When we study the agora of the Lacedaemonians living in Sparta, as Pausanias says (III, 11, 2), adding that it is axía theas (worthy of being seen), - meaning that it has passed the selective examination of the Periegete, who stops only at what he deems worthy of remembrance - the first thought we need to make concerns the current macroscopic difference between the fate of Sparta and Athens. While the agora of Athens has been almost completely uncovered, that of Sparta is completely unknown. We have tried to understand the reasons for this, starting with Thucydides' famous comparison (I, 10), which is invoked as a kind of a priori condemnation of the archaeology of a city so unworthy of consideration that it has been almost completely erased by modern urbanization. In our opinion, however, an ideological choice played a decisive role, resulting, in the early 1930s and after a complicated history, in the start of American excavations, claimed as a right by those who proclaimed themselves the heirs of Athenian democracy. Fortunately, however, Sparta's agora, known only from Pausanias' description, which makes us regret our archaeological ignorance, can be located with certainty on the Palaiokastro hill , at the northern end of the modern settlement.
Here, in a dense olive grove of around 4 hectares, we can study a number of monuments, even if only partially excavated. We have described these monuments in detail. Leaving aside the so-called Roman stoa (in reality, it's an enormous base that closes off the square to the south), we have analyzed the circular building excavated by Waldstein in 1892 and the portico excavated by Ch. Christos in 1962. Both buildings appear to be identifiable with two prominent monuments of the Spartan agora, the so-called Skiàs, and the Persiké Stoa. Thanks to the identification of these two monuments, it is also possible to establish the southern and western limits of the square.
