The city-states during ancient Greece were smaller kingdom-like territories with customs, traditions, economies and societies that varied greatly, despite the fact that they were all geographically close to one another. Among the city states, two of the most famous and better known are Athens and Sparta. The first, because it was known for its cultural development and the second for its military strength and self-sufficiency.
Two common factors among all city-states within ancient Greece were the dependence on agriculture and the second the use of slavery for the development of agricultural activities. Another thing that was common for all these states was that farmers and slaves were dependent on richer landowners and poverty among them was rampant.
As said before, slaves were also a common group in ancient Greece within all city-states and most activities depended on these people. While in most of Greece, especially Athens, however, slaves came from conquered peoples, the Spartans simply created a group called the Helots who originated in the beginning from people who had been settled in Messenia and Laconia, when the Spartans overtook their territories. Thus, Helots integreated into Spartan society and became a group within society that depended entirely on birth and death of its members and not on Sparta conquering new land.
Before the beginning of the Macedonian empire, where the city states were annexed and joined into one larger nation, under Phillip of Macedonia, Greece in general saw a shift of its economy from dependence on agriculture to a dependence on trade. This led to greater poverty for city-state farmers and a lot of unrest. In the case of Helots, they had always suffered under the Spartans, but at one point, after an earthquake that hit the greek mainland, when Helots became greater in numbers to Spartans, and tired of tyranny and poverty, Helots tried to overtake Spartans, but they did not succeed. The result of both conflicts was a total shift from agriculture into trading and the use of slaves and some labor hands for military purposes when Greece sought to expand into other territories and a furthering of the slave system.
