"The world is full of foreigners you could fight, / but it's

Greek men and cities you destroy!" she cries, to inspire the Spartans and Athenians to fight the barbarians at the gate, not one another. (1112) Lysistrata also reminds both Athenians and Spartans how both sides have helped one another -- the Athenians from a slave rebellion, and the Athenians saved the Spartans although democrats were oppressed by the Persian tyranny until the Spartans helped them.

Thus, the play "Lysistrata" is not about the evils of war in general but the specific evils of Greeks fighting Greeks in civil wars, when they should be united against common enemies like the tyrannical Persians, as depicted by Herodotus when Spartans and Greeks fought against the tyrant Darius. This is blatantly stated in the words of the Spartan Ambassador, at the end of the play: "Holy Memory, reveal/the glories of yore:/how

Spartans...
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