemned was forbidden but, with no adult yet present, no-one was going to suggest to such a renowned boy as the older ephebe that he should not exchange a few words with his new younger friend.

"I see that you either forgot or ignored my advice," Lysander ruefully commented to Agesilaos, whose hands had been tightly bound together above him by Lysanoridas to a metal ring firmly embedded in the wood, causing him to be so outstretched that he balanced on tiptoes. Such a desperately unstable face-forward posture negated the need for the boy’s legs to be similarly tied.

"I must have," the rightly apprehensive Agesilaos rather sheepishly replied. "Well then," Lysander retorted, "let’s hope that your imminent beating will be a lesson to you that’ll instil into you the need to listen carefully to and obey my advice in future!"

"I hope so to," Agesilaos responded quietly, as he fearfully observed his paidonomos, with menacing crop in hand, now advancing towards him.

(A farm near Sparta, Laconia, Greece, several days later)

The moon was high in the cloudless starry sky. The naked Agesilaos, who was shivering in the autumnal night-time chill, as well as from nerves, tentatively approached the main farmhouse, which he had been secretly patiently observing from afar for several days, despite his now ravenous hunger and the anguish still inflicting his young body from his recent thorough beatings.

Agesilaos’ paidonomos, who was fully aware that the boy needed to recover his lost tunic if he was to survive for long, had excused the new ephebe barracks’ lessons so that he could attempt to recapture his only permitted item of clothing. However, the instructor did so not out of altruistic consideration but rather because he believed that the 7 year-old would learn more through his latest escapade. He also fully expected the cadet to fail again in his mission and thereby earn another beating or two.

Agesilaos’ discomfort from the cold was not aided by the fact that his form was currently comprehensively smeared with cattle dung, which provided no real protection from the night chill but did smell and feel awful. However, the cow-pats, in which the boy had just rolled his nude body, should prevent the farmer’s hounds from detecting him, if Lysander’s advice proved correct.

Agesilaos had, for this dangerous mission at least, when failure would inevitably lead to more beatings, carefully absorbed Lysander’s latest sage counsel regarding how the younger boy’s much-needed tunic might be successfully retrieved. The 7 year-old was also rigidly following the older ephebe’s wise suggestions.

Agesilaos had picked his moment carefully. The farm manager’s wife had fortunately performed her regular domestic laundry late on this day because she had earlier been busy with other chores. As the cloudless hours of darkness would undoubtedly remain free of rain, she had subsequently left the cleansed clothes to dry overnight on the twine washing-lines outside the main farmhouse. The various garments were fixed in place by crude pegs, which were essentially partially split slithers of strong wood.

Amongst the clothing on the washing-line was Agesilaos’ much-needed tunic, which had recently been worn by the farm manager’s 6 year-old son. As the young ephebe crept in the moonlight across the farmyard, which was enclosed by low walls, and approached this skimpy red woollen uniform, he suddenly heard the ominous sound of a ferocious hound barking loudly nearby.

(Ephebe barracks, near Sparta, Laconia, Greece, later same night)

Agesilaos was again shivering. However, on this occasion, the boy’s bodily quivering did not mainly result from the cold in the air of this cloudless autumnal night or from nerves. The 7 year-old’s normally lovely but currently rather marked form was instead reacting to the fact that he had recently bathed in the chilly River Eurotas, just outside his ephebe barracks.

Agesilaos had done so in order to remove the cow excrement despoiling his naked body and otherwise clean himself, in readiness to redress happily in his recovered tunic. Lysander’s advice had worked perfectly, with the barking hound only reacting to the coincidental proximity of a fox hunting farm chickens, which was soon chased away without rousing from their beds the household, who were accustomed to such occasional night-time disturbances.

Nevertheless, Agesilaos had taken the precaution of grabbing his tunic and running away quickly from the scene. The boy was then helped in his subsequent rapid escape by two other factors.

Firstly, the local path and road, leading to Sparta, were deserted at this time of night and so there was no need for Agesilaos to conceal his nude body in embarrassment behind flanking trees and shrubbery. The boy could instead just run along the middle of these routes.

Secondly, Agesilaos’ souls were finally hardening and so the boy was becoming inured to going barefoot. Consequently, the 7 year-old could now demonstrate how he could compensate for lack of physical size through the fact that he possessed natural running speed, which would soon make him the fastest ephebe in his age group over both short and long distances.

Agesilaos eventually entered the ephebe barracks by furtively climbing over one of the more secluded parts of the perimeter wall, previously suggested by Lysander as a good secret access point. Overnight absence was technically forbidden for cadets, although his paidonomos had ignored this regulation when allowing the boy to go on his mission, which the man had been told might take several days.

The paidonomos was again not being altruistically considerate in his attitude, as the rule existed to discourage post-pubescent ephebes and young warriors from having illicit outside liaisons with females, and a 7 year-old was unlikely to be similarly motivated. The threat of being beaten for being caught attempting to re-enter the barracks at night, as Agesilaos had been told he must try to do, also, in his instructor’s opinion, comprised another useful challenge and potential harsh lesson for the boy.

In fact, Agesilaos did learn a valuable lesson on this night. The boy whispered his finding to the similarly aged Eudamidas, who had instinctively awoken when his best friend had returned to the hut shared by their angele.

The fretting Eudamidas had only slept fitfully over the previous nights when Agesilaos had been absent. The boy had been worried about his best friend’s welfare but now joyously invited his clearly chilled fellow 7 year-old to share his reed pallet mattress and bodily warmth, whilst the other soundly somnolent members of their angele remained blissfully unaware of developments.

After the euphoric and excited Eudamidas had subsequently considerately wrapped his lovely warm form around the shivering Agesilaos in order to transfer bodily heat, he asked his best friend to appraise him about his latest mission, which had obviously been successful because the boy was happily redressed in his tunic. However, he only received the weary reply of "Can I tell you tomorrow, as I’m desperate to sleep."

Eudamidas was suddenly ashamed that his euphoria and excitement, engendered by Agesilaos’ successful return from his latest dangerous mission, had encouraged him not to realise that his best friend would be very tired and would therefore want to sleep and leave lengthy conversation until the next day. The boy therefore answered "Of course!" However, his weary fellow 7 year-old did manage one last comment before his sensuous blue eyes closed and he succumbed to deep slumber, and his remark related to the key lesson that he had learnt on this day.

"What I will tell you, Eudamidas, before I fall asleep," Agesilaos happily whispered, "is that Lysander’s advice should always be followed!"

(Ephebe barracks, near Sparta, Laconia, Greece, 3½ years later, early spring, 433 BCE)

Unfortunately, Lysander’s sage advice could not always save Agesilaos from suffering regular acute distress over the next 3½ years. Despite the younger very intelligent ephebe’s ability now to absorb and adapt wise suggestions, the boy’s diminutive size was a major handicap to his welfare. His special social status was also an impediment to continued wellbeing, as he remained a target for grudging jealous bullies and their cronies, especially Lysanoridas. Even his superiority in certain skills, such as running fast, was ironically to prove occasionally detrimental to his best interests.

Lysander and Eudamidas could only observe Agesilaos’ continued troubles with abhorrence and sorrow. Ephebe ethics meant that they could not directly interfere, only afterwards offer comfort and further advice. Their friend had to fight his own battles, and their sole compensation, as he frequently lost, was that the hope that he would eventually emerge as a better person as a result of such humiliating and often painful experiences.

Meanwhile, Lysanoridas remained wary of Eudamidas, who, despite being slightly smaller, could occasionally defeat him at wrestling. The prefect was therefore worried that his fellow ephebe might also be able to win a much rougher informal fight and so he never tried to bully the boy. However, such consideration did not extend to the more diminutive Agesilaos.

Lysanoridas continued to humiliate Agesilaos in various ways. The prefect would frequently call the smaller boy a ‘wimp’ and other derogatives, as well as insult him in other ways.

Lysanoridas would also allocate Agesilaos the most menial chores within the angele, for example cleaning the pack’s hut and laundering his fellow ephebes’ tunics in the nearby River Eurotas, as well as sending him on the least important errands. Some of the latter were sometimes invented for amusement.

Such invented errands were designed to waste Agesilaos’ time or send him into personal peril. He was often despatched to the hut of an older angele, where Lysanoridas knew he would suffer additional verbal abuse and probable physical bullying. In fact, the boy often returned from delivering bogus messages displaying bruises.

Agesilaos also suffered physically at Lysanoridas’ sadistic hands. The prefect would often find spurious fault with the boy’s performance of chores and have him strip and bend over for a beating, in front of the other mainly chortling ephebes of their angele. The subsequent chastisement would be within the parameters allowed to his position, namely five strokes of a stick across the miscreant’s bottom.

Lysanoridas was also occasionally permitted by the paidonomos to organise games just for members of his angele. The prefect could therefore choose the teams and act as arbiter if he wished.

Lysanoridas would invariably allow Agesilaos to be one of the captains. However, this was a very dubious honour as those holding such a position were personally punished if their teams lost.

Lysanoridas ensured that Agesilaos’ teams nearly always lost by appointing to them only the worst performing in the relevant games of the ephebes of their angele. The reluctant captain was rarely able, through his own burgeoning sporting and leadership abilities, to compensate personally for such weakness in his ranks in order to secure unlikely victory and so usually earned another five blows of the prefect’s stick across his buttocks.

Lysanoridas also supplemented his most common games’ ploy to ensure that he could beat Agesilaos’ bottom by means of an additional two fiddles. He showed blatant bias when acting as sports’ arbiter and also occasionally joined the team competing against that of the boy he liked to bully, so ensuring that the latter was outnumbered by the extra player in his 15-strong angele.

Lysanoridas particularly enjoyed the irony inherent in such games’ activities. Eudamidas was proficient at most sports and so was invariably reluctantly one of Agesilaos’ most skilled opponents. The boy was also honour-bound to perform as well as he could and his successes were often major contributory factors in ensuring that his best friend’s bottom was subsequently beaten by the happy manipulative prefect.

Agesilaos was not stupid and recognised what Lysanoridas was trying to achieve when sending him on bogus errands, accusing him of spurious work faults and appointing him as captain of usually losing teams. However, the boy could not disobey an order from the prefect unless he was either prepared to suffer severe punishment or challenge the bigger ephebe’s authority with their paidonomos, who would undoubtedly resolve the issue by commanding the pair to fight each other.

In fact, despite being advised by Lysander not to allow Lysanoridas to taunt him into making such a rash challenge, Agesilaos’ pride did occasionally spur him into ignoring his older friend’s wise counsel.

Lysander had attempted to teach Agesilaos good unarmed combat technique and tricks, involving both sets of limbs. However, Lysanoridas had been a bully before he entered the ephebe barracks and could therefore add much greater experience at virtually no-holds-barred fighting to his far superior size and strength, which was a differential that was maintained as the years passed.

The inevitable results of the fights between Agesilaos and Lysanoridas were therefore sound, bruising and painful thrashings by the prefect, which invariably ultimately left the smaller boy almost unconscious on the ground. The paidonomos also later allowed the victor to flog the loser with the instructor’s strap and, on such occasions, the whole of the vanquished boy’s rear and not just his bottom suffered.

Eudamidas did sometimes consider challenging Lysanoridas himself in order to try to put an end to the bullying of Agesilaos. However, two factors prevented the brave boy from doing so.

Firstly, Eudamidas realised that, even if he became prefect by winning the resultant fight against the slightly bigger, stronger and more combat-capable Lysanoridas, he could not simply order the previous incumbent to desist from bullying Agesilaos. Given ethebe ethics, his new authority would not extend to such matters.

Secondly, and more importantly, when appraised of such a possibility, his best friend had begged Eudamidas not to risk such a precarious fight. The paidonomos would undoubtedly as customary allow Lysanoridas to flog any defeated challenger, and Agesilaos had firmly suggested that his conscience could not bear such an outcome.

Consequently, Agesilaos continued to endure Lysanoridas’ snide and calculated bullying. The boy also suffered regularly at the hands of his paidonomos, who, because of the young ephebe’s special social status, still frequently presented him with far more difficult challenges than other cadets had to face.

In fact, many of the set targets were completely unreasonable and unrealisable but the paidonomos wanted to test Agesilaos’ response to facing such impossible odds. Failure to meet the challenges, which was frequent, always, of course, resulted in harsh punishment.

Given such cruel experiences over several years at the hands of Lysanoridas and the paidonomos, it is unsurprising that young Agesilaos acquired a reputation for often walking awkwardly and sometimes with a noticeable limp. However, the boy’s many sufferings, including such temporary handicaps, amazingly did not adversely affect his brave spirit.

Both Lysander and Eudamidas could not help but admire such immense pluckiness, and many other aspects of Agesilaos’ fine character. However, as the years passed, the pair also came to appreciate immensely one of the boy’s other major attributes.

As Agesilaos approached puberty and despite his regular marks of recent painful chastisement, the boy with the silky fair hair and sensuous blue eyes was quite clearly developing into the most beautiful ephebe in the whole barracks. He was now a 10 year-old and had grown significantly since his arrival in the barracks, although he was still smaller than most other cadets of his own age, especially Lysanoridas. He was also someone whom many other older males were beginning to lust after and make plans to seduce when the time and the youngster’s body were fully ripe.

Agesilaos was also now about to suffer again, on this sunny and warm spring day. The boy was once more naked and bound face-forward to the punishment stake in the barracks’ parade ground, whilst members of his own angele, including the prefect, Lysanoridas, plus some other ephebes, had gathered to watch the imminent punishment.

Agesilaos had recently failed to complete a long and very wearying cross-country run in the required impossible fast time, set by his unrelenting paidonomos and measured by a water-clock. The last drop of liquid had fallen from the container just before the exhausted naked boy had returned to the barracks’ parade ground from the surrounding river-plain and hills.

One aspect of performance that had clearly remained unaffected by Agesilaos’ diminutive physique was his running speed over either short or long distances. Consequently, the boy happily proved to be the fastest in not only in his angele but also his age group. Unfortunately, such an attribute only encouraged his paidonomos to make the swift ephebe race against the clock and not fellow cadets and to set unrealistic time targets.

Agesilaos’ rear had already suffered comprehensive chastisement for just failing a few days before to run naked ten times around the parade ground before the water-clock ran dry. This was the reason why the boy’s front, including his smooth genitals, was to suffer now for his failure in the longer race.

Unlike when he had first suffered a similar beating on the front of his body 3½ years previously, Agesilaos’ shame at his current predicament was increased by the shape his maturing cock had now incongruously chosen to adopt in readiness. The fearful boy’s pleasant slender smooth uncut penis was erect and pointing towards his paidonomos, who was advancing towards him, not with menacing crop in hand but in possession of an even harsher short-stranded whip.

(To be continued in part γ΄ – ‘τύρός’ [part 3 – ‘Cheese’])