WORLD HISTORY

Detailed explanation-1: -Helots, whose name meant “captives” were assigned to citizens to carry out domestic work or to work on their klēroi, or portions. The klēroi were the original divisions of Messenia after its conquest by Sparta. Various sources mention such servants accompanying this or that Spartan.

Detailed explanation-2: -The helots were in a sense state slaves, bound to the soil and assigned to individual Spartans to till their holdings; their masters could neither free them nor sell them, and the helots had a limited right to accumulate property, after paying to their masters a fixed proportion of the produce of the holding.

Detailed explanation-3: -According to this writer, the Helots were the descendants of the Messenians who were enslaved by the Spartans during the First Messenian War in the 8th century BC. Another account of the origins of the Helots can be found in Strabo’s Geography.

Detailed explanation-4: -They were the helots, the subjugated and conquered people, the slaves of Sparta. Nobody knows exactly what the term “Helot” actually means. Some say it came from the village called Helos that was conquered by the angry Spartans. Others say that it simply means “a slave” or “a serf”.

Detailed explanation-5: -The Spartans’ way of life would not have been possible without the Helots, who handled all the day-to-day tasks and unskilled labor required to keep society functioning: They were farmers, domestic servants, nurses and military attendants.

Detailed explanation-6: -Helot : a member of a class of serfs in ancient Sparta. : someone held in forced servitude : an enslaved person or serf. helotry. ˈhe-lə-trē