Acropolis of Sparta

Sparta's ruins are famously disappointing, and that is the point. Thucydides predicted it: if Sparta were deserted, he wrote, later generations would never believe it had been so powerful, because it had no grand temples, only scattered villages. The acropolis holds a Roman-era theatre, the sanctuary of Athena of the Bronze House, and the Byzantine remains of the town that followed. The city that produced Europe's most feared infantry left less standing than places it conquered, which is either irony or exactly the ethos.