P. J. Rhodes

Political activity in classical Athens

‘Only the naive or innocent observer’, says Sir Moses Finley in his book Politics in the ancient world , ‘can believe that Pericles came to a vital Assembly meeting armed with nothing but his intelligence, his knowledge, his charisma and his oratorical skill, essential as all four attributes were.’ Historians of the Roman Republic have been assiduous in studying clientelae,factiones and ‘delivering the vote’, but much less work has been done on the ways in which Athenian politicians sought to mobilise support. There have been studies of family connections and of links between individual politicians; there have been studies of the associations known as hetaireiai ; but many questions remain unanswered. W. R. Connor in The new politicians of fifth-century Athens contrasted an old style of politics, based on ties of philia within the upper classes, with a new style, which spurned philia and appealed directly to the people. Even in his old style, the votes of the ordinary, middling-to-poor citizens counted for more in the straightforward Athenian assembly than in the Roman comitia with their complex systems of block votes. Connor limits political friendship to the upper classes; he pours cold water on Sealeys suggestion that rich families might have brought pressure to bear on their tenants and other dependants (saying, ‘The proud and independent Athenian might be expected to resist intimidation’); but apart from general references to largesse he does not really explain how an old-style Cimon or a new-style Cleon would ensure that the assembly was full of voters willing to elect him as general or approve a motion which he proposed. J. K. Davies has tried to take the matter further in Wealth and the power of wealth in classical Athens .

Cultures of commemoration : war memorials, ancient and modern

Preface Comparing Cultures of Commemoration in Ancient and Modern Societies The Monuments ot the War Dead in Classical Athens: Forms, Contexts, Meanings Commemorating the War Dead of the Roman World The Ritualised Commemoration of War in the Hellenistic City: Memory, Identity, Emotion Two Neo-Classical Monuments in Modern France: The Pantheon and Arc de Triomphe Naming the Dead, Writing the Individual: Classical Traditions and Commemorative Practices in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries Cultural Memory and the Great War: Medievalism and Classicism in British and German War Memorials Monument to Defeat: the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in American Culture and Society

Thucydides and Athenian History

Thucydides reports in a matter-of-fact section of narrative that he was an Athenian general in 424/3 and did not return from Thasos in time to prevent Amphipolis from going over to the Spartan Brasidas, but was in time to keep Eion in Athenian hands (4.105-106); as a result of that he was exiled, returning to Athens under the amnesty of 404 (5.26.5); it is often and plausibly thought, but is not attested, that the man responsible for his exile was Cleon. This chapter concentrates on passages in which Thucydides focuses directly on Athens; but there are many passages focused primarily on other states where he has Athens in mind. In 7.55.2 and again in 8.96.5 Thucydides claims, not entirely fairly, that the Syracusans, who were democratic and powerful, were the enemies most similar in character (homoiotropoi) and therefore the most formidable to the Athenians. Keywords: Amphipolis; Athenian History; Cleon; Syracusans; Thucydides

The polis and the alternatives

FOURTH-CENTURY ATHENS: THE MACHINERY OF GOVERNMENT Formally, Athens had the same constitution from the tribal reorganization of Cleisthenes in 508/7, or at any rate from the reform of the Areopagus by Ephialtes in 462/1, until the suppression of the democracy by Antipater at the end of 322/1: the oligarchies of 411–410 and 404/3 were brief interruptions, each ending with the restoration of the democracy. The working of this democracy in the time of Pericles has been described in the previous volume. Decisions, on both domestic and external matters, were taken by an assembly of adult male citizens, which by the end of the fifth century had forty regular meetings a year: all topics on which the Assembly pronounced had first to be discussed by the Council of 500, and there were other safeguards by which the Assembly was limited, but any member could propose motions or amendments, or speak in the debate, and decisions were taken by a simple majority. It was not possible for all the citizens to be involved simultaneously in carrying out decisions, as they were all involved simultaneously in making them, but it was possible for them all to be involved in turn. The administration of the democracy was based on a large number of separate boards, usually comprising one man from each of the ten tribes, appointed by lot for one year and not eligible for reappointment to the same board; the scope for competence or incompetence was slight, and the conscientious citizen would serve on several of these boards in the course of his life.

Demagogues and Demos in Athens

M. I. Finley sought to rescue the ‘demagogue’ as an essential ingredient in Athens’ democratic processes. This paper explores the interactions of politicians and the assembly.There is some evidence for pressure on men to attend and to vote on a particular side. There were many occasional speakers and proposers in addition to the few most active politicans. We should not think of a series of duels; and experienced assembly-goers were not mere ‘spectators of speeches’. Speakers could be supported by cheers or heckled. Nobody could count on the assembly’s voting as he wanted consistently time after time.Politicians sought to cultivate an image, whether the aloof, magisterial image of Pericles or the extravagantly populist image of Cleon. Orators had to master a range of strategies to succeed, but there was not a simple division between elite politicians and a lower-class demos to whose tune they had to dance.

Graphe nomon me epitedeion theinai

An Athenian lawsuit (“public suit for proposing an inexpedient law”), available for one year against the proposer and indefinitely against the law (cf. Dem. Lept. 144 and hyp. 2.3), in fact on the grounds either that the law was inexpedient or that it was illegal. Keywords: Greek history; legal history

The Alleged Failure of Athens in the Fourth Century

The view that the successes of Macedon in the fourth century marked the failure, or the end, of the Greek polis is increasingly being abandoned, and some scholars are abandoning also the view that Athens was great and glorious in the fi fth century but degenerate in the fourth. However, the successes of Macedon meant for Athens the loss of that ultimate freedom which it had aspired to and had often enjoyed between the early fi fth century and the late fourth, freedom not merely from receiving orders from others but to give orders to others, and in this paper I explore the reasons for that change. Some scholars believe that fourth-century Athens was led astray by “the ghost of empire;” others believe that the Athenians were unwilling to pay for a response which could have defeated Philip; I argue that except in the years after Leuctra the ghost of empire did not have malign effects, and even with more expenditure Athens could not have defeated Philip. There was nothing fundamentally wrong with Athens in the fourth century, but Sparta’s success in the Hellespont in 387 and the resulting King’s Peace, the rule in Macedon of Philip II, who was too clever diplomatically and became too strong militarily for the Athenians, and Alexander’s succession in 336 and his success and survival in his campaigns, placed Athens in situations which it could not overcome.