Scholars have disagreed about whether the Great Dionysia was celebrated in 404 BCE, despite the grim circumstances in Athens on the eve of the city's surrender to Sparta. This article reconsiders the problem and reviews the positive documentary evidence for the festival's celebration. The evidence indicates that the festival was indeed held, which speaks to the centrality of the Great Dionysia to Athenian civic life. The article then re-examines the conditions in Athens in the spring of 404, the practical consequences (...) that these may have had for the festival, and the celebration of other festivals during times of war and crisis. Despite the evidence that the Great Dionysia was celebrated, the scale of its festivities must have been reduced. The first regular celebration after the war did not likely take place until 402/1, when the posthumous premiere of Sophocles' Oidipous at Kolonos would have served partially as a symbolic proclamation that Athens' great theatrical tradition would continue undiminished. (shrink)

This paper seeks to contextualize Lycurgus' use of the historical example of King Codrus' self-sacrifice within Athenian social memory and public discourse. In doing so, it offers a solution to the puzzle of Lycurgus' calling Codrus one of the ἐπώνυμοι τῆς χώρας . I make the case that Codrus was one of the forty-two eponymous age-set heroes who played an important role in the Athenian military and socio-political system. I contend that devotion to the city's gods and heroes and knowledge (...) of their mythology were essential parts of the religious and ideological instruction of Athenian ephebes. Consequently, Lycurgus' citation of the Ephebic Oath, the self-sacrifices of King Codrus and the daughters of Erechtheus, as well as his repeated invocation of the city's gods and shrines, must be seen as integral elements of his indictment of Leocrates for cowardice and treason, behavior that is diametrically opposed to the hoplite ethos and religious devotion that were instilled into young ephebes. Lycurgus thus brings the jurors' memories of their own ephebate into the courtroom and taps into emotions and values that lie at the heart of Athenian collective identity. (shrink)

Existing attempts to understand the relationship between violence and stability within Classical Athens are undermined by their failure to compare democracies with oligarchies. The exclusionary policies of oligarchies created a fragile political equilibrium that required considerable regulation if oligarchic regimes were to survive. By contrast, the inclusiveness of democracies largely defused the danger that disputes would lead to regime collapse. Citizens of democracies faced fewer incentives to police their behavior, resulting in higher levels of public disorder and violence; this violence, (...) however, was at the same time less likely to escalate into deadly force and stasis. The distinctive cultures of democracies and oligarchies were determined in part by considerations of basic political order. (shrink)

Zusammenfassung Demosthenes, Aristoteles und Pausanias berichten von dem Dikasterion in Phreatto, zu dem ein außer Landes gegangener Athener auf einem Boot heranfährt, dieses unmittelbar an der Küste festmacht und sich dann in einem Prozess verteidigt. Er betritt zu keinem Zeitpunkt athenischen Boden, sondern bleibt auf dem Boot und vernimmt dort das Urteil, ob er vorsätzlich getötet hat oder nicht. Diese Verhandlungsform zwischen Land und Meer kann – so aufwendig und eigentümlich sie auch anmutet – durchaus historisch sein, ist aber nur (...) zu begreifen, wenn man von Drakons Gesetz über die Tötung ausgeht. Der Gesetzgeber hat 621/620 v. Chr. den Vollzug der Blutrache unter die Kontrolle der athenischen Gemeinschaft gestellt und damit einen wichtigen Schritt zur Eindämmung von Konflikten in der Polis geleistet. Das Verfahren in Phreatto ist im Kontext dieser Verordnung zu betrachten. (shrink)

This paper explores how gender can operate as a disguise for class in an examination of the self-sacrifice of the Maiden in Euripides' Children of Herakles. In Part I, I discuss the role of human sacrifice in terms of its radical potential to transform society and the role of class struggle in Athens. In Part II, I argue that the representation of women was intimately connected with the social and political life of the polis. In a discussion of iconography, the (...) theater industry and audience I argue that female characters became one of the means by which different groups promoted partisan interests based on class and social status. In Part III, I show how the Maiden solicits the competing interests of the theater audience. After discussing the centrality and marginality of the Maiden's character, I draw upon the funeral oration as a comparative model with which to understand the quite different role of self-sacrifice in tragedy. In addition to representing and mystifying the interests of elite, lower class and marginal groups, the play glorifies a subordinate character whose contradictory social status embodies the social position of other “marginal” members of Athenian society. The play stages a model for taking political action to transform the social system and for commemorating the tragic costs of such undertakings. (shrink)

This study makes a pair with the author's “Framing the Gift: The Politics of the Siphnian Treasury at Delphi,” Classical Antiquity 20 : 273–336. Like that essay, it argues that the function of a treasury is to provide a civic frame for ostentatious dedications by wealthy citizens: in effect, to “nationalize” votives. In this sense, the Athenian Treasury is a material trace, or fossil, of city politics in the 480s. The article tracks this function through the monument's iconography; its use (...) of marble from the medizing island of Paros; its relation to the “Alkmeonid” temple of Apollo; and the responses it evoked at Delphi and in Athens. Special attention is given to the methodological problem of finding meaning in non-iconic or non-representational features, such as building materials. The article concludes with a new reading of Pindar's sixth Pythian, for Megakles of Athens, which neatly encapsulates what was at stake in this building project. (shrink)

Thêsauroi, or treasure-houses, are small, temple-like structures, found typically in the sanctuaries of Delphi and Olympia. They were built by Greek city-states to house the dedications of their citizens. But a thêsauros is not just a storeroom: it is also a frame for costly votives, a way of diverting elite display in the interest of the city. When placed on view in a treasure-house, the individual dedication is re-contextualized: although it still reflects well on its dedicant, it also glorifies the (...) polis. Thêsauroi effectively nationalize votives—and, with them, a dedicant's privileged relationship to the gods. The sculptural program of the Siphnian treasury exemplifies these issues. (shrink)

The first sentence of the Annals reads urbem Romam a principio reges habuere. Commentators observe the echo of Sallust, Catiline 6.1 urbem Romam, sicuti ego accepi, condidere atque habuere initio Troiani, and of Claudius, ILS 212 quondam reges hanc tenuere urbem. In a stimulating recent contribution David Levene also compares the first sentence of Justinus' Epitome of the Histories of Pompeius Trogus: principio rerum gentium nationumque imperium penes reges erat. A fourth potential model may now be taken into consideration: Ἀθηναῖοι (...) τὸ μὲν ἐξ ἀρχῆς ἐχρῶντο βασιλɛίαι. (shrink)

Many of Menander's comedies are structured according to a rape plot pattern in which a young Athenian citizen usually rapes and impregnates a female citizen prior to the opening of the play. In most cases, the rape leads to a happy ending: the marriage of the rapist and victim. This casual treatment of rape is striking because in all other respects Menander's plays are not only scrupulously faithful to Athenian law, they also use Athenian legal and social norms as their (...) own generic conventions. Although the rape of a female citizen was a serious oense in Athenian law, potentially punishable with death, and a flagrant violation of the norms of Athenian citizenship, Menandrian comedy never morally or legally problematizes rape. This study considers how the comedies neutralize the potential legal signicance of rape and what this tells us about Athenian law and the ideology of democratic citizenship. It argues that by portraying a neutral form of rape, Menander's comedies implicitly articulate those factors which had the potential to bring "rape" within the purview of Athenian legal discourse. Menandrian Comedy's strategic fidelity to the norms of Athenian citizenship also tells us something about the gender ideology of Athenian democratic citizenship, that is, the ways in which relations between the sexes support and sustain civic relations between men in Athenian political culture and democratic ideology. While Menander's romantic plots uphold the laws of citizen marriage, they do not passively enact the legal constructs. In one common variant of the rape plot, the gendered construction of citizenship embedded in Athenian law is specically conjoined to democratic norms. In this type of play, a wealthy young citizen rapes and eventually marries the daughter of a seemingly poor citizen. By using rape to generate matrimonial unions between the rich and the poor, these plays extend democratic norms into the social arena. The formation of marriages across class lines disrupts the eects of intergenerationality in reproducing social and economic inequalities. (shrink)

This paper considers Pindar's diverse appropriations of elements of the sacred topography of Aegina for different purposes in epinikia composed for Aeginetan victors. It focuses on poems likely performed in the vicinity of the Aiakeion for their different mobilizations of a monument that we know from Pausanias stood beside the Aiakeion—the tomb of Phokos, an earth mound topped with the “rough stone” that killed him. The more speculative final part of the paper suggests that it may also be possible to (...) track a coherent ideology attached to the island's sacred topography across several Aeginetan odes, thereby detecting a broader structural unity that accompanies and frames the different individual appropriations of different poems. This part starts from Pausanias’ mythic narrative of the exemplary justice of Aiakos banishing his own son Telamon as the aetiology for a distinctive Aeginetan justice system inscribed in a whole set of man-made monuments that ring the island with concentric circles of rough stones. (shrink)

This article discusses Lysias’ Against Eratosthenes as an ancient Athenian instance of the superior orders plea, a line of defence made notorious during the Nuremberg trials, which in turn became the cornerstone of modern war crime legislation. Whereas the pre-Nuremberg jurisdiction largely embraced the principle of superior responsibility, whereby a subordinate executing criminal orders was not to be held liable for them, the trials of the Nazi war criminals brought about a complete reversal of this doctrine. While remaining faithful to (...) the spirit of the Nuremberg jurisdiction, the subsequent legislative acts sought to further elaborate its underlying principle of absolute liability, in order to precisely determine the question of guilt and innocence. I argue that despite the close relationship between modern legal systems and Roman law, which fully embraced the doctrine of superior responsibility, it is in the juridical thought of ancient Athens that one finds the archetype of contemporary war crime legislation. (shrink)

This article has two objectives. First, and in particular, it seeks to reinterpret the ostracism procedure of early democratic Athens. Since Aristotle, this has been understood as a rational, political weapon of collective defense, intended to expel from Athens a disproportionately powerful individual. In this article, by putting emphasis on themateriality, gestures, and location of ostraka-casting, I propose instead that the institution can more fruitfully be understood as a ritual enactment of civic unity. Second, and more generally, I hope to (...) explore the frames within which early Athenian democracy is placed: while Greek kingship and tyranny have been very successfully explored through anthropological and cross-cultural comparison, Greek democracy for the most part has remained in the domains of the institutional historian and political theorist. Taking a phenomenological and comparative approach, this article asks how the citizens of early democratic Athens experienced and comprehended their new sovereignty and the invented procedures of mass decision-making through which it was expressed. (shrink)

How are we to understand Solon's departure from Athens "for the sake of theôria" immediately after the introduction of his laws ? Previous accounts have taken theôria to mean "sightseeing," but the goal of Solon's departure-to avoid explaining or changing the laws-is guaranteed by certain religious features of theôria: the theôros plays the role of civic guardian and must not add to or subtract from an oracle he conveys to the city, and during the theôria the city itself must remain (...) pure and avoid disturbances. Solon adapts these features of theôria to establish his laws as a pseudo-oracular discourse, as a purification of the city, and as a permanent civic medium. The beginning of Solon's open-ended journey thus gives ideological finality to the laws at the middle of the city. This reading of Solon's theôria coheres with other instances of the creative adaptation of ritual in archaic Greek politics. It also develops our understanding of the discourse on theôria as regulating the laws that constitute the political sphere. (shrink)

The article explores the question whether there was a possible dialogue between ancient Greek and Mesopotamian chronography. This is an interesting albeit challenging subject due to the fragmentary preservation of the Greek texts. The idea that cuneiform tablets might have influenced the development of the genre in Greece lingers in the background without having been the subject of detailed discussion. Notably the Neo-Assyrian limmu list has been suggested as a possible blueprint for the Athenian archon list. In order to examine (...) this topic further, a thorough analysis of ancient Greek chronography starting in the second half of the fifth century BC, when eponymous dates in various literary compositions begin to appear, is required. A close examination of the fragmentary evidence shows how difficult it is to trace the supposed annalistic style in the local histories of Athens (Atthides). In the Neo-Assyrian Empire, the eponymous limmu officials served as the chronological backbone, but there remains a huge time gap between the seventh century cuneiform manuscripts and the Athenian archon list from the fifth century. A comparison of the Neo-Assyrian Eponymous Chronicles with the preserved Greek chronographic traditions in Eusebius’ chronicle (fourth century AD) shows that the similarity is mainly confined to an abbreviated style, as the entries clearly point to the different cultural and political settings. Apart from the Neo-Assyrian sources, the Neo- and Late-Babylonian chronicles deserve further attention in the present inquiry. Looking for a connection with ancient Greek chronography in the fifth century, the lack of wholly preserved texts on both sides in the corresponding time constitutes an unsurmountable obstacle. Presenting and scrutinising the textual evidence both for ancient Greek and for Mesopotamian chronography enables an improved understanding of similarities and differences alike. To exemplify this point, Greek and Akkadian temple histories serve as test cases. (shrink)

This paper examines the generic structure and underpinnings of Xenophon's Lacedaimonion Politeia. The Lac. has frequently been regarded as a praise or defence of Sparta yet its rhetoric and narrative structure bear little resemblance to contemporary practices for composing encomia or defense speeches. Although this does not preclude an encomiastic or defensive purpose, an examination of the type of rhetoric Xenophon employs and the narrative patterns and structures in the work reveal different generic affiliations, showing that the Lac., like many (...) of Xenophon’s other writings, is a hybrid work with features belonging to politeia- literature and philosophical enquiry. Further, careful examination, in particular, of the way Xenophon makes use of imaginary interlocutors suggests that praise cannot have been the aim of this treatise. (shrink)

This paper seeks to give a more precise grounding to the question of relevance in Athenian forensic argument with a specific focus on the speeches delivered by Aeschines and Demosthenes in the case On the Crown. I argue that in Athenian litigation relevance can be determined quite precisely by the specific terms of the accusation, and that the litigants are well aware of this standard and take care to make their arguments relevant or to justify them if they may appear (...) to be “outside the issue.” Because all the issues specified in the accusation are legally relevant, the distinction commonly drawn between legal and political arguments has no place in a discussion of relevance. The effect of this rule of relevance, I argue, is not to promote fairness but to increase the advantage enjoyed by the plaintiff. I conclude with a few observations on the Athenian view of law which, I suggest, was considerably broader than ours. (shrink)

This paper addresses the question of the role of ostracism in democratic Athens. I argue that the frequent expulsion of aristocrats by rival aristocrats in the predemocratic polis is the key to understanding the function of ostracism in the democratic polis. I show that aristocratic "politics of exile" was a fundamental political problem in the archaic polis and that democratic political power, symbolized by the institution of ostracism, was the polis' solution to the problem. In the archaic polis, the expulsion (...) of aristocrats often led to an endless cycle of exiles and returns and consequent political instability. In 508/7, the Athenian demos usurped the power over decisions of exile by banishing Isagoras and recalling Cleisthenes from exile. By taking control of decisions of exile, the Athenian demos took over political power insofar as power over decisions of exile had become synonymous with political power. The creation of the institution of ostracism, whereby the people decided collectively whether to banish a single citizen for ten years, provided not only a mechanism for the symbolic expression of democratic power, but also a means for the practical and ideological distinction between oligarchic and democratic rule. While aristocrats had banished their opponents without limit in numbers and duration of exile, the Athenian democracy decided each year whether to banish a single individual for a limited time period. In most years, the Athenian demos chose not to exercise the power of exile. Nevertheless, the annual question in the assembly served to remind aristocrats that the demos held the fundamental political power, and hence deterred aristocrats from attempting to overthrow the democracy. The limited nature of ostracism further deterred exiled aristocrats from attempting to return by force. Finally, the infrequent and moderate use of exile as a means of resolving political conflict helps to explain the extraordinary stability of the Athenian democracy. (shrink)

The advent of writing in the Greek polis administration resulted in the appointment of officials responsible for document management. These were known as grammateis (secretaries). The need for records connected to judicial proceedings led to the involvement of secretaries in the polis legal procedure. Although there remains little evidence of this, in Athens secretarial support was certainly connected with almost every use of writing in a judicial context. Secretaries appear to have received suits, published notifications of trials and recorded fines, (...) but their most well-attested duty is that of the reading of documents brought as evidence in the courtroom. The study of references to secretaries in a judicial context demonstrates that their duties were essential to the persons involved in the administration of justice. By keeping track of judicial documents secretaries helped the officials to keep accurate records for the sake of accountability, while the reading of legal texts enabled the Athenian citizen-judges to get to know verbatim the texts of the state laws and avoid manipulation by litigants who produced their own interpretations of a law. The purpose of this article is to present all the relevant cases of secretarial support in the justice system of Athens and to discuss the contribution made by the secretaries to the Athenian legal procedure. (shrink)

Summary This paper investigates the Athenian gymnasiarchy, an office that remains badly understood. Originally a festival liturgy, the gymnasiarchy was transformed into a magistracy at the end of the fourth century BC. This paper first examines the reasons for the shift and argues that it was connected to broader political currents in late Classical Athens. Secondly, it sheds new light on the nature of the office in the Hellenistic period. Whereas earlier scholars assumed that the Athenian gymnasiarch was a minor (...) official under the kosmetes, epigraphic and literary sources reveal that he was a fully-fledged gymnasium director, just as in other poleis. (shrink)

This article discusses the way the ancient Greeks dealt with public and private debts, focusing on one specific aspect: debt cancellation. On the one hand, ancient Greeks were aware of the risks entailed in debt relief as a tool for fuelling civic strife: sources describe it as a demagogic or even criminal action often in association with the political agenda of tyrants. On the other hand, however, Greeks knew well also the benefic effects of debt cancellation in coping with financial (...) and political crisis. In late accounts of archaic history, debt relief is the solution to civic strife and the foundation act of political order. Some public decrees of the Hellenistic period attest debt relief as a communal decision of the polis, dictated by the necessity of preventing or solving ongoing or imminent crises. This second meaning and purpose of debt cancellation should perhaps urge us to reconsider from a different perspective the “politics of debt” in today’s Europe. (shrink)

In the fifth centuryb.c.e.the Athenians did not make any distinction between laws and decrees. The Assembly passed both kinds of measures in the same way, and both general enactments and short-term provisions held the same legal status. At the end of the fifth century, however, the Athenians decided to make a distinction between the two kinds of measures and created the rule that no decree would be superior to a law. The Assembly continued to pass decrees in the same way, (...) but a new body ofnomothetaiwas created to ratify laws. There were also two separate procedures for rescinding the two kinds of measures: one could bring agraphê paranomôn against apsêphismaand agraphê ‘nomon mê epitêdeion theinai’ against anomos. This much is clear; scholars do not agree however about the procedure for passing a new law in fourth-century Athens. (shrink)

This is a close scrutiny of De Anima II 5, led by two questions. First, what can be learned from so long and intricate a discussion about the neglected problem of how to read an Aristotelian chapter? Second, what can the chapter, properly read, teach us about some widely debated issues in Aristotle's theory of perception? I argue that it refutes two claims defended by Martha Nussbaum, Hilary Putnam, and Richard Sorabji: that when Aristotle speaks of the perceiver becoming like (...) the object perceived, the assimilation he has in mind is ordinary alteration of the type exemplified when fire heats the surrounding air, that this alteration stands to perceptual awareness as matter to form. Claim is wrong because the assimilation that perceiving is is not ordinary alteration. Claim is wrong because the special type of alteration that perceiving is is not its underlying material realisation. Indeed, there is no mention in the text of any underlying material realisation for perceiving. The positive aim of II 5 is to introduce the distinction between first and second potentiality, each with their own type of actuality. In both cases the actuality is an alteration different from ordinary alteration. Perception exemplifies one of these new types of alteration, another is found in the acquisition of knowledge and in an embryo's first acquisition of the power of perception. The introduction of suitably refined meanings of 'alteration' allows Aristotle to explain perception and learning within the framework of his physics, which by definition is the study of things that change. He adapts his standard notion of alteration, familiar from Physics III 1-3 and De Generatione et Corruptione I, to the task of accounting for the cognitive accuracy of perception and second potentiality knowledge: both are achievements of a natural, inborn receptivity to objective truth. Throughout the paper I pay special attention to issues of text and translation, and to Aristotle's cross-referencing, and I emphasise what the chapter does not say as well as what it does. In particular, the last section argues that the textual absence of any underlying material realisation for perceiving supports a view I have defended elsewhere, that Aristotelian perception involves no material processes, only standing material conditions. This absence is as telling as others noted earlier. Our reading must respect the spirit of the text as Aristotle wrote it. (shrink)

This paper discusses an Athenian calyx krater whose style, shape, and inscription allow attribution to the Pantoxena Painter, a member of the Polygnotan workshop. I argue that the unusual scene on the obverse—with a wreathed, draped youth mounting a bema before Nikai and judges—provides the only known image of a rhapsode from the second half of the fifth century BC and joins the very small group of scenes that depict this contest at all. Given the similarity to images of kitharodes (...) and victors in other mousikoi agones, the krater testifies to the continued prestige given rhapsodia in this period. Unfortunately, because the krater was looted from the tomb in Tarquinia where it was placed after export from Athens, its meaning for an Etruscan viewer is more difficult to evaluate. The lack of documentation and physical context means that only part of this vase's biography can be recovered. (shrink)

In Aeschylus' "Supplices" the Danaids flee their cousins and take refuge at Argos. Scholars have noted similarities between the Argos of the play and contemporary Athens. Yet one such correspondence has generally been overlooked: the Danaids are awarded sanctuary in terms reflecting mid fifth-century Athenian μετοιϰία, a process providing for the partial incorporation of non-citizens into polis life. Danaus and his daughters are of Argive ancestry and take up residence within the city, yet do not become citizens. Instead, they receive (...) the right μετοιϰεῖν τῆσδε γῆς . As metics they retain control of their person and property, and are not liable to seizure by another. They are not permitted to own immovable property , but receive rent-free lodgings. Pelasgus and the other Argive citizens serve as their citizen representative . Casting the Danaids as metics highlights the similarities between Pelasgus and his predecessor, Apis. Both leaders were confronted by violent strangers demanding to live among the Argives, and sought to protect the autochthony and territory of Argos. Yet as suppliants the Danaids cannot be forcibly expelled. Pelasgus' solution is a grant of μετοιϰία approved by the Argive assembly. The emergence of μετοιϰία as a formal status at Athens is difficult to date. Most scholars place it between the reforms of Cleisthenes and Pericles' citizenship law . The "Supplices" provides evidence for a date in the 460s, and functions as a charter myth legitimizing μετοιϰία, much the way the Eumenides does for the Areopagus. The "Supplices" also fits well within the context of immigration and urban development leading to Pericles' law. The fact that the Danaid trilogy won first prize may be due to the Athenians' empathy for Argos as a risk-taking polis committed both to defending its identity and to acknowledging divinely sanctioned claims to refuge. (shrink)

According to classical and postclassical sources, the early Greek turannoi were, by definition, illegitimate rulers who overturned existing political arrangements and installed rogue monarchic regimes in their place. And on this one fundamental point at least, modern observers of archaic turannides seem to have little quarrel with their ancient informants. To this day, it remains axiomatic that Cypselus, Peisistratus, and the rest were autocrats who gained power by usurpation. Whatever their individual accomplishments, they were still, in a word, "tyrants." Relying (...) mostly on evidence from the contemporary literary and material records, my paper aims to challenge this time-honored conventional wisdom and restore the first turannoi to the political mainstream. (shrink)

Normal 0 21 false false false PT-BR X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 Le concept de loi socratique a depuis toujours été l´objet decontroverses, principalement en raison des tentatives pour expliquerson attitude lors de son jugement, son emprisonnementet son exécution. Toute la difficulté de concilier entreeux les différents textes sur la philosophie et la vie de Socrate,naturellement ressort à propos des circonstances de sa condamnationet de sa mort. Si, dans l´état actuel de notre documentation,il paraît impossible d´apporter une solution définitive,néanmoins une possibilité d´en (...) atténuer les contradictions résidedans l´examen du fonctionnement de la méthode socratiqueà partir de ses fondements: le dialogue comme moyend´un accord, non seulement entre les citoyens d´Athènes,mais entre ceux-ci et le propre ordre universel, lequel se dessineda la recherche humaine de la justice et du bien commun. (shrink)