Reconstructions of palaeoseismicity are useful for understanding and mitigating seismic hazard risks. We apply cosmogenic ³⁶Cl exposure-age dating and measurements of rare-earth elements and yttrium (REE-Y) concentrations to the palaeoseismic history of the Sparta Fault, Greece. Bayesian-inference Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) modelling of ³⁶Cl concentrations along a 7.2 m long vertical profile on the Sparta Fault scarp at Anogia indicate an increase in the average slip rate of the scarp from 0.8–0.9 mm yr⁻¹ 6.5–7.7 kyr ago to 1.1–1.2 mm yr⁻¹ up to the devastating 464 BCE earthquake. The average exhumation of the entire scarp up to the present day is 0.7–0.8 mm yr⁻¹. Modelling does not indicate additional exhumation of the Sparta Fault after 464 BCE. The Sparta Fault scarp is composed of fault breccia, containing quartz and clay-lined pores, in addition to host-rock-derived clasts of calcite and microcrystalline calcite cement. The impurities control the distribution of REE-Y in the fault scarp surface and contribute spatial variation to ³⁶Cl concentrations, which precludes the identification of individual earthquakes that have exhumed the Sparta Fault scarp from either of these data sets. REE-Y may illustrate processes that localize slip to a discrete fault plane in the Earth's near-surface, but their potential use in palaeoseismicity would benefit from further evaluation.