![To survive we must return to the old ways, in many aspects of our lives. [960x576 - 74KB]](https://pic8.co/sh/0RAApw.jpg){kind=link}
Spartans yes (helots were forbidden from athletic training), but Romans and Vikings no. Romans during the republic felt it was every citizen's duty to fight in the army, and this was why they could raise massive armies during the Punic wars after their last one had been wiped out.
For Vikings, less organized but same result. You were not a man if you couldn't fight well with a spear and shield no matter your class. Tacitus writes as much about the Goths, who originally came from Scandinavia. The Varangian Guard, Byzantium's elite, were drawn from average peasant Norsemen who wanted some money and adventure.
That’s pretty interesting. Would you say, however, the majority of European men throughout all regions and history weren’t trained so extensively?
It's a matter of time and place. The celts, the goths, and the Scythians were aryans with a warrior culture going back thousands of years. But the Roman people lost their warrior culture to a professional army replacing them, and bread and circuses placating them. The peasants that the goths took over were no longer warriors, and the trend has been the more a land develops the softer the people get. By length of time and generations, we've been warriors many many times longer than civilized semi-slaves. But by population count there's probably been more of us in the latter category, or at least close to even.
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