Lycurgus

       I think that Plutarch has written this biography of Lycurgus because he wanted to illustrate how Sparta's government was set up, and he is getting at the backstory of where it came from. He tells the stories of Lycurgus' travels to different countries (e.g. Crete, Asia, Egypt) and he extracts from these travels the principles, customs, and ideas that these cultures had. the next part of the biography that Plutarch shares is Lycurgus' strategy to achieve his goal of creating a political system. He starts by bringing an oracle to Sparta which he claimed had the new political system. He then secretly gathers supporters until he is ready to make his entrance into the city. After winning the favor of the kings he makes his reforms to the government and political system, and made a mixed constitution. Plutarch then goes into the story briefly of Lycurgus' later life. I think that Plutarch did all of this because Lycurgus was the single person who reformed Sparta's structure and life, and he wanted to explain how these reforms happened, so he traces it through the whole life of Lycurgus.
       I think that Plutarch was in favor of the Spartan constitution. He describes how Sparta started to plummet into chaos when the constitution was not followed, and his own words are, "-thus proving what a truly divine piece of good fortune it was for the Spartiates to have had someone to construct a mixed constitution.(pg 17)" This clearly indicates that Plutarch is in favor of the constitution that Lycurgus constructed. Also, at the end of his biography he shows his view of the reforms of Lycurgus when he says, "Lycurgus however created left no mere words and ideas, but created an acutal and unrivaled system of government. (pg 40)" Though Plutarch was very good at telling the story without his own bias, he shows us glimpses of his feelings which are that the constitution was very good.