CONTENTS
Preface......................................................................................................................7
Figures.....................................................................................................................9
References..............................................................................................................11
Contributors...........................................................................................................13
.
Ivan Ladynin
The ‘Crisis of the Pyramid-Builders’ in Herodotus Book 2
and Diodorus Book 2, and the Epochs of Egyptian History 1...............................15
P. J. Rhodes
Instability in the Greek Cities................................................................................27
Valerij Goušchin
Aristocracy in Democratic Athens: Deformation and/or Adaptation.....................47
Polly Low
Empire and Crisis in Fourth-Century Greece........................................................63
Yuri N. Kuzmin
The Antigonids, Caunus and the so-called ‘Era of Monophthalmus’:
Some Observations Prompted by a New Inscription.............................................73
Oleg L. Gabelko
‘A Tale of Two Cities’: Some Particulars of the Conquest of Cius and Myrlea
by the Kingdom of Bithynia..................................................................................87
T. J. Cornell
Crisis and Deformation in the Roman Republic:
The Example of the Dictatorship.........................................................................101
Amy Russell
The Tribunate of the Plebs as a Magistracy of Crisis..........................................127
Catherine Steel
The Roman Political Year and the End of the Republic......................................141
Natalia Almazova
The ‘Cultural Crisis’ in Rome on the Cusp of the Republic and Principate
as Seen in Russian Research in the Late 19th – Early 20th Centuries.................157
6
Contents
Pavel Rubtsov
Imperial Power in the Third and Fourth Centuries: Deformation or Evolution? 169
Aleksey Kamenskikh
The Dialectic of the Other: Political Philosophy and Practice
in the Late Neoplatonist Communities................................................................183
Index....................................................................................................................193
FIGURES
1. IKaunos 4, from Ch. Marek (ed.), Die Inschriften von Kaunos (Munich: Beck, 2006),
p. 134 (by permission of Prof. Ch. Marek)..............................................................................85
2. Region of Propontis: Campaigns of late third century. © Oleg L. Gabelko............................98
3.The stele of Nana: photograph by I. Luckert, from Ε. Pfuhl & Η. Möbius,
Die Ostgriechische Grabreliefs, ii (Mainz: Von Zabern, 1979), Taf. 189 Nr. 1273................99
4.The stele of Nikasion: (a) upper part; (b) lower part: drawings from P. Le Bas et al.,
Voyage archéologique en Grèce et en Asie mineure: Planches de topographie,
de sculpture et d’architecture (Paris: Firmin-Didot, 1888), pl. 131. 1 and 2...........................99
5. Coin of Cius (second half of fourth century): photograph from
Tantalus Online Coin Registry, S/N 37110............................................................................100
PREFACE
The Higher School of Economics is one of Russia’s National Research Universities:
it has campuses in Moscow and three other cities, and at Perm (on the west flank of
the Urals) it has a Section of Historical Research, with a particular interest in the
ancient world of Greece and Rome. This Section has undertaken a major research
programme on ancient civil communities, with V. G. as the Leading Research
Fellow and P. J. R. as an Academic Supervisor. As part of this programme, in Sep­
tem­ber 2014, an international conference was held on Deformations and Crises in
Ancient Civil Communities, with speakers both from Russia and from the United
Kingdom, and here we publish papers from that conference.
Some of our speakers address broad topics within our theme: instability in the
Greek cities, the adaptation of aristocrats to the democracy of Athens, empire and
crisis in fourth-century Greece; in the Roman Republic the dictatorship, the tribunate, changes in institutional arrangements which had far-reaching but unforeseen
consequences; also in Rome the transtition from the Middle to the Late Empire.
Others focus on particular case studies: a ‘crisis of the pyramid-builders’ in Egypt
which Herodotus misdated by more than a millennium; two problematic episodes in
the hellenistic world, concerning Caunus, and Cius and Myrlea; in the Roman
world, in connection with the transition from the Republic to the Principate an examination (particularly suitable for a Russian conference) of the interpretations of
Russian scholars a century ago, and, finally, the survival of Neoplatonic communities in the Late Empire.
We are very grateful to all our speakers, who converged on Perm from the
United Kingdom and from various places in Russia, and who good-naturedly responded to our pressure to let us have their English texts; to all those at the Higher
School of Economics who have supported our work, and particularly to our Mana­
ger, Anna Shtennikova; to the Perm State Opera, whose performance of Eugene
Onegin we enjoyed; and to the Publishers and all who have been involved in the
production of this book.
V. G., P. J. R.
REFERENCES
The titles of periodicals are abbreviated as in L’Année Philologique, with the usual
anglophone divergences (principally, AJP etc. for AJPh etc.); notice also JAOS
(Journal of the American Oriental Society). Ancient authors and their works, collections of texts and other standard works of reference are abbreviated as in the
fourth edition (2012) of the Oxford Classical Dictionary.
CONTRIBUTORS
Natalia S. Almazova is Associate Professor in the School of History, Faculty of
Humanities, National Research University ‘Higher School of Economics’, Moscow.
T. J. Cornell is Emeritus Professor of Ancient History, University of Manchester.
Oleg L. Gabelko is Professor in the Department of Ancient History, Institute for
Oriental and Classical Studies, Russian State University for the Humanities,
Moscow.
Valerij Goušchin is Leading Research Fellow in the Section of Historical
Research, National Research University ‘Higher School of Economics’, Perm.
Aleksey Kamenskikh is Associate Professor in the Department of Humanities,
National Research University ‘Higher School of Economics’, Perm.
Yuri N. Kuzmin is Assistant Professor in History, Samara Branch of Moscow City
Pedagogical University.
Ivan A. Ladynin is Associate Professor in the Department of Ancient History,
Faculty of History, Lomonosov Moscow State University.
Polly Low is Senior Lecturer in Ancient History, University of Manchester.
P. J. Rhodes is Honorary and Emeritus Professor of Ancient History, University of
Durham.
Pavel Rubtsov is Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology and Political
Science, Ural State Pedagogical University (Ekaterinburg).
Amy Russell is Lecturer in Classics and Ancient History University of Durham.
Catherine Steel is Professor of Classics, University of Glasgow.
THE ‘CRISIS OF THE PYRAMID-BUILDERS’ IN HERODOTUS
BOOK 2 AND DIODORUS BOOK 2, AND THE EPOCHS OF
EGYPTIAN HISTORY
Ivan Ladynin
Ancient Egypt, as everyone knows, is by no means a classical civil community;
moreover, from its early time (probably, after the mid third millennium b. c.)
Egyptian society lacked free rural communities, which might be called analogous
to classical civil communities in other Near Eastern lands.1 However, the Greek
city-states were in a resonating contact with Egypt throughout their existence; and
the tradition of describing Egypt launched already in the Greek archaic period continued well into the hellenistic and Roman periods, when civil communities were
no longer true independent states. This tradition served as a cornerstone to the study
of Egypt in modern times – a cornerstone notoriously neglected by many contemporary Egyptologists. The present paper deals with an episode which was perceived
in its classical reflection as a severe crisis in the history of ancient Egypt. The specific problem to be touched upon is the misplacement of this episode in the sequence of historical events, which at the first glance seems a gross mistake of the
classical writers. The aim of this paper is to come to a better knowledge of who was
responsible for this mistake, and if it is a mistake in the proper sense of the word;
hopefully, a conclusion on this will illustrate how far Greek understanding went in
perceiving the past of this alien people with its specific turning points.
The best-known description of the pyramid-building is found in Herodotus
Book Two (Hdt. 2.124–34);2 however, it is inadvisable to treat that apart from a
much less known account by Diodorus Siculus in Book One of his Library of
History (Diod. Sic. 1.63.2–64).3 There seem to be no reasons to doubt that Diodorus’
Book One was largely built on the work on Egypt compiled in the late fourth century by Hecataeus of Abdera at the court of Ptolemy (possibly, still when he was a
satrap of Egypt).4 Herodotus should not be treated apart from Hecataeus reproduced
1
2
3
4
Yu. Ya. Perepyolkin, ‘Menovye otnoshenia v staroegipetskom obshchestve (The Exchange in
the Egyptian Society of the Old Kingdom)’, in Sovetskoe vostokovedenie (Soviet Oriental
Studies) vi (Moscow/Leningrad: Academic Press, 1949), 302; I. Ladynin, Rev.: P. Andràssy,
Untersuchungen zum ägyptischen Staat des Alten Reiches und seinen Institutionen, BO
lxxi.1–2 2014, 138.
See general commentary: A. B. Lloyd, Herodotus Book II, Commentary 99–182 (Études
préliminaires aux religions orientales dans l’Empire Romain 43) (Leiden: Brill, 1988), 62–86.
See general commentary: A. Burton, Diodorus Siculus: Book I. (Études preliminaires des
religions orientales dans l’Empire Romain 29) (Leiden: Brill, 1972), 187–92.
E. Schwartz, ‘Hekataeos von Teos’, RM xl 1885, 223–62; E. Schwartz, ‘Diodoros (38)’, in RE
v (1905), 669–72; F. Jacoby, ‘Hekataios aus Abdera’, in RE vii (1912), 2750–69; O. Murray,
16
Ivan Ladynin
by Diodorus, as their accounts are the only ones inside the classical tradition available to us that trace the Egyptian history in all its length. Shortly after Hecataeus
there appeared the famous work by Manetho of Sebennytos;5 and some of its stories
allude to Herodotus. However, Manetho’s scheme of Egyptian history is different
from those of classical authors (and, needless to say, more adequate to the reality).
As for Herodotus and Hecataeus, it has already been observed that the latter not
seldom narrated the same stories as the former; however, he rather addressed their
different and somewhat expanded versions, probably, taken independently from
Egyptian tradition.6 The same applies to the outline of the Egyptian history given
by these authors: Hecataeus/Diodorus’ scheme is richer than that of Herodotus, it
gives a longer sequence of kings and a subdivision of periods nearly lacking with
Herodotus; but both authors highlight mostly the same figures arranged in the same
order. One might say that Herodotus and Hecataeus give two different versions –
one shorter and rougher, another more detailed and skilled – of basically the same
scheme, which, speaking fairly, could have only an Egyptian origin7; thus there is
every reason to consider the stories narrated by both these authors in comparison.
Herodotus’ story of the pyramid-builders is known for a series of errors it contains. The description of the building process itself (Hdt. 2.125) is perhaps accurate;
however, the second pyramid-builder, Chephren (id. 127.1: accusative Χεφρῆνα
5
6
7
‘Hecataeus of Abdera and Pharaonic Kingship’, JEA lvi 1970, 144–50; S. Burstein, ‘Hecataeus
of Abdera’s History of Egypt’, in J. H. Johnson (ed.), Life in a Multi-Cultural Society: Egypt
from Cambyses to Constantine and Beyond (Studies in the Ancient Oriental Civilisations 51)
(Chicago: Oriental Institute, 1992), 45–9; J. Dillery, ‘Hecataeus of Abdera: Hyperboraeans,
Egypt and Interpretatio Graeca’, Historia xlvii 1998, 255–75 at 256 n. 4; S. A. Stephens, Seeing
Double: Intercultural Poetics in Ptolemaic Alexandria (Hellenistic Culture and Society 37)
(Berkeley & Los Angeles: U. of California P., 2003), 32, n. 35; R. B. Gozzoli, The Writing of
History in Ancient Egypt during the First Millenium b. c. (ca. 1070–180 b. c.): Trends and
Perspectives (Golden House Publications Egyptology 5) (London: Golden House, 2006), 193–
4. An alternative view, Burton (n. 3 above); fair criticism of it, reviews by A. B. Lloyd, JEA lx
1974, 287–9; O. Murray, JHS xcv 1975, 214–5.
J. Dillery, ‘Manetho’, in T. Whitmarsh & S. Thomson (edd.), The Romance between Greece
and the East (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 2013), 38–59.
See below about their transmission of the names of the pyramid-builders; about Moiris, the
maker of Lake Moiris, for whom Herodotus states this commitment (Hdt. 2.101.2) and
Hecataeus/Diodorus explains (rightly) that it was intended to prevent the deficiency of water
(Diod. Sic.1.52.1); cf. on the story about Darius and the statues of Sesostris/Sesoosis in these
two versions: Burton (n. 3, above), 26–9; A. Ivantchik, ‘Eine griechische Pseudo-Historie. Der
Pharao Sesostris und der skytho-ägyptische Krieg’, Historia xlviii 1999, 406–7.
The arguments for this is the abundance of allusions to Egyptian phenomena and their adequate
descriptions in both narratives (see, passim, the comments of A. B. Lloyd and A. Burton), as
well as the structuring of their information into sequences of reigns that actually corresponded
to the epochs known to the Egyptians themselves (see on Herodotus Gozzoli [n. 4, above],
172–3). The only possible alternative to Herodotus’ and Hecataeus’ borrowing from Egyptians
is the assumption that they invented their information, perhaps, only pinning it to some authentic pieces of narrative. If this was the case, one should go further and propose that Herodotus’
‘invention’ of Egyptian history was somehow canonised for Hecataeus, who amplified it inventing a number of new stories but left untouched the setting found in Herodotus; but the
improbability of such a course seems self-evident.
The ‘Crisis of the Pyramid-Builders’ in Herodotus Book 2 and Diodorus Book 2
17
<*Χεφρήν < #ay.f-Ra ‘He appears, Re’,8 Khafre), is called the brother of Cheops
(id. 124.1, etc.: accusative Χέοπα <*Χέοψ <#wy.f-w(i)-$nmw ‘He protects me,
Chnum’,9 Khufu, according to the first part of this name), though in the historical
Egyptian Dynasty IV Khafre was certainly Khufu’s son (this error might have occurred because either Herodotus or his Egyptian informers knew that Khafre’s predecessor, the historical king Djedefre, really was his brother but confused him with
a much better-known Khufu).10 There might be another inconsistency, as Herodotus
says that Mycerinus (Hdt. 2.129.1: accusative Μυκερῖνον <*Μυκερῖνος < MnkAw-Ra, ‘Firm are the Doubles of Re’,11 Menkaure was Chephren’s son and followed him directly, though some Egyptian sources indicate between them one more
king, Baufre;12 but there is not much clarity on that point as to the Egyptian sources
themselves.13 Hecataeus of Abdera seems to have known the history of Dynasty IV
better: according to Diodorus, there were also three pyramid-builders: Chemmis
(1.63.2: Χέμμις, with the name-form corresponding to the second component of the
historical Cheops’ full name), his brother Cephren (1.64.1: Κεφρήν), who alternatively was thought to be his son and to be called Chabryes (a transcription which fits
much better the original Egyptian form; ibid.: acc. Χαβρύην <*Χαβρύης), and
Mycerinus (1.64.6: Μυκερῖνος), who was called alternatively Mencherinus (accusative Μεγχερῖνον <*Μεγχερῖνος; ibid.). Thus Hecataeus was aware both of
Herodotus’ version of this dynastic sequence and of another one which was in a
better relation to the Egyptian realities and certainly derived from Egyptian informers.
However, the most blatant error attested for both these authors is the position of
the pyramid-builders within the sequence of the Egyptian history: their time was
placed after the reigns which correspond in all probability to the historical New
Kingdom, and before the reigns which should correspond to the Libyan period of
the early first millennium. According to Herodotus, Cheops was the successor of
Rhampsinitus (Hdt. 2.121: acc. Ῥαμψίνιτον < Ῥαμψίνιτος), and it was specially
remarked that until the time of that king ‘Egypt … was altogether well governed
and prospered greatly’, in contrast to what started under Cheops (2.124.1).
Herodotus’ story of Rhampsinitus (2.121–3)14 is marked with every feature of a
folklore tale, and its meaning is quite clear: it tells of a cunning king, whose morale
was not unimpeachable but who nevertheless managed to run his country well.
There is a reason to bear in mind the ambivalence of this image and the contrast
between the reigns of Rhampsinitus and Cheops. In the scheme of Hecataeus
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
J. von Beckerath, Handbuch der ägyptischen Königsnamen (Münchner ägyptologische Studien
49) (Mainz: Zabern, 21999), 54–5.
Beckerath (n. 8, above), 52–3.
Lloyd (n. 2, above), 74.
Beckerath (n. 8, above), 54–5.
Lloyd (n. 2, above), 76–7.
J. von Beckerath, ‘Baef-Re’, in W. Helck, E. Otto & W. Westendorf (edd.), Lexikon der
Ägyptologie (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1972–92), i. 600.
Lloyd (n. 2, above), 52–60.
18
Ivan Ladynin
Chemmis is the eighth successor of Remphis (Diod. Sic. 1.62.2: Ῥέμφις)15, who is
a clear equivalent of Rhampsinitus (perhaps this name is an extension of the root of
the name ‘Remphis’ with a frequent Late Egyptian royal epithet zA-Nt, ‘son of
Neith’16). The negative features of this image are articulated by Hecataeus/Diodorus
much more neatly than by Herodotus: Remphis is in the first place a niggard, who
amassed a ‘treasure larger than any king before him’ but was reluctant to spend
money on offerings to gods and benefactions to his subjects. Symptomatically, closing the temples and the cessation of offerings was ascribed to Cheops by Herodotus
(Hdt. 2.124.1; cf. note 1 above) and said to have continued under Chephren (2.127.1,
129.1); but this is not stated of these two kings by Hecataeus/Diodorus, and so this
feature seems to be fully transferred in their tradition on Remphis. The successors
of Remphis between him and Chemmis were all ‘confirmed sluggards and devoted
only to indulgence and luxury’, except for the king called Nileus (genitive Νειλέως
< Νειλέυς), who constructed many canals (2.63.1). Thus, Hecataeus/Diodorus tells
about a sort of ‘negative trend’ in Egyptian history which started with Remphis and
continued into the reigns of the pyramid-builders (both Herodotus and Diodorus
define this as the time of extreme hardship: Hdt. 2.128; Diod. Sic.1.64.4–6).
However, who is Rhampsinitus, or Remphis? It is evident that the stem of the
name resembles the Egyptian name ‘Ramesses’. For those preferring to define a
precise prototype of this figure the choice lies between Ramesses II17 and Ramesses
III.18 In due course, A. B. Lloyd proposed that Rhampsinitus is a ‘composite creation embodying the Ramesses Pharaohs of the New Kingdom, though the mesmeric
figure of Ramesses II may have made a particularly important contribution’.19 This
judgement is true as a matter of principle; nevertheless it skips certain details, especially coming from the comparison of Herodotus’ and Hecataeus’ traditions. Even
with Herodotus there is a detail associated with Ramesses II but detached from the
image of Rhampsinitus: the erection of two colossi before the Memphite temple of
Hephaestus ascribed to Sesostris (Hdt. 2.110); and the story connected with them is
reproduced in Hecataeus’ narration of Sesoosis (Diod. Sic. 1.58.4).20 As for
15 Burton (n. 3, above), 185–6.
16 Lloyd (n. 2, above), 52.
17 K. Sethe, Sesostris (Untersuchungen zur Geschichte und Altertumskunde Ägyptens 2.1)
(Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1900), 6 (partly because the figure of the king-warrior Sesostris/Sesoosis
that precedes the figure of Rhampsinitus/Remphis should replicate Senwosrets of Dynasty XII
and not Ramesses II).
18 Most earlier Egyptologists believed that Sesostris/Sesoosis is equivalent to Ramesses II (cf.
critically: Sethe [n. 17, above],4); thus it was logical to assume that Rhampsinitus/Remphis
must be the only later remarkable bearer of the name “Ramesses”, i. e. Ramesses III (cf. Burton
[n. 3, above], 185 n. 5).
19 A. B. Lloyd, ‘Herodotus’ Account of Pharaonic History’, Historia xxxvi 1988, 22–53 at 43; cf.
Lloyd (n. 2, above), 52.
20 This is a story of Darius’ intention to put his statue near the statues of Sesostris/Sesoosis, which
was prevented by a priest (or, according to Hecataeus/Diodorus, by an assembly of priests) as
Darius had not yet became equal to the Egyptian warrior-king in his deeds. The erection of
colossi to the west of the temple of Hephaestus by Rhampsinitus (Hdt. 2.121.1) was thought to
indicate his equivalence to Ramesses II (Burton (n. 3, above), 185). However, Herodotus certainly cannot mean in this case the same monuments, as in the story of Sesostris and Darius: the
The ‘Crisis of the Pyramid-Builders’ in Herodotus Book 2 and Diodorus Book 2
19
Hecataeus, there is a well-discernible replica of Ramesses II in his figure of
Osymandias (᾿Οσυμανδύας; Diod. Sic. 1.47–48): his name corresponds to the socalled ‘solar’ name of Ramesses II Wsr-mAat-Ra %tp.n-Ra (‘Mighty is the truth of Re,
Chosen by Re’),21 and his alleged tomb is certainly the Ramesseum, the funerary
temple of Ramesses II, with scenes showing his wars with the Hittites22. Notably,
the scenes in the tomb of Osymandias depicted ‘the war which the king waged
against those Bactrians who had revolted’ (Diod. Sic. 1.48.1); and in later time the
topos of contacts with Bactria reflected Ramesses II’s interplay with the Hittites and
was connected with the king remembered as Ramesses.23 Thus the appearance of
Osymandias in the narration of Hecataeus/Diodorus makes it clear that if the figure
of Remphis was influenced by the memory of Ramesses II, it was somehow totally
purified of any military character, which was completely transferred to Osymandias.
Actually, the figure of Herodotus’ Rhampsinitus is also peaceful; and this, incidentally, makes problematic the direct equation of this character not only with Ramesses
II, but also with Ramesses III, whose important activity was the repulsion of the Sea
Peoples24. Thus, Rhampsinitus, or Remphis, appears at the position marked in real
history by the bearers of the name ‘Ramesses’, therefore corresponding to the second half of the New Kingdom; but the message of this figure is somehow different
from what might be expected.
An important characteristic of Rhampsinitus, or Remphis, is his chronological
relation to the Trojan War. Both Herodotus and Hecataeus/Diodorus placed him
after Proteus, who is said to be contemporary with it (Hdt. 2.112–20; Diod. Sic.
1.62.1); besides, Hecataeus placed among the seven kings between Remphis and
Chemmis the king Nileus (Gen. Νειλέως), ‘from whom the river came to be called
21
22
23
24
emphasis laid by both Herodotus and Hecataeus on the plan of Darius makes improbable that
the monuments involved in it would be confused with some other. For the colossi of Sesostris/
Sesoosis there is some degree of certainty that they are the colossi of Ramesses II at Mit
Rahineh (Lloyd [n. 2, above], 36–37); for the colossi of Rhampsinitus there is no substantiated
identification.
Beckerath (n. 8, above), 154–5; Burton (n. 3, above), 148.
Burton (n. 3, above), 148–52)
Cf. the Bentresh Stela, ascribing to Ramesses II contacts to the country of Bakhtan, i. e. probably Bactria (K. A. Kitchen, Ramesside Inscriptions: Historical and Biographical, ii (Oxford:
Blackwell, 1979), 284–7; K. Ryholt, ‘Imitatio Alexandri in Egyptian Literary Tradition’, in T.
Whitmarsh & S. Thomson (edd.), The Romance between Greece and the East (Cambridge:
Cambridge U. P., 2013), 66–8), and a statement by Tacitus ascribing to the king Rhamses the
possession of the Bactrians, among other lands and peoples (Tac. Ann. 2.60; B. Kelly, ‘Tacitus,
Hermanicus and the Kings of Egypt’, CQ2 lx 2010, 221–37; Ryholt (op. cit.), 63–4.
There is a reason to believe that the wars against the Sea Peoples were reflected in Manetho’s
story about the king Amenophis and his son Sethos-Ramesses and their struggle with Egyptian
lepers allied with Hyksos (Manetho, fr. 54 Waddell): I. A. Ladynin & A. A. Nemirovsky, ‘K
evoluzii vospriatia amarnskih zarey i Horemheba v ideologicheskoy i istoricheskoy tradizii
drevnego Egipta’ (On the Evolution of the Attitude Towards the Amarna Kings and Horemheb
in the Ideological and Historical Tradition of Ancient Egypt)’ in A. A. Nemirovsky & O. I.
Pavlova (edd.), Drevniy Vostok: Obshchnost’ i svoeobrazie kulturnyh tradiziy (Ancient Orient:
Unity and Diversity of Cultural Traditions) (Moscow: Institute for Oriental Research, 2001),
92–9.
20
Ivan Ladynin
the Nile, though formerly called Aegyptus’ (1.63.1). A fragment ascribed to
Eratosthenes and reinterpreting the sequence of Egyptian (‘Theban’) kings (FGrH
610 F 1)25 lists as the thirty-eighth among them ‘Thuoro, or the Nile’ (Θουορῶ
ἤτοι Νεῖλος) preceded by ‘Siphthas’ (Σιφθὰς). At the same time Manetho put
‘Thuoris’ at the very end of Dynasty XIX (Manetho, frs. 55–6 Waddell: Θούορις,
Thuoris), and he must be equivalent to the historical queen Tawosret, who was really preceded by the king Saptah.26 Manetho says that in the reign of Thuoris Troy
was captured; so the equivalence of the king ‘Nile’ with Thuoris again brings the
reign of Remphis quite close to the Trojan War. Historically this event must have
been connected with a vast migration, which affected Egypt with the advent of the
so-called Sea Peoples;27 and the kings Sethnakhte and Ramesses III, who fought its
‘second wave’, are conflated in the Manethonian tradition in a single figure of
‘Sethos (and) Ramesses’ (Manetho, fr. 54 Waddell = Joseph. Ap. 1.245: Σέθων
τὸν καὶ Ῥαμεσσῆν) or simply ‘Rampses’ (1.251: Ῥάμψης) or ‘Ramesses’
(Manetho, fr. 55.4 Waddell: Ῥαμεσσῆς), placed in the king-list one generation
before Thuoris (see note 24). This is quite similar to the position of Remphis before
Nileus in Hecataeus’ sequence of kings; and this similarity should, if anything, reinforce the idea that Rhampsinitus/Remphis is equivalent to Ramesses III. Anyway,
the proximity to the Trojan War defines perfectly well the position of this figure not
just in relative but also in absolute chronology: the border of the thirteenth and
twelfth centuries.28
The aftermath of the pyramid-builders is defined more neatly by Hecataeus/
Diodorus: in this tradition their successor is Bocchoris (Βόκχορις; Diod. Sic.
1.65.1), who is characterised as both arrogant and wise and, in another fragment, as
the fourth greatest legislator of Egypt (1.79, 94.5).29 This tradition says that his
reign was followed by the attack of Ethiopians under the king Sabaco (Σαβάκων;
the historical king Shabaka of Napata, founder of Dynasty XXV) only ‘much later’
(1.65.2: πολλοῖς δ’ ὕστερον χρόνοις); however, Manetho states that Bocchoris
was burned by Sabaco (frs. 66–7 Waddell), and the authentic data prove, at least,
the immediate proximity of their reigns. According to Herodotus, the Ethiopian
advance closely followed the time of the pyramid-builders: Mycerinus was succeeded by Asychis (acc. Ἄσυχιν; Hdt. 2.136), and his successor Anysis (acc.
Ἄνυσιν) faced the attack on Egypt by Sabaco (acc. Σαβακῶν; 2.137). There is no
controversy on the identity of Bocchoris: he is believed to correspond to the histor25
26
27
28
A. Möller, ‘Epoch-making Eratosthenes’, GRBS xlv 2005, 245–60 at 258–9.
K. A. Kitchen, ‘Tausret’, in Lexikon der Ägyptologie (n. 13, above), vi. 244–5.
C. A. H.2 iii. 2 (1975), 363–71.
Nearly the same figure is indicated in the calculation of Dicaearchus of Messana as quoted by
Apollonius of Rhodes: ‘From Sesonchosis to the kingship of Nilus was 2,500 years, <from the
kingship of Nilus to the destruction of Ilium was 7 years>, from the capture of Ilium to the first
Olympiad was 436 years, altogether 2,943 years (schol. Ap. Rhod. 4.276 = Dicaearchus, fr. 59
Fortenbaugh: γίνεται δὲ ἀπὸ Σεσογχώσεως ἐπὶ τὴν Νείλου βασιλείαν ἔτη βφ′, <ἀπὸ δὲ
τῆς Νείλου βασιλείας ἐπὶ τὴν ᾿Ιλίου ἅλωσιν ζ′>, ἀπὸ δὲ τῆς ᾿Ιλίου ἁλώσεως ἐπὶ τὴν α′ ᾿Ο
λυμπιάδα υλς′, ὁμοῦ βϡμγ′). If the year of the first Olympiad is 776/5, the kingship of Nilus
must be c. 1219–1212.
29 A. Moret, De Bocchori rege (Paris: Leroux, 1903); Burton (n. 3, above), 194, 231–2.
The ‘Crisis of the Pyramid-Builders’ in Herodotus Book 2 and Diodorus Book 2
21
ical king of this name (BAk-n-rn.f) who reigned before the Nubian conquest of
Egypt in the mid 710s.30 Things are more difficult with Asychis, though A. B. Lloyd
gave a number of reasons to identify him with the founder of the Libyan Dynasty
XXI Shoshenq I31. Even so this figure marks not an individual reign but rather the
entire Libyan period in the history of Egypt; however, one might think about the
identity of Asychis with the father of Bocchoris, Tephnakhte (with the Horus name
siA-Xt, ‘Knowing (things) with his belly, heart’,32 easily transformed into ‘Asychis’
in Greek transmission).33 Anyway, both Herodotus and Hecataeus place a figure
symbolising the pre-Ethiopian epoch after the pyramid-builders; thus they somehow insert their rule between the border of the thirteenth and twelfth centuries and
the late eighth century – instead of the mid third nillennium!
Those hypercritical of the classical evidence for Egypt (and especially of
Herodotus Book Two) would hardly need any explanation for this anachronism: it
would go well with the assumption that such evidence came from the classical writers themselves rather than from Egyptians.34 Fortunately, Russian scholarship is
immune to hypercriticism35; and much has been done by now to show the abundance of Egyptian realities in the evidence of Herodotus and Hecataeus (see notes
2 and 3). Before accusing them or their informants of ignorance and mistake it is
advisable to try explaining this anachronism within the Egyptian view of the past in
the mid first millennium.
To do this one has to address the reflection of the pyramid-building in authentic
Egyptian tradition: there this epoch is assessed most frankly in works of fiction. The
king Khufu is a protagonist of the Tales of the Papyrus Westcar, a text which might
date back in its kernel to the First Intermediate Period (late third millennium)36: it
30
31
32
33
H. de Meulenaere, ‘Bokchoris’, in Lexikon der Ägyptologie (n. 13, above), i. 846.
Lloyd (n. 2, above), 88.
Beckerath (n. 8, above), 202–3.
Hecataeus/Diodorus calls Sasychis (acc. Σάσυχιν) the second greatest lawgiver of Egypt, who
‘made sundry additions to the existing laws and, in particular, laid down with the greatest precision the rites to be used in honouring the gods, and he was the inventor of geometry and
taught his countrymen both to speculate about the stars and to observe them’ (Diod. Sic. 1.94.3);
thus Sasychis appears to be a cultural hero, like Menas at the beginning of Egyptian history
(1.45.1). However, in connection with Menas Hecataeus mentions Tnephachthus (acc.
Τνέφαχθον), the father of Bocchoris, who on a campaign in Arabia cursed Menas for inventing a luxurious and depraving life (1.45.2). The ruler so indignant against the first cultural hero
is likely to become a second one: perhaps the stories about Sasychis and Tnephachthus reproduce the same story of Hecataeus’ informants on the founder of Dynasty XXIV.
34 W. A. Heidel, Hecataeus and the Egyptian Priests in Herodotus, Book II (New York/London:
Garland, 1987); O. K. Armayor, ‘Did Herodotus Ever Go to Egypt?’ JARCE xv 1978, 59–73;
O. K. Armayor, ‘Sesostris and Herodotus’ Autopsy of Thrace, Colchis, Inland Asia Minor, and
the Levant’, HSP lxxxiv 1980, 51–74; O. K. Armayor, Herodotus’Autopsy of the Fayoum: Lake
Moeris and the Labyrinth of Egypt (Amsterdam: Gieben, 1985).
35 I. E. Surikov, ‘Gerodot i egipetskie zhrezi (K voprosu ob “otze istorii” kak ob “otze lzhi”)’
(Herodotus and the Egyptian Priests (The ‘Father of History’ as the ‘Father of Lies?’), in
Issedon: Almanah po drevney istorii i kulture (Issedon: An Almanac of Ancient History and
Culture), iv (Ekaterinburg: Ural State University, 2007), 7–25.
36 A. M. Blackman, The Story of King Kheops and the Magicians, Transcribed from Papyrus
22
Ivan Ladynin
depicts Khufu as a headstrong ruler obsessed with the erection of his tomb and
immolating humanity and moral for the sake of his desires, or even amusement
(meeting a wizard able to reattach a head, which has been cut off, he immediately
orders an execution to be performed to see his skill). Two points of this composition
are important. First, the wizard coming to Khufu’s court predicts that in two generations (probably, after the next pyramid-builders Khafre and Menkaure) his dynasty
will be replaced with a new one taking its origin from a simple priestly family. After
the wizard’s omen Khufu tries to prevent this course; however, the supreme god Re
makes the same prediction and sends minor deities to deliver the mother of future
kings. In Egyptian ideas the birth of a new king and his advent to power were totally
in the hands of the supreme god: he engendered the future king himself and to that
effect chose a woman to mate with37. If he made his choice outside the royal family,
he wished to oust it from power and would not do that without some motive.
Undoubtedly, in the case of Khufu the motive was his unfair doings: probably the
supreme god has already engendered Khufu’s son and grandson and could not deprive them of their kingship, but it was possible for him not to allow any further
birth of kings within this family. Secondly, the Tales of the Papyrus Westcar stress
the fact that the successors of Khufu’s dynasty will fill the altars of gods with sacrifices. However, this is a normal task of an Egyptian king; and highlighting it hints
that this made a huge contrast to the condition that preceded the accession of this
new dynasty. Probably Khufu neglected the worship of gods because of his obsession with his pyramid, and this must have been another reason for replacing his
dynasty; here the Tales of the Papyrus Westcar resonate with an over-coloured
statement of Herodotus that Khufu closed the Egyptian temples and totally stopped
sacrifices (Hdt. 2.124.1)38.
Another work of fiction containing an implicit assessment of the pyramid-builders is the Prophesies of Neferty, dating back to the early Dynasty XII (twentieth
century)39. There the predecessor of Khufu, king Snofru, wished to be entertained
and invited his court wizard Neferty; he asked to tell him something interesting
about the future, and Neferty foretold to him a natural and social catastrophe in
Egypt in some perspective. This catastrophe meant a distortion and partly an inversion of the normal order of things and laws; and it had to cease as soon as the new
legitimate king Ameny ascended to throne and was able to perform the necessary
Westcar (Berlin Papyrus 3033) (Reading: J. V. Books, 1988); for the question of dating see:
O. D. Berlev, Obshchestvennye otnoshenia v Egipte Srednego zarstva (Social Relations in the
Middle Kingdom Egypt) (Moscow: Nauka, 1978), 121; A. Stauder, Linguistic Dating of Middle
Egyptian Literary Texts (Lingua Aegyptia Studia Monographica, 12) (Hamburg: Widmayer,
2013), 132.
37 O. D. Berlev, ‘The Eleventh Dynasty in the Dynastic History of Egypt’, in: D. W. Young (ed.),
Studies presented to H. J. Polotsky (Beacon Hill, Mass.: Eisenbrauns, 1981), 362–3.
38 A. E. Demidchik, Bezymyannaya piramida: Gosudarstvennaya doktrina drevneegipetskoy
Gerakleopolskoy monarchii (Nameless Pyramid: The State Doctrine of the Ancient Egyptian
Heracleopolitan Monarchy) (St.Petersburg: Aletheia, 2005), 92.
39 W. Helck, Die Prophezeiung des Nfr.tj (Kleine ägyptische Texte 2) (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz,
1992).
The ‘Crisis of the Pyramid-Builders’ in Herodotus Book 2 and Diodorus Book 2
23
rites. The name of Ameny, i. e. the first king of Dynasty XII Amenemhat I40, allows
the catastrophe predicted by Neferty to be dated: this is undoubtedly the First
Intermediate Period, i. e. the epoch of Egypt’s decentralisation after the Old King­
dom, caused by some internal problems and in due course reinforced by the ecological crisis. The accent on the point that Ameny would be able to perform the ritual
effectively shows that the situation was the opposite before him: probably the chaos
in Egypt started when the ritual exchange between the mundane and the divine
stopped owing to the rejection of sacrifices by gods. However, the latter effect must
have been prompted by some fault of the terrestrial Egyptian kings, who performed
the rituals. The Prophesies of Neferty do not say explicitly what that fault was, and
the troubles of Egypt in the First Intermediate Period were presented just as something inevitable. Nevertheless it is significant that the mise en scene of this composition is specifically the reign of Snofru: it seems highly probable that the prediction
of Neferty at the court of Snofru alluded to the misdoings that would follow his
reign in the time of the pyramid-builders, would shatter the norm and cause the
disruption in the ritual exchange with the gods. All this will lead to the catastrophe
that Neferty describes openly.
Thus the images of Snofru and Khufu in authentic Egyptian tradition in a way
constitute the pair ‘good king – bad king’; and it is most faithfully reproduced in the
contrast between Rhampsinitus and Cheops according to Herodotus. The affinities
in these images go further than that: as already observed, there is some ambivalence
in the character of Rhampsinitus, beneficent in the material effects of his reign and
shrewd in his personal motives. In a way Snofru in the Prophecies of Neferty is
similar to Rhampsinitus: nothing deflates there the idea that Egypt is prosperous in
his reign, as was generally thought about him41, but he learns from Neferty serious
things instead of the amusement he expected; probably these serious things have to
be forced on him, contrary to his own quite selfish priorities. Perhaps this very motive is reinforced by the tradition of Hecataeus/Diodorus ascribing the urge for
wealth to Remphis and his successors. Finally, Snofru is a basically peaceful character in Egyptian tradition: it concentrated rather on the results of his commitments
inside the country than on activities abroad, though there were some activities
abroad in his reign. If the figure of Rhampinitus/Remphis is indeed an analogue of
Snofru, it is clear why it is so cleaned of any military aspect indispensable for the
bearers of the name ‘Ramesses’.
As for the king Bocchoris, who followed the pyramid-builders according to
Hecataeus/Diodorus, it emerges from Manetho (frs. 64, 65а Waddell) and some
pieces of even later evidence (Ael. N.A. 12.3; [Plut.] De Proverbiis Alexandrinorum,
21 (p. 12 Crusius); the Potter’s Oracle: POxy. xxii 2332. ii. 34; the Demotic Oracle
40 G. Posener, Littérature et politique dans l’Égypte de la XIIe dynastie (Bibliothèque de l’École
des Hautes Études, 307) (Paris: Champion, 1956), 21–60.
41 R. Stadelmann, ‘Snofru’, in Lexikon der Ägyptologie (n. 13, above), v. 994; see about the
Egyptian tradition on Snofru: D. Wildung, Die Rolle ägyptischer Könige im Bewußtsein ihrer
Nachwelt, i: Posthume Quellen über die Könige der ersten vier Dynastien (Münchner ägyptologische Studien, 17) (Berlin: Hessling, 1969), 105–51.
24
Ivan Ladynin
of the Lamb: PVindob. dem. 10000)42 that this ruler also was an ‘ambivalent’ figure,
to whom a lamb speaking with a human voice prophesied the troubles of Egypt
caused by foreign conquest. Though this prophecy went as far as the Persian and
even the hellenistic time, it is perfectly clear what conquest menaced Egypt immediately in the reign of Bocchoris: this was the Ethiopian conquest led by the king
Shabaka, i. e. Sabaco of the classical tradition. Thus in Hecataeus’ scheme the time
of the pyramid-builders appears as a threshold of a catastrophe, after which it became imminent. According to Herodotus, the last pyramid-builder Mycerinus, unlike his predecessors, behaved beneficently but was predicted to die an early death;
an oracle told him that Egypt was doomed to pass through hardship for 150 years,
and while 50 years of Cheops and 56 years of Chephren fitted this pattern, the beneficent rule of Mycerinus did not and for this reason his life had to be shortened
(Hdt. 2.133.3). The following reigns of Asychis and Anysis were not the time of
hardship either; however, for Sabaco was predicted 50 years of rule over Egypt
(Hdt. 2.139.3; cf. Diod. Sic. 1.65.2–8), and this must have been the real completion
of the trouble announced to Mycerinus. The figures given here by Herodotus speak
for themselves, though neither he nor Hecataeus dramatises the advent of Sababo:
moreover, they consider him a just and merciful king replacing the death penalty for
convicts with forced labour (Hdt. 2.137.3; Diod. Sic. 1.65.3). The very idea of
Egypt as doomed to pass through hardship resembles the fatalistic explanation for
the troubles of the First Intermediate Period in the Prophecy of Neferty. However,
the most important fact is that Herodotus’ story of Mycerinus does unite, though
somewhat indirectly, the period of pyramid-building and the Ethiopian conquest
into one epoch of major trouble. The way it is done somehow resembles the connection between the pyramid-building and the advent of the First Intermediate Period
that is felt in the authentic Egyptian tradition.
Thus the entire historical and moralistic construction which in the authentic
Egyptian tradition embraced the consecutive reigns of Snofru and Khufu and the
eventual epoch of major trouble seems to have been literally transplanted in the
traditions of Herodotus and Hecataeus, with a shift of some millennium and a half
later than its real timing. Is it, finally, possible to explain why this was done? To do
this one probably has to take into account two basic things. First, for Herodotus the
entire history of Egypt is divided into two sequences: the sequence of ancient kings
down to the so-called ‘priest of Hephaestus’ named Sethos, who ruled after Sabaco
and waged war with Assyria (Hdt. 2.141); and another sequence starting with the
epoch of the Dodecarchy and coming down to the Persian conquest. This division
is not so well seen in the account of Hecataeus, who gave a more detailed subdivision of earlier Egyptian history; nevertheless, the border between the conquest of
Sabaco and the epoch of the Dodecarchy is felt in his narration as well. In real history, the Nubian conquest of the late eighth century, subsequent Nubian rule and the
42 H.-J. Thissen, ‘Das Lamm des Bokchoris’, in A. Blasius & B. U. Schipper (edd.), Apokalyptik
und Ägypten: Eine kritische Analyse der relevanten Texte aus dem griechisch-römischen
Ägypten (Orientalia lovanensia analecta, 107) (Leuven: Peeters, 2002), 113–38; L. Koenen,
‘Die Apologie des Töpfers an König Amenophis oder das Töpferorakel’, in Blasius & Schipper
(edd.), op. cit., 139–87.
The ‘Crisis of the Pyramid-Builders’ in Herodotus Book 2 and Diodorus Book 2
25
shortcomings of the seventh century which brought to life the Saite state shaped the
state, and especially the society in which the Egyptian contemporaries of Herodotus
and Hecataeus lived; for them it was the dawn of their own modern, if not contemporary history, and this view is actually reflected in the chronological division registered by Herodotus. Secondly, in Herodotus’ narration the history of Egypt is not
interrupted by any crisis till the time of Cheops and his successors. It is not quite the
same with the narration of Hecataeus/Diodorus: according to that the cruel rule of
Amasis and the invasion of Ethiopian Actisanes into Egypt occurred still before
Remphis and Chemmis, sometime after Sesoosis (Diod. Sic. 1.60). This evidence is
somewhat strange, and its meaning and background in Hecataeus’ narration need a
special investigation; nevertheless the notion of a really serious crisis, which went
as far as the desire of Egyptians to throw the kings’ bodies out of their tombs and to
tear them apart (Diod. Sic. 1.64.5), was also connected for Hecataeus only with the
pyramid-builders. It seems that the Egyptian informants of both Herodotus and
Hecataeus somehow put an accent on the crisis and episode of transition that, as it
was said, opened their ‘modern history;, i. e. the Nubian rule. At the time the pyramid-building was notoriously known to them as a ‘model’ epoch of hardship profoundly connected with the following and also hard period of transition; thus they
preferred to place it before the period of transition, which was for them the most
topical.
This proposal allows us to explain the position given to the ‘crisis of the pyramid-builders’ by Herodotus and Hecataeus not through a mistake or unhelpful invention of theirs but though a basic imperfection in the information that they reproduced. Is it, however, the whole explanation? After all, the Late Egyptian ‘academic
historiography’ presented by Manetho put the epoch of pyramid-building where it
belonged, in Dynasty IV of the historical third millennium (Manetho, frs. 14–16
Waddell); why did Herodotus’ and Hecataeus’ informants depart from the truth that
seems to have been so well known? Things they reported were complicated and
authentic to Egyptian notions to a degree that would exclude a widely-spread idea
that they simply went back to the platitudinous information of tourist guides;43 so a
mistake of the kind has to be explained through some tendency rather than through
mere chance. Notably, Hecataeus speaks about the line of the ‘Theban kings’ (Diod.
Sic.1.45.4, 46.7), anonymous except for two Busiris (1.45.4) and Osymandias: this
line seems totally fictitious, for it duplicates the reigns of the historical second millennium described below in much more detail (1.50–65). Hecataeus’ informants
obviously tended to present Thebes as a more ancient capital of Egypt than
Memphis; and this is quite in accord with the apologies for Thebes known in the
Graeco-Roman epoch, for instance, in the so-called ‘temple monographs’.44
However, presenting Thebes an earlier capital of Egypt than Memphis would have
required their ‘changing places’ in the sequence of Egyptian history; and in
43 E. g., [W. W. How &] J. Wells, A Commentary on Herodotus with Introduction and Appendixes,
i (Oxford: Oxford U. P., 1912), 413.
44 D. von Recklinghausen, ‘Anspruch und Wirklichkeit: Ptolemäische Beschreibungen der Stadt
Theben,’ in: St. Pfeiffer (ed.), Ägypten unter fremden Herrschern zwischen persischer Satrapie
und römischer Provinz, (Oikumene, 3) (Frankfurt: Verlag Antike, 2007), 140–64.
26
Ivan Ladynin
Hecataeus’ scheme the later period (comprising the historical second and first millennia, from the king Uchoreus to the immediate predecessors of Alexander) was
really defined as Memphite (id. 50.3–7). Thus, as the pyramid-building was known
to have belonged to the Memphite epoch and to have preceded a transitional period,
it was natural to place it closely towards the end of the phase of that epoch which
was semi-legendary for Hecataeus’ informants, and earlier than the boundary separating it from their ‘modern time’, i. e. before the Ethiopian invasion. It is not as
easy to prove that the same ‘pro-Theban’ tendency affected the narration of
Herodotus; however, Theban inspiration can be felt in his assertion that the Theban
area had once been the only place in Egypt not covered with water (Hdt. 2.4.3), i. e.
it was undoubtedly the place of creation in Egyptian notions, and his evidence on
the number of Egyptian generations that had passed since the time of the gods is
connected with Theban priestly genealogies (2.142–3). Thus the tendency reproduced in Herodotus’ scheme of Egyptian history might be Theban also.
INSTABILITY IN THE GREEK CITIES1
P. J. Rhodes
Sparta in the classical period claimed to have had the same constitution since the
time of Lycurgus (after stasis and bad government before that),2 and Athens’ democracy was set aside in the classical period only in 411 and 404 b. c. after military
failures, and soon restored each time; so we are tempted to think of a stable world
dominated by the opposition between democratic Athens and oligarchic Sparta, as
the modern world for nearly half a century after the Second World War was a stable
world dominated by the opposition between the capitalist U. S. A. and the communist U. S. S. R. I shall say no more about the modern world; but the ancient Greek
world was in fact far from stable – even Athens and Sparta less so than we tend to
think.
1. SPARTA3
In Sparta from the late sixth century to the early fourth we know of a whole series
of crises centred on kings and regents: Anaxandridas II succeeded not by Dorieus
but by Cleomenes I;4 Demaratus removed by Cleomenes I, replaced by Leotychidas
I, and himself ending as an exile with the Persians;5 Cleomenes exiled, restored and
then driven to death or put to death;6 Leotychidas exiled for taking bribes in
Thessaly;7 Pausanias the regent accused of treason and eventually starved to death;8
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
My thanks to the ancient historians at the Higher School of Economics, Perm, for inviting me
to join in their work, and to all involved in the conference in September 2014; also to Mr. A. D.
Newell, Auditor of the Classical Society of University College, Dublin, and to all involved in
my visit to give the Auditor’s Inaugural Lecture in April 2015.
The books which come closest to the theme of this paper are A. W. Lintott, Violence, Civil Strife
and Revolution in the Classical City (London: Croom Helm, 1982), and H.-J. Gehrke, Stasis:
Untersuchungen zu den inneren Kriegen in den griechischen Staaten des 5. und 4. Jh. v. Chr.
(Vestigia xxxv. München: Beck, 1985), which go into far more detail than is possible in this
paper. R. Garland, Wandering Greeks: The Ancient Greek Diaspora from the Age of Homer to
the Death of Alexander the Great (Princeton U. P., 2014), focuses on a phenomenon connected
with the Greeks’ instability. For well-known episodes I give the principal sources only.
Hdt. 1.65.2–5, Thuc. 1.18.1.
Cf. Lintott (n. 1, above), 66–70 (in ch. 2).
Hdt. 5.39–48.
Hdt. 5.75.1, 6.51, 61–70.
Hdt. 6.74–5.
Hdt. 6.72.
Thuc. 1.94–5, 128–34.
28
P. J. Rhodes
Plistoanax exiled for taking bribes from Athens but later restored;9 Agis II succeeded not by his son Leotychidas, who was suspected of being a son of the
Athenian Alcibiades, but by his brother Agesilaus II;10 Pausanias the king exiled for
failing to support Lysander at Haliartus and then making a truce to withdraw;11 and
there were various other points at which there were serious disagreements between
the two kings. It must almost have been a relief to come to Cleomenes II, who
reigned from 370 to 309 and about whom, apart from that, hardly anything is
known.
Also there were trouble-makers from outside the royal families: c. 400 Lysander,
who wanted the traditional kings to be replaced by elected kings,12 and Cinadon,
who tried to unite all the lower orders against the Spartiates;13 further plots after
Sparta’s devastating defeat by Thebes in 371 at Leuctra.14 And, of course, there was
the ever-present problem of the helots and the Messenians (overlapping but not
identical categories): probably not a war in the 490’s, mentioned by Plato but not by
Herodotus;15 but the rumour that Pausanias the regent intrigued with them;16 the
Third Messenian War after the great earthquake of c. 464;17 suspicion of the helots
and devices to eliminate ambitious helots, mentioned by Thucydides;18 the liberation of the Messenians by Thebes after the battle of Leuctra19 – after which there
was a new problem as Sparta sought to recover what it had lost.20 And there was the
problem which Sparta failed to address, that of oliganthropia: a decline in citizen
numbers, from a notional 9,000 in the time of Lycurgus and 8,000 at the time of the
Persian Wars to perhaps 1,200 before the battle of Leuctra and 800 after.21
2. ATHENS22
Athens also was not as stable as is sometimes imagined. There was of course a good
deal of contention between rival political leaders, focused sometimes on personalities but sometimes (I believe) on matters of policy, and in the fifth century sometimes resolved when an ostracism removed the less successful rival and left the
9 Exiled, Thuc. 2.21.1 with 1.114.2; restored, 5.16.
10 Xen. Hell. 3.3.1–4.
11 Xen. Hell. 3.5.17–25.
12 Diod. Sic. 14.13.
13 Xen. Hell. 3.3.4–11.
14Plut. Ages. 32.6–12.
15Pl. Leg. III. 692d, 698d–e, explaining Sparta’s delay in going to Marathon: contrast Hdt.
6.105–6.
16 Thuc. 1.132.4–5.
17 Thuc. 1.101.2–103.3.
18 Thuc. 4.80.3–4, cf. 41.2, 55.1, 5.14.3.
19 Diod. Sic. 15.62–67.1 (Xen. Hell. 6.5.22–52 fails to mention this).
20 First in Xen. Hell. 7.1.27.
21 Lycurgus, Plut. Lyc. 8.5, 16.1; Persian Wars, Hdt. 7.234.1; after Leuctra, Arist. Pol. 2.1270a29–
31. Cf. e.g. G. E. M. de Ste. Croix, The Origins of the Peloponnesian War (London: Duckworth,
1972), 331–2, whose estimated figures I give.
22 Cf. Lintott (n. 1, above), 41–50 (in ch. 2), 125–84 (ch. 4).
Instability in the Greek Cities
29
more successful in a stronger position. More seriously, in the seventh century Cylon
tried to make himself tyrant, but the people rallied against him and his supporters
were killed in problematic circumstances.23 Solon’s attempt at the beginning of the
sixth century to strike a balance between the advantaged and the disadvantaged
failed to satisfy either, and was followed by the tyranny of the Pisistratids.24 After
the overthrow of the tyranny, Cleisthenes’ reform of the citizen body was enacted
after his success against Isagoras, who had the support of Cleomenes of Sparta.25 A
story reported by Plutarch is probably a later invention, that after the Persian Wars
Aristides, seeing that the demos deserved it, proposed a decree that the politeia
should be koine (‘common’, whatever that might mean) and that the archontes
should be appointed from all Athenians.26 But it seems clear that the move to a
fuller democracy by Ephialtes was opposed by Cimon, who is said to have wanted
to revive ‘the aristocracy of the time of Cleisthenes’,27 and whose enemies described him as both philolakon (pro-Spartan) and misodemos (anti-democratic).28
Cimon was ostracised; but Ephialtes himself was murdered not long afterwards,29
and there were rumours of an oligarchic plot linked with Cimon at the time of the
battle of Tanagra.30 Cimon’s relative Thucydides the son of Melesias was said in the
440’s, in opposing Pericles, to have created a greater polarisation of aristocrats and
democrats in Athens.31 Pericles, despite the historian Thucydides’ attempt to depict
him as a wise and unchallenged leader, faced further opposition in the 430’s, this
time probably from the democratic end of the spectrum32 – and even Thucydides
has to admit that when the Peloponnesian War began Pericles was accused of not
being belligerent enough in 431 and of being too belligerent in 430, in the second
case being deposed from his generalship and fined.33
In the 420’s we should perhaps take as seriously the view of the ‘Old Oligarch’
that Athens’ democracy was bad in principle but successful and stable34 as the tendency of the populist Cleon to see ‘conspirators’ everywhere.35 But by 415 the stability was wearing thin, and Thucydides reports that the religious scandals of that
23 Hdt. 5.71, Thuc. 1.126.3–12, Plut. Sol. 12.1–9 (cf. Ath. Pol. 1), schol. Ar. Eq. 445.
24 Ath. Pol. 5–19.
25 Hdt. 5.66, 69–73, Ath. Pol. 20–1.
26Plut. Arist. 22.1.
27Plut. Cim. 15.3.
28Plut. Per. 9.5.
29 Ath. Pol. 25.4, Antiph. 5. Herodes 68.
30 Thuc. 1.107.4, 6; cf. for Cimon Plut. Cim. 17.4–7, Per. 10.1–3.
31Plut. Per. 11–14, handled too sceptically by A. Andrewes, ‘The Opposition to Perikles’, JHS
xcviii 1978, 1–8.
32 Thuc. 2.65.5–13: contrast Plut. Per. 31.2–32, with F. J. Frost, ‘Pericles and Dracontides’, JHS
lxxxiv 1964, 69–72, ‘Pericles, Thucydides the Son of Melesias and Athenian Politics before the
War’, Historia xiii 1964, 385–99 = his Politics and the Athenians (Toronto: Kent, 2005), 270–
7, 278–97.
33 431, Thuc. 2.21–22.1; 430, 59, 65.1–4, deposition Diod. Sic. 12.45.4, Plut. Per. 35.4–5.
34 [Xen.] Ath. Pol.: for a date in the mid 420’s see e. g. J. L. Marr & P. J. Rhodes, The ‘Old
Oligarch’ (Oxford: Oxbow, 2008).
35 E. g. Ar. Eq. 626–31 (I assume that Aristophanes’ caricature was based on actual features of the
actual Cleon).
30
P. J. Rhodes
year were seen as a sign of a plot against the democracy:36 I suspect that that suspicion was unjustified – if there were plots, they were more probably against the
Sicilian expedition and against Alcibiades – but the fact that such plots could be
suspected is significant.
I do not need to discuss in detail here the oligarchic régimes of 411–410 and
404–403 and the mixtures of motives on both sides. What matters is that there was
a significant number of Athenians who, when the democracy was no longer delivering success, for different reasons did actively want or reluctantly accept oligarchy, while others remained staunchly opposed to them; and the result was a great
deal of bitterness, which persisted for a long time. Officially there was a reconciliation which began in 403, and was cemented in 401/0 when the semi-independent
oligarchic Eleusis was reincorporated into democratic Athens;37 but, in spite of a
ban on mnesikakein, what side a man had been on in the times of oligarchy could be
cited to his credit or discredit for a long time afterwards. Lysias XXVI. Dokimasia
of Evandrus was written in 382, when a man with an oligarchic background had
been appointed archon for the next year but was rejected in his dokimasia (the confirmation process which all men appointed to official positions in Athens had to
undergo); the appointment then went to Evandrus, who also had an oligarchic background, and Lysias’ speech is part of the attack on him in his dokimasia; but this
second attack failed, and Evandrus did hold office as archon in 382/1. Much later,
in 343, Aeschines says that in 346 he had mentioned among the episodes from history from which Athens should learn the oligarchy of the Thirty, which he knew
about because his father had gone into exile then and had joined in the democratic
restoration; later in the same speech he mentions the Thirty, the democratic restoration and the reconciliation; and in 330 he evokes the evils of the Thirty again.38
In the fourth century the political temperature was lower, because it was agreed
that the oligarchic régimes had been very bad, and that in Athens democracy was
the patrios politeia and should be upheld, but it became possible to combine allegiance to democracy with suggestions that improvements were possible.39 In the
late fifth century if one disliked the present state of affairs one was seen both by
oneself and by others as a revolutionary oligarch,40 but in the fourth century, while
in the philosophical schools of Plato and Aristotle the good and bad features of
different constitutions could be compared, in the world of practical politics even
Isocrates insisted that oligarchy was objectionable and that what he wanted was
simply the better kind of democracy which Athens had had in the past.41 In the first
36
37
38
39
Thuc. 6.27.3, 53.3, 60. 1i, 61.1–2.
Ath. Pol. 39–40.
Aeschin. 2. Embassy 77–8; 176; 3. Ctesiphon 234–5.
See e. g. P. J. Rhodes, ‘Appeals to the Past in Classical Athens’, in G. Herman (ed.), Stability
and Crisis in the Athenian Democracy (Historia Einz. ccxx 2011), 13–30 at 22–3, developing
a point made by R. Osborne, ‘Changing the Discourse’, in K. A. Morgan (ed.), Popular
Tyranny: Sovereignty and its Discontents in Ancient Greece (Austin: U. of Texas P., 2003),
251–72 = his Athens and Athenian Democracy (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 2010), 267–87(–
88).
40 E. g. [Xen.] Ath. Pol. 3.8–9.
41 Isoc. 7. Areop. 56–78.
Instability in the Greek Cities
31
half of the century we find disagreements largely on foreign policy, and these are
largely a matter of changing stance more or less quickly in the light of such major
events as the defeat of Sparta at Leuctra.
A change came in the third quarter of the century, with the realisation that
Philip of Macedon was an altogether stronger king than his predecessors, and the
problem of how to deal with him at a time when the Social War of the 350’s had
demonstrated that Athens’ expansionist policies of the past two decades had consumed money without bringing benefits. Until the Peace of Philocrates in 346 there
was a division between Demosthenes and others over when and how it was right to
resist Philip; after that the division was over whether to accept that settlement, however unsatisfactory it might be, and make the best of it, or to regard Philip as fundamentally hostile to ‘the freedom and democracy of Athens and all the Greeks’, and
to look for suitable opportunities to oppose him. This led to more of a polarisation
and party division than we find at most times in Athens’ history;42 and Demosthenes
gradually increased his support, in Athens and in the rest of Greece, until the great
confrontation at Chaeronea in 338 resulted in the defeat of Athens and Thebes and
the domination of mainland Greece by Philip.
Division between opponents of Macedon, Demosthenes and his associates, and
collaborators with Macedon, now particularly Demades, continued. After
Alexander’s destruction of Thebes in 335 it was agreed that in the short term
Macedonian supremacy had to be accepted; but Alexander might be killed by the
Persians (and some Athenians stayed in touch with the Persians43), and in any case
Athenians hoped to recover after defeat by Macedon as they had recovered after
defeat in the Peloponnesian War. Athens did not join in the rising led by Agis of
Sparta in 331–330, but the refashioned ephebeia trained young citizens as hoplites,44 the navy, defeated in the Social War, was modernised and made larger than
ever before,45 and Athens did lead a Greek rising in the Lamian War after Alexander’s
death in 323. Demosthenes and Hyperides led Athens into the war; after Athens’
defeat Demades and Phocion negotiated with Macedon, and Hyperides was executed and Demosthenes committed suicide.
I mentioned above that Demosthenes saw Philip as a threat to ‘the freedom and
democracy of Athens and all the Greeks’. Demosthenes tended increasingly to identify democracy with external freedom, and in particular freedom from Philip, rather
than with internal freedom. When he and his opponents accused one another of
being undemocratic, he meant that they were unpatriotic, while they meant that he
was undemocratic in the more normal sense. One change in Athens’ democracy,
foreshadowed by Isocrates in the 350’s in his VII. Areopagitic and put into practice
42 Cf. Dem. 19. Embassy 225–6.
43 Athenians fighting on the Persian side at the Granicus, 334, Arr. Anab. 1.29.5; Athenians among
the Greek envoys to Darius whom Alexander captured at Issus, 333, Arr. Anab. 2.15.2–5, Curt.
3.13.15.
44See Ath. Pol. 42.2–5 and the inscriptions collected in O. W. Reinmuth, The Ephebic Inscriptions
of the Fourth Century b. c. (Mnemosyne Supp. xiv 1971).
45 In 325/4 over 400 ships, including fifty quadriremes and two quinqueremes: IG ii2 1629. 783–
812 with SEG xxix 143.
32
P. J. Rhodes
from the mid 340’s, was a revival of Athens’ council of former archons, the
Areopagus, as a politically important body. Its interventions were regularly on
Demosthenes’ side, and I see the law of 337/6 which threatened the Areopagus with
suspension if the democracy were overthrown not as a sign that the democracy was
seriously in danger or that Philip wanted to impose an oligarchy on Athens but as a
warning to Demosthenes from his opponents. 46
Demosthenes’ reinterpretation of democracy took root. After defeating Athens
in the Lamian War the Macedonians did impose an oligarchic constitution on
Athens, with the poorest citizens excluded from political rights,47 and I think this
was done not because any leading men in Athens favoured oligarchy as such or
because the Macedonians did but because democracy had come to be associated
with opposition to Macedon. During the next half century Athens experienced a
series of different régimes: two were technically oligarchic (from 321 to 318 and
from 317 to 30748); but, while several régimes stressed that they were democratic
and labelled the régime which they had supplanted as oligarchic (or in one case a
tyranny), what is more obvious is that the régimes which advertised themselves as
democratic were those which were most strongly opposed to Macedon. After the
defeat of Athens and Sparta in the Chremonidean War, in 263/2, Athens finally
abandoned the attempt to be a major actor in the Greek world, and it did then enter
a period of stability, first in subordination to Macedon (which for a time intervened
in its internal affairs) and afterwards in association with the Ptolemies.49
3. ARCHAIC GREECE AND TYRANNY50
What about the rest of the Greek world? In the archaic period instability is connected particularly with the rise and fall of tyrants.51 Various explanations have
been advanced, and we should probably combine them as symptoms of the growing-pains of the Greek poleis rather than attach overriding importance to any one of
them. In mainland Greece tyramts were typically fringe members of the previously
ruling aristocracies, personally ambitious,52 not doing so well under the existing
régime that they were content with it, but not so far from the centre of power that
they were not credible as rulers. And they tended to attract supporters by focusing
on whatever causes of dissatisfaction there might be in their own city, all of which
will have contributed to instability.
46
47
48
49
RO 79 (see commentary) = IG ii3 320.
Diod. Sic. 18.18, Plut. Phoc. 26.3–28.
317–307, Diod. Sic. 18.74.3.
Cf. P. J. Rhodes, ‘ “Classical”; and “Hellenistic” in Athenian History’, in E. Dąbrowa (ed.),
Greek and Hellenistic Studies (Electrum xi. Kraków: Jagiellonian U. P., 2006), 27–43 at 31–4,
and ‘Appeals’ (n. 39, above), 30.
50 ` Cf. Lintott (n. 1, above), 34–81 (ch. 2).
51 The most comprehensive study of Greek tyrants is H. Berve, Die Tyrannis bei den Griechen
(München: Beck, 1967).
52 E. g. R. Drews, ‘The First Tyrants in Greece’, Historia xxi 1972, 129–44.
Instability in the Greek Cities
33
Thucydides linked tyranny with the growth of wealth,53 and it is credible that
as the Greeks travelled more and engaged in a wider range of economic activities it
became easier for some men to become richer than their ancestors and for other men
to become poorer. Theognis in Megara, perhaps in the seventh century, lamented
the rise of the nouveaux riches and was afraid that a tyrant might seize power;54 and
in Athens Solon’s use of wealth as the sole criterion of eligibility for offices55 suggests that there were rich men who were excluded from the ruling circle and who
wanted to be included in it.
Although it is likely that Greeks of the classical period tended to see civil discord in the archaic period in terms of conflict between rich and poor, and between
oligarchs and democrats, when other considerations may have been more important,56 we should not totally rule out conflict between rich and poor. In Athens,
Solon in his poetry attacked the rich; and, while his seisachtheia is probably to be
seen as a liberation of the dependent peasants known as hektemoroi by making them
the unencumbered owners of the land which they farmed, the fact that he says he
did not want to impose equal shares of the land on ‘good’ and ‘bad’ indicates that
such a redistribution of the land was not inconceivable.57
Aristotle in his Politics envisaged a political development linked to military
development, from kingship to an aristocracy based on the cavalry and then to politeia or democracy based on the hoplite infantry;58 and some modern scholars have
stressed the egalitarian nature of hoplite fighting and have seen tyrants as champions against the aristocrats of the new hoplites who made an important contribution
to their city’s success and who demanded a share in their city’s affairs.59 Since the
middle of the twentieth century there has been a great deal of argument over how
serious and how sudden a change was represented by the adoption of the hoplite
phalanx, and also over how rigid and egalitarian the fighting of the phalanx was.60
53 Thuc. 1.13.1. For an extreme instance of this explanation in modern scholarship see P. N. Ure,
The Origin of Tyranny (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 1922). More recently G. L. Cawkwell,
‘Early Greek Tyranny and the People’, CQ2 xlv 1995, 73–86 = his Cyrene to Chaeronea
(Oxford: Oxford U. P., 2011), 33–53, has seen archaic tyrants as rich men who would not tolerate rivals.
54 Theognis 53–68; 39–52.
55 Ath. Pol. 7.3–8.1, Plut. Sol. 18.1–2, cf. Arist. Pol. 2.1274a19–21 (with the classes in the wrong
order).
56 Notice in particular the three Athenian groupings mentioned in connection with the rise of
Pisistratus: Hdt. 1.59.4 gives them regional characterisations only, but Ath. Pol. 13.4–5 and
following that Plut. Sol. 13.1–3 cf. 29.1 add the labels oligarchic, democratic and middling.
57 Attack on rich, Sol. frs. 4b–c West ap. Ath. Pol. 5.3; seisachtheia, e. g. P. J. Rhodes, A Comentary
on the Aristotelian Athenaion Politeia (Oxford U. P., 1981), 125–7; no redistribution of land, fr.
34.8–9 ap. Ath. Pol. 12.3.
58Arist. Pol. 4.1297b12–26.
59 E. g. M. P. Nilsson, ‘Die Hoplitentaktik und das Staatswesen’, Klio xxii 1929, 240–9; H. L.
Lorimer, ‘The Hoplite Phalanx with Special Reference to the Poems of Archilochus and
Tyrtaeus’, BSA xlii 1947, 76–138.
60 First challenge to sudden change, J. Latacz, Kampfparänese, Kampfdarstellung und
Kampfwirklichkeit in der Ilias, bei Kallinos und Tyrtaios (Zetemata lxvi. München: Beck,
1977). Hoplite engagement like a scrum in rugby football: e. g. G. B. Grundy, Thucydides and
34
P. J. Rhodes
My own position is nearer to the traditional than to the revisionist extreme of the
spectrum on both points: that the Greeks did during the archaic period develop a
style of hoplite fighting for which a growing proportion of the citizens were enlisted
and in which the manner of fighting was collective and egalitarian rather than individualist and conducive to ‘star’ performers, and that the men who fought in these
armies will have come to think of themselves as men who ought to matter to their
city.
Another source of discontent has been seen in perceived racial tensions within
a city, particularly in the Peloponnese, where (whatever the truth behind the perceptions) some of the inhabitants saw themselves as belonging to the Dorian strand of
the Greek people and others saw themselves as non-Dorian. Cypselus in Corinth is
represented as opposing specifically the Bacchiad clan which dominated the city,
but his father was not merely non-Bacchiad but non-Dorian;61 and after the ending
of the tyranny Corinth was given a new apparatus of eight tribes which cut across
older divisions.62 In Sicyon Cleisthenes, himself allegedly non-Dorian, made some
change to the tribes, even if Herodotus’ story of three unflattering names and one
flattering name is not to be taken at face value.63
Herodotus has a tendency to write in the language of his own time of conflict
between the upper and lower classes;64 but when he writes that Gelon, after gaining
control of Syracuse, reinstated the gamoroi (land-owners) who had been expelled
by ‘the demos and their slaves called the Kyllyrioi’,65 it has been suggested that the
demos ‘may have included a Greek element’ but probably was not totally distinct
ethnically from the Kyllyrioi.66 More generally, in colonies there could be fluctuations in the relationship between the Greek settlers and the native inhabitants of the
region, and there could be tension between earlier and more recently arrived settlers: both seem to be evident, for instance, in the history of the colony at Cyrene.67
In the fifth century, after the last refoundation of Sybaris, perhaps in 446/5, there
was stasis between the previous inhabitants and the newcomers, in which the new-
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
the History of His Age, i (London: Murray, 1911), 267–9; challenge anticipated by A. W.
Gomme, Essays in Greek History and Literature (Oxford: Blackwell, 1937), 135; A. D. Fraser,
‘The Myth of the Phalanx-Scrimmage’, CW xxxvi 1942, 15–16; challenge begun in earnest by
G. L. Cawkwell, Philip of Macedon (London: Faber, 1978), 150–3 (Cawkwell himself played
rugby for Scotland). For a recent discussion see E. L. Wheeler, in P. Sabin et al. (edd.), The
Cambridge History of Greek and Roman Warfare (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 2007), i. 186–
213.
Hdt. 5.92.β–ε (father, 92.β.1).
Nic. Dam. FGrH 90 F 60.2, Photius (π 168 Theodoridis), Suda (π 225 Adler) πάντα ὀκτώ.
Some scholars move this change to a different point in Corinth’s history: e. g. J. B. Salmon,
Wealthy Corinth (Oxford: Oxford U. P., 1984), 205–6, 413–9 (change by Cypselus).
Hdt. 5.68.
Cf. P. J. Rhodes, ‘Herodotus and Democracy’, in E. Irwin & T. E. H. Harrison (edd.), Interpreting
Herodotus (Oxford: Oxford U. P., forthcoming).
Hdt. 7.155–6 (Hdt. continues with further acts of Gelon, on which he comments that Gelon
‘thought the demos was a most uncongenial cohabitant’).
R. W. Macan, Herodotus: The Seventh, Eighth and Ninth Books (London: Macmillan, 1908),
i. i. 215–6.
Hdt. 4.150–67, 200–5.
Instability in the Greek Cities
35
comers prevailed and invited further newcomers to join them in the new foundation
of Thurii.68 Back in Greece, when Argos was defeated with heavy losses by Sparta
at Sepeia c. 494, according to Herodotus the douloi (‘slaves’) took over the running
of the state until the sons of those who were killed grew up; Aristotle in his Politics
says that the Argives were compelled to take in some of their perioikoi, and it may
be that that is a fairer account of what happened and that what we have in Herodotus
is the result of aristocratic bias.69
Sometimes there may have been no particular ground for discontent but simply
rivalry within the ruling aristocracy, among whom a man later designated ‘tyrant’
managed to gain a powerful position for himself.70 This seems to have been the
case, for instance, in the series of rulers in Lesbos at the end of the seventh century
and the beginning of the sixth,71 and in Samos, where Polycrates in the late sixth
century is the best-known tyrant (and may have been credited with some of the
achievements of earlier rulers).72
Tyrants often pursued aggressive foreign policies, to glorify themselves and
their cities. One of the achivements attributed to Polycrates which is easier to believe before the Persian conquest of Asia Minor than after it, when he was ruling, is
an extension of Samos’ power not only in the south-eastern Aegean but also on the
Asiatic mainland;73 earlier, in Greece, Pheidon of Argos, who is described as a hereditary king who made himself tyrant, pursued an expansive policy in the
Peloponnese.74 In Athens Cylon had support from Theagenes the tyrant of Megara;75
and Pisistratus, having had support from Lygdamis of Naxos, afterwards helped
Lygdamis to become tyrant there.76
In Asia Minor another foreign dimension was involved. Persia after its conquest of Lydia in the 540’s liked to control the Greek cities on the coast through
tyrants, even when in the Greek heartland tyrants were disappearing. At the time of
Darius’ Scythian expedition, c. 514, Herodotus represents the Greek contingents as
commanded by tyrants; at the Danube, when Miltiades the Athenian (currently ruling in the Chersonese) wanted to break the bridge and leave Darius stranded in
Scythia, Histiaeus of Miletus warned that the cities wanted ‘democracy’ (which in
this context I think means simply constitutional government) rather than tyranny,
and the tyrants depended on Persian backing for their positions.77 At the beginning
68 Diod. Sic. 12.11.1–2.
69 Hdt. 6.83.1; Arist. Pol. 5.1303a6–8.
70 Cf. G. Anderson, ‘Before Turannoi were Tyrants: Rethinking a Chapter of Early Greek History’,
CA xxiv 2005, 173–222.
71 Cf. Strabo 599–600/13.1.38, 617/13.2.3, Diog. Laert. 1.74–5, and fragments of the poems of
Alcaeus.
72 Hdt. 3.39–60, 120–5, 139–49. On the chronology see L. Woodbury, ‘Ibycus and Polycrates’,
Phoenix xxxix 1985, 193–220 at 207–18, with references to earlier discussions.
73 Hdt. 3.39.4, Thuc. 1.13.6, 3.104.2.
74 King who exceeded limits, Arist. Pol. 5.1310b18–20, 26–8; expansion in Peloponnese, Hdt.
6.127.3, Ephorus FGrH 70 F 115 ap. Strabo 358/8.3.33.
75 Thuc. 1.126.3–5.
76 Hdt. 1.61.4, 64.2, Ath. Pol. 15.2–3.
77 Hdt. 4.137.
36
P. J. Rhodes
of the Ionian Revolt Aristagoras of Miletus had the tyrants of the other cities arrested and resigned his own tyranny (though he nevertheless seems to have retained
some kind of commanding position until he departed to Myrcinus in Thrace).78 The
Persians tried unsuccessfully to win back the cities through their deposed tyrants;79
after the revolt had been put down Mardonius replaced the tyrannies with ‘democracies’ (again, I think, simply constitutional government of some kind);80 but either
this was not done everywhere or some tyrants were imposed again before long.81
And when the Persians invaded Greece, presenting the Greeks with a different
threat from that posed by a hostile neighbouring Greek city, how to react to the
Persians was another destabilising factor. When Darius sent his demands for earth
and water, Athens and Sparta refused, but some cities complied, and this led to intervention in Aegina by Athens and Sparta.82 In 490, when the Persian invading
forces arrived, the Eretrians were said to be divided between fleeing to the hills and
surrendering to the Persians, but in fact they resisted for a week before the city was
betrayed.83 The Persians had Hippias with them, and they hoped that Athens would
be betrayed to them and that they could reinstate Hippias as a vassal tyrant: that did
not happen, but the ostracisms of the 480’s show that some Athenians were, rightly
or wrongly, suspected of disloyalty.84
In 480–479 Argos refused to join the resistance under Spartan leadership, and
was at any rate sympathetic to the Persians.85 When the Greeks went to Thessaly to
block the Persians’ advance at Tempe, one reason why they abandoned that plan
was that some of the Thessalians were already supporting the Persians.86 After
Thermopylae Boeotia could not be defended against the Persians, but Herodotus
and Thucydides let us see two conflicting accounts: according to Herodotus the
whole plethos of the Boeotians medised;87 but in the debate which Thucydides presents after the surrender of Plataea to the Spartans, when the Plataeans contrast their
loyalty with the disloyalty of the other Boeotians, the Thebans claim that their city
medised because it ‘was administered at that time neither by an oligarchy based on
equal laws nor by a democracy, but … its affairs were in the hands of a clique (dynasteia) of a few men’.88
Tyrannies did not last longer than two or three generations.89 Where a tyrant
had posed as the champion of a section of the population with particular grievances,
those grievances were dealt with, and the predominant position of the tyrant in the
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
Hdt. 5.36.4–38; Aristagoras’ position, 98 (where he is still tyrannos), 99, 124–6.
Hdt. 6.9.2–10.
Hdt. 6.43.3.
See A. R. Burn, Persia and the Greeks (London: Arnold, 1962), 222.
Hdt. 6.48–73.
Hdt. 6.100–1.
Hippias, Hdt. 6.102, 107–9, 121; ostracism, Ath. Pol. 22.4–6, cf. the record of men against
whom ostraca are recorded from the 480’s (e. g. ML 21).
Hdt. 7.148–52, 9.12.
Hdt. 7.6.2, 172–4.
Hdt. 8.34, cf. 9.87.2.
Plataeans, Thuc. 3.54.3–4, 56.5, 57.3–4, 58.5; Thebans, 3.62.3.
The tyranny of a hundred years in Sicyon was said to be the longest: Arist. Pol. 5.1315b11–39.
Instability in the Greek Cities
37
city became in its turn a new source of grievance. The rule of a tyrant was bad for
aristocrats in general, because the predominant position of one man or family overrode the mixture of cooperation and competition between a number of leading families which had been characteristic of aristocratic politics, and which aristocrats no
doubt hoped to bring back into existence, as in the rivalry between Cleisthenes and
Isagoras after the overthrow of the Pisistratids in Athens.90 And foreign policy
could be involved in the overthrow of tyrants also. Sparta in the classical period
claimed not only to have had no tyrants itself but also to have overthrown tyrants
elsewhere.91 The best-attested instances are in Sicyon in the middle of the sixth
century and in Athens at the end of the century;92 but after expelling Hippias from
Athens the Spartans considered reinstating him.93 I suspect that Sparta’s doctrinaire
opposition to tyranny was an invention of the fifth century, based largely on the
expulsion of the Pisistratids from Athens, and that what happened in the sixth century was that Sparta’s expansion in southern Greece coincided with and in some
cases involved the overthrow of tyrants, but was not directed against tyrants as
such.
Instability of another kind is found in Sicily in the early fifth century, with
large-scale population movements. Zancle was taken over by Samians fleeing after
the Ionian Revolt.94 Gelon of Gela gained control of Syracuse by supporting the
exiled upper-class gamoroi, and he not merely reinstated them but moved to
Syracuse all the people of Camarina, half the people of Gela and the upper class of
Megara Hyblaea and Euboea.95 He also gave citizenship to a large number of mercenaries.96 His successor Hieron indulged in further transplantations, moving the
inhabitants of Naxos and Catana to Leontini, and refounding Catana as Aetna with
settlers from Syracuse and from mainland Greece.97 But in the 460’s, after the
downfall of the tyrants, the population movements were undone, and political exiles returned home too; Aetna was refounded inland at the Sicels’ city of Inessa; and
Zancle, now calling itself Messana, provided a new home for the tyrants’ mercenaries.98
90 Hdt. 5.66, 72.
91 Thuc. 1.18.1 (but no mention in Hdt.).
92 P. Rylands 18.2.5–13 (FGrH 105 F 1), schol. Aeschin. II. Embassy 77 (164a Dilts), and a longer
list Plut. De Her. Mal. 859c–d.
93 Hdt. 5.90–3.
94 Hdt. 6.22–3.
95 Hdt. 7.155–6.
96 Diod. Sic. 11.72.3.
97 Diod. Sic. 11.49.1–3, Strabo 268/6.2.3.
98 Diod. Sic. 11.76.
38
P. J. Rhodes
4. THE FIFTH CENTURY:
OLIGARCHY VERSUS DEMOCRACY, ATHENS VERSUS SPARTA99
By the middle of the fifth century the concepts democracy and oligarchy had been
formulated (I date this development to the second quarter of the fifth century100),
and men and cities were capable of considering themselves democratic and oligarchic. Also by the middle of the fifth century the Greek world was coming to be
polarised between Athens with its Delian League and Sparta with its Peloponnesian
League, and Athens came to be seen as a champion of democracy and Sparta
(though it was not itself straightforwardly oligarchic) as a champion of oligarchy.101
This meant that, however they originated, local disputes in particular cities tended
to be perceived both by the participants and by outsiders as disputes between democrats and oligarchs, and between Athenian sympathisers and Spartan sympathisers, and could therefore become absorbed into that larger framework of dispute.102
Megara provides us with a good example. C. 460, when it was involved in a
dispute with Corinth, it had broken away from the Peloponnesians and had joined
Athens; but in 447/6 it rejoined the Peloponnesians, and by the Thirty Years’ Peace
of 446/5 Athens had to relinquish Megara’s harbour towns.103 Some time after that
it provoked Athens to impose economic sanctions, and from autumn 431 the
Athenians attacked Megara twice a year.104 In 424 a body of oligarchs which had
been expelled by the plethos was troubling the city, there were proposals to take
these exiles back, and that prompted the champions of the demos to enter into a plot
to betray the city to Athens. News of the plot reached its opponents, the Spartan
Brasidas heard of what was happening and went to Megara, and both parties in
Megara waited for the outcome of his encounter with the Athenians. The Athenians
withdrew, the exiles returned on the understanding that there was to be an amnesty,
and the final result was the installation of an extreme oligarchy.105
Thucydides focuses particularly on an episode in Corcyra.106 Corcyra was democratic and allied to Athens. Upper-class prisoners captured by Corinth in 435–433
were sent back to Corcyra with the intention that they should bring the city into
alliance with the Peloponnesians. This led in 427 to a bitter civil war, with Athens
99 Cf. Lintott (n. 1, above), 82–124 (ch. 3).
100 Demokratia, and oligarchia and aristokratia, coined about the time of Ephialtes, e. g. K. A.
Raaflaub, in Raaflaub et al., Origins of Democracy in Ancient Greece (Berkeley & Los Angeles:
U. of California P., 2007), 107–12; but demokratia used already by Cleisthenes, e. g. M. H.
Hansen, ‘The Origin of the Term Demokratia’, LCM xi 1986, 35–6.
101 Sparta, Thuc. 1.19 cf. 76.1; Athens and Sparta, 3.82.1. Athens imposed democratic forms of
constitution in the Delian League not systematically but as and when it was provoked (R. Brock
in J. Ma et al. [edd.], Interpreting the Athenian Empire [London: Duckworth, 2009], 149–66),
but instances include Erythrae probably in the late 450’s (IG i3 14) and Miletus before 434/3
(Milet vi. iii 1218).
102 Cf, Thuc. 3.82.1.
103 C. 460, Thuc. 1.103.4; 447/6–446/5, 114.1–115.1.
104 Economic sanctions, Thuc. 1.67.4, 139.1–2, 140.3–4, 144.2; attacks, 2.31, 4.66.1.
105 Thuc. 4.66–74.
106 Thuc. 3.69–85, 4.2.3, 46–8.
Instability in the Greek Cities
39
and the Peloponnesians each sending support to their partisans, and finally in 425 to
a victory of the pro-Athenian democrats and the slaughter of their opponents.
Thucydides used this as a starting-point for a general comment on the collapse of
standards and pursuit of selfish advantage during the Peloponnesian War.107
Argos is another interesting case study. It became an ally of Athens in 462/1,
but made a thirty-year peace with Sparta in 451, and kept out of the first phase of
the Peloponnesian War.108 It was democratic. After the Peace of Nicias in 421 and
the alliance between Sparta and Athens which accompanied that, Corinth incited
Argos to establish a new anti-Spartan alliance;109 Thucydides remarks that Argos’
democracy attracted Mantinea and Athens’ democracy attracted Argos, while
Boeotia and Megara, though they had not joined in the Peace, found Sparta’s oligarchy more attractive.110 In winter 421/0 an attempt to add Boeotia to the alliance and
realign the alliance with Sparta failed, because of too much secrecy.111 In 418
Athens joined the Argive alliance;112 and there was then fighting in the Peloponnese
which might have led to a Spartan defeat but in fact ended with a Spartan victory at
Mantinea.113 In the following winter Spartan sympathisers gained the upper hand in
Argos, and, in spite of the efforts of Alcibiades on behalf of Athens, they secured a
treaty which envisaged joint leadership of the Peloponnese by Sparta and Argos,
and installed a pro-Spartan oligarchy in Argos.114 But in the summer of 417 the
democrats returned to power; a Spartan expedition learned that it was too late and
returned to Sparta; a later plan to intervene was not carried out. In the winter Sparta
did attack Argos, but without success. In 416 Argos’ alliance with Athens was finally renewed, and Alcibiades deported three hundred Spartan sympathisers from
Argos.115 In the winter a Spartan attack was abandoned because of unfavourable
auspices;116 and Argos remained allied with Athens to the end of the Peloponensian
War and beyond.
5. THE FOURTH CENTURY117
In the first half of the fourth century Corinth had a particularly uncomfortable history. It was one of the Spartan allies alienated by the outcome of the Peloponnesian
War, from which only Sparta itself seemed to profit. After refusing to join in some
Spartan campaigns, it became involved as an ally of the Boeotians in the war against
Sparta which has come to be known as the Corinthian War, because much of the
107 Thuc. 3.82–3 (84 is probably an interpolation).
108 462/1, Thuc. 1.102.4 (date Ath. Pol. 25.2); 451, 5.14.4.
109 Thuc. 5.27–31.
110 Mantinea, Thuc. 5.29.1; Argos, 44.1; Boeotia and Megara, 31.6.
111 Thuc. 5.36–8.
112 Thuc. 5.43–8, cf. IG i3 83.
113 Thuc. 5.57–75.
114 Thuc. 5.76–81.
115 Thuc. 5.82–4; alliance, IG i3 86.
116 Thuc. 5.116.1.
117 Cf. Lintott (n. 1, above), 222–38 (ch. 6).
40
P. J. Rhodes
fighting was in the neighbourhood of Corinth.118 In 392, when there was a possibility that Corinth would revert to the Spartan side, the opponents of Sparta massacred
supporters of Sparta (an emendation of Diodorus’ text refers to the anti-Spartan
men as democrats, but, even if the emendation is correct, foreign policy was probably the primary consideration). To keep Corinth on the anti-Spartan side there was
subsequently arranged an isopoliteia (joint citizenship) or perhaps even a greater
union between Corinth and Argos.119 A little later the Athenian Iphicrates, commanding a mercenary force based on Corinth, tried to get control of the city, but
failed and was dismissed from his position.120
Sparta after the Peloponnesian War showed an increasing tendency to interfere
in the internal affairs of states within its orbit. The King’s Peace of 387/6, a ‘common peace’ obtained from Persia by Sparta, prescribed freedom and autonomy for
Greek states other than those of mainland Asia Minor, but did not define what constituted freedom and autonomy or what entities were entitled to it.121 Sparta proceeded to interpret this prescription, to suit Sparta’s own interests in particular
cases. Thus the union of Corinth and Argos was undone, and Corinth rejoined the
Peloponnesian League;122 and the Boeotian federation was broken up, because
Boeotia had been fighting against Sparta for the past ten years,123 though not all
federal bodies were broken up. In 382 Sparta responded to an appeal to take action
against the league being built up by Olynthus, in the north. Thebes refused to supply
soldiers, and presumably on the pretext that Thebes was refusing to help Sparta
implement the King’s Peace Thebes was occupied by a Spartan garrison, and it and
the other Boeotian cities were given governments of Spartan sympathisers.124
Olynthus was eventually defeated, but built up its power again afterwards.
Also after the King’s Peace, the Arcadian city of Mantinea, which had been
united from a collection of villages by the process of synoikismos nearly a century
before, and which had not been sufficiently loyal to Sparta, was broken up into its
component villages.125 Phlius, in the north-east of the Peloponnese, had exiled partisans of Sparta some time earlier: in 391 Sparta could have demanded their reinstatement but did not; after the King’s Peace the exiles appealed to Sparta and
Sparta did demand their reinstatement.126 That was not the end of the matter. In 381,
while Sparta’s main effort was against Olynthus, Phlius failed to give the restored
exiles the full restoration of their rights; they complained to Sparta, and king
Agesilaus took delight in campaigning against Phlius; after twenty months Phlius
118 Xen. Hell. 3.5.1, 17, 4.2.11, etc.; Hell. Oxy. 10.3 Chambers.
119 Massacre, Xen. Hell. 4.4.1–5, Diod. Sic. 14.86.1–2; union with Argos, Xen. Hell. 4.4.6, Diod.
Sic. 14.92.1, Andoc. 3. Peace 26–7. On the details see Salmon (n. 62, above), 354–62, with
references to other discussions.
120 Xen. Hell. 4.8.34, Diod. Sic. 14.92.2, with Salmon (n. 62, above), 367.
121 Xen. Hell. 5.1.29–31, Diod. Sic. 14.110.2–4 (fifth-century synoikismos, Strabo 337/8.3.2).
122 Xen. Hell. 5.1.34, 36.
123 Xen. Hell. 5.1.32–3, 36.
124 Xen. Hell. 5.2.11–36, Diod. Sic. 15.19–20.
125 Xen. Hell. 5.2.1–7, Diod. Sic. 15.5.3–5, 12.
126 Xen. Hell. 4.4.15; 5.2.8–10.
Instability in the Greek Cities
41
tried to surrender not to Agesilaus but to the authorities in Sparta, but he persuaded
them to refer the decision to him anyway, and he imposed a settlement.127
In the winter of 379/8 Thebans who had fled when Sparta occupied their city
returned from Athens and recovered control, and before long they had refounded
the Boeotian federation.128 A Spartan raid on Athenian territory prompted the
Athenians to found their Second League, aimed at defending the freedom and autonomy of the Greeks, and the King’s Peace, against Sparta: we have an inscribed
prospectus for the League, containing promises which served both as an assurance
that Athens would not behave as it had behaved in the Delian League and as an indication of what Athens took freedom and autonomy to mean: no constitutional
interference, no garrisons, governors or payment of tribute, no Athenian-owned
property in allied territory.129
In 371 Sparta was defeated so thoroughly that it would never again threaten the
freedom and autonomy of the Greeks – but on land, at Leuctra, by the Boeotians,
whose growing strength and ambition was making Athens increasingly uncomfortable to have them as allies.130 What matters for our present theme is that the ending
of Spartan power had a great destabilising effect on the Peloponnese, where Spartan
power directly exercised or as a threat in the background had for two hundred years
always been an important consideration. Diodorus places after the renewal of the
King’s Peace in 375 a chapter which ought to have been placed after Leuctra: in
various cities of the Peloponnese, now that Sparta was no longer able to give its
support to oligarchies, there were democratic revolutions (of which Diodorus disapproved).131 One of his instances was in Phlius, for which Xenophon gives a more
detailed account: Phlius with its Spartan sympathisers restored remained staunchly
pro-Spartan; there were now some anti-Spartan exiles, who at one point occupied
the acropolis, but it survived a series of attacks by them and its anti-Spartan neighbours.132 Separately, after the battle of Leuctra, Diodorus mentions an exceptionally
violent episode in Argos: the city was democratic, attacks on members of the upper
class led them to plan a revolution, but many who were denounced by an informer
were put to death, and after that the ochlos turned against the democratic leaders
also.133
Particularly important for its wider repercussions was what happened in
Mantinea, where (as I mentioned above) after the King’s Peace Sparta had broken
up the city into its component villages. In 370 the Mantineans voted to reunite, the
Spartan king Agesilaus tried but failed to dissuade them, and Sparta was not willing
to intervene militarily.134 Mantinea then supported a federalist movement in
127 Xen. Hell. 5.3.10–17, 21–5.
128 Xen. Hell. 5.4.1–12, Diod. Sic. 15.25–7.
129 Xen. Hell. 5.4.20–34 (not mentioning the League), Diod. Sic. 15.28, 29.5–8 (placing the
Spartan raid after the foundation of the League), IG ii2 43 = RO 22.
130 Xen. Hell. 6.4.1–26, Diod. Sic. 15.51–6.
131 Diod. Sic. 15.40.
132 Xen. Hell. 7.2.
133 Diod. Sic. 15.57.3–58.
134 Xen. Hell. 6.5.3–5.
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P. J. Rhodes
Arcadia, and the Arcadians were supported against Sparta by Elis and Argos. For
further support they appealed to Athens; Athens in the new world after Leuctra was
not willing to act against Sparta; so they then appealed to Thebes135 – and so in the
360’s and 350’s there was a new polarisation of the Greek world, between an alliance of Sparta and Athens on one side and Thebes on the other. A campaign led by
Thebes resulted in the liberation of Messenia from Sparta,136 and supported the
foundation of the new Arcadian capital of Megalopolis near the border of Laconia.137
In the years which followed Thebes, having knocked out Sparta, hoped to
knock out Athens too, by gaining Persian support for a new common peace treaty
aimed against Athens (that did not win enough support in Greece, but a more limited treaty, accepted by Corinth and others, effectively ended the Peloponnesian
League),138 and by challenging Athens at sea.139 Athens after its reconciliation with
Sparta had no purpose for its League except the advancement of Athens’ interests,
and Athens’ activities on one side, and the activities of Thebes and of Mausolus of
Caria on the other, led to the Social War of 356–355 and the defection of several
members of the League.140
Before Corinth made its peace with Thebes, there had been an Athenian plan to
get control of Corinth, and keep it loyal to Sparta, but news of this reached the
Corinthians in time, and the Athenian plan was frustrated. The Corinthians next
raised a body of mercenaries, but their commander, Timophanes, tried to make
himself tyrant, and his own brother Timoleon was involved in his assassination.141
Twenty years later Timoleon was sent to Sicily to deal with tyrants there.
In 359 Philip II became king of Macedon, and he quickly showed himself to be
a stronger and more purposeful king than his predecessors. He was brought south
into Greece by the Third Sacred War. Thebes had begun using Delphi and its
Amphictyony to further Theban interests, and after it persuaded the Amphictony to
impose fines on Phocis (in whose territory Delphi lay: it had not been a sufficiently
loyal ally of Thebes) and on Sparta (for sacrilege committed during its occupation
of Thebes), the Phocians in 356 seized Delphi, Thebes secured the declaration of a
sacred war against them, and the war saw Sparta and Athens supporting the Phocians
against Thebes and the Ampictyony. The war ended in 346 with Philip securing
victory for the Amphictyony, and himself being made a member of the Amphictyony,
which gave him a recognised position in Greece.142 Thebes, though on the winning
side, was exhausted by the war; and the new polarisation was between friends of
Philip and enemies of Philip.
135 Xen. Hell. 6.5.6–7.1.14, Diod. Sic. 15.59, 62–67.1.
136 Not mentioned by Xen. Hell.; Diod. Sic. 15.66.1.
137 Not mentioned by Xen. Hell.; Diod. Sic. 15.72.4.
138 Xen. Hell. 7.1.33–40, 4.7–11, cf. Diod. Sic. 15.76.3, 81.3, 90.2.
139 Diod. Sic. 15.78.4–79.2.
140 Diod. Sic. 16. 7.3–4, 21.
141 Xen. Hell. 7.4.4–6 (omitting the tyranny), Diod. Sic. 16.65.3–4 (misdating the episode), Arist.
Pol. 5.1306a19–24, Plut. Tim. 4.4–8.
142 Beginning of war, Diod. Sic. 16.14.3, 23–6; end of war, 59–64, cf. Dem. 19. Embassy, 18. De
Cor. Aeschin. 2. Embassy, 3. In Ctes.
Instability in the Greek Cities
43
The cities of Euboea were among the earliest members of Athens’ League.143
After Leuctra they followed Thebes in leaving the League,144 but in 357 divisions
inside the cities enabled Athens to intervene promptly and bring Euboea back on to
the Athenian side.145 In 349–348 there were internal divisions again, Athenian intervention began well but ended in failure, and it is possible that the other side received support from Philip.146 Certainly in the late 340’s there were divisons there
with Philip supporting one side and Athens the other, and on that occasion Philip
misjudged and backed unpopular leaders, and Euboea was brought back into the
Athenian orbit once more.147 Similarly in various places on various occasions we
find local divisions with Philip supporting one side and Athens supporting the other.
Demosthenes sometimes refers to the men supported by Philip as tyrants,148 but
probably they were simply leaders of whom Demosthenes disapproved, and Philip
could have referred to the leaders on the other side as tyrants likewise. Demosthenes
represented Philip as a threat to the freedom and democracy of the Greeks,149 and
persuaded an increasing number that Philip was a threat to all the Greeks and not
only to Athens.
The Fourth Sacred War brought Philip south into Greece again, and resulted in
his victory over Athens and Thebes at Chaeronea in 338 and a peace settlement after
that. He combined a ‘common peace’ for all the Greeks (after the manner of the
King’s Peace) with a league of allies, of which he was the hegemon; and in an effort
to bring stability to the unstable Greek cities he included in the oath sworn by the
members an undertaking not to overthrow the constitution which each state had
when it swore to the peace.150 Alexander in the Greek cities of Asia Minor replaced
the existing oligarchies, which had been pro-Persian, with democracies which
would be grateful and loyal to him.151 But at the end of his reign he introduced a
new source of instability with his order to all the Greek states to take back their
exiles.152 One of the states threatened by that order was Athens, which had maintained Samos as a cleruchy since freeing it from the Persians in 365.153 Athens had
in any case hoped to recover from its defeat at Chaeronea as it had recovered from
its defeat in the Peloponnesian War. With this further incitement it led a Greek rising against Macedon in 323 in the Lamian War after Alexander’s death – but unsuccessfully, and after that Macedon imposed an oligarchic constitution on Athens. I
suggested above that this was because, thanks to Demosthenes’ reinterpretation of
demokratia, opposition to Macedon was seen as linked with democracy.
143 Diod. Sic. 15.30.1, IG ii2 43 = RO 22.A.80–4, B.18, ii2 44.
144 Cf. Xen. Hell. 7.5.4, Diod. Sic. 15. 85.2.
145 Diod. Sic. 16.7.2, IG ii2 124 = RO 48.
146Plut. Phoc. 12–14.2, cf. Aeschin. 3. In Ctes. 86–8.
147Philoch. FGrH 328 FF 159–60, cf. Aeschin. 3. In Ctes. 88–105, IG ii2 125 = RO 69 and the
Eretrian law against tyranny SEG li 1105.
148 E. g. Dem. 9. Phil. 3. 33, 18. De Cor. 71, with reference to Euboea.
149 E. g. Dem. 10. Phil. 4. 4.
150 IG ii2 236. = RO 76.12–14, [Dem.] 17. Treaty with Alexander 10.
151Arr. Anab. 1.17.9–18.2, cf. SIG3 283 = RO 84.A.3–6 (Chios).
152 Diod. Sic. 17.109.1, 18.8.2–7, Curt. 10.2.4–7, Just. Epit. 13.5.2–5.
153 Isoc. 15. Antid. 111, Arist. Rhet. 2.1384b32–5, Diod. Sic. 18.18.9.
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P. J. Rhodes
I need not pursue this theme in detail into the hellenistic period. Greek leaders,
cities and leagues now found themselves manoeuvring not between leading Greek
cities but between the great kings, and, in due course, Rome. On various occasions
a king or the Romans would promise the Greeks their freedom, in order to gain their
support in opposition to a rival who did not make such a promise,154 and in individual cities kings tended to be happy to allow freedom on the understanding that it
was graciously granted by the king rather than forcibly extorted from the king. An
increasing number of cities were technically democratic for much of the time, but
run in such a way that rich benefactors became influential. And there were still
changes of régime: in Athens, as I remarked above, a series of them until the middle
of the third century. Technically the Athenian constitution was oligarchic in two
periods, 321–318 and 317–307; but until the middle of the third century the régimes
which were most firmly anti-Macedonian were those which most strongly insisted
that they were democratic and described the other régimes as oligarchic.155
6. REASONS FOR INSTABILITY156
Altogether there was a great deal of political instability in the Greek cities, and
there must in fact have been many more attempted or actual changes of régime than
we know from the surviving evidence. Why was this?
There is a philosophical dimension. Whereas in fourth-century Athens, as in
our own world, there was a tendency for people to agree that democracy was good
while disagreeing about what was the best kind of democracy, in the Greek world
more generally it was not agreed that democracy was good: some people sincerely,
though no doubt also selfishly, believed that some men, because they are in some
way more able or because they in some way have a greater stake in the community,
deserve to have more political power than others. And the relativism of the latefifth-century sophists encouraged the view that there is no objectively best form of
constitution, but people will naturally prefer the kind of constitution which best
suits their own interests.157 So there were in the Greek world cities and groups and
individuals which regarded themselves as democratic, and cities and groups and
individuals which regarded themselves as oligarchic. Plato in his Republic produced a scheme showing how one form of government can develop into another,
inferior form; Aristotle in book V of his Politics discussed the causes of revolution
and the ways in which the dangers of revolution can be avoided.158
154 First in 319, by Polyperchon in the name of Philip III Arrhidaeus, with the restoration of men
exiled under Antipater and the constitutions which the cities had had under Philip and
Alexander: Diod. Sic. 18.55–6. Last in 196 by T. Quinctius Flamininus in the name of Rome,
with ‘traditional laws’: Polyb. 18.46.5.
155 On Athens after the death of Alexander cf. above, pp. 8–9 with nn. 47–9.
156 Cf. Lintott (n. 1, above), 252–63 (ch. 8).
157 Notice especially Lys. 25. Overthrowing Democracy 7–17.
158Pl. Resp. 8.541a1–9.576b10; Arist. Pol. 5.1301a19–1316b27.
Instability in the Greek Cities
45
There are also practical considerations. One, I think, is the smallness of most of
the cities. Athens, with an area of c. 2,600 km2, and perhaps 60,000 adult male citizens at the beginning of the Peloponnesian War and 30,000 at the end,159 was one
of a very few exceptionally large cities, whereas altogether there were about a thousand cities and most of them were very small.160 In a large modern state leading
politicians and industrialists are comparatively remote from the ordinary citizens,
who may think that those people have an unfair share of wealth and power but feel
unable to do much about it. In a small, ‘face to face’ community,161 however, the
rich and powerful are people whom the ordinary citizens encounter from day to day,
and there if the ordinary citizens feel badly done by they are perhaps more likely to
assert themselves. Another point is that Greek states lacked what modern democracies call the concept of a ‘loyal opposition’, the idea that you can oppose the current
government without being a revolutionary or a traitor: if my policies for Athens are
right (and of course they are), then your policies must be wrong, and why should
you as an Athenian champion wrong policies for Athens unless some enemy had
bribed you to do so?
In inter-state matters, for the past century we have had first the League of
Nations and then the United Nations, which have tried to maintain peace between
states in a non-hegemonic way. In the Greek world there were partisan alliances and
leagues, and in theory disputes between states could be settled by arbitration, but as
often as not appeals to arbitration were used to score points rather than in the expectation that they would be accepted;162 and, as we have seen, even the common peace
treaties of the fourth century were dominated by a strong state which planned to
exploit them to its own advantage.
Athens was not only larger than most cities, but during most of the classical
period it was successful in military and political terms, it was economically prosperous and it was also culturally predominant. Whatever we may think of the view
of J. Ober, that the demos called the tune and the élite had to dance to that tune,163
the classical Athenian democracy provided a good life for all of the citizens, rich as
well as poor, and, although the rich inevitably had to bear a heavier financial burden, most of them are likely to have thought most of the time that the price was
worth paying. It is significant that in the 420’s the ‘Old Oligarch’ thought that de159 Before war, P. J. Rhodes, Thucycides, History, II (Warminster: Aris & Phillips, 1988), 271–6,
M. H. Hansen, Three Studies in Athenian Demography (Copenhagen: Royal Danish Academy,
1988), 14–28; after war, M. H. Hansen, Demography and Democracy (Herning: Systime,
1985).
160 Cf. Hansen in M. H. Hansen & T. H. Nielsen (edd.), An Inventory of Archaic and Classical
Poleis (Oxford: Oxford U. P., 2004), 53–5 (number), 70–3 (size: 60 % 100 km2 maximum).
161 Face-to-face society, P. Laslett, ‘The Face to Face Society’, in Laslett (ed.), Philosophy, Politics
and Society, 1st series (Oxford: Blackwell, 1956), 157–84; applied to Athens, M. I. Finley,
Democracy Ancient and Modern (London: Hogarth, 21985) 17; should be applied not to Athens
as a whole but to subsidiary units, R. G. Osborne, Demos: The Discovery of Classical Attika
(Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 1985), 64–5, 89.
162 E. g. Corcyra’s appeal to Corinth, in 435–433, Thuc. 2.28.2, 34.2, 39; provision in the Thirty
Years’ Peace of 446/5, which Athens invoked against Sparta in 432, Thuc. 1.78.4 etc.
163 J. Ober, Mass and Elite in Democratic Athens (Princeton: Princeton U. P., 1989).
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P. J. Rhodes
mocracy was bad in principle but successful and stable, and that it was only in the
later years of the Peloponnesian War, when the democracy was no longer delivering
success, that it was set aside. And the experiences of oligarchy then were so bad that
nobody in the fourth century wanted oligarchy.
As for Sparta, the dispensation attributed to Lycurgus can be seen as an attempt,
by making certain concessions, to unite all the full citizens, richer and poorer together, in conditions of comparative equality and in opposition to the much larger
number of non-citizens. The citizens knew that their supremacy depended on preserving that arrangement; and, in spite of their fear of the helots, for most of the
time the perioikoi and the helots accepted their inferior position without rebelling
against it.
And the polarisation of the Greek world, between Athens and Sparta for much
of the fifth century, between Athens-plus-Sparta and Thebes in the middle of the
fourth century, between Athens and Macedon after that, meant that local differences
were exacerbated by being drawn into a more wide-ranging opposition.
So political instability was an important and pervasive feature of ancient
Greece, and is well worth studying as an aspect of Greek political life.
ARISTOCRACY IN DEMOCRATIC ATHENS: DEFORMATION
AND/OR ADAPTATION
Valerij Goušchin
1. INTRODUCTION
The Old Oligarch and his Athenaion Politeia are the first things that come to mind
if we discuss the role of the aristocracy in classical Athens. In this pamphlet it is
stated that the Athenians have chosen the kind of constitution (i. e. democracy) that
‘lets the worst people be better off than the good’.1 This could suggest that the aristocracy had lost its meaning at least in the second half of the fifth century b. c.
In spite of that, the Athenian constitution could retain its aristocratic style even
in the time of democracy. F. J. Frost was sure that until the middle of the fifth century most significant decisions were made by a narrow circle of aristocratic families.2 The same has been claimed recently by R. W.Wallace, however specifying a
chronological milestone. The hereditary aristocracy, he asserts, remained important
down to 442, i. e. to the ostracism of Thucydides Melesiou.3
This is in agreement with W. Eder, who supposed that the priority of the aristocracy in democratic Athens continued until the middle of the fifth century, and an
alternative to the old leading families could be provided only by the ‘new politicians’ who emerged in politics relatively late in the fifth century.4 He stated, however, that the Athenian demokratia was designed to fit the existing system of aristocratic leadership.5
1
2
3
4
5
[Xen.] Ath. Pol. 1.1, transl. E. C. Marchant.
F. J. Frost, ‘Tribal Politics and the Civic State’, AJAH i 1976, 66–75, see also E. D. Frolov,
‘Politicheskie lideri afinskoi demokratii’ (Political Leaders of the Athenian Democracy), in his
Paradoxi istorii – paradoxi antichnosti (Paradoxes of History – Paradoxes of Antiquity) (St.
Petersburg: U. P., 2004), 164–81 (in Russian).
R. W. Wallace, ‘The Practice of Politics in Classical Athens, and the Paradox of Democratic
Leadership’, in D. Hammer (ed.) A Companion to Greek Democracy and the Roman Republic
(Chichester: Wiley–Blackwell, 2015), 241.
W. Eder, ‘Die Athenische Demokratie im 4 Jh. v.Chr.: Krise oder Vollendung?’, in his (ed.), Die
Athenische Demokratie im 4 Jh. v.Chr. Vollendung oder Verfall einer Verfassungsform?
(Stuttgart: Steiner, 1995). 11–28; idem, ‘Aristocrats and the Coming of Athenian Democracy’,
in I. Morris & K. A. Raaflaub (edd.), Democracy 2500? Questions and Challenges (Dubuque:
Archaeological Institute of America. Colloquia and Conference Papers ii, 1997), 10–40 at 107.
Eder, ‘Aristocrats’ (n. 4, above), 106, 122, cf.: J. Ober, Mass and Elite in Democratic Athens.
Rhetoric, Ideology and the Power of the People (Princeton: Princeton U. P., 1989) 84. The word
demokratia, as Eder thought, originally pointed not to the people’s power, but to the position of
a person or group whose power rested on the demos (Eder, 113).
48
Valerij Goušchin
Obviously it is still questionable what influence Athenian democracy and democratic institutions exerted upon the aristocracy (or the latter on democracy). I shall
discuss this question below, but offer some preliminary considerations at the beginning.
In speaking about democratic Athens I refer to the sixth (as the beginning) and
the fifth centuries. I leave aside here the question whether the Athenian democracy
was fully developed in this time or reached its developed form at the end of the fifth
century (or even in the fourth century).6 On the other hand, I shall discuss their role
in politics, but not, for example, in the religious sphere, where the aristocracy perhaps retained a more or less influential position throughout the fifth century.7
As for the aristocrats, they could be conceived in terms of merit, birth and
wealth. Though the well-born and the well-to-do could belong to different social
strata, I am inclined to think of ‘aristocracy’ as the term synonymous with the ‘upper class’ (or leisured class) that included the members of Attic gene and the wealthy
Athenians.8 This is how Aristotle characterized the ‘notables’ (gnorimoi): ‘among
the notables wealth, birth, virtue, education, and the distinctions that are spoken of
in the same group as these (τῶν δὲ γνωρίμων πλοῦτος εὐγένεια ἀρετὴ παιδεία
καὶ τὰ τούτοις λεγόμενα κατὰ τὴν αὐτὴν διαφοράν)’.9
We need to take into account that the aristocracy of ancient Athens differed
substantially from the aristocracy of mediaeval Europe that used to enjoy hereditary
titles and political privileges. The Athenian upper class was not a closed social stratum or a so-called ‘le premier état’ with more or less constant membership.10 ‘Les
époques archaïque et classique’, A. Duploy asserts, ‘ont connu en permanence la
disparition de certaines lignées et l’émergence de nouveaux groupes, provoquant
une recomposition sociale incessante de l’élite’.11
6
7
E. g. Eder, ‘Aristocrats’ (n. 4, above), 107.
See, e. g., M. H. Jameson, Religion in the Athenian Democracy in Morris & Raaflaub (n. 4,
above), 171–96, N. Evans, Civic Rites: Democracy and Religion in Ancient Athens (Berkeley
& Los Angeles: U. of California P., 2010). But there could be one important change, in that
from the middle of the fifth century new priesthoods were not hereditary in particular gene but
were open to all qualified Athenians (S. D. Lambert, ‘A Polis and Its Priests: Athenian
Priesthoods Before and After Pericles’ Citizenship Law’, Historia lix 2010, 143–75; cf. the
argument of J. H. Blok, ‘Pericles’ Citizenship Law: A New Perspective’, Historia lviii 2009,
141–170, that the purpose of the law was to ensure that all citizens should be truly Athenian and
therefore fit to hold priesthoods).
8 The Greeks used for ‘aristocracy’ rather ambiguous terms: agathoi (or kaloikagathoi), esthloi,
gnorimoi etc. See on this W. Donlan, ‘Social Vocabulary and Its Relationship to Political
Propaganda in Fifth-Century Athens’, QUCC. xxviii 1978, 95–111, Ober (n. 5, above), 251 ff.
Aristoi is not found during the archaic period as a designation of the aristocrats (W. Donlan, ‘A
Note on Aristos as a Class Term’, Philologus cxiii 1969, 268–70).
9 Arist. Pol. 4.1291b28 sqq., transl. H. Rackham.
10 E. g. D. Roussel, Tribu et cité: Études sur les groupes sociaux dans les cités grecques aux époques archaïque et classique (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1976), 71–2.
11 A. Duploy, ‘La Cité et ses élites. Modes de reconnaissance sociale et mentalité agonistique en
Grèce archaïque et classique’, in H. Fernoux & C. Stein (edd.), Aristocratie antique: modèle et
exemplarité sociale (Dijon: Actes du colloque organisé à l’Université de Bourgogne [25 no-
Aristocracy in Democratic Athens: Deformation and/or Adaptation
49
In other words, the individuals and the families covered by word ‘aristocracy’
were not necessarily the same in the time of Solon and during and after the Persian
Wars. Most of those men whose names is known from the century before Solon, as
P. J. Rhodes argues, cannot be linked reliably to families which were prominent after Solon.12
This could mean that the aristocracy (or ruling class) was not a group of equals.
There could be certain dividing lines within the aristocracy, for example, between
the well-born and the well-to-do (and the palaioploutoi and the kainoploutoi within
the well-to-do). One may also assume that those who belonged to the oldest families may have had some priority among the well-born owing to their hereditary
fame (πατρικός δόξα).
2. ARISTOCRACY AND THE COMING OF DEMOCRACY
In Archaic Athens political activity was dominated by the aristocratic families who
relied upon their followers (hetairoi).13 According to Aristotle’s Politics in oligarchies ‘the magistrates … are filled from high property-grades or from political clubs
(hetairon)’.14 Perhaps the Athenian constitution before Solon which was ‘in all respects oligarchic’ could be an example of this.15
The leaders of hetaireiai were the most influential persons from the first-rank
nobility, who had an unquestionable and incontestable authority among the others.
Cylon, for example, as Thucydides narrates, came from an old and authoritative
family (τῶν πάλαι εὐγενής τε καὶ δυνατός).16 Solon mentions such a leader in
one of his verses, when he addresses yourself to the young Critias who did not
honor his father (Sol. fr. 18.1–2 Diehl = 22a West = 22 Gentili & Prato). Apparently,
the young aristocrat Critias was firmly attached to the leader of an aristocratic group
(a hegemon) rather than to his father: in other words group solidarity proved to be
stronger than family ties.17 I should also recall the words of Thucydides, who noted
that in the period of the Peloponnesian War the bonds of friendship (and aristocratic
12
13
14
15
16
17
vembre 2005], 2007), 57–77 at 73. Ober doubts that the old gene played as important a role in
the early history of Athens as was once believed (Ober [n. 5, above], 252).
P. J. Rhodes, ‘Oligarchs in Athens’, in R. Brock & S. Hodkinson (edd.), Alternatives to Athens:
Varieties of Political Organization and Community in Ancient Greece (Oxford: Oxford U. P.,
2000), 119–36 at 120. He assumes that they died out or withdrew from politics after Solon.
E. g. W. R. Connor, The New Politicians of Fifth-Century Athens (Princeton: Princeton U. P.,
1971), 25 ff. A leading man’s authority and prestige were measured by the number of his followers (W. Donlan, ‘The Pre-State Community in Greece’, SO lxiv 1989, 5–29 at 13 n. 22 = his
The Aristocratic Ideal and Selected Papers (Chicago: Bolchazy–Carducci, 1999) 299 n. 22. In
using the language of hetaireiai I am not supposing that these links were comparable to the
hetaireiai known from the late fifth century.
Arist. Pol. 5.1305b30–5, transl. H. Rackham.
Ath. Pol. 1.
Thuc. 1.126.3–5; see also S. Hornblower, A Commentary on Thucydides, i (Oxford: Oxford
U. P., 1991), 203 ff. Cylon was an Olympic victor and son-in-law of the Megarian tyrant, and in
this way he was most authoritative among his helikiotes and hetairoi (Hdt. 5.71.1).
Perhaps the term hegemon designates the leaders of hetaireiai.
50
Valerij Goušchin
solidarity) were stronger than familial ones: ‘The tie of party was stronger than the
tie of blood, because a partisan was more ready to dare without asking why’.18
‘Political friendship’ (to put it in Connor’s terms) and hetaireiai gave to politics
an informal style. The mechanism of rotation (or election) was not carefully constructed or frequently violated. This type of power relations resulted in the bitter
rivalry of aristocratic factions and was fraught with serious political upheavals; and
the case of Cylon could be an example of this.
But with the lapse of time some leaders began to seek the demos’ support in
their struggle with their opponents. The common people at this time became more
influential, if not in politics yet in society.19 According to Thucydides the demos
took an active part in the suppression of Cylon’s coup.20 In the times of Solon and
Pisistratus, I believe, the common people played an active part politically.21 Suffice
it to recall the long-lasting quarrel between the multitude and the notables before
Solon’s reforms.22 And so some of the aristocrats recognized the masses’ ambitions
as a new weapon to use against each other.23 Those who were ready to recognise the
mass’s ambitions converted themselves into prostatai tou demou.
At first the prostatai could use the demos’ support primarily for the struggle
with their rivals.24 Over some time they will have had to formulate certain democratic slogans, i. e. to act (whether consciously or not) as democratic reformers.25
This type of politician (prostatai and demagogues) is mentioned particularly in the
first part of the Athenaion Politeia.26 Obviously these are first-rank politicians who
in their own way promoted the development of democracy in Athens27:
18 Thuc. 3.82.5, transl. B. Jowett.
19 Ober supposes that it was only in the time of Cleisthenes that the lower classes became sufficiently politically aware to be a factor in political struggles (Ober [n. 5, above], 85).
20 ‘The Athenians, when they saw what had happened, came in a body from the fields (πανδημεὶ
ἐκ τῶν ἀγρῶν) and invested the Acropolis’ (Thuc. 1.126.7, transl. B. Jowett).
21 V. Goušchin, ‘Pisistratus’ Leadership in A. P. 13.4 and the Establishment of the Tyranny of
561/60 b. c.’, CQ2 xlix1999, 14–21. The demos could make an appeal to the leaders.
22 Ath. Pol. 2.1: στασιάσαι τούς τε γνωρίμους καὶ τὸ πλῆθος πολὺν χρόνον.
23 Ober (n. 5, above), 85. But one of the aristocrats (as in the case of Pericles) could ‘decide[d] to
devote himself to the people, espousing the cause of the poor and the many instead of the few
and the rich, contrary to his own nature, which was anything but popular’ (Plut. Per. 7.3, transl.
B. Perrin). [In common with the other contributors to this book, I cite Plutarch’s Lives by the
chapters and sections of the Teubner and Budé editions; but I quote the translations of B. Perrin
from the Loeb edition, which has a different division of the chapters into sections.]
24 According to Ober the democratic leaders were driven by a competitive ethos rather than by
theoretical principles (Ober [n. 5, above], 84).
25 On prostatai and their democratic programmes see: Goušchin (n. 21, above), 14–19.
26 Certainly, we need to be careful here, because of course the Athenaion Politeia may be (mis)
understanding these early politicians by using the criteria of the author’s own time.
27 This list of prostatai tou demou is given by. Ath. Pol. 28.2–3. Certainly, from other sources
other persons could be added to this list (e. g. Hyperbolus, Androcles, etc.).
Aristocracy in Democratic Athens: Deformation and/or Adaptation
sixth century
fifth century
Solon
Pisistratus
Cleisthenes
Xanthippus
51
Themistocles28
Ephialtes
Pericles
Cleon
28
Cleophon
On this basis we may accept Eder’s idea that the democratic system was invented
by the aristocracy.29 But with some correction: that it was not the whole of the aristocracy who made efforts to create a democratic constitution, but a part only.
If this is right, there took place in Athens a division into democratic and aristocratic orientations among the politicians, or, more precisely, a separation of democratically-oriented leaders from the aristocracy. And this happened much earlier
than we might expect, i. e. in the sixth century, not in the time of Pericles or after the
appearance of the demagogues.30 Besides, this could be described as a serious divorce in the ranks of the aristocracy that would exert a considerable impact on
subsequent events, even though those who turned into prostatai were very few.
Certainly, this does not mean that the whole of the aristocracy divided into warring
parties. There were, I suspect, a certain number who were not inclined to join to any
side (the so-called ‘quiet’ Athenians or apragmones).31
The political actions of those aristocrats who were inclined to rely on the demos
differed significantly from what had gone before. Politicians of that sort needed to
make themselves known among the common people in order to become a prostates.
Because prostatai tou demou may be a men at the head of their own factions (hetaireiai), they may include common people in their hetaireiai.32 Cleisthenes, as
Herodotus narrates, who was getting the worst of Isagoras, ‘took the commons into
his party’ (τὸν δῆμον προσεταιρίζεται).33 This formulation could be a meta28 In Ath. Pol. 28. 2 the meaning seems to be that Themistocles was a democratic leader and
Aristides was an aristocratic leader, but Ath. Pol. 23. 3 puts both on the democratic side.
29 Eder (n. 4, above), 122, 128.
30 Plutarch in his life of Pericles wrote as follows: ‘Now there had been from the beginning a sort
of seam hidden beneath the surface of affairs, as in a piece of iron, which faintly indicated a
divergence between the popular and the aristocratic programme; but the emulous ambition of
these two men [Pericles and Cimon] cut a deep gash in the state, and caused one section of it to
be called the “Demos”, or the People, and the other the “Oligoi”, or the Few’ (Plut. Per. 11.3,
transl. B.Perrin) – but for doubts see A. Andrewes, ‘The Opposition to Pericles’, JHS xcviii
1978, 1–8 at 2). Connor thinks that political conflicts before the appearance of demagogues
were mainly a matter of personal rivalry (Connor [n. 13, above], 110 ff.).
31 These could be those whom Solon envisaged in his law on stasis (Ath. Pol. 8.5); see also n. 80,
below.
32 On prostatai and their hetaireiai see Gouschin (n. 21, above), 123 n. 58.
33 Hdt.5.66.1, transl. A. D. Godley. According to the Ath. Pol. he was ἡττώμενος δὲ ταῖς
52
Valerij Goušchin
phor.34 But nothing prevents us from treating it literally, i. e. from noting the inclusion of the demos (or some men from the demos) into Cleisthenes’ group. In this
case it could have provided him with numerical superiority over Isagoras.
The appearance of prostatai tou demou gradually weakened the importance of
traditional aristocratic associations (hetaireiai) and shifted the focus of political
activity from informal groups to state institutions. The appeal to the demos (or the
demos’ appeal to the leaders) could be taken through the representative institutions
such as the people’s assembly and the jury-courts. Despite the fact that many of the
leaders of the demos (if not all) held official positions in the state, their influence as
prostatai had an informal tone. A similar influence in the people’s assembly was to
be exercised by Cleon, Hyperbolus, etc.35 In this way those who sought the demos’
support gave rise to demagogy as the model of political behaviour. Plutarch supposed that Pericles was prone to demagogy before the ostracism of Thucydides
Melesiou.36 Therefore I suspect that demagogy as political phenomenon could have
appeared much earlier.
Nevertheless membership of hetaireiai could still be a prerequisite for a successful political career (or for the beginning) of one in the first half of the fifth
century. Plutarch, if we can trust him, wrote that Themistocles’ career owed much
to membership of a hetaireia.37 Unlike him Aristides was alone in his political activity.38 However, Plutarch narrates that Aristides introduced his decrees through
other men so that Themistocles might not oppose him.39 These ‘other men’ could be
the members of Aristides’ grouping or hetaireia. If so, Aristides was not alone as
Plutarch assumed (or as Aristides wished to appear).40 The same practice was attributed to Pericles, who did not want people to grow accustomed to speeches by him.41
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
ἑταιρείαις (Ath. Pol. 20.1: see, e. g., Goušchin [n. 21, above], 17 n. 25, and in general Eder [n.
4, above], 135).
According to Connor Cleisthenes brought the demos over his side by informal means, by promising to treat them as his hetairoi (Connor [n. 13, above], 90–1 n. 5).
E. g. M. I. Finley, ‘Athenian Demagogues’, Past and Present xxi 1962, 3–24; revised in his
Democracy Ancient and Modern (London: Hogarth P., 21985); reprinted in various collections,
e. g. P. J. Rhodes (ed.) Athenian Democracy (Edinburgh: Edinburgh U. P., 2004), 163–84. See
also J. T. Roberts, ‘Athens’ So-Called Unofficial Politicians’, Hermes cx 1982, 354–62.
Plut. Per. 15.2. See also: R. Sealey, ‘The Entry of Pericles into History’, Hermes lxxxiv 1956,
234–47 at 234 ff. = his Essays in Greek Politics (New York: Manyland), 59–74 at 59 ff.; R. K.
Sinclair, Democracy and Participation in Athens (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 1989), 39. It is
usually thought that Plutarch’s distinction between the earlier and the later Pericles was the
result of his trying to reconcile the leader of all the Athenians from Thucydides with the partisan politician of other writers: e. g. Gomme, H. C. T. i. 65–7.
Plut. Arist. 2.5. But we need to be careful with Plutarch: there is certainly a tendency in
Plutarch’s biographies to see Athenian politics in anachronistic terms; much depends on what
the source was for his different remarks.
Plut. Arist. 2.6. But elsewhere he calls Aristides the friend (hetairos) of Cleisthenes (Plut. Arist.
2.1). See also Connor (n. 13, above), 54.
Plut. Arist. 3.4.
Оn Aristides’ hetaieria see Connor (n. 13, above), 27 and n. 42, 55.
Plut. Per. 7.7.
Aristocracy in Democratic Athens: Deformation and/or Adaptation
53
However, the first-rank politicians were not eager to flaunt their friendly interactions. The Athenians indeed could look askance at those who seemed to prefer the
company of their social peers to that of ordinary citizens.42 This explains Aristides’
desire to look like a lone (or independent) politician. Pericles, who had friends of
the greatest influence, avoided invitations to dinner, friendly and familiar interaction.43 Some time later Cleon demonstratively broke off with his friends, displaying
his loyalty to the demos.44
This fact demonstrated, on the one hand, that narrow group loyalty was replaced (or seemed to be replaced) by loyalty to the people. But, on the other hand,
it could relate to such a phenomenon as demagogy. The latter is characterized,
Connor postulates, by the abandonment of working through friends and by appealing directly to the people.45 In that case, some features of demagogy appeared before Cleon: one may find it in the behaviour of Aristides and Pericles.
3. BETWEEN STABILITY AND INSTABILITY
At the turn of the sixth and fifth centuries the aristocrats were faced with new challenges, because they were divided into rival groups.46 The Alcmaeonids and their
(and/or Cleisthenes’) supporters could be weakened after Cleisthenes’ sudden departure from the political scene.47 It would seem that this created certain advantages
for their ill-wishers. Indeed, there could be among them the opponents of Cleisthenes
and his reforms. Besides, there could be still alive the followers of Isagoras (or his
followers’ descendants) and those whom the sources called as ‘the friends of the
tyrants’, e. g. Hipparchus son of Charmus.48 There were also those who did not join
any of these groups. Each group mentioned above could have been led by one of its
members, but the aristocracy did not have a common leader. The situation changed
with appearance of Miltiades, who, as A. W. Gomme wrote, ‘put himself at the head
of the nobles’.49 But after Miltiades’ death his opponents, who put him on trial in
42 Ober (n. 5, above), 86.
43Plut. Per. 7.5, Connor (n. 13, above), 57, 119–22, 127, K.-W. Welwei, Die griechische Polis
(Stuttgart: Steiner, 1983), 49, Ober (n. 5, above), 86.
44 Plut. Praec. Ger. Reip. 806 f., Connor (n. 13, above), 91–2.
45 Connor (n. 13, above), 117–8. Rhodes thinks that some politicians cultivated the reputation of
full-time politicians (P. J. Rhodes, ‘Political Activity in Classical Athens’, JHS cvi 1986, 132–
44 at 141 = his [ed.], Athenian Democracy [n. 34, above], 185–206 at 201).
46 But together with E. S. Gruen I am averse to see in this political parties (‘Stesimbrotus on
Miltiades and Themistocles’, CSCA iii 1970, 91–8 at 91–2).
47 E. g. V. Goušchin, ‘Athenian Ostracism and Ostraka: Some Historical and Statistical
Observations’, in L. Mitchell & L.Rubinstein (edd.) Greek History and Epigraphy: Essays in
Honour of P. J. Rhodes (Swansea: Classical Press of Wales, 2009), 225–50 at 228.
48 He was archon in 496/5 (R. Develin, Athenian Officials. 684–321 b. c. [Cambridge: Cambridge
U. P., 1989], 54).
49 A. W. Gomme, ‘Athenian Notes’, AJP lxv 1944, 321–39 at 329 = his More Essays in Greek
History and Literature (Oxford: Bl;ackwell, 1962), 26; see also Goušchin (n. 47, above), 230–
1. In the course of time he became a panhellenic and national leader: p. 322 = 20).
54
Valerij Goušchin
489 (i. e. the Alcmaeonids), won the leadership in Athens.50 But they lost their
championship as soon as the Athenians made use of the law of ostracism. Later, in
the 480s–470s, Themistocles and Aristides took priority with varying success. If
Themistocles was a democratic leader, Aristides was thought to be a leader of an
aristocratic kind.51 But Plutarch writes of him as a single-handed politician who
was more inclined to demonstrate his independence.52 If that is right, the aristocracy could have been deprived of a leader in the traditional sense of the word until
Cimon’s appearance in politics. Perhaps this is how we might understand a problematic passage in the Athenaion Politeia.
We read there as follows:
For it so happened that during these periods the better classes had no leader at all, but the chief
person among them (μηδ᾽ ἡγεμόνα ἔχειν τοὺς ἐπιεικεστέρους ἀλλ᾽ αὐτῶν προεστάναι),
Cimon son of Miltiades, was a rather young man who had only lately entered public life; and
in addition, that the multitude had suffered seriously in war.53
This text presents many difficulties. It follows the story of Ephialtes’ reform of 462,
which did not relate to the time of Cimon’s youth.54 In addition to that, the substantial Athenian losses would seem to us unrealistic, if we move Aristotle’s narration
to the 480s (on casualties see pp. 12–15, below). I assume that Cimon’s youth and
the substantial military losses of the Athenians should be attributed to different periods.
We may suppose that after Miltiades’ death the aristocracy, if not leaderless, did
not have a recognised leader at the head of them. Aristides, as remarked above, may
have preferred a different political style emphasising his independence. The situation changed when Cimon obtained leading position. He belonged, to a particularly
notable and influential family and therefore surpassed many of the aristocrats. This
could give him a dominant position among the aristocrats (αὐτῶν προεστάναι).
Over time Cimon turned into a national (and, like his father, panhellenic) leader.
His indisputable leadership is reflected in the text of Ath. Pol., where we find a teleological view of it, i. e. Cimon’s priority and leadership as a pre-ordained result.
But in the 480s he was still young to enter public life. That is perhaps why, according to Ath. Pol., the aristocrats had a recognised champion but not a hegemon (μηδ᾽
ἡγεμόνα ἔχειν τοὺς ἐπιεικεστέρους).
What was happening in society displeased the aristocracy and demanded an
immediate reaction on their part. Their discontent could be especially intensified in
a time of war. If we put our trust in Plutarch’s narration, before the battle of Plataea
(in 479) a conspiracy was organized by noblemen (ἄνδρες ἐξ οἴκων ἐπιφανῶν)
who had been impoverished by the war, and they wanted, Plutarch reports, to over50 E. Badian, ‘Archons and Strategoi’, Antichthon, v 1971, 1–34 at 11–14, P. Karavites, ‘Realities
and Appearances, 490–480 b. c.’, Historia xxvi 1977, 129–47 at 135.
51 E. g. Plut. Arist. 2.1, V. Rosivach, ‘State Pay as War Relief in Peloponnesian-War Athens’,
G&R2 lviii 2011, 176–83 at 178 n.10.
52 Plut. Arist. 3.4; see also p. 9, above.
53 Ath. Pol. 26.1, transl. H. Rackham.
54 See e. g. P. J. Rhodes, A Commentary on the Aristotelian Athenaion Politeia (Oxford: Oxford
U. P., 1981), 325–6.
Aristocracy in Democratic Athens: Deformation and/or Adaptation
55
throw the democracy (καταλύσειν τὸν δῆμον).55 Nevertheless Aristides, who
commanded the Athenians at Plataea, put a brake on the investigation.
Among the conspirators Plutarch mentions Agasias of Acharnae and Aeschines
of Lamptrae, who managed to escape from the camp.56 The finding of ostraka with
the name Agasias of Agryle or Lamptrae (but not of Acharnae), gives some reason
to trust Plutarch’s story in spite of the confusion in the details.57 If so, some things
seems to me noteworthy, in particular, the negative effects of the war remarked on
by Plutarch (see also pp. 14 ff., below). In addition, I should like to draw attention
to one thing. The conspirators preferred to act secretly from Aristides, though it
would be comprehensible that he had enough sympathy with them not to initiate
judicial proceedings.
The situation changed after Cimon headed (or organised) the aristocratic faction, which we shall see in the battle of Tanagra c. 457 (see below). In Athens there
began a ‘Cimonian’ era. For a long time Cimon continued to be a successful military commander and the most influential politician. Thereby he contributed to the
strengthening the position of the aristocracy;58 and that in turn may have enabled
the Athenaion Politeia (or its sources) to talk about the Areopagus’ domination.
According to the Athenaion Politeia, in the 470s–460s the state was dominated by
the Areopagus.59 Perhaps Cimon’s political influence or his effective collaboration
with the Areopagus (though most likely he was not a member) could be an explanation of this notion.
However, Ephialtes’ reform of 462/1 and subsequent events put an end to
Cimon’s dominance and to the influence of the aristocracy. Cimon’s sluggish attempt to restore the aristocracy’s previous importance (as he responded to the reform of 462, according to Plutarch) were unsuccessful.60 His subsequent expulsion
by the procedure of ostracism put an end to the Cimonian era.
The aristocrats remained leaderless again. Changing political realities stirred
up their dissatisfaction and irritations. For the first time, as was said above, that had
happened at Plataea in 479. A second attempt was made before the battle of Tanagra
c. 457. This time the discontent was caused by the long walls, which were thought
55 On the Plataean conspiracy see also Plut. Arist. 13, F. D. Harvey, ‘The Conspiracy of Agasias
and Aeschines (Plutarch, Aristeides 13)’, Klio lxvi 1984, 58–9, Rhodes (n. 12, above), 123, J.
Marincola, ‘The Fairest Victor: Plutarch, Aristides and the Persian Wars’, Histos vi 2012,
104–5 n. 32 (with bibliography). That conspirators were interested in overthrowing the democracy raises many doubts: perhaps they wanted to come to terms with Persia (Rhodes [n. 12,
above].123).
56 Plut. Arist. 13.3.
57 Harvey (n. 55, above), 58–9, Rhodes (n. 12, above), 123, S. Brenne, Ostrakismos und Prominenz
in Athens (Tyche Supp. iii 2001), 89–90, discusses the ostraka and considers the identification
with Plutarch’s Agasias possible but ‘sehr hypothetisch’.
58 ‘When he was at home, he mastered and constrained the people in its onsets upon the nobles’
(Plut. Cim. 15.1, transl. B. Perrin)
59 E. g. Ath.Pol. 23.1, 25.2, with Rhodes (n. 54, above), ad loc., see also Rhodes (n. 12, above),
123–4, idem. A History of the Classical Greek World. 478–323 b. c. (Chichester: Wiley–
Blackwell, 22010), 40–6.
60 Plut. Cim. 15.3.
56
Valerij Goušchin
to be a symbol of the democracy.61 The attempted coup was unsuccessful or without
effect, though we do not know the details of it.
Soon after that there emerged new negative circumstances. Here we should
place what we learn from the Athenaion Politeia, that the aristocracy suffered from
the wars and numerous military campaigns, which resulted in ravage and their numerical decline. For Aristotle this was above all a stimulus to the development of
democracy.62 ‘Revolutions in the constitutions also take place on account of disproportionate growth; for just as the body is composed of parts, and needs to grow
proportionately in order that its symmetry may remain, and if it does not it is
spoiled.’63 He gives, in particular, the example of Taras, where a great many notables were defeated and killed by the Iapygians after the Persian Wars and constitutional government was changed to a democracy.64 In this context also he mentions
Athens, where ‘the notables (gnorimoi) became fewer because at the time of the
war against Sparta the army was drawn from a muster-roll’.65
But in this case we are interested not so much in Aristotle’s theoretical assessment as in the problem of the supposed numerical decline of the aristocracy in the
460s–430s. In the Athenaion Politeia we find as follows ‘In those days the expeditionary force was raised from a muster-roll, and was commanded by generals with
no experience of war but promoted on account of their family reputations, so that it
was always happening that the troops on an expedition suffered as many as two or
three thousand casualties, making a drain on the numbers of the respectable members both of the people and of the wealthy (ὥστε ἀναλίσκεσθαι τοὺς ἐπιεικεῖς
καὶ τοῦ δήμου καὶ τῶν εὐπόρων)’.66
P. J. Rhodes points out it is not plausible that the casualties should have occurred only or principally among the upper classes. He assumes that Aristotle used
ἐπιεικεῖς not in a political but in a moral sense.67 These casualties could be in any
case the representatives of three first property classes.68 The conscription ek katalogou meant indeed that the men recruited (and hence killed) were Athenians belonging to the first three classes.69 If so we can talk about military losses among the
aristocrats in the time of the so-called First Peloponnesian War as well.70 Suffice it
61 Tanagra: Thuc. 1.107.5, Hornblower (n. 16, above), 170–1; but contra E. Badian, From Plataea
to Potidaea (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins U. P., 1993), 213.
62 E. g. A. Dovatur, ‘Aristotel o sotsialnih prichinah izmenenia afinskogo gosudarstvennogo stroja
v 60–30 godah V v. do n. e. (Aristotle on the reasons for the changes of the Athenian Constitution
in 60s–30s of the fifth century b. c.)’, in Drevnij Vostok i antichnij mir (Ancient Orient and
Ancient World) (Мoscow: U. P., 1980), 152–8 (in Russian).
63 Arist. Pol. 5.1302b33–6, transl. H. Rackham.
64 Arist. Pol. 5.1303a1–6.
65 Arist. Pol. 5.1303a8–10, transl. H. Rackham. Aristotle remarks on losses in land battles (ἐν
Ἀθήναις ἀτυχούντων πεζῇ οἱ γνώριμοι ἐλάττους ἐγένοντο).
66 Ath. Pol. 26.1, transl. H. Rackham: see, e. g., M. Christ, ‘Conscription of Hoplites in Classical
Athens’, CQ2 li 2001, 398–422 at 399.
67 Rhodes (n. 46, above), 328. But the gnorimoi whom Aristotle mentions in the Politics were
obviously a social category,
68 Dovatur (n. 55, above), 154–5.
69 See in general Christ (n. 66, above).
70 Dovatur (n. 55, above), 156. We may add the sizeable casualties at Drabescus in 465/4
Aristocracy in Democratic Athens: Deformation and/or Adaptation
57
to mention the defeat of the Athenians at Halieis c. 459 and at Tanagra c. 457.71 One
may add to the list the Egyptian disaster of 454.
The battle of Tanagra may provide an example of the mass death of the aristocrats. The ostracised Cimon who had refused to join his tribe (Oeneis) appealed to
his followers (or hetairoi) to fight strongly against the Lacedemonians. ‘They took
his armour and set it in the midst of their company, supported one another ardently
in the fight, and fell, to the number of one hundred.’72
Certainly, the casualties will not always have been so sizeable. In the battle of
Plataea, as Herodotus reports, the Greeks lost 159 men with 52 Athenians among
them.73 Nevertheless, it can be assumed that the losses of the Athenians could be
substantial, at least within the so-called hoplite-class. The casualty list of the tribe
Erechtheis for a year c.460 contains 176 names (IG i3 1147), and that perhaps of
Aegeis more than 57 (1147 bis). If the war losses of the other tribes were equal to
those of Erechtheis, as G.Smith assumed, the total losses would be 1,76074 – though
she granted that most likely that would be an overestimate.75
Whatever the actual numbers, the military losses created a social void in the
civil community and in the ranks of the aristocracy, which eventually was filled by
those who satisfied the property qualifications. But in this case the aristocracy of the
well-born diluted by the well-to-do turned increasingly into a propertied class. Thus
the list of those who were prominent after these wars could differ to some extent
from what had gone before76.
71
72
73
74
75
76
(e. g.:Paus. 1.29.4, cf. D. W. Bradeen, ‘The Athenian Casualty List of 464 b. c.’, Hesperia xxxvi
1967, 321–8).
Thuc. 1.105.1 (Halieis), 108.1 (Tanagra), cf. Dovatur (n. 55, above), 156.
Plut. Cim. 17.7, transl. B. Perrin. Cimon’s hetaireia consisted of men from different tribes.
Cimon himself belonged to Oeneis (VI), Euthippos of Anaphlystus (whom Plutarch mentions)
to Antiochis (X). His hetairoi perhaps were Macartatus and Melanopus, whose funerary stele
Pausanias mentions (Paus. 1.29.6. See also: N. T. Arrington, ‘Inscribing Defeat: The
Commemorative Dynamics of the Athenian Casualty Lists’, Cl. Ant. xxx 2011, 179–212 at
206–207). If the latter was related to the Melanopus who was famous in the fourth century, he
could belong to Cecropis (IX) (e. g.: Develin, [n.48, above], 247, 282, cf.: J. K. Davies, Athenian
Propertied Families. 600–300 b. c. (Oxford: Oxford U. P., 1971), 388. In the fourth century a
Macartatus of Prospalta from the tribe Acamantis (V) is known (Davies, 364).
Hdt. 9.70. But according to Plutarch in his life of Aristides the Greek losses at Plataea were
1,360 men, with the 52 Athenians, all from the Aiantid tribe, among them (Plut. Arist. 19.5–6,
for Athens citing Cleidemus: FGrH 324 F 22). The 1,360 ‘looks like a mere compilation from
the incomplete items in Herodotus; Plutarch’s source has apparently added another 600 for the
other half of the centre and rounded off the total’ (C. Hignett, Xerxes’ Invasion of Greece
[Oxford: Oxford U. P., 1963], 340–1). But these figures are regularly considered too low (e. g.
Hignett, loc. cit.). On military losses in general see, e. g., A. J. Holladay, ‘Hoplites and Heresies’,
JHS cii 1982, 94–103 = his Athens in the Fifth Century and Other Studies in Greek History
(Chicago: Ares, 2002), 169–81; P. Krentz, ‘Casualties in Hoplite Battles’, GRBS xxvi 1985,
13–20.
G. Smith, ‘Athenian Casualty Lists’, CP xviii 1919, 351–64 at 360–1.
Smith (n. 74, above), 363.
In the same way perhaps as with the century before and that after Solon (see p. 3–4 and n. 12,
above).
58
Valerij Goušchin
However, I suspect that during the ongoing wars – even taking into account the
fact that they aimed at enrichment77 – the regeneration of the propertied class is
unlikely to have been fast,78 especially if the classes were defined on the basis of
wealth obtained from agricultural production. Plutarch mentions economic disasters of the propertied class before the battle of Plataea, and Thucydides in turn reports that the Athenians recovered from the calamities of the Persian Wars only on
the eve of the Peloponnesian War.79
4. ADAPTATION: THUCYDIDES MELESIOU AS A CASE-STUDY
Democratic institutions and the successes of those whose who relied on the demos
had a ;profound effect on politics. (Let us recall the impressive list of prostatai tou
demou of the sixth and fifth centuries on p. 6–7, above). The aristocratic hetaireiai
in this situation moved step-by-step out of the political sphere (perhaps until 411),
remaining only informal communities of friends. This means that some groups of
aristocrats lost their political influence and/or converted into apragmones.80
However, if the representative institutions were playing an increasing role in
politics, the ability to work in (and with) people’s assembly or heliaia was becoming increasingly significant, and the aristocracy had to take this into account. That
is why we hear of Miltiades’ psephismata (whether authentic or not), which were
the result of cooperation with the people’s assembly (ekklesia).81 Readiness to adapt
to new conditions was displayed by Cimon.82 He also had to acquire the skills of
77 On enrichment as the aim of wars see M. Trundle, ‘Coinage and the Transformation of Greek
Warfare’, in G. G. Fagon and M. Trundle (edd.), New Perspectives on Ancient Warfare (Leiden:
Brill, 2010), 227–52 at 233 and n. 24.
78 It is possible that the zeugitai’s obtaining in 457/6 the right to be appointyed archons (Ath. Pol.
26.2) was a result not only of democratisation, but also of a numerical reduction of the pentakosiomedimnoi and hippeis. Thus, extending the archonship to zeugitai, I think, will have made
many more eligible. H. van Wees inclined to think that zeugitai were members of the Athenian
leisured class, therefore extending the archonship to zeugitai did not greatly increase the number eligible (e. g.: H. van Wees, ‘The Myth of the Middle-Class Army: Military and Social
Status in Athens’, in T. Bekker-Nielsen & L. Hannestad [edd.], War as a Cultural and Social
Force (Copenhagen; 2001), 45–71, contra M. Valdés Guia & J. Galiego, ‘Athenian Zeugitai and
the Solonian Census Classes: New Reflections and Perspectives’, Historia lix 2010, 257–81).
79 Thuc. 2.16.1.
80 W. Donlan, The Aristocratic Ideal in Ancient Greece (Lawrence: Coronado Press, 1980), 122 =
his The Aristocratic Ideal and Selected Papers (n. 13, above), 122. On apragmones and apragmosyne see, e. g., L. B. Carter, The Quiet Athenian (Oxford: Oxford U. P., 1986).
81 Dem. 19.303.
82 We find a conspicuous story in the life of Cimon: ‘When the Medes made their invasion, and
Themistocles was trying to persuade the people to give up their city, abandon their country,
make a stand with their fleet off Salamis, and fight the issue at sea, most men were terrified at
the boldness of the scheme; Cimon was first to act, and with a gay mien led a procession of his
companions through the Cerameicus up to the Acropolis, to dedicate to the goddess there the
horse’s bridle which he carried in his hands, signifying thus that what the city needed then was
not knightly prowess but sea-fighters’ (Plut. Cim. 5.2, transl. B. Perrin). Cimon refused to rely
on his aristocratic status, if we are to trust this story.
Aristocracy in Democratic Athens: Deformation and/or Adaptation
59
working in (and with) the people’s assembly. It is also displayed in his repeated
election as strategos from 478/7 to 462/1, because he was a skilful and popular
military commander.83 Another illustration of his impact on the demos could be his
victory over Ephialtes when the question of assistance to Sparta was discussed.84
He won this victory at the meeting(s) of people’s assembly, and that seemed to
control his democratic opponent Ephialtes.
Вut perhaps the most conspicuous evolution was made by Thucydides Melesiou,
who was Cimon’s relative. Information about him we find mainly in Plutarch,
which in itself may provoke disbelief. But what Plutarch reports does not contradict
historical reality and could well be the case. Thucydides, as Plutarch wrote, ‘being
less of a warrior than Cimon, and more of a forensic speaker and statesman (ἀγοραῖος δὲ καὶ πολιτικὸς μᾶλλον), by keeping watch and ward in the city, and by
wrestling bouts with Pericles on the bema, soon brought the administration into
even poise’.85 Besides, he was successful in the lawcourts (dikasteria), in particular
in the trial of a certain Pyrilampes. Perhaps this event preceded his rivalry with
Pericles.86
And the struggle over Pericles’ building programme was conducted in the assembly, which could affect the nature of the confrontation and add ‘parliamentary’
features to it.87 Elsewhere Plutarch mentions ‘Thucydides and his party’ (τῶν δὲ
περὶ τὸν Θουκυδίδην ῥητόρων).88
83 478/7 is his first supposed strategia: Develin (n. 48, above), 67–72. See also E. SteinHölkeskamp, ‘Kimon und die athenische Demokratie’, Hermes cxxvii 1999, 145–64 at 157–8.
‘He mastered and constrained the people in its onsets upon the nobles, as Plutarch narrates, and
in its efforts to wrest all office and power to itself” (Plut. Cim. 15.1).
84 Plut.Cim. 16.8–10.
85 Plut. Per. 11.1, transl. B. Perrin; see also Rhodes (n. 12, above), 127.
86 E. g.: Pl. Lach. 158a, Anon. Vit. Thuc. 6. See also: P. Cartledge, ‘Fowl Play: A Curious Lawsuit
in Classical Athens’, in P. Cartledge, P. Millett & S. Todd (edd.) Nomos. Essays in Athenian
Law, Politics and Society (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 1990), 41–61 at 45, E. Carawan,’The
Trials of Thucydides “the Demagogue” in the Anonymous “Life” of Thucydides the Historian’,
Historia xlv 1996, 405–22 at 411–6, D. Nails, The People of Plato: A Prosopography of Plato
and Others (Indianapolis; Hackett, 2002), 257–9. R. Meiggs supposed that Pyrilampes was
among those who made the Peace of Callias (R. Meiggs, The Athenian Empire [Oxford: Oxford
U. P., 1972], 146, cf. Develin [n. 48, above], 80, 107).
87Plut. Per. 12.1, 14.1–2. See also J. S. Boersma, Athenian Building Policy from 561/0 to 405/4
(Groningen; Scripta Archaeologica Groningana 4, 1970), 65–81 at 80–1, A. Powell, ‘Athens’
Pretty Face: Anti-Feminine Rhetoric and Fifth-Century Controversy over the Parthenon’, in A.
Powell (ed.), Ancient Greece (London: Routledge, 1995), 245–70 at 249. I leave aside here the
question of the reason for this rivalry. Not all scholars tend to see in it a conflict of the opponents or supporters of the democracy: e. g.: F. J. Frost, ‘Pericles, Thucydides, son of Melesias,
and Athenian Politics Before the War’, Historia xiii 1964, 385–99 = his Politics and the
Athenians (Topronto: Kent, 2005), 278–97; K.-J. Hölkeskamp,’Parteiungen und politische
Willensbildung im demokratischtn Athen: Pericles und Thukydides, Sohn des Melesias’ HZ
cclxvii 1998, 1–27. E. Carawan calls Thucydides a demagogue because he was named prostates tou demou in the anonymous Life of Thucydides (Anon. Vit.Thuc. 7) (Carawan [n. 79,
above]). But I am inclined to see in Thucydides Melesiou Cimon’s political heir (cf., e. g., H. T.
Wade-Gery, ‘Thucydides the Son of Melesias: A Study of Periklean Policy’ JHS lii 1932, 205–
27 at 205 = his Essays in Greek History [Oxford: Blackwell, 1958], 239–70 at 239).
88 Plut. Per. 14.1.
60
Valerij Goušchin
But at the beginning the aristocrats were dispersed in the face of their opponents. ‘He would not suffer the party of the “Good and True (καλοὺς κἀγαθοὺς)”,
as they called themselves, to be scattered up and down and blended with the populace, as heretofore, the weight of their character being thus obscured by numbers,
but by culling them out and assembling them into one body, he made their collective influence, thus become weighty, as it were a counterpoise in the balance’.89 He
separated off the kaloi kagathoi to give them greater political weight in the assembly. If this was so, Thucydides’ hetaireia had certain similarities with a parliamentary party.90
Thucydides managed to restore the influence of the aristocracy in the assembly,
but for a short time only. Pericles, as Plutarch narrates, ‘secured his rival’s banishment, and the dissolution of the faction (κατέλυσε δὲ τὴν ἀντιτεταγμένην
ἑταιρείαν) which had been arrayed against him’.91 Thucydides’ faction was defeated and he was exiled by the procedure of ostracism.92 The aristocracy lost its
leader once more. It was not easy for a new man, we may agree with Connor, to take
over the leadership of the group.93 I should even say that it would be impossible
owing to the lack of equal rights for leadership, as I suggested earlier. Thucydides
became the leader because he was Cimon’s relative, because he belonged to the one
of the most distinguished and influential aristocratic families.
Plutarch assumed that after Thucydides’ expulsion Pericles converted from the
leader who did not hesitated to use demagogic techniques into the wise leader of all
the people.94 But at this time in Athenian politics there appeared new figures such
as Cleon.
5. CONCLUSIONS
So what happened to the aristocracy in democratic Athens? During the period under
review aristocracy remained the most politically active layer of the citizen body.
Firstly under the domination of competitive values (or the agonistic spirit) the aristocrats were fighting with each other while remaining parts of a whole. But over
time there was a split, which had a significant impact on subsequent events. It found
its expression in the appearance of prostatai whose efforts supplied the beginning
of democracy in Athens. Besides, their type of political behaviour, i. e. direct appeal
to the demos, permits us to distinguish them from the other aristocratic leaders
whose activity was based primarily on friendship association (hetaireiai). The po89Plut. Per. 11.2, transl. B. Perrin. Cf. Thuc. 6.13.1 (Alcibiades).
90 E. g. Ober (n. 5, above), 89. But for doubts about the resemblance of Thucydides’ hetaireia to
a political party see M. H. Hansen, ‘Political Parties in Democratic Athens?’, GRBS liv 2014,
379–403 at 381 ff.
91 Plut. Per. 14.3.
92 See, e. g., Wade-Gery (n. 87, above), 206 ff. = 240 ff. Pericles, in Wade-Gery’s expression, began his fifteen years’ principate (p. 205).
93 Connor (n. 13, above), 63 n. 55.
94 Plut. Per. 15.1–2. See also Sealey, (n. 36, above), 234 ff. = 59 ff., Sinclair, Democracy and
Participation (n. 36, above), 39.
Aristocracy in Democratic Athens: Deformation and/or Adaptation
61
litical actions of prostatai had features of demagogy. Thus we can assume that such
a phenomenon as demagogy appeared long before Cleon.
Nevertheless the situation of fifth-century Athens was not favourable for the
aristocracy. The supposed numerical reduction of the nobility owing to frequent
wars and military conflicts (more or less perceptible) could have been an acute
problem as well. Despite the likely replacement of the lost men by new members of
propertied class(es), this situation could be regarded as a serious deformation.
Those who preferred to use the traditional forms of political struggle were frequently faced with problems. On the one hand, this was a result of the inner inequality of the nobility. Not all of its members had the chance to be leaders of aristocratic
factions. Often this left the nobility leaderless and so prevented the emergence of
new political groupings. Suffice it to mention the efforts made by Thucydides son
of Melesias in creating his own group. In the event there emerged a political hybrid,
of an aristocratic hetaireia which did not shun demagogic techniques. We should
treat this as a sign of adaptation, or adaptation through deformation.
EMPIRE AND CRISIS IN FOURTH-CENTURY GREECE
Polly Low
1. INTRODUCTION: THE PROBLEM, AND ITS ORIGINS
The history of Greece in the fourth century b. c. has sometimes been seen, by ancient commentators as well as modern, as not much more than a sequence of crises
of various sorts – political, economic, and even moral.1 My focus here, however,
is rather on the ways in which Greek – or more accurately, Athenian – writers of this
period attempted to show how these crises could be avoided. More specifically, I
want to explore the perceived connections between the acquisition of power in the
inter-state system and the maintenance of the stability and safety of the polis. Both
of these goals are generally perceived as highly desirable objectives (for reasons
which do not need explaining); what is contested, though, is how (and indeed, if)
they can be combined. To put it another way: does the quest for power in the interstate arena help to avert crises in civil society, or is it more likely to create them?
One powerful historical example overshadows fourth-century efforts to address
this problem, and that is the experience of Athens’ fifth-century empire. Empire
was, of course, widely credited with making fifth-century Athens both strong and
wealthy;2 it was also regularly associated with the preservation of Athenian security
and liberty (eleutheria).3 The failure of empire, meanwhile, could be associated
with the arrival of the opposite of all these good things. Isocrates’ Panegyricus, for
example, makes the collapse of Athenian imperialism the ‘beginning of evils’
(ἀρχὴ τῶν κακῶν) for the Greeks (4.119).4 These ‘evils’ include international upheaval (above all, the increasing power of Persia: 4.120), but they also encompass
1
2
3
4
The overall nature (or existence) of the ‘fourth century crisis’ is beyond the scope of this chapter: for discussion (and criticism) of the issues, see especially J. K. Davies, ‘The Fourth Century
Crisis: What Crisis?’, in W. Eder (ed.), Die athenische Demokratie im 4. Jahrhundert v. Chr.:
Vollendung oder Verfall einer Verfassungsform? (Stuttgart: Steiner, 1995), 29–36.
Numerous examples could be cited (from texts produced both during and after the Empire), but
striking instances include Pericles’ catalogue of imperial revenues at Thuc. 2.13; [Xen.] Ath.
Pol. 2.4–12; Dem. 3.23–6; Plut. Per. 12. Generally on the perceived connection between
Athenian imperial power and wealth, see L. Kallet-Marx, ‘Money Talks: Rhetor, Demos, and
the Resources of the Athenian Empire’, in R. Osborne & S. Hornblower (edd.), Ritual, Finance,
Politics: Athenian Democratic Accounts Presented to David Lewis (Oxford: Oxford U. P.,
1994), 227–51 at 238–51.
For example: Thuc. 1.75.3–4 (Athenian envoys speaking at Sparta), 2.63 (Pericles), 6.87.2
(Euphemus); see also K. A. Raaflaub, The Discovery of Freedom in Ancient Greece (Chicago:
U. of Chicago P., 2004), 166–81.
A pun adopted (presumably knowingly?) from Hdt. 5.97.3.
64
Polly Low
domestic disasters (political disruption, exile, poverty: 4.167), disasters which afflict not just Athens but the whole Greek world.
But imperial power itself is potentially not without its problems. The idea that
empire brings prosperity and security is, of course, a recurring theme in Thucydides’
speeches, but those speeches also explore a concomitant feature of imperial power:
that the benefits which it brings need to be constantly, and jealously, guarded.
Thucydides has his Pericles warn the Athenians: ‘You hold your empire like a tyranny now: taking it is thought to have been criminal; letting it go would be extremely dangerous’ (Thuc. 2.63.2). The logic of this argument is expanded on by
Cleon in the Mytilenean debate (Thuc. 3.37): exercise of power has made the
Athenians hated; any evidence of weakness will therefore encourage the subject
states to revolt (thereby undermining Athenian power); the only safe policy is to
continue on a path of power-maximisation (even though this might increase the
hostility of the allies towards Athens). Athens, in other words, is caught in a version
of the ‘security dilemma’: in order to sustain its position, it needs to act in a way
which encourages other states to undermine that position.5
The unravelling of Athenian power at the end of the fifth century could reasonably be seen as a demonstration of the reality of that dilemma, and of the fact that
the Periclean/Cleonian solution to it – simply to cling as tightly to power as possible
– was not sufficient. The first half of the fourth century sees some attempts to develop alternative approaches to combining external security with domestic stability:
Andocides’ arguments in his On the Peace, for example,6 or the model for a reformed approach to hegemonic leadership proclaimed in the ‘Prospectus’ of the
Second Athenian League (IG ii2 43 = RO 22).7 Here, though, I want to focus on
works from the middle of the fourth century, a period when the problem of empire
(and alternatives to empire) was again particularly pressing. My intention is not to
show that any author from this period had located the answer to the ‘security dilemma’, but instead to explore how contested the problem still was. Rather than
there being a single model of ‘reformed’ (or ‘hegemonic’) imperialism in the mid-
5
6
7
The dilemma is described by H. Butterfield, History and Human Relations (London: Collins,
1951), 17–27. R. Jervis, Perception and Misperception in International Politics (Princeton:
Princeton U. P., 1976), ch. 3 (esp. 64–7), sets the problem in the context of more recent international theory; for further discussion, see C. L. Glaser, ‘The Security Dilemma Revisited’, World
Politics l 1997, 171–201.
On Andocides’ approach to empire in this speech, see A. Missiou, The Subversive Oratory of
Andokides: Politics, Ideology and Decision-Making in Democratic Athens (Cambridge:
Cambridge U. P., 1992), ch. 3.
The extent to which the promises of IG ii2 43 represent a genuine reform (in either intention or
outcome) of the Athenian approach to interstate leadership is, of course, highly contested: see
(for a sample of views) J. Cargill, ‘Hegemony, not Empire: the Second Athenian League’,
AncW v 1982, 99–102 (arguing for change); S. Hornblower, Review of J. Cargill, The Second
Athenian League, CR2 xxxii 1982, 235–9 (arguing for a greater degree of continuity); G. T.
Griffith, ‘Athens in the Fourth Century’, in P. D. A. Garnsey & C. R. Whittaker (edd.),
Imperialism in the Ancient World (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 1979), 127–44 (arguing for
essentially unchanged ambitions, but severely diminished power to act on them).
Empire and Crisis in Fourth-Century Greece
65
dle of the fourth century, the question of how a state should best preserve its (and
its allies’) external and internal stability was, I will argue, still unresolved.
2. A SOLUTION: ISOCRATEAN LEADERSHIP
Isocrates’ approach to interstate politics is notoriously inconsistent,8 but his position on imperialism in his speeches of the 350s (and later) is broadly coherent.9 A
key shift which has taken place since his earlier speeches (such as the Panegyricus,
mentioned above) is that it is not the collapse of arche, but rather the attempt to
exercise it in the first place which leads to trouble. So, in the speech On the Peace,
a version of the ‘arche of troubles’ pun is deployed again, but this time it is the beginning of arche, not its demise, which is the cause of disaster (8.102: ‘they first
became subject to the dominion of their present ills [τὴν ἀρχὴν … τῶν συμφορῶν]
at the moment when they attempted to seize the dominion of the sea [τὴν ἀρχὴν
τῆς θαλάττης]). The disasters themselves, though, are notably similar to those
which, in the Panegyricus, were attributed to the loss of empire: abandonment of
ancestral laws, loss of self-control, general disturbance and confusion (8.103; compare also 8.64).
Empire, therefore, causes problems rather than solving them, and this is a principle which (according to Isocrates) applies not just to the Athenian example, but to
any attempt to exercise unrestrained imperial power (often qualified by Isocrates as
‘empire of the sea’, or tyrannical empire’).10 At 8.95, Isocrates alleges that arche
‘caused the ruin not only of Athens but of the city of the Lacedaemonians’, destroying a constitution which had been in place for seven hundred years and proving
equally destructive to the stability of states which came under Spartan rule (he alleges that it was the cause of σφαγὰς καὶ στάσεις, ‘slaughter and civil war’ in
those cities: 8.96). The same accusation (along with yet another version of the arche
pun) appears in the To Philip (5.61). Again in the Antidosis (as part of a summary
of the arguments of On the Peace), Isocrates emphasises the destructive effect of
this sort of rule: it is no better than monarchy, and no less catastrophic in its outcomes, ‘for Athens, for the Lacedaemonians, and for all the others’ (15.64).
Isocrates’ solution to this problem is not to suggest that Athens should abandon
its quest for interstate leadership entirely, but that it should pursue a different style
8
Y. L. Too, The Rhetoric of Identity in Isocrates (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 1995), 61–73
(noting that the charge of inconsistency is addressed even by Isocrates himself).
9 For detailed analysis of Isocrates’ views on empire throughout his works, see now C. Bouchet,
Isocrate l’Athénien ou la belle hégémonie: étude des relations internationales au IVe siècle a. C.
(Bordeaux: Ausonius, 2014), arguing for a broadly consistent approach (at least in Isocrates’
commitment to Athenian primacy). See also P. Constantineau, La Doctrine classique de la
politique étrangère (Paris & Montréal: Ed. l’Harmattan, 1998), 137–46; D. Grieser-Schmitz,
Die Seebundpolitik Athens in der Publizistik des Isokrates (Bonn: Habelt, 1999), ch. 3.
10Bouchet, Isocrate l’Athénien (n. 9, above), 75; on Isocratean (and other) terminology for ‘empire’ in the fourth-century, see also S. Perlman, ‘Hegemony and Arkhe in Greece: FourthCentury b. c. Views’, in R. N. Lebow & B. S. Strauss (edd.), Hegemonic Rivalry from Thucydides
to the Nuclear Age (Boulder & Oxford: Westview Press, 1991), 269–86.
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of leadership. In part, that change is a qualitative one: leadership, based on the cultivation of eunoia with other poleis,11 should be exercised for the mutual benefit of
leaders and led; the leading state will be the protector of justice, freedom, security,
and peace, not only between poleis but within them too. In sum, Athenian leadership will lead not to slavery (δουλείας) but security (σωτηρίας) (8.144).12 The
relationship between leader and led, that is, ceases to be a zero-sum equation,13 and
becomes instead beneficial for all parties.
Less clearly signalled, but nevertheless worthy of note, is a shift in the approach to
the scale of empire – or, more precisely, to the expansion of empire. A necessary
feature of arche, in the ‘Thucydidean’ model, was that it could not be constrained:
an imperial power’s survival depended on its constant activity.14 Isocrates’ use of
the language of tyranny to characterise his ‘bad’ imperialism plays on that idea of
uncontrolled ambition (which leads inevitably to disaster).15 ‘ Good’ imperialism,
by contrast, relies on a state being able to place limits on its ambitions – a lesson
which the Thebans, for example, failed to appreciate after Leuctra: if they had contented themselves with liberating the Peloponnese, rather than lurching into ‘meddlesomeness’ (πολυπραγμοσύνη), their city would have retained (or even enhanced) its power (8.58).
In his mid-century speeches, then, Isocrates has arrived at a position which is
more or less diametrically opposed to the ‘Thucydidean’ line on the relationship
between imperialism and security: a state which seeks to maximise its power will,
on Isocrates’ model, succeed only in undermining it, and a style of leadership which
seeks only to benefit the imperial state will end up damaging both leaders and led.
In theory, this Isocratean model seems appealing, but its practical utility is rather
more questionable. The precise mechanisms by which smaller states are supposed
to profit from this form of leadership remain vague (and primarily negative rather
11On eunoia in Isocrates, see J. de Romilly, ‘Eunoia in Isocrates or the Political Importance of
Creating Good Will, JHS lxxviii 1958, 92–101; in Greek interstate politics, L. G. Mitchell,
‘Philia, Eunoia and Greek Interstate Relations’, Antichthon xxxi 1997, 28–44.
12 Similar conclusions are reached (although by a very different route) by Xenophon in the Poroi:
see esp. 5.5–7, and J. Dillery, ‘Xenophon’s Poroi and Athenian Imperialism’, Historia xlii
1993, 1–11.
13 Cf. Euphemus at Thuc. 6.72.2: ‘We are rulers in Greece in order not to be subjects’; Raaflaub,
Discovery of Freedom (n. 3, above), 177–9.
14 See (for a particularly clear expression of the principle) the speech of Euphemus (e. g. at
6.87.2): ‘We are compelled to interfere in many things, because we have many things to guard
against’); see also Pericles at 2.63. On meddlesomeness – polypragmosune – as a feature of
Athenian behaviour (in Thucydides and other fifth and fourth-century sources), see V.
Ehrenberg, ‘Polypragmosyne: A Study in Greek Politics’, JHS lxvii 1947, 46–67; A. W. H.
Adkins, ‘Polypragmosune and “Minding One’s Own Business”: A Study in Greek Social and
Political Values’, CP lxxi 1976, 301–27 (at 311–6).
15 E. g. (tyranny) 8.89, 91, 114; (despotism) 8.107, 134; (monarchy) 8.166, 15.64. See also J.
Davidson, ‘Isocrates against Imperialism: An Analysis of De Pace’, Historia xxxix 1990, 20–
36 (at 31–2); C. J. Tuplin, ‘Imperial Tyranny: Some Reflections on a Classical Greek Political
Metaphor’, in P. A. Cartledge & F. D. Harvey (edd.), Crux. Essays in Greek History Presented
to G. E. M. de Ste. Croix on his 75th Birthday (London & Exeter: Imprint Academic), 348–75.
Empire and Crisis in Fourth-Century Greece
67
than positive in form: that is, the benefits for the poleis consist largely in freedom
from various impositions, rather than actual improvements in their current status).
The advantages for the ruling state are more clear-cut, but to attain (and particularly
to retain) them, the leading state must make itself responsible for policing its own
actions. Sophrosune, self-control, is the key to the success of the Isocratean model,16 but Isocrates provides no real reason to think that this will be in any greater
supply in the fourth century than it had been in the fifth. And it is here – to find plugs
for those two holes in the Isocratean framework – that it can be useful to turn to
Demosthenes’ speeches.
3. A REFINEMENT: DEMOSTHENIC HEGEMONY
In many ways, Demosthenes’ views on imperialism fit well with what we might see
as the mid-fourth-century consensus. Acceptable interstate leadership for
Demosthenes (as for Isocrates) is characterised by moderation; failure to exercise
that moderation will provoke resistance against the leading state, and indeed has
already done so. This is a point which emerges particularly clearly in the
Demosthenes’ catalogue of past empires in the Third Philippic: ‘Neither to you nor
to the Thebans nor to the Lacedaemonians has this ever yet been allowed by the
Greeks: the right to do whatever you want … Quite the opposite: all thought it their
duty … to go to war in defence of those who had been wronged’ (9.23–4). Occupation
of the position of leadership does not, therefore, entitle the leader entirely to ignore
the wishes of those being led; rather, successful leadership (or occupation of the
position of primacy: the term used in the Third Philippic is prostates) depends on
the support of those being led. This is a rule which, for Demosthenes, applies both
to Greek states and to others: Philip II’s (alleged) failure to appreciate this point
will, Demosthenes asserts, lead to the collapse of his power too (see e. g. 2.9).
Demosthenes’ depiction of the fragility of Philip’s rule might be optimistic, but it is
at least consistent: power based only on unrestrained self-interest is inherently unstable, and will lead to disaster; a state’s success, by contrast, is based not just on
the accumulation of allies but also on the cultivation of goodwill.17
This moderated form of imperialism will, therefore, help safeguard the wellbeing of the leading state (by making its status more secure, thereby putting it in a
better position to enjoy the rewards of leadership). What Demosthenes adds to this
model, though, is a clearer sense of how it might also safeguard the well-being of
states other than the leader. In his On the Peace, for example, Demosthenes attributes the following calculation to smaller Greek poleis:
No individual ally is so fond either of us or of the Thebans as to regard our security (σῶς τ’
εἶναι) and our supremacy (κρατεῖν) in the same light. Secure they would all have us, for their
16 Isoc. 7.3–4, 8.63–4, 8.119–20, 15.84, with Davidson, ‘Isocrates against Imperialism’(n. 15,
above), 25–7; A. Raademaker, Sophrosyne and the Rhetoric of Self-Restraint: Polysemy and
Persuasive Use of an Ancient Greek Value Term (Leiden: Brill, 2005), 248–9.
17For eunoia as the route to success, see 15.4; at 10.69 (= 8.66), eunoia is listed alongside allies
and good faith (pistis) as evidence of success having been achieved.
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own sakes; that either should gain supremacy and be their master would suit none of them
(5.17).
This is a strikingly un-Thucydidean argument: the acquisition of kratos– the sort of
unlimited power wielded by the fifth-century Athenian arche18 – is not a necessary
condition for the maintenance of a leading state’s security. In fact, the opposite
holds: the accumulation of too much power will damage the state’s position, because smaller states will perceive in this a threat of imperial despotism, and with it
a reason to oppose and undermine the leading state (a scenario Demosthenes goes
on to sketch out in 5.17–19). The logic which underpins Demosthenes’ claim here
(and which he explores at greater length elsewhere, particularly in the speech For
the Megalopolitans) is one of the ‘balance of power’: it is desirable for (leading)
states to accumulate a certain amount of power, not just for their own security, but
because they can deploy this power both to defend smaller states and to constrain
the behaviour of other large states – and (crucially) to prevent other states from
amassing so much power that it would become impossible to control their behaviour.19 This, then, is what smaller states gain from the existence of a hegemon:
protection against the excesses of other states. And this also provides a possible
solution to the other question left unanswered (or not satisfactorily answered) by
Isocrates: how are larger states to be encouraged to exercise sophrosune? The answer, in this model, relies not on their assimilation of abstract principles of self-control, but on the more imminent threat of external coercion. The limits on imperialism are not, that is (as they are for Isocrates), primarily self-imposed, but are an
inherent part of a properly balanced system.
This discussion of balance-of-power politics might seem to have taken us some
way from the problem of domestic crisis (and its avoidance). In fact, though, I
would suggest that it is central to understanding Demosthenes’ enthusiasm for (his
favoured version of) interstate leadership. We have seen that this hegemony, correctly exercised, will bring benefits for both leaders and led. Once that point is accepted, it is not too much of a leap to the second, and more distinctive, characteristic of Demosthenes’ approach: leadership, and the struggle to acquire it, is not just
an acceptable part of Greek interstate politics, but also a necessary and desirable
phenomenon. That this principle applies even if the hegemonic power might end up
being someone other than Athens is visible in the passage of the Third Philippic
mentioned above (9.23), where the prospect of the hegemony being passed, baton-like, around the Greek (though only Greek) states is described with perhaps
surprising equanimity. And in the speech For the Liberty of the Rhodians conflicts
over hegemonia are portrayed as a relatively harmless way for Greek states to spend
their time, in contrast with conflicts over ‘constitution and liberty’ (15.17).
18For kratos (and related forms) as ‘imperial’ language, see R. Meiggs, The Athenian Empire
(Oxford: Oxford U. P., 1972), 425–7; P. A. Low, ‘Looking for the Language of Athenian
Imperialism’, JHS cxxv 2005, 93–111 at 95–6.
19 On balance of power politics in Demosthenes, see P. Hunt, War, Peace and Alliance in
Demosthenes’ Athens (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 2010), 168–80; focussing on the
Megalopolitans, W. Jaeger, Demosthenes: the Origins and Growth of his Policy (Berkeley &
Los Angeles: U. of California Press, 1938), 82–90.
Empire and Crisis in Fourth-Century Greece
69
But, while the outcome of the contest for hegemony might (according to
Demosthenes) be of only limited significance, the contest itself remains important.
‘It is an honourable ambition for Greeks to dispute with each other for the hegemony’, he claims in On the Crown (18.185). One of Philip’s (many) crimes was to
deprive Greek poleis of this right – and it is the loss of the right to contend for hegemonia (rather than the loss of hegemonia itself) which is portrayed in that speech
as a disaster on a par with the loss of internal political freedom. Philip destroyed,
we are told, ‘the prestige, the leadership, the independence, and even the constitution of every city alike’ (18.65).
4. AN ALTERNATIVE APPROACH: DEMOSTHENIC IMPERIALISM
Is there any space in Demosthenes’ picture of successful interstate politics for a
more ‘Thucydidean’ approach to empire: that is, one in which power is pursued for
more selfish aims, to preserve only the safety and stability of the leading state? We
might expect that the answer to that question should be ‘no’, and we have already
seen a hint of this in On the Peace’s rejection of the necessity of kratos. That rejection is, of course, not voiced by, or necessarily endorsed by, the Athenians themselves, but in the speech On the Chersonese Demosthenes tells the Athenians that:
Nature has not equipped you to seek aggrandisement (πλεονεκτῆσαι) and secure empire
(κατασχεῖν ἀρχὴν), but you are clever at thwarting another’s designs and wresting from him
his gains, and quick to confound the plots of the ambitious and to vindicate the freedom of all
mankind (8.42).
Pleonexia leads to arche; Athens is not suited to either, but is suited to restricting
the arche of others, and to protecting freedom (others’ freedom; not, explicitly, her
own) – to exercising, that is, the sort of beneficial hegemony which (as we have
seen) Demosthenes presents elsewhere as the ideal form of interstate leadership.
But there is a problem with this apparently neat formulation. Even worse, the
problem emerges later in this same speech:
Moreover, you have not the same interests at stake as the other cities, for it is not our subjection
that Philip aims at, but our annihilation. He is well assured that you will not consent to be slaves; or if you consent, will never learn how to be slaves, for you are accustomed to rule others
(ἄρχειν γὰρ εἰώθατε) (8.60).
In part, this is a problematic claim because it seems flatly to contradict the assertion
of § 42: Athens, it now emerges, is accustomed to exercising arche. But there is
another important change here too, and that is one of perspective. Earlier,
Demosthenes focussed on a key implication of arche for the ruled: loss of freedom.
Here, the emphasis is on the consequences of arche for the rulers, and the picture is
significantly different. From this perspective, arche is something to be preserved,
because (regardless of its effect on other people’s liberty) it enables the rulers to
ensure that they are not enslaved. We seem to be back in a much less co-operative
world, in which one has to rule in order to avoid being ruled by others; a world
closer, that is, to the ‘zero-sum’ model of interstate supremacy emphasised by
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Thucydides’ speakers, and rejected (at least at times) by Isocrates and Demosthenes.
The claims of § 42 and § 60 are not, perhaps, mutually exclusive, but they reflect
dramatically different conceptions of what it is that the Athenians should be fighting
for: the freedom of all Greeks (which requires resisting arche), or their own freedom (which requires that they keep a firm grip on their own arche, and, apparently,
not worry too much about the effect this might have on others’ freedom).
How can we explain this apparent u-turn? Perhaps it demonstrates nothing
more surprising than Demosthenes’ willingness to exploit the well-documented
ability of political audiences simultaneously to hold several mutually incompatible
points of view. But I am aware that I might be overly keen to dismiss this inconvenient comment, because it stands in the way of what would otherwise be a fairly neat
conclusion, in which Demosthenic thought on unbridled empire (and its dangers)
and more moderate leadership (and its uses) can be seen to align fairly closely with
what seems to be the mainstream of fourth-century Greek, or at least Athenian,
thought on the subject.
What, though, would happen if we chose instead to take Chersonese § 60 as
serious evidence of a less reconstructed approach to empire – one which focuses
much more closely on Athens’ own power, and which views the maximisation of
power as the best way to ensure safety and liberty? Should we take this as evidence
for the existence of a different Demosthenic – or even fourth-century Athenian –
approach to imperialism, one which is usually successfully repressed, but which
sometimes bobs inconveniently to the surface?
They key evidence for this alternative approach appears in a problematic location: the Fourth Philippic. This is, of course, a speech of contested authenticity:
although it contains several passages which are repeated verbatim in the Chersonese
speech (including Chersonese 42), it also seems to adopt an apparently un-Demosthenic approach to certain key questions of policy.20 Particularly relevant among
those policy shifts, for my purposes, are some of Demosthenes’ comments on empire, which seem to contradict the pattern of the other symbouleutic speeches.
This speech is, first of all, much less happy to accept the view that any Greek
state is entitled to contest for hegemony. Far from being a sign of the flourishing of
Greek liberty, this is represented as undermining the security of the Greek world
(10.51–2; Greek affairs are now μάλιστ’ ἐν ταραχῇ; ‘in the greatest confusion’).
Competition for leadership, on this model, is not a symbol of Greek unity, but a
cause of division; a world in which most Greek states knew their place, and in
which only one (or perhaps two) poleis concerned themselves with hegemony, was
far preferable.
Perhaps more significant is an apparent change in attitude not to the question of
who should hold the leadership, but of what the consequences of doing so might be:
… a rival has stepped into the position that you ought to have filled, and it is he who has become prosperous and great and ruler over many things (εὐδαίμων καὶ μέγας καὶ πολλῶν
20 The main problems are summarised by D. M. MacDowell, Demosthenes: Statesman and
Orator (Oxford: Oxford U. P., 2009), 354–6 (MacDowell, in line with the general modern consensus, accepts the authenticity of the speech).
Empire and Crisis in Fourth-Century Greece
71
κύριος). And rightly so; for there is a prize, honourable, great, and glorious, a prize for which
the greatest of our states once spent all their time in contending, but since misfortune has
dogged the Lacedaemonians, and the Phocian War has left the Thebans no leisure, and we are
heedless, he has grasped it without a struggle. Therefore fear is the portion of the others, but his
the possession of many allies and a mighty force (10.46–8).
The assertion that Athens needs to take an active role in Greek politics is familiar.
What is less usual, though, is the extent of power and control which Demosthenes
appears to be advocating as an ideal, and the benefits which he claims will result
from attaining that power. Having control – being kurios – over the Greeks brings
glory, honour, power (dunamis), and freedom from fear. This is not absolutely inconsistent with what Demosthenes has suggested in other speeches, but it is a much
stronger statement of the case for leadership than appears elsewhere, and, most
importantly, one which gives much more explicit emphasis to power (dunamis) as
a desirable goal.
If these comments are accepted as real divergences from the lines taken elsewhere in the Demosthenic corpus, then how are they to be explained? The easiest
way out is probably to accept the case for the spuriousness of the Fourth Philippic.
But there is another possible solution, which is to take seriously the suggestion that
what we have here is a version of a speech (the speech which became On the
Chersonese) which was intended for a significantly different audience from the rest
of the symbouleutic speeches (in the form that we have them). The Fourth Philippic,
it has been suggested, is closer to what was said by Demosthenes to the Athenian
assembly; the Chersonese (like most of the other symbouleutic speeches we have)
is a polished-up version, intended for wider dissemination in and – importantly in
this context – beyond Athens.21 What the Fourth Philippic might, therefore, be offering us is a glimpse of a much less benevolent, more self-centred, model of imperialism – one which would not look particularly out of place in Thucydides’ world,
but which is apparently still flourishing in some (and specifically Athenian) contexts deep in the fourth century.
21 The suggestion is that of G. Daitz, ‘The Relationship of the De Chersoneso and the Philippica
Quarta of Demosthenes’, CP lii 1957, 145–62, who argues that the original speech was the
Fourth Philippic, and that the Chersonese was a version edited ‘for reasons of international
diplomacy, as well as from considerations of domestic harmony’ (160); this is a development
of an argument for the relationship between the two speeches proposed by C. D. Adams,
‘Speeches VIII and X of the Demosthenic Corpus’, CP xxxiii 1938, 129–44. I. Worthington,
‘The Authenticity of Demosthenes’ Fourth Philippic’, Mnemosyne4 xliv 1991, 425–8, suggests
that the Fourth Philippic was the text delivered in the Athenian Assembly, intended to ‘[exhort]
an excited crowd to action’: Worthington’s arguments are based more on content than style, but
might also help explain the speech’s emphasis on the necessity of Athenian primacy.
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5. CONCLUSIONS
Does empire cause crisis, or prevent it? The short answer is that it depends who you
ask, and when you ask them. A longer answer would conclude that the dominant
mode of thinking in our fourth-century texts is that unrestrained imperial power
does indeed lead to disaster, not just for the subjects of empire (who will suffer loss
of liberty, both internal and external) but also for the imperial state; this is an argument most frequently supported by appeal to Athens’ fifth-century history, but is
also generalised to cover other states (especially Sparta and Thebes). A more restrained form of interstate leadership, on the other hand, is permissible, and – on the
stronger view (particularly that found in Demosthenes) – even necessary.
Demosthenes’ speeches are also useful in offering a more rounded explanation of
why this hegemonic style of leadership might help all Greek states avoid crisis; in
doing so, they also give some insight into the question of why weaker poleis might
have been willing to accept Athenian (or any other) leadership, and why they might
have been willing to believe that it would not, inevitably, descend into abusive
arche. From Demosthenes’ speeches it is possible to see how the apparently pious
speculations of Isocrates (or even the, to some historians, implausible propaganda
of the ‘Prospectus’ of the Second Athenian League) might have been able to work
in practice; how, in fact, they could be represented as deeply pragmatic – even realistic – as well as idealistic policies.
But the answer which is most visible to us was not, I would suggest, the only
one available. We do, I think, do need to acknowledge the possibility that, even in
the fourth century, the argument that the only way for a state to maintain its own
safety, prosperity and freedom was by securing absolute imperial power remained
attractive, and that the spasms of Athenian imperial ambition which we see in the
second half of the fourth century are driven not (or not only) by simple greed,22 or
by a pathological attachment to the ‘ghost’ of empire,23 but by a more rational
calculation that the acquisition of arche – in its unmoderated form – was indeed the
best way to stave off crisis. That is, that the lesson which was learned from Athens’
experiences of the late fifth-century was (one might say) that Thucydides’ speakers
were right: without arche, there could be no safety. This is not, I suspect, the message which Thucydides intended his readers to take from his text, but it is one
whose appeal persisted, through (and perhaps beyond) the fourth century.
22 Suggested by G. L. Cawkwell, ‘Eubulus’, JHS lxxxiii 1963, 47–67 (at 52).
23 For which see E. Badian, ‘The Ghost of Empire’, in W. Eder (ed.), Die athenische Demokratie
im 4. Jahrhundert v. Chr. (n. 1, above), 79–106.
THE ANTIGONIDS, CAUNUS AND THE SO-CALLED
‘ERA OF MONOPHTHALMUS’: SOME OBSERVATIONS
PROMPTED BY A NEW INSCRIPTION1
Yuri N. Kuzmin
In memory of Chris Bennett
This paper tries to offer a new historic interpretation of an important inscription
from Caunus in Caria. This source is put in the context of a history of this city that
passed through several stages in the late fourth century b. c. and subsequent decades. In this period Caunus witnessed a number of ‘deformations and crises’ caused
by the rivalry of some Hellenistic rulers in the south-west of Asia Minor.
In 2006 Ch. Marek published in the corpus of inscriptions from Caunus the
initial part of a much damaged decree dated to year 15 of the reign of a certain
Antigonus (the inscription is dated also by the name of the city’s eponymous priest):
βασιλεύοντος Ἀντιγ[όν-]
[ο]υ, [ἔτ]ει πεντεκαιδεκά[τ-]
ω[ι, μην]ὸς Ἀπελλαίου ἕ[κτ-]
ηι [ἱστ]α̣μένου, ἐφ’ ἱερέως […-]
μνους, ἐκκλησίας κ̣[υρίας]
γενομένης ἐπὶ π̣ρ̣[υτάνεων]
τῶν περὶ Σ[…].2
There can be no doubt as to the restoration of the king’s name (gen. Ἀντιγ[όνο]υ),3
since the last letter in the end of the line right before the chip can only be a gamma.
1
2
3
I should like to extend my thanks to C. Bennett (†), K. Hallof (Berlin), K. M. Kalinin (Samara),
I. A. Ladynin (Moscow), Ch. Marek (Zürich), Ch. Mileta (Berlin/Halle), P. J. Rhodes (Durham)
and A. L. Zelinskiy (London). None of them, of course, is responsible for the conclusions set
forth in this paper.
IKaunos 4 = Ch. Marek (ed.), Die Inschriften von Kaunos (Munich: Beck, 2006), 133–6. See
fig. 1. The discovery of this inscription was announced as early as in 1997 (P. Frei & Ch. Marek,
‘Die Karisch-griechische Bilingue von Kaunos’, Kadmos xxxi 1997, 60–1, 76). Upon discovery
it attracted the attention of several classicists, e. g. R. Descat, ‘La Carrière d’Eupolemos, stratège
macédonien en Asie Mineure’, REA c 1998, 190 n. 81; E. Panagopoulou, ‘Antigonos Gonatas:
Coinage, Money and the Economy’ (University College, London, Ph.D. thesis, 2000), 86.
Cf. Marek (n. 2, above), 134.
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Yuri N. Kuzmin
1. WHICH ANTIGONUS?
Among the three Antigonid kings who bore this name and had at different times
interests in Caria and adjoining regions, the only one who reigned for more than 15
years was Antigonus II Gonatas (283–239).4 His grandfather Antigonus I
Monophthalmus, the founder of the dynasty, was basileus from 306 to 3015, and his
nephew, Antigonus III Doson, reigned from 229 to 221.
However, before the inscription from Caunus was published, E. Grzybek had
noticed for a different reason (the problem of the mysterious dating of the manumission from Beroea in Macedonia) that from 317/6 some Babylonian cuneiform
documents had been dated by the name of Antigonus Monophthalmus (however,
without the title of ‘king’).6 Grzybek proposed that even after Monophthalmus had
accepted the title basileus in 306 the period of his ‘reign’ was calculated not from
that moment, but from 317/6. In due course, this system (a de facto dynastic era)
was used by Monophthalmus’ son Demetrius I Poliorcetes during his reign in
Macedonia in 294–288. Thus, according to Grzybek, the manumission from Beroea
should be dated 291 or 290,7 but he is obviously wrong in the case of this inscription.8
4
5
6
7
8
The decree from Amphipolis dated to Year 41 of Gonatas, 243 or 242, (IG xii 4 1 220.ii.19–20)
is evidence that he started to style himself as basileus after the death of his father Demetrius I
Poliorcetes (283), not after his establishment in Macedonia (c. 277–276). On dating the start of
the regnal years of Gonatas with the years 284/3 or 283/2 see M. Chambers, ‘The First Regnal
Year of Antigonus Gonatas’, AJP lxxv 1954, 385–94; N. G. L. Hammond & F. W. Walbank, A
History of Macedonia, iii (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988), 581–3; P. V. Wheatley, ‘The
Lifespan of Demetrius Poliorcetes’, Historia xlvi 1997, 23–7; L. Gounaropoulou & M. B.
Hatzopoulos (edd.), EKM i = Ἐπιγραφὲς Κάτω Μακεδονίας, i. Ἐπιγραφὲς Βεροίας
(Athens: Ἐθνικὸν Ἵδρυμα Ἐρευνῶν, 1998), 93–4.
Diod. Sic. 20.53.2–3; Plut. Demetr. 17.5–18.1; id. Aem. 8.1; App. Syr. 54; Iust. 15.2.10; PKöln
vi 247.I.18–21. The semi-official use the title basileus before 306 by Antigonus and Demetrius,
as well as some other Successors, is rather doubtful (P. Paschidis, ‘Agora XVI 107 and the
Royal Title of Demetrius Poliorcetes’, in V. Alonso Troncoso & E. M. Anson (edd.), After
Alexander. The Time of the Diadochi (323–281 b. c.) (Oxford: Oxbow, 2013), 121–41). The
royal proclamation of Monophthalmus and Poliorcetes in 306 was an exceptional event which
was a surprise for the other Successors (see Ch. Mileta, ‘Ein Agon um Macht und Ehre.
Beobachtungen zu den agonalen Aspekten der Königserhebungen im “Jahr der Könige” ’, in A.
Lichtenberg et al. (edd.), Das Diadem der hellenistischen Herrscher: Übernahme, Trans­for­ma­
tion oder Neuschöpfung eines Herrschaftszeichens? [Bonn: Habelt, 2012], 315–26).
E. g. I. Finkel & R. J. van der Spek (edd.), Babylonian Chronicles of the Hellenistic Period
(preliminary on-line edition at http://www.livius.org/cg-cm/chronicles/chron00.html), 3 rev. 4.
See on Monophthalmus’ dates in the Babylonian cuneiform texts: T. Boiy, ‘Dating Problem in
Cuneiform Tablets concerning the reign of Antigonus Monophthalmus’, JAOS cxxi 2001, 645–
9; id., ‘Date Formulas in Cuneiform Tablets and Antigonus Monophthalmus, Again’, JAOS
cxxix 2009, 467–76.
E. Grzybek, ‘Eine Inschrift aus Beroia und die Jahreszählweisen der Diadochen’, in Ancient
Macedonia, v (Thessaloniki: Institute for Balkan Studies, 1993), 521–7. His opinion received
some support, e. g. H. H. Schmitt, J. Nollé, ‘Antigoniden(reich)’, in H. H. Schmitt & E. Vogt
(edd.), Lexikon des Hellenismus (Wiesbaden: Harrasowitz, 2005), 69 n. 5; Boiy, ‘Date
Formulas’ (n. 6, above), 475–6.
The manumission from Beroea is dated to year 27 of a certain Demetrius (EKM i [n. 4, above],
The Antigonids, Caunus and the so-called ‘Era of Monophthalmus’
75
Some students of Hellenistic history rely on Grzybek’s theory on the ‘Babylonian
system’ and make suppositions to the effect that the inscription from Caunus could
be dated according to the years of Monophthalmus ‘reign’ from 317/6 onwards;
and, therefore, that, its date should be c. 303/02.9
9
45.2–3). However, both Macedonian kings of this name, Demetrius I Poliorcetes and his grandson Demetrius II, ruled for shorter periods. Even if one counts the years of Demetrius I from
his acceptance of the title basileus in 306 after the victory at Salamis of Cyprus to his death in
283, the period will be around 23 years. Demetrius II, the son of Antigonus Gonatas, ruled only
for 10 years (239–229) (Polyb. 2.44.2; Euseb. Chron. 1.237–238, 243 Schoene; cf. Plut. Aem.
8.2). Many classicists, starting with the first editor of the manumission M. Andronikos,
Ἀρχαῖαι ἐπιγραφαὶ Βεροίας (Thessaloniki: Γενικὴ Διοίκησις Μακεδονίας, 1950), 18–21,
tended to explain its dating by assuming a co-regency of Antigonus Gonatas and his son (the
un­am­biguous evidence for that is another inscription from Beroea, EKM i 3, the so-called
‘Letters of Demetrius to Harpalus’). Polyaen (4.6.1) mentions Demetrius as a basileus in
Gonatas’ lifetime, c. 245. It is probable that upon starting his individual rule in 239 Demetrius
II began to count his ‘reign’ from the beginning of his participation in the government (i. e. not
later than 256), although during the reign of Gonatas the name of his son was not included in
the dating formulas (EKM i 3.1; IG xii 4 1 220.ii.19–20). However, there are two documents
showing that Demetrius II counted his reign from the time of Gonatas’ death in 239. The treaty
with Gortyn is dated to year 3 of Demetrius II (SdA iii 498.1–2). According to the ‘traditional’
10-year chronology of the reign of Demetrius II, the treaty with Gortyn must be dated to 237,
which corresponds well the political situation of this time, when the so-called ‘Demetrian war’
(c. 238–229) had started, and the king needed allies and mercenaries to fight against the
Aetolian–Achaean alliance. Quite recently there has been published a letter of Philoxenus, a
citizen of Pythium in Perrhaebia, to Demetrius II, and the decision of the king in his year 6 is
mentioned in this document (REG cxxiv 2011, 427–31: Bulletin épigraphique, no. 399). Thus
the dating of the manumission from Beroea remains an enigma, but it seems that assuming a
co-regency of Demetrius II and his father explains it best. A natural analogy to this is the dating
system of Ptolemy II Philadelphus, who first counted his reign from 282, i. e. after the death of
Ptolemy I Soter, but eventually switched to counting from 285, when he was declared co-regent
with his father (see R. A. Hazzard, ‘The Regnal Years of Ptolemy II Philadelphos’, Phoenix xli
1987, 140–58). Notably, in Soter’s lifetime the name of the future Philadelphus was not included in the dating formulas of documents (PEleph 2–4; cf. K. Buraselis, ‘Kronprinzentum
und Realpolitik. Bemerkungen zur Thronanwartschaft, Mitregentschaft und Thronfolge unter
den ersten vier Ptolemäern’, in V. Alonso Troncoso (ed.), διάδοχος τῆς βασιλείας. La figura
del sucesor en la realeza helenística [Madrid: Universidad Complutense, 2005], 94). The theory of R. M. Errington, ‘An Inscription from Beroea and the Alleged Co-rule of Demetrius II’,
in Ancient Macedonia, ii (Thessaloniki: Institute for Balkan Studies, 1977), 115–22, who considered the manumission from Beroea to have been dated posthumously with the years of
Demetrius Poliorcetes counted from 306 and, thus, to belong to the time around 280–279 (after
he had not only lost Macedonia but died as well) cannot be accepted. On the problems of the
co-regency of Antigonus Gonatas and Demetrius II see M. B. Hatzopoulos, ‘Un nouveau document du règne d’Antigone Gonatas’, in M. B. Sakellariou (ed.), Ποικίλα (Athens: Research
Centre for Greek and Roman Antiquity, 1990), 144–7; Yu. N. Kuzmin, Аристократия Берои
в эпоху эллинизма (The Aristocracy of Beroea in the Hellenistic Epoch) (Moscow: Russian
Foundation for the Promotion of Education and Science, 2013), 108–23. One can assume the
co-existence of two dating systems of Demetrius II’s reign or the introduction of a retrospective
dating shortly after the sixth year of his reign evidenced in the above-mentioned inscription
from Pythium.
E. g. A. Meadows, ‘The Ptolemaic Annexation of Lycia: SEG xxvii 929’, in K. Dörtlük et al.
(edd.), The IIIrd Symposium on Lycia. Symposium Proceedings, ii (Antalya: Suna & İnan
76
Yuri N. Kuzmin
Marek supposed that the letter forms in the decree IKaunos 4 may belong to the
fourth century; however, he did that with a certain reservation.10 Having analysed
the possibility of dating of this inscription according to the regnal years of
Monophthalmus or Gonatas, he has carefully considered what tends for and against
both kings, but remains undecided at the end, with a slight implicit preference towards the Antigonid dynasty founder.11
On the other hand, K. Hallof conveyed to me per epistolas his impression that
the decree IKaunos 4 – because of its letter forms – certainly does not come from
the fourth century, but must rather be dated in the second half (towards the end) of
the third century.12
There are still grounds for questions. (1) Was the ‘Babylonian system’ of dating
ever used by Monophthalmus and his son outside Babylonia, especially after 311,
when the Antigonids lost it?13 (2) If so, was this system used after the beginning of
‘the so-called ‘Year of the Kings’ (306–304)? (3) Did Antigonus and Demetrius
possess Caunus in the late fourth century?
2. THE SO-CALLED ‘ERA OF MONOPHTHALMUS’
AND THE YEAR-RECKONING OF THE FIRST ANTIGONIDS
The earliest documents with the name of Antigonus from Babylonia are dated to his
year 3, i. e. 315/4, and the latest to year 9 (308).14 Recently, T. Boiy convincingly
10
11
12
13
14
Kıraçk Research Institute on Mediterranean Civilizations, 2006), 462–3; I. Savalli-Lestrade,
‘Les rois hellénistiques, maîtres du temps’, in I. Savalli-Lestrade & I. Cogitore (edd.), Des rois
au prince. Pratiques du pouvoir monarchique dans l’Orient hellénistique et romain (IVe siècle
avant J.-C. – IIe siècle après J.-C.) (Grenoble: ELLUG, 2010), 59; C. Bennett, Alexandria and
the Moon. An Investigation into the Lunar Macedonian Calendar of Ptolemaic Egypt (Leuven:
Peeters, 2011), 155, 158; id., ‘Alexandria and the Moon. Addenda and corrigenda’ (5th ed. 17
July 2013), 6–7 (https://www.academia.edu/1134799/Alexandria_and_the_Moon_Addenda_
et_Corrigenda; accessed 26 December 2014).
Marek (n. 2, above), 136.
Marek (n. 2, above), 97, 133–6, 267. Marek has assumed that control of the Antigonids over
Caunus at the end of the fourth century may be confirmed by the epigram on the base for the
statue of a certain Antileon, son of Menander, who was associated σὺμ βασιλεῦσιν Βακχιάδαις
π[όντου κ]αὶ χ̣θ̣ο̣νὸς ἁγεμόσιν (IKaunos 83). However the possibility of referring to
Monophthalmus and Poliorcetes as ‘Bacchiad kings’ just because they founded the Hellenic
League in Corinth in 302 is rather doubtful.
Antigonus III Doson, though he made an expedition to Caria c. 227 (see S. Le Bohec, Antigone
Dôsôn, roi de Macédoine (Nancy: P. U. de Nancy, 1993), 327–61), cannot be the king mentioned
in the inscription from Caunus, as he reigned only nine years (229–221). Inscriptions from
Perrhaebian Tripolis dated to his years 8 and 9 (REG cxxiv 2011, 427–31: Bulletin épigraphique,
no. 399) show that Doson counted his reign from the death of Demetrius II in 229.
However, the struggle for Babylonia between Seleucus and the Antigonids continued until 308
(P. Wheatley, ‘Antigonus Monophthalmus in Babylonia, 310–308 b. c.’, JNES lxi 2002, 39–
47).
Probably the documents mentioning the year 2 of Antigonus were compiled later and the date
was used retrospectively (Boiy, ‘Date Formulas’ (n. 6, above), 471–3).
The Antigonids, Caunus and the so-called ‘Era of Monophthalmus’
77
showed that the attribution of a cuneiform text to Antigonus’ Year 14 is false.15
However, previously this attribution was considered accurate by Grzybek and was,
indeed, a part of his hypothesis that Monophthalmus counted his ‘reign’ as starting
in 317/616 even after the ‘Year of the Kings’.
In the 1990s there were published some Aramaean ostraca from Idumaea with
datings in the names of the kings Alexander (probably Alexander IV, the son of
Alexander the Great) and Philip III, and of Antigonus Monophthalmus without the
title of king. The ostraca with the name of Antigonus were dated to his years 3 and
5.17 If the Babylonian system of year-reckoning in his name, which started in 317/6,
was used here, these datings would refer to the years 315/4 and 313/2.18 On the
other hand, E. M. Anson admitted that the Idumaean ostraca fix only the local chronology from the years 314/3, when Idumaea fell under the rule of Monophthalmus.
Anson dated them, respectively, to the years 312/1 and 310/09.19 However it is
equally possible that this is the same system of chronology that was in Babylonia,20
and recently Anson admitted this himself.21
In connection with Grzybek’s hypothesis one should pay attention to the
statement of Eusebius that after Philip III Arrhidaeus (323–317) Antigonus
Monophthalmus ‘was the first to become the king in Asia and ruled for 18 years’
(Euseb. Chron. 1.247–248 Schoene: [Ἀ]ντίγονος [ὁ] πρῶτος ἐβασίλευσε τῆς
Ἀσίας, καὶ ἦρξε μὲν ἔτεσιν ὀκτὼ καὶ δέκα). Indeed, Eusebius gives a number of
years which is sufficiently close to the length of Monophthalmus’ ‘reign’ according
to Grzybek’s concept. However, it can be supposed that Eusebius’ source calculated
the ‘reign’ of Monophthalmus, who was killed in the battle of Ipsus in 301, not from
the death of Arrhidaeus (317) but from the agreement of Successors in Triparadeisus
(320), when Antigonus became the ‘strategos of the Royal Army’ or the ‘strategos
of Asia’ (Diod. Sic. 18.39.7–40.1). However, the statement by Eusebius, overlooked
by Grzybek and his supporters, can indirectly back up the theory that the official
chronology accepted by Monophthalmus after 306, when he took the title of basileus, counted the years of his ‘reign’ from a much earlier date.
Thus it is possible to accept the reckoning of Monophthalmus’ ‘reign’ from
317/6, at least in some parts of his ‘empire’,22 but only before 306. There is not a
15 Boiy, ‘Dating Problem’ (n. 6, above), 648–9.
16 Grzybek (n. 7, above), 525.
17 A. Lemaire, ‘Der Beitrag idumäischer Ostraka zur Geschichte Palästinas im Übergang von der
persischen zur hellenistischen Zeit’, Zeitschrift des Deutschen Palästina-Vereins cxv 1999,
13–14; T. Boiy, Between High and Low: A Chronology of the Early Hellenistic Period
(Frankfurt am Main: Verlag Antike, 2007), 37–8.
18Boiy, Between High and Low (n. 17, above), 90–1; id., ‘Local and Imperial Dates at the
Beginning of the Hellenistic Period’, in E. Dąbrowa (ed.), New Studies on the Seleucids
(Kraków: Jagiellonian U. P., 2011), 18–21.
19 E. M. Anson, ‘Idumaean Ostraca and Early Hellenistic Chronology’, JAOS cxxv 2005, 263–6.
20 Boiy, ‘Local and Imperial Dates’ (n. 18, above), 18–21.
21 E. M. Anson, Alexander’s Heirs. The Age of the Successors (Malden, MA: Wiley–Blackwell,
2014), 120–1.
22 It is illustrative that there are no Babylonian documents precisely dated by the name of
Antigonus prior to his Year 3 (315/4). This correlates well with the fact that by this time, after
78
Yuri N. Kuzmin
single sound piece of evidence that Monophthalmus used this year-reckoning system after 306 (likewise, Seleucus I and Ptolemy I, having accepted their royal titles
in the ‘Year of the Kings’, continued their systems of year-reckoning from earlier
dates).23 The decree IKaunos 4 may well be dated to the reign of the grandson of
Monophthalmus, Antigonus II Gonatas (I shall give arguments for that below).
As for the reckoning of Demetrius Poliorcetes’ regnal years, M. B. Hatzopoulos
showed on the basis of paleographic analysis that Poliorcetes was the king who
settled a territorial dispute between Pherae and Demetrias, as attested in the inscription from Dium, dated to year 16 (ἔτους ς´ καὶ ι´) of a king whose name was not
preserved (previously it was believed that the king was Philip V).24 Thus the inscription from Dium should be dated 291 or 290 and its context is related to the
foundation of Demetrias in Magnesia by Poliorcetes (some time after 294). If
Hatzopoulos’ interpretation is correct, the inscription from Dium proves that
Demetrius Poliorcetes counted his reign right from the victory of Salamis of Cyprus
in 306.
The dating of this document by Hatzopoulos was disputed by C. Bennett, who
attributed it to the reign of Antigonus Gonatas. However, the ground for that was
only his acceptance of Grzybek’s theory that Poliorcetes counted the ‘reign’ exclusively from 317/6.25
On speculative grounds one might accept the theory of Grzybek, that the ‘Era
of Monophthalmus’ from 317/6 was used by his son in Macedonia in 294–288 for
the sake of propaganda, so as to emphasize the dynastic succession (especially in
connection with Poliorcetes’ desire to restore his father’s empire destroyed after the
battle of Ipsus: Plut. Demetr. 43.3–4). However, it seems probable that for
Poliorcetes an undoubtedly more important milestone for the start of his reign was
his victory in the battle of Salamis of Cyprus in 306, after which his father assumed
the title of basileus and conferred it on his victorious son as well.
the defeat of Eumenes (316), the ruling ambitions of Antigonus became clearly manifested
(expulsion of Seleucus from Babylon, accusation of Cassander in usurping the rule in
Macedonia, etc.) and they should have been supported by the inclusion of his name in the dates
of the documents.
23 After the ‘Year of the Kings’ Seleucus I calculated his reign from the return to Babylon in the
spring of 311, and obviously from his usurpation of the authority of the ‘strategos of Asia’ from
Monophtalmus (B. van der Spek, ‘Seleukos, Self-Appointed General (Strategos) of Asia (311–
305 b. c.), and the Satrapy of Babylonia’ in H. Hauben & A. Meeus (edd.), The Age of the
Successors and the Creation of the Hellenistic Kingdoms (323–276 b. c.) (Leuven: Peeters,
2014), 323–42). Later this moment became the starting point for counting the Seleucid era
(from 312 according to the Macedonian calendar, and from 311 according to the Babylonian
calendar). Upon accepting the royal title Ptolemy I continued to count his years in Greek documents from the death of Alexander the Great in 323, while Egyptian demotic documents
counted his reign from 305/4 (Savalli-Lestrade [n. 9, above], 57–9).
24 M. B. Hatzopoulos, La Macédoine: Géographie historique – Langue – Cultes et croyances –
Institutions (Paris: De Boccard, 2006), 85, 88–9; cf. REG cxxiii 2000, 523: Bulletin
épigraphique, no. 453 (5); SEG xlviii 782.
25Bennett, Alexandria (n. 9, above), 215.
The Antigonids, Caunus and the so-called ‘Era of Monophthalmus’
79
The factor of a military victory is known to have played an important role in the
ideology and propaganda of the Hellenistic era.26 Monophthalmus and Poliorcetes
both had a great victory as the starting-point for their kingship and dynasty, but their
opponents were declared kings without similar military successes. They were
forced to seek another basis for the justification of their kingship, and Seleucus and
Ptolemy probably found it in the earlier starting-points for the calculating of their
‘reigns’.
It would be worthwhile asking the following: why did not Antigonus Gonatas,
the son of Poliorcetes, use the alleged ‘Era of Monophthalmus’ which might have
been continued by Demetrius Poliorcetes according to Grzybek and his supporters?
(We know that Antiochus I, the heir of Seleucus I, continued the year-reckoning
used under his father and thus actually introduced the Seleucid era.) It is highly illustrative that Gonatas, having taken power over Macedonia c. 277–276, did not
introduce the official date of his reign from this event, but continued his own earlier
year-reckoning from 283, when his father Demetrius Poliorcetes died and he became basileus, although without a kingdom (at that moment under Gonatas’ control
were Piraeus, Corinth, Demetrias and probably a few other places).
3. TOWARDS THE HISTORY OF CAUNUS IN THE SUCCESSORS’ ERA
To continue, we need to address the history of Caunus in the early Hellenistic period. Unfortunately, it is known only in fragments. In 314/3 Caunus fell in the hands
of Antigonus Monophthalmus (Diod. Sic. 19.75.5). Some years later, in 309, the
city was taken by Ptolemy I (Diod. Sic. 20.27.1–2)27.
Polyaenus (3.16) records a stratagem which helped Philocles, the king of Sidon
and general of Ptolemy, to occupy Caunus. However, the exact dating of this event,
as well as identification of ‘Ptolemy’ (Soter or Philadelphus) are quite a challenge,
although it seems plausible that it was for Ptolemy I that Philocles conquered
Caunus in 309.28
One might forward a hypothesis that Caunus fell under the rule of the
Antigonids, like some other parts of Caria, after the the defeat of Ptolemy I in the
battle of Salamis of Cyprus in 306.29 Nevertheless, there are no direct indications in
the sources that in the late fourth century the city was controlled by Monophthalmus
26 The victory of Salamis was immortalized in the emissions of Poliorcetes both at the Eastern
mints and in Macedonia. The well-known types of coins related to the battle of Salamis bear the
following images: (1) Nike on the fore of the battleship (obverse) / Poseidon (reverse); (2) the
king’s portrait (obverse) / Poseidon (reverse).
27 R. S. Bagnall, The Administration of the Ptolemaic Possessions Outside Egypt (Leiden: Brill,
1976), 98.
28 H. Hauben, ‘Callicrates of Samos and Patroclus of Macedon, Champions of Ptolemaic
Thalassocracy’, in K. Buraselis, M. Stefanou & D. J. Thompson (edd.), The Ptolemies, the Sea
and the Nile. Studies in Waterborne Power (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 2013), 43–4.
29 G. E. Bean, ‘Notes and Inscriptions from Caunus’, JHS lxxiii 1953, 18; R. A. Billows, Antigonos
the One-Eyed and the Creation of the Hellenistic State (Berkeley & Los Angeles: U. of
California P., 1990), 208; Hauben (n. 28, above), 43.
80
Yuri N. Kuzmin
and Poliorcetes, which would allegedly have been reflected in the dating of the local
documents.
The Samian decree in the honour of Hipparchus of Cyrene, [τεταγμένο]ς ἐγ
Καρίαι by ‘the king Antigonus’ (IG xii 6 1 31.6–7), can hardly attest the full control of the Antigonids over Caria.30 From Diodorus we know that before the siege
of Rhodes Loryma in Caria was under the control of Poliorcetes (Diod. Sic.
20.82.4).31
H. Hauben pointed out that the unfinished base for a statue of the Sidonian king
Philocles that was found in Caunus (IKaunos 82) is evidence that city fell under the
rule of the Antigonids some time after it was conquered by Ptolemy I in 309.32 But
there can be other explanations for the fact that the work on the statue base was
never finished.
A. Meadows refers to Plutarch and believes that in 305/4, during the campaign
against Rhodes, Demetrius Poliorcetes could have stayed with his army in Caunus.33
But in describing the events related to the siege of Rhodes Plutarch tells only that
Demetrius seized in one of the suburbs (ἔν τινι τῶν προαστείων ἔλαβεν ὁ
Δημήτριος) a nearly-finished painting on the history of Ialysus, one of the Rhodian
cities, by the famous artist Protogenes from Caunus (Plut. Demetr. 22.2–4.).
Plutarch clearly speaks about a suburb of Rhodes, where Protogenes lived and
worked, and not the proasteion of his native Caunus (cf. Plin. N.H. 35.81; 35.88;
35.101; 35.104–105).
Yet Meadows seems to be correct in another point: after 309 Caunus happened
to pass from one set of hands into another more than once (it is possible that for a
spell in the 290s the city was controlled by the Carian dynast Eupolemus, who
could have minted coins there34). Only in the middle of 280s could Caunus really
fall under the rule of Demetrius Poliorcetes or become his ally (see below). After
the fall of Poliorcetes, Caunus might have been controlled by Lysimachus and after
his death by the Ptolemies.35
30 As A. Meadows, ‘Fouilles d’Amyzon 6 Reconsidered: the Ptolemies at Amyzon, ZPE clxvi
2008, 115–6, thinks.
31 Cf. A. Mastrocinque, La Caria e la Ionia meridionale in epoca ellenistica (323–188 a. C.)
(Rome: ‘L’Erma’ di Bretschneider, 1979), 33.
32 Hauben (n. 28, above), 44 n. 34.
33 Meadows, ‘The Ptolemaic Annexation’ (n. 9, above), 462.
34 Meadows, ‘The Ptolemaic Annexation’ (n. 9, above), 463 n. 22; cf. R. H. J. Ashton, ‘Kaunos,
not Miletos or Mylasa’, NC clxiv 2004, 33, 43–4.
35 A. Meadows pointed out that Caria and Lycia, as well as some other coastal regions of Asia
Minor fell under the reign of Ptolemies only in the late 280s owing to the crisis and the downfall of Lysimachus’ kingdom (Meadows, ‘The Ptolemaic Annexation’ (n. 9, above), 459–70;
id., ‘Fouilles d’Amyzon 6’ (n. 30, above), 115–20; id., ‘Deditio in Fidem: The Ptolemaic
Conquest of Asia Minor’, in C. Smith & L. M. Yarrow (edd.), Imperialism, Cultural Politics,
and Polybius (Oxford: Oxford U. P., 2012), 118–33). At the same time, one should not rely
completely on this interesting concept, as the situation in different regions of Asia Minor was
obviously more complicated (cf. A. Meeus, ‘The Territorial Ambitions of Ptolemy I’, in H.
Hauben & A. Meeus (edd.), The Age of the Successors and the Creation of the Hellenistic
Kingdoms (323–276 b. c.) (Leuven: Peeters, 2014), 304 n. 156). The opinion that Poliorcetes
The Antigonids, Caunus and the so-called ‘Era of Monophthalmus’
81
Thus it is not quite certain that Caunus belonged to the Antigonid Empire in the
late fourth century shortly before it collapsed after the catastrophe of Ipsus and the
death of Monophthalmus (301). Yet, even if the city really was controlled by
Antigonus I at that time, this should not lead to conclude that decree IKaunos 4 is
to be dated in his reign.
We need also to take into account that from 306 onwards the title of ‘king’ belonged to the son and co-regent of Monophthalmus, Demetrius Poliorcetes, whose
role in the rule of the Antigonid Empire and military command was crucial. It would
be quite natural for the name of Demetrius to be included in the dating of the
Caunian decree (as happened later in the documents of the Seleucids and the
Ptolemies).36 The names of Monophthalmus and Poliorcetes were mentioned jointly
many times in treaties, dedications and so on (e. g. ISE 7; SdA iii 446; SIG3 350–
351; SEG i 357).37 One can think that the decree from Caunus may well be dated to
the year 15 of the reign of Antigonus II Gonatas, i. e. the time c. 269–268.
4. ANTIGONUS GONATAS, AEGEAN, ASIA MINOR AND CAUNUS
If the considerations outlined above are correct, this inscription might radically
change our view on the policy and on the possessions of Antigonus Gonatas in the
Aegean and Asia Minor, as well as of the balance of power in the Eastern Mediterra­
nean before the start of the Chremonidean War of c. 268–262.38 This source still
needs a comprehensive historical interpretation, which can hardly be given in this
paper. However, we can formulate some preliminary remarks.
The first thing to notice is that Antigonus Gonatas did not give up his claims to
western Asia Minor after his peace with the Seleucid king Antiochus I (c. 278), as
some scholars think.39 The interest of Gonatas in Asia Minor is indicated by several
36
37
38
39
could rule Caunus during the siege of Rhodes, which is important for Meadows’ concept, must
be erroneous, as was shown above.
In Babylonian documents the co-regency of Seleucus I and Antiochus I is reflected shortly after
its commencement in the second half of the 290s (A. T. Olmstead, ‘Cuneiform Texts and
Hellenistic Chronology’, CP xxxii 1937, 6; T. Boiy, Late Achaemenid and Hellenistic Babylon
(Leuven: Peeters, 2004), 138–9). There are mentions of them as kings in the Greek inscriptions
(OGIS 214–5). For the Ptolemies, the first inclusion of a co-regent in the dating of documents
is found in the first half of the 260s in the sources referring to Ptolemy II and to the mysterious
‘Ptolemy the Son’ (W. Huß, ‘Ptolemaios der Sohn’, ZPE cxxi 1998, 229–34).
It must be noted that notwithstanding multiple mentions of Monophthalmus and Poliorcetes
(jointly or apart) as basileis in Greek inscriptions, there are no documents dated with the years
of their co-regency cf. Savalli-Lestrade [n. 9, above], 60).
Cf. P. Paschidis, Between City and King. Prosopographical Studies on the Intermediaries between the Cities of the Greek Mainland and the Aegean and the Royal Courts in the Hellenistic
Period (322–190 b. c.) (Athens: Research Centre for Greek and Roman Antiquity, 2008), 388
n. 4.
W. W. Tarn, Antigonos Gonatas (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1913), 203; cf. Hammond &
Walbank (n. 4, above), 251. Contra: K. Buraselis, Das hellenistische Makedonien und Ägäis:
Forschungen zur Politik des Kassandros und der drei ersten Antigoniden im Ägaischen Meer
und in Westkleinasien (Munich: Beck, 1982), 114–9.
82
Yuri N. Kuzmin
sources on his naval victory over the Ptolemies in the battle of Cos (we shall come
to this below). Besides, Gonatas is mentioned in connection with the succession
crisis in Bithynia after the death of Nicomedes I, which occurred not earlier than in
the second half of the 250s.40
As far as Caunus is concerned, one can suppose with some prudence that
Antigonus Gonatas inherited the rule over the city from his father Demetrius
Poliorcetes. We can see that Poliorcetes ruled Caunus c. 285 from a remark by
Plutarch: during his last anabasis in Asia Minor Demetrius was pursued by Seleucus
and tried to make his way to no other place than Caunus (Plut. Demetr. 49.5). This
might be an indirect indication of the Antigonid’s control of the city.41 There are
also fragments of a letter from Poliorcetes to the citizens of Caunus, which is likely
to date back to this period (IKaunos 1). The inscription mentions the ‘war against
Lysimachus’, and most probably that was the conflict preceding the capture of
Poliorcetes by Seleucus (Plut. Demetr. 46–48). At the same time it is possible that
the citizens of Caunus became only allies but not subjects of Demetrius during his
last campaign.
On the other hand (and this seems even more likely) it could have been
Antigonus Gonatas himself who conquered Caunus on the eve of the Chremonidean
War. After the defeat of Pyrrhus in 272 Gonatas’ foreign policy obviously was more
aggressive than scholars (e. g. W. W. Tarn) used to believe. Probably the takeover of
Eretria on Euboea by the Macedonians (Diog. Laert. 2.127) preceded beginning of
the Chremonidean War.42
Another point is that it is not quite convincing to explain the outbreak of the
Chremonidean War just by the desire of Philadelphus’ wife Arsinoe II to expropriate the Macedonian throne from Antigonus Gonatas and to give it to Ptolemy the
son of Lysimachus and Arsinoe.43 It is more likely that the formation of a broad
anti-Macedonian coalition consisting of Ptolemaic Egypt and some Greek states
became possible because of the growing strength of the Antigonid kingdom and to
its aggressive policy in the Balkans as well as in the Aegean and even Western Asia
Minor.
40 Shortly before his death (obviously c. 255 or a little later) the Bithynian king Nicomedes I made
Antigonus Gonatas, Ptolemy II as well as the cities of Byzantium, Heraclea Pontica and Cius
guardians of his heirs from the second marriage, to whom he wanted to bequeath his kingdom
(Memn. FGrH 434 F 14.1; see O. L. Gabelko, История Вифинского царства (A History of the
Bithynian Kingdom) (St. Petersburg: Humanitarian Academy, 2001), 198–203). The inclusion
of Gonatas among the guardians could hardly have been possible without sustainable connections between Macedonia and the Bithynian kingdom in the preceding years.
41 Cf. Bean (n. 29, above), 18; Buraselis (n. 39, above), 31 n. 110; Hammond & Walbank (n. 4,
above), 234 n. 3; Meadows, ‘The Ptolemaic Annexation’ (n. 9, above), 463–4; Hauben (n. 28,
above), 43. It is possible that Caunus even was one of the mints of Demetrius, see Ashton (n.
34, above), 44–5.
42 D. Knoepfler, ‘Les Relations des cités eubéennes avec Antigone Gonatas et la chronologie
delphique au début de l’époque étolienne’, BCH cxix 1995, 141–4.
43 E. g. Tarn (n. 39, above), 444; J. L. O’Neil, ‘A Re-examination of the Chremonidean War’ in P.
McKechnie & Ph. Guillaume (edd.), Ptolemy II Philadelphus and His World (Leiden: Brill,
2008), 66–7; B. van Oppen, ‘The Death of Arsinoe II Philadelphus: The Evidence Reconsidered’,
ZPE clxxiv 2010, 148–9.
The Antigonids, Caunus and the so-called ‘Era of Monophthalmus’
83
The dating of the decree IKaunos 4 with the king’s name (with the mention of
the local eponymous priest only after it – ἐφ’ ἱερέως […]μνους) is an unambiguous evidence of the fact that Caunus was not just an ally of the ‘king Antigonus’
(and it seems to be none other than Antigonus Gonatas), but also for some time a
part of his empire.
Now it seems more plausible that the battle of Cos, which resulted in the victory of Gonatas’ fleet over the fleet of Ptolemy II, can be placed among the events
of the Chremonidean War rather than dated to the 250s.44 It is quite possible that the
naumachia which took place off the coasts of Caria belonged to the events around
Caunus (its conquest by Gonatas or the defence of his Carian possessions from an
attack by the Ptolemaic fleet45).
There is a statue of Sostratus of Cnidus, one of the well-known people in the
retinue of the first two Ptolemies, found on Delos and was dedicated by the ‘demos
of Caunus’ (OGIS 68). Sextus Empiricus reproduced a story about Sostratus’ diplomatic mission, in which the latter acted as ‘Ptolemy’s’ envoy to ‘Antigonus’ (Sext.
Emp. Adv. Math. 1.276). For a long time attempts were made to connect this story
to the maritime rivalry between Philadelphus and Gonatas, as well as to the negotiations after the battle of Cos.46 One should probably compare the evidence of
Sextus Empiricus with the dedication of the statue of Sostratus by the citizens of
Caunus for his benevolence (εὔνοια) to the city. There is reason to decide that despite his victory at Cos Gonatas did lose control over Caunus (probably even before
the naumachia), and this fact was admitted by himself after the negotiations with
Sostratus.
It is quite possible that the loss of Caunus by Antigonus was related to the capture and execution of the poet Sotades, who insulted Ptolemy II and his wife Arsinoe
II, by Patroclus, strategos of the Egyptian king.47 According to Athenaeus, quoting
Hegesander (an author of the second century), Sotades was captured in the ‘isle of
Caunus’ (ἐν Καῦνῳ τῇ νήσῳ) (Athen. 14.621a; cf. Eustath. Comm. ad Hom. Il.
3.879 van der Valk). However, the Carian Caunus was located on the continent not
far from the coast, and some classicists after M. Launey admitted that Athenaeus
was not referring to the city of Caunus but to Caudus, a small island off the southern
44 On the problems of the dating of the battle of Cos see e. g. Hammond & Walbank (n. 4, above),
595–9; Buraselis (n. 39, above), 141–51, 160–70; G. Reger, ‘The Date of the Battle of Kos’,
AJAH × 1985 (1993), 155–77.
45 There were attempts to restore the name of Καῦνος in the line 7 of PHaun 6, but is it more
likely that the name of the city mentioned there as conquered by the Ptolemaic forces was
Αἶνος (A. Bülow-Jacobsen, ‘Pap. Haun., 6. An Inspection of the Original’, ZPE xxxvi 1979,
94). The events mentioned in this section of PHaun 6 are definitely related to the Third Syrian
War (246–241).
46 E. g. Tarn (n. 39, above), 386–87; H. Heinen, Untersuchungen zur hellenistischen Geschichte
des 3. Jahrhunderts v. Chr.: Zur Geschichte der Zeit des Ptolemaios Keraunos und zum
Chremonideischen Krieg (Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1972), 196–7; Buraselis (n. 39, above), 165–
167; Hammond & Walbank (n. 4, above), 294–5.
47 See G. Weber, ‘The Hellenistic Rulers and Their Poets: Silencing Dangerous Critics?’, Ancient
Society xxix 1998–1999, 162–5.
84
Yuri N. Kuzmin
shore of Crete.48 Indeed, inscriptions attest Patroclus’ activity in Crete;49 however,
in the light of decree IKaunos 4 the original reading of Athenaeus receives some
support. It is more logical to believe that Sotades tried to find shelter not on Crete,
where the Ptolemaic influence was too strong, but rather in Caunus, probably controlled at that time by Antigonus Gonatas, the adversary of Philadelphus. It is not
quite clear why Athenaeus called Caunus an ‘island’, although one might say that
νῆσος stands for one of the small islands on the river Calbis (mod. Dalyan Çayi)
next to Caunus (of course, one can not exclude that the coastline and the river bed
have undergone changes since antiquity50). It is also worth mentioning that Caunus
is listed among ‘islands’ by Dionysius Periegetes as well (Orbis Descriptio 530–7).
5. EPILOGUE
So, if Antigonus Gonatas did not receive the rule over Caunus from his father
Demetrius Poliorcetes (which is, as a matter of fact, a rather controversial supposition), then the city must have been conquered by the Macedonian king shortly before the beginning of the Chremonidean War. It is also probable that it was during
this war that Caunus returned to the rule of the Ptolemies after the capture of the
city by Patroclus.51
Although Antigonus Gonatas lost control over Caunus, which remained in the
Ptolemaic sphere of influence until the early second century, the decree IKaunos 4
and its dating seems to allow a better understanding of the aspiration towards Caria
that is known for the subsequent Antigonid kings, Antigonus III Doson and Philip
V.52
48 M. Launey, ‘L’Exécution de Sotades et l’expédition de Patroklos dans la mer Égée (266 av. J.C.)’, REA xlvii 1945, 33–45; cf. Heinen (n. 46, above), 143; G. Hölbl, A History of the
Ptolemaic Empire (London; New York: Routledge, 2001), 43. Marek (n. 2, above), 21, and
Hauben (n. 28, above), 65–6, rightly doubted this emendation.
49 IC i 12 4a.35–37 (Olous); iii 4 3 (= OGIS 45: Itanus). See also Launey (n. 48, above), 36–8;
Heinen (n. 46, above), 142–8; Hauben (n. 28, above), 54.
50 Cf. Bean (n. 29, above), 14–15.
51 In Caunus an altar was found dedicated to the wife of Ptolemy II, Arsinoe II Philadelphus
(IKaunos 54). However, the timing of her death (July 270 or July 268) and the nature of her
early personal cult as during her lifetime or post mortem are questions still open for discussion
(see van Oppen (n. 43, above), 139–50; E. D. Carney, Arsinoë of Egypt and Macedon (Oxford:
Oxford U. P., 2013), 95–110). The altar, therefore, cannot be used to date precisely the spread
of Arsinoe’s cult in Caunus and, consequently, the city’s association with the empire of the
Ptolemies. But probably Arsonoe’s cult started spreading in Caunus after the city’s reinstatement under the rule of the Ptolemies in 260s by Patroclus (who in 271/0 was in Alexandria an
eponymous priest of Alexander as well as Ptolemy II and Arsinoe II as theoi adelphoi – PHib
ii 199/2.19).
52 As was mentioned above (n. 12) the fleet of Antigonus Doson made an expedition to Caria c.
227. Obviously the part of this region was in the Macedonian sphere of influence in the first
years of Philip V (221–179); besides, Caria became an area of military operations during the
expedition of the king to the Aegean and Asia Minor in the late third century (see F. W. Walbank,
Philip V of Macedon [reissued Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1967], xi, 108–37).
The Antigonids, Caunus and the so-called ‘Era of Monophthalmus’
Fig. 1: IKaunos 4, from Ch. Marek (ed.), Die Inschriften von Kaunos
(Munich: Beck, 2006), p. 134 (by permission of Prof. Ch. Marek).
85
‘A TALE OF TWO CITIES’
SOME PARTICULARS OF THE CONQUEST OF CIUS AND
MYRLEA BY THE KINGDOM OF BITHYNIA1
Oleg L. Gabelko
The conquest of Cius and Myrlea by Prusias I in 202 b. c., one of the last steps in
the territorial expansion of the Bithynian kingdom, has seldom been an object of
special study.2 It was usually considered that the scope of information about those
events was limited exclusively to written sources, Polybius (15.21–3) and Strabo
(563/12.4.3),3 in the first place. However, it is noteworthy that a more scrupulous
analysis yields several extremely interesting (but previously unnoticed) facts in the
works of some other authors also. To shed more light on these events it is also possible to invoke some archaeological and epigraphic artefacts which have hitherto
remained unused.
I begin by determining the general political context within which one has to
look for the background to the events of 202. Cius first became involved in Bithynian
foreign policy in the middle of the third century, when its citizens were mentioned
among the guardians nominated by Nicomedes I for the young children from his
second marriage (Memnon FGrH 434 F 14.1). Later, after Ziaelas had taken over
the rule, he and the Cians may have had clashes of some sort, confirmation of which
may be seen in the treaty of isopoliteia between the Cians and Milesians containing
a mention that the lands of Cius had been devastated by wars (τοὺς πολέμους τοὺς
κατασχόντας τὰς αὐτῶν τὴν χώραν).4 These conflicts continued during the reign
of Prusias, and Polybius made several mentions of that. Thus in 25.22.2 it is stressed
that Philip helped Prusias when the latter ‘treacherously attacked the neighbours’;
in 18.4.7 (cf. Liv. 32.34.6) Philip makes it a point in his discussions with Titus
1
2
3
4
The article is written within the framework of the research project ‘Polis and Super-Polis
Structures: The Forms and Evolutions of Interrelations in the Graeco-Roman World’, supported
by the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation. Volumes in the series
Inschriften griechischer Städte aus Kleinasien are abbreviated as IK Placename. For a map to
locate the places and campaigns discussed see fig. 2.
See in most detail: O. L. Gabelko, The History of the Bithynian Kingdom (in Russian) (St.
Petersburg: Humanitarian Academy, 2005), 245–53.
The traditional interpretation of events: G. Vitucci, Il regno di Bitinia (Roma: Signorelli, 1953),
46–8; C. Habicht, ‘Prusias (1)’, RE xxiii. 1 (1957), 1093–6; C. Michels, Kulturtransfer und
monarchischer ‘Philhellenismus’: Bithynien, Pontos und Kappadokien in hellenistischer Zeit
(Göttingen: V&R Unipress, 2009), 273–4; 276–7.
G. Kawerau & A. Rehm, Das Delphinion in Milet (Berlin: Reimer, 1914), No. 141 = IK Kios
T3. 10–11. See in more detail Gabelko, The History of the Bithynian Kingdom (n. 2, above),
207–8.
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Oleg L. Gabelko
Flamininus in 197 that he had not marched against the Cians himself but just had
helped Prusias who had been at war with them. The alliance between Cius and the
Aetolian League (Polyb. 15.23.8; 18.3.12),5 and even the presence in the city of the
Aetolian commander as προστάτης τῶν κοινῶν (15.23.9), did not protect the citizens from the attack of the Bithynians and Macedonians (even though Philip had
recently made a treaty of peace with the Aetolians: 15.22.8) but could rather have
made their situation even more difficult.6 The situation was aggravated by internal
unrest in the city, as a result of which a certain Molpagoras7 came to power (15.21.1–
3). Polybius depicts him as a typical demagogue:8 a radical democrat, currying favour with the crowd, eliminating or expelling his enemies and confiscating their
property. Besides, he generally reprimands the Cians for their recklessness and
wrong form of government expressed in the repression of the ‘best’ citizens and
expropriation of their fortunes (15.21.3–4).
Philip’s intervention in the conflict between Bithynia and Cius gave grounds
for the opinion that the whole war was provoked by the Macedonian king;9 however, the suggestion that Prusias had at first tried to make use of the uneasy situation
in the city having agreed, possibly, on joint action with Philip, seems more plausible.10 Most probably, Molpagoras’ coming to power was somehow related to the
difficulties that the preceding oppression from the Bithynians had brought to the
citizens: Polybius judges the injustice of their neighbours (15.21.3) to be one of the
reasons (but not the main) for the misfortune that befell the Cians. It is probable that
we can see an indirect connection with the conflict between Bithynia and Cios in the
events implied by the Suda: ‘Cians: citizens of Cius. Those whom Prusias wished
to betray (παρασπονδῆσαι) for some reasons’ (Suda κ 1571 Adler Κιανοί). Most
likely, this text unnoticed by researchers must date back to Polybius; understanding
5
On its date, object and legal form see Corsten, in IK Kios 36. The rapprochement of Cius and
the Aetolians could be the result of an increasing threat from Philip and Prusias (F. W. Walbank,
A Historical Commentary on Polybius, ii [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1982], 478).
6 The accusations against the Aetolians made by Philip during the first negotiations with
Flamininus (197) to the effect that the Aetolians allegedly were inflicting violence on their own
allies (Polyb. 18.4.8–5.3; Livy 32.34.5) may actually have some justification. For example,
Calchedon, which became an ally of the Aetolians at the same time as Cius and Lysimachea,
was most likely forced to do so by the attacks of Aetolian pirates (Sibylline Oracles 3.433–6);
сf. IK Kalchedon 95, 124. Cius could well have experienced something similar.
7 This aristocratic name is attested in other Milesian colonies (Cyzicus and Sinope) and in
Ephesus: see LGPN va. 321, s. v.
8 On Polybius’s attitude to demagogues see C. Champion, ‘Polybian Demagogues in Historical
Context’, HSCP cii 2004, 199–212.
9 Ed. Meyer, ‘Bithynia’, RE iii (1898), 518.
10 J. Sölch, ‘Bithynische Städte im Altertum’, Klio xix 1924, 151; G. Vitucci, Il regno di Bitinia
(n. 3, above), 47. Modern scholars interpret the specifics of those events in different ways.
Walbank thinks that Philip used the internal political struggle but hardly was an enemy of
Molpagoras (Historical Commentary [n. 5, above], 475). Corsten is of a different opinion:
Prusias and Philip could use the support of the citizens expelled by Molpagoras (IK Kios, p.
37). Proceeding from the position that Molpagoras became the autocratic ruler of Cius, according to Polybius (15.21.2), and Philip and Prusias had to conduct a long and difficult siege of the
city, the second proposal seems better substantiated.
Some Particulars of the Conquest of Cius and Myrlea by the Kingdom of Bithynia
89
it literally, we may infer from it the existence of some previous treaties between
Bithynia and Cius, which Prusias decided to break. It is not impossible that a fragment of Polybius’ work, which is not cited from any particular book, is related to
the siege of Cius: the passage concerns the attempts of some intermediaries ‘to
separate the adversaries and take measures so that Prusias should do them [the
Cians? – O. G.] no harm’ (Polyb. fr. 127 Büttner-Wobst ap. Suda δ 926 Adler
διέξειν).11 These acts had probably taken place even before Philip became actively
involved in the siege of the city, when the chief enemies of the Cians were the
Bithynians. Thus Prusias’ hostility towards the Cians was clearly manifested – as
the precursor of their city’s being conquered by Philip V.
There is absolutely no information about the relations of Bithynia and Myrlea
before 202; but considering Strabo’s phrase mentioning that Cius and Myrlea had
been conquered and destroyed by Philip and Prusias, and then restored from their
ruins by the latter (12.4.3), we might think that Myrlea had become an object of the
aggressive policy of Philip, and Prusias took part in the conflict after having been
involved in it by his ally and relative, i. e. in contrast to the case of Cius, here it was
Philip who took the initiative. Nevertheless, there is one important – yet unnoticed
by researchers – passage in an infrequently cited source; it seems to be the only one
to give more or less concrete information about the events in the history of Myrlea.12
Dionysius of Byzantium says that on the European coast of the Thracian Bosporus,
not far from the estuary of the strait, there is a certain settlement of Myrlaeum, ‘the
domicile of those who lived in exile from Myrlea during the trouble and came there’
(Myrlaeum, domicilium eorum, qui ob seditionem a Myrlaea in exilium proiecti
hunc solum verterunt: Dion. Byz. 82).13 Unfortunately, Dionysius gives no chronological indication, but it seems likely that those events also date back to the very
end of the third century. In the first place, we can admit an analogy with the situation in Cius, for which a link of internal trouble with an aggravated foreign situation
due to the escalated conflict with Bithynia was beyond doubt; probably something
11 The alternative is to refer this fragment to the war of Rhodes and Bithynia against Byzantium
in 220, which ended thanks to the mediation of Cavarus, the king of the Thracian Galatians
(4.52.1–2). A detailed story of this conflict survived in its entirety (4.46.1–52.10), but Cavarus
is mentioned also in fragments of book 8 (24.2–3), and the first fragment tells specifically about
the services rendered by him to the Byzantines. Polybius’ mention of the ambassadors ἀπὸ τῶν
προειρημένων πόλεων, ‘from the cities mentioned above’, which tried to protect the Cians
(15.22.4), does not allow a reliable interpretation owing to the bad preservation of the text of
his work. Habicht includes Rhodes and Byzantium in the number of mediating states (‘Prusias’
[n. 3, above], 1093), which led to negotiations with Philip on making peace between him and
the Aetolians as early as 217 together with representatives of Chios and ambassadors of
Ptolemy IV (Polyb. 5.100.9). In the situation of 202 the Byzantines could have been anxious
about the possible menace to their Asian possessions (see below) and the previous conquest by
Philip of their ally Perinthus.
12 For a brief outline of Myrlea’s history from the fifth to the first century see Corsten, in IK
Apameia und Pylai, pp. 8–13.
13 E. Oberhummer’s opinion that the name Myrleion is to be dated back to Myra in Lycia (considering the fact that the neighboring bay is called the Lycian Bay – Dion. Byz. 81) (‘Bosporos
[1]’, RE iii [1898], 751–2), is not very convincing, for Dionysius in this case reports quite detailed information obtained in all probability from local Byzantine sources.
90
Oleg L. Gabelko
of the same sort could have taken place in Myrlea. Another point is that there are
sufficient grounds to believe that an apoikia was led from Myrlea itself to Myrileum
with assistance from the Byzantines, who despite the settlement of their conflict
with Prusias in 220 had every reason for animosity against him. Myrleion was situated not far from Byzantium and almost certainly on the territory controlled by it.14
Besides, the probable attention given by Byzantines to the events inside Myrlea and
around it is readily explained by their anxiety for the fate of their own possessions
on the southern coast of Propontis located somewhat to the west of Myrlea.15 Thus
the clash of citizens of Myrlea with Philip and Prusias could also have been somehow connected with the domestic political situation in the polis.
I turn now to the most complete descriptions of two extremely interesting and
informative grave stelai, which it would be appropriate to name, in accordance with
the names given in the epitaphs inscribed on them, as the monument of Nana (fig.
3) and the monument of Nikasion (fig. 4, a–b). They are included in the comprehensive edition of eastern Greek grave reliefs by E. Pfuhl & H. Möbius.16
1273. Unknown origin. Museum of Bursa, asset No. 23817. Blue-grey marble.
Dimensions: 74 × 41 × 10 cm. Edges and figures chipped. Chip above the image
area. Stele with inner rod (pin) below.
A soldier in a short chiton and high helmet; a round shield in his left hand pointing to the right, and a long sword that looks like a thin knife held in his right hand.
His enemy, covered from head to toe with a long Gallic shield, holds in his right
hand a spear pointed downwards. Between them, a dead body is lying on the ground,
its headgear indiscernible owing to damage. Is it clad in trousers and footwear?
(Reminiscences of battle against Galatians in Asia Minor?)
Inscription below the relief (apparently later and paradoxically meant for a
woman):
Νάνα Φιλίσκου θυγάτηρ,
γυνὴ δὲ Ἀριστοκράτου
Τιμοθέου τοῦ καὶ Ῥωίτα
χαῖρε.
14 Not more than five kilometres from Myrleion there was the temple of Serapis (Polyb. 4.39.6;
Dion. Byz. 75), known as Ἱερὸν τῶν Βυζαντίων (K. Lehmann, ‘Das Kap Hieron und die
Sperrung des Bosporus’, in K. Regling & H. Reich [edd.], Festschrift zu C. F. Lehmann-Haupts
sechzigstem Geburtstage [Wien: Braumüller, 1921], 175–6). See Barr., map 53.
15 On their localisation and the time of their acquisition see O. L. Gabelko, ‘Zur Lokalisierung und
Chronologie der Asiatischen Besitzungen von Byzanz’ O.Terr. ii 1996, 121–8. On Philip’s policies towards Byzantium see: A. Dumitru, ‘Byzance et les Philippe de Macédoine’, REG cxix
2006, 139–56.
16 Ε. Pfuhl & Η. Möbius, Die Ostgriechische Grabreliefs, ii (Mainz: Von Zabern, 1979), 309–10.
See also the other publications of the stele of Nikasion: IK Kios 58 (here the date suggested for
the relief is the first half of the second century); M. Cremer, Hellenistisch-römische Grabstelen
im nordwestlichen Kleinasien, ii. Bithynien, (Bonn: Habelt, 1992), 10, 20, 26–29, 127, NSA 1.
17 Today the asset number of this relief is 3121 (T. Corsten, ‘Neue Denkmäler aus Bithynien’, EA
xvii 1997, 98.).
Some Particulars of the Conquest of Cius and Myrlea by the Kingdom of Bithynia
91
Not an expert, but a fresh and lively piece of work dating back probably to the first
half of the second century
1277. Found in Cios (Gemlik). Location unknown.
Marble, 174 × 55 cm, originally almost 2 m high. Two quadrangular slabs finished most likely for one stele since both bear the rare name of Nikasion. The
scripts of the inscriptions however differ, which could have been due to making of
the relief and the inscription for the son on the father’s stele at a later date. The detail is not fine but it proves the presence of several completely different parts of the
relief. The upper slab is broken on the level of the shoulders and necks [of the images of people at a feast – O. G.]. The eagle’s head, left wing and end of tail are
missing; lateral edges are chipped.18
The upper part displays a funeral feast.
Lower part. Left: rostrum of a warship, of simple shape, with round stern posts;
right: aft of the second ship with an aphlaston (stern ornament) of four parts.
Between them: face-up in the water (implied, but not expressed) lies a naked body
of a man with long hair, his right foot caught by the tip of the steering oar. His right
hand is held down and his left hand is knuckled and raised to his forehead. The ship
on the left occupies more space and rises above the second behind the figure of
Nikasion standing on the epotis (bow). He is raising a stone from left to right from
behind his shoulder and pulls an oval shield from the other side of the stern post. He
is clad in a coat of plates with straps, helmet with a visor, neck flap and plume. On
the left: in an opposing motion a small servant is depicted, stooping to the left, his
shield reaching the floor, also brandishing a stone. On the second ship there is undoubtedly a hanging [aboard – O. G.] oval shield (θυρεός) and a round shield of a
soldier hurrying to the aft who is stepping on the back of the dead body lying flat on
its stomach, whose proportions are uncertain; probably there is no connection with
the body of the dead man, considering the manner in which his left hand is resting
on the torso, and the long shield…
Below the edge is an inscription:
[Νι]κασίων Νικασίοννο[ς]
– – – ανδία Μενελάου.
Below the upper slab on the thin ridge there is a continuation of an older inscription:
[κ]αὶ υἱος αὐτοῦ Νικασ[ίω]ν, which refers probably to the lower relief, where,
together with the killed father, the son is depicted as a participant in a naval battle,
because the figures definitely could not have been the grandfather and father.
Both reliefs and inscriptions may likely date back to the decade around 200
with a rather broad tolerance.
18 According to a plausible suggestion of Corsten, the slab was cut for further use, and originally
the upper part should have been as wide as the lower with two reliefs (IK Kios, p. 128, No 58).
92
Oleg L. Gabelko
Some important mentions and clarifications with respect to the interpretation of
both gravestones have been made in subsequent work. The principal of them is that
the German epigraphist T. Corsten, who worked for a long time in the museums of
Turkey to compile corpora of inscriptions of Bithynian cities for the series
Inschriften griechischer Städte aus Kleinasien, succeeded in establishing the origin
of the stele of Nana, which remained unknown to the original publishers: it was
found in the settlement of Zeytinbağı, located not far (about 8 km) to the west of the
present-day city of Mudanya, where Myrlea was situated. There are strong grounds
for believing that this territory in ancient times belonged to the chora of Myrlea.19
It is this circumstance that forms the basis for the subsequent suggestions of this
paper.
Is it possible to say that the foregoing description and analysis yield all the information there is? The author of this paper is inclined to disagree; moreover, it is
his opinion that what is most important, the main peculiarities of both reliefs, did
not attract the attention they deserve – and these could shed light on many still unanswered questions. Strange as it may seem, researchers have focused their attention mainly on the interpretation of different artistic peculiarities of the reliefs, but
the opportunity to place both monuments in a definite historic and military and
political context has been neglected. But this opportunity is given to us by the depictions of the adversaries of the Greek soldiers. In my opinion, both on the stele of
Nana and on the monument of Nikasion the enemies of the hoplites are not abstract
‘adversaries’ but quite specific Galatians.20
The possibility that the stele of Nana was somehow related to the struggle
against the Celts, as stated above, was mentioned by Pfuhl & Möbius (cf. their
mention of the shield of θυρεός type on the stele of Nikasion), but, regrettably, this
careful suggestion did not find any development. Probably this resulted from the
fact that the images of naked soldiers seen on grave reliefs from Asia Minor (similar
to those seen on the stele of Nikasion), whom the dead man had fought, are occasionally related to some ‘generic’ image of a ‘miserable barbarian’.21 However,
19 On the site of Zeytinbağı there had been a shrine of Triglia, which, in the opinion of Corsten,
belonged to Myrlea (‘Neue Denkmäler’ [n. 17, above], 97). One must however keep in mind
that somewhere in the vicinity there had been possessions of Byzantium (in more detail
Gabelko, ‘Zur Lokalisierung’ [n. 15, above]), but the relief of Nana could not have originated
from there. The point is that the inscriptions made on the territory of the Asian peraia of the
Byzantines are characterised by the prevailing Dorian dialect (see a very illustrative example
for this case: a Doric γυνά in the epitaph to a woman called Dada: IK Apameia und Pylai
121.2), which we do not find in the document in question.
20 The difference of these two monuments from a very interesting category of Bithynian grave
stelai with images of galatomachia (on which see F. Rumscheid & W. Held, ‘Erinnerungen an
Mokazis’, Ist. Mitt. xliv 1994, 89–106; U. Peschlow, A. Peschlow-Bindokat & M. Wörrle, ‘Die
Sammlung Turan Beler in Kumbaba bei Şile, II. Antike und byzantinische Denkmäler von der
bithynische Schwarzmeerküste’, Ist. Mitt. lii 2002, 429–522; T. Corsten, ‘Thracian Personal
Names and Military Settlements in Hellenistic Bithynia’, in E. Matthews [ed.], Old and New
Worlds of Greek Onomastics [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007], 121–33) lies in the fact
that the latter, as a rule, depict horsemen and not hoplites, and they bear almost exclusively
specifically Bithynian, not Greek, names.
21 E. g. Rumscheid & Held, ‘Erinnerungen an Mokazis’ (n. 20, above), 101–2. This is how the
Some Particulars of the Conquest of Cius and Myrlea by the Kingdom of Bithynia
93
such an interpretation of the two stelai under consideration is undermined both by
the unusual composition, which does not entirely fall under the traditional canons,
and by the liveliness of the images on the reliefs (we must remember the description
of the stele of Nana by Pfuhl & Möbius): this makes one think the stelai reproduce
an actual historic event. It is permissible therefore to suggest that the very iconography of the enemies of the Greek hoplites on our reliefs is itself ‘speaking’.
Very significant is the combination of a characteristic ‘barbaric’ look of the
adversaries of the Greek warriors on both reliefs (no helmet, long hair, and on the
stele of Nikasion the lack of any attire on one of them)22 and the use by them of
Celtic-type shields.23 On the whole, the figures of the Greek soldiers’ enemies quite
agree with the stereotype developed in the Hellenistic world to depict the Galatians.24
It would be worthwhile to dwell on the subjects of the reliefs, since these make
them original and allow us to consider both images true both as a whole and in their
details. Very curious, indeed, is the fact that the stele with the battle scene was
erected on a woman’s grave. The very fact makes researchers think the stone was
re-used.25 Meanwhile, if one looks away from the traditional conceptions of the
composition and stylistics of the Greek grave reliefs of the Hellenistic period, the
stele of Nana may be regarded as a specimen of a rather non-traditional artistic approach (originating probably from a very dramatic situation in which the struggle of
the Myrleans against the barbarians was taking place). It is difficult to say anything
definite about the figure lying between the two fighting soldiers (in particular, one
can hardly recognize trousers, footwear and a headgear in the dead person’s attire,
as Pfuhl & Möbius and Corsten think, quite naturally supposing the dead person to
be the Greek soldier’s enemy killed by him). However, the posture of the lying body
leaves no doubt: before falling, the person killed had been standing next to the hoplite, facing in the same direction as the Greek soldier. Moreover, the Greek soldier
is almost trying even now to deflect with his sword the enemy’s attacking spear,
which is directed at the lying body. Finally, it is very significant that there is no
weapon or armour on the dead body, which is a very common attribute of such
22
23
24
25
authors understand the battle scene on the central of the three reliefs on the monument of
Mokazis. However, note the characteristics of one of the figures on a relief from the region of
Nicomedia as ‘a Galatian footman’, given on the grounds of a shield of a Galatian type being
depicted: Cremer, Hellenistisch-römische Grabstelen (n. 16, above), 25, 126–7, Taf. 6, NS 13
(the soldier however being clad in a regular Greek chiton).
On the fairly common practice of the Celts of fighting naked see P. Couissin, ‘La nudité guerière
des Gaulois’, AFLA xiv.2 1929, 65–89. The Asian Galatians in the second century kept this
custom, to judge from Livy’s remarks (38.21.9; 26.7).
Strange as this is, neither relief is included by M. Eichberg in his catalogue of similar shields
(Die Entwicklung einer italisch-etruskischen Schildform von den Anfängen bis zur Zeit Caesars
[Frankfurt: Lang, 1987]).
See the latest research on the iconography of the Galatians E. Kistler, Funktionalisierte
Keltenbilder: Die Indienstnahme der Kelten zur Vermittlung von Normen und Werten in der
hellenistischen Welt (Berlin: Verlag Antike, 2009): on the monuments from Bithynia, 53–65
(with the strange omision of the aforementioned stelai!).
SEG xli 1091. Corsten notes meanwhile that the inscription is done very nicely and neatly
(Corsten, ‘Neue Denkmäler’ [n. 19, above], 98).
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Oleg L. Gabelko
images.26 All this leads one to suggest that the prostrate figure should be associated
not with the defeated enemy, as usual, but with the buried woman, with Nana herself. There are no analogues in the Greek practice of grave monuments,27 but the
situation is readily understood if one suggests that the stele had been made to the
order of the killed woman’s husband, Aristocrates – that very same hoplite who
showed no fear in the fight against the barbaric Galatian over the body of his dead
wife. In this case the obscure nickname (?), Roito/as, most probably is to be referred
to himself rather than to his father, which is admissible from a grammatical standpoint: having been moved by a somewhat naïve desire to elegise his courage in
fighting the enemy, Aristocrates tried to fit all the possible information about himself into the epitaph to his killed wife.28
The scene of Nikasion throwing stones at his enemies during the sea battle is
also of interest. The installation of catapult weapons on the ships during a naumachia was quite common practice in the Hellenistic world, but throwing stones
with one’s hands also looks like a logical and effective example of using the available material (especially against an enemy weakly protected by armour – as was
probably the case with the Celts).29
Therefore it is possible to acknowledge the following. Two grave stelai containing scenes of a military character – episodes from a land battle and from a naval
battle – were found at a distance of just 30 km from one another. They are dated to
approximately the same period (with a tolerance of a few decades, even if one relies
on the dates farthest apart). What is more, both monuments, on the basis of their
iconography, are somehow related to the presence of the Galatians in north-western
Asia Minor. Is this sheer chance? We can believe that a positive answer to that question may be safely eliminated. We need to find out when and in what circumstances
the Galatians could appear here.
First and foremost, the inscription for Nana may be linked hypothetically to the
events directly related to the first advent of the Galatians to Asia in 278/7 (this possibility was not excluded by Pfuhl & Möbius: see above). Although nothing is
known about the acts of the Celts against Myrlea, we should not rule out such a
possibility; moreover, the Galatians did attack Cyzicus, situated a little to the west
26 A figure lying naked without any weapons is depicted on one of the Bithynian grave stelai
(Peschlow, Peschlow-Bindokat & Wörrle, ‘Die Sammlung’ [n. 20, above], 433, No 1 with Abb.
2b): this monument surely deserves special consideration.
27 However, we must remember the well-known epitaph to three Milesian maidens killed during
the Galatian invasion (Anth. Pal. 7.492). On the extreme cruelty of the Galatians towards
women during the Galatian invasion of Greece see Paus. 10.22.2–4; scepticism on the reliability of this episode (Kistler, Funktionalisierte Keltenbilder, [n. 24, above], 205–11) seems to be
unwarranted.
28 Professor Corsten, whom I have informed about this interpretation of the inscription, had personally perused the stele in the museum of Bursa. He admitted this suggestion was rather unusual but quite plausible, and noted that the poor preservation of the relief does not allow one
to arrive at certain conclusions.
29 Cf. a detailed description of the Romans’ tactic in actively using missiles in their battles against
the Galatians during the campaign of Cn. Manlius Vulso in 189 (Livy 38.21.1–10).
Some Particulars of the Conquest of Cius and Myrlea by the Kingdom of Bithynia
95
(about 80 km) of Myrlea.30 In this case, however, there would be a conflict with the
dating of the relief, and a substantial one, of 70–80 years at least. Moreover, the
stele of Nikasion could hardly be related to the Galatians’ invasion of Asia, since it
depicts such an unusual event as the Galatians’ fighting at sea, and this deserves
special attention. It is known that Celtic troops led by Lutarius managed to cross the
Hellespont on five ships captured by deceit (Liv. 38.16.6),31 but we can hardly
doubt that this modest ‘naval operation’ (of course, not requiring any special navigational skills) did not develop: beyond that, the Celts acted only and exclusively
on land. Having settled in central Anatolia, the Galatians became fully isolated from
the sea and were almost never mentioned in connection with any naval campaigns
whatsoever.32 Memnon’s statement that the Galatians, having set out on a campaign
against Heraclea Pontica (c. 190), strove to reach an exit to the sea (Memnon FGrH
434 F 20.1) is perceived by S. Mitchell as evidence of their desire to establish contacts with their Danube brethren33 (by using ships?); but it is likely that the phrase
has a different meaning. Since their very first campaigns to Macedonia, Greece,
Thrace and Asia the Galatians should have remembered well that the largest and
richest Greek cities were located along the coast,34 and Memnon’s expression is to
be interpreted in this context.
Let us now consider other possibilities. As is known, in 218 the Galatian tribe
of the Aegosagi came to Asia Minor from Europe. Originally they had been in the
service of Attalus I of Pergamum, and later they terrorised the cities of the Hellespont
until they were fully exterminated by Prusias I two years later (Polyb. 5.111.6–7).35
These Galatians seem to have left a trace in the onomastic data of the Troad,36 but
we have no grounds for believing that they managed to go far to the east, to Myrlea:
30 OGIS 748, where the ‘Galatian war’ is mentioned (ll. 18–19). Comment on the inscription in
the political context of the 270s: M. Launey, ‘Études d’histoire hellénistique, I. Un épisode
oublié de l’invasion galate en Asie Mineure (278/7 av. C.)’, REA xlvi 1944, 217–36; and important additions, K. Strobel, Die Galater. Geschichte und Eigenart der keltischen Staatenbildung
auf dem Boden des hellenistischen Kleinasien, i. Untersuchungen zur Geschichte und historischen Geographie der hellenistischen und römischen Kleinasien, i (Berlin: Akademie Verlag,
1996), 249–250, 258 and n. 471.
31 Pausanias’s expression that the Galatiansr sailed to Asia on ships (1.4.5) does not reflect the fact
that those Celts had been transported over the Thracian Bosporus by Nicomedes I of Bithynia
and his Greek allies in the Northern League. See in more detail P. Moraux, ‘L’établissement des
Galates en Asie Mineure’, Ist. Mit.t vii 1957, 56–75; Strobel, ‘Die Galater’ (n. 30, above),
236–52.
32 This is quite probable, considering Livy’s characteristic remark on the Galli feeling uneasy
even in the quiet sea (Gallis vix quietem ferentibus in mari: 44.28.11) in the story of the Third
Macedonian war (here the Galatian mercenaries in the Pergamene forces are mentioned).
33 S. Mitchell, Anatolia: Land, Men and Gods in Asia Minor, i. The Celts in Anatolia and the
Impact of Roman Rule (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993), 23.
34 On the Galatians’ outrageous conduct on the Thracian and Asian coasts during their invasions
in the early 270s see Livy 38.16.3; Paus. 1.4.5; 10.15.3; Zos. 2.37.1.
35 For more detail on those events see Gabelko, The History (n. 2, above), 238–40. It is suggested
that the occurrence of stelai depicting scenes of galatomachia are related to these acts of
Prusias (Peschlow, Peschlow-Bindokat & Wörrle, ‘Die Sammlung’ [n. 20, above], 429).
36 L. Robert, Études épigraphiques et philologiques (Paris: Champion, 1938), 210.
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Oleg L. Gabelko
Polybius says that the plundering inroads to ‘the neighbouring cities’ were made by
the Aegosagi from their base in Arisbe in the vicinity of Abydus (5.111. 5), and later
mentions that Prusias had defeated the Aegosagi and liberated the cities of the
Hellespont from strong fears (111.7); and Myrlea, on the basis of its geographical
position, should not be included among those cities.
Finally, the Galatian Toliostoagii are mentioned in the well-known decree from
the Hellespont city of Lampsacus in the honour of Hegesias (Syll.3 591 = IK
Lampsakos 49),37 but the context of the passage does not allow us to consider that
it implies any military conflicts for that moment between the Galatians and the
Greeks of the region in question or any possibility of such a conflict.38
Thus there probably remains only one military conflict of the Hellenistic period
known to us, and it concerns in the most direct way both of the cities interesting us,
Cius and Myrlea: this is the campaign of Philip V to Asia Minor, supported by his
ally Prusias I and resulting in the conquest of both cities and their inclusion in
Prusias’ state. This suggestion does not contradict considerations of chronology: the
difference from the tentative dating of both tombstones estimated by the researchers
(c. 200 or the first half of the second century) is minimal.
Could the Galatians have participated in the Macedonian and Bithynian campaign? Is it the case that the stele of Nikasion is to be regarded as evidence of Galatian
mercenaries in the forces of Philip V? Examples of the Asian Celts’ involvement in
the campaigns of Philip as mercenaries are known,39 but this case can hardly add to
their number. Almost no researchers have looked specifically into the question of
what route – land or sea – was used by Philip to bring his troops to Asia, but the
opinion of R. B. McShane, who insists on the latter,40 does not seem convincing. In
order to conquer Lysimachea during the initial phase of that campaign Philip naturally did not need any naval forces; and on taking over Calchedon, for which the
Macedonian troops had to cross the Bosporus, Philip could use the assistance of his
Bithynian ally, and later that same assistance (auxiliary force, foodstuffs, forage,
etc.) could be enjoyed by the Macedonian army in its march through Bithynia to
Cius and Myrlea and beyond – as far as the invasion of the territory of Pergamum.
The Macedonian fleet took an active part in the Asian campaign of Philip, and one
would find it sufficient to remember its battles with the Pergamene and Rhodian
naval forces at Chios and Lada. However, its presence on the Propontis was unnecessary, moreover, it seems strategically senseless: if it had been there, the enemy
could easily block the Hellespont and impede the Macedonians’ way to the Aegean.
Thus the stele of Nikasion can hardly be regarded as evidence of a naval campaign
of Philip to Cius. This is why we have to consider the possibility of connecting the
37 The most detailed comment is by P. Frisch at IK Lampsakos 4.
38 F. Stähelin, Geschichte der Kleinasiatischen Galater2 (Osnabrück: Zeller, 1973), 48 n. 4; S.
Mitchell, Anatolia (n. 33, above), 22.
39 E. g. M. Launey, Recherches sur les armeés hellénistiques, i (Paris: De Boccard, 1950), 518–9.
40 He thinks Cius was besieged and conquered as a result of the acts of the Macedonian fleet (R. B.
McShane, The Foreign Policy of the Attalids of Pergamum [Urbana: University of Illinois
Press, 1964], 118). In this case it would be possible to expect Galatian mercenaries to be on the
Macedonian ships.
Some Particulars of the Conquest of Cius and Myrlea by the Kingdom of Bithynia
97
Celts’ participation in the war against Cius and Myrlea with the activities of another
power, essentially hostile to the Greeks of Asia Minor: the Bithynian kingdom.
Prusias I might have managed to restore amicable relations between Bithynia
and the Galatians, which must have been broken after the Celts had killed his father
Ziaelas c. 230 (Phylarchus FGrH 81 F 50 ap. Athen. 2.58c; Trogus Proleg. 17), a
possible conflict which could have resulted in the victory of Prusias, in honour of
which the festival of the Soteria was held (Polyb. 4.49.3),41 and in Prusias’ extermination of the Aegosagi in 216. It is reliably known that the alliance between Prusias
and the Galatians did exist during the war of Bithynia and Pergamum in 186–183,
since this is confirmed by both narrative sources (Polyb. 3.3.7; Trogus Proleg. 32;
Nep. Hannib. 10.1–2) and inscriptions.42
Involvement of Galatian mercenaries in the aggressive acts against Cius and
Myrlea as part of the Bithynian force43 does not at all seem improbable; likely
enough, the clashes between the Bithynians and Cians could indeed have taken
place at sea.44 It is important to emphasise the following: most probably, the events
reflected on both stelai had taken place before 202, because the erection of those
monuments (especially of the bulky and high-quality monument of Nikasion) could
hardly have been possible after the conquest and demolition of both cities, since the
citizens of Cius, according to Polybius, were sold into slavery without exception
(15.23.3; 10).45 There is a strong temptation to suggest that both stelai were con41 C. Habicht, ‘Prusias’ (n. 3, above), 1087–8.
42 OGIS 298, the dedication of Attalus, brother of Eumenes II, for the victory over the Bithynians
and Galatians; M. Segre, ‘Due nuovi testi storici’, RFIC xl 1932, 446–51, a decree from
Telmessus of Pisidia mentioning the victory of King Eumenes over Prusias, the Galatians of
Ortiagon and their allies (ll. 11–13).
43 An additional proof of this suggestion could be the use of a round shield by the second adversary of Nikasion: it was not a part of the Galatians’ traditional weaponry. The use of such a
shield would require mastering different melée tactics from using the Celtic θυρεός, which
would be quite possible when the soldier was a part of an army of a different state. Also we
should remember that the second Bithynian king, Nicomedes I, in 278/7 armed his Celtic allies
during their march to Asia (Memnon FGrH 434 F 11.5).
44 On the operations of Prusias’ fleet in the late third century see: Livy 38.30.16. Habicht denies
the accuracy of Livy’s report of the availability of a navy in Bithynia (‘Prusias’ [n. 3, above],
1092); however, even Nicomedes I in 280–279 could possibly have had a number of ships
(Memnon FGrH 434 F 10.2; 11.1). On the other hand, on the widely known coins of Cius the
rostrum of a battle ship is depicted by no mere chance (W. H. Waddington, E. Babelon & T.
Reinach, Recueil général des monnaies grecques d’Asie Mineure, i, [Paris: Leroux, 1908],
311–3, pl. xlix, nos. 1–27): cf. fig. 4. Of course, it was not difficult for the Bithynians to attack
Cius from the land, but a combined offensive action could have resulted in a stronger effect.
45 Cf. H. Volkmann, Die Massenversklavungen der Enwohner eroberter Städte in der hellenistisch-römischen Zeit (Stuttgart: Steiner, 1990), 12. As far as Myrlea is concerned, its conquest
was, in most probability, not accompanied by such cruelty as was the case with Cius, the latter
being the reason for bitter criticism of Philip on the part of his adversaries, both Greek and
Roman (Polyb. 17.3.12; Livy 31.31,14; 32.22.22; 33.16; Auct. ad Her. 4.54; 68). While M.
Holleaux believed that the degree of Philip’s cruelty to the Cians was exaggerated in our
sources (Rome, la Grèce et les monarchies hellénistiques au IIIe siecle av. J.-C. [273–205]
[Paris: De Boccard, 1921], 291, n. 1), K. Michels admits the possibility of Prusias’ returning
some part of the enslaved population to both Cius and Myrlea (Kulturtransfer [n. 3, above],
274, 276).
98
Oleg L. Gabelko
nected with one and the same campaign, which had taken place earlier than 202 and
had included both acts at sea, against Cius, and on land (the landing of troops ?),
against Myrlea, which however had turned out to be unsuccessful for Prusias at the
time, for it did not result in the conquest of Cius and Myrlea – but, regrettably, we
have no strong proof for such a conclusion. Probably it was the intervention of the
Macedonian troops that really became the decisive factor allowing the Bithynian
king to subdue two Greek cities and include them within his state.
Thus the history of Cius and Myrlea in the end of the third century shows much
in common. The run-of-the-mill topos of Greek political thought about the malignancy of internal trouble in the face of external threat has found a very significant
expression in this case: the civil political crisis in Cius and, perhaps in Myrlea as
well, resulted, for each of the two cities, in the loss of their independence and their
very names (Cius was refounded by Prusias as Prusias-on-Sea, and Myrlea as
Apameia), in submission to the Bithynian kingdom and in a dramatic twist in their
historical fates.
Fig. 2: Region of Propontis: Campaigns of late third century. © Oleg L. Gabelko.
Some Particulars of the Conquest of Cius and Myrlea by the Kingdom of Bithynia
99
Fig. 3: The stele of Nana: photograph by I. Luckert, from Ε. Pfuhl & Η. Möbius, Die
Ostgriechische Grabreliefs, ii (Mainz: Von Zabern, 1979), Taf. 189 Nr. 1273.
Fig. 4: The stele of Nikasion: (a) upper part; (b) lower part: drawings from P. Le Bas et al.,
Voyage archéologique en Grèce et en Asie mineure: Planches de topographie, de sculpture et
d’architecture (Paris: Firmin-Didot, 1888), pl. 131. 1 and 2.
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Oleg L. Gabelko
Fig. 5: Coin of Cius (second half of fourth century): photograph from
Tantalus Online Coin Registry, S/N 37110.
CRISIS AND DEFORMATION IN THE ROMAN REPUBLIC:
THE EXAMPLE OF THE DICTATORSHIP
T. J. Cornell
It is generally assumed that in the early republic the natural Roman response to a
crisis was to appoint a dictator, a single authoritative figure who exercised command until the crisis was brought to an end, or for six months, whichever was the
shorter.1 But the idea of dictatorship, and the very word ‘dictator’, were deformed
out of all recognition in the last century of the republic; and this deformation of
what was originally a simple and innocent concept caused the term to be revived in
modern times to describe forms of non-royal authoritarian rule, by the likes of
Cromwell, the two Bonapartes, and their successors and imitators who continue to
afflict subject populations in many parts of the world. The model was the all-powerful dictatorship of unlimited duration instituted first by Sulla, who abdicated voluntarily but at a time of his own choosing, and subsequently by Caesar, whose office ended in dramatic fashion with his murder. It is not surprising that in the
nineteenth century ‘Caesarism’ competed with ‘Bonapartism’ as the appropriate
term for what is now generally called dictatorship.
Before these deformations in the late republic, the original, traditional dictatorship was, it seems, a relatively benign and unusually effective institution, at least in
the sense that almost all the dictators we know about – and there were many of
them, as we shall see – were able to complete their tasks and to abdicate within the
allotted time. To anyone familiar with the history of crises, and for that matter the
history of political institutions, this seems truly remarkable. But before we turn to a
closer examination of this suspiciously trouble-free and successful record, it will be
well to remind ourselves of what a traditional dictatorship was like. In the annals of
the early republic the classic instance is the story of Cincinnatus, who assumed the
1
Standard accounts of the Roman dictatorship include T. Mommsen, Römisches Staatsrecht, ii3
(Leipzig: Hirzel, 1887), 141–80; W. Liebenham, ‘Dictator’, RE 5 (1905), 370–86; F. De
Martino, Storia della costituzione romana, i2 (Naples: Jovene, 1974), 236–47; 275–85; 438–55;
W. Kunkel & R. Wittmann, Staatsordnung und Staatspraxis der römischen Republik (München:
Beck, 1995), 665–717; A. W. Lintott, The Constitution of the Roman Republic (Oxford: Oxford
U. P., 1999), 109–13. Note also the proceedings of a CNRS conference on dictatorship in 1984:
F. Hinard (ed.), Dictatures (Paris: De Boccard, 1988). There is no published monograph in
English, but M. E. Hartfield’s doctoral dissertation ‘The Roman Dictatorship: Its Character and
Its Evolution’ (Berkeley: University of California, 1982) is a very useful survey, widely quoted
in modern scholarship. The recent work of G. K. Golden, Crisis Management during the Roman
Republic (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 2013), is disappointing on the dictatorship (11–41) and
offers a broadly conventional account.
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T. J. Cornell
office in 458 b. c. (Varronian).2 L. Quinctius Cincinnatus was a distinguished patrician and public servant (he had been consul two years earlier, in the year we call
460), who was known for his simple tastes and austere way of life. At the time our
story begins, he was engaged in working his small farm on the right bank of the
Tiber, the so-called prata Quinctia, in the region near the Vatican known even today
as Prati. When news reached Rome that the army of one of the consuls, L. Minucius
Esquilinus Augurinus, had been surrounded by the Aequi3 and was trapped in its
camp near Mount Algidus, it was decided that a dictator should be appointed.
Cincinnatus was chosen, and a group of senators sent to summon him. They found
him, stripped to the waist, ploughing his tiny plot. Calling to his wife to fetch his
toga from their hovel, Cincinnatus left his plough and made haste for Rome.
Rising before dawn the following day, he appointed L. Tarquitius Flaccus his
second-in-command (magister equitum – see further below), and then proceeded to
close down all the normal activities of the city: the courts, shops, taverns, and every
kind of private business. He commanded all men of military age to assemble in
arms before sunset, each man to bring food for five days and twelve wooden stakes;
those who were too old were ordered to help with the provision of food and other
preparations. He then led his army out to the Algidus, where he surrounded the
Aequi, hemming them in with a palisade. When the besieged Romans under the
consul learned of this they attacked the Aequi at nightfall on their inner line. The
battle continued until daybreak, whereupon the dictator’s forces closed in and
forced the Aequi to surrender. Their soldiers were sent under the yoke (the first occasion on which this humiliation was inflicted on a defeated enemy) and their camp
looted. The dictator divided the spoils among his men, to the exclusion of the consular army, who thereby received their punishment; the consul himself resigned
from office, but remained with the army as the dictator’s legate. Cincinnatus then
returned to Rome, celebrated a magnificent triumph, laid down his office, and returned home to his plough. He had been in office a mere fifteen days. This is the
account provided by Livy (3.26.3–29.7). Dionysius of Halicarnassus offers a parallel narrative, with some significant differences (10.23.4–25.3; cf. 11.20).
Whether the story has any basis in historical fact is uncertain. Cincinnatus himself may be a historical figure whose name was preserved in the consular Fasti. The
story also bears witness to a period when eastern Latium experienced intermittent
incursions by the Aequi, which may well be broadly historical. That Cincinnatus
won a victory as dictator and celebrated a triumph may be true, but if so it was
hardly decisive, as the annalistic narratives record further raids by the Aequi in the
following years, without any obvious break.4 And it goes without saying that all the
2
3
4
On the ‘Varronian’ or ‘vulgate’ chronology see below, p. 00 and n. 37.
The Aequi were a mountain people who inhabited a region of the central Apennines in the upper Anio valley to the east of Rome. In the early fifth century they had threatened eastern
Latium, had probably occupied Tibur, Pedum, and Praeneste, and had encroached on the territory of Tusculum, where much of the action of the Aequian wars took place, including the
victory of Cincinnatus. See further T. J. Cornell in C. A. H.2 vii.2 (1989), 282–9, with map at
283.
See Cornell (n. 3, above), 288.
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103
details of the traditional story were the product of literary elaboration by later historians. The basic structure – the idea of a modest and reluctant individual being
called upon to save his fellow-citizens from disaster, and returning as soon as possible to private life – was no doubt part of a long-standing and widely celebrated
oral tradition. By the late republic it was extremely well known, and frequently invoked by Roman authors as exemplifying selfless devotion to the public good, the
idea that farmers make the best soldiers (Colum. 1 praef. 13, Veget. R.M. 1.3), the
dignified poverty of the ancients (Cic. Sen. 56; Fin. 2.12; Val. Max. 4.4.7), and the
modesty, restraint, and lack of political ambition of Rome’s early heroes.5
Cincinnatus was celebrated as the ideal dictator, and as an example to later generations; and, sure enough, we find that the pattern was repeated countless times by his
successors, the great majority of whom completed the tasks entrusted to them and
resigned before their allotted time was up.6
This extraordinary institution, which has no clear parallel in any ancient or
modern political system, has aroused the interest of Roman historians, especially in
the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, who have asked themselves how
and why it could have been introduced, and of political philosophers and political
scientists since Machiavelli, who have marvelled at its apparent efficacy as a means
of dealing with emergencies.7 The rise of Fascism and the proliferation of dictatorships in the first half of the twentieth century provoked renewed interest in the nature of dictatorship,8 and in the question of whether it could be reconciled with democracy. The Roman model was frequently invoked by those who advocated
‘constitutional dictatorship’, and was taken by Carl Schmitt as the classic instance
of what he called ‘commissarial dictatorship’ (kommissarische Diktatur).9 In the
5
As is well known, a parallel has often been drawn with George Washington, who was called
from retirement on his farm at Mount Vernon to lead the Continental Army, and returned there
after the war was over. His officers went on to form the Society of the Cincinnati, in a deliberate
recollection of their ancient role model, and made Washington their first President General.
N.B. the title of the book by Gary Wills, Cincinnatus: George Washington and the Enlightenment
(Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1984).
6 Completion of the task within the time limit clearly added to a dictator’s reputation, and was
proudly remembered by his descendants. By contrast, to be timed out after serving the full six
months was evidently a mark of failure.
7 Classic statements include Machiavelli, Discorsi sopra la prima deca di Tito Livio (1531), i ch.
34; Rousseau, Du Contrat Social (1762), iv ch. 6; Hamilton, The Federalist, 70.
8 Two examples (among many): A. Cobban, Dictatorship: Its History and Theory (London:
Cape, 1939); G. W. F. Hallgarten, Why Dictators? The Causes and Forms of Tyrannical Rule
since 600 b. c. (New York: Macmillan, 1954).
9 C. Schmitt, Dictatorship (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2014), translated from Die Diktatur
(München: Duncker und Humblot, 1921). On ‘constitutional dictatorship’ see F. M. Watkins,
‘The Problem of Constitutional Dictatorship’, in C. Friedrich &, E. Mason (edd.), Public Policy
(Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard U. P., 1940), 324–80, esp. 331–44; C. Rossiter, Constitutional
Dictatorship: Crisis Government in the Modern Democracies (Princeton: Princeton U. P.,
1948), 15–28; C. Friedrich, Constitutional Government and Democracy (Waltham, Mass.:
Blaisdell Publishing, 41968), 557–60; 580–1; finally, a whole book on Roman political institutions by the veteran political scientist K. Loewenstein, The Governance of Rome (The Hague:
Nijhoff, 1973); on dictatorship 71–80.
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later twentieth century the debate died down, but since 2001 there has been a remarkable resurgence of interest in these questions, especially in the United States of
America; in the years since 9/11, the Patriot Act, and the formation of the United
States Department of Homeland Security, political scientists have been agonising
over the problems raised by states of emergency, the justification and use of emergency powers, and the suspension of normal constitutional liberties at times of crisis.10 The Roman dictatorship has featured prominently in their discussions. What
makes the topic especially appealing to political scientists is the apparent success of
the Roman dictatorship in achieving the aim of resolving crises without serious side
effects; and in particular the fact that, in the 300 or so years of its existence,11 none
of the many dictators attempted to hold on to office beyond the permitted term or to
abuse his power by turning against the constitution itself.12
10 Recent studies include J. Ferejohn & P. Pasquino, ‘The Law of the Exception: A Typology of
Emergency Powers’, International Journal of Constitutional Law ii 2004, 210–39; B. Manin,
‘The Emergency Paradigm and the New Terrorism’, in S. Baume & B. Fontana (edd.), Les
Usages de la séparation des pouvoirs (Paris: P. U. F., 2008), 136–71, esp. 137–42; N. C. Lazar,
States of Emergency in Liberal Democracies (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P. 2009), 119–35;
ead., ‘Why Rome Didn’t Bark in the Night’, Polity xlv. 3 2013, 422–44. Two publications that
seem particularly well informed on the ancient material are F. Saint-Bonnet, L’état d’exception
(Paris: P. U. F., 2001), 43–70 and A. Kalyvas, ‘The Tyranny of Dictatorship: When the Greek
Tyrant Met the Roman Dictator’, Political Theory xxxv 2007, 412–42. Of particular importance are works on dictatorship by Roman historians who have engaged with political theory:
U. von Lübtow, ‘Die römische Diktatur’ in E. Fraenkel (ed.), Die Staatsnotstand (Berlin: Otto
Suhr Institut, 1965), 91–137; J. Irmscher, ‘Die Diktatur: Versuch einer Begriffsgeschichte’,
Klio lviii 1976, 273–87; C. Nicolet, ‘Dictatorship in Rome’, in P. Baehr & M. Richter (edd.),
Dictatorship in History and Theory (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 2004), 263–78 (first published 1982); id., ‘Dictateurs romains, στρατηγοὶ αὐτοκράτορες grecs et généraux carthaginois’, in Hinard (ed.), Dictatures (n. 1, above), 27–47; G. Meloni, ‘Dottrina romanistica, categorie giuridico-politiche contemporanee e natura del potere del “dictator” ’, in G. Meloni (ed.),
Dittatura degli antichi e dittatura dei moderni (Rome: Editori Riuniti, 1983), 77–110; W.
Nippel, ‘Emergency Powers in the Roman Republic’, in P. Pasquino & B. Manin (edd.), La
théorie politico-constitutionelle du gouvernement d’exception (Paris: Cahiers du CREA, 2000),
5–23; id., ‘Saving the Constitution: The European Discourse on Dictatorship’, in J. Coleman &
P. M. Kitromilides, In the Footsteps of Herodotus: Towards European Political Thought
(Florence: Olschki, 2012), 29–49.
11 The first dictatorship is traditionally dated to 501 (Varr.), and the last in 202. This of course
presupposes that the revived dictatorships of Sulla and Caesar in the first century have little or
nothing in common with the traditional form of the office (see further below, p. 00 and n. 94).
12 Nearly ninety dictatorships are attested between 501 and 202, and around seventy dictators (the
difference explained by the fact that some held the office more than once– Camillus supposedly
no fewer than five times): the evidence was set out in full by F. Bandel, Die römischen
Diktaturen (Diss. Breslau, 1910), and is conveniently tabulated by T. R. S. Broughton in The
Magistrates of the Roman Republic i–ii (Philadelphia: American Philological Association,
1951). The online list conveniently available on wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_
of_Roman_dictators) appears to be taken directly from Hartfield (n. 1, above), whence also the
useful notes. A detailed but uncritical catalogue of all dictators recorded in the sources down to
202 can also be found in A. Kaplan, Dictatorships and Ultimate Decrees in the Early Roman
Republic, 501–202 b. c. (New York: Revisionist Press, 1977). Partial lists in S. P. Oakley, A
Commentary on Livy VI–X (Oxford: Oxford U. P. 1997–2005), i. 41–2; Golden (n. 1, above),
25–6.
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105
As for the historians, they have mostly been concerned with the problem of the
origins of the dictatorship, in an attempt to explain its unusual, not to say unique,
features. They have taken their inspiration from two distinct aspects of the institution: first that it appears to resemble the ancient Roman monarchy (as the literary
sources frequently remark),13 and thus in a way to stand rather awkwardly in the
intervening space between monarchy and republic, and secondly that the dictatorship is known to have existed in other communities of ancient Italy, but as a regular
annual magistracy rather than an occasional and temporary one. Annual dictators
are found as magistrates at Lanuvium, Nomentum and Aricia, among other places;14 and the legend that at Alba Longa the king was replaced by an annual dictator
before its destruction by the Romans is supported (and was perhaps inspired) by the
fact that in historical times the sacred institutions of the supposed former city were
artificially maintained, under the leadership of a priest bearing the title dictator
Albanus.15
These data prompted some revisionist historians to place the dictatorship at the
centre of a radical reconstruction of the passage from monarchy to republic in archaic Rome. In the early decades of the twentieth century E. Kornemann and K. J.
Beloch revived an old theory that the king was first replaced by an annual dictator
(as had supposedly happened at Alba16), and only at a second stage by the two consuls, after which the dictatorship was kept in reserve for use in times of crisis.17
Many other scholars have argued that in its earliest years the republic was governed
by a single supreme magistrate, or by a college of two or more in which one was
superior to the other(s);18 the key piece of evidence on which they all depend is a
13Cic. Rep. 2.56; Livy 8.32.3; Zonar. 7.13; and see Mommsen (n. 1, above), 168–9.
14 Lanuvium: Cic. Mil. 45; Ascon. 31C; CIL xiv 2097, 2110, 2112, 2119, 2121, 4178. Nomentum:
CIL xiv 3941, 3955. Aricia: CIL xiv 2169, 2213, 4195. Other places include Tusculum: Livy
3.18.2; 6.26.3, with Oakley (n. 12, above) ad loc., and possibly Fidenae: Macrob. Sat. 1.11.37;
CIL xiv 4058. See A. Rosenberg, Der Staat der alten Italiker (Berlin: Weidmann, 1913), 74–5.
Rosenberg’s account of this whole subject (71–84) is indispensable. For dictators at Caere see
CIL xi 3614, 3615, 3593; presumably dictator was a translation into Latin of the title of an
Etruscan magistracy: thus Rosenberg, 66–9; L. Aigner-Foresti, ‘Sopravvivenza di istituzioni
etrusche in età imperiale’, in G. D’Urso (ed.), Patria diversis gentibus una?(Pisa: ETS, 2008),
99–114.
15 CIL vi 2161. Replacement of the king by an annual dictator: Plut. Rom. 27.1; Dion. Hal. (all
references are to Ant. Rom.) 5.74.4 = Licinius Macer, FRHist 27 F 15; Livy 1.23.4, 24.9, 27.1;
Dion. Hal. 3.5.3, 7.3, 23.3, 26.6.
16 The historian Licinius Macer is quoted (see previous note) as saying that the Romans borrowed
the institution of the dictator from Alba.
17 E. Kornemann, ‘Zur altitalischen Verfassungsgeschichte’, Klio xiv, 1915, 190–206; K. J.
Beloch, Römische Geschichte bis zum Beginn der punischen Kriege (Berlin: De Gruyter,
1926), 225–36. The theory had originally been proposed by A. Schwegler, Römische Geschichte
ii (Tübingen: Laupp, 1856), 62, 86, 92, and W. Ihne, History of Rome i (London: Longmans,
Green, 1871), 127, 133.
18 C. Gioffredi, ‘Rex, praetores e pontifices nella evoluzione dal regno al regime consolare’,
BCAR lxxi, 1943–5, 129–35; S. Mazzarino, Dalla monarchia allo stato repubblicano (Catania:
Agnini, 1945), 81–97; 169–91; K. Hanell, Das altrömische eponyme Amt (Lund: Gleerup,
1946), 145–212; A. Bernardi, ‘Dagli ausiliari del rex ai magistrati della respublica’, Athenaeum2
xxx, 1952, 3–58; R. Werner, Der Beginn der römischen Republik (München: Oldenbourg,
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passage of Livy (7.3.5), who quotes an ancient law, ‘written in ancient words and
letters, that he who is the chief magistrate on the Ides of September shall hammer a
nail [into the wall of the Temple of Jupiter]’.19 This view maintains that at the start
of the republic Rome was ruled by a chief magistrate, who was designated either
praetor maximus or dictator20 – or both, in the view of those who regard the two as
identical;21 others prefer to believe that the annual dictator was replaced after the
decemvirate by a praetor maximus together with a junior colleague (or colleagues);
this regime would have alternated erratically with years when military tribunes held
office, until finally, in 367, the dual consulship was introduced for the first time.22
Another explanation of the origin of the dictatorship took as its starting-point
the possibility that the chief officer of the Latin League bore the title dictator. This
at least is the implication of a text that the Elder Cato appears to have copied from
an archaic inscription;23 it records a religious dedication by a dictator Latinus acting on behalf of a group of Latin states. If the Latin dictator was also a military
commander, it is likely that he took office only when the need arose – that is, at
times when the Latin cities joined forces in their common defence. Obvious parallels would include the Thessalian League, and the federations of Oscan peoples
who came together in time of war to appoint a single commander.24 With these
considerations in mind De Sanctis suggested that the Romans instituted the dictatorship in imitation of the Latin League.25 His theory is attractive because the command of the forces of the Latin League, unlike the ordinary annual dictatorships of
cities such as Lanuvium and Aricia, was by definition extraordinary, intermittent,
and of short duration – lasting no longer than a single campaigning season. It thus
explained at a stroke the two most distinctive and unusual features of the Roman
1963), 240–63; J. Heurgon, ‘Magistratures romaines et magistratures étrusques’, in Les origines de la république romaine (Geneva: Fondation Hardt, Entretiens xiii, 1967), 99–127; De
Martino (n. 1, above), i2. 236–47; G. Valditara, Studi sul magister populi: dagli ausiliari militari del rex ai primi magistrati repubblicani (Milan: Giuffrè, 1989), 182–99.
19 Lex uetusta …, priscis litteris uerbisque scripta, ut qui praetor maximus sit Idibus Septembribus
clauum pangat. Livy quotes this from the work of L. Cincius, an antiquarian of (probably) the
Augustan period, on whom see J. Heurgon, ‘L. Cincius et la loi du clauus annalis’, Athenaeum
xlii, 1964, 432–7; FRHist i. 181–3 (E. H. Bispham & T. J. Cornell).
20 Probably bearing his alternative (and original) title magister populi, which was used in official
documents: Cic. Rep. 1.63 (citing the libri augurales); cf. Velius Longus (Gramm. Lat. 7.74);
Cic. Leg. 3.9; 3.10; Fin.3.75; Varro, Ling. 5.82; 6.61; Festus 216L s. v. optima lex.
21 E. g. A. Heuss, ‘Zur Entwicklung des Imperiums der römischen Oberbeamten’, ZRG lxiv, 1944,
57–133 at 69; Mazzarino (n. 18, above), 159; De Martino (n. 1, above), i2. 239–40; AignerForesti (n. 14, above), 106; contra, Werner (n. 18, above), 259–62; A. Giovannini, ‘Les origines
des magistratures romaines’, MH xli 1984, 15–30, at 20.
22 De Martino (n. 1, above), i2. 236–50.
23Cato FRHist 5 F 36, and see my commentary ad loc.
24The ἀρχός of the Thessalian League is compared to the dictator by Dionysius 5.74.3. Cf.
Strabo 254/6.1.3 (the Lucanians).
25 G. De Sanctis, Storia dei Romani (Turin: Bocca, 1907), i 422–6; similarly R. M. Ogilvie,
Commentary on Livy 1–5 (Oxford: Oxford U. P., 1965), 281–2; more recently Ridley has
pointed out that according to Livy (2.18.3–4) the Romans instituted the dictatorship at a time
when they were threatened by the forces of the Latin League: R. T. Ridley, ‘The Origin of the
Roman Dictatorship: an Overlooked Opinion’, RM cxxii 1979, 302–9.
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107
dictatorship. De Sanctis’s theory was taken further by his pupils, who suggested
that after the Foedus Cassianum, which created a bilateral alliance between Rome
and the Latin League, Roman generals who took command of the allied forces did
so by assuming the role of dictator – which was therefore a Latin office transferred
to Rome.26 The problem, however, is that in the majority of relevant texts the commander of the Latins is designated praetor;27 and even in the crucial text of Cato it
is not certain that dictator is the correct reading.28
These multifarious theories proliferated in the middle years of the twentieth
century, but have rather died away in the past few decades: to the best of my knowledge little or nothing of real significance has been published recently on the dictatorship in archaic Rome.29 Twenty years ago I tried to argue (following Mazzarino
and Valditara) that under the last kings Rome was ruled by a magistrate who held
office for life (call him praetor maximus or dictator as you wish), the real king having been reduced to a purely ceremonial role (the rex sacrorum, an office that continued for hundreds of years).30 On this view the later dictatorship was a temporary
reversion to the type of monarchic rule that had preceded the dual consulship. As far
as I know, no-one has taken the slightest notice of this suggestion; but this is not
especially surprising, as the whole debate about the origin of the dictatorship and its
possible role in the transition from monarchy to republic is now distinctly passé; the
evidence is the same as it was half a century ago,31 and there is little value in further
speculation, especially when there is no possibility of definitive proof. Historians of
early Rome are nowadays much more concerned with archaeological discoveries,
which have the advantage of being able to provide new evidence, and with historical problems on which archaeology can have some bearing; but in the nature of
things such problems do not include the origin of political institutions, let alone
political thought and practice.
It also needs to be said that the historians, in their eagerness to study the origins
of the dictatorship, have not really addressed themselves to the key issues surrounding the office. Partly this is because their real focus, and the starting point for so
many theories, was not the dictatorship as such, but rather the origins of the repub26 Thus A. Momigliano, ‘Ricerche sulle magistrature romane I: il dictator clavi figendi causa’,
BCAR lviii 1931 (but dated 1930), 29–42 at 31–3 = his Quarto Contributo (Rome: Storia e
Letteratura, 1969), 273–83 at 275–6, speaking on behalf of De Sanctis’s school. The same argument had been advanced, it seems independently, by W. Soltau, ‘Der Ursprung der Diktatur’,
Hermes xlix 1914, 352–68.
27 Livy 8.3.9, and above all Cincius ap. Festus 276L.
28 One of the oldest manuscripts reads dicator rather than dictator, implying a purely religious
official: see my comments in FRHist iii. 83 and Oakley (n. 12, above), i. 334 and n. 13.
29 The most recent major contribution is that of Valditara (n. 18, above), itself largely a (very
useful) work of synthesis; also Golden (n. 1, above), 11–41, who points out (11 n. 1) that ‘there
has been little, if any, detailed work on the dictatorship in the past decade’. But see n. 98, below.
30 T. J. Cornell, The Beginnings of Rome (London: Routledge, 1995), 235–6. On the rex sacrorum
see A. Momigliano, ‘Il rex sacrorum e l’origine della repubblica’, in Studi E. Volterra (Milan:
Giuffrè, 1971), i. 357–64 = Momigliano, Quarto Contributo (n. 26, above), 395–402; E. Bian­
chi, Il rex sacrorum a Roma e nell’Italia antica (Milan: Vita e Pensiero, 2010).
31 Indeed, it is the same as it was when Niebuhr was writing, over two centuries ago. See the
well-directed remarks of A. Giovannini (reviewing Valditara), Gnomon lxiv 1992, 71.
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T. J. Cornell
lic in general and of the consulship in particular. It was a general belief that the
consulship, an annual collegiate magistracy of two equal members, is so strange
and unusual that it cannot have been devised all at once and out of nothing; there
must have been an intermediate stage, so it was held, in which the abolition of the
monarchy had entailed the replacement of a lifelong ruler by an annual one –
whence the spectre of the annual dictator. The problem with such speculations,
apart from the absence of any serious evidence,32 is that they serve only to postpone, rather than to resolve, the problem (if in fact it be such) of why Rome eventually came to have two equal chief magistrates, and retained the dictatorship only
for use in emergencies.33 As for the dictatorship itself, its unusual features tend to
be overlooked in theories involving a change from lifelong to annual supreme rule.
In place of speculative hypotheses about the magistracies (if any) that preceded the
consulship, what is needed is a detailed examination of the historical dictatorship
itself as a functioning institution in the middle republic.
In recent years it is the political scientists who have raised the most interesting
questions about the nature and function of the dictatorship down to the end of the
third century34 – matters which have mostly been overlooked by Roman historians.
For their part the political scientists have not been sufficiently alert to difficulties in
the evidence, and have tended to follow the method adopted by Machiavelli, namely
to take the ancient sources, especially Livy, at face value, and as representing a fully
historical account of what actually happened in the centuries before the Punic
Wars.35 Although they are generally aware that the evidence on which our available
sources are based is to some degree uncertain, contemporary political scientists
tend, for entirely understandable reasons, to rely on secondary accounts and not to
examine the original sources directly. This can sometimes lead to error. For example it has been argued, with good reason, that some of the supposed restrictions on
the powers of the dictator were not absolute but were applied with a certain flexibility. ‘This is true of temporal limitations’, writes M. de Wilde, ‘as is suggested by the
fact that dictators were sometimes allowed to remain in office longer than six
months.’36 It turns out on examination that the dictators in question were the ones
who, on four occasions according to the Augustan Fasti Capitolini, held office for
an entire year in place of consuls. These ‘dictator-years’, as they are called, do not
32 The only partial exception is the ancient law mentioning a praetor maximus (cited above), but
this is made to carry far more weight than it can possibly bear (cf. Momigliano, Quinto
Contributo [Rome: Storia e Letteratura, 1975], 315–6); it is in any case open to other explanations and is probably a red herring: Cornell (n. 30, above), 229–30; Oakley (n. 12, above), ii.
77–80.
33 Thus, rightly, Momigliano, Quarto Contributo (n. 26, above), 273–4.
34 See above, nn. 9–10.
35 An egregious example is O. Gross, ‘The Concept of “Crisis”: What Can We Learn from the
Two Dictatorships of L. Quinctius Cincinnatus?’. The bulk of this article is an interesting and
intelligent analysis of the ways in which exceptional powers tend to become normal and permanent; the digressions on Roman ‘history’ (actually legend) seem to me to be largely irrelevant and to add little.
36 M. De Wilde, ‘The Dictator’s Trust’, History of Political Thought xxxiii. 4 2012, 555–77 at
561–2; also 571–5.
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appear in Livy or any other historical account, and are actually a blatant antiquarian
fabrication by the scholars who produced the so-called Varronian (or ‘vulgate’)
chronology.37 This is a very understandable error, because of the unfortunate fact
that by a longstanding scholarly convention modern scholars are compelled to use
the manifestly incorrect Varronian chronology. Most Roman historians are simply
unaware of the problems this causes;38 nevertheless, few historians are likely to
regard the dictator-years as historical. As a matter of fact the temporal limitation on
the dictator’s office appears to have been absolute, at least in the sense that we know
of no historical instance of a dictatorship that lasted more than six months.39
It is evident that the study of the dictatorship in the period from 501 to 202 requires some investigation of the reliability of the historical record. Our principal
sources (Livy, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, and the Fasti Capitolini) purport to give
a systematic record of the successive dictatorships during the periods where their
texts are extant.40 From the resulting list it can be seen that dictatorships were relatively infrequent in the fifth and early fourth centuries, and there must be a great
deal of doubt about their authenticity. Some if not all of the earliest dictators are
likely to be purely legendary. For example the story of Cincinnatus appears to be a
timeless exemplary tale. Few will disagree with Mommsen’s view that the first authentic dictators date from the 430s at the earliest.41 Of the five dictatorships of
Camillus only the first, in 396 (Varr.) when he captured Veii, has any serious claim
37 The years in question are the Varronian years 333, 324, 309 and 301. See Broughton (n. 12,
above) i. 141, sub anno ‘333’. De Wilde (see previous note), 571 n. 67, is aware that these years
are problematic, but not that they are demonstrably fabricated. See A. Drummond, ‘The
Dictator Years’, Historia xxvii 1978, 550–72; Oakley (n. 12, above) i. 104–5. On the Varronian
chronology in general see Cornell (n. 30, above), 399–402.
38 How often do we read, for example, statements to the effect that Polybius dated the Gallic sack
in 387/6, but Livy in 390? In fact, on Livy’s chronology it occurred in 386. Such errors arise
from the fact that Varronian dates are artificially imposed on Livy’s account, and are even
printed on the headings or in the margins of modern editions – e. g. the Loeb, Penguin Classics,
and Oxford World Classics translations.
39 Cf. Mommsen (n. 1, above), 160, with n. 3 pointing out that Plutarch, Cam. 31.3 is based on a
misunderstanding of Livy 6.1.4. This dictatorship (Camillus in 390) is in any case a fictitious
invention: see Cornell (n. 30, above), 317. Two other dictatorships are sometimes thought to
have lasted for a full year, namely those of 316 and 315 (Varr.): thus, e. g. De Wilde (n. 36,
above), 571 n. 67. But this idea arises from what is almost certainly an error by Livy or his
source: thus, Drummond (n. 37, above), 572; Oakley (n. 12, above) iii. 277–8.
40 Livy’s full text is available for the period from 509 to 292 and from 218 to 167, while Dionysius
goes from 509 to 443; the Fasti Capitolini, though fragmentary, are available for the following
years (inclusive): 483–472; 466–450; 422–414; 409–390; 380; 371–358; 350–346; 332–329;
320–299; 296–293; 284–222; 218–72. The Fasti Capitolini are edited by A. Degrassi, Inscr.
Ital. xiii. 1 (Rome: Libreria dello Stato, 1947). Livy and the F. C. agree very closely on the
dictatorships (more so than on the consuls), and between them cover the whole of the republic
down to 72, with the exception of the very problematic years from 292 to 285 and from 221 to
219, when both are missing. At least four dictatorships recorded but not precisely dated by
other sources must be fitted into the first of these ‘blank’ periods, and the first dictatorship of
Fabius Cunctator into the second: Broughton (n. 12, above), i. 185–7, 234–5).
41 Mommsen (n. 1, above), 141 n. 1; cf. De Sanctis (n. 25, above), i 426. Oakley’s list has the
‘somewhat arbitrary’ starting point of 420: Oakley (n. 12, above), i. 41–2. Nicolet’s suggestion
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to be historical.42 The relative infrequency and extreme historical uncertainty of the
earliest dictators is another reason for questioning the wisdom of concentrating
historical research on the role of the dictatorship in the transition from monarchy to
republic. In fact it is only in the period following the restoration (or introduction) of
the consulship in 366 (Varr.) that we can place serious trust in the historical record.
And the first thing that strikes the observer is that from this point onwards dictatorships become much more regular and frequent. Some forty dictators are recorded in
the sixty years from 363 to 300 – on average one every eighteen months.43 This
period can be seen as the heyday of the dictatorship: by the end of the fourth century
the office had virtually disappeared altogether as an executive post, and was only
briefly revived during the Hannibalic War.
That said, I propose in the rest of this paper to deal with the purpose of the
dictatorship and the nature of dictatorial power in republican Rome. Let us begin by
outlining the key features of the office as best we can from the available sources.
First we should note that the dictatorship was a regular part of the constitution, and
only ‘extraordinary’ in that dictators were appointed when the need arose, rather
than being a permanent feature, as the other magistrates were. But the dictator was
unlike the other magistrates in two key respects: first he was the sole occupant of
his position, and had no colleagues. True, he had an assistant, the magister equitum
(‘Master of the Horse’), but one whose role was that of a second-in-command and
very much subject to the dictator’s authority. Secondly, he was appointed, rather
than elected – normally by one of the consuls (there are some exceptions,44 but they
are mostly late and are presented as highly irregular), usually acting on the instructions of the Senate. The appointment had to take place at dead of night (between
midnight and dawn) and in complete silence: according to Valerius Maximus (1.1.5)
the first dictatorship of Fabius Maximus (probably 221) had to be aborted when the
squeaking of a mouse disrupted the proceedings. It also had to take place on Roman
territory (Livy 27.5.15).
The appointment of a dictator was always linked to the performance of a particular task, which was recorded (according to the Fasti Capitolini) as an appendage to his title, normally in the form of the rather vague phrase rei gerundae causa
(‘for getting the thing done’). In most cases this seems to have referred to a military
task, and there are good reasons for thinking that the dictator was in principle a
that all dictators before 320 are suspect is extreme: Nicolet, ‘Dictatorship in Rome’ (n. 10,
above), 266.
42 Thus Beloch (n. 17, above), 64–5. Camillus’ multiple dictatorships are defended by A.
Momigliano, ‘Camillus and Concord’, CQ xxxvi 1942, 111–20 at 114–5 = Secondo Contributo
(Rome: Storia e Letteratura, 1960), 89–104, at 93–5; see also the balanced discussion of Oakley
(n. 12, above), i. 376–9.
43 The period amounts to exactly sixty years (inclusive) if we ignore the non-existent ‘dictator-years’ (and of course the non-existent annual dictatorships are excluded from the total number, which would otherwise be 44). The relevant statistics are well summarised by G. Meloni,
‘Dictatura popularis’, in Hinard (ed.), Dictatures (n. 1, above), 73–86 at 74.
44 Fabius Maximus, in the exceptional circumstances of 217, was elected to the dictatorship. Sulla
in 82 became dictator as a result of a law introduced by an interrex, and in 49 Caesar’s dictatorship resulted from a law proposed by the praetor M. Lepidus.
Crisis and Deformation in the Roman Republic: The Example of the Dictatorship
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purely military officer. This emerges in particular from his original title magister
populi, meaning master of the people in arms, i. e. the citizen army,45 and is confirmed by the fact that his assistant retained the title magister equitum (‘Master of
the Horse’). One interesting and related fact is that the dictator himself was not allowed to mount a horse (a fact evidently forgotten by Livy when describing
Cincinnatus on horseback inspecting the enemy’s position46), although he could if
necessary obtain special permission to do so.47 This prohibition may have had a
religious significance;48 alternatively it reflects the conditions of an age when the
army depended principally on heavily-armed infantry using hoplite tactics.49 Either
way it attests to the antiquity of the institution and to its original military character,
and thus supports statements in the sources that the dictatorship was first instituted
to deal with serious military threats (Cic. Rep. 1.63; cf. 2.56; Livy 2.18.4). Dionysius
on the other hand suggests that the patricians thought up the idea of the dictatorship
as a way of circumventing the citizens’ right of appeal (ius prouocationis) and thus
enabling them to crush popular unrest (5.70); on his view the military emergency
was a pretext for getting the people to agree to an ‘elective tyranny’ (αἱρετὴ
τυραννίς). But this unlikely interpretation is undermined by Dionysius’ own narrative, in which the dictator, T. Larcius, raised an army, marched out against the Latins
and defeated them (5.76). On his return he laid down his office before his six-month
term had expired ‘without having put any of the Romans to death, banished any, or
inflicted any other severity on any of them’ (5.77.2).
Most of the dictators recorded in our sources acted as military commanders, but
there are some exceptions. Some are said to have been appointed to deal with civil
unrest; but in the earliest period these dictatorships are of doubtful authenticity.
According to one story it was the dictator M’. Valerius who reconciled the patricians and plebeians at the time of the First Secession in 494;50 but according to the
mainline tradition he conducted a victorious campaign against the Sabines and then
resigned when the patricians refused his request to help the indebted plebeians.51 In
the secession that followed the reconciliation was effected by Menenius Agrippa,
an elderly senator acting in a private capacity.52 It is generally agreed that this was
45 This sense of populus is attested in the verb populari (= ‘destroy’, ‘devastate’), and in texts
such as Macrob. Sat. 3.2.14 (= Piso FRHist 9 F 45); also the phrase pilumnoe poploe (‘pilum-bearing people’) in the Carmen Saliare (Fest. 224L). See Valditara (n. 18, above), 204–32;
id. ‘Il magister populi tra monarchia e repubblica’, in G. Firpo & G. Zecchini (edd.), Magister:
aspetti culturali e istituzionali (Alessandria: Edizioni dell’Orso, 1999), 9–26, at 14–15
46 3.18.1: ibi dictator quantum nocte prospici poterat equo conuectus contemplatusque qui
tractus castrorum quaeque forma esset …; cf. 7.41.3 (Valerius Corvus rides back to Rome).
47 Livy 23.14.2; Plut. Fab.4.1; Zonar. 7.13.13.
48 A similar ban was included among the many taboos surrounding the Flamen Dialis (Plin. H.N.
28.146; Paul.-Fest. 71L; Plut. Quaest. Rom. 40/274c; Gell. 10.15.3; Serv. Aen. 8.552). Religious
aspects of the dictatorship are discussed by D. Cohen, ‘The Origin of the Roman Dictatorship’,
Mnemosyne4 × 1957, 300–18; F. Sini, ‘A proposito del carattere religioso del “dictator” ’, SDHI
xlii 1976, 400–24.
49 Thus G. Valditara, ‘Perché il dittatore non poteva montare a cavallo’, SDHI liv 1988, 226–38.
50Cic. Brut. 54, and Valerius’ Elogium: Inscr. Ital. xiii 3.78.
51 Livy 2.30.5–31.11; Dion.Hal. 6.38–44; Zonar. 7.14.
52 Livy 2.32.2–33.1; 33.10–11; Dio 4, fr. 17.9–12; Zonar. 7.14.
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the original version, and that the alternative involving the dictator was an attempt
by the Valerian family to claim the credit for themselves – no doubt propagated, and
perhaps invented, by the historian Valerius Antias.53
In 439 (Varr.) the elderly Cincinnatus was supposedly appointed dictator for a
second time to deal with the threat of Sp. Maelius, a demagogue suspected of trying
to make himself king.54 The Master of the Horse, C. Servilius Ahala, confronted
Maelius and ordered him to appear before the dictator. When he refused, Servilius
killed him on the spot. That is how Livy tells the story (4.13.12–16.1); but according to a variant account in Dionysius (12.4.2–5) Servilius was acting as a private
citizen under orders from the Senate. It is likely enough that the rival versions reflect a debate on the legitimacy of tyrannicide, which must have been prompted by
the fates of the Gracchi and Saturninus, and possibly also of Catiline and Caesar.
Dionysius ascribes the variant, in which Maelius acted in a private capacity, to two
early historians, Cincius Alimentus and Calpurnius Piso, the former of whom lived
long before the Gracchi. It would seem, therefore, that this was the earlier version,
and that the idea of a dictatorship, with Servilius as the magister equitum, was the
product of later elaboration (the idea being to give some cloak of constitutional legitimacy to his action).55
The Fasti Capitolini report that in 368 (Varr.) P. Manlius Capitolinus was appointed seditionis sedandae et rei gerendae causa (‘for calming sedition and getting
the thing done’) – a unique entry in the surviving fragments of the list. According
to Livy he was appointed in place of Camillus, who as dictator for the fourth time
(rei gerundae causa – Fast. Cap.) had opposed the Licinio-Sextian reforms, but had
then resigned under pressure from the plebs;56 for his part Manlius favoured the
plebeian cause, appointed the first ever plebeian magister equitum, and according to
Plutarch permitted the enactment of the law limiting holdings of land.57 Other
sources, including Plutarch himself in a later section (Cam. 42.3–5; cf. Livy 6.42),
credit the final enactment of the reforms to Camillus in his fifth dictatorship in 367,
but as something of an afterthought, Camillus’ main achievement in that year being
an alleged victory over the Gauls.
However that may be, it seems that, with the exception of the dubious episode
of Sp. Maelius, on most occasions when dictators are presented as intervening in
53 Thus T. P. Wiseman, Roman Drama and Roman History (Exeter: Exeter U. P., 1998), 85; on
Valerius Antias see now J. W. Rich, ‘Valerius Antias and the Construction of the Roman Past’,
BICS xlviii 2005, 137–61; id. in FRHist i. 293–304.
54 Cicero, who for his own reasons referred to the episode frequently (e. g. Cat. 1.3; Dom. 86; Mil.
8, 72; Sest. 143; Phil. 2.26; etc. etc.), made this the occasion on which Cincinnatus was called
from the plough (sen. 56).
55 See the discussion, by E. H. Bispham and me, in FRHist iii. 51–3.
56 Livy 6.38.9–10; Plut. Cam. 39.4. Plutarch says that he feigned illness, while Livy prefers to
believe that faulty auspices forced him to quit. See Oakley’s discussion (n. 12, above), i. 685–7.
The Fasti Capitolini give the enigmatic information that Camillus and his Master of the Horse
‘abdicated after an edict against (? or concerning?) the soldiers in accordance with a decree of
the senate’ ([post edictu]m in milites ex s. c. abdicarunt).
57Plut. Cam. 39.5: παρῆκεν ἐπικυρῶσαι τὸν νόμον τὸν μάλιστα λυποῦντα τοὺς πατρικίους
(‘permitted the law to be passed which was especially distressing to the patricians’).
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political conflicts, they did so in order to effect reconciliation, and if anything to
favour the cause of reform in the plebeian interest. In 342 M. Valerius Corvus was
named dictator to deal with a mutiny, and did so by giving in to the mutineers’ demands (Livy 7.41.3–8). The three laws passed in 339 by the dictator Q. Publilius
Philo were an important landmark in the long struggle for plebeian equality;58 according to Varro (L. L. 7.105) it was as dictator in 313 that C. Poetelius Libo abolished debt-bondage; and, most significant of all, the dictator Q. Hortensius in c.287
brought the last plebeian secession to an end by giving the full force of law to
plebiscites.59 Unfortunately the relevant parts of the Fasti Capitolini are missing, so
we do not know whether Valerius Corvus, Publilius Philo, and Hortensius were
appointed seditionis sedandae et rei gerendae causa, but they, if anyone, would
seem to be the most likely candidates for that designation alongside Manlius
Capitolinus. In any case the pattern is unmistakable – and very striking. In the surviving evidence for the reasons why dictators were appointed, and in the record of
what they actually did, there is not a single case of a dictator taking office and acting
aduersus plebem, in spite of Dionysius’ claim that that is why the office was created, and Livy’s repeated statements to the effect that it instilled fear into the plebs.60
It seems much more likely, in fact, that dictators who took office in times of political unrest were specifically appointed as conciliators, as G. Meloni and W. Nippel
have argued.61 The very method of appointment meant that dictators were independent of the normal political process and could to some extent stand outside it,
and for that reason they were also more likely to be accepted as mediators by the
plebs. As such they would have had more flexibility than the elected magistrates,
and by virtue of their superior imperium they were able to impose compromise
solutions and to act as auctores concordiae.
This is one of those instances in ancient historiography where a historian’s understanding of an institution is contradicted by his own narrative – as a number of
recent scholars have observed (see previous note). But the dictatorship offers another example of the same phenomenon which, as far as I know, has never been
noticed (but see n. 98, below). This is the idea, presupposed in all accounts, ancient
and modern, that the dictatorship was a response to crisis, and reflects a state of
58 Livy 8.12.12–17. On the significance of the leges Publiliae see K.-J. Hölkeskamp, Die
Entstehung der Nobilität (Stuttgart: Steiner, 1987), 109–13; Cornell (n. 30, above), 341.
59 The sources for this poorly-documented event are listed by Broughton (n. 12, above), i. 185–6.
Discussion in K.-J. Hölkeskamp, ‘Die Entstehung der Nobilität und der Funktionswandel des
Volkstribunats: Die historische Bedeutung der Lex Hortensia de plebiscitis’, Archiv für
Kulturgeschichte lxx 1988, 271–312.
60 Livy 2.18.8–9; 2.29.11; 2.30.5; 3.29.6; 6.28.4; 6.38.9; 9.26.7. Labruna has taken these and
similar passages as evidence that the dictatorship was indeed used as a weapon of class conflict:
G. Labruna, ‘ “Adversus plebem” dictator’, Index xv 1987, 289–314 = Hinard (ed.), Dictatures
(n. 1, above), 49–72. I am not convinced; on the other hand he makes the valid point that the
‘popular’ reforms effected by dictators in 367, 339 and 287 promoted the interests not of the
common people but of the so-called patricio-plebeian nobility.
61 Meloni (n.43, above), 84–5; Nippel, ‘Emergency Powers’ (n. 10, above), 8. Nippel rightly
draws attention to the phrase seditionis sedandae causa, meaning ‘to calm [not to suppress]
civil discord’.
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emergency, a state of siege, or a state of exception. It has been argued, on theoretical
legalistic grounds, that the idea of a ‘state of exception’ is alien to Roman juridical
thought;62 but what has not been noticed is the more striking and very surprising
fact that in the period when the dictatorship was most regular and frequent (that is,
from c. 366 to 300) there is almost no trace in the record of anything that could
reasonably be described as a serious crisis or emergency – in spite of general statements in the sources that might lead one to assume the contrary. In his ideal republican constitution in the de legibus Cicero says that a dictator should be appointed
‘when a particularly serious war or civil disorder occurs’.63 The emperor Claudius
said the same thing in different words when summarising Rome’s constitutional
history in a speech to the Senate: ‘the dictatorship, which had more power even than
that of the consuls, was devised by our ancestors when wars were particularly arduous or there was a major civil disturbance’.64 So too Appian, more briefly: ‘appointing dictators for six months at times of the most alarming necessity’.65 Appian’s
suggestion that fear was the chief motive recurs frequently in Livy, who speaks of
dictators being called for in trepidis rebus (e. g. 4.17.8, and passim). In one passage
the appointment of a dictator is described as ‘the last resort in alarming situations’.66
But Livy’s own account of events in the fourth century does not bear this out.
Few if any of the 40 dictators who held office between 363 and 300 were appointed
in response to what could reasonably be described as a serious emergency. Indeed,
during this period an increasing number of dictators were appointed for minor
tasks: to hold elections (comitiorum habendorum causa), to hold games and festivals (ludorum faciendorum causa, feriarum constituendorum causa), and to fix a
nail into the wall of the temple of Jupiter (claui figendi causa: see above, p. 00 and
n. 19). These were routine tasks that would otherwise have been performed by regular magistrates; and it would seem obvious that dictators were called upon because
the regular magistrates were otherwise engaged, or indisposed, or for whatever reason not available at the times in question.67 The distinction between these ‘minor’
dictators68 and dictators rei gerundae causa, who carried out serious tasks, is well
62 See the very interesting discussion of Saint-Bonnet (n. 10, above), 43–70. His conclusion is that
‘la dictature [romaine] n’est pas un état d’exception’ (54) … ‘il n’y a pas de séparation étanche
entre légalité normale et exceptionelle, comme dans la théorie moderne’ (59).
63 Cic. Leg. 3.9: quando duellum gravius discordiaeque civium escunt.
64 The Lyons Table (ILS 212): dictaturae hoc ipso consulari imperium valentius repertum apud
maiores nostros quo in asperioribus bellis aut in civili motu difficiliore uterentur.
65 App. B.C. 1.3.9: δικτάτορας … ἐπὶ ταῖς φοβερωτάταις χρείαις ἑξαμήνους τιθέμενοι.
66 Livy 4.56.8: in rebus trepidis ultimum consilium. Notice also e. g. 9.38.9 (310 Varr.): ingens
terror patres invasit dictatoremque dici placebat (‘a great panic overcame the senators, who
resolved that a dictator be appointed’).
67 The assumption is obvious, and is confirmed in a number of specific cases: in 350 a dictator
comitiorum habendorum causa was appointed because the consuls were both ill (Livy 7.24.10),
and in 335 the Senate ordered the consuls to campaign against the Sidicini, but first to name a
dictator to hold elections (8.16.11–12). In 327 when both consuls were in the field, the Senate
wrote to the consul operating in Samnium to name a dictator for holding elections (8.23.13); so
too in 306 (9.44.1–2), etc., etc.
68 Sometimes described (in modern works) as dictators imminuto iure: H. Siber, ‘Provocatio’,
ZRG 62 (1942), 376–91, at 381; G. I. Luzzatto, ‘Appunti sulle dittatture “imminuto iure” ’, in
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recognised in modern scholarship; but matters are not quite as simple as this distinction might seem. In the first place it is not always clear what sort of dictator we
are dealing with. In 361, according to Livy (7.9–11), the dictator T. Quinctius
Poenus won a victory and celebrated a triumph over the Gauls; but according to
Licinius Macer he was appointed comitiorum habendorum causa.69 Similarly in
322 Livy recounts the victory of the dictator A. Cornelius Cossus and his triumph
over the Samnites (Livy 8.38.1–39.15; also Zonar. 7.26); but he then adds that some
sources ascribe these achievements to the consuls, while the dictator was appointed
to start the chariot race at the games in place of the praetor who was too ill (8.40.1–
3; the Fasti Triumphales and [Victor] vir. ill. 32 also credit the consuls with the
victory). Another source-conflict of the same type occurs at 9.28.2–6 (313).
Uncertainty of a different kind arises with the dictators of 353–352 (Varr.). In
both years Livy records the appointment of dictators to deal with threats of war in
Etruria. In the first case T. Manlius Torquatus declared war on Caere, which surrendered without a blow and was granted a hundred-year truce; the dictator then ravaged the territory of the Faliscans, who also offered no resistance (7.19.9–20.9). In
the following year C. Iulius Iullus was appointed to deal with an Etruscan war –
which in the event did not materialise at all (7.21.9). But in both years the dictators
devoted most of their energy to holding elections, and trying to get two patricians
elected to the consulship (7.21.1, 22.1); neither was successful (in 353 Livy says
that the elections were continually vetoed by the tribunes), and when their terms
expired an interregnum ensued. These are the first occasions on which dictators are
recorded as attempting to hold elections, and in view of the minimal (or indeed
non-existent) military threats they were supposedly appointed to deal with, one is
bound to suspect that that was the primary reason for their appointment. This is
confirmed by the fact that the next year (351) was the first in which a dictator was
appointed specifically comitiorum habendorum causa (Livy 7.22.10–11), an appointment that was repeated in each of the next three years, 350, 349, and 348 (this
last recorded only in the Fasti Capitolini). Livy (l. c.) offers a flagrantly political
motive for 351 – that the aim was to ensure the election of two patrician consuls –
which may well be correct,70 although in 350 a dictator was appointed because the
consuls were indisposed (7.24.10), and in 349 one consul had died and the other
was conducting a war (7.25.10, 26.11).
These various instances give rise to the possibility that there may not be as
much difference between the ‘minor’ dictators and those appointed rei gerundae
causa as is conventionally supposed. It is not just that it is sometimes difficult to tell
which category a given dictator belongs to;71 it is also the fact that the reasons for
Studi in onore di P. De Francisci iii (Milan: Giuffrè, 1956), 405–459; but the text on which this
is based (Festus 216L) actually distinguishes between the earliest dictators (appointed optima
lege), who were not subject to appeal, and the later ones (appointed imminuto iure) who were:
thus, rightly, Mommsen (n. 1, above), 164.
69 Livy 7.9.4–5; FRHist 27 F 22, with commentary (S. P. Oakley).
70 Oakley (n. 12, above), ii. 22.
71 As the sources themselves discovered: see Livy’s accounts of 361, 322 and 313, discussed
above. The Fasti Capitolini always specify the reason for which the dictator was appointed, and
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appointing both types of dictator were often the same, namely to carry out a task
that could not be carried out by an elected magistrate. This explanation would apply
just as much in the case of a military command as in that of an administrative or
ritual task such as holding an election or fixing a nail. In that case the dictatorship
rei gerundae causa would be little more than a convenient device to provide an
additional commander if both consuls were occupied with other matters, or to replace a consul who was unable to perform the task.
It is clear from Livy’s account that many of the fourth-century dictators were
appointed to undertake campaigns at times when the consuls were already engaged
elsewhere. This was certainly the case in 360, 358, 353, 345 and 334.72 And it is not
as if the campaigns in question were always the most perilous or demanding. In 360
the two consuls, M. Fabius Ambustus and C. Poetelius Libo, each led a successful
campaign, the former against the Hernici and the latter against Tibur. But the appearance of a Gallic army outside Rome called for a dictator, Q. Servilius Ahala,
who defeated them at the Colline Gate. In spite of Livy’s efforts to suggest the
contrary, this appears to have been a relatively minor engagement. At any rate it was
the consuls who were rewarded, Poetelius with a triumph, Fabius with an ovation
(thus Livy 7.7.9, supported by the Fasti Triumphales), while the dictator got nothing. The events of 345 can be interpreted in the same way. In that year L. Furius
Camillus was appointed dictator to deal with an attack by the Aurunci, which it was
feared might escalate into a full-scale revolt by the Latins (Livy 7.28.2). In the
event the Aurunci were easily defeated (Livy says that they showed the spirit of
bandits, rather than worthy enemies: 7.28.3), and the Latin revolt did not materialise. Meanwhile the consuls advanced against the Volsci and captured Sora, which
was actually a significant achievement (although Livy makes nothing of it), as Sora
was a major strategic centre. The most probable interpretation is that the dictator
was required to deal with an unexpected and – as it turned out – minor problem
while the consuls were occupied with more important business. Livy’s suggestion
that the Auruncan attack might develop into a Latin revolt is odd, to say the least, as
the Aurunci were not Latins. The dictator’s campaign was probably an insignificant
affair, chiefly remembered because in the course of it he vowed a temple to Juno
Moneta (Livy 7.28.4).
Dictators can thus be seen to have functioned as additional commanders when
required. But they also acted as replacements if the elected magistrates were unable
to carry out their appointed tasks. A dictator could take the place of a consul who
fell ill, as happened in 325, when L. Papirius Cursor took over from the ailing L.
Furius Camillus and won a famous victory over the Samnites.73 Similarly in 312 C.
Junius Bubulcus Brutus was named dictator by the consul P. Decius Mus, who was
provide us with the formulae rei gerundae causa, seditionis sedandae causa, and so on; but it
is not at all certain that these entries are based on earlier documentary records. The consensus
of modern scholarship is that in the case of the Fasti Capitolini the official record is based on
the annalists, rather than the other way around.
72 Full source references in Broughton (n. 12, above), sub annis.
73 Livy 8.29.8–9; this was the setting for the celebrated quarrel between the dictator and his magister equitum, Q. Fabius Maximus Rullianus (8.30–7).
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sick (Livy 9.29.3).74 Sometimes the illness may have been little more than an excuse. For instance, in 340 the consul T. Manlius Torquatus appointed L. Papirius
Crassus dictator to deal with raids by the Antiates when he himself claimed to be
too unwell to undertake the task in person. In the event the dictator spent several
months in Antiate territory but accomplished nothing memorable (Livy 8.12.2–3).
Meanwhile Torquatus, evidently fully recovered, went on to win a magnificent victory over the Latins at Veseris. One cannot help wondering if his appointment of a
dictator to deal with the minor problem of the Antiates was not the best way he
could think of to keep himself free for the more significant campaign.
The death of a consul in office could also prompt the appointment of a dictator,
especially if it was in the course of a campaign, as in 362, when Appius Claudius
was named dictator to take command after the consul, L. Genucius, was killed in
battle (Livy 7.6.9–10). In such circumstances a dictator would provide an immediate replacement, and one whom the Senate could nominate, at least indirectly, thus
avoiding the time-consuming and less predictable process of electing a suffect. This
also emerges from Livy’s account (7.25.10–11) of the events of 349, when the consul Ap. Claudius Crassus died in office. Although Rome faced serious threats from
a Gallic raiding party and from attacks on southern Latium by a Greek (probably
Syracusan) fleet, the Senate decided to leave the surviving consul, L. Furius
Camillus, in sole charge, rather than to appoint a dictator. This revealing text clearly
implies that a dictatorship would normally be expected in such circumstances; but
it also demonstrates that, even when Rome faced serious threats, there was no particular advantage in appointing a dictator when there was no need for an extra
commander and when the Senate had confidence in the ability of those who remained.
It may be conceded that some dictators were appointed to deal with genuinely
serious situations, as in 362 when the consul was defeated and killed (see above);
similarly in 356 C. Marcius Rutilus was named dictator when the consul M. Fabius
Ambustus was routed by the Faliscans and Tarquinienses (Livy 7.17.2–9). In 310 a
consul suffered a reverse against the Samnites, and was himself wounded; in the
ensuing panic the Senate instructed the other consul to name as dictator the veteran
L. Papirius Cursor, the most eminent general of his time. Cursor went on to win a
victory at Longula and a triumph, although the event is ignored in Diodorus’ parallel account (20.35.1–5), and it is possible that the danger was exaggerated by Livy.75
But while it would be wrong to deny that some dictators were appointed in critical
circumstances, this seems to have applied in only a small minority of cases in the
later fourth century. Admittedly the question of what might count as serious or critical is a matter of subjective judgement, and in any case our sources do not really
allow us to reconstruct the nature of events at this time with any real accuracy. But
what seems quite clear from the record is that the appointment of a dictator had
74 Most uncharacteristically Livy fails to name the Master of the Horse on this occasion. As the
Fasti Capitolini name Bubulcus Brutus as the magister equitum, and C. Sulpicius Longus as
the dictator, many editors have been inclined to suspect a problem with the text. On this see
Oakley’s commentary (cit. n. 12, above), iii. 348–50.
75 Livy 9.38.8–9, with Oakley’s note ad loc.
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little or nothing to do with the seriousness of the threat (if any) that might be facing
the State, and everything to do with the pragmatic fact that an additional magistrate
was required – whether to replace one of the elected magistrates or to supplement
those currently in office – in order to perform some necessary, but not necessarily
urgent, task.
It seems clear that, in the period when dictatorships were most frequent, few if
any were prompted by serious national emergencies. On the contrary, most of the
known dictators rei gerundae causa, just like those appointed to hold elections or
perform religious duties, seem to have been more-or-less routine substitutes for the
regular magistrates. It is also worth noting that, on those occasions when major
campaigns were undertaken in response to serious military threats, it was usually
the consuls who took command – for instance in the Latin war leading to the Battle
of Veseris in 340 (remember that in that year the dictator was sent off to deal with a
minor problem). During the later years of the fourth century the dictators rei gerundae causa – that is, those appointed to command armies – become less and less
frequent in the record. After 302 they almost disappear altogether. Q. Hortensius
was dictator at the time of the last secession of the plebs in c. 287. After that only
one dictator rei gerundae causa is recorded in the period down to 217, namely A.
Atilius Caiatinus, who led an army to Sicily and thus became the first and only
dictator to exercise command outside Italy (Livy per. 19); even so, according to
Zonaras (8.15; cf. Dio 36.34.23), he and his Master of the Horse accomplished
nothing memorable (οὐδὲν δὲ μνήμης ἔπραξαν ἄξιον). Otherwise during this
period dictators were appointed exclusively to carry out routine administrative and
ritual duties.
The explanation for this change cannot be that there were now fewer emergencies. On the contrary, as Rome became a major Mediterranean power she began to
face ever greater and more serious threats. These would include the Sentinum campaign of 295, the final showdown with the Samnites at Aquilonia in 293, the Gallic
wars of the 280s, the Pyrrhic War, and the Gallic invasion of 225. Most if not all of
these would count as extreme emergencies by any standard, and yet it did not occur
to the Romans on any of these occasions to name a dictator. Part of the reason must
be that, however it originated and whatever its functions in the early decades of the
republic, the dictatorship had long since ceased to be an exceptional office used in
times of great danger and military necessity. Even when it was a regular office in
the middle years of the fourth century, the dictatorship rei gerundae causa was not
the preferred form of command in the most challenging military situations. The best
indication of this is the list of triumphs, which were held in three years out of every
four in the century from 363 to 264.76 In the same period there were at least 45
dictatorships, but of the 75 triumphs dictators celebrated only five.77 There could
76 See the list in C. A. H.2 vii. 2. 363–4, based on E. Pais, Fasti Triumphales Populi Romani
(Rome: Nardecchia, 1920) and Degrassi (n. 40, above). To the sixty-six known triumphs, a
further nine or so should be added to cover the lacuna in the Fasti from 290 to 283 (for which
Livy’s text is missing also).
77 The five are: C. Sulpicius Peticus in 358, C. Marcius Rutilus in 356, L. Papirius Cursor in 325
and 310, and M. Valerius Corvus in 302. Details in Broughton (n. 12, above), sub annis.
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hardly be a clearer demonstration of the lack of correlation between dictatorships
and serious military campaigns.
Even as a run-of-the-mill device to provide additional military commanders
when needed (which seems to be the best way to define the office in the fourth century), the dictatorship rei gerundae causa gradually gave way during the Samnite
Wars to more convenient and more efficient ways of achieving the same result –
principally the introduction of pro-magistracies and the clearer definition of magisterial prouinciae. These new mechanisms were a product of the emergence of the
Senate in the later fourth century as the body that decided and implemented all key
policy decisions.78 It was the Senate that came to define and allocate the tasks that
the senior magistrates were to carry out (their prouinciae), and then to extend the
commands of magistrates after their year of office had expired: the system was
flexible, in the sense that the Senate was able to select at will those consuls that
deserved to be kept on as proconsuls. These two devices were effective ways of
making sure that there were enough magistrates with imperium to command armies
where they were needed, and secondly to ensure that the best generals were appointed to the most important commands. In times of extreme need proven commanders could be appointed as pro-magistrates even when they held no office; thus
in the serious military crisis of 295 four ex-consuls were brought out of retirement
and made pro-praetors.79 These so-called priuati cum imperio provided a valuable
precedent for the future, and the device was often called upon in later years on occasions which in earlier times might have called for the appointment of a dictator.
The foregoing discussion has established that, at the time when it was a regular
and frequent occurrence, the dictatorship was not, in fact, an institution to which the
Romans resorted at times of crisis, even though the sources that preserve the record
were firmly of the opinion that it was. How are we to account for this strange discrepancy? None of the Roman historians had witnessed the dictatorship in action.
The earliest historians, who included Fabius Pictor, Cincius Alimentus, and Cato
the Censor, lived at the time of the Second Punic War – a time when the dictatorship
rei gerundae causa had long been abandoned as a regular office. But the crisis of
the Hannibalic War caused the Romans to revive the dictatorship, during the extreme emergency that followed the defeat and death of the consul C. Flaminius at
Trasimene in 217. The appointment (by election) of Q. Fabius Maximus made possible the concentration of all Rome’s forces in Italy under his sole command, and
allowed him to implement his famous policy of delay. No doubt the need for a
unified command led to the decision to revive the ancient office, together perhaps
with a residual memory that in the earliest years of the republic it had functioned as
an emergency measure. In 216 after the disaster of Cannae another dictator (M.
78 I have argued this point elsewhere. See Cornell (n. 30, above), 369–70; 372–3 and, in more
detail, in ‘The Lex Ovinia and the Emancipation of the Senate’ in C. Bruun (ed.), The Roman
Middle Republic (Rome: Institutum Romanum Finlandiae, 2000), 69–89, reprinted in J. H.
Richardson & F. Santangelo (edd.), The Roman Historical Tradition: Regal and Republican
Rome (Oxford: Oxford U. P., 2014), 207–36.
79 Details in Broughton (n. 12, above) i. 176–8, under ‘Promagistrates’; see further Cornell (n. 30,
above), 360–2.
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Iunius Pera) was appointed, but he achieved little, after which the experiment was
evidently abandoned. For the rest of the war the Romans reverted to the use of
pro-magistrates, as well as permitting frequent iterations of the consulship. They
also revived the practice of appointing dictators to hold elections, which is not surprising given the continued absence of magistrates on war service. But the direct
experience of dictatorships after Trasimene and Cannae seems to have conditioned
the attitude of contemporary and later historians, who evidently viewed them as
revivals of the original emergency institution, and took it for granted that this had
always been its function throughout its history.
In the same way the historians of the first century clearly allowed their view to
be coloured by their own experience of Sulla’s bloodthirsty reign of terror. As
Nicolet rightly observed, this must be the explanation for the portrayal of the dictatorship in the surviving sources as a fearful instrument of political repression.80 For
example, Livy‘s repeated references to the fears of the plebeians at the mere sight
of a dictator must be an anachronism based on the experience of Sulla‘s tyranny.
Indeed Dionysius of Halicarnassus, at the end of his interesting authorial comment
on the creation of the office at the start of the republic, notes that the dictatorship
became the object of hatred under Sulla, who was the first to wield his power with
harshness and cruelty. As a result, says Dionysius (5.77.4), the Romans came to
realise for the first time what they had previously been unaware of, namely that the
rule of a dictator is tyranny. A more probable reading of the facts, it seems to me, is
that Sulla revived what had previously been a relatively innocuous institution, and
turned it into a tyranny by fundamentally changing its character and purpose.
Similar biases have equally affected modern interpretations of the institution.
The most deeply rooted is the assumption that the appointment of a dictator was
always a response to crisis, and amounted to a declaration of a ‘state of emergency’.
Some of our sources, especially Greek historians, suggest that when a dictator took
office the constitution was suspended, that all the existing magistrates stood down,
and that the normal business of the city automatically ceased.81 As for the dictator
himself, he is sometimes presented as possessing what we would call emergency
powers, and as not being subject to the checks that constrained the ordinary magistrates. But these supposed emergency arrangements are not borne out by the historical record: in fact the existing magistrates continued to hold office, as is clear even
from the narratives of the Greek historians who assert the contrary.82
Some dictators are said to have proclaimed a iustitium (that is, a cessation of
public business) and an emergency call-up of every able-bodied man;83 but these
80 Nicolet, ‘Dictatorship in Rome’ (n. 10, above), 264.
81 Thus Polyb. 3.87.8; Dion. Hal. 11.20.3; Plut. Ant. 8.5; Quaest. Rom. 81/283b; App. Hann.
12.50. On the attitude of Greek sources see Mommsen (n. 1, above), 155 n. 4; Kalyvas (n. 10,
above). The idea that in his imaginary blueprint for an ideal republic Cicero lays down that no
other magistrates should hold office under a dictator and his Master of the Horse (Leg. 3.9)
seems to me to misunderstand the text.
82 Giovannini (n. 21, above), 20 and n. 19; Liebenham (n. 1, above), 382–3.
83 Thus for example Cincinnatus (Livy 3.27.2–3: see above); other instances are recorded by Livy
at 4.22.1 (435); 4.26.12 (431); 4.31.9 (426); 6.2.6 (389); 7.6.12 (362); 7.9.6 (361); 7.28.3 (345);
10.4.1–2 (302). The pattern is revealing: Livy makes no mention of a iustitium or emergency
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are almost certainly conventional annalistic fabrications and part of the colouring
inserted to create a sense of alarm. In any case they do not amount to special dictatorial powers, as any curule magistrate could call a iustitium, and a tumultus could
be proclaimed by a consul or even a praetor. As for the supposedly unrestrained
power of the dictator, it is very uncertain that he was not subject to appeal, as is
widely supposed, at least in the historical period. Of course the answer to this question very much depends on whether the right of appeal (ius prouocationis) existed
at all in the early republic. Many scholars maintain that provocatio was first introduced by the lex Valeria of 300, and that the record of earlier legislation to the same
effect is fabricated.84 For these scholars the lack of a right of appeal against a dictator is a non-issue, as there would equally have been no appeal against the other
magistrates. But the ancient sources are unanimous that the right of appeal had been
recognised by law at the beginning of the republic, and reinforced by the ValerioHoratian laws of 449.85 These same sources maintain that the dictator was exempt
from the law on provocatio; indeed Dionysius claims that it was instituted for this
very reason (5.70.1–3). But a passage of Festus (s. v. optima lex: 216L) tells us that
at some unspecified date dictators were made subject to appeal. In the view of
Mommsen and others who have accepted the traditional account in broad outline it
was the law of 300 that brought dictators into line with the other magistrates and
made them subject to appeal.86 The more probable alternative is that Festus is referring to the law of 449, the purpose of which was not to grant the right of appeal per
se, but to prohibit the creation of magistracies not subject to appeal.87 However that
may be, the question is hardly central to the point at issue, because most dictators
were appointed to military commands, and the right of appeal did not apply in the
military sphere until the second century. Moreover there is no record of any dictator
or Master of the Horse exercising summary capital jurisdiction against a citizen.88
The dictator was also subject to the tribunician veto, and could not prevent the
tribunes from exercising their traditional powers on behalf of citizens. This emerges
from a number of episodes in the historical record in which tribunes did, in fact, act
against dictators, or at least threaten to do so (e. g. Livy 6.38.4–10; 7.3.9; 8.34.1,
5–7; 9.26.10; Plut. Cam. 39), and from the very nature of plebeian institutions,
84
85
86
87
88
levy in his account of the dictatorships between 345 and 302. The fact that most references
belong to the earliest period makes it likely that they are annalistic inventions.
E. S. Staveley, ‘Provocatio during the Fifth and Fourth Centuries b. c.’, Historia iii 1954–5,
412–28; J. Bleicken, ‘Ursprung und Bedeutung der Provocation’, ZRG lxxvi 1959, 324–77,
esp. 356–63.
Thus in general Cic. Rep. 2.53–4. The lex Valeria of 509: Livy 2.8.2; Dion. Hal. 5.19.4; Plut.
Publ. 11.3; Pompon. Dig. 1.2.2.16. The lex Valeria-Horatia of 449: Livy 3.55.5–6
Mommsen (n. 1, above), 163–5; R. A. Bauman, ‘The Lex Valeria de Prouocatione of 300 b. c.’,
Historia xxii 1973, 34–47; M. Humbert, ‘Le Tribunat de la plèbe et le tribunal du peuple:
Remarques sur l’histoire de la prouocatio ad populum’, MEFRA c 1988, 431–503 at 488.
Thus Cic. Rep. 2.54: ne qui magistratus sine prouocatione crearetur. Cf. Livy 3.55.5: ne quis
ullum magistratum sine prouocatione crearet. See Cornell (n. 30, above), 277.
Cf. Nippel, ‘Emergency Powers’ (n. 10, above), 7. Naturally this excludes (as we surely must)
the story that Servilius Ahala killed Sp. Maelius by virtue of his exceptional power as magister
equitum.
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which appear to have originated as a body of extra-legal mechanisms based on selfhelp and the sacrosanctity of the tribunes themselves.89 Everything tends to suggest,
in fact, that the idea of a dictator wielding absolute and unrestrained authority, including the power of life and death over Roman citizens, is a retrojection of the
powers that Sulla claimed for himself.
It is probable that the dictator had maius imperium – that is, supreme authority
and greater imperium than the other magistrates, as symbolised by the fact that he
had twenty-four lictors as against the consul’s twelve, and that the regular magistrates’ lictors had to lay down their fasces when in the presence of a dictator.90
These symbolic rules, which provide further proof that a dictator had to coexist with
the other magistrates, indicate that he was placed in sole command of the forces
under him, and that if these included existing consular armies they too were subordinated to his overall command. My point is not to deny that in the early days the
dictator was appointed to take sole charge and to have authority over the other
magistrates; but his task was usually a particular area of military action, and his
absolute authority (which is not the same as unrestrained power) was to be exercised in performing that task.
It has long been recognised that the traditional Roman dictatorship of the early
and middle republic which we have been analysing bears little relation to what is
normally understood by dictatorship in the modern world. A good definition of
modern dictatorship is offered by Alfred Cobban, in what is still one of the best and
most readable accounts of its subject. According to Cobban ‘dictatorship … is the
government of one man, who has not primarily obtained his position by inheritance,
but either by force or consent and normally by a combination of both. He must
possess absolute sovereignty, that is, all political power must emanate from his will,
and it must be unlimited in scope. It must be exercised, more or less frequently, in
an arbitrary manner, by decree rather than by law. And, finally, it must not be limited in duration to any given term of office; nor must the dictator be responsible to
any other authority, for such restrictions would be incompatible with absolute
rule.’91 It seems to me that this definition describes almost exactly the regime established by Sulla, and for that matter the rule of Julius Caesar who, although he exercised his power with none of the appalling cruelty and ruthlessness shown by Sulla,
would nonetheless have been able to do so had he wished – as Cato recognised,
when he took his own life in order to deny Caesar the choice to exercise clemency.
But Cobban’s definition clearly does not fit the traditional Roman dictatorship
– and not only because of the strict time-limit the office was subject to. The dictator
of the early republic did not rule by decree, did not possess sovereignty (which remained with the people), and exercised a power that was not unlimited in scope. On
the contrary: he seems to have carried out the same functions, and to have been
89 Cf. Staveley (n. 84, above), 427–8.
90 All these aspects of the dictatorship are controversial. For recent discussions see T. C. Brennan,
The Praetorship in the Roman Republic (Oxford: Oxford U. P., 2000), 37–43; F. J. Vervaet,
‘The Lex Valeria and Sulla’s Empowerment as Dictator (82–79 b. c. e.)’, Cahiers Glotz xv
2004, 37–84 at 51–6.
91 Cobban (n. 8, above), 26.
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subject to the same restrictions, as the consuls, who continued in office and in most
cases continued to hold their own commands independently of the dictator; they
were only subordinated to him if his command overlapped with theirs. The important point in any case is that he was appointed for the purpose of dealing solely with
the matter that had led to his appointment. It was this fact, that he was appointed
with a specific commission, that led Jean Bodin, in 1576, to argue that the dictator
was not sovereign: ‘il n’avait rien qu’une simple commission pour fair la guerre, ou
supprimer la sédition’.92
The radical difference between the traditional dictatorship of the fourth and
third centuries and the first-century versions of Sulla and Caesar was clearly recognised by Mommsen. His discussion of the early republican dictatorship, as an established and regular part of the constitution, is treated in his account of the magistracies, while the rule of Sulla and Caesar is relegated to a later chapter on Die
ausserordentlichen constituirenden Gewalten, where it is lumped together with the
Decemvirate and the Triumvirate.93 This radical separation of the two types of dictatorship, which has been criticised94 but is fully accepted here, led Carl Schmitt to
go back to Bodin and to propose his famous distinction between commissarial dictatorship (‘kommissarische Diktatur’) and sovereign dictatorship (‘souveräne Dik­
ta­tur’) – the former being a temporary expedient in a state of exception (‘Aus­
nahme­zustand’) with the aim of restoring the status quo ante, and the latter a conferment of absolute power with the aim of creating a wholly new order in perpetuity.95 Schmitt follows a long tradition of thinkers, from Machiavelli to Alexander
Hamilton, who saw the traditional Roman dictatorship as a wholly beneficent institution, a perfect answer to the problems created in emergencies, both in its intentions and in historical practice.
This view of the matter was revived in the twentieth century by the advocates
of ‘constitutional dictatorship’, and in the twenty-first by devotees of what has been
called the ‘neo-Roman model’.96 The problem, however, is that the gap between
92 J. Bodin, Les six livres de la république, book I, ch. 8: ‘De la souveraineté’.
93 Mommsen (n. 1, above), 141–72 and 704–42 (respectively).
94 A rather ineffectual challenge to Mommsen’s view came from U. Wilcken, ‘Zur Entwicklung
der römischen Diktatur’, Abh. Berlin 1940, 11–12, revived, to my mind with no more effect, by
Nicolet, ‘Dictatorship in Rome’ (n. 10, above), 263–78. F. Hurlet also argues that Sulla’s dictatorship was a traditional republican magistracy just like those of earlier times: La dictature de
Sylla: monarchie ou magistrature républicaine? (Brussels: Institut Historique Belge de Rome,
1993); but see the justified criticisms of Verwaet (n. 90, above). For his part A. Keaveney argues
that Sulla’s dictatorship ‘resembled the office of old, and most particularly with regard to its
out­ward trappings’, but that it differed from it in three ways: the method of appointment, the
absence of a time limit, and the fact that the powers conferred on Sulla ‘were far wider than any­
thing previously conceived’: Sulla: The Last Republican (London: Routledge, 22005), 136–7.
95 Schmitt (n. 9, above). Nippel has argued that Schmitt owed more to Mommsen than he was
prepared to acknowledge: ‘Saving the Constitution’ (n. 10, above), 46–8; id., ‘Carl Schmitts
“kommissarische” und “souveräne Diktatur”: Französische Revolution und römische Vorbilde’,
in H. Bluhm, K. Fischer & M. Llanque (edd.), Ideenpolitik: Geschichtliche Konstellationen
und gegenwärtige Konflikte (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 2011), 105–39, esp. 129–33.
96 See the works cited in nn. 9–10, above. The phrase ‘neo-Roman model’ occurs in Ferejohn &
Pasquino (n. 10), 213 and passim.
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traditional dictatorship and Sullan/Caesarian despotism is actually much wider than
Mommsen, Schmitt and their recent successors have supposed. The ideal type of a
dictator, appointed at a time of crisis to take charge of affairs with special emergency powers for the duration, is actually a myth, based on semi-legendary stories
such as that of Cincinnatus, and on the artificial and ultimately unsuccessful revival
of the office in the crisis of the Second Punic War. As our earlier analysis has shown,
the great majority of dictatorships in the historical period from 363 to 264 had a
very different character. At this period dictators functioned as substitutes for the
regular magistrates in order to carry out more-or-less routine tasks, which might
include holding elections, staging games, hammering a nail into the temple of
Jupiter, or taking up a military command; but even in the latter case they were usually standing in for elected magistrates, rather than because a critical emergency
had arisen. For instance, L. Papirius Cursor’s great victory over the Samnites in 325
would not have happened without the illness of a consul, which had led to his appointment as dictator.
It follows that advocates of constitutional dictatorship are wrong to look to the
Roman Republic for historical precedents. The long list of dictators who held office
in the fourth and third centuries should not be taken as evidence of Rome’s success
in dealing with a persistent series of emergencies. We should not forget that this was
actually a period of unparalleled growth and prosperity, in which Rome grew from
a small state in Latium to become the overlord of the whole Italian peninsula and a
major Mediterranean power. There is surely something strange in the idea that
throughout this time there occurred with remarkable frequency (on average every
eighteen months) a crisis so severe that the normal pattern of government had to be
temporarily suspended and emergency powers conferred upon a single absolute
ruler in order to preserve the state from extinction. The proposition only has to be
stated for its absurdity to become apparent. The long series of frequent dictatorships
at this time cannot be taken as a sign that the republic was continually beset by
temporary crises or as evidence of its success in dealing with them. The details of
the historical record actually provide evidence of something quite different –
namely that in the period of its most frequent use the dictatorship had a much more
mundane function within the normal working of the Roman government, and that it
was not, in fact, a mechanism for dealing with emergencies at all.
In 1954 the German-born American historian G. W. F. Hallgarten published a
history of dictatorship in which the Roman dictators of the early republic are conspicuous by their absence.97 His reasoning was obviously that ‘constitutional dictatorship’ had no part in the story he was telling, which concerned the history of tyrannical rule. His paradoxical argument (although he nowhere says so explicitly) is
that the Roman dictators were not dictators. Our examination of the historical evi97 Hallgarten (n. 8, above). On p. 30 we find this apparently strange statement (under the heading
‘The Dictatorship in Ancient Rome [Second and First Centuries b. c.]’): ‘Roman dictatorship
started very late, six hundred years after the city’s alleged foundation by Romulus.’ He then
goes on to deal with the Gracchi (victims of ‘the Roman nobility, sworn enemy of all dictators’:
32), Marius, Sulla and Caesar.
Crisis and Deformation in the Roman Republic: The Example of the Dictatorship
125
dence in this paper has shown that he was right, but even more so than he knew, and
in ways that he could never have imagined.98
98 This paper was completed and submitted to the editor before the publication of F. K. Drogula’s
important study Commanders and Command in the Roman Republic and Early Empire (Chapel
Hill: U. of North Carolina P., 2015), which contains (esp. 161–80) interesting and original observations on the dictatorship of the early republic. Drogula’s account has many points of similarity with the conclusions reached here, especially on the powers of the dictator in relation to
the other magistrates, the importance of his designated task (comparable to a prouincia), his
function as a proxy or substitute for an elected magistrate, and the reasons for the misleading
portrayal of the office in the surviving sources.
THE TRIBUNATE OF THE PLEBS
AS A MAGISTRACY OF CRISIS1
Amy Russell
Appian’s Bella Civilia, the most extensive continuous narrative of the end of the
Roman Republic to have survived from the ancient world, depicts the tribunate of
Tiberius Gracchus in 133 b. c. as the beginning of the end. In the next fifty years, a
string of successive crises caused by tribunes in the Gracchan mould prove the undoing of the Republican system. Appian’s version of events is corroborated by
Cicero, who also sees the tribunate as intrinsically linked to crisis. Appian is hampered by hindsight, leading to an overly schematic and teleological view of the end
of the Republic. Nor should Cicero be taken at face value: his opinion of the tribunate was decisively slanted towards the negative by his personal experiences with
Clodius. There were plenty of tribunes of the plebs during the last century of the
Republic whose terms in office did not end with constitutional crisis and violent
death.2 Yet the way in which our sources construct the tribunate of the plebs as the
key to the Republic’s fall has become embedded in modern approaches to the ‘crisis
of the Roman Republic’.3
1
2
3
My thanks go to all the participants in the Perm conference, and particularly to Peter Rhodes. I
am grateful to Catherine Steel and Tom Shores for commenting on the written version; all flaws
are my own.
The best introduction to modern research on the tribunate is E. Badian, ‘Tribuni Plebis and Res
Publica’, in J. Linderski (ed.), Imperium Sine Fine: T. Robert S. Broughton and the Roman
Republic, (Stuttgart: Steiner, 1996), 187–213. J. Bleicken, Das Volkstribunat der klassischen
Republik: Studien zu seiner Entwicklung zwischen 287 und 133 v. Chr (München: Beck, 1955),
and L. Thommen, Das Volkstribunat der späten römischen Republik (Stuttgart: Steiner, 1989)
are useful for matters of detail, but their overall approach is now dated; see L. Thommen,
‘Populus, Plebs und Populares in der römischen Republik’, in R. Faber and F. Unger (edd.),
Populismus in Geschichte und Gegenwart, (Würzburg: Köningshausen & Neumann, 2008),
31–41, for his reaction to more recent developments. G. Niccolini, Il tribunato della plebe
(Milan: Hoepli, 1932), though even earlier, contains some valuable observations, and his I fasti
dei tribuni della plebe (Milan: Giuffré, 1934) is fundamental. E. J. Kondratieff, ‘Popular Power
in Action : Tribunes of the Plebs in the Later Republic’ (2003), a University of Pennsylvania
Ph.D. dissertation, contains expanded versions of Niccolini’s lists and is worth consulting.
Various versions of crisis theory are explored in the text that follows. For an overview, see R.
Morstein-Marx & N. S. Rosenstein, ‘The Transformation of the Republic’, in N. S. Rosenstein
& R. Morstein-Marx (edd.), A Companion to the Roman Republic, (Malden, MA: Blackwell,
2006), 625–37. Some recent scholarly approaches can be found in the papers in K.-J.
Hölkeskamp and E. Müller-Luckner, (edd.), Eine politisch Kultur (in) der Krise? Die ‘letzte
Generation’ der römischen Republik (München: Oldenbourg, 2009).
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1. THE TRIBUNATE AND THE FALL OF THE REPUBLIC IN LATER
HISTORIANS
Florus (and so, we may suspect, Livy) says explicitly that the tribunate of the plebs
caused the fall of the Republic:4
seditionum omnium causas tribunicia potestas excitauit, quae specie quidem plebis tuendae,
cuius in auxilium comparata est, re autem dominationem sibi adquirens, studium populi ac
fauorem agrariis, frumentariis, iudiciariis legibus aucupabatur. (Flor. 2.1)
The tribunician power aroused the beginnings of all the seditions. In theory it was supposed
to help the plebs (it had been devised to help them), but in practice it sought domination for
itself, accumulating the people’s support and favour by laws on land distributions, grain doles,
and jury service.
The placement of the passage, at the beginning of his second book, is significant.
These reflections mark a major turning-point in his narrative, the moment at which
the history of Rome flipped from glory to disaster. He dates the change to 133:
Primam certaminum facem Ti. Gracchus – ‘Tiberius Gracchus lit the first torch of
the conflicts’ (2.2).
The general pattern of Florus’ account is repeated elsewhere. Appian, too, begins his account with some remarks tying the disturbances of the late Republic to
the earlier history of conflict between patricians and plebeians and the creation of
the tribunate (B. Civ. 1.1), and then moves directly to the new beginning of civic
strife in the tribunate of Tiberius Gracchus (1.2). Since his Bella Civilia is the fullest narrative account of the entire period that has come down to us, his choice to
begin his story of the Republic’s fall in 133 has helped fix in generations of students’ minds the idea that the tribunate of Tiberius Gracchus was the beginning of
the end.
Florus and Appian come from different historiographical traditions, but they
have one thing in common: they treat Rome’s internal and external affairs separately. Florus departs from his Livian model to discuss under separate headings
Rome’s just and glorious conquests and her impious civil strife (1.34); Appian’s
life’s work is divided geographically, and the foreign wars of the period are narrated
in their respective volumes. These two historians, therefore, bring out particularly
clearly a pattern which can also be found in for example the Livian Periochae,
Velleius, or Orosius, but which in those authors is complicated by shifts of focus to
events taking place overseas. All tend to tell the story of internal politics at Rome
between the 130s and the 80s in a way which foregrounds the tribunate as a cause
of disruption and crisis. The pattern runs as follows: the disastrous events of the
tribunates of both Gracchi were followed by the chaos brought on by Saturninus,
and next the tribunate of Drusus the younger, which is positioned as the cause of the
Social War. The Social War led into the conflict between Marius and Sulla – itself
4
For Livy’s attitude to the tribunate, see R. J. Seager, ‘ “Populares” in Livy and the Livian
Tradition’, CQ2 xxvii 1977, 377–90 at 384; in general on the question of Florus’ relationship
with Livy, L. Bessone, La storia epitomata: introduzione a Floro (Rome: ‘L’Erma’ di
Bretschneider, 1996).
The Tribunate of the Plebs as a Magistracy of Crisis
129
often told as a tribunician crisis, with blame assigned to Sulpicius – and from then
on military conflicts between generals take centre stage in a new phase of decline.
Each tribunician conflict repeats and intensifies the one which came before.
Florus in his summary of the period assimilates both Gracchi and Saturninus in his
description of Gracchanae prima et secunda et illa tertia Apuleiana seditio – ‘the
first and second Gracchan, and the third Apuleian sedition’, and then moves straight
to Drusus (1.47). As he goes over the period in more detail in the second book, he
structures his account of internal politics up to the Social War entirely in terms of
seditious tribunes, devoting a section to Tiberius Gracchus, one to Gaius, one to
Saturninus, and one to Drusus with little mention of any intervening events. The
chapter headings inserted by a second hand in the ninth-century Codex Bamburgensis,
our best surviving manuscript, even title these Seditio Tiberi Gracchi (2.2), Seditio
C. Gracchi (2.3), Seditio Apuleiana (2.4), and Seditio Drusiana (2.5).
Appian goes into slightly more detail. After his discussion of Gaius Gracchus
he includes one transitional paragraph (1.27) which reports agrarian legislation between 121 and 111. Yet the three measures reported there are explicitly given as the
results of the Gracchan agrarian settlement, and really form part of the commentary
on the events of 121. The next chapter devotes a single sentence to all other internal
affairs of the intervening decades, noting that a consul Caepio pulled down a theatre, but then launches straight into the tribunates of Saturninus (1.28–33). Like
Florus, Appian calls Saturninus’ activity the third of three episodes of civil strife,
after the two associated with the Gracchi (1.34). Without any intervening material,
he then passes to the Social War, linking it prominently with Drusus’ tribunate
(1.35); as soon as the military narrative of the war is finished, he begins a new section with the machinations of Marius and Sulpicius (1.55).
In the fifty years or so between the Gracchi and Sulla, this version of events
runs, the state lurched from tribunician crisis to tribunician crisis. Very little is said
about any other internal political issues. The exclusive emphasis on tribunes dies
away in the period between Sulla and Caesar, where the narrative is instead dominated by warlords and armies, and eventually outright civil wars, but the preceding
narrative has already disposed the reader to understand that it was with the seditious
tribunes of the earlier generation that the rot began.
2. TRIBUNES, CONFLICT AND CRISIS IN CONTEMPORARY AUTHORS
The concept of the tribunate of the plebs as destructive is not simply an artefact of
later historians’ hindsight. In the de Legibus, Cicero puts into the mouth of his
brother Quintus an extreme assessment of the tribunate: it is in seditione et ad seditionem nata – ‘born in sedition and for sedition’ (3.19). Whether or not this was
Cicero’s own opinion is a question to which I shall return; for now, it is enough to
note that it was a plausible point of view, ascribed in a contemporary text to an experienced politician.
The ‘Quintus’ of the dialogue is constructed as an implacable foe of the tribunate of the plebs. Yet his assessment has points of contact with another famous
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Republican (at least purportedly) view of the office from the other end of the political spectrum, that attributed to Tiberius Gracchus by Plutarch. Plutarch’s Gracchus
claims that obedience to the plebs is the most important duty of a tribune, more so
than individual morality or patriotism: a tribune might attack the Capitol protected
by his sacrosanctity, but he cannot disregard the will of the people (Ti. Gracch.
15.2–3).5 The setting is important: Gracchus is asking the people to remove Octavius
from power after Octavius, urged on by the majority of the Senate, has vetoed
Gracchus’ land bill. In this context, when Gracchus says that the tribunes of the
plebs must champion the power of the people, he means they must uphold the people’s wishes even – perhaps especially – when those wishes conflict with the will of
the elite. Cicero knew exactly what to call the behaviour of a politician who championed the people in disagreement with the elite: seditio.
When Cicero has cause to reflect on how Gracchus deposed Octavius, he tells
his audience that it was achieved per seditionem (Mur. 78). A fragment from the de
Republica gives a basic definition: eaque dissensio ciuium, quod seorsum eunt alii
ad alios, seditio dicitur – ‘And this disagreement among citizens, because they are
divided from each other, is called sedition’ (Cic. Rep. 6.1). Elsewhere, he condemns
anyone who considers the interests of one part of the citizenry above another, saying that both populists and those who look only to the elite breed seditio and discordia (Cic. Off. 1.85). Given Cicero’s attachment to concordia, it makes sense that in
his works it is a small step from disagreement of any kind to conflict, and thence to
sedition and disaster.
In his less philosophical moods, Cicero is less even-handed: the Republic is
conceptually divided into a monolithic ‘people’ and a monolithic ‘elite’, and the
particular blame in a case of seditio always falls on those who take the people’s part
against the elite. Seditiose is used almost as a synonym for populariter at Pro
Cluentio 93, and a little later he uses a virtuoso piece of accumulation to draw the
same equivalence: iniqua falsa turbulenta popularia seditiosa – ‘wicked, lying,
disruptive, populist, and seditious’ (Clu. 113). Seditio belongs with discordia, factio, and partes – but most of all with tribunes, who if hostile to Cicero and his ilk
are labelled as seditiosus almost by default.6 The fullest statement of the theme is at
de Inventione 2.51, when we hear that C. Flaminius as tribune proposed an agrarian
bill inuito senatu et omnino contra uoluntatem omnium optimatium per seditionem
– ‘without the Senate’s approval and entirely against the wishes of all the best men,
by sedition’. As in the Pro Cluentio, ‘sedition’ sums up rather than adds to the other
5
6
M. Sordi, ‘La sacrosanctitas tribunicia e la sovranità populare in un discorso di Tiberio Gracco’,
in M. Sordi (ed.), Religione e politica nel mondo antico (Milan: Vita e Pensiero, 1981), 124–30,
argues that this remark derives eventually from an anti-Gracchan source reporting a question
asked at Blossius’ trial in 132 (Plut. Ti. Gracch. 20.3–4), but the wider context remains the
same.
Discordia: e. g. Mur. 83; Sest. 42, 99, 104; Fin. 1.44. Factio: Pis. fr. 7. Partes: Off. 1.85; Att.
10.1.2. Tribunes as seditiosus: e. g. Clu. 130; Leg. Agr. 2.14; Vat. 18; Mil. 8; Brut. 224; Luc.
144; Fam. 9.21.3. Further discussion can be found in R. J. Seager, ‘Cicero and the Word
Popularis’, CQ2 xxii 1972, 328–38 at 337.
The Tribunate of the Plebs as a Magistracy of Crisis
131
charges: acting against the will of the elite (who are, naturally, united) is by definition seditious.
Both Plutarch’s Gracchus and Cicero’s ‘Quintus’ view disagreement or even
conflict with the elite as characteristic of the tribunate of the plebs. In the majority
of Ciceronian works, this feature makes the tribunate a magistracy of sedition,
which is not too far from calling it a magistracy of crisis.7 But the full context of
‘Quintus’s’ remark in the De Legibus has some surprises to offer. Above, I noted
that the historical Quintus did not necessarily hold the views the character expresses: the work’s dialogue form allows Cicero the author to put forward for the
sake of argument a range of opinions to which he himself and the historical figures
he uses as characters may or may not subscribe.8 Still, given the historical Cicero’s
political leanings it is astonishing that at this point in the dialogue the character
‘Cicero’ rejects the opinion ‘Quintus’ has advanced, arguing instead that although
some tribunes have been pernicious the magistracy itself is not entirely bad.
At the point where ‘Quintus’ speaks his piece, the fictional ‘Cicero’ has just
introduced the tribunate of the plebs as a component of his proposed legal system
and declared that this item needs no explanation (Leg. 3.19). As an author, however,
Cicero clearly felt that explanation was required, since he then gives his interlocutor ‘Quintus’ one of the longest and most complex arguments made by either of the
minor characters in the work (3.19–22), and a lengthy discussion ensues (3.23–6).
‘Cicero’ defends the tribunate, claiming that its function is to control the power of
the people. The institution, he says, gives the people an outlet, but because each
individual tribune fears for his own safety and reputation, he does not dare to pursue
the excesses to which the people might aspire without his mediation (3.23). He even
flirts with the implication that the tribunate is tantamount to a way of deceiving the
people: it allows them to aequari se putarent – ‘think themselves equal’ with their
leaders (3.24). Later, he concedes that the tribunate offers them real power, but
follows his admission immediately with a qualification:
quam ob rem aut exigendi reges non fuerunt, aut plebi re, non uerbo, danda libertas. quae
tamen sic data est, ut multis <institutis> praeclarissimis adduceretur, ut auctoritati principum
cederet. (Cic. Leg. 3.25)
For this reason, either we should not have expelled the kings, or we must give the plebs liberty
in reality, not only in theory. But it was given in such a way that it they are induced by many
excellent arrangements to yield to the authority of the leading men.
7
8
The tantalising fragments of the pro Cornelio preserved by Asconius (77C) may originally have
propounded a different view which comes closer to that of the character ‘Cicero’ in de Legibus.
In the fragmentary speech, Cicero appears to defend the tribunate as a magistrate which can
bring consensus, though this time with reference to its early history rather than its contemporary operation; see further C. J. Smith, ‘The Origins of the Tribunate of the Plebs’, Antichthon
xlvi 2012, 101–25 at 106. Tellingly, the speech dates from 66, well before Cicero’s own run-ins
with hostile tribunes.
On Cicero’s use of dialogue form, see most recently J. W. Atkins, Cicero on Politics and the
Limits of Reason: The Republic and the Laws (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 2013), esp. 8–9,
14–17, 157.
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The ‘excellent arrangements’ he refers to are the fact that the tribunes themselves
are generally sensible members of the elite. In effect, the tribunes in the fictional
‘Cicero’s’ scheme exist to transform the energy of public anger against the elite into
disputes which take place within the elite and strictly on their terms. ‘Quintus’ has
already pointed out one of the major flaws in this argument: the power given to
tribunes is so great that even in the context of elite competition it could well be
dangerous.
In general, the argument Cicero gives to himself is not strong.9 In allowing
‘Quintus’ such an unusually long interjection he suggests that there is merit in his
argu­ment (an argument which was, of course, composed by Cicero himself). Though
his alter ego argues against ‘Quintus’, Cicero the author goes out of his way to emphasise the divergence:
Cicero: scis solere frater in huius modi sermone, ut transiri alio possit, dici
‘admodum’ aut ‘prorsus ita est’.
Quintus:haud equidem adsentior. tu tamen ad reliqua pergas uelim.
Cicero: perseueras tu quidem et in tua uetere sententia permanes.
Atticus: nec mehercule ego sane a Quinto nostro dissentio. sed ea quae restant
audiamus.
(Cic. Leg. 3.26)
Cicero: You know, brother, that in a conversation of this kind it is normal for you
to say ‘indeed’, or ‘yes, that’s right’, so that we can move on to the next topic.
Quintus:But I don’t agree! Still, I want you to move on to the rest.
Cicero: So you persevere and you maintain your old opinion.
Atticus: By god, I don’t disagree with our friend Quintus either. But let’s hear
the rest.
The two brothers never reach agreement, and ‘Atticus’ takes ‘Quintus’s’ side.
Finally, a joke about the characters’ failure to abide by the conventions of the genre
highlights this unique moment of disagreement in the reader’s mind.
Cicero the author refuses to commit fully to ‘Cicero’ the character’s arguments
for the tribunate. He is determined not to depart from his conviction that the mos
maiorum represents the best way to govern a state, and this includes the institution
of the tribunate of the plebs: the final argument given in its favour is that since it
does exist it cannot be taken away (3.26).10 However, the reservations which he
expresses in ‘Quintus’s’ speech are perhaps nearer to his own opinion as it emerges
9
L. Thommen, ‘Das Bild vom Volkstribunat in Ciceros Schrift über die Gesetze’, Chiron xviii
1988, 357–75, disagrees (though he accepts that ‘Cicero’s’ version is hardly an adequate description of the tribunate of his own time), but the schema given by A. R. Dyck, A Commentary
on Cicero, De Legibus (Ann Arbor: U. of Michigan P., 2004), 493, demonstrates at a minimum
that however one judges ‘Cicero’s’ positive arguments, he does not counter all of the points he
gives to his brother.
10 From a philosophical point of view, the debate centres on whether the ideal law code is the one
which is the best in absolute terms, or whether it is right to make alterations to account for
particular circumstances: Atkins (n. 8, above), 211.
The Tribunate of the Plebs as a Magistracy of Crisis
133
from his other works than is his own character’s contrived defence of the tribunate.
The argument the character ‘Cicero’ espouses, that the tribunate is a tool and function of the elite’s dominance of Roman politics, is one which modern scholars also
have proposed.11 They are right to discard the assumption of Appian and Florus that
all tribunes were revolutionary firebrands out to wreck the Republic. But we should
not leap to the opposite extreme and see all tribunes as passive mancipia nobilium
– ‘servants of the nobles’ (Livy 10.37.11).12 If we accept that the historical Cicero,
a member of the elite supposedly perpetrating this great scam, was more worried
about the radical potential of the tribunate than his fictional character will allow, the
idea of the tribunes as props for an aristocratic regime immediately becomes harder
to accept.
3. CONFLICT AS A POSITIVE FORCE
The disagreement between the two brothers is not the first time the tribunate of the
plebs appears in the De Legibus. As he begins to treat magistracies in general,
‘Cicero’ declares that there cannot be a magistrate in Rome with sole power, since
this would be kingship in all but name (3.15). The first solution mentioned is not, as
we might expect, the collegiate principle of the consulship, but the institution of the
tribunate (3.16). Opposition to the consuls is therefore the most important and necessary feature of the tribunes’ role. They are the only magistrates who do not have
to obey the consuls, and they are required to support others, both magistrates and
private citizens, in conflict with the consuls in order to make sure that kingship
never returns to Rome.
Modern scholars have noted that the tribunes’ power to oppose the consuls gave
them in practice an important role in defusing, rather than provoking, conflict. They
could break the deadlock between two consuls who were at odds, or act on behalf
of the Senate to rein in a consul who had acted against the wishes of the elite.13
Luciano Perelli notes that Cicero, by emphasising how the tribunes can assist other
magistrates against the consuls, locates the conflicts they provoke within the bounds
11 This is the general thrust of the analyses of both Bleicken and Thommen, Volkstribunat (n. 2,
above), for example, and indeed of C. Meier, Res Publica Amissa (Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1966)
116–51, who takes Cicero’s metaphor even further to characterise all the popular institutions
both before and after 133 as a ‘Ventil’ (128, 144–51); see also J. Bleicken, ‘Das römische
Volkstribunat: Versuch einer Analyse seiner politischen Funktion in republikanischer Zeit’,
Chiron xi 1981, 87–108, though he proposes a strong distinction between the pre- and
post-Gracchan tribunate; F. Pina Polo, ‘Ideología y práctica política en la Roma tardorrepublicana’, Gerion xii 1994, 69–94 at 84; R. Feig Vishnia, State, Society and Popular Leaders in
Mid-Republican Rome, 241–167 b. c. (London: Routledge, 1996), 190–201; L. Thommen,
‘Populus, Plebs und Populares’ (n. 2, above), 36.
12 Note that Livy himself never says this: the phrase is an insult placed in the mouth of a character
upbraiding two tribunes for failing to live up to their responsibilities to the people.
13 Bleicken, ‘Das römische Volkstribunat’, and Feig Vishnia (both n. 11, above) catalogue such
episodes.
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of elite competition.14 Ultimately, in this interpretation, they provide a tool of conflict resolution, allowing the elite to resolve their differences and present a united
front to the people. Certainly, we do see tribunes of all periods taking advantage of
their hazily-defined powers to intervene in purely political squabbles affecting only
the elite. But this is only part of the story: resistance by private citizens is also given
a place in Cicero’s account.
In the De Legibus Cicero finds himself torn between a view of the tribunate
which sees conflict as an inherent part of the magistracy, and a more general approach to politics which views any kind of conflict as anathema. Rather than trying
to find a place for disagreement in Rome’s political system, his character tries to
explain it away: the tribunate may seem to be a magistracy of seditio, but is in fact
a carefully-balanced mechanism for making sure that the people do not disagree
with their betters. Not all ancient commentators were so convinced that all conflict
is crisis. For a different view on the role of conflict in Rome’s political system, we
can look to Polybius. Rome’s tripartite constitution, as he describes it, consists of
three nodes of power each pulling in different directions: consuls, Senate, and people. Their needs are different, but their powers are equally matched, meaning that
each group has to take the other two into account. Their conflicting interests lead
not to disaster, but to compromise and stability.15
In Polybius’ scheme, the tribunes of the plebs represent the people and must
obey their wishes in all things (6.16.5). He says they are not required to obey the
consuls (6.12.2), and can use the veto against the Senate (6.16.4), a power he introduces in order explicitly to illustrate how it is that the Senate is compelled to listen
to the wishes of the people (6.16.1). Polybius’ model does not imply that the tribunes will always create conflict, but he does presuppose that the people have their
own needs and wishes which may not accord with those of the Senate or consuls,
and he both requires that the tribunes stand for the people in any disagreement that
ensues and highlights that they have been given an effective tool for doing so in the
veto. The threat that disagreement will turn into conflict forces the three elements
of the state to come to a compromise. Polybius imposes a theoretical structure in
terms of antagonisms which does not necessarily match reality. But we should consider seriously his idea that conflict, or the threat of conflict, is not always a sign of
crisis: it can also be a tool which prevents any one interest group from destabilising
the state.
The idea that conflict could be a positive force was foreign to Appian and
Florus.16 They and others like them wrote under the Principate. Like us, they knew
14 L. Perelli, ‘Note sul tribunato della plebe nella riflessione ciceroniana’, QS × 1979, 285–303 at
287.
15 Atkins (n. 8, above), 80–115, demonstrates that Polybius’ productive conflict represents a departure from Platonic and Aristotelian political theory; Cicero, in turn, reverts in his own account of the mixed constitution in De Republica to a Platonic model which sees conflict as a
negative force.
16 It was not, of course, entirely foreign to Cicero: he records (De Or. 2.124) that his mentor
Antonius, as part of his defence of a wayward tribune, had praised seditio as a vital tool used
by the people to maintain their political power.
The Tribunate of the Plebs as a Magistracy of Crisis
135
how the story ends, and their interpretations are explicitly teleological. Appian’s
introductory summary of the civil wars ends ὧδε μὲν ἐκ στάσεων ποικίλων ἡ
πολιτεία Ῥωμαίοις ἐς ὁμόνοιαν καὶ μοναρχίαν περιέστη – ‘Thus out of a variety of civil conflicts the Roman state transformed into harmony and monarchy’ (B.
Civ. 1.6). His focus on volatility and conflict in the last century of the Republic is
directly connected with the coming of peace under the Principate.17 The contrast
between Republican chaos and Pax Augusta is one of the strongest structural features to be found in historians writing in the imperial period.18 Because these authors see the shift from Republic to Principate as one from instability to stability,
from crisis to resolution, they inevitably interpret both change and conflict as crisis.
4. CONFLICT, CHANGE AND CRISIS IN MODERN SCHOLARSHIP
The crisis of the Roman Republic as constructed by modern historical research can
be understood essentially as an institutional crisis. Even though the underlying
problems which caused the change may have been economic, military, geopolitical,
social, or even environmental, in the end the institutional question recurs: why did
the institutions of the Roman Republic fail to solve these problems? Modern scholars have offered a range of answers, and there is no space here to do any more than
sketch out two broad trends. Peter Brunt argued that the senatorial elite, which had
eventual control over the entire political process, failed to listen to the people.19 The
underlying causes of popular discontent are not my concern here, but an institutional problem also lies at the core of Brunt’s interpretation: there was no political
mechanism to force the elite to listen to the people. Christian Meier, on the other
hand, proposed a different form of institutional failure in the form of institutional
paralysis, the Krise ohne Alternativ.20 As he saw it, the system itself was incapable
of change. Romans had internalised its values so successfully that it was impossible
to conceive of anything else.
The role of the tribunate of the plebs in the last century of the Roman Republic
provides an interesting test case for both influential modern theories. Brunt’s explanation centres on the aristocracy’s failure to heed the justified discontents of the
people. Yet for Plutarch’s Gracchus the tribune’s role was precisely to follow the
people’s wishes, against those of the aristocracy if necessary; he must not neglect
(καταλύῃ, Plut. Ti. Gracch. 15.3) the people. Meier focuses instead on the inherent
conservatism of the system: its inability to produce alternative ideas which might
17 Further discussion in E. Gabba, Appiani Bellorum Civilium Liber Primus (Florence: La Nuova
Italia, 31958), xvi, xxi–xxii.
18 Cassius Dio expands the insight into a full consideration of the relative benefits of democracy
and monarchy at 44.2 and the famous debate of book 52, with the historical contrast drawn
most clearly at 52.16. Tacitus, unsurprisingly, turns the trope on its head by praising Republican
libertas over imperial tranquillitas, but his first report of the views current upon Augustus’
death at Ann. 1.9 preserves the same sentiments.
19 P. A. Brunt, The Fall of the Roman Republic and Related Essays (Oxford: Oxford U. P., 1988).
20 Meier (n. 11, above).
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bring institutional change.21 Yet when Cicero’s ‘Quintus’ attacks the tribunate, its
power to effect both social and constitutional change is at the core of his complaint.
The seditio in which it was born was the ‘Struggle of the Orders’, a period of almost
total overhaul for Rome’s political institutions, during which (as ‘Quintus’ points
out, Cic. Leg. 3.19) the social order was inverted and power taken from the patres.
The new seditio he fears is the potential that tribunes of his own day will achieve a
similar upending of the social and political world he knows – perhaps even one
radical enough to qualify as an Alternativ. The exact historical events which led to
the introduction of the tribunate are not strictly relevant here; more important is the
fact that Cicero and his fictionalised brother certainly believed that it was designed
in order to effect radical change, was well suited to that role, and was ideologically
linked with the popular will and reform. For them, the tribunate was a magistracy
of change (the thing Meier finds lacking in the system) and of conflict, or at least of
disagreement, in the sense that it could bring popular discontent to the attention of
the aristocracy (the thing Brunt finds lacking in the system).
Even if we put to one side the canon of seditious tribunes after 133 who form
the basis of Appian’s and Florus’ narratives but whom modern scholars may be inclined to treat as exceptions, the transformative power of the tribunate remains.
When the pre-Gracchan elite made expedient use of the tribunes’ wide-ranging and
ill-defined powers to solve their own internal disputes, they did so precisely because the system as it stood did not offer a suitable institutional method for resolving the problem. The tribunes stepped in, and the result was often that a new mechanism was invented, a new precedent was set, and the system as a whole gradually
developed.22 Conflict produced change.
Change and conflict occupy a paradoxical position in crisis narratives. Cicero
reads these functions of the tribunate as sedition, and we modern scholars might be
tempted to read them in terms of crisis. But not all change, and not all conflict, is
indicative of ‘crisis’ in the sense of disaster. In two of the most influential theories
of the fall of the Roman Republic, those of Brunt and Meier, change and conflict
were exactly what the system needed to save it.
21 In the hands of more recent German scholars such as K.-J. Hölkeskamp, Rekonstruktionen
einer Republik: Die politische Kultur des antiken Rom und die Forschung der letzten Jahrzehnte
(Munich: Oldenbourg, 2004), this becomes the inherently limited scope of Roman Republican
political discourse. I have argued in A. Russell, ‘Speech, Competition and Collaboration:
Tribunician Politics and the Development of Popular Ideology’, in C. Steel & H. van der Blom
(edd.), Community and Communication: Oratory and Politics in Republican Rome, (Oxford:
Oxford U. P., 2013), 101–15, that the tribunate provided a mechanism for expanding the limits
of political discourse.
22 Russell (n. 21, above); see also J. M. David, ‘Conformisme et transgression: À propos du tribunat de plèbe à la fin de la République romaine’, Klio lxxv 1993, 219–27.
The Tribunate of the Plebs as a Magistracy of Crisis
137
5. CONCLUSION: CONSENSUS IN HINDSIGHT
We can never escape hindsight: the Republic did fall. Nothing in the ancient sources
I have cited can demonstrate that the tribunate of the plebs was actually successful
in highlighting conflict or prompting needed change: perhaps it provided a mechanism, yes, but an ineffective one. Here Cicero’s two competing explanations of the
functions of the tribunate can provide useful analytic tools. If, with the character
‘Cicero’ in the de Legibus, we see the tribunate as a way of placating popular discontent, then the tribunate itself cannot be the cause of the crisis. Rather, it was the
failure of this mechanism that led people to support violent, extra-legal attempts to
solve their problems, from Catiline to Caesar. Brunt’s view is vindicated: the system was not responsive enough to ordinary people’s real needs.
I have suggested, however, that the historical Cicero’s own anxieties are on
display in the de Legibus. The problem he faced in his own political career was not
that tribunes of the plebs failed to respond to popular discontent: in fact, some of
them responded too readily for his liking and were happy to exploit differences of
opinion within the elite. ‘Quintus’s’ theory, which mirrors more closely the attitude
expressed in Cicero’s other works, is that the tribunate was inherently seditious.
Although tribunes themselves were members of the elite, their magistracy carried
strong ideological overtones and some of them used it as a platform for what Cicero
felt were attacks on the elite. For modern historians, these attacks could be understood as symptoms of the failure of Rome’s political institutions, or perhaps more
accurately Rome’s political culture, the unwritten rules which governed political
life. The unspoken limits to elite political competition, which had previously ensured that no popular leader fully exploited the sovereign power which Rome’s
laws and customs technically granted to the people, were being swept away. The
‘senatorial consensus’ was breaking down, with the result that Rome became ungovernable.
But is this supposed senatorial consensus itself an artefact of hindsight? The
assumption that tribunes of the plebs before 133 did not stand with the people
against the Senate is only the flipside of the assertion we find in Appian and Florus
that after 133 they did nothing else. Despite the fact that they contrast the Republic’s
chaotic end with the beneficent peace of Augustus’ reign, historians writing in the
imperial period also value Republican institutions. Their almost paradoxical reverence for the Republic, in the context of their general picture of the century before
Augustus as unalloyed chaos, gives rise to a second structural contrast. The Late
Republic is contrasted not just with the reign of Augustus, but with a perfectly-functioning classical Republic located hazily at some point in the second or third century. Appian makes his adherence to this model clear in his insistence that Rome
never saw civil strife before 133 (B Civ. 1.2); Florus says that the hundred years
before the fall of Carthage were a golden age (1.34; 1.47).23 This was the classical
Republic of Cicero’s dreams, marked by high moral standards and guided gently
23 On Appian’s attitude to the Republic see further A. Gowing, The Triumviral Narratives of
Appian and Cassius Dio (Ann Arbor: U. of Michigan P., 1992), 47–8.
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but firmly by senatorial consensus. Yet when we try to locate this golden age, it
continually retreats further and further into the past. We know the Gracchi had forerunners, and the idea that the Middle Republic was a time of perfect concordia
(meaning, among other things, that tribunes obeyed the will of the united Senate) is
partly an artefact of the state of our sources for the period.24 Livy has very different
preoccupations from Sallust or Cicero, and is less interested in recording tribunician activity.25 When the issue of evidence is combined with the teleological impulses of Appian and Florus and their understandable desire to locate a single
well-defined moment at which the crisis of the Roman Republic began, it is easy to
see why 133 has become a watershed for both ancient and modern commentators.
Tiberius Gracchus, the man whom Appian and Florus credit with destroying
Republican Rome’s golden age of concordia, did not claim to be going beyond the
bounds of either Republican political institutions or Republican political culture.
His self-presentation, at least in Plutarch’s version, presumes that the tribune’s role
as antagonist to the elite is not a symptom of institutional breakdown, but is itself
one of Rome’s institutions.26 Gracchus’ actions fit well into the Polybian model of
stability through tension – a model developed, it is worth noting, before 133 – in
which checks and balances formed not by consensus but by institutionalised conflict are the source of the Republic’s strength.27
Contemporary observers, including Polybius, Gracchus, and Cicero, all saw the
tribunate of the plebs as a magistracy of change and conflict. Later historians pigeonholed its transformative power into a (relatively) brief period which they understood as the final crisis leading up to the collapse of one system and the birth of
another. It is this temporal limitation which should be discarded as the product of
teleology and hindsight. The tribunate’s potential to bring conflict into Rome’s political arena, whether for good or for bad, was not a challenge to Rome’s political
culture but a part of it – both before and after 133. None of the above can shed much
light on the question of what the average tribune of the plebs actually did and why,
whether the tribunate was in the end a stabilising or a destabilising force in the
Republic, or whether tribunes after 133 used their powers in ways which were qualitatively different from what their pre-Gracchan forerunners had done (though on
this last point I am sceptical). Nor are there any easy answers as to which explanation of the Republic’s fall is the correct one. But considering the roles assigned by
various ancient observers to the tribunate in the crisis of the Roman Republic does
24 L. R. Taylor, ‘Forerunners of the Gracchi’, JRS lii 1962, 19–27; E. Badian, ‘Tiberius Gracchus
and the Beginning of the Roman Revolution’, A. N. R. W. i.1 (1972), 668–731 at 695–6, has
some perceptive remarks on what can and cannot be known about the activities of tribunes in
the century before the Gracchi.
25 Badian (n. 2, above), 187–90; P. Williams, ‘The Roman Tribunate in the So-Called “Era of
Quiescence”, 287–133 b. c.’, Latomus lxiii 2004, 281–94.
26 We are reminded of the view that it was Octavius’ veto, not Gracchus’ rogatio, which was the
decisive break with tradition: Badian (n. 24, above).
27 For an excellent restatement of the importance of tension and division in the Roman Republic,
see A. Yakobson, ‘The People’s Voice and the Speakers’ Platform: Popular Power, Persuasion
and Manipulation in the Roman Forum’, SCI xxiii 2004, 201–12.
The Tribunate of the Plebs as a Magistracy of Crisis
139
help clarify what is at stake in the definitions of ‘crisis’ assumed by models both
ancient and modern.
Change and conflict were, in the form of the tribunate, an institutionalised part
of Rome’s political system. Disagreement, much to Cicero’s chagrin, was never
lacking.28 We cannot therefore use change or conflict to diagnose crisis, as Appian
and Florus do – or we must admit that Republican Rome was in a constant state of
crisis from the very beginning, which is tantamount to saying that it never was.29
The modern interpretations I have summarised, on the other hand, suggest that it
was the absence of change and conflict which doomed the Republic. A reassessment
of the tribunes’ role in the light of these modern debates can help us escape the
pessimistic, Ciceronian model of the tribunate later taken on and developed by
Appian and Florus. If change and conflict were not signs of crisis, but instead signs
of Polybian vitality even in a decaying system, we should see the tribunes Cicero
calls seditious not as symptoms of institutional failure, but as successes. Their contribution to the crisis of the Roman Republic was of a different kind: they did not
go far enough.
28 R. Morstein-Marx, Mass Oratory and Political Power in the Late Roman Republic (Cambridge:
Cambridge U. P., 2004), 283, writes, ‘When, after 133, was the Roman élite not divided?’– but
surely it was no more united in the era of the trials of the Scipios?
29 If we take this route, the tribunate as I see it fits more comfortably into the view of the Late
Republic propounded by E. S. Gruen, The Last Generation of the Roman Republic (Berkeley&
Los Angeles: U. of California P., 1974), who denies that there ever was a crisis – though the
stability I see in the system comes from flexibility and a degree of popular control, rather than
the elite dominance he envisages.
THE ROMAN POLITICAL YEAR
AND THE END OF THE REPUBLIC
Catherine Steel
The dictatorship of L. Cornelius Sulla was a moment of profound change in the
nature of the Roman res publica.1 This change affected Roman politics and society
very broadly; one area which deserves particular attention is the nature of the political year. The annual political cycle was radically altered and the consequences
were substantial, both in the effects on the nature of the citizen experience and in
the implications for the way in which the magistrates and the Senate carried out
their functions.
1. THE NATURE OF THE PROBLEM
The end of the Roman Republic is a perennial challenge to historical explanation.
That something happened at Rome, in terms of its political organisation, in the first
century b. c. that requires explanation seems indisputable. But what exactly was
this? The emergence of Octavian as sole ruler of the area which Rome controlled
after the battle of Actium in 31 and his conquest of Egypt in 30 are widely accepted
as an end-date to this process, whether one sees 31, 30 or even 27, when Octavian
took the name Augustus, as the decisive date for purposes of periodisation. But few
would argue that the Republic in the sense in which the term is used in modern
discussions of Rome was still in existence in 31. Octavian’s victory was preceded
by nearly twenty years of intermittent civil war which began in early 49 when
Caesar invaded Italy; the intervals of peace during this period were dominated by
individuals in positions of exceptional power. Caesar assumed the dictatorship in 49
and by the time of his death was dictator in perpetuity, and the realisation that
Caesar had no intention of relinquishing this position of sole power was a major
factor in his death and contributed to its presentation in many of the sources as an
act of tyrannicide. A number of men emerged as independent loci of power in the
period after Caesar’s death, their power based on military resources. Within this
group, Antonius, Lepidus and Octavian have a distinct status, since their position
was also confirmed by the Roman people, who elected them – albeit under exceptional conditions – as triumuiri rei publicae constituendae, triumvirs for the establishment of the res publica. That their assumption of this role inverted the republi1
H. Flower, Roman Republics, (Princeton: Princeton U. P., 2011), 117–34; cf. 22–3; F. Sant­
angelo, ‘Roman Politics in the 70s b. c.: A Story of Realignments?’, JRS civ 2014, 1–27; C.
Steel, ‘Rethinking Sulla: The Case of the Roman Senate’, CQ2 lxiv 2014, 657–68.
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can pattern whereby military power followed popular endorsement does not entirely
undermine the fact that they, unlike Brutus, Cassius or Sextus Pompeius, had a
formal position within the res publica to justify their activity.
From this perspective, then, the year 49 takes on particular significance: it was
the last year in which two consuls elected by the Roman people took office. It retains its importance even if one argues that there was a real opportunity, in the period immediately after Caesar’s death, to restore the constitutional pattern in existence before 49, since even if that opportunity had been successfully grasped, as it
was not, the outcome would have been the restoration of the res publica after a hiatus. Civil war was the cause of the disruption, and the causes of the civil war, and
in particular the set of circumstances which led to Caesar’s invasion, are central to
any attempt to explain why the Republic ended. Most such explanations contextualise the outbreak of civil war within a framework of political and social problems.
Meier argued that the way the Roman res publica operated – its constitutional form
– prevented its governing class from addressing the threats which it faced in its last
decades from powerful individuals holding military power; as a result, it was attempting to deal with a ‘crisis without an alternative’, since there was no mechanism for introducing essential constitutional reform.2 Morstein-Marx essentially
amplified this view in his Mass Oratory and Political Power in the Late Roman
Republic, identifying an ‘ideological monotony’ in public discourse in the late
Republic.3 As a result, meaningful debate on issues was difficult to initiate. Brunt,
by contrast, located the causes of civil war in the discontent felt by the mass of
citizens at the unfair distribution of the profits of empire. Those citizens who were
serving as soldiers saw that their commanders offered them a better prospect of
material reward than did the Senate; so the circumstances were in place which gave
individuals the resources to challenge the res publica, a process which began with
Sulla and Cinna in the 80s and culminated with the conflict between Caesar and
Pompeius. The resulting violence alienated wealthy Italians who were not involved
directly with political life at Rome; hence their eventual acquiescence in Augustus’
rule.4 On such an interpretation, the end of the Republic was thus a social and economic phenomenon rather than the result of constitutional failings.
In sharp distinction to these approaches is Gruen’s highly influential The Last
Generation of the Roman Republic.5 Gruen argued that the final decades of the
2
3
4
5
C. Meier, Res Publica Amissa: Eine Studie zur Verfassung und Geschichte der späten rö­
mischen Republik, (Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1966)
R. Morstein-Marx, Mass Oratory and Political Power in the Late Roman Republic, (Cambridge:
Cambridge U. P., 2004)
P. A. Brunt, ‘The Fall of the Roman Republic’, in Brunt, The Fall of the Roman Republic and
Related Essays (Oxford: Oxford U. P., 1988), 1–92. Compare, however, Morstein-Marx’s argument (R. Morstein-Marx, ‘Dignitas and Res Publica: Caesar and Republican Legitimacy’, in
K.-J. Hölkeskamp (ed.), Eine politische Kultur (in) der Krise? Die ‘letzte Generation’ der
römischen Republik [München: Oldenbourg, 2009], 115–40) that Caesar’s appeals to his army
in 49 were based on the threat to their citizen rights posed by the pauci in Rome rather than the
personal profits which might follow their victory.
E. Gruen, The Last Generation of the Roman Republic, (Berkeley & Los Angeles: U. of
California P., 1974).
The Roman Political Year and the End of the Republic
143
Republic were not a period of decline; rather, its distinctive features were stability
and institutional vitality. The conflict between Pompeius and Caesar developed almost by accident, the result of a number of contingencies rather than weaknesses in
the operation and organisation of the state. But Gruen does, like Meier, Brunt and
others, assume that we can talk about ‘the Roman Republic’. That we should not –
that there was a sequence of republics between the expulsion of the kings and the
establishment of the Julio-Claudian monarchy – is Flower’s central contention.6
She identified a series of republics at Rome between 450 and 60, of which Sulla’s
was the sixth and radically different from what had gone before: he introduced a
new kind of state, in which the rule of law was intended to supersede the power of
the nobiles. She argues that it came to an end with the consulship of Caesar in 59,
leaving Rome under the domination of Pompeius, Caesar and Crassus until, after
Crassus’ removal from the scene, Pompeius and Caesar came to inevitable conflict.
This paper considers the problem from the perspective of the political life of
Rome; to that extent, it follows analyses of the end of the Republic which see the
causes of civil war there, rather than in the ambition of commanders and the willingness of soldiers to follow them. However, I concentrate on the details of how
politics actually worked, rather than broader questions concerning the nature of
political participation, the extent of a democratic element in Republican Rome, and
the methods by which politicians sought to work with and against one another’s
interests. Apparently mundane issues of political practice hold the key, I suggest, to
understanding why Caesar came to believe that the exceptionally high-risk strategy
of invading Italy was his best option. I agree with Flower that Sulla changed the res
publica radically. But I differ from her interpretation in seeing the fundamentals of
the Sullan res publica persisting until 49; Gruen is right not to emphasise a break in
70. However, I disagree with Gruen’s contention that in its final year the res publica
was institutionally effective. The form of constitutional arrangement which Sulla
imposed was unworkable: whether knowingly or not, he had devised a res publica
in which government was almost impossible. The Senate, which had previously
exercised this function, was deprived of it, not because of increases in the power of
individuals but through a series of relatively small changes, which have been largely
ignored in scholarship on the period. No other element in the res publica was in a
position to assume it. Thus there were three decades of improvisation until the vacuum was decisively filled by Caesar.
These observations emerge very clearly from a consideration of the year as a
structuring device for political activity and the implications of the annual cycle for
the way that magistrates and citizens conducted their duties. I outline how the year
worked prior to Sulla, consider the ways in which the changes imposed by Sulla
affected it and then discuss their implications for our analysis of the period between
Sulla’s abdication of power and Caesar’s invasion of Italy.
6Flower, Republics (n. 1, above).
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Catherine Steel
2. THE INSTITUTIONAL FRAMEWORK PRIOR TO SULLA’S
DICTATORSHIP
The annual political cycle was a fundamental feature of Roman political life
throughout the Republic: magistrates were elected for a year, with fixed start and
end dates.7 Each year, regularly in March at least from the late third century, and
then from the mid-second century in January, there was a complete renewal of executive office-holders on the basis of the votes cast by citizens. In addition, there
was a very strong prohibition on multiple office-holding and, as far as we can tell,
an absolute bar on consecutive office holding. These restrictions ensured that political power could not be concentrated in the hands of individuals. The relatively few
exceptions do not seriously undermine this principle. The censorship was held for
longer than a year – eighteen months appears to be the norm – which is to be explained by the sheer volume of tasks with the censors had to accomplish. In addition, elections to the censorship took place only every five years. Repeat holding of
the consulship did occur in response to military crisis, most strikingly during the
Samnite wars of the late fourth and early third centuries, and a century later during
the second war between Rome and Carthage. At such moments, demonstrable military ability appears to have become more important than a desire to share honours
around. Even in the crisis of the war against Hannibal, however, consecutive consulships did not occur. Against this background, Marius’ repeated consulships in the
later second century are striking in their divergence from normal practice, but even
then the innovation was discontinued once the crisis of the Celtic migrations was at
an end.
The consequences of these practices can be observed in the operation of politics. The existence of annually-elected magistrates, who changed from year to year,
led to a regular and largely predictable annual cycle of political activity, at least
from the time of the second war between Rome and Carthage. Elections were held
shortly before the political year started (whether in March or in January) and, usually, the consuls and most praetors left for their prouinciae once the Feriae Latinae
had been celebrated in early spring. It was not mandatory for consuls to go to a
province, and some are attested in Rome during their year in office; but military
service was the expected activity of the consuls.8 It was also in many cases highly
attractive because it was only through the conduct of a successful campaign that a
politician could triumph, an accolade which – along with membership of one of the
priestly colleges – marked out an exclusive inner circle within the senatorial nobility; and campaigning could be financially profitable, too.9 As Rome’s overseas em7
8
9
A. Lintott, The Constitution of the Roman Republic (Oxford: Oxford U. P., 1999) 9–15. This
annual cycle underpins the structure of much Roman historiography with its annalistic structure.
F. Pina Polo, The Consul at Rome: The Civil Functions of the Consuls at Rome (Cambridge:
Cambridge U. P., 2011), 211–5.
H. Beck, ‘Züge in die Ewigkeit: Prozessionen durch das republikanische Rom’, in F. Marco
Simón et al. (edd,), Repúblicas y ciudadanos: modelos de participación cívica en el mundo
antiguo, (Barcelona: Universitat de Barcelona, 2006), 131–51; N. Rosenstein, ‘War, Wealth
The Roman Political Year and the End of the Republic
145
pire and concomitant diplomacy expanded, the early months of the year were increasingly dedicated to dealing with embassies, which sought to influence Roman
activity immediately prior to decisions about the tasks to be allotted to imperium-holding magistrates. Tribunician activity ran to a different timetable. Tribunes
of the plebs entered office on 10 December, with elections immediately prior to that
date, and if they intended to bring forward legislation it seems that they normally
did so on entering office, with legislative voting taking place during the winter, at
the end of the political year as determined by the election of magistrates.
The process and rationale for the shift of consular entry date in 153 to 1 January
from 1 March are not well documented.10 It is however possible that it was connected to the increasing complexity and geographical range of Rome’s diplomatic
and military commitments. Rome’s magistrates, particularly its consuls, wished to
have more influence over the debates which would inform their responsibilities
during their year of office by presiding over the senatorial meetings which heard
embassies and decided foreign policy priorities. But whatever the cause, the result
of the shift of date was the consuls assumed office just twenty days after the tribunes of the plebs did, and were often in Rome, as consuls, for a period of some
weeks before they left on campaign. The possibility that this juxtaposition played a
part in raising political temperatures should not be disregarded; it may well not be
a coincidence that this change to practice was followed by more contentious and
disturbed domestic politics than had been the case in the previous half-century,
even if the unpopular wars in Spain provided the cause over which tribunes and
consuls most frequently came into conflict.11
That regularity of annual processes was also an integral part of the citizen experience of participation in politics.12 A Roman citizen in the Republican period had
the opportunity to cast his vote at least three times a year, at the concilium plebis
which elected the tribunes in early December, the comitia centuriata which elected
senior magistrates towards the end of the winter, and the subsequent comitia tributa
for junior magistrates. The centuriate meeting is likely to have taken most of a
(short) winter day given the number of voting units involved, and the sheer number
of different junior posts will have made the other meetings lengthy affairs as well.
In effect, voting required three whole days of each citizens’ time each year. In addition, there was legislative voting. Although legislation is not attested in every year,
there was on average more than one legislative vote in each year throughout the
second century.13 Even if voting on legislation was quicker than electoral voting,
the vote itself was usually preceded by contiones at which the law’s proposer ex-
10
11
12
13
and Consuls’, in H. Beck et al. (edd.), Consuls and Res Publica: Holding High Office in the
Roman Republic (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 2011), 133–58.
Pina Polo, Consul (n. 8, above), 13–15.
L. R. Taylor, ‘Forerunners of the Gracchi’, JRS lii 1962, 19–27, which highlights a number of
conflicts between tribunes and consuls in the period 151–133.
C. Nicolet, Le Métier de citoyen dans la République romaine (Paris: Gallimard, 1976), 307–80.
C. Williamson, The Laws of the Roman People: Public Law in the Expansion and Decline of
the Roman Republic, (Ann Arbor: U. of Michigan P., 2005), 456–62, lists 168 laws from the
second century.
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Catherine Steel
plained its rationale and opponents articulated their objections: voters might attend
these meetings, though were not obliged to.14 What is evident about this cycle is
that although the demands of full participation were high, at least in comparison
with the experience of citizens in modern democracies, the obligations normally
fell in winter and thus were compatible with the demands of a citizen militia and, to
a certain extent, those of agricultural labour.15 The frequency and predictability of
these interactions is a factor in considering voting patterns, both before and after the
introduction of the secret ballot in the later second century.
The annual cycle is also evident in the activity of the Roman Senate. I have
already noted the development of the early months of the year as a time for engagement with foreign embassies. In these months, too, the key strategic decisions
around the identification of prouinciae and of military resources also took place.
Once the Feriae Latinae had been celebrated, the imperium-holding magistrates
who had prouinciae outside Rome would depart, with the result, in many years, that
from April until the end of the calendar year the only imperium-holding magistrates
in the city itself were the urban and peregrine praetors.16 The urban praetor chaired
Senate meetings when the consuls were absent, and the Senate’s role throughout the
summer and early autumn was largely reactive: crises demanded action, but in other
respects there was a pause until the election of tribunes of the plebs restarted the
active phase of the cycle once more.
It seems likely that these patterns of activity framed participants’ expectations
of their roles and responsibilities; and as a result, political activity at the ‘wrong’
time of the year is always worth attention. The year 133 is perhaps the most striking
example from the period before Sulla. Although a detailed chronology is not easy
to reconstruct, it is clear that Tiberius Gracchus did not propose all of the legislation
that he sponsored at the point at which he entered office on 10 December 134. His
legislative programme developed over the course of the year in response both to the
opposition he faced from the Senate and to foreign policy developments.17
Nonetheless, despite the pressures which annual elections imposed on the practice of politics, there were also, in the pre-Sullan period, some institutional factors
which operated on a scale longer than a year. These were concentrated in the Senate,
where membership tended to be for life. Although identification as a member of the
Senate was closely connected to holding or having held a magistracy, the choice
itself lay with the censors, and once made, the expectation was clearly that names
would remain on the senatorial roll unless serious flaws of behaviour justified expulsion. Even though senatorial membership implied participation in Senate meet14 On attendance at contiones, H. Mouritsen, Plebs and Politics in the Late Roman Republic
(Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 2001); Morstein-Marx, Mass Oratory (n. 3, above), 128–36.
15 The disjunction between the Roman calendar and the sun at points during the second century
because of missed intercalations lessens but does not destroy the force of this argument.
16 On two occasions (191 and 189) one man covered both urban and peregrine jurisditions: T. C.
Brennan, The Praetorship in the Roman Republic (New York: Oxford U. P., 2000), 108–9;
Brennan also notes the rare occasions on which the urban praetor left Rome.
17 H. Flower, ‘Beyond the Contio: Political Communication in the Tribunate of Tiberius
Gracchus’, in C. Steel & H. van der Blom (edd.), Community and Communication: Oratory
and Politics in Republican Rome (Oxford: Oxford U. P., 2013), 85–100.
The Roman Political Year and the End of the Republic
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ings, we do not find examples of senators retiring if age made it impossible for them
to continue their duties, implying that attendance was in practice seldom constrained.18 The Senate thus embodied ongoing experience and authority which transcended annual boundaries, an aspect which was embodied in the position of princeps senatus. Prior to Sulla, the princeps led senatorial debate, if present; he was
nominated by the censors, who invariably followed their predecessors’ nomination
if the princeps were still alive. Their nomination seems to have been of the most
senior senator from one of a limited number of patrician gentes.19 Another supra-annual institutional factor was the colleges of priests, whose membership was
also for life. The precise nature of the political authority which the various colleges
exercised is not entirely clear, but the high degree of overlap between their members and those who had or were likely to hold the highest magistracies ensured that
the position of priest was another way in which a position in the res publica could
be maintained from year to year.20
3. SULLA’S RES PUBLICA
The institutional framework which I have been describing was in place only down
to 82 B. C. In that year, the proconsul Sulla defeated an army commanded by two
praetors just outside Rome, and then took control of the city, having himself declared dictator.21 As dictator, he introduced a sweeping set of changes which fundamentally altered how Roman politics worked. The radical nature of the Sullan res
publica has often been ignored, influenced perhaps by the surviving ancient sources
which largely, and generally uncritically, accept Sulla’s own presentation of his
activity as a restoration, restituere. And it is true that the institutions of the state
appear unchanged insofar as the magistrates remained, with the same names and
held in the same order as before, the Senate continued in existence and citizenship
remained the basis of mass political participation. However, this view is deceptive:
if we drill down to the details of Sulla’s changes, and above all if we reflect on institutions in practice, it becomes apparent that the res publica was transformed. To
this extent, then, I am entirely in accord with Flower, who claims that ‘Sulla the
dictator effectively declared that a traditional republican system led by nobiles had
failed within his own lifetime…It is vital to understand that his New Republic was
not a restoration of any kind’.22 Nonetheless, Flower overestimates the extent to
18 On the role of consulars in the Senate, M. Jehne, ‘The rise of the consular as a social type in the
third and second centuries b. c.’, in H. Beck, et al, edd., Consuls and Res Publica: Holding High
Office in the Roman Republic (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P. 2011), 211–31.
19 F. X. Ryan, Rank and Participation in the Republican Senate (Stuttgart: Steiner, 1998), 137–
246.
20 J. Richardson and F. Santangelo (edd.), Priests and State in the Roman World (Stuttgart:
Steiner, 2011).
21 T. Hantos, Res Publica Constituta: Die Verfassung des Dictators Sulla (Stuttgart: Steiner,
1988); F. Hurlet, La Dictature de Sylla: Monarchie ou magistrature republicaine? Essai d’histoire constitutionelle (Brussels: Institut Historique Belge de Rome, 1993).
22Flower, Republics (n. 1, above), 129–30.
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which the post-Sullan res publica operated in accord with what she discerns as
Sulla’s vision. The three decades which separate Sulla’s retirement from the fresh
outbreak of civil war in 49 were indeed a new kind of res publica: but it was also
highly unstable, riddled with design flaws whose consequences Sulla may or may
not have intended or envisaged.
The significance and extent of Sulla’s changes is evident if one considers their
effect on the annual cycle of political activity. A major shift occurred around elections: these now took place in late summer, rather than November or December.
The cause of this shift was apparently trivial: the rise in the number of praetorships
from six to eight meant that praetorian elections took too long to be held during
daylight in the winter.23 When they were consequently moved to the summer, the
elections to other offices moved too; the usual date appears to have been in July,
though elections were subject to delays, particularly in the 50s. This change of date
had a profound effect on the nature of citizen participation in political life: to be an
electoral voter now meant being present in Rome during high summer. This is likely
to have had some effect on the socio-economic composition of those citizens who
travelled to Rome to vote – that is, one can suspect that anyone who was directly
involved in agricultural activity would have some difficulty in leaving their duties.
In addition, it had consequences for participation by soldiers. Although late
Republican armies were often active at a considerable distance from Rome and
their absences lasted for years, some soldiers involved in campaigns closer at hand.
These men could potentially vote in a winter election, but were barred from exercising their vote with summer elections. Throughout the fifties there was a large
Roman army in Gaul, and permitting its members to vote is cited as reason for some
of the delays which were so prevalent in the timetable of elections during that decade.
The emergence of high summer as a key moment for citizen participation because elections were held then was matched by a decrease in the importance of
winter. Tribunes of the plebs seem as a result of Sulla’s changes to have lost the
capacity to propose legislation, and so that period immediately after their entry into
office in December, when tribunician legislation had formerly been proposed,
ceased to be one of activity. Furthermore, we might speculate that the tribunician
elections themselves attracted less interest once the office was stripped so extensively of its powers. And although curule magistrates did sponsor legislation during
the 70s when the tribunes were not legislatively active, it is less easy to see a pattern
in the times during the year at which they did so. The leges Aeliae et Fufiae, which
had been in force since the 90s, stipulated a timetable for legislation which in theory
will have alerted those citizens resident outside Rome to imminent opportunities to
exercise their vote, though we may suspect that the absence of predictability reduced participation. In addition, these changes to the citizen’s year took place when
the citizen body itself had recently been profoundly altered by the extension of the
franchise following the Social War. In theory, every free inhabitant of Italy was now
a Roman citizen. In practice, the process of assimilation took time and was presum23Brennan, Praetorship (n. 16, above), 391 n.15.
The Roman Political Year and the End of the Republic
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ably delayed, at least in terms of classifying new citizens by centuries, by the lack
of a census between 86 and 70. These new citizens could probably vote in elections
where the voting unit was the tribe; whether or not they did is much more difficult
to determine. And I suspect it was much more difficult for members of the political
elite to predict who would vote, a difficulty which was compounded by the changes
to the annual cycle which themselves are likely to have altered patterns of participation among ‘old’ citizens. As a result, managing elections became much more
challenging than it had been prior to the Social War; these are changes comparable
in their effects to the introduction of the secret ballot, and the apparent rise in the
intensity of electoral bribery should be connected to the newly unpredictable identity of electors as well as to the increase in the numbers of some offices which increased the pool of candidates for higher positions.
The annual cycle also underwent some shifts from the perspective of office
holders. For those elected to the consulship there was now usually a period of five
or so months as consul-designate, in comparison with just a few weeks prior to
Sulla’s dictatorship. Consuls-designate had a privileged position in senatorial debates and used their position to plan ahead for their year in office and could on occasion influence and lead policy to a very significant extent.24 In addition, and for
reasons that have to my knowledge not fully been explained, consuls themselves
tended in the post-Sullan period to remain in Rome, even if they then proceeded to
take up an overseas province. This was not the result of any legal ban – Giovannini
demonstrated that the idea that there was a Sullan law preventing consuls from exercising their imperium outside Rome is entirely unfounded – but it emerges strikingly as an element in practice: consuls stayed in the city at least until late autumn.25
Furthermore, all eight praetors were now usually in Rome, and in this case as a direct result of Sulla’s reforms to the administration of justice: all had a role as a court
president.26 Thus Roman political life moved from a situation in which two imperium-holders were usually present in the city between the Feriae Latinae and the end
of the year to one in which ten were. As Brennan observes ‘on the most basic level,
in such a crowded atmosphere, with newly circumscribed powers – and with the
consulship now significantly harder to obtain – the temptation for an individual
praetor to grandstand would be huge’.27
Moreover, these changes had major implications for the Senate. I have argued
elsewhere that it is a mistake to see Sulla’s changes as measures which strengthened
the Senate (setting aside the question of what he might actually have intended).28
The increase in the size of the Senate, in particular, combined with increasing regulation around political life in general (or, to use Flower’s terminology, Sulla’s
24 F. Pina Polo, ‘The Political Role of the Consules Designati at Rome’, Historia lxii 2013, 420–
52.
25 A. Giovannini, Consulare Imperium (Basel: Reinhardt, 1983).
26Brennan, Praetorship (n. 16, above), 396–8.
27Brennan, Praetorship (n. 16, above), 397. On the political activity of consuls in the period, Pina
Polo, Consul (n. 8, above), 307–15.
28 C. Steel, ‘Rethinking Sulla’ (n. 1, above); C. Steel, ‘The Roman Senate and the Post-Sullan Res
Publica’, Historia lxiii 2014, 323–39.
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adoption of the role of a law-giver) pointed in the other direction, towards a much
less autonomous and authoritative Senate. In addition, the near-total destruction of
the most senior members of the Senate in the Social and Civil Wars of the 80s led
to a vacuum of leadership and experience within the Senate, a situation compounded
by the apparent ending of the position of princeps senatus. The Sullan res publica
inscribed onto the Senate with greatly increased force the primacy of the annual
cycle over other forms of structuring time: its debates and decisions were now dominated by annually-elected magistrates whose tenure of a position of influence was
strictly time-limited. It is also worth observing the extent to which these shifts in
practice made it difficult for the Senate to manage in any rational fashion the res
publica’s relationships with foreign powers. A lex Sempronia, proposed by Gaius
Gracchus in the 120s, had compelled the Senate to identify the consular provinces
in advance of the consular elections, the rationale probably being to ensure that
electors knew what tasks those they elected would be called upon to undertake. This
measure was compatible with timely decision-making in an environment in which
consuls proceeded to their provinces soon after election: the Senate was making
decisions in the autumn which could be implemented the following spring as the
consuls entered their provices. After 80, however, the Senate was compelled to
make decisions about the allocation of consular provinces almost two years before
they could be put into effect. Consular provinces would be decreed in the early
summer of a year, before the election of consuls that summer; these consuls would
then spend hold office the following year in Rome before, at the earliest, leaving
Rome in late autumn to begin campaigning the following spring. That is no basis on
which to run foreign policy. It is extremely curious that this situation was not addressed; of course, praetorian provinces were not subject to the same constraints, so
the praetors provided a more flexible source of imperium holders to respond to
crises. In addition, it appears that the Senate could amend decisions made under the
lex Sempronia in times of crisis.29 But it is striking that military crises in the
post-Sullan period were more often addressed through popular commands, which
sidestepped the lex Sempronia. The development of such special commands has
been extensively studied; it is surely correct to see their fundamental rationale being
the assertion of popular sovereignty and the exploitation of personal charismatic
relationships with the people by individual politicians to bypass the collective restraint embodied in the Senate. But I would suggest that an environment which
militated against decisive and effective control of policy by the Senate and reduced
opportunities for consuls to exercise relevant military power was another factor in
the emergence of special commands and in their winning widespread support from
among the citizens. The unresponsiveness of senatorial mechanisms to manage for29 The account of Lucullus’ intrigues in 74 to get the command against Mithridates (Plut. Luc.
6–7) implies that the Senate had the capacity to change his province. Cf. also Cicero’s swap of
provinces with Antonius in 63, which indicates that consensual changes were possible; and see
F. Vervaet, ‘The Scope of the Lex Sempronia Concerning the Assignment of the Consular
Provinces (123 b. c. e.)’, Athenaeum xciv 2006, 627–56. However, consuls who could not persuade the Senate to alter its decision under the lex Sempronia, or their colleague to make a deal,
were stuck with existing consular allocations unless they turned to the people.
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eign policy gave tribunes, once they had regained the capacity to propose legislation, further justification to articulate direct popular control over such decisions.
4. THE IMPLICATIONS
The Sullan res publica offered a radically new experience of political life for citizens and for senators and magistrates. The dominant political issue of the remaining
three decades of the Republic, if we consider Caesar’s invasion of Italy to be a decisive turning-point, was precisely an ongoing debate about the form of the res
publica in the light of Sulla’s changes, a debate which sometimes became explicit
but is more often to be traced implicitly in legislation and in institutional innovation. From this perspective, to focus discussion on the year 70 and the debate about
whether or not that year marks an end of the Sullan res publica is unhelpfully limited. What happened in 70 was important, but its importance was as much symbolic
as actual; and the process of adjusting to the Sullan res publica neither ended in that
year, nor even found its most significant expression then.
Consuls and praetors continued to be present in Rome during their year in office throughout the period down to 49, as did the innovation of summer elections
with the consequent period of several months in which consuls-designate had the
opportunity to play a major role in senatorial debate. Our best attested examples of
this phenomenon come from the 60s and 50s: Pina Polo highlights Silanus’ role in
the debate on the Catilinarian conspirators in 63, Celer’s opposition to concessions
to the publicani in 61, and Lentulus Spinther’s support for Cicero’s restoration in
the autumn of 58.30 The Sullan transformation in the nature of the relationship between the res publica’s executive officers and its deliberative body remained in
place: magistrates now exercised their functions and their imperium in Rome and in
the Senate. There are a number of examples from the 60s and 50s of the Senate
becoming stuck on a particular issue: the trial of Clodius in the first half of 61, the
administration of Pompeius’ conquests in 60, and the restoration of Ptolemy XII in
56. Cicero’s letters describe situations in which debate cannot proceed because
agreement cannot be reached on the matter in hand. In February 61 he noted (Att.
1.14.5) that ‘the Senate has decreed that there should be no action on either praetorian provinces or embassies or any other issue until the law [sc. on Clodius’ sacrilege] has been brought forward’.31 In the spring of 56 the consul Lentulus
Marcellinus ‘has removed all the comitial days…in this way very dangerous legislation is prevented’ (Qfr 2.5.2).32 The letters to Quintus and to Lentulus Spinther
from this period in 56 also refer to a number of Senate debates which could not
reach a vote because of filibustering.33
30 Pina Polo, ‘Consules Designati’ (n. 24, above).
31 Senatus et de prouinciis praetorum et de legationibus et de ceteris rebus decernebat ut ante
quam rogatio lata esset ne quid ageretur.
32 Dies comitialis exemit omnis…sic legibus perniciosissimis obsistitur.
33Cic. Fam. 1.2.1–2; 1.4.1; Q. Fr. 2.2.3; 2.3.1.
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The Senate had of course often been the location, prior to Sulla’s dictatorship,
of heated debate in which entrenched positions were adopted. What seems to be
new about the post-Sullan period is the frequency with which specific issues dominated debate, preventing consideration of other topics, and the extent to which procedural mechanisms were invoked to prevent decisions being made. After 70 the
tribunician veto was again available, but it is clear that it was not the only mechanism to prevent debate; non-tribunes, and particularly consuls, were also using their
resources, particularly limited time, to close off debates without reaching decisions.
This pattern should be linked to the duration of time available to men in which they
could be influential. Consuls had some months between their election and their assumption of office in which to signal what they intended to do; once in office, their
year was split into two, with the presence of consuls designate complicating their
role after the elections in the summer. This period was enough time to encourage
consuls to see themselves as having an effective role in the city (particularly as the
likelihood that they would proceed to a glorious military campaign was now slight)
but the end-date was always in sight, and in a system rich in reasons and ways not
to take action, inertia was an ever-present danger: a group which opposed action
had more effective tools with which to achieve its ends than those wanting action.
A revealing piece of legislation is a lex Gabinia to ensure that the Senate heard
embassies during February, which modified a lex Pupia which restricted senatorial
debate on other topics in January and February until embassies had been heard.
These date from their sponsors’ respective consulships, in 61 and in 58, and point
to an ongoing concern to manage senatorial debate and ensure timely decision-making. Although Cicero was not in Rome for the crucial period in 51 and 50 when the
Senate was failing to resolve the issue of Caesar’s command in Gaul, other sources,
particularly Caelius’ letters, indicate how difficult it was to frame and secure votes
on relevant issues, when faced with tribunician vetoes and with obstruction from
some of the consuls in these years. This institutional sclerosis was a major factor in
the outcome of that confrontation, when, despite a huge senatorial majority in favour of bilateral disarmament, a small group of Caesar’s enemies engineered a
showdown.
The reinstatement of all the powers of the tribunate, a process which began in
75 with the restoration of the capacity of ex-tribunes to hold other offices and was
completed in the consulship of Pompeius and Crassus in 70 with the re-establishment of the veto and the tribunes’ right to bring forward legislation, is rightly regarded as the most significant modification to the Sullan constitution. It was also,
probably, the easiest to predict. In De Legibus Cicero – not in other respects a constitutional innovator or a popularis sympathiser, whose blueprint for the ideal
Roman state matches to a remarkable extent the framework within which he himself worked – has his character support the restoration of the tribunate, in the face
of a vigorous counter-argument from his brother Quintus (Leg. 3.15–26). ‘Quintus’
argues that the existence of the tribunate promotes and enables discord within the
state: thus he approves of Sulla, ‘because he took away from tribunes of the plebs
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the capacity to do harm’.34 ‘Marcus’ does not disagree, but claims that restoration
was unavoidable: as the people had had experience of the tribunate of the plebs,
they would simply not acquiesce in not having it. However much Cicero believed
that the people should be constrained by the distribution of powers inherent in a
mixed constitution, he recognised that they had to have some role.35 Nor was he
alone in this; there is little evidence of opposition to the lex Pompeia Licinia in 70
itself. However, the operation of the tribunate from 70 onwards needs a little further
consideration. That moment is usually described as a ‘restoration’; and if judged in
terms of the formal rights and powers of the institution of the tribunate, that is
surely correct. But what of actual practice? There was a gulf of more than a decade
which separated the tribunes of 69 from the last college which had operated without
Sulla’s interference, in 82. (In fact none of the tribunes from 82 is known; the latest
pre-Sullan tribunician legislation is a lex Iunia from 83, authorising the colonisation
of Capua). In terms of institutional memory this is a significant break: as legislators
and active participants in the political environment, the tribunes of 69 began with a
near-blank slate. Whatever inherited tradition, unspoken understandings and indeed
technical expertise the tribunes had drawn upon prior to Sulla’s dictatorship was
now, for practical purposes, largely obliterated. The relationship between tribunes
and Senate in the 60s and 50s was frequently antagonistic: that had serious implications for the res publica’s capacity to be effective and can be directly related to the
hiatus in tribunician power in combination with the transformation in the Senate I
discussed above. The tribunate’s powers were restored in 70, but not its former
method of activity in which co-operation with the Senate was as common as confrontation.36
Finally, the question of how foreign policy was handled remained a significant
issue. As noted above, the development of special grants of imperium cannot be
regarded as a response solely to the difficulty of ensuring prompt action which was
created by the lex Sempronia de prouinciis consularibus when combined with
changes in patterns of consular activity. Ambition is clearly highly relevant; and,
insofar as structural constraints were invoked to justify special arrangements, it was
the shortage of commanders, not the untimeliness of decision making: hence
Philippus’ famous quip that Pompeius was sent to Spain – a senatorial commission
– non pro consule sed pro consulibus.37 Rather, the time lag involved in normal
senatorial decision-making created a vacuum – or at least an environment in which
new challenges emerged – into which tribunes could popularly and indeed responsibly rush, in order to provide the good governance which the Senate was failing to
provide. To that extent, then, the laws which gave Pompeius military tasks in the
early 60s can meaningfully take their place alongside the measures also put forward
by Gabinius and Manilius to improve the behaviour of Senate and magistrates as
34Cic. Leg. 3.22, Quamobrem in ista quidem re uehementer Sullam probo, qui tribunis plebis sua
lege iniuriae faciendae potestatem ademerit.
35 J. Atkins, Cicero on Politics and the Limits of Reason: The Republic and Laws (Cambridge:
Cambridge U. P., 2013), esp. 207–17.
36 See further on the pre-Sullan tribunate Russell’s chapter in this collection.
37Cic. Leg. Man. 62.
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part of coherent programmes of amelioration. The consequences, however, were
profound. Pompeius’ success in his commands during the 60s changed the nature of
what constituted military success, leading to a triumph of astonishing lavishness
and massive, unmissable remodelling of Rome’s built environment.38 He also put
forward a new model of military activity, in which a single imperium-holder orchestrated a large number of legates to campaign across hitherto impossibly extensive ranges of territory. These developments were taking place while conventional
military success was proving elusive: the Senate was reluctant to authorise other
men’s triumphs. In the autumn of 63, three former consuls (Metellus Creticus,
Lucullus, and Q. Marcius Rex) were waiting in the vicinity of Rome in the hope that
they would be permitted to celebrate a triumph. Their presence and imperium were
useful to the consul Cicero as he orchestrated an Italy-wide response to the threat of
uprisings linked to Catiline’s activities; but this was not a normal phenomenon in
political life. Triumphs tended to be delayed after the commander’s return only so
long as preparations for the ceremony required. The peculiar situation in 63 – that
is, the Senate’s reluctance to authorise triumphs – demands an explanation. I would
suggest that it is due to a combination of modest achievements on the part of the
men involved, particularly in comparison with reports of what Pompeius was doing, with the tendency of the Senate to jam which has already been noted.
The special command, as managed by Pompeius, proved an irresistible model.
Caesar seized on it and introduced two important innovations. The first was that he
used a tribunician law to give him his proconsular command, thus bypassing the
Senate’s plans. Pompeius had been a private individual, commissioned in the face
of a crisis; Caesar was simply replacing the Senate by the people in the normal arrangements of the res publica for its magistrates. Secondly, his command’s extent
was defined in terms of time, not task; he was to have Cisalpine Gaul and Illyria for
five years, and not until a particular threat had been dealt with.39 Such a formulation
was designed to protect him from being replaced, and thus is testimony to poor relations with the Senate which were not, despite some senatorial opposition, true of
Pompeius in the early 60s; but it also indicates the lack of a real justification for the
extended command. Caesar did not, in 59, have the benefit of a crisis to which he
could respond, though as it turned out he did his very best with the materials at his
disposal. A subsidiary issue, which became of such vital importance, was the failure
clearly to define when the specified time period began and ended. These two elements were replicated in the subsequent grants of imperium through tribunician
legislation. In effect, throughout the fifties, the Roman res publica had two distinct
foreign policies, one handled by the Senate, the other by the tribunes, guided by
consuls with a view to their own interests.
What are the implications of these institutional factors for the slide towards
civil war in 49? I conclude by returning to Gruen’s analysis of the problem in The
38 M. Beard, The Roman Triumph (Cambridge, Mass: Belknap Press of Harvard U. P., 2007),
7–41.
39 For possible use of fixed terms in the 60s, see F. Vervaet, ‘Reducing Senatorial Control of
Provincial Commanders: A forgotten Gabinian Law of 67 b. c. e.’, in O. Hekster and T. Kaizer
(edd.), Frontiers of the Roman World (Leiden: Brill, 2011), 265–90.
The Roman Political Year and the End of the Republic
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Last Generation of the Roman Republic, and suggesting that his interpretation is
both profoundly right and profoundly wrong. He is right in locating the causes of
the war in political life at Rome: ‘political conflict precipitated the crisis’.40 This
was not a war whose origins lay in social or economic discontents or which pitted
ideologically opposed factions against one another. Where Gruen is surely wrong,
however, is to ignore the institutional factors which enabled the suspicion and hostility which leading politicians, including Pompeius, felt towards Caesar to turn into
armed conflict. It was these, rather than a series of unfortunate events, which led to
disaster. The changes which Sulla had imposed on the res publica had weakened its
governing class as a collective body and created a political environment in which
the short-term interests of annually-changing office-holders overwhelmed capacity
to engage in longer-term planning; the relationship between Senate and magistrates
tipped out of balance. The result was high levels of instability and unpredictability,
which led to increasingly violent attempts by individual politicians to maintain their
power.
The annual cycle is only one element in this complex picture, but it deserves
particular attention because it encapsulates the nature of the transformation of the
res publica following Sulla’s dictatorship: a large number of relatively small
changes combined to create a radically different form of political organisation. Yet
they were superficially compatible with Sulla’s overall message of a res publica
restored, a message which has, with rather few exceptions, dominated interpretation of the end of the Republic and distracted attention from the minutiae of political practice. It is only by acknowledging the transformative effects of Sulla’s dictatorship at the level of detail as well as in general terms that we can assess the end of
the Republic. Sulla broke the res publica as it had existed up until that point, with
its careful balancing between different interests; and for all their efforts, his successors could not put in back together again.
40Gruen, Last Generation (n. 5, above), 497.
THE ‘CULTURAL CRISIS’ IN ROME ON THE CUSP OF THE
REPUBLIC AND PRINCIPATE AS SEEN IN RUSSIAN
RESEARCH IN THE LATE 19TH – EARLY 20TH CENTURIES
Natalia Almazova
The late first century b. c. and the early first century a. d. mark an important border
in the history of classical antiquity; and the Roman culture of the Augustan time is
epoch-making for classical culture. Such was the impression of this epoch for many
people in Russian classical research, whose own time was also an epoch of cultural
transformation and transition. For this reason addressing their experience in the
cultural research of a much similar period of transition will contribute not just to the
history of scholarship but also to the study of what might be called a dialogue between the boundary epochs. This aspect should certainly not be neglected at the
present time, which in itself is a period of cultural transformation (be it from Soviet
to a post-Soviet, not often more fruitful, cultural paradigm, or from the Western
culture of the twentieth century to the notorious ‘post-modernism’).
The border of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries was of special significance
for Russian culture. The background for its intellectual and spiritual pursuit was the
feeling of a great cultural transformation. This feeling was especially deep with
people involved in literature and art; and it found a reflection in many of their writings and memoirs. Undoubtedly, this general feeling of instability affected the research of the Russian scholars, including their studies on the Roman culture of the
early imperial time. It is especially symbolic that the ‘silver age’ of Russian poetry
that falls within this time is rich in borrowings and even in direct quotations from
the motifs and forms of Roman poetry of the Augustan ‘golden age’ (as in the poetry of Mandelschtamm, giving many parallels to Ovid’s themes or in Brusov’s
variations on the Horatian Monumentum).1 Besides many scholars of classical antiquity in Russia had personal connections and contacts with people of artistic culture: for example, Mikhail Rostovtsev was a friend of the poet and philosopher
1
See in more detail S. Averintsev, ‘Sud’ba i smert’ Osipa Mandelshtama (Destiny and Death of
Osip Mandelstamm)’, in S. Averintsev, Poeti (Poets), Moscow (Moscow: Yazyki russkoy kultury, 1996), 189–276; M. Gasparov, ‘Poet i kultura (tri poetiki Osipa Mandelshtama)’, in M.
Gasparov, Izbrannye stat’i (Selected Articles) (Moscow: Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie, 1995),
327–70; S. Osherov, ‘Tristia Mandelshtama i antichnaya kultura (Mandelstamm’s Tristia and
the Classical Culture)’, in S. Osherov, Naiti yazyk epoch: ot arhaicheskogo Rima do russkogo
Serebryanogo veka (Searching the Language of Epoch: from Archaic Rome to the Russian
Silver Age) (Moscow: Agraf, 2001), 274–86; M. Zvetayeva, ‘Geroy truda. Zapisi o Valerii
Brusove (Hero of Labour: Notes about Valery Brusov)’, Nashe nasledie (Our Heritage) 1987
(5), 53–69; Z. M. Torlone, Russia and the Classics: Poetry’s Foreign Muse (London: Duckworth,
2009), 55–91, 118–52.
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Natalia Almazova
Vyacheslav Ivanov,2 Faddey Zieliński contacted Ivanov3 and the poet Innokentiy
Annenskiy,4 Annenskiy had good relations with Boris Warnecke,5 etc. Apart from
personal contacts and correspondence these scholars and people of art were connected by common activities in the domain of popularisation (such as publishing
the newspaper Iris6 and the magazine Hermes covering issues of Classical culture;7
preparing the History of European Culture in seven volumes,8 etc).
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
G. Bongard-Levin, M. Vahtel’ & V. Zuev, ‘M. I. Rostovtzev i Vyach. Ivanov (Michael
Rostovtsev and Vyacheslav Ivanov)’, in G. Bongard-Levin (ed.), Skifsky roman (Scythian
Novel) (Moscow: ROSSPEN, 1997), 248–58.
Vyacheslav Ivanov wrote to Faddey Zieliński in his poem ‘To the Friend Humanist’ (1933) the
following lines: ‘You, resurrected Lateran Sophocles, | Zeus in the Attic cloak, | My friend, our
destinies are not by chance | bound with invisible string: | my gift and your broadly lighted
talent | were bound by the will of gods” (Vyach. Ivanov, Sobranie sochineniy (Collected works)
(Brussels: Zhizn’ s bogom, 1979), iii. 530–1).
F. Zieliński, ‘Pamyati I. F. Annenskogo (In Memoriam Innokentiy Annenskiy)’, in F. Zieliński,
Iz zhizni idey (From the Life of Ideas) (Moscow: Ladomir, 1995), ii. 364–78. In fact, the relations between Vyach. Ivanov, I. Annenskiy and F. Zieliński deserve special research. Though
their biographies were quite different there was something common in their personalities. All
three were partisans in asserting the ‘educational importance of the classics’. This was not just
the cause of promoting classical education (see, e. g., F. Zieliński, Drevniy mir i my [The
Ancient World and Us] [St.Petersburg: M. Stasyulevich, 1911]; or I. F. Annenskiy, ‘O pedagogicheskom znachenii drevnih yazykov v sredney shkole (On the Pedagogical Importance of the
Classical Languages in the Middle School)’, Russian State Archives for Literature and Art
(RGALI), fonds 6, inv. 1, file 219, 8 fol.), but a wider task of ‘restoring the Hellenic concept of
life’. For some time there existed a sort of ‘division of labour’ between them within their common effort of popularizing classical culture. The audience of Professor F. Zieliński was the
milieu of university and gymnasia (Russian classical schools) students as well as Russian cultivated society in general. I. F. Annenskiy, who served several years as an inspector of middle
schools in the St.Petersburg University District, often spoke to audiences of teachers. Vyach.
Ivanov propagated the ‘Hellenic concept of life’ among the members of the intellectual elite (in
the circle of the ‘tower’ at St.Petersburg with its famous Wednesday parties: Yu. Asoyan & A.
Malofeev, Otkrytie idei kultury (Opyt russkoy kulturologii serediny XIX – nachala XX vv.) (The
Discovery of the Idea of Culture (Essay in Russian Culturology, mid-19th to early 20th centuries) (Moscow: OGI, 2001), 334–5).
B. Warnecke, ‘I. F. Annenskiy (nekrolog)’, Zhurnal Ministerstva narodnogo prosveshchenia
(Journal of the Ministry for Public Education) N. S. xxvi 1910 (3), 37–48; A. Lavrov, R.
Timenchik, ‘Innokentiy Annenskiy v neizdannyh vospominaniah (Innokentiy Annenskiy in unedited memoirs)’, in Pamyatniki kultury: novye otkrytia. Pismennost’. Iskusstvo. Arheologia.
Ezhegodnik. (Monuments of Culture: New Discoveries. Writing. Art. Archaeology. Annuary.
1981) (Leningrad: Nauka, 1983), 71–6.
The weekly newspaper Iris, devoted ‘exclusively to matters of literature, science and art’, was
planned in 1917. Among the its possible authors were the famous Russian poetess Anna
Akhmatova, Academician N. A. Kotlyarevskiy, Professors A. K. Borozdin, S. A. Vengerov, S. A.
Zhebelev, F. Zieliński, N. I. Kareev and A. I. Malein: Archives of the Institute for Russian
Literature, Russian Academy of Sciences (IRLI RAN), IRLI RAN, fonds 568 (Archive of A. G.
Fomin), inv.1, file 124, folio 8).
Many poets published their writings in the magazine Hermes edited by A. I. Malein. For instance, Valeriy Brusov, who collaborated with this magazine, proposed Serguey Shervinskiy to
Malein as a new translator of Classical poets: IRLI RAN, fonds 444, file 38 (letters of V. Ya.
Brusov to A. I. Malein), folio 20.
F. Zieliński and M. I. Rostovtzev proposed to Vyach. Ivanov to take part in this project, which
The ‘Cultural Crisis’ in Rome on the Cusp of the Republic and Principate
159
There are several aspects of Roman culture that were especially prominent in
the Russian research of that period. These are, first, the Roman and, more widely,
the Classical worldview; second, Roman literature of the Augustan ‘golden age’;
and, third, Roman art, especially theatre, though here the results were the least fruitful. Perhaps the most interesting and all-embracing concepts of the Roman culture
and spiritual life were created by Faddey Zieliński and Mikhail Korelin.
Mikhail Korelin (1855–1899), a professor of Moscow University, was not a
specialist in classical antiquity as such; his research interest was the study of the
Italian Renaissance. In 1892 he wrote two works: a study of the early Italian humanism submitted as a Master’s thesis but awarded a highly distinguished doctoral
degree in general history (1892);9 and a work on the cultural crisis in the Roman
Empire.10 Though Korelin started with the study of the Renaissance, his interest
towards classical antiquity was quite logical. Korelin directed his attention mainly
‘to the cultural contents of the history, to the power of ideas and images of human
mind’.11 Still in his studies of the Italian humanism Korelin defined the ‘release of
individualism’ as the major factor, which prepared the coming of the new world
view. According to Korelin, humanists started studying classical antiquity intensively not for the sake of academic interest but rather of satisfying their cultural
ambitions. They discerned in classical culture something kindred to them – a free
personality.12 In this respect Korelin’s attention to an epoch different from his own
must have included publishing translated works by foreign historians: see the letter of M. I.
Rostovtzev, 12 October 1912: The Department of Manuscripts, Russian State Library (OR
RGB), fonds 109, file 33, unit 87, folio 1. Quoted after Bongard-Levin, Vahtel’, Zuev (n. 2,
above), 255.
9 See the publication M. Korelin, Ranniy ital’yanskiy gumanism i ego istoriographia (The Early
Italian Humanism and Its Historiography: A Critical Research), i–ii (Moscow: E. Lissner and
Yu. Roman, 1892), 1–4 (St.Petersburg: M. Stasyulevich, 21914). The award to Korelin of his
doctoral degree was not typical, from the viewpoint of not only his but also the contemporary
time; probably it was perceived ambivalently by the academic community. Korelin wrote about
this case to the researcher of Western literature A. N. Vesselovskiy: ‘I thought it appropriate to
have my book compete for the prize of Metropolitan Makariy, certainly, not for the sake of
glory. Awarding me a doctorate for this work, thanks to the references by V. I. Gerier and N. I.
Storozhenko, seems to have caused some gossip and even the accusations of my referees’ having too high an evaluation of my book. It is true that this hissing is heard from the backstreet
and dark corners; I haven’t heard it in the open air, at least … Nevertheless I should like to have
the academic value of my book sanctioned by the other side” (IRLI RAN, fonds 45, inv. 3, file
418, folio 5).
10 M. Korelin, ‘Kulturnyi krizis v Rimskoy imperii (Cultural Crisis in the Roman Empire)’,
Russkaya mysl’ (Russian Thoughts) 1892 (6), 57–68; (7), 1–12; (9), 62–85; (10), 37–61; (11),
1–24; (12), 1–23; eventually a separate book entitled Padenie antichnogo mirosozerzania:
Kulturnyi krizis v Rimskoy imperii (The Downfall of the Ancient Worldview: Cultural Crisis in
the Roman Empire) (St.Petersburg: O. N. Popov, 1895).
11 N. Kareev, ‘M. S. Korelin kak istorik gumanisma (M. S. Korelin as a Historian of Humanism)’,
Russkaya mysl’ (Russian Thoughts) 1900 (5), 102.
12 M. Korelin wrote: ‘The development of individualism was the reason for the political, social
and ecclesiastic changes in Italy of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries… . Affected by the
historical conditions, the human personality rose to the perception of its right to all-round development; hence the negation of church tutelage and the demand of freedom and indepen-
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Natalia Almazova
research interest seems well-motivated: one might say he was following the humanists in their sequence of thoughts.
In his work Korelin distinguished the ‘world-historical crises’, which showed
themselves unevenly in the life of peoples. Some of them are followed by the ‘pernicious clamour’ leading to destruction; the other, ‘cultural revolutions, ‘take place
in the individual soul and thus change social relations’.13 Both kinds of crises are
related to struggle; but in cultural crises ‘the victory is achieved not by physical
force but by what creates benefit for each individual personality and, consequently,
for the entire society’;14 the victory of these benefits is determined just by their
nature. On this base Korelin defined the specifics of the cultural crisis in the Roman
Empire: in the first place he had in mind the crisis of pagan religion. The foundation
of classical culture was its vision of the world, and it was based on religion; religion
was the spiritual pivot of the epoch and gave to it the moral principles that satisfied
the needs of society.
Chronologically a cultural crisis might be quite protracted. ‘The cultural crisis
that started before the foundation of the empire not only remained unsolved by the
late third century a. d., but, moreover, achieved its highest tension; and its only
solution was Christianity’.15 The start of the crisis, according to Korelin, was the
start of the Christian era. Though the culture of that time was at a high level, all its
moral and spiritual foundations – citizenship and the devotion of a citizen to his
community, the supremacy of citizens over slaves – were, according to Korelin,
shattered. All these notions were sanctified by Roman religion, which at that time
lost the people’s faith. At that time personality grew out of the traditional notions
and started seeking a new basis for a new vision of the world. Such new vision,
satisfying personality’s demands, was the new religion: Christianity, which forwarded a new moral ideal.16 Only one thing is not clear about Korelin’s concept:
when and why personality’s need to release itself from its surroundings emerged.
Korelin did not answer this question. Also he did not say what was the stimulus of
human spiritual development, which defined the direction of personality’s activities
in all spheres. From his letters to another researcher of general history, Nikolai
Kareev,17 one can conclude that the answer to that question lay for Korelin in the
domain of psychology; but research into this point seemed a special and a difficult
task.
Another researcher with original views was Faddey (in Polish: Tadeusz)
Zieliński (1859–1944), one of the most remarkable people in classical research
within Russia. A Pole by birth, he was a professor at the University of St.Petersburg
(he moved to Poland and became a professor at Warsaw only after the revolution,
13
14
15
16
17
dence for the creative activity of human spirit’ (M. Korelin, Ranniy ital’yanskiy gumanism i ego
istoriographia (Early Italian Humanism and Its Historiography: A Critical Research), i, (St.
Petersburg: M. Stasyulevich, 1914), 270.
Korelin, Padenie antichnogo mirosozerzania (n. 9, above), 1.
Ibid.
Ibid. 2.
Ibid. 3–5.
Kareev, ‘M. S. Korelin kak istorik gumanisma’ (n. 11, above), 100–12.
The ‘Cultural Crisis’ in Rome on the Cusp of the Republic and Principate
161
in 1922); and the context of his own studies during his career in Russia was undoubtedly Russian scholarship.
In his studies Zieliński tried to define not only classical culture, but also
European culture as a whole, its ‘distinction from other cultures’18. This topic is not
found in the research of other Russian scholars; however, it is to be expected of the
Pole Zieliński, who passed a great part of his life in Russia in a personal situation
of cross-cultural contact. For Zieliński classical antiquity was a ‘living part of the
modern culture’; in his words, ‘it was the ancestor of the ideas with which we live
until now’.19 Antiquity is the first part of the single European culture, deeply connected with its later stages, though its world view is highly specific. The shocks that
European culture passed through, namely the emergence of Christianity, the
Renaissance and the Enlightenment, only defined the borders of its stages but did
not break its integrity.20
The end of the Republic and the early Principate were a turning epoch for
Zieliński. In his theoretical considerations, the unchanging element of culture is
‘not an institution, nor a custom, nor a form nor an instrument of the public or the
private life’,21 but a personality. The personality is ‘in the outstanding meaning of
the word a cultural personality’,22 an individual able to move the cultural evolution.
In the first century b. c. Cicero was such a personality. According to Zieliński, each
later epoch of European culture discovered in Cicero a new aspect; Zieliński believed that these epochs are defined by the status of an individual and his relationship to the masses. Antiquity was a time of freedom for selected individuals; this is
exactly the time that brought Cicero and his cultural contribution to life. The Middle
Ages were the period when the personality was dissolved in the masses; thus, at that
time Cicero was useful with his concept of civil religion as the religion of masses.
The Renaissance was the period of personality’s freeing itself from the masses,
when individualism appeared; in this epoch the letters of Cicero were highly acclaimed. The Enlightenment was the time when a personality tried to subordinate
the masses to itself; thus Cicero was in demand at that time as a philosopher and a
man of state. Finally, the nineteenth century was the time when a personality wanted
18 F. Zieliński, Zizeron v istorii evropeyskoy kultury. Rech’ F. Zielińskogo, proiznesennaya v istoricheskom obshchestve pri Sankt-Peterburgskom universitete v yanvare 1895 goda (Cicero in
the History of European Culture. Lecture by F. Zieliński to the Historical Society at St.
Petersburg University, January 1895) (St. Petersburg: N. N. Klobukov, 1901), 1; first published
in Vestnik Evropy (Journal of Europe) clxxvi 1896 (2), 661–701. This lecture became a cornerstone for the monograph by Zieliński, which comprised 100 pages in its first edition (Th.
Zielinski, Cicero im Wandel der Jahrhunderte [Leipzig: Teubner, 1897]) and 450 in its second
(Th. Zielinski, Cicero im Wandel der Jahrhunderte [1908]). See reviews of this book: F. B. R.
Hellems, CP iv 1909, 335–6; P. Shorey, CP vii 1912, 505–6; A. C. Clark, CR xxvii 1913,
139–40.
19 F. Zieliński, ‘Predislovie k pervomu izdaniu “Iz zhizni idey” (Foreword to the First Edition of
“The Life of Ideas”)’, in F. Zieliński, Iz zhizni idey (The Life of Ideas), i (St. Petersburg: M.
Stasyulevich, 31916), p. v.
20 Zieliński, Zizeron v istorii (n. 18, above), 2.
21 Ibid. 1.
22 Ibid.
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Natalia Almazova
to dissolve itself in the masses.23 As a matter of fact, Zieliński was not prepared to
say what the personality of Cicero might be for this epoch.
The second point connected with the beginning of the Christian era is the appearance of Christianity. Here Zieliński asked a question: did the classical culture
disappear after that? His answer is clear: it did not; the classical culture continued
to exist. Moreover, Zieliński believed that certain elements of pagan religion were
somehow meeting Christianity and preparing the Roman mind for its perception.24
Another important fact was that Christianity rose on Roman soil, and not on the soil
of Judaism, where it emerged. Zieliński said that an ‘academically minded person’
would explain this by the greater proximity of Christianity to the Roman rather than
to the Jewish mind: both classical culture and the Christianity to a greater or lesser
extent met the eternal needs of human souls.25
Zieliński’s ideas are hard to evaluate today. On the one hand, he grasped the
internal logic of the cultural development in Europe of the nineteenth century, when
mass culture started to emerge and the cultivated minority had somehow to accommodate to this process. On the other hand, if he had been more convinced of his
own theory, he would have expanded it with greater certainty on his own time – the
nineteenth and the early twentieth centuries. Besides, Zieliński’s method is specific,
as the academic analysis is combined in it with an irrational component that he
called ‘feeling’26 the source with a special ‘spiritual perception’.27
Many Russian studies of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries were
devoted to the Roman literature. Some of them were conducted in the field of philological analysis as such; however, it is more interesting to address the scholars of
cultural-historical research. A common characteristic of their method was the combination of philological analysis with historical approaches: a standard impetus for
analysing a work of classical literature was the consideration of the historical conditions in which it was created. Thanks to this many of them discussed the crisis or
the decadence in the literature of the transition from the Republic to the Principate;
some of them approached the historical evaluation of this transitional epoch.
Here attention should be paid to the study of Horace by Nikolai Blagovesh­
chenskiy (1821–1892), which appeared earlier than the concepts we have already
23 Ibid., 25–54.
24 F. Zieliński, ‘Rome and Its Religion’, in F. Zieliński, Iz zhizni idey (The Life of Ideas), iii.
Soperniki hristianstva (The Concurrents of Christianity) (St. Petersburg: M. Stasyulevich,
1907), 5.
25 F. Zieliński, ‘Harakter antichnoy religii v sravnenii s hristianstvom (The Character of Ancient
Religion Compared to Christianity)’, in F. Zieliński, Iz zhizni idey (The Life of Ideas), ii (St.
Petersburg: M. Stasyulevich, 1911), 363.
26 F. Zieliński, ‘Predislovie (Foreword)’, in F. Zieliński, Iz zhizni idey (The Life of Ideas), iii.
Soperniki hristianstva (The Concurrents of Christianity) (St.Petersburg: M. Stasyulevich,
1907), p. vi.
27 O. Nikitinskiy & A. Rossius, ‘F. F. Zieliński i problemy kulturologii (Analis metodologii) (F. F.
Zieliński and the Problems of Culturology (The Analysis of Methodology)’, in Istoria evropeiskoy zivilizazii v russkoy nauke. Antichnoe nasledie (The History of European Civilisation in
Russian Scholarship. The Classical Heritage) (Moscow: INION RAN, 1991), 133.
The ‘Cultural Crisis’ in Rome on the Cusp of the Republic and Principate
163
considered.28 Blagoveshchenskiy’s approach to this poet was defined rather by public than by purely academic interest in him.29 Blagoveshchenskiy did not only formulate academic questions but also drew analogies with the Russian situation of the
mid nineteenth century before and after the abolition of serfdom, i. e. the time of his
own life. When Blagoveshchenskiy described the historical situation in Rome before and after Augustus as despotism, an observer from outside might have said that
the scholar was expressing his attitude towards the Russian monarchy. However,
this scholar’s idea of despotism was somewhat unexpected. According to Blagovesh­
chenskiy Augustus’ time was an interval between the civil wars and the established
empire dating from the rule of Tiberius; and it is these epochs that Blagoveshchenskiy
defined as ‘despotism’.30 The rule of Augustus between them was a rational political regime, which was necessary for Rome and even made a ‘brilliant page in
Roman history’.31 For Blagoveshchenskiy the figure of Horace is a ‘good historical
lesson for our youth’, a ‘rare and instructive example of an honest and logical transition from one conviction to another’ (see my n. 29). Blagoveshchenskiy tried to
decide if Horace was a flattering courtier or, on the contrary, a man who sincerely
changed his ideals because believed that it was necessary for saving his country;32
in fact, he chose the second option.
Though Blagoveshchenskiy assessed Augustus positively, he said that the
change of political form in Rome became possible only after the Roman life lost
some essential internal elements. The literature of the Augustan time, the so-called
‘golden age’ of Roman literature, well showed the complexity of this epoch of transition. Significantly, Blagoveshchenskiy advanced a proposal which was supported
later in Russian research of the late twentieth century (e. g. by Mikhail Gasparov):33
the evolution of literature in Augustan Rome was not a uniform process; the struggle in the writing of that time was defined not just by artistic factors (the search for
means of expression, style, language options, etc.). In Blagoveshchenskiy’s thinking, the existence of literary factions or trends of that time could be an indicator of
a specific social and even political struggle: the ‘archaists’ fought with the ‘hymners
28 N. Blagoveshchenskiy, Goraziy i ego vremya (Horace and his Time) (St. Petersburg: Imperial
Academy of Sciences, 1864; Warsaw: M. Zemkevitch and V. Noakovskiy, 21878).
29 N. Blagoveshchenskiy wrote in a letter to his pupil I. Zvetaev: ‘This theme for a long time
caught my attention as a good historical lesson for our youth. It is difficult to find another rare
and instructive example of an honest and logical transition from one conviction to another,
opposite to the former. Horace, once a passionate Republican and eventually as passionate a
monarchist, might have seemed to other people an ordinary renegade. This case was worth
studying; and I consider my book a strict and a conscientious psychological study, which has a
certain not purely academic but also public interest’ (quoted from I. V. Pomyalovskiy, ‘N. M.
Blagoveshchenskiy (obituary)’, Zhurnal Ministerstva narodnogo prosveshchenia (Journal of
the Ministry for Public Education) cclxxxiii 1892 (9), 35).
30 Blagoveshchenskiy, Goraziy (n. 28, above), 184.
31 Ibid. 184–85.
32 N. Blagoveshchenskiy, ‘Istoria rimskoy literatury d-ra E. Munka (rezenzia) (A History of
Roman Literature by Dr. E. Munk [review])’, Zhurnal Ministerstva narodnogo prosveshchenia
(Journal of the Ministry for Public Education) cxiii 1862 (1), 102.
33 See, e. g., M. Gasparov, ‘Poslanie Gorazia Avgustu (The Epistle of Horace to Augustus)’, VDI
1964 (2), 162–3.
164
Natalia Almazova
of Augustus’ not just for traditional Latin poetic forms and against hellenophilia but
also for republican principles and against the monarchist tastes of the new faction,
to which Horace belonged.34 Unfortunately, this important point was not developed
by Blagoveshchenskiy completely.
Another interesting view on the Roman literature of the Augustan time was
given by Blagoveshchenskiy’s pupil Vassily Modestov (1839–1907). At first
Modestov was studying the historical and literary heritage of Tacitus: this was the
theme of his Master’s thesis.35 Later, especially in the so-called ‘Italian’ period of
his life, Modestov studied early Roman history.36 His basic view of Augustan literature is given in his collection of lectures on the history of Roman literature, published in three editions in the 1870s – 1880s.37 Though the lectures were republished three times in 15 years, and one might expect that the views of Modestov
changed somewhat during this period, this did not happen. Certainly, the third edition of Modestov’s lectures took notice of newly-discovered sources and new bibliography, but this did not affect the essence of his concept. He himself wrote: ‘The
early elaboration of these lectures took a too vast and long labour for me to find
enough reason to change their plan or contents, as well as the opinions referring to
the assessment of literary occurrences in Roman life or the scholarly works of modern time’.38 This work was appreciated highly by such prominent classicists as Ivan
Zvetayev39 and Mikhail Rostovtsev.40
According to Modestov, the Roman Augustan culture was, on the one hand,
‘the height of literary development, where Roman literature reached its classical
perfection and acquired world significance’.41 On the other hand, the greatness that
it achieved had its dark sides: the Augustan age was not only the peak of the literary
34 Blagoveshchenskiy, Goraziy (n. 28, above), 231–72.
35 V. Modestov, Tazit i ego sochinenia. Istoriko-literaturnoe issledovanie (Tacitus and his Works.
Historical and Literary Study) (St. Petersburg: N. Tiblen, 1864).
36 V. Modestov, Vvedenie v rimskuyu istoriu (Introduction to Roman History), i (St. Petersburg:
M. O. Wolf, 1902); ii (1904).
37 V. Modestov, Lekzii po istorii rimskoy literatury (Lectures in the History of Roman Literature)
(Kiev: U. P., 1873–1875; St. Petersburg: Maykov, 21876 ; St. Petersburg: L. F. Panteleev,
31888).
38 V. Modestov, Lekzii3 (n. 37, above), p. ii.
39 ‘Had V. I. Modestov written and published nothing except this course, even then an honoured
name among the professors of the historical-philological faculties of the universities would be
secured to him’ (I. Zvetaev, ‘Professor Vassiliy Ivanovitch Modestov. Po povodu 40-letia ego
nauchno-pedagogicheskoy deyatelnosti (Prof. V. I. Modestov. On the 40th Anniversary of his
Academic and Literary Activities)’, Filologicheskoe obozrenie (Philological Revue) 1899 (17),
85–6.
40 ‘Not only one generation of young classicists was introduced to research in Roman literature
by the book by V. I. Modestov. Whatever faults were found with it – and any big work has faults
– a great advantage is inherent in it: this book is doubtless a fruit of empathic reading and communicating not all but a greater number of Roman authors, of the communicating process that
led the author of the book to understand vividly the importance of specific authors and the idea
of the general trend of Roman literature’ (M. Rostovtzev, ‘V. I. Modestov [nekrolog] (V. I.
Modestov [obituary])’, Zhurnal Ministerstva narodnogo prosveshchenia (Journal of the
Ministry for Public Education) N. S. × 1907 (July), 80.
41 V. Modestov, ‘Vstupitelnaya lekzia po istorii rimskoy literatury (Introductory Lecture on the
The ‘Cultural Crisis’ in Rome on the Cusp of the Republic and Principate
165
development but equally the start of its decline.42 In Modestov’s view this decline
was connected to the political processes in Rome at that time. The establishment of
the empire, or, in Modestov’s words, of the ‘military despotism’,43 was the necessary consequence of the internal processes that shook the Roman republic after the
time of the Gracchi; and in the general evolution of Roman history the empire is a
‘time of undoubted decline’.44 Modestov’s concept gives an explanation of this: he
distinguished two types of social revolutions, one of which brought benefit to the
people and the other brought buds of trouble disguised as benefit and marked the
start of a decline. Such a revolution was the establishment of Augustus’ principate.
The age of Augustus as such did not create anything new: on the one hand, this was
the result of the previous history of Rome; on the other hand, this was the border
reached by Rome through hellenisation. After it came a perversion of the state regime, a decline in intellectual life, and moral and social decay.45 The new political
regime (‘state despotism’) oppressed freedom of speech, which, according to
Modestov, was necessary for the flourishing of talent.46 Here, as in the case of
Blagoveshchenskiy, Modestov’s view is probably related to his opinion on Russian
policy, especially in the field of education.47 He was critical of the formal introduction of classical education at schools and universities, and this affected his own
career: for his critical articles he was dismissed from the University of St. Petersburg
and did not teach for about ten years (from the late 1870s to the late 1880s).48
The classical art of Greece and Rome also evoked a great interest in Russian
research in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries; though there were not
so many studies dealing specifically with Roman Augustan art and even with the
Roman art in general. This might be explained, on the one hand, by the idea of
Roman art as secondary and imitative, at the level of direct borrowing; thus it did
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
History of Roman Literature)’, Zhurnal Ministerstva narodnogo prosveshchenia (Journal of
the Ministry for Public Education) ccxlvii 1886, 216.
Ibid., 217–8.
V. Modestov, Lekzii3 (n. 37, above), 556.
Ibid. 558.
Ibid. 556–9.
Ibid. 559.
See the collections of his articles: V. Modestov, Shkol’nyi vopros (The Issue of Schools) (St.
Petersburg: V. Balashev, 1880); Idem, Stat’yi dlya publiki po voprosam istoricheskim, politicheskim, obshchestvennym, filosofskim i proch. (Public Articles on the Issues of History, Politics,
Society, Philosophy etc.) (St. Petersburg: V. Balashev, 1883). There Modestov spoke against the
system of classical education accepted at the time in Russian gymnasia and criticized the new
University Rules of 1883, which abolished the autonomy granted by the Rules of 1863. See
also M. Aksenenko, ‘V. I. Modestov i “shkol’nyi vopros”: materialy k biografii (V. I. Modestov
and the “Issue of Schools”: Biographical Materials)’, VDI 2011 (1), 153–9.
This enforced retreat continued for nine and a half years, from 1880 until 1889. In 1886
Modestov started giving lectures as a privat-docent at the University of St. Petersburg; and only
in 1889, after the death of D. A. Tolstoy (Minister of Interior, earlier Minister for Public
Education) he was promoted as a professor to the Novorossiyskiy University at Odessa: A.
Shofman, ‘V. I. Modestov kak istorik antichnosti (V. I. Modestov as a Historian of Antiquity)’,
in Istoria i istoriki. Istoriograficheskiy ezhegodnik (History and Historians. A Historiographic
Annuary) (Moscow: Nauka, 1978), 178–9.
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not make a specific interest for historians of art. On the other hand, the presence of
the Greek heritage on Russian territory, in the ancient sites of the North Black Sea
area, put before Russian researchers the task of addressing specifically Greek history and culture; this was also connected with the reflections on the spiritual ties of
Russia and Byzantine, as well as with the purely material aspect: travel to Italy for
studying Roman art was too expensive. No wonder that Modestov’s project for the
creation of a Russian Archaeological Institute at Rome, on the example of the similar German and other European institutions, was not supported by the emperor
Nicolas II.49
However, one should mention Boris Warnecke (1874–1944), whose special interest was the Roman theatre.50 The epoch of Augustus was defined by Warnecke as
a ‘careful transition to the orders of a Hellenistic monarchy’.51 The theatrical life of
this epoch changed greatly in his view. External luxury became a symptom of the
new regime. However, the internal qualities of the new cultural institutions did not
always correspond to their increase in number: the luxurious surface often concealed the poor contents of plays, as it was necessary to have regard not only for the
opinion of the cultivated minority but also for the tastes of the majority, which demanded in the midst of a performance a show of fighters or trick bears.52 This
change of taste (in Warnecke’s words, ‘perversions of the real meaning of the theatre’)53 dated back to the Republican time: its last two centuries saw a struggle between the theatrical fans of Rome. Some of them were attracted by drama with a
rich plot and meaning; others were bored by that and were happy only with the
glamour of a big show.54 Finally, theatre gave place to circus, its rival.55 Material
evidence for these conclusions by Warnecke could be found in a work by Mikhail
49 See the communication made by Modestov at the session of the St. Petersburg Society for
Classical Philology and Pedagogy on 20 September 1900: V. Modestov, ‘O Rime, kak centre
arheologicheskogo istoricheskogo i filologicheskogo obrazovaniya i o moih v nyom zanyatiyah
(Rome as the Centre of Archaeological, Historical and Philological Education and My Studies
There)’, Filologicheskoe obozrenie (Philological Revue) 1900 [18] 91–110). V. Letyaev paid
attention to this fact and substantiated it with a petition addressed to Nicolas II, which is kept
in the Russian State Historical Archives (RGIA; fonds 565, inv. 8, file 29618, folios 1–2; V.
Letyaev, Vospriyatie rimskogo naslediya rossiyskoy naukoy XIX – nachala XX vv. (The
Perception of the Roman Heritage by the Russian Scholarship of the 19th and the early 20th
centuries) (Volgograd: Volgograd U. P., 2002), 42.
50 Master’s thesis: B. Warnecke, Ocherki iz istorii drevnerimskogo teatra (Essays on the History
of the Ancient Roman Theatre) (St. Petersburg: I. N. Skorohodov, 1903); doctoral thesis: B.
Warnecke, Nablyudeniya nad drevnerimskoy komediey. K istorii tipov (Observations on Ancient
Roman Comedy: Towards the History of Types) (Kazan’: U. P., 1906). One of the general works
by Warnecke, The History of the Classical Theatre, was published well after the start of the
Soviet time; but in his own words it was the adaptation of lectures he was giving from 1898,
while his university teaching was inseparable from research: B. Warnecke, Istoria antichnogo
teatra (The History of the Classical Theatre) (Moscow/Leningrad; Iskusstvo, 1940), 3.
51 Warnecke, Istoria (n. 50, above), 204.
52 Ibid.
53 Ibid. 205.
54 Ibid. 206.
55 Ibid. 228.
The ‘Cultural Crisis’ in Rome on the Cusp of the Republic and Principate
167
Rostovtsev about Roman lead tesserae:56 there he indicated a great number of
tesserae designated for circus games57 and a small quantity used for theatrical performances.58 The introduction of tesserae as tickets for shows is dated by Rostovtsev
to the time of Augustus. The great number of theatrical tesserae indicates not only
the mass character of these shows but also a well-considered propaganda of monarchy in society: access to shows became a favour and not a right of citizens, as the
most interesting of them became a monopoly of the emperor.59 Thus the transition
to the empire caused a change in the functions of theatre within the Roman civil
community. The views of Warnecke on this point were definitely influenced by the
cultural and intellectual situation in the Russian theatrical life of the early twentieth
century: it could be described as a crisis of both Russian and European theatre. At
that time Russia experienced the spread of entertaining shows: farce, variety, grotesque, harlequinade. Warnecke’s interest in Roman theatre was probably influenced by this contemporary crisis in theatre: he wrote about contemporary performances, for example, about the Greek tragedies Oedipus at Colonus staged by the
famous Russian symbolist writer Dmitri Merezhkovski and the King Oedipus
staged by Max Reinhardt. Warnecke believed that both performances – the former
with its false mysticism, the latter with its exaggerated showmanship – distorted the
original appeal of the plays; and this was possible only in the condition of cultural
decay.60
The choice of these five scholars for the analysis I have presented was not random: their works give by far the most reflected and conceptual view of the Augustan
period in the Russian research of the several decades before the revolution. My
observations can be summed up as follows. All these scholars treated the epoch of
transition from the Republic to the Empire as a stage in a long evolution. The nature
of this evolution was defined by them from the viewpoint of their own interest: for
Blagoveshchenskiy and Modestov it was the evolution of the Roman state influencing literature; for Korelin and Zielinski it was the spiritual evolution of human
psychology or of the relationship between individuals and the mass; finally, perhaps
most unexpectedly, for a student of a concise topic that Warnecke was, the factor of
this evolution was Roman society defining with its mood and tastes the development of the Roman theatre. Symptomatically, the supporters of the spiritual factor
Korelin and Zielinski by no means saw it in religion as such: for both of them religion, for all the importance that they grant, is nevertheless just a form in which
more profound spiritual factors manifest themselves; however spiritual, the approach of these scholars is certainly secular. Another important thing is that their
approach is influenced by processes that had taken shape quite recently before their
time: both Zielinski and Warnecke take account of the phenomenon that we should
call mass culture. All these features of their research allow us to conclude that they
56 M.Rostovtzev, Rimskie svincovye tessery (Roman Lead Tesserae) (St. Petersburg: I. N.
Skorohodov, 1903).
57 Ibid. 90.
58 Ibid. 102.
59 Ibid. 102–3, 111, 308.
60 Warnecke, Istoria (n. 50, above), 205.
168
Natalia Almazova
not only saw parallels between the object of their study and their contemporary
epoch but were themselves with their knowledge and approaches the fruits of this
epoch.
IMPERIAL POWER IN THE THIRD AND FOURTH CENTURIES:
DEFORMATION OR EVOLUTION?
Pavel Rubtsov
Any periodisation is a victim of teleology. Late antiquity as a historiographical
construct is no exception. There are some quarrels about its borders,1 but they concern mostly the end of the period, not its beginning. Of course, scholars traditionally use different dates to mark the transition from the High to Late Empire, but this
transition is mostly linked with the accession of Diocletian or some essential points
in the reign of Constantine. Once it had been established, such a periodisation became constitutive for explanations of almost everything in Roman imperial history.
In some cases a cure for the rigidity of chronological frames can be found in a
conception of the ‘long century’,2 but it does not change the basic idea of the watershed. It is true, there are some voices against this differentiation3 and a number of
works where a distinction between the Early and Late Empire does not play a key
role,4 yet they are not usual.
Views on imperial power were crucial for the formation of this periodisation
and, vice versa, they fell into the trap of the division of the history of the Empire.
The rule of the late emperors is often treated as the result of a deformation of the
early imperial system under the pressure of problems accumulated during so-called
crisis of the third century a. d. This deformation can be shortly described by the
German term ‘Verabsolutierung’.5 But there is still a lack of comprehensive analysis of the process in spite of numerous studies on some issues within the theme.
1
See, e. g., A. Marcone, ‘A Long Late Antiquity? Considerations on a Controversial Perio­diza­
tion’, JLA i 2008, 4–19.
2 E. g. P. Eich, Zur Metamorphose des politischen Systems in der römischen Kaiserzeit: Die
Entstehung einer ‘personalen Bürokratie’ im langen dritten Jahrhundert (Berlin: Akademie
Verlag, 2005); K. Harper, Slavery in the Late Roman World (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P.,
2011), 3–4 (the long fourth century). Initially, as a conference paper, my article had ‘the long
fourth century’ in its title, but now that seems to me too speculative.
3 More systematically, J. Bleicken, Prinzipat und Dominat: Gedanken zur Periodisierung der
römischen Kaiserzeit (Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1978); cf., e. g., M. Kulikowski, ‘Regional Dynasties
and Imperial Court’, in J. Wienand (ed.), Contested Monarchy. Integrating the Roman Empire
in the Fourth Century a. d. (Oxford: Oxford U. P., 2014), 135–7.
4 E. g. J. E. Lendon, Empire of Honor: The Art of Government in the Roman World (Oxford:
Oxford U. P., 1997); C. Ando, Imperial Ideology and Provincial Loyalty in the Roman Empire
(Berkeley & Los Angeles: U. of California P., 2000). Cf. D. Potter, The Roman Empire at Bay,
a. d. 180–395 (London: Routledge, 2004).
5 F. Hartmann, Herrscherwechsel und Reichskrise: Untersuchungen zu den Ursachen und
Konse­quenzen der Herrscherwechsel im Imperium Romanum der Soldatenkaiserzeit (3. Jahr­
hundert n. Chr.) (Frankfurt: Lang, 1982), 12.
170
Pavel Rubtsov
The precise evidence of our sources warns against simple answers. On the one
hand, there are different opinions on who was the first emperor to be called an ‘autocrat’ in oriental style. We have indeed clearly visible evidence, from authors of
the second half of the fourth century, that Diocletian was such a man. Aurelius
Victor, Eutropius, Ammianus Marcellinus and Jerome make Diocletian responsible
for introducing the new form of ceremonial that was alien to the previous times.6
But all of them were dependent on one source – evidently Enmann’s Kaiser­
geschichte.7 Later authors also knew this version. As John Lydus states8:
This kind of orderliness (eutaxia), then, of Caesares was preserved by the Romans down to the
time of Diocletian, who, because he had put on his head a diadem consisting of precious stones
and had adorned his dress and feet with gems, was the first to turn to the customs of kings or,
truth to tell, of tyrants, and to survey the continent and burden it with taxes).
But, as is clear from another work of Lydus, that was based on Eutropius9, and so
he belongs to the Kaisergeschichte tradition too.
Lactantius, who was a contemporary of the tetrarchs, blames Galerius for an
attempt to introduce the mos Persarum but points out that the emperor could not do
it openly.10 Nothing in this account refers to any serious change in the imperial
ritual, and we can look for a later date. We can find it in some sources, where the
new ritual and representation of the emperor are attributed to the time of
Constantine.11 But we can equally well look for earlier dates, and our sources confirm them too. The Kaisergeschichte tradition knows that the first one who ordered
people to call him dominus et deus (‘lord and god’) was Domitian (or Caligula).12
The Historia Augusta blames Gallienus for his un-Roman clothing, and the Epitome
de Caesaribus preserves an opinion that Aurelian was the first emperor to wear a
diadem ornamented by gems.13 These variations, being dependent on the inventor
motive14 powerful in ancient literature, are complicated by a strong belief about the
uninterrupted continuity of imperial power from Augustus onwards.15 Even in the
Kaisergeschichte tradition Diocletian’s reign is not represented as a real turning
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
Aur. Vict. Caes. 39.2–4; Eutr. 9.26; Amm. Marc. 15.5.18; Hieron. Chron. 226с (Helm).
R. W. Burgess, ‘Jerome and the Kaisergeschichte’, Historia xliv 1995, 349–69 at 366.
Lydus, Mag. 1.4, trans. A. C. Bandy.
Lydus, Mens. 1.26. John of Antioch (fr. 191 Mariev), who also used Eutropius in some form
(see Introduction to the edition by S. Mariev, 33*–34*), drew on a similar tradition.
Lactant. De Mort. Pers. 21.2–3. In this case a conviction that ‘oriental’ rites were introduced by
Diocletian serves as a proof of Lactantius’ biases, see e. g. B. Leadbetter, Galerius and the Will
of Diocletian (London: Routledge, 2009), 232.
Epit. de Caes. 41.14; Malalas 13.8; Chron. Pasch. a. 330; Cedrenus. 517.7–9; cf. J. Bardill,
Constantine, Divine Emperor of the Christian Golden Age (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P.,
2012), 11 ff.
Aur. Vict. Caes. 39.4; Lydus, Mens. 1.26; cf. Eutr. 7.23.2; Hieron. Chron. 190h.
SHA Gall. 16.4; Epit. de Caes. 35.5.
A. Alföldi, ‘Die Ausgestaltung des monarchischen Zeremoniells am römischen Kaiserhofe’,
MDAI(R) l 1934, 1–118 at 6 ff.
E. g. SHA Alex.Sev. 10.3; Nov. Just. 47. praef.; Lydus, Mag. 1.2.
Imperial Power in the Third and Fourth Centuries: Deformation or Evolution?
171
point, because the notion about the change in the ceremonial aligns there with a
picture of Diocletian as a ruler with old-fashioned virtues.16
Closer reading of the De Caesaribus shows that Aurelius Victor was more interested in focusing on the changes in imperial administration which were still present in his time. He points out that after Probus’ death the senate was deprived of the
right to choose emperors and take part in the military command – the process which
was initiated by Gallienus.17 But the real threshold for that historian is the end of the
Severan dynasty, when the imperial office became open for pretenders not of noble
origin.18 Diocletian as humillimus just reproduced the behaviour intrinsic to this
stratum.19
On the other hand, there is evident disproportion in the sources for the third and
fourth centuries that has recently been recognised as a restriction for a full-scale
comparison of these periods.20 Serious differences in the scope and quality of the
sources made it difficult to outline the uninterrupted development of the imperial
government and imperial power itself from the second to the fourth centuries. One
example. Panegyrics – a genre that is invaluable for the reconstruction of the imperial ideology and the attitudes of imperial power – are preserved mostly from the
‘Later Empire’. This is a matter not only of the corpus of the Gallic Panegyrici
Latini, but also of other speeches in Latin and Greek.21 The only extant Latin panegyric from the Early Empire – Pliny’s gratiarum actio – was preserved in full only
thanks to a composer of the Panegyrici Latini, most likely Pacatus.22 We have some
evidence about third-century Greek panegyrics which were in a circulation in the
fourth century,23 and even a speech ‘On Kingship’ that is considered in modern
scholarship to be a product of the third century.24 But we have nothing comparable
with the corpus of late antique panegyrics, and thus there is a danger of exaggerating the novelty of the ideas contained in them, in spite of the fact that in his instructions on how to praise an emperor Menander Rhetor, in the second half of the third
century, had not invented but summarised the tradition25.
16 Aur. Vict. Caes. 39.8; Eutr. 9.26.
17 Aur. Vict. Caes. 37.5–7; 33.34; on the Edictum Gallieni see P. Cosme, ‘À propos de l’Édit de
Gallien’, in O. Hekster, G. de Kleijn, D. Slootjes (edd.), Crises and the Roman Empire:
Proceedings of the Seventh Workshop of the International Network Impact of Empire (Nijmegen,
June 20–24, 2006) (Leiden: Brill, 2007), 97–109.
18 Aur. Vict. Caes. 24.8–11.
19 Aur. Vict. Caes. 39.5–6.
20 E. g. E. Lo Cascio, ‘The Emperor and his Administration’, in C. A. H.2 xii (2005), 131–83.
21 For the genre in late antiquity see, e. g., S. МaсCormack, Art and Ceremony in Late Antiquity
(Berkeley & Los Angeles: U. of California P., 1981), 1–14; M. Mause, Die Darstellung des
Kaisers in der lateinischen Panegyrik (Stuttgart: Steiner, 1994), 43–62.
22 R. Rees, ‘Afterwords of Praise’, in P. Roche (ed.), Pliny’s Praise: The Panegyricus in the
Roman World (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 2011), 178; C. Kelly, ‘Pliny and Pacatus: Past and
Present in Imperial Panegyric’, in Wienand (n. 2, above), 223–6.
23 Lib. Ep. 1078.
24 I rather join the opinion of this speech as a rhetorical exercise, on the ground of the absence of
a concrete addressee, in contrast with other panegyrics; for this speech, see C. Körner, ‘Die
Rede Eis basilea des Pseudo-Aelius Aristides’, MH lix 2002, 211–28.
25 On Menander, see M. Heath, Menander: A Rhetor in Context (Oxford: Oxford U. P., 2004),
172
Pavel Rubtsov
Following the logic of the Kaisergeschichte tradition, which concentrates on
changes in the representation of emperors under Diocletian, modern scholarship
tries to attest such a change in visual objects – portraiture, for example. But the
unevenness of the evidence and often the subjectivity of interpretations cannot provide us with solid grounds for a conclusion about the deformation of the imperial
power. Thus the diadem as a symbol of new-style imperial power can be detected
from the time of Caracalla,26 or Gallienus, or Aurelian,27 or Constantine.28 As we
can see from these kinds of sources, a serious shift was made from at least the reign
of Gallienus. From Severus’ time the repairing of imperial statues was no more a
crimen maiestatis29 and from Gallienus onward portraits of previous emperors were
recarved – a practice which is well attested in the fourth century.30 For this reason,
we can hardly be sure that it was Constantine who emulated hellenistic examples in
his portraiture, while previous emperors did not.31 In any case, it is reasonable to
assume that the changes in imperial representation and ceremonial were slower
than the inventor motive supposes.
All of these points32 could prompt us to look at the third and fourth centuries as
a coherent period. The third century is often labelled as a time of ‘crisis’, though
after the works of C. Witschel and K. Strobel this characterisation is often contested33. One of the possible solutions for this challenge is to present a century-long
crisis as a series of crises, each of which demanded a solution. The ‘third-century
crisis’, as seen from the political angle, is the period of rapid changes of persons on
the imperial throne. There were about seventy emperors and ‘usurpers’ between 193
and 284 (i. e. from Pertinax to Carinus),34 and no stable dynasty after the Severans.
Diocletian’s reforms are now seen as an attempt to improve this trend, but, for comparison: there were about fifty emperors and ‘usurpers’ from Diocletian to the joint
rule of Arcadius and Honorius.35 The problems of the third century were too similar
to those of the fourth.
93–131.
26 A. Lichtenberger, Severus Pius Augustus: Studien zur sakralen Repräsentation und Rezeption
der Herrschaft des Septimius Severus und seiner Familie (193–211 n. Chr.) (Leiden: Brill,
2011), 248 n. 199.
27 For both see A. Watson, Aurelian and the Third Century (London: Routledge, 1999), 181.
28 Bardill (n. 11, above), 11 ff.
29 Dig. 48.4.5 (Marcianus).
30 M. Prusac, From Face to Face: Recarving of Roman Portraits and the Late-Antique Portrait
Arts (Leiden: Brill, 2011), 52 ff.
31 Cf. Prusac (n. 30, above), 59–60; for the hellenistic origin of Constantine’s images see Bardill
(n. 11, above), 19 ff.
32 Here could be added the archeological data which, as S. E. Cleary notes, show that visible
changes occurred not around 300, but around 200: The Roman West, a. d. 200–500: An
Archeological Study (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 2013), 5–6.
33 For discussion see, e. g., W. Liebeschuetz, ‘Was There a Crisis of the Third Century?’, in O.
Hekster et al. (n. 17, above), 11–20.
34 Hartmann (n. 5, above), 63–5.
35 Counted from D. Kienast, Römische Kaisertabelle: Grundzüge einer römischen
Kaiserchronologie (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 21996), without considering the changing status of the tetrarchy’s members.
Imperial Power in the Third and Fourth Centuries: Deformation or Evolution?
173
The greater number of the holders of imperial power and pretenders to it can be
seen not only as a sign of the ‘crisis’, but also as a result of gradual changes in the
imperial office. The Mehrkaisertum was indeed a structural feature of the fourth
century, but of the third too. Collegial rule was not absolutely alien to the imperial
office from its formation under Augustus,36 but it is the division of power between
Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus that constituted a new practice and that was seen
as a paradigm by late antique authors.37 The reign of Marcus Aurelius anticipated
late antique practices not only in sharing the imperial power. In 175 Avidius Cassius
proclaimed himself emperor, and this usurpation is noticeable for an attitude to the
usurper found in later tradition: one who could be optimus princeps was a rival of
the actual one.38 Avidius Cassius is indeed the first ‘illegitimate’ purpuratus who
has his own biography in the Historia Augusta.39 For late antique authors to put
‘usurpers’ alongside ‘legitimate’ emperors (principes cum tyrannis, according to
Polemius Silvius40) was normal practice though its origin is obscure.41 An author of
the Historia Augusta complains of scarce information about usurpers in historical
writings, yet that concerns the first two centuries of the Empire.42 Ausonius was
able to write De Imperatoribus Res Novas Molitis a Decio usque ad Diocletianum
after one Eusebius of Nantes.43 In the number of usurpations of the third and fourth
centuries, there could sometimes be a problem in defining who was really a legitimate emperor44 or in distinguishing a usurper from a rebel.45 This problem was resolved, cynically enough, by the opinion that there was no usurper, there was a
36 F. Hurlet, Les Collègues du prince sous Auguste et Tibère: De la légalité républicaine à la
légitimité dynastique (Rome : École Française de Rome, 1997).
37 A. Pabst, Divisio regni: Der Zerfall des Imperium Romanum in der Sicht der Zeitgenossen
(Bonn: Habelt, 1986), 59–61.
38 Cass. Dio 72.22.2; SHA Avid. Cass. 13.10.
39 Justification of such a subject: SHA Avid. Cass. 3.3.
40 Chronica Min. 1 (MGH. AA. ix) 518.
41 R. W. Burgess, ‘Principes cum tyrannis: Two Studies on Kaisergeschichte and Its Tradition’,
CQ2 xliii 1993, 491–500, derives it from the Kaisergeschichte, but Herodian already had used
such a formula as tyrannoi kai basileis (1.1.4) to describe those who held the imperial throne
after Marcus. And if elsewhere Herodian uses tyrannos and its derivatives for ‘bad’ emperors
(e. g. 1.16.1; 2.1.3, 8; 6.1.2; 7.1.1; 8.3.4; but cf. 3.11.8–9 on Plautianus), here he anticipates the
late antique political language in which tyrant was equal to usurper: see V. Neri, ‘L’usurpatore
come tiranno nel lessico politico della tarda antichità’, in F. Paschoud & J. Szidat (edd.),
Usurpationen in der Spätantike (Stuttgart: Steiner, 1997), 71–86.
42 SHA Pesc. 9.1–2; Tyr. Quadr. 1.1–2.
43 The poem is lost now though it is listed in the index of Ausonius’ works by Giovanni
Mansionario: R. P. H. Green (ed.), The Works of Ausonius (Oxford: Oxford U. P., 1991), 720.
For the identification of Eusebius, see Green, ‘Marius Maximus and Ausonius’ Caesares’ CQ2
xxxi 1981, 230; H. Sivan, ‘The Historian Eusebius (of Nantes)’, JHS cxii 1992, 158–63; but see
Burgess (n. 41, above), 496–9.
44 For example, Aemilianus in different sources is represented either as a ‘legitimate’ emperor or
as a usurper (references in Burgess [n. 41, above], 494 n. 16), and Maxentius, who was unquestionably a tyrannus in official language after 312 (CIL vi 1139), is listed as imperator in the
Chronica Urbis Romae (Chron. Min. 1.148).
45 SHA Tyr. Quadr 2.
174
Pavel Rubtsov
pretender who simply had not won.46 Such a strategy – to undermine the possibility
of distinguishing ‘legitimate’ emperors from usurpers in any normative sense – recurs sometimes in recent works on late antique usurpations47.
Mehrkaisertum and the routinisation of usurpation were, I assume, interconnected phenomena because the recognition of usurper(s), though tactically, at some
points played no less a role than the proclamation of a ‘legitimate’ co-ruler. Gallienus
held the ‘legitimate’ imperial power for the longest period between Severus and
Diocletian not least owing to the existence of the usurpation-based Gallic Empire
and Palmyran kingdom, which are not seen any more as an outcome of separatist
movements. In the fourth century Constantius II, preparing a war against another
usurper, Magnentius, arranged with Vetranio and, according to Philostorgius, offered him a diadem.48 Theodosius recognised Magnus Maximus, who was proclaimed emperor in 383, as co-ruler until the latter invaded Italy in 387.49
The usurpation of Maximus started in Britain, as did that of Carausius almost a
hundred years earlier. Carausius tried to use the same strategy, representing himself
for a time as a colleague of Diocletian and Maximian,50 yet he was not recognised
by the ‘legitimate’ emperors. The Diocletianic dyarchy and, later, tetrarchy were
rather modelled for the prevention of usurpations by a multiplication of the ‘legitimate’ rulers. The possibility for more than one man had to hold the imperial power
challenged attitudes to this institution already in the Severan time. Cassius Dio, for
whom the establishment of Augustus’ principate had marked a transition to monarchy, considered that the monarchical nature of imperial power persists regardless of
the number of its holders.51 In the fourth century Mehrkaisertum was rather a rule,
and the Roman Empire was under control of a sole Augustus without even a Caesar
only twice and for a short time. The reigns of Julian and Jovian were the instances
of this. If we take Ammianus’ words at face value, it was the army which demanded
the choice of a co-emperor when Valentinian was elected.52 First Valentinian elevated his brother Valens to the rank of Augustus, and in 367 Valentinian’s son
Gratian was proclaimed as Augustus too. Ammianus draws the following conclusion about these proclamations:53
46 SHA Pesc. 1.1: quos tyrannos aliorum victoria fecerit; cf. Aur. Vict. Caes. 33.24.
47 J. Szidat, Usurpator tanti nominis: Kaiser und Usurpator in der Spätantike (337–476 n. Chr.)
(Stuttgart: Steiner, 2010); cf. A. Pabst, ‘Das Imperium Romanum im 4. Jh. im Spiegel der
Orationes des Q. Aurelius Symmachus’, in Pabst (ed.), Quintus Aurelius Symmachus. Reden
(Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1989), 172; A. E. Wardman, ‘Usurpers and
Internal Conflicts in the 4th century a. d.’, Historia xxxiii 1984, 220–37 at 225.
48 Philostr. 3.22; on the episode see Szidat (n. 47, above), 68–9.
49 R. M. Errington, Roman Imperial Policy from Julian to Theodosius (Chapel Hill: U. of North
Carolina P., 2006), 33–4.
50 See the legends on Carausius’ antoninianus (RIC v.ii. 550.1): CARAVSIVS ET FRATRES SVI
(obverse), PAX AVGGG (reverse), and the issues for Diocletian and Maximian (RIC v.ii. 551–
6). For Carausius’ usurpation see P. J. Casey, Carausius and Allectus: The British Usurpers
(London: Batsford, 1994).
51 Cass. Dio. 53.17.1.
52 Amm. Marc. 26.2.3.
53 Amm. Marc. 27.6.16 (trans. J. C. Rolfe).
Imperial Power in the Third and Fourth Centuries: Deformation or Evolution?
175
In this affair Valentinian overstepped the usage established of old, in that he named his brother
and his son not Caesar, but Augustus, generously enough. For before that no one had appointed
a colleague of equal power with himself except the emperor Marcus, who made his adopted
brother Verus his partner, but without any impairment of his own imperial majesty.
This statement oversimplifies the tradition in some points. First, the proclamation
of sons or adoptive sons as Augustus was a practice well known to the third century.
Caracalla and Geta, Diadumenianus, Philip Junior, Herennius, Hostilianus,
Volusianus, Gallienus, Saloninus – all of these received the title Augustus under
their reigning fathers.54 It is true that all of them also were first proclaimed Caesars
to designate them as heirs, but Ammianus omits in the passage cited the status of
Gratian before his proclamation as Augustus. Valentinian’s son was named consul
for 366, being nobilissimus puer.55 Such a title is a result of more than a hundred
years’ development of the imperial titulature. Nobilissimus Caesar (ἐπιφανέστατος
Καῖσαρ56) was the standard title for would-be Augusti from Geta to Julian57, after
whom the title of Caesar disappeared until the time of Leo I. Since Caesars were,
as a rule, sons of the reigning Augusti, that could be reflected in titulature as in the
case of the Maximian’s son Maximus (Caesar in 236–8) who in a Greek inscription
is named γενναιότατος υἱός (most noble son).58 In the age of the tetrarchies
Caesars in official rhetoric were represented as sons of Augusti, which could be
supported by adoption, and in 308 a new title appeared for Constantine and Maximin
– filius Augustorum (son of the Augusti) – though for a short time.59 Also we have
evidence that a gold crown was to be presented to Licinius for the birthday of τοῦ
ἐπιφανεστάτου π[αι]δός, his ‘most noble son’, who perhaps had not yet been
proclaimed Caesar at that point.60 The abolition of the title of Caesar had not interrupted this tradition, but had transformed it. Already Jovian made his son
Varronianus, who was named consul for 364, nobilissimus.61 The formula nobilis54 See the relevant entries in Kienast (n. 35, above).
55 R. S. Bagnall et al. (edd.), Consuls of the Later Roman Empire (Atlanta: Scholars P., 1987),
266–7; Pabst (n. 47, above), 219–20.
56 For other variants of the Greek titles, see F. Mitthof, ‘Vom ἱερώτατος Καῖσαρ zum
ἐπιφανέστατος Καῖσαρ: Die Ehrenprädikate in der Titulatur der Thronfolger des 3. Jh. n. Ch.
nach den Papyri’, ZPE xcix 1993, 97–111.
57 S. Conti, Die Inschriften Kaiser Julians (Stuttgart: Steiner, 2004), 40.
58 M. Peachin, Roman Imperial Titulature and Chronology, a. d. 235–284 (Amsterdam: Gieben,
1990), 140 Nro 223.
59 Lactantius (De Mort. Pers. 20.3) expresses clearly enough a kinship terminology used for the
imperial college: sed eum (sc. Licinium) Caesarem facere noluit (sc. Galerius), ne filium nominaret, ut postea in Constantii locum nuncuparet Augustum atque fratrem; cf. Pan. Lat. 8(5).1.3.
For evidence for the title filius Augustorum and discussion of its meaning see A. Stefan, ‘Un
Rang impérial nouveau à l’époque de la quatrième tétrarchie: filius Augustorum’, Ant. Tard. xii
2004, 273–91; xiii 2005, 169–204.
60 P. Oxy. xliii. 3121. Licinius Junior, born in 315, was proclaimed Caesar on 1 March 317: see
PLRE i. 509–10 (4), Kienast (n. 35, above), 296.
61 SB xxii. 15768: [ὑπατεία]ς̣ `τ[ῶν δεσποτῶν ἡ]μ̣ῶν´ Ἰοουιν̣ι̣α̣ν̣[οῦ] α̣ἰωνίου
Αὐγούστου τὸ α (ἔτος) [καὶ Ο]ὐαρρωνιανοῦ τοῦ ἐ`πι´φανεστάτου; other instances in
PLRE i. 946 (2), Bagnall et al. (n. 55, above), 262.
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simus puer (ἐπιφανέστατος υἱός62) replaced nobilissimus Caesar for the designation of the future Augustus, and it seems more appropriate for the time when such
successors were children. Not only did Valentinian grant his son this title, but also
Valens had done it for Valentinian Junior before he had named him consul for 369.63
Thus the proclamation of Gratian was built upon an elaborated tradition which was
adopted for the circumstances of the 360s.
Secondly, sharing imperial power with brother(s) was acceptable in Roman
political practice and ideology not only in the time of Marcus Aurelius, as Ammianus
stated. In the third century, apart from Caracalla and Geta, who were proclaimed
Augusti during their father’s life and remained co-emperors after his death, Carinus
and Numerian shared the imperial power after Carus had died.64 Even in the meritocratic experiments of Diocletian it was nevertheless natural to style Augusti officially as brothers and, as we have seen, such a model was adopted by Carausius and
Diocletian’s successors.65 Constantine’s model of an imperial college presupposed
only one Augustus with Caesar-sons, but on 9 September 337 three sons of the deceased Constantine shared the power and Empire as Augusti.66 Valentinian, who
needed to choose a co-emperor but knew well the perils of the Caesar title, as illustrated by Julian’s coup, could make his decision following such a tradition.
All these models served dynastic stability, though this goal, immanent to imperial power from its establishment by Augustus, had not been attained up to the time
of Justinian, when the anonymous author of a dialogue on political science provided, inter alia, the project of regulating the legitimate acclamation (ennomos
anarresis) of the emperors.67 If we leave dynastic claims aside, the multiplication
of emperors and formation of hierarchical imperial colleges signify changes in government and in the imperial office itself. Cassius Dio, as has been shown, considered the Roman Empire a monarchy even if there were two or three rulers, and
correspondingly described imperial power in a highly institutional mode.68 So some
kind of depersonalisation of the imperial power was being formed in the third century alongside the mainstream concept of the personal virtues of its holder. The
existence of several emperors at the same time changed the attitude to the supreme
power as belonging to only one man,69 and opened a way for representation of em62 For Gratian: P. Hamburg iv. 263; P. Mich. xx. 803.
63 N. Lenski, Failure of Empire. Valens and the Roman State in the Fourth Century a. d. (Berkeley
& Los Angeles: U. of California P., 2002), 90–1.
64 Carinuswas perhaps proclaimed Augustus earlier than Numerianus (see Kienast [n. 35, above],
261), but the latter did not remain Caesar after Carus’ death and was elevated to the rank of
Augustus.
65 Pan. Lat. 10(2). 11.1, 13.1–3; 11(3). 6.3; cf. Lactant. De Mort. Pers. 8.1; 20.3 (quoted in n. 59,
above).
66 For the details see R. W. Burgess, ‘The Summer of Blood: The “Great Massacre” of 337 and the
Promotion of the Sons of Constantine’, DOP lxii 2008, 5–51.
67 De Scientia Politica Dialogus 19–20 (Mazzucchi).
68 A. M. Kemezis, Greek Narratives of the Roman Empire under the Severans: Cassius Dio,
Philostratus and Herodian (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 2014), 132.
69 Cf. E. Flaig, Den Kaiser herausfordern: Die Usurpation im Römischen Reich (Frankfurt:
Campus, 1992), 551–5.
Imperial Power in the Third and Fourth Centuries: Deformation or Evolution?
177
peror as a more ‘universal’ figure. This universalism was also connected with the
rejection of Rome as the permanent seat of the emperors and the ‘emancipation’ of
the imperial power from the senatorial order. Already Herodian in the first half of
the third century could put in the mouth of Commodus the statement that Rome is
wherever the emperor is,70 and it was clear from the proclamation of Macrinus in
217 that the emperor would not necessarily be of senatorial rank. This alteration
demonstrates clearly the destruction of Mommsen’s ‘dyarchy’ of the emperor and
the senate, but was it really a Verabsolutierung?
Gradually the growing absence of the emperors from Rome connected them
more closely to the perception of the imperial power of provincials and the army.
Apart from the higher abstract image of the distant emperor, which was formed in
provinces,71 this perception had great religious connotations, representing the emperor as a living deity.72 One of the central points of late antique ideology, crucial
for modern scholarship, is the sacral status of the emperor and his immediate environment, and we can assume that the formation of such a sacral aura was a result of
this divergence of the emperor and Rome. In political vocabulary, used in communication between rulers and subjects, the epithet sacratissmus, ‘most scacred’, for
emperors had appeared already in Domitian’s reign and in the Severan time or even
earlier imperial constitutiones and rescripti were normally represented as sacral in
official language.73 Consequently a violation of the imperial instruction considered
in late antique juridical texts as sacrilege.74 But what does this development of vocabulary mean: the growth of a religious attitude to imperial power or the devaluation of the term sacer?
Juridical texts show that consequences of sacrilegium in the fourth century
were different also. Constantius II needed to clarify that melting down money is
sacrilegium and implies a capital charge.75 In the cases of, for example, violating
the right to osculation of domestici ac protectores, or resistance to the emperor’s
decision about candidacy for an office, there was either an unspecified poena or a
70 Herodian 1.6.5; cf. Cass. Dio 53.16.6 on the palatium.
71 Cf. J. de Jong, ‘Representation and Perception of Roman Imperial Power in Greek Papyrus
Texts from a. d. 238’, in L. de Blois et al. (edd.), The Representation and Perception of Roman
Imperial Power (Amsterdam: Gieben, 2003), 278: ‘We may conclude that in Egypt in this period the emperor was not perceived as an individual with personal qualities, but rather as the
person who was merely filling in a vacant place’.
72 See e. g. literature in A. Lichtenberger (n. 26, above), 321 n. 12.
73 Sacratissimus imperator / princeps: ILS 6105 (Domitian); cf. Stat. Silv. 2 praef., 3 praef.; Mart.
8 praef.; ILS 1374 (Trajan), 6472 (Hadrian), 6988 (Antoninus);4052 (Marcus and Verus).
Sacral imperial orders: Dig. 40.1.5 praef.; 49.14.18 praef., 5 (Marcianus); 23.2.60.3 (Paulus);
27.5.5 (Ulpian); 48.16.15.1; 49.4.3; 49.5.4; cf. BGU ii. 665; for the preservation of the original
wording of juristic texts in the Justinianic edition of the Digest see F. Millar, ‘A New Approach
to the Roman Jurists’, JRS lxxii 1982, 272–80; there is an earlier example, from the reign of
Commodus, in the petition from the Saltus Burunitanus (ILS 6870.iii.24, cf. iv.13–14: the inscription is re-edited by T. Hauken, Petition and Response: An Epigraphic Study of Petitions to
Roman Emperors, 181–249 [Bergen: Norwegian Institute at Athens, 1998], 2–28).
74 E. g. C. Th. 6.5.2; C. Just. 29.9.
75 C. Th. 29.3.1.
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fine.76 In the Christian Empire emperors ceased to be the object of specific cult,
though the practice of consecration, which made a dead emperor (and his relatives)
divus, continued to the end of the fourth century.77 The terminology of the sacred
served for symbolisation, for making emperors universal figures as elaborated ceremonial did. But in this process such terminology became more political than religious. For example, images of emperors, retaining their significance in political
communication and religious rhetoric around them,78 were perceived in late antiquity more pragmatically. So, in the law on amnesty of 381, in spite of using this kind
of rhetoric for those who counterfeited coins with what was surely a sacrum os
(sacred face), this unforgivable sacrilegium is connected primarily with the fact of
counterfeiting, not of violating the emperor’s image, and that is confirmed by a
similar law of (almost) the same emperors, issued in 385, in which the rhetoric of
the sacred is omitted and a counterfeiter is named simply adulterator monetae.79 As
has been stated above, from the first half of the third century imperial statues could
legally be repaired and, if they were statues of previous emperors, recarved. In the
fourth century violation of imperial statues had a political dimension and, for example, Libanius in his exculpatory speech on the Antiochean riot in 387 scarcely exploited religious language for the violation of Theodosius’ statues by citizens: ‘what
happened was dreadful’ (δεινὰ τὰ γενόμενα).80 Thus the language of the sacral did
not necessarily signify any sacral attitude.
The representation of disobedience to imperial instruction as sacrilegium reminds us of another ‘absolutist’ feature of late antique imperial power as it is seen
in modern scholarship. The new (late) period in the development of the imperial
office is routinely connected with a conception that emperor is above any law. But
here again we are in the trap of the scarcity of our sources. The Principate as an
institution was always elusive of juridical definition, and the idea that late antique
emperors were free from the prescriptions of law is based on repeating several
phrases, of which the one most cited is Ulpian’s dictum princeps legibus solutus est.
This formula – a shortened citation from Ulpian’s commentary on the lex Iulia et
Papia in the Justinianic Digest – played an important role in the debates on a king’s
or an emperor’s authority in the Middle Ages and the Early Modern period, and in
the formation of the concept of sovereignty81. So later tradition did link the formula
with autocratic discourse; but was it the same in antiquity?
76 C. Th. 6.24.4; 1.6.9.
77 F. R. Trombley, ‘The Imperial Cult in Late Roman Religion (ca. a.d. 244–395): Observations
on the Epigraphy’, in J. Hahn (ed.), Spätantiker Staat und religiöser Konflikt: Imperiale und
lokale Verwaltung und die Gewalt gegen Heiligtümer (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2011), 19 ff.
78 See Ando (n. 4, above), 245–53.
79 C. Th. 9.38.6: qui sacris oris imitator et divinorum vultuum adpetitor venerabiles formas sacrilegio eruditus inpressit (381); 9.38.8 (385); cf. C. Th. 29.3.1.
80 Lib. Or. 19.8, 14; cf. Amm. Marc. 14.7.12; Libanius knew well that this crime is classified as
sacrilege (Lib. Or. 19. 36), but did not develop the theme; in contemporary official language
imperial portraiture was sacred: C. Th. 8.11.4 (383).
81 Bodini, De Re Publica Libri Sex (Paris, 1586), 78: maiestas (i. e. sovereignty) est summa in
cives ac subditos legibusque soluta potestas; cf. D. R. Kelly, ‘Law’, in J. H. Burns (ed.), The
Cambridge History of Political Thought, 1450–1700 (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 1991), 68.
Imperial Power in the Third and Fourth Centuries: Deformation or Evolution?
179
The full version of Ulpian’s dictum is: princeps legibus solutus est: Augusta
autem licet legibus soluta non est, principes tamen eadem illi privilegia tribuunt,
quae ipsi habent (‘the emperor is not bound by statutes; and although the empress
is bound by them, nevertheless emperors give the empress the same privileges as
they have themselves’).82 In this form the citation concerns, first of all, the status of
the Augusta, not of the princeps. It was in accordance with previous commentaries
on the same law,83 and the problem of the rights of the Augusta had persisted up to
the reign of Justinian.84 It was indeed Justinian’s compilers of the Digest who
placed this fragment in the context of the general consideration of law and its
forms,85 and this placement gave an additional meaning to the original text. The
formula itself appears in the sources too rarely and almost always in connection
with the emperor’s right to obtain a property on the ground of inheritance. In the lex
de imperio Vespasiani, where such a formula appeared for the first time, there is no
indication by what kind of laws the emperor should not be bound.86 But emperors
and jurists of the Severan period – that is Severus and Caracalla, Alexander Severus
and Paulus – all consider it to be an imperial virtue (personal or institutional) to
follow the law on inheritance, though in this sphere emperors were not bound by the
law.87 Yet even these statements, as well as one of Cassius Dio,88 show some evolution of the idea of the relation between the emperors and the law. Vespasian sought
82 Dig. 1.3.31: princeps legibus solutus est: Augusta autem licet legibus soluta non est, principes
tamen eadem illi privilegia tribuunt, quae ipsi habent (translation is from the edition by A.
Watson).
83 Dig. 31.57: si Augustae legaveris et ea inter homines esse desierit, deficit quod ei relictum est,
sicuti divus Hadrianus in Plotinae et proxime imperator Antoninus in Faustinae Augustae persona constituit, cum ea ante inter homines esse desiit, quam testator decederet (Mauricianus).
84 C. Just. 5.16.26: Donationes, quas divinus imperator in piissimam reginam suam coniugem vel
illa in serenissimum maritum contulerit, ilico valere sancimus et plenissimam habere firmitatem, utpote imperialibus contractibus legis vicem obtinentibus minimemque opitulatione
quadam extrinsecus egentibus. This law was issued on 6 April 529 – a day before publication
of the first edition of the Codex and little more than a year and a half before the compilation of
the Digest was announced.
85 Cf. Bleicken (n. 3, above), 23–4.
86 M. H. Crawford (ed.), Roman Statutes (BICS Supp. lxiv 1996), 39.22–25: utique quibus legibus
plebeiue scitis scriptum fuit, ne diuus Aug(ustus), Tiberiusue Iulius Caesar Aug(ustus),
Tiberiusque Claudius Caesar Aug(ustus) Germanicus tenerentur, iis legibus plebisque scitis
imp(erator) Caesar Vespasianus solutus sit; for the law, but with an another approach, see P. A.
Brunt, ‘Lex de Imperio Vespasiani’ JRS lxvii 1977, 95–166, esp. 107–16.
87 Inst. Iust. 2.17.8: Eadem oratione expressit (sc. Pertinax), non admissurum se hereditatem eius
qui litis causa principem heredem reliquerit, neque tabulas non legitime factas in quibus ipse
ob eam causam heres institutus erat probaturum, neque ex nuda voce heredis nomen admissurum, neque ex ulla scriptura cui iuris auctoritas desit aliquid adepturum. Secundum haec
divi quoque Severus et Antoninus saepissime rescripserunt: ‘licet enim’, inquiunt, ‘legibus
soluti sumus, attamen legibus vivimus’. C. Just. 6.23.3: Ex imperfecto testamento nec imperatorem hereditatem vindicare saepe constitutum est. Licet enim lex imperii sollemnibus iuris
imperatorem solverit, nihil tamen tam proprium imperii est, ut legibus vivere. Dig. 32.23: Ex
imperfecto testamento legata vel fideicommissa imperatorem vindicare inverecundum est: decet enim tantae maiestati eas servare leges, quibus ipse solutus esse videtur.
88 Cass. Dio. 53.18.1.
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to obtain the same privileges as previous emperors, Severus and Caracalla willingly
refused to use privileges granted to them, and Alexander Severus saw it as a norm
for the emperor to follow the prescription of the law. The last vision is echoed, but
without any reference to inheritance, in the constitution of 42989:
For a sovereign to acknowledge himself bound by the laws is a statement befitting the majesty
of a ruler, and, therefore, our authority depends upon the authority [of] law. And for a sovereign to submit himself to the laws is in fact a greater thing than imperial power. And by the
announcement of the present edict we show what we do not permit ourselves to do.
If the uncertainty of the legal status of the emperors provided late antique authors
with an opportunity to choose any strategy they needed in a description of the relation between imperial power and the law, in juridical texts we see rather an evolution to a more ‘constitutional’ than ‘autocratic’ model of this relation90.
This mode of thinking manifests itself in various spheres of government and
legislation, where a tendency to create a more comprehensive system, in comparison with the Early Empire, is observed. In law-making there was visible (at least in
the official rhetoric) an evolution to the system of the leges generales,91 and in the
government the formation of some kind of bureaucratic hierarchy. The last process
obviously started in the third century92 and had not stopped with the reforms of
Diocletian and Constantine. Their rule in total lasted more than fifty years, more
than whole Soldatenkaiser epoch, and surely the Empire was changed. Nevertheless,
if we see in the reforms of this period not a response to a global ‘third century crisis’
but reaction to immediate crises, this reaction appears as a continuation, of course,
more successful, of the policies of the third-century emperors. For example, the
famous reorganisation of provinces, as fixed in the hard-to-date Verona list, can be
seen as a result of the policy, originated in the Severan time, to prevent usurpations.93 The reforms of the fourth century were not just anticipated by some
third-century measures, but they were a prolongation of the previous policy.
Successors of Constantine, such as Constantius II or Valentinian, reorganised governmental structures according to the same logic.94
89 C. Just. 1.14.4: Digna vox maiestate regnantis legibus alligatum se principem profiteri: adeo
de auctoritate iuris nostra pendet auctoritas. Et re vera maius imperio est submittere legibus
principatum. Et oraculo praesentis edicti quod nobis licere non patimur indicamus (trans. F. H.
Blume).
90 Cf. C. F. Wetzler, Rechtsstaat und Absolutismus: Überlegungen zur Verfassung des spätantiken
Kaiserreichs anhand von CJ 1.14.8 (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1997); T. Honoré, ‘Roman
Law, a. d. 200–400: From Cosmopolis to Rechtsstaat?’, in S. Swain & M. Edwards (edd.)
Approaching Late Antiquity: The Transformation from Early to Late Empire (Oxford: Oxford
U. P., 2004), 109–32.
91 J. Harris, Law and Empire in Late Antiquity (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 1999), 30–1.
92 Eich (n. 2, above).
93 See W. Kuhoff, Diokletian und die Epoche der Tetrarchie: Das römische Reich zwischen
Krisenbewältigung und Neuaufbau (284–313 n. Chr.) (Frankfurt: Lang, 2001), 329–70.
94 See, e. g., C. Vogler, Constance II et l’administration impériale (Strasbourg: AECR, 1979); J.
Migl, Die Ordnung der Ämter: Prätorianerpräfektur und Vikariat in der Regionalverwaltung
des römischen Reiches von Konstantin bis zur Valentinianischen Dynastie (Frankfurt: Lang,
1994).
Imperial Power in the Third and Fourth Centuries: Deformation or Evolution?
181
Changes in governmental structures affected the imperial office too. Late antique traditionalist thinkers considered the emperors functionally the same as their
early predecessors, and this view occurs also in modern scholarship.95 Nevertheless,
the late fourth and fifth centuries were marked by the reigns of the so-called
Kinderkaiser (Gratian, Valentinian II, Arcadius, Honorius, Theodosius II,
Valentinian III), who were scarcely able to fulfil a serious imperial task – to command the army, not to mention such another functions as to be a supreme judge or
legislator. Again, this situation was not a unique sign of the time, but there were
several boy-emperors (as co-rulers) in the third or early fourth centuries. The difference is in the longer and more stable rule of these emperors.96 Traditionalists criticised their inability to perform imperial tasks by drawing a picture of the princeps
clausus, ‘enclosed emperor’, who never leaves the palace and, accordingly, does
not know the truth.97 This picture is not especially reserved for child-emperors, and
Ammianus, for example, blames Valens for his evasion of the judicial function.98.
The growing depersonalisation (institutionalisation) of the imperial power allowed
the emperors not to be engaged permanently in the administrative processes. The
princeps clausus, as well as the Kinderkaiser, was an obverse of this evolution.
Later authors could even find a legal basis for the evasion of some tasks by emperors:
From the time, however, that it happened that the last Theodosius assumed the imperial office
when he was altogether a child and in accordance with his father’s legislation was not permitted
to be present at wars, and after this had been barred by a general law which forbade the emperor
of the Romans to set out to wars, naturally the business of wars became the province of generals, while the affairs of the palatium that of the magister.99
‘Constitutionalism’ and the institutionalisation of imperial power were thus interconnected.
95 A. Demandt, Die Spätantike: Römische Geschichte von Diocletian bis Justinian, 284–565 n.
Chr. (München: Beck, 1989), 214.
96 See M. A. McEvoy, Child Emperor Rule in the Late Roman West, a. d. 367–455 (Oxford:
Oxford U. P., 2013), esp. 5–8, though see above on the titulature.
97 SHA. Aurel. 43.4: imperator, qui domi clausus est, vera non novit.
98 Amm. Marc. 30.4.1–2. In the passage from SHA quoted in n. 97, above, in fact there is nothing
about the age of a ‘bad’ emperor: cf. A. Chastagnol, ‘Autour du thème du princeps clausus’,
BHAC 1982/1983, 1985, 149 ff.
99 Lydus, Mag. 3.41; cf. 2.11.
THE DIALECTIC OF THE OTHER: POLITICAL
PHILOSOPHY AND PRACTICE
IN THE LATE NEOPLATONIST COMMUNITIES
Aleksey Kamenskikh
Among researchers on late antiquity there is a widely-received view on the philosophers of the late Neoplatonist communities of Athens, Alexandria and Syria in the
fourth to sixth centuries a. d. as almost a-political persons, who completely ignored
all the affairs of the terrestrial world – including its social and political facets – and
devoted themselves exclusively to intensive intellectual and mystical practices,
striving for the unity with the highest transcendent first principle. Indeed, among
the bulk of the late Neoplatonic treatises on intelligible time, on the eternity of the
world and on the multitude of super-physical levels of being, we can find hardly a
dozen texts devoted to special discussion of social or political problems.
However, since the publication of Dominic O’Meara’s Platonopolis,1 such an
approach can hardly be received as incontrovertible. O’Meara was the first to describe both the philosophical framework elaborated by the Neoplatonists for understanding and legitimising political activity and the factual examples of such activity
– from Plotinus’ project of the foundation of the ideal polis in Campania in the fifties of the third century to the attempt of the emperor Julian’s reforms (361–3) and
the polemic on the status of the last Neoplatonists, which occurred in 532 between
the Persian and the Byzantine courts.
In this short outline I should like to demonstrate that the series of extremely
interesting cases observed in the life and in the textual practice of the last
Neoplatonist communities of the third to sixth centuries can be interpreted by a
careful researcher as a set of modes by which the intellectual tradition of antiquity
and, more important, the hellenistic intellectuals themselves survived in an environment which increasingly became more and more alien to them. Being observed
from a specific, ‘inner-Platonic’ point of view, these modes can be described as a
kind of projection of the Platonic dialectic of ‘the one’ and ‘the other’ (presented in
Plato’s dialogue Parmenides) on to the social and political planes of reality.
Irrespec­tive of the specifically Platonic approach, these modes can be observed in
the general perspective of the crisis suffered by the traditional hellenistic types of
communities, and the hellenistic intellectual communities particularly.
The set of Neoplatonic schools of Rome, Athens, Alexandria and Syria can be
considered as the most representative case of such an intellectual community. Two
1
D. J. O’Meara, Platonopolis: Platonic Political Philosophy in Late Antiquity (Oxford: Oxford
U. P., 2003).
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main characteristics of this set allow us to observe the Neoplatonic communities
from such a point of view. First, these communities presented a system of fairly
stable institutions, whose constancy was supported by the common two-step curriculum which consisted of a strictly-ordered sequence of Aristotle’s and Plato’s texts
subjected to study, by the reproduction of practices both scholarly (commentary on
the authoritative texts and discussion of the classical problems) and religious.
Besides, the persistence of these communities was bound up with their relatively
closed character in conjunction with their network of many personal connections,
including family connections. It is known, for example, that Amphiclea, one of
Plotinus’ students in Rome, married the son of Iamblichus of Chalcis who founded
a philosophical school in Syria;2 Sosipatra, the wife of Iamblichus’ pupil Eustathius,
after her husband’s death (near the middle of the fourth century) taught in Pergamum
in the school of Aedesius of Asine, another pupil of Iamblichus;3 Julian, a pupil of
Aedesius, having become emperor (in 361), called to his court other pupils of
Aedesius – Crysanthius, Eusebius of Myndus, Maximus of Ephesus and Priscus –
to assist him in the attempt to restore the ancestral religion as formalised by
Iamblichean philosophy; and so on. Finally, the solidarity of the Neoplatonic community as a special social institution was supported by ‘the production of memory’
in the series of biographical texts – such as the Life of Plotinus by Porphyry, Life of
Proclus by Marinus, Life of Isidore by Damascius and so on – in the complex of
which the whole history of the Neoplatonic community was presented.
The second feature that makes the Neoplatonic community a good representative of any intellectual group of late antiquity is the generalised, synthetic and, at
the same time, systematic character of the Neoplatonists’ doctrinal studies. So they
elaborate the axiomatic philosophical system in order to find a way to reconcile
Plato’s and Aristotle’s doctrines with some theses of Stoicism and pre-Socratic philosophy;4 in their series of treatises they philosophically understand and systematise the principles of classical mathematics,5 physics and cosmology;6 in early
Byzantium they remain the last writers who keep the general style of the thinking
elaborated by the hellenistic scholarly tradition, with the technique of logical deduction, with the estimation of arguments’ probative value, with the discussion of
hypotheses.
The chronological framework of our outline is determined by two dates: 244,
the date of the establishment of Plotinus’ school in Rome, and 529, the year of
Justinian’s edict that prohibited the teaching of pagan philosophy in Byzantium,
and resulted in the forced emigration of Damascius, the last scholarch of the
2
3
4
5
6
O’Meara, Platonopolis (n. 1, above), 16.
O’Meara, Platonopolis (n. 1, above), 18.
D. J. O’Meara. ‘The Transformation of Metaphysics in Late Antiquity’ (Трансформация
метафизики в эпоху поздней античности), σχολή: Ancient Philosophy and the Classical
Tradition iii. ii 2009, 416–32.
D. J. O’Meara. Pythagoras Revived: Mathematics and Philosophy in Late Antiquity (Oxford:
Oxford U. P., 1990).
R. Chiaradonna & F. Trabattoni (edd.), Physics and Philosophy of Nature in Greek
Neoplatonism: Procedings of the European Science Foundation Exploratory Workshop
(Leiden: Brill, 2009).
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185
Athenian school, together with six other distinguished philosophers, to the Persian
empire.
First of all, we need to observe the ways in which political philosophy found a
place in the system of Neoplatonism. The study of D. J. O’Meara shows that the
gate through which political philosophy found itself legitimised in Neoplatonism
became the concept of the Scale of Virtues.7 The origin of this conception O’Meara
finds in Plotinus’ treatise On Virtues (Enn. 1.2).8 According to Plotinus, the goal of
a wise man is ‘the assimilation to god (θέωσις) as far as possible’ (Plato, Theaetetus,
176b). Plotinus emphasises the passage in Plato’s Republic (441d1–443b2) about
the four cardinal virtues: practical wisdom (φρόνησις), courage, moderation and
justice. According to Plotinus, these virtues are not the attributes of the divine life;
they are only ‘political’ virtues which deal with the ordering relation of soul to body
and the ordering relation of intellect to soul. But these ‘political’ virtues – the lower
steps on the scale of ascent to the divine life, distinguished from the higher, ‘purificatory’ virtues, which emancipate soul from her preoccupation with the body and
bring her nearer to the divine intellect – are nevertheless the projection of some of
the highest intellectual forms on to a lower, political level of reality. So Plotinus
demonstrates the ambivalent nature of ‘political’ virtues (and, ipso facto, determines the function of political philosophy): they are (1) the first step in the ascenst
of the soul to the higher levels of being, but, at the same time, (2) the imaging forth
of divine life, the divinisation of the political sphere ‘as far as possible’.
Porphyry (Sent. 32),9 the pupil of Plotinus, and Macrobius (In Somn. 1.8.6–8),10
a Latin scholar of the fifth century, comment on Plotinus’ treatise, formalise the
‘scale of virtues’ and detail the teaching of the ‘political’ virtues.
The most sophisticated doctrine of the scale of virtues, including the political
ones, was presented by Iamblichus, in his treatise On Virtues.11 The work has not
survived, but may be reconstructed in its main aspects from the evidence of quotations and paraphrases in the writings of late Neoplatonic and Byzantine authors.
Iamblichus extends the scale of virtues, adding the lowest level, the ‘natural’ virtues, that is, natural qualities of the soul in a particular bodily constitution, human
or animal; and he places the ‘ethical’ values between the ‘natural’ and the ‘political’
ones, arguing that some ethical instructions can received by animals and irrational
children. The scale of virtues is extended upwards also: in addition to the levels of
the purificatory’ values described by Plotinus, the ‘theoretical’ and the ‘paradigmatical’ virtues of Porphyry’s scheme, Iamblichus introduced the highest, ‘theurgic’
level of divinisation of the soul.
What is most important, the treatise On Virtues served for Iamblichus as a theoretical foundation for elaborating the curriculum, which was received afterwards
7
8
O’Meara, Platonopolis (n. 1, above), 40–9.
Plotinus, Enn. 1.1–9. With an English Translation by A. H. Armstrong (Cambridge, Mass.:
Harvard U. P., 1989), 126–47.
9 Porphyrius, Sententiae ad Intelligibilia Ducentes, ed. E. Lamberz (Leipzig: Teubner, 1975), 23.
10 Macrobius Ambrosius Theodosius, Commentarii in Somnium Scipionis, ed. J. Willis (Leipzig:
Teubner, 1970), 1–154.
11 O’Meara, Platonopolis (n. 1, above), 46–9.
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by all the schools of late Neoplatonism. In this two-step curriculum a strict correspondence was established between the scale of virtues, the scale of sciences and
the groups of Aristotle’s (the first circle of the curriculum, the Minor Mysteries) and
Plato’s (the second circle, the Major Mysteries) texts, accompanied by the commentaries produced by distinguished Neoplatonic scholars. Towards the end of the
fifth century the curriculum was supplemented with a preliminary circle. For example, in the later Neoplatonic schools of the early sixth century the complex of the
‘political’ virtues was thought of as linked with research in practical philosophy –
ethics, economics and politics – and proceeded through the study of the series of
texts. In the first, preliminary stage of the curriculum they were the PseudoPythagorean Golden Verses, with the commentaries of Iamblichus, Proclus and
Hierocles, The Manual by Epictetus, with the commentary of Theosebius, and some
writings of Isocrates – Ad Demonicum, Ad Nicoclem and Nicocles. In the second,
Aristotelian, stage, Aristotle’s texts, arranged in accordance with the tripartition
ethics/economics/politics, were ordered in the sequence Nicomachean Ethics,
Eude­mian Ethics, Magna Moralia / Economics / Politics, Constitutions, and studied with Porphyry’s commentary. Finally, on the highest level of the curriculum, the
students studied sequentially the selected texts of ‘divine Plato’: Apology of
Socrates, Alcibiades, Gorgias, Republic and – the summit of political wisdom – the
Laws.
So the function of political philosophy in the system of Neoplatonism is linked
with training in the ‘political’ virtues as one element of the first level of the ascent
of the soul to the divine life. These ‘political’ virtues – practical wisdom, moderation, courage and justice – are connected, first of all, with the ordering activity of
the soul towards a subject’s own passions and desires. But a subject (or subjects),
having been trained enough in the ‘spiritual exercises’,12 can and must transmit this
ordering, ruling power derived from the forms dwelling in the divine intellect outside on to the social and political matter. That is, the subject must become a philosopher-king or queen of the Platonic ideal state.
Now, having in mind this Neoplatonic theoretical model, we can observe the
series of practical modes of the Neoplatonists’ relation to the real ‘other’, the social
environment that, from the middle of the third to the middle of the sixth century,
became more and more alien and hostile to the pagan philosophers. At the beginning of this period the ‘other’ itself appears episodically, in the small groups of
strange persons (Christians? Gnostics?) who visited Plotinus’ classes in Rome.13 At
the end of it, the Neoplatonists find their communities as small islands in the sea of
the ‘other’, the last Ἕλληνες among Χριστιανοί and Ῥωμαῖοι.
12 The term of Pierre Hadot: see: P. Hadot, ed. A. I. Davidson, trans. M. Chase, Philosophy as a
Way of Life: Spiritual Exercises from Socrates to Foucault (Oxford: Blackwell, 1995).
13 Porph. Plot. 16; Plotinus, Enn. 1.1–9 (n. 8, above), 44–5.
Political Philosophy and Practice in the Late Neoplatonist Communities
187
1. Scholarly discussion. The first contact of the Neoplatonists with the Christians
relative to which we have reliable textual evidence14 took place in Rome in
(most probably) the middle of the sixties of the third century. Porphyry reports
about some ‘Christians’ who attended the lectures of Plotinus and among whom
strange books circulated: they ‘possessed a great many treatises of Alexander
the Libyan and Philocomus and Demostratus and Lydus, and produced revelations by Zoroaster and Zostrianus and Nicotheus and Allogenes and Messus
and other people of the kind, deceived themselves and deceived many, alleging
that Plato had not penetrated to the depths of intelligible reality’ (Plot. 16.4–
10).
Who were these ‘Christians’? To judge from the titles of their books, they were
non-Christian Gnostics. Plotinus writes a treatise against their doctrines (Enn.
2.9),15 Porphyry refutes the authenticity of The Book of Zoroaster, and Amelius,
another pupil of Plotinus, writes forty polemical books against The Book of
Zostrianus. We have also two books by Porphyry, of which one, Contra
Christianos, is devoted to polemics against the Christians especially,16 and another, De Philosophia ex Oraculis,17 gives evidence of the attempts of Porphyry
to distinguish Christ (about whom the philosopher speaks with genuine respect)
and the historical Christians.
So the general form of the first Neoplatonic controversy with the ‘other’, according to the texts of Plotinus (against the Gnostics) and Porphyry (against the
Christians) is the form of a scholarly discussion, with rational criticism, and
moderate logical and ethical argumentation, typical for such a type of debate.
Both philosophers saw in their opponents bad Platonists, ‘the heretics, who
have broken away from ancient philosophy’ (αἱρετικοὶ δὲ ἐκ τῆς παλαιᾶς φι
14 I cannot enter here into a detailed analysis of the old discussion of the Christian origin of
Ammonius Saccas, Plotinus’ teacher in Alexandria. Do the reports of Porphyry (Plot. 3.7–17,
25–36) and Eusebius (presented as a quotation from Porphyry’s Contra Christianos: see Euseb.
Hist. Eccl. 6.19.6.1–7.4, esp. 7.1–4, Ἀμμώνιος μὲν γὰρ Χριστιανὸς ἐν Χριστιανοῖς ἀνατρ
αφεὶς τοῖς γονεῦσιν, ὅτε τοῦ φρονεῖν καὶ τῆς φιλοσοφίας ἥψατο, εὐθὺς πρὸς τὴν κατὰ
νόμους πολιτείαν μετεβάλετο) on a certain Ammonius refer to the same person? Was Origen,
another pupil of Ammonius Saccas and Plotinus’ co-disciple (Porph. Plot. 3.24–33, 14.20–5),
identical with Origen of Alexandria, a famous Christian theologian (cf. Euseb. Hist. Eccl.,
6.19.7.4–5, Ὠριγένης δὲ Ἕλλην ἐν Ἕλλησιν παιδευθεὶς λόγοις, πρὸς τὸ βάρβαρον
ἐξώκειλεν τόλμημα)? On the history of the discussions of ‘two Origens’ and ‘two Ammonius’
see: R. Goulet, ‘Porphyre, Ammonius, les deux Origène et les autres … ’, RHPhR lvii 1977,
471–96; F. M. Schroeder, ‘Ammonius Saccas’, ANRW ii.36.1 (1987), 493–526; M. J. Edwards,
‘Ammonius, Teacher of Origen’, JEH xliv 1993, 169–81.
15 Plotinus, Enn. 2. Porphyry calls the treatise ‘Against those who say that the Universe and its
Maker are Evil’ (Plot. 24.6–9).
16 Porph. Contra Christianos (fragmenta), ed. A. von Harnack. (Berlin: Reimer, 1916), 45, 47–51,
54–67, 75–85, 87–94, 96–103.
17 Porph. De Philosophia ex Oraculis Haurienda, ed. G. Wolff (Berlin: Springer, 1856), 109–85.
See also J. G. Cook, The Interpretation of the New Testament in Greco-Roman Paganism
(Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2000), 106–67; R. M. Berchman, Porphyry Against the Christians
(Leiden: Brill, 2005).
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λοσοφίας);18 the task of a true Platonic philosopher is to contribute to their
returning to the true philosophy, into the social, cultural and cosmic whole, the
universal polis inhabited by gods and humans.
2. Institutionalising of school life after the pattern of a religious community.
Another form of Neoplatonic reaction to the strengthening of Christianity is
linked with one of the key figures in the history of Neoplatonism, Iamblichus of
Chalcis (c. 245 – c. 326). Having been a pupil of Porhyry in Rome, in the first
decade of the fourth century he established his own school in Syrian Daphne,
where he elaborated an appreciably new form of Neoplatonic metaphysics, detailing and supplementing the doctrines of Plotinus and Porphyry with a series
of his own.19
Furthermore, Iamblichus – or ‘divine Iamblichus’, as all his pupils and later
successors called him,20 – realised a kind of organisational reform in the
Neoplatonic community. The strict formalising of the curriculum brought about
by Iamblichus was described above. But along with that, all the aspects of
school life underwent a reorganisation in accordance with the paradigmatic
model of a community that might combine the features of an academic association and a religious confraternity. Iamblichus found such a paradigmatic image in the Pythagorean θίασος; his writing On the Pythagorean Life can be
regarded as an attempt to construct a model of such an ideal community, a pagan monastery – with all the complex of cult practices, prayers, worship and
sacrifices.
This synthesis of philosophy and religion in the school of Iamblichus had not
only an institutional, but also a theoretical dimension: for the first time in all the
history of ancient Platonism the philosopher receives popular religion and subjects it to a systematic philosophical re-interpretation, inserting all the ranks of
gods and demons in his metaphysics.21 As a result, ‘practical philosophy’ in
Neoplatonism includes now not only ethics and political philosophy, but also
magic and theurgy.
Despite his brilliant philosophical talents, Iamblichus acquired in the history of
philosophy a dubious reputation of being a pagan theologian and a magician
(θεουργός). Eric Dodds called the most famous of Iamblichus’ works, De
Mysteriis, ‘a manifesto of irrationalism, an assertion that the road to salvation
18 Porph. Plot. 16.2.
19 The conception of intelligible time, ὁ χρόνος νοερός, is perhaps the most interesting.
20 M. J. Edwards, Neoplatonic Saints: The Lives of Plotinus and Proclus by their Students
(Liverpool: U. P., 2000), xxxix. Cf. the form of a pupil’s appeal to Iamblichus, ὦ διδάσκαλε
θειότατε, in Eunap. V.S. 5.1.7.4–5. There was a remarkable belief of Iamblichus’ pupils in his
capacity of levitation (V. S. 5.1.7.4–9.1). See also a long passage on ‘Iamblichus’ divinity’, with
a description of miracles which he performed, in V. S. 5.1.12.1–2.7.1.
21 Cf. Edwards, Neoplatonic Saints (n. 20, above), xli: ‘Iamblichus had brought the gods back into
Platonism, thus cementing the alliance between philosophy and popular religion’. Certainly we
have some examples of allegorical interpretation of mythological subjects by Iamblichus’ predecessors: Plutarch’s On Isis and Osiris and On the Cave of the Nymphs by Porphyry are the
most representative. But it is Iamblichus who seems to set himself the task of embracing by
philosophical reflection the whole complex of traditional religion and mythology.
Political Philosophy and Practice in the Late Neoplatonist Communities
189
is found not in reason but in ritual’,22 and regarded his theurgical activity as an
attempt to build ‘the refuge of a despairing intelligentsia which already felt la
fascination de l’abîme’.23 The ‘rehabilitation’ of Iamblichus as a distinguished
philosopher was carried out only in the second half of the last century, and is
connected, to a large degree, with the famous dissertation of John Dillon, who
has attempted ‘to raise him [Iamblichus] from the status of a third-rate magician to that of, perhaps, a philosopher of the second rank’.24
After Iamblichus’ reform we may note a change in the character of the opposition between Neoplatonism and Christianity: now it is not an opposition of one
philosophical school to another (as it was perceived by Plotinus and Porphyry),
but a confrontation between two institutionalised religious communities.
3. Political and religious reformation of the Empire. The short period of the reign
of the emperor Julian (361–3) is an extremely interesting case, in all the history
of political Platonism, when Neoplatonic political doctrine had a chance to be
realised. A nephew of Constantine the Great, Julian (born in 331) was brought
up as a Christian, but in 351 he went to Pergamum, where he met Iamblichus’
pupil Aedesius and the circle of his students – Priscus, Crisanthius, Eusebius
and others. Then he went to Ephesus and studied under Maximus, another pupil
of Aedesius.25 In 355 he visited Athens and for several months listened to lectures together with Gregory of Nazianzus (the future St. Gregory the Theologian)
and Basil of Caesarea (the future St. Basil the Great). From 356 to 361 Julian
combined study, military campaigns and participation in mystery cults.
Having become emperor after the sudden death of Constantius, Julian invited
to his court other Neoplatonists from the school of Aedesius and proceeded to
his reforms. For the first time a Platonic philosopher became a king and, as is
incumbent on a Platonic philosopher, began to implement the project of the
ideal state, in accordance with the model of Plato’s Laws26 and the religious
philosophy of Iamblichus. Julian perceived his mission as the fulfilment of
Zeus’ will in the subsequent ordering of the universe; from the contemplation
of gods he must proceed to reform the Empire, restoring its piety, making the
people – not by violence, but by ‘the very mildest remedy, namely admonition
and arguments’ (αἰτίας τὸ προσηνέστατον, παραίνεσιν καὶ λόγους – Ep.
60.59–6027) – come back to the ancestral gods. The realization of this programme was opened by the edict on tolerance of 362.
22 E. R. Dodds, The Greeks and the Irrational (Berkeley & Los Angeles: U. of California P.,
1951), 287.
23 Dodds (n. 22, above), 288.
24 J. M. Dillon, Iamblichi Chalcidensis in Platonis dialogos commentariorum fragmenta (Leiden:
Brill, 1973), vii.
25 See Eunap. V.S. 7.1.5.1–2.13.3.
26 The choice of Plato’s Laws, but not the Republic, as the model of political reform is very important. In this ‘second-best’ state piety is regarded as the fundamental virtue, since it makes
the citizens become godlike through the service rendered to the gods, demons, heroes and
parents. See O’Meara, Platonopolis (n. 1, above), 120–4.
27 J. Bidez, L’empereur Julien: Oeuvres completes, vol. i.ii (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 21960).
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We can, following to Dominic O’Meara, identify four main points of Julian’s
religious programme: (1) fundamental religious conservatism: ancient religious
traditions should not be disturbed (in contrast to the new ones, such as
Christianity); (2) Julian established a hierarchy of gods, in accordance with the
statements of Plato’s Laws and the principles of Neoplatonic hierarchy: local,
national and regional gods were presided over by the supreme gods of the
Greek tradition; (3) an extensive programme of restoring temples, altars and
cults28; (4) the organisation of a system of pagan clergy, with numerous hierarchic levels, subject to the Pontifex Maximus, Julian himself.
Among the multiplicity of mysteries, cults and religions communities subjected
to support and arrangement it was only the Christians (or ‘Galileans’) whom
Julian perceived as unconditionally alien and hostile, ‘atheistic’. In his work
Contra Galilaeos (or Contra Christianos)29 Julian develops the traditional ethical criticism of the Old Testament, charging the Old Testament God with violence, envy and inconsistency; the main error of the Christian, according to
Julian, is the deification of a mortal, yet righteous man.
For the purposes of this paper the edict of 17 July 362 is of special interest. The
edict forbids the Christians to teach rhetoric and general subjects. Julian demonstrates in the text the completely holistic conception of culture. That is to be
emphasised: this holism in the understanding of culture is an explication of
ontological monism, one of the main features of Neoplatonic metaphysics. So,
Julian reasons, all the disciplines of the educational course are parts of Greek
paideia, which has traditional religion and mythology as its basis. Consequently,
only a person who believes in the gods of Homer, Hesiod, Demosthenes and
Isocrates can interpret their texts properly. A Christian cannot believe in the
gods of the Greek classics, he cannot believe in what he says in the classes.
Ergo, he plays the hypocrite, and this is immoral.30
28 In the letter to Theodore, High Priest of the province of Asia, Julian presents an interesting
apology for the worship of cult images, postulating theses and arguments some of which paradoxically bear a great resemblance to the arguments that the defenders of icons would postulate
in the future iconoclastic controversies (Ep. 89a–b).
29 C. J. Neumann, Juliani Imperatoris Librorum contra Christianos quae Supersunt (Leipzig:
Teubner, 1880), 163–233. The work has survived in a fragmentary state, in quotations and
paraphrases in the responding letter by Cyril of Alexandria Contra Julianum.
30 Ep. 61c24–42: εἰ μὲν οὖν ἀληθὲς ἢ μή, τοῦτο ἀφείσθω νῦν· ἐπαινῶν δὲ αὐτοὺς οὕτως
ἐπαγγελμάτων καλῶν ὀρεγομένους, ἐπαινέσαιμ’ ἂν ἔτι πλέον, εἰ μὴ ψεύδοιντο, μηδ’ ἐξ
ελέγχοιεν αὑτοὺς ἕτερα μὲν φρονοῦντας, διδάσκοντας δὲ τοὺς πλησιάζοντας ἕτερα. τί
οὖν; Ὁμήρῳ μέντοι καὶ Ἡσιόδῳ καὶ Δημοσθένει [μέντοι] καὶ Ἡροδότῳ καὶ Θουκυδίδῃ
καὶ Ἰσοκράτει καὶ Λυσίᾳ θεοὶ πάσης ἡγοῦνται παιδείας· οὐχ οἱ μὲν Ἑρμοῦ σφᾶς
ἱερούς, οἱ δὲ Μουσῶν ἐνόμιζον; ἄτοπον μὲν οἶμαι τοὺς ἐξηγουμένους τὰ τούτων
ἀτιμάζειν τοὺς ὑπ’ αὐτῶν τιμηθέντας θεούς· οὐ μὴν ἐπειδὴ τοῦτο ἄτοπον οἶμαι, φημὶ
δεῖν αὐτοὺς μεταθεμένους τοῖς νέοις συνεῖναι· δίδωμι δὲ αἵρεσιν μὴ διδάσκειν ἃ μὴ
νομίζουσι σπουδαῖα, βουλομένους <δέ>; διδάσκειν ἔργῳ πρῶτον, καὶ πείθειν τοὺς
μαθητὰς ὡς οὔτε Ὅμηρος οὔτε Ἡσίοδος οὔτε τούτων οὓς ἐξήγηνται καὶ κατεγνωκότες
ἀσέβειαν ἄνοιάν τε καὶ πλάνην εἰς τοὺς θεούς. ἐπεὶ δ’ ἐξ ὧν ἐκεῖνοι γεγράφασι
παρατρέφονται μισθαρνοῦντες, εἶναι ὁμολογοῦσιν αἰσχροκερδέστατοι καὶ δραχμῶν
ὀλίγων ἕνεκα πάντα ὑπομένειν.
Political Philosophy and Practice in the Late Neoplatonist Communities
191
After Julian’s death in 363 and the persecution of his associates, the Neoplatonic
communities were marginalised and insularised. We can outline a series of
modes which mark the strategies of the last surviving Neoplatonists.
4. The position of intellectual negation. The case of Marinus in Vita Procli (after
485).31 The life of Proclus is described by his pupil as if it occurred not in the
second half of the fifth century, but in the scenery of classical antiquity. The
author of the encomium carefully avoids any mention of the affairs of the early
medieval Christian empire, as if he is trying to see through them only the perennial reality of idealised antiquity: Constantinople in the text is called only
‘Byzantium’, Proclus converses in his sleep with Athena32 and in reality with
Hecate; by his praying he directs rain on Attica and calms earthquakes.33 All the
‘other’ is subjected to exclusion, at least from the text.
5. Heroic death and – this is more important – heroization of this death, a kind of
cult of the martyrs. The case of Hypatia’s murder (415) and Damascius’ extreme panegyric for her in his Vita Isidore (fragment 102).34 In general, we may
state that the biographical genre in the late Neoplatonic literature reveals a clear
tendency to transformation into hagiography, where the canonical structure of
a classical encomium is supplemented with the theory of the scale of virtues.
The beginning of such a transformation may be noted already in Proclus’ Life
of Plotinus, with the author’s effort to convince his reader of the divinity of his
teacher. Afterwards, in the writings of Iamblichus, Eunapius, Marinus,
Damascius this style of the biographical narrative became canonical: the
Neoplatonic teachers walking through their lives accompanied by signs and
miracles are portrayed as patterns of sanctity.35
6. Emigration. The case of Damascius and the Athenian school. In 529, after
Justinian’s prohibition of teaching pagan philosophy, a group of prominent
Neoplatonic philosophers from the Athenian school led by Damascius arrived
at a decision to leave the Byzantine Empire for Persia:
Because they did not share the view of God prevailing among the Romans and
thought that the Persian state was far better – they were persuaded by the very
widespread tale that the Persian government was supremely just, the union of
philosophy and kingship as in the writing of Plato, and the people disciplined
and orderly, that there are no thieves or robbers among them, nor do they practise any other sort of crime, and that even if some precious object is left in a
lonely place, no one who comes by will steal it, so that it remains safe, even if
it is unguarded, for the man who left it there to return. So, therefore, they
thought that this was true and were inspired by it, and besides, they had been
forbidden by law to live here in security, since they did not subscribe to the
31 Marinus, Vita Procli, ed. J. F. Boissonade (Leipzig: Weigel, 1814). See also Edwards,
Neoplatonic Saints (n. 20, above), 58–116.
32 Vita Procli 30.
33 Vita Procli 28.
34 Damascius, Vita Isidori, ed. C. Zintzen (Hildesheim: Olms, 1967).
35 D. J. O’Meara, ‘Patterns of Perfection in Damascius’ Life of Isidore’, Phronesis li 2006, 74–90.
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existing order, so they left forthwith for a foreign and wholly alien people,
meaning to live there for the rest of their lives36.
The real Persia proved to be far from this ideal image, and after three years the
philosophers were forced to return.37
7. Christianisation. The case of John Philoponus, the last scholarch of the
Alexandrian school, and his pupils. Among the latter we may assume the author
of so called Pseudo-Dionysian Corpus, a Christian Neoplatonist with good
knowledge of the metaphysics of Proclus.
8. ‘Inner emigration’: the life of a solitary pagan intellectual, a ‘last Ἕλλην’
among the Χριστιανοί and Ῥωμαῖοι. The case of Simplicius. We can identify
two main aspects of this mode: (a) polemics with the ‘renegades’, like the discussion of Simplicius with John Philoponus on the eternity of the world;38 and
(b) collecting, keeping, compiling and commenting on the texts. To a large extent, it is thanks to this ‘uncreative’, ‘secondary’ activity of the last pagan
Platonists of the sixth and seventh centuries that the literary heritage of the
ancient Neoplatonic thought lived on in Byzantium until the fifteenth century.
36 Agathias 2.30: Agathias, Historiae, ed. R. Keydell (Corpus Fontium Historiae Byzantinae, 2.
Series Berolinensis. Berlin: De Gruyter, 1967), 3–197.
37 An important remark: ‘Yet Chosroes was certainly a patron of philosophy and solicited from
Priscian of Lydia answers to a series of questions about the soul. The philosophers … returned
from Persia, protected in their lives and liberty of thought by an article in a treaty signed in 532
between the Persian king and the Roman emperor’: O’Meara, Platonopolis (n.1, above), 23.
38 See: M Chase, ‘Discussions on the Eternity of the World in Late Antiquity’, σχολή: Ancient
Philosophy and the Classical Tradition v. ii 2011, 111–73.
INDEX