“Lying at table on expensive couches, being waited upon by confectioners and chefs, fattened up in the dark like gluttonous animals, and ruining themselves physically as well as morally, and by giving free rein to every craving and excess which demanded lengthy slumbers, warm baths plenty of rest, in a sense, daily nursing.”
Plutarch says the groups at Mess were fifteen, but most likely they were much larger – either Pentecostys (144) or Lochos (288). Each man was required to contribute monthly barley-meal, wine, cheese, figs, and some money for meat. Often the Spartiates would make their contribution by going on hunts and bringing the meat to the Mess.