Artemis Orthia in her aspect of Potnia Theron

The Goddess, Artemis, as the Mistress of the Wild Beasts.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mistress_of_the_Animals

Plato, Plutarch, and Pausanias described the cult of Artemis Orthia in Sparta as including the ritual flogging of young boys and epheboi, sometimes even to death, as a blood sacrifice. This was a test of fitness, strength, and endurance; an important part of the elite Spartiate education, without which no one had full rights as a citizen in Sparta. An echo of this practice survived in elite British Imperial education (until fairly recent times), where it was said to give one
"a good bottom".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mistress_of_the_Animals