Tragedy Offstage: Suffering and Sympathy in Ancient Athens

tragedy offstage T3801.indb i 8/7/06 12:47:45 PM THIS PAGE INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK Tragedy Offstage Suffering an...

Author: Rachel Hall Sternberg

267 downloads 1052 Views 2MB Size Report

This content was uploaded by our users and we assume good faith they have the permission to share this book. If you own the copyright to this book and it is wrongfully on our website, we offer a simple DMCA procedure to remove your content from our site. Start by pressing the button below!
Report copyright / DMCA form

DOWNLOAD PDF

tragedy offstage

T3801.indb i

8/7/06 12:47:45 PM

THIS PAGE INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK

Tragedy Offstage Suffering and Sympathy in Ancient Athens

rache l h a l l s t e r n b e r g

University of Texas Press, Austin

T3801.indb iii

8/7/06 12:47:45 PM

Copyright © 2006 by the University of Texas Press All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America First edition, 2006 Requests for permission to reproduce material from this work should be sent to: Permissions University of Texas Press P.O. Box 7819 Austin, TX 78713-7819 www.utexas.edu/utpress/about/bpermission.html ⬁ The paper used in this book meets the 䊊 minimum requirements of ansi/niso z39.48-1992 (r1997) (Permanence of Paper). Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Sternberg, Rachel Hall. Tragedy offstage : suffering and sympathy in ancient athens / Rachel Hall Sternberg. — 1st ed. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. isbn-13: 978-0-292-71416-8 (cloth : alk. paper) isbn-10: 0-292-71416-5 (cloth : alk. paper) 1. Athens (Greece)—Moral conditions—History. 2. Helping behavior—Greece— Athens—History—To 1500. 3. Caring—Greece—Athens—History—To 1500. I. Title. df275.s75 2006 303.3⬘7209385 — dc22 2006003687

T3801.indb iv

8/7/06 12:47:45 PM

Dedicated to my parents

T3801.indb v

8/7/06 12:47:45 PM


Contents

Acknowledgments ix Introduction 1 one

Home Nursing 21

two

The Ransom of Captives 42

three

Bystander Intervention 76

four

The Transport of Sick and Wounded Soldiers 104

five

The Judicial Torture of Slaves 146 Conclusions 174 Notes 183 Works Cited 211 Indexes 227

T3801.indb vii

8/7/06 12:47:46 PM


Acknowledgments

It is impossible to acknowledge everyone who sustained and enriched a work so many years in the making, so I will be brief. Bryn Mawr dissertation advisors T. Corey Brennan and Richard Hamilton supplied the encouragement and criticism that launched two of the chapters here. The other three chapters could not have been written without a research leave from The College of Wooster, nor could the project have been completed without an American Fellowship from the American Association of University Women. Jim Burr at the University of Texas Press steadfastly supported the idea for the book, as did Leslie Lebl. Friends and colleagues who generously read and commented on all or part of the manuscript at various stages included Neil Bernstein, Tom Falkner, Tom Figueira, Edward M. Harris, Edith Hall, Bruce Heiden, and Martha Malamud. I am grateful to them all. Anonymous readers caught mistakes, proposed useful revisions, and were kind enough not to complain about inconsistencies in the transliteration of Greek proper nouns. Audiences at the paper sessions and lectures where I presented this research over the years offered stimulating remarks and insights. Many thanks to Floyd, who shared the sojourn in Mexico City that inspired the central question of Tragedy Offstage, and thanks also to Jack, Claire, and Audrey for bringing me joy throughout the years that I worked on it.

T3801.indb ix

8/7/06 12:47:46 PM


tragedy offstage

T3801.indb xi

8/7/06 12:47:46 PM


Introduction

O

ne night, several passersby see a group of thugs attacking someone in the center of the city. On a nearby island, another man’s childhood friend lies mortally ill, unable to rise from his bed. Athenian citizens, this time soldiers, are wounded and unable to walk as the rest of the army retreats after a disastrous battle. A man kidnapped by the marauding crew of a warship is first sold into slavery, then ransomed, then threatened with slavery once again if he cannot pay off his ransomers. In a murder trial, a slave is tortured for legal evidence as parties to the case look on. In each instance, the sufferers who face pain, danger, or death are desperately in need of help. Will they get it? How do strangers, friends, war comrades, neighbors, or slave-owning citizens feel about the suffering that they witness? Do they care? Can they afford to? Will pity, empathy, or a sense of humanity prompt them to intervene?1 All of these people live in the same society. What do they think they owe one another? This book studies part of the moral universe of the ancient Athenians: how adult male citizens may have treated one another in times of adversity, when and how they were expected to help. It is not a cheerful book, and cannot be, because it concerns suffering, and a certain amount of time must be spent building up a detailed picture of the terrible situations that Athenians sometimes faced and how they dealt with them. Lest readers relatively new to the world of classical Athens carry away an indelibly grim picture of that time and place, it is worth stating at the outset that Athenian society made room for joy and pleasure and valued both highly. Elite male citizens feasted, competed, and pursued their passions; the entire community held celebrations throughout the year. Yet the fortunes of individuals and the city-state were mutable, and calamities got in the way, casting a shadow

T3801.indb 1

8/7/06 12:47:46 PM

2

tr a g ed y o ffs ta g e

over lives and engendering a profound distrust of the future that is captured perfectly in the famous and impossible anecdote in which Solon the Athenian advises Croesus to “call no man happy until he is dead.” 2 Throughout the fifth and fourth centuries b.c.e., and despite all the vicissitudes of history, Athens witnessed a remarkable cultural flowering that would impart to the West a world of ideas: naturalistic art that put human beings at the center; a democratic system of government; a refined concept of virtue; philosophy for the soul, medicine for the body; rhetoric that allowed people to persuade and be persuaded; narrative history; and many types of poetry. The poetry was part of ordinary people’s lives. They all knew Homer, and each spring at the Theater of Dionysus, on the south slope of the Acropolis, Athenians staged and watched numerous spectacles, including choruses, dithyrambs, comedies, satyr plays—and tragedies. The latter told stories that moved their spectators; similar scenes are found in the histories (Griffin 1998, 56 –59). Strikingly, most tragedies had to do with irremediable suffering. One thinks, for example, of Oedipus, driven to blind himself; of Cassandra, the anguished war captive who foresees her own death; of Jason’s young bride, whom Medea hideously kills. In scenes such as these, the chorus and other characters are made to feel pity, and so are the spectators. Until recently, the lion’s share of scholarship on pity in ancient Greece was inspired by Aristotle’s discussion of the pity and terror—leading to some kind of purging or katharsis— experienced by those spectators. The emotions Aristotle describes were no doubt real enough, but one must draw a clear distinction between “tragic pity” and pity in everyday life. They are not the same. Indeed, commenting on the turmoil created by faction and warfare in his own day, Isocrates says that people weep in the theater but view the actual calamities of others with something like pleasure (4.168): “They think it worth crying over the misfortunes composed by the poets; but looking upon real sufferings, the many and terrible things brought about by war, they are so far from pitying that they rejoice more in the evils of others than in their own private advantages.” 3 In the theater, pity is akin to pleasure and costs nothing but spent tears. Nothing is required of the spectator but a fleeting emotional involvement in fictional situations that are soon over and done with. In real life, however, pity may lead to significant expenditures of time, energy, goods, or money; it can entail lasting emotional pain. Despite the important place that tragedy occupied in the culture of Athens, we must not assume that tragic pity bore more than a passing resemblance to the pity

T3801.indb 2

8/7/06 12:47:46 PM

i nt roduc t io n

3

that one experienced in the real world of private and civic obligations, where the illnesses, bereavements, financial embarrassments, and misadventures of family, friends, or war comrades often tested bonds of affection ( philia) and placed heavy demands upon individual Athenians. This book examines those demands. It searches for the everyday existence that underlay the high art of tragedy—the mundane world in which playwrights and audiences lived out their lives. It also explores, and indeed tests, the civic self-image of the Athenians. In a speech entitled Panegyricus, Isocrates praises Athens for defending the wronged (4.52) and exalts the city’s mythological achievements familiar from tragedy: aid to suppliants from elsewhere in the Greek world who sought help against an unjust and insolent enemy.4 The fifth-century empire of Athens, he claims, was won not through violence but by treating other cities well (4.80). This speech, written c. 380 and greatly admired in antiquity (Dobson 1974, 276), strongly suggests that the humane treatment of fellow Greeks was central to Athenian civic ideology.5 Here is how the statesman and orator Demosthenes describes the ethos of Athens (24.171): “To pity the weak and not permit the strong and powerful to commit outrages; not to handle the populace savagely, nor flatter the man who seems always to be in a position of power.” 6 Demosthenes says elsewhere that pity is embedded in the laws and constitution (22.57): “In them there is pity, pardon, everything appropriate to free men.” This ideal of kindness persisted, so that centuries later it was thought that Athenians of the classical period had erected an altar to pity in the center of town.7 Pity sometimes influenced the votes of jurors in the lawcourts.8 Still, to judge by the historical accounts of Herodotus and Thucydides, Athenian citizens who attended the Assembly typically approached political and military issues with hardheaded pragmatism. Donald Lateiner (2005) points out that where the interests of the polis were at stake, there was little or no room for pity: expediency ruled foreign affairs. But what of individual decisions concerning relatives, friends, neighbors, fellow citizens, and slaves? To whom did pity apply? To whom was it denied? Confronted with the suffering of another human being, what was the appropriate response? Would most people turn away in loathing or indifference, or was one expected to help? Under what circumstances? And at what risk to oneself? In short, what was one supposed to do in the face of another person’s misery? These questions raise ethical issues that are still relevant today, so it is not surprising that helping behavior, together with the emotions of compassion

T3801.indb 3

8/7/06 12:47:47 PM

4


or sympathy, has lately commanded considerable interest in a broad range of academic fields, including biology, anthropology, psychology, social psychology, and philosophy.9 Julia Annas (1993, 223 –325) has analyzed Aristotelian concepts relating to “other-concern” in a section that touches on some of the same issues at stake here. David Konstan, in Pity Transformed (2001), explores Greek and Roman concepts of pity as they developed over a period of a thousand years. He relies heavily on Aristotle and the Stoic philosophers, along with comedy and other genres of imaginative literature. This book, however, takes a different tack. First, it focuses strictly on Athens in the classical period, looking neither forward nor backward in time, in an attempt to capture the moral and emotional climate of that important historical moment. Second, it presents a series of case studies, grounded in oratory and historiography, that offer snapshots of Athenian life.10 Of course, the evidence is uneven, incomplete. But these morality tales, when examined closely, yield a wealth of insight and information about Athenian social realities and Athenian cultural ideals. They provide a glimpse of specific quotidian issues that the most highly valued canonical texts—tragedy and philosophy— do not provide. The Limits of Aristotle Until a few years ago, few had attempted to analyze pity or helping behavior in everyday Athens. The main reason, it seems, was simple: Plato and Aristotle set the agenda for moral philosophy, and compassion was not on it. Neither of them ever wrote, so far as we know, about what one was supposed to do in the face of another person’s misery. Yet ordinary people faced that question every day, for they could hardly avoid witnessing the suffering of others. In modern America and Europe, most of us have limited personal contact with suffering; severely sick or injured individuals are usually treated in hospitals and other care centers by trained professionals, so that one can speak, as Susan Sontag has, about the separate kingdoms of the well and the ill (1977, 1). In ancient Greece, however, those kingdoms were intermingled. Sick people were almost inevitably taken care of at home, by relatives or slaves; noisome diseases or painful war wounds would constantly have tested the fortitude of caretakers. Beggars, outcasts, and the poor would have been highly conspicuous in their plight, since people who lacked a home and family had no sure place of refuge. Slaves, with their unenviable lot, were everywhere. In other words, the haves could not easily insulate themselves from

T3801.indb 4

8/7/06 12:47:47 PM

i nt roduc t io n

5

the have-nots. Those possessed of good fortune were constantly brushing shoulders with people to whom the gods had dealt, as Zeus does in the Iliad, a portion of unmixed evil (24.531–533). Moreover, no one, rich or poor, was invulnerable to the blows of fate, and no one was exempt from painful moral choices. A generation ago, Jacqueline de Romilly traced the course of humanity and gentleness in Greek literature. Hers was a study in intellectual history that did not purport to recapture everyday moral attitudes or behavior. Indeed, she complained that evidence of everyday behavior is prohibitively scarce (1979, 6): “The most significant thing, with regard to relations between people, would be in effect to define the place of gentleness in everyday life and in the contemporary judgments of individual conduct. But that is almost never what the texts bring us.” Of course, no genre of Greek literature can be taken as a pure and undistorted reflection of the everyday. That is obviously true of epic and of tragedy, whose scenes are almost always set in the mythological past and shaped by theatrical conventions far removed from ordinary life. It is also true of philosophy, which represents the best intellects of Athens and can hardly be regarded as typical. Moreover, ancient writers tended to draw a veil of privacy over personal matters, and de Romilly was right in saying that the evidence is scarce. Yet it is well worth seeking. The Nicomachean Ethics of Aristotle would seem a logical place to turn when investigating moral attitudes, especially the bonds of kinship and friendship discussed in Books 8 and 9. His treatment of philia has justly attracted the attention of scholars such as Konstan (1997) and Pangle (2003), who write about friendship rather narrowly defined as the bond of affection and trust between two people, like the legendary friendship between Achilles and Patroclus. In asking how such friendship contributes to human happiness and the good or virtuous life, Aristotle finds that it can heighten one’s awareness of pleasure and conscious activity (Pangle 2003, 190). Friends are expected to help one another, but the essence of friendship in the highest sense is shared conversation, shared activity, and a sense of affinity that can lead to greater self-knowledge (Cooper 1999, 283 –285). Aristotle also takes a wider view of philia as a universal bond (Eth. Nic. 8.1.3) and the foundation of society (8.1.4). As Konstan points out, the term philia encompassed much more than modern “friendship.” Pangle writes that it “can cover all bonds of affection, from the closest erotic and familial ties to political loyalties, humanitarian sympathies, business partnerships, and even love for inanimate things” (2003, 2). In the Nicomachean Ethics,

T3801.indb 5

8/7/06 12:47:47 PM

6


Aristotle talks about husbands and wives, parents and children, as well as same-sex age-mates and friends. Reciprocity is a recurrent theme (see esp. 9.1 through 9.2). Friends are sought in times of prosperity and adversity alike (9.11). “For it is the part of a friend to render service, and especially to those in need, and without being asked, since assistance so rendered is more noble and more pleasant for both parties” (9.11.6, trans. Rackham). Aristotle furnishes examples of friendly feeling and mutual reliance between soldiers and shipmates, for example (8.9.1), travelers (8.9.4), and members of demes and tribes (8.9.5). All friendship, he says, involves community: en koino¯ niai men oun pasa philia estin (8.12.1). He urges repeatedly, however, that friendships based on mere utility are shallow and fleeting (e.g., 8.4.2, 8.6.4, 8.13.4) compared to those based on a true affinity between virtuous men. Aristotle seems so perspicacious that it is tempting to rely heavily on him. Yet there are limits to his treatment. First, he is all too brief on the topic of friendship in adversity, and the examples he gives are few (see below). Second, he is most keenly interested in the moral ramifications of elite friendship between men who are more or less equals, rather than the practical ramifications of a broader philia at every level of society. Consequently, we cannot afford to look at Athenian social relations through Aristotle’s eyes alone. To gain fresh perspectives, we must look elsewhere. Methodological Framework For the purposes of this project, I set aside philosophy in favor of two literary genres that are arguably more prosaic and quotidian because they usually purport to talk about actual events. Those genres are historiography and oratory. The first includes the Histories of Herodotus, the Peloponnesian War of Thucydides, and the Anabasis and Hellenica of Xenophon. The second consists of speeches composed for the courtroom, democratic assembly, or other public occasions: works written by or attributed to the most famous Attic orators, including Antiphon, Andocides, Lysias, Isocrates, Isaeus, Demosthenes, Aeschines, and Lycurgus. These texts, which refer in complex ways to everyday life, cover a span of roughly 130 years, from Antiphon and Herodotus in the mid-fifth century to the last letters of Demosthenes in the late 320s. The two genres are not equivalent, and each in fact contains a startling range of work: “historiography” ranges from ethnography to political and military history to historical romance and autobiographical narrative, while “oratory” encompasses actual courtroom speeches, schoolbook

T3801.indb 6

8/7/06 12:47:47 PM

i nt roduc t io n

7

examples of the same, funeral addresses, deliberative speeches, and so forth. Two of the three historians reflect fifth-century Athens, while most of the orators reflect fourth-century Athens. Yet the genres do sometimes dovetail: they describe the feeling of pity, for example, in very similar ways (Sternberg 2005). And the texts do offer multiple points of entry into the ancient citystate, with its complex social structures that both dealt with and gave rise to tensions and difficulties that Aristotle never describes. Sir Kenneth Dover, who devoted six pages to compassion in his Greek Popular Morality (1974), hammered out a useful framework for evaluating moral attitudes expressed in oratory as well as in tragedy and comedy. Our task, he urged, is to discern how ancient texts reflected the presuppositions of their intended audiences (1–13). Approaches to historiography soon followed suit, and my own methodological stance can be briefly stated. Although scenes from Xenophon or Lysias, or any of the other historians or orators, are not transparent windows on the past, they at least purport to tell us what is real or attempt to create a convincing fiction, and they reveal emotions and attitudes in two ways. First, the author can make the characters within his narrative respond to one another in various situations, thereby disclosing ancient views on individual psychology. Second, he can attempt to impress or influence his intended audience, thereby pointing to popular attitudes and expectations, the social ideals of the day. Such texts cannot be regarded as a faithful and accurate reflection of actual events.11 We can never say with certainty, “This is what a given person said or did.” All we can say is, “This is how someone in Athens wrote about moral choices, and it must have seemed plausible at the time,” for the texts were believable in their own day. In a city-state or polis that lacked state-sponsored schooling, citizens derived their concepts of virtue from their private upbringing, no doubt, but also, and more importantly perhaps, from public events, including performances of Homeric epic, dramatic spectacles, athletic competitions, political assemblies, funerals for the war-dead, litigation, and public readings of historical works. Individual Athenians were implicitly encouraged to match themselves to the ideals of the city-state. Discrete narratives embedded in the speeches and histories, which are replete with terms of approbation and opprobrium, show how. They also suggest the range of actions open to people living in that culture; they illuminate social structures and reveal how people defined themselves at a specific historical moment, just as modern discourse allows observers to understand similar phenomena within contemporary

T3801.indb 7

8/7/06 12:47:47 PM

8


culture. Robert Wuthnow, a sociologist studying volunteerism and charity in the United States, writes (1991, 45): When I talk about “acts of compassion,” then, I do not mean a particular set of behaviors, taken simply at face value, such as a visit to the hospital or an afternoon of volunteering at a center for abused women. I mean the cultural framework as well: the languages we use to make sense of such behaviors, the cultural understandings that transform them from physical motions into human action. The discourse in which such behavior is inscribed is no less a part of the act than is the behavior itself. The possibility of compassion depends as much on having an appropriate discourse to interpret it as it does on having a free afternoon to do it. Then, as now, the possibility of compassionate action or helping behavior is created, in part, by language and rhetoric: words reflect culture, and they also shape it. If Wuthnow is correct, the texts of classical Athens should make accessible precisely the kind of analysis that de Romilly thought impossible. This book therefore attempts to understand helping behavior in everyday Athens by building on the premise that ancient narratives in which one person must respond to another person who is suffering or in danger employ a subtle rhetoric of moral obligation. The storyteller and the characters who speak within the story use terms of praise and blame. Their language, even if not overtly moralizing and didactic, expresses approval, derision, or dismissal. Through it, we can learn much about the cultural framework within which ordinary Athenians, as moral agents, lived and acted. The stories also point to specific deeds that Athenians were expected to perform that have gone largely unnoticed by modern scholars. My first task was to peruse all extant oratory and historiography in search of stories in which individuals directly confronted the suffering of others and were obliged to respond, either by offering help or by refusing it. To be useful, the stories had to be detailed and reflect attitudes toward human beings in dire circumstances, namely the sick or helpless, poor and destitute, slaves, and prisoners of war. I considered only those situations where to feel pity or furnish help might carry a high personal cost. Very few stories met all the criteria, and those few dictated my chapter topics: home nursing, the ransom of captives, bystander intervention in street crime, the transport of sick and wounded soldiers, and the judicial torture of slaves.

T3801.indb 8

8/7/06 12:47:48 PM

i nt roduc t io n

9

My second task was to set the chosen narratives in context. In order to grasp the moral implications of the passages, it was necessary to draw a detailed picture of the physical settings and social realities that Athenians confronted: the practical pressures and constraints under which they, as moral agents, operated every day. How can one assess home nursing, for example, without looking at domestic architecture? Or the handling of sick and wounded soldiers, without looking at military logistics? I also compiled all known examples of the five situations under scrutiny: every documented instance of bystander intervention in street crime, or judicial slave torture, and so forth. Such information, together with relevant scholarship on each subject, as well as parallels from comedy,12 creates a backdrop against which each major narrative can be considered. Social historians of ancient Greece may be familiar with this descriptive material, but much of it will be new to specialists in philosophy or literary criticism, or students of Roman culture and society, or readers interested in the history of emotion. My third task, finally, was to subject the chosen texts to a close reading. In so doing, I attempted to discern how Athenians described their emotional responses and what they thought their moral obligations were, especially toward friends. Literary tools were employed to analyze the rhetoric and the attitudes that it reflects. Where appropriate, theoretical work from anthropology or sociology or social psychology was brought into play. In each instance, I examined the position of the moral agent who, faced with someone else’s pain or jeopardy, must decide how to act. Although such decisions will have depended largely upon the individual character of the moral agent and the complex circumstances of the moment, one can learn something about the expectations laid upon that moral agent by society. The material, as I explored it, led me to adopt the model of a moral agent who stands at the center of three concentric circles: first, his nearest and dearest family and friends; second, friends and acquaintances to whom his obligations were less binding; and third, fellow citizens whom he knew barely or not at all.13 The moral agent is imagined as a man perforce because all of the narratives revolve around men; where the evidence permits, however, I do consider the role of women in a household confronted by sickness or by the prolonged absence of an adult male relative. The model is not as simple as it sounds, because a moral agent cannot always easily discern to which circle the “other” belongs. Is one’s neighbor, for example, to be counted as a close friend or an acquaintance? Will a half-sister living in another household

T3801.indb 9

8/7/06 12:47:48 PM

10


honor the ties of kinship? If not, how should she be treated? A further complication in analyzing any interpersonal relationship is that the parties involved would not necessarily both view it in the same light. Either one might have trouble interpreting the actions of the other or assessing his own level of obligation. And finally, the pressure of events could transform even the closest amity into bitter enmity. A real-life moral agent, then, negotiating the treacherous depths of social life, might experience considerable uncertainty in deciding what sort of help to offer, and to whom. In every chapter, I have tried to draw out from ancient stories the emotions and attitudes reflected there—to explicate the texts. I have therefore avoided imposing questions or categories not found within them. So, for example, I did not explore an Athenian’s religious obligations toward suffering people because such obligations won no mention in my sources. Why did religion go unmentioned there? It’s hard to say. Perhaps the stories, so few in number, are unrepresentative and therefore misleading on this score. Or perhaps the religious dimension of popular morality was so obvious that it required neither comment nor reminder. Or perhaps Athenians seldom thought of Zeus or the other gods when making everyday ethical decisions. Similarly, I have declined to weigh costs and benefits for each moral actor except as the text allowed. The characters in these everyday dramas do not mimic Aristotle or Thucydides: they never systematically analyze issues of merit or of expediency, interest, advantage. An overt weighing of motives would serve no purpose in the particular texts we have: the man who boasts to jurors that he nursed his dying friend, for example, has no reason to spell out all the reasons why, and a man embroiled in litigation with a former friend will certainly distort their prior dealings. But I restricted my study to situations where helping behavior imposed high costs—such high costs, in fact, that only some kind of moral imperative, a very strong feeling or societal expectation, would prompt a person to act. In general, the moral agents in these narratives could have derived little or no short-term advantage from their involvement with people in pain or jeopardy, and some took risks that undercut any possible long-term advantage. Tragedy On and Off the Stage The title of this book, Tragedy Offstage, is consciously transgressive: it breaks a time-honored rule among classicists and other literary scholars that the term “tragedy” should apply strictly to the artistic and literary genre that in

T3801.indb 10

8/7/06 12:47:48 PM

i nt roduc t io n

11

fifth-century Athens was raised to astonishing heights by Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides. According to that rule, it is vulgar to label actual calamities “tragic” or to construe actual suffering and loss as “tragedy.” Nevertheless, I wish to draw attention to several points of correspondence between the genre of tragedy and the realm of real life. In doing so, I will explain and justify the word “tragedy” in the title, my deployment of a scene from tragedy at the start of each chapter, and the occasional parallels from tragedy that are sprinkled throughout. First, as noted earlier, most of the plays written by the great tragedians were very much concerned with suffering. Destruction and loss are prominent elements in tragic plots, and tragic characters often give voice to anguish. These artfully crafted scenes spring from the imagination of the playwrights and are usually set in the heroic past, but they bring to life real human conflicts and real pain. Despite the line between tragedy and the world—a line that Phrynichus was penalized for crossing when he depicted the actual fall of Miletus—Athenian tragedy was and is about trauma and pain that real people recognize. Terry Eagleton writes (2003, 17): “The discrepancy between tragedy as art and tragedy as life is an ironic one. For most pieces of tragic art behave exactly as though tragedy were indeed a matter of actual experience, rather than some purely aesthetic phenomenon.” Surely this is why the genre may lay claim to an enduring interest that, in the fullness of history, has so often cut across temporal, geographical, and cultural boundaries. The word “tragedy,” then, is a literary term, but it can supply a powerful and appropriate metaphor for certain terrible situations in everyday life. This is the metaphor that my title employs. Second, many scenes of destruction and loss in Athenian tragedy focus on responses to suffering—responses from characters within various scenes who are confronted with the pain of others, and become spectators to it, but must also decide how to act in response to it. In the Trojan Women of Euripides, for example, Talthybius, the Achaean messenger who takes the child Astyanax away to be killed, witnesses the suffering of Hecuba and Andromache and is moved by it (786 –789, trans. Kovacs): “Such herald’s errands,” he says, “had best be done by someone who is without pity and is more inclined than I am to heartlessness.” He is especially touched by Andromache, the Trojan princess now condemned to be a slave and concubine (1130 –1133): “She wrung many tears from my eyes as she set out from the land lamenting for her country and saying farewell to the tomb of Hector.” Talthybius subsequently, on his own initiative, washes her young son’s corpse (1151–1152).

T3801.indb 11

8/7/06 12:47:48 PM

12


I have placed scenes similar to these at the start of each chapter: the Nurse responding to suffering Phaedra in Euripides’ Hippolytus, Neoptolemus to the wounded hero of Sophocles’ Philoctetes, and so on. This is not to suggest a facile relationship between these great works of literature and the actual experiences of ancient Athenians. Rather, it is to suggest that art and life are connected in meaningful ways; that tragic characters must respond to one another with some degree of realism because tragedy reflects the moral attitudes and social consensus of its day; and that Athenian audiences, having witnessed the responses of tragic characters, might or might not carry from the theater a residue of feeling, a propensity toward action, predicated directly or indirectly upon the dramatic confrontations they had seen on stage. Tragic pity, though in its moment fleeting, might in the long run produce consequences. If this explanation is hedged about with qualifying adjectives and adverbs, speculative oppositions, and verbs in the conditional, let the reader forgive my circumspection. For to explore the interface between tragedy and everyday existence—to consider in detail how tragic poetry relates to the social and emotional and practical world of everyday Athens—would require a separate project built upon the theoretical work of “new historicism” as well as recent discussions of the sociology of tragedy and its social function.14 Though the present work calls upon tragedy from time to time for parallels, it focuses primarily on everyday life in classical Athens— on specific feelings and attitudes that contributed to the emotional and moral ambiance of the polis and were played out in the real world. Greek Pity, Humanity, and Empathy The most important feelings and attitudes of other-concern that emerged during my study of oratorical and historiographical texts were pity ( oiktos and eleos), humanity (philanthro¯ pia), and empathy (for which there is no Greek word). Other words and concepts could have been pursued as well—the shared feelings denoted by the family of sun-compounds come immediately to mind, as does philia—but these three seemed most helpful in mapping the emotional and moral landscape of positive responses to suffering. The chapters of this book, then, will look at how pity, humanity, and empathy relate to specific situations, and some preliminary remarks are offered here. Admittedly, all three are hard to define in today’s world, and harder still in a world that lies thousands of years in the past. We can never fully recover what the

T3801.indb 12

8/7/06 12:47:48 PM

i nt roduc t io n

13

ancients thought or felt. Yet evidence for these concepts does exist— enough to merit an earnest attempt at interpretation. I begin with pity. Most of us would agree, upon reading Greek tragedy, that the characters express recognizable emotions such as loss and anguish, pity and fear. Tragic plots may strike us as foreign, or even bizarre, but many scenes still convey transcendent meanings because certain responses, it seems, are common human experiences. Recent scientific research on human emotions has explored their biological underpinnings: autonomic responses, hormonal and electrocortical changes, muscle tension and tremor, facial expression, and so forth.15 The emotions, however, are shaped and refined by culture. We all recognize fear, for example, and yet different societies may ascribe to it—and to its expression—varying levels of sympathy or scorn. Fear may be considered either healthy and natural, or base and cowardly; a person, under given conditions within a given culture, may be expected either to admit fear or to conceal it. What of pity? Evolutionary biologists and psychologists, attempting to explain altruism, point to the fundamental importance of sympathetic responses within human society, but few scholars today would argue that a specific concept like “pity” is universal rather than culturally constructed. In ancient Greek, both words for pity, oiktos and eleos, possess multiple meanings.16 Typically, though, both denote the sorrow or distress that one person feels for another who is in pain or jeopardy. This feeling was said to “enter into” a person who saw someone suffering, or heard a sad tale, or observed tears being shed. But pity was not to be trusted, because it could be easily manipulated and, unless brought into line with justice, might produce an undesirable outcome. According to Herodotus, for example, it was pity that restrained ten Corinthian men from murdering the infant Cypselus, with the result that he grew up—into a bloodthirsty tyrant. In the courtroom, the manipulation of emotion, including pity, was termed a tekhne¯ (Dem. 21.196, Aeschin. 2.156). For that reason, perhaps, pity never joined the traditional virtues, such as goodness or excellence (arete¯ ), justness (dikaiosune¯ ), and self-control (so¯ phrosune¯ ).17 At the same time, Athenians prided themselves on their championship of the pitiable helpless and the wronged, and passages from oratory demonstrate how individual Athenians were encouraged to bring their own behavior into line with the humanitarian ideals of the polis. We are left, then, with a profound tension within Athenian culture, in that the emotion of pity was both rejected and accepted. The limited evidence suggests change over time. Despite the pity that Achilles famously showed

T3801.indb 13

8/7/06 12:47:48 PM

14


Priam in the Iliad, no overt praise of pity in either historiography or oratory can be dated before the very end of the fifth century: there is none in Herodotus, Thucydides, Antiphon, or Andocides.18 Moralizing rhetoric, however, shifted toward a limited praise of it in the fourth century, perhaps as a result of the Peloponnesian War and the subsequent turmoil and hardships that touched Athens so closely.19 Eventually, the individual’s capacity for pity became, in the courtroom setting at least, a litmus test of character.20 The fourth-century praise of pity coincides with another development in the realm of words and ideas: the advent of philanthro¯ pia.21 The word means, literally, “love of humanity,” and it may have originated as a term to describe the most desirable attitude of gods or heroes toward mankind.22 On a strictly human plane, it can mean the love of humanity that causes people to help one another. It prompts the generals after the battle of Arginusae to order the rescue of some 2,000 shipwrecked warriors (Xen. Hell. 1.7.18), though the order cannot be carried out. In Xenophon’s historical novel Cyropaedia, defeated populations are allowed to retain some of their possessions owing to the philanthro¯ pia of Cyrus (7.5.73), and this same quality ensures his popularity and success (8.2.1, 8.4.7– 8). In yet another work, Xenophon claims admiringly that the Spartan king Agesilaus won over entire cities because of his philanthro¯ pia (Ages. 1.22). Sometimes, it is true, philanthro¯ pia seems to mean no more than friendliness, as in passages from Aeschines and sometimes Demosthenes.23 In one speech, however, philanthro¯ pia in the grand sense is held up as the linchpin of Athenian society. Athenians, we are told (Dem. 25.87), live in “mutual philanthro¯ pia that you have by nature toward one another.” 24 Two further points remain to be made about philanthro¯ pia. First, unlike pity, it does not mean sorrow for the sufferings of another. In none of its forty-six occurrences in the genres of oratory and historiography25 is there any suggestion that it was a feeling that could “enter into” a person, nor does it appear in association with sight, hearing, or tears, as pity does. It is not grouped with any emotion except for pity itself, and even that association is limited to two occurrences in the same speech. So philanthro¯ pia cannot be construed as a synonym for pity. The second point is that philanthro¯ pia seldom appears in close association with the traditional virtues.26 More often, it is grouped with pity, pardon, or gentleness.27 Perhaps we should view the capacity for pity and the love of humanity, taken together or singly, as qualities that were held up for unprecedented public praise in the fourth

T3801.indb 14

8/7/06 12:47:49 PM

i nt roduc t io n

15

century. This is not the same as viewing them, unjustifiably, as qualities that were nonexistent in the fifth. The novel rhetorical move is to find someone boasting of his good character by claiming to be moderate, people-loving ( philanthro¯ pos), and pitying many (Dem. 21.185). Finally, a few words about empathy. In Xenophon’s Cyropaedia, the uncle of Cyrus, named Cyaxares, feels outshone and humiliated by the military successes of his nephew (5.5.8 –9). He weeps as he explains this to Cyrus, leading Cyrus to weep with him, presumably out of pity (5.5.10). Then he listens, unconvinced, as Cyrus explains why he should be pleased rather than perturbed by recent developments (5.5.10 –24). At length, Cyaxares asks Cyrus to imagine his situation (5.5.28): “‘If I seem to you,’ he said, ‘to take this to heart quite senselessly, turn all these things around to yourself, not to me, and observe how they appear.’ ” This act of imagining oneself into the situation of another person, as Cyaxares asks Cyrus to do, is what I shall call empathy. Over the past thirty years, social psychologists have explored various notions of empathy: cognitive empathy, participative empathy, affective empathy, empathic joining, and parallel and reactive empathy, to name a few (Staub 1987). Some notions emphasize affect, the sharing of a similar emotional state; others emphasize cognition, the ability to think about another’s state. My own rather narrow definition of the term emphasizes the cognitive aspect of acknowledging another’s jeopardy or pain. And indeed, Cyaxares does not invite his nephew to share his emotions, but rather to “observe how things appear.” He doesn’t want pity, he wants understanding. The famous scene in Herodotus in which Cyrus the Great is about to have Croesus, captive king of Lydia, burned at the stake offers another example of empathy. The sight of his defeated foe has failed to inspire pity in Cyrus, but then Croesus cries aloud to Solon. Herodotus continues (1.86.4 – 6): Cyrus, hearing him, told his interpreters to ask Croesus whom it was he called on. . . . So Croesus told his story while the fire was already lit and the edges were burning. Cyrus heard from the interpreters what Croesus said, and his mind changed and he recognized that he, a human being, was giving alive to the fire another human being who had been no less fortunate than himself; in addition to this, he was afraid of the penalty and pondered how nothing in human affairs was secure, and he ordered them to quench immediately the burning fire and bring Croesus down and those who were with him.

T3801.indb 15

8/7/06 12:47:49 PM

16


Herodotus provides a wonderfully detailed account of the inner thoughts that the hearing of this story has provoked. Cyrus recognizes that Croesus is a man like himself, fears retribution, and reflects upon the insecurity of life. Fixing on the moral danger of consigning to a fiery death another person, especially a king like himself, he changes his mind. Perhaps he pities Cyrus.28 On the other hand, he is moved more by intellectual reflections than by feeling. Cyrus’ subsequent behavior, when he turns to Croesus for advice, confirms this view: he identifies with Croesus and speaks to him as one king to another (Hdt. 1.88 –90). Empathy, then, combines with Cyrus’ selfish fears and prompts him to spare Croesus (though his rescue is not achieved without the aid of a divinely sent rainstorm) in an other-directed piece of helping behavior. The role of empathy in Xenophon’s tale of Cyaxares and Cyrus, and in Herodotus’ tale of Cyrus and Croesus, may be compared with the role of empathy in a passage found in On the Mysteries. When Andocides, in 399, appeared before the Heliaea to plead his right to participate in the community of Athens, he asked the judges to imagine themselves in his situation (1.57): Come now! For it is necessary, gentlemen, for a judge to reckon affairs with fellow-feeling (anthro¯ pino¯ s) just as if he were in the situation.29 What would each of you have done? This kind of empathy, it has been argued since Hume and Rousseau, forms the basis of any moral society with claims to civility.30 A person who cannot imagine the situation of another human being is unlikely to help anyone but himself. The available evidence suggests, then, that the Athenian ideal of humanitarianism throughout the classical period rested not so much upon the feeling of pity as upon a sense of humanity or reasoned empathy. Ultimately, I believe, the Athenians were pragmatic about pity. Intentions mattered less than results. What one felt or said in the face of another person’s misery, similarly, mattered less than what one did, as the speaker protests in Against Theocrines (Dem. 58.59): For on top of our other misfortunes, this also, men of the jury, has happened to us: On the one hand, everybody urges us on, and they claim to share our pain (sunakhthesthai ) over what has happened, and they say that we have suffered terrible things and that [the defendant] is subject to legal action. On the other hand, nobody who says these things is willing to act with us.

T3801.indb 16

8/7/06 12:47:49 PM

i nt roduc t io n

17

My effort to enter the everyday moral world of ancient Athenians, to grasp their style of thinking and feeling, relies entirely on their discourse.31 In the passage just quoted, for example, the speaker claims that his friends or acquaintances egg him on and say they share his pain but do nothing. How should we evaluate this claim? It sounds plausible, but there is no independent evidence to show how his friends actually responded. Never mind: for the purposes of this discussion, what matters are the representations of the speaker, who presents the shortcomings of his friends as a misfortune that the jurors can recognize and, with their votes, correct (Dem. 58.61). The content of courtroom speeches is always studied rather than spontaneous, and the level of candor is likely to be low. Yet despite the best efforts of both parties to obfuscate the facts and confound their enemies, and despite post-trial editing, this discourse is useful: it may fail to disclose the internal states of litigants, but it does illuminate social life. William M. Reddy, historian and cultural anthropologist, has recently laid out in The Navigation of Feeling: A Framework for the History of Emotions a detailed theoretical basis for interpreting such discourse, which not only expresses emotions, he insists, but also elicits them, “confirming responses and intensifying emotional inclinations that were already there” (2001, 169). He usefully surveys recent “revolutions” in the study of emotions that have taken place in several academic disciplines. Psychologists have begun using laboratory techniques to probe the intertwined connections between cognition and emotion; anthropologists have been working with new field techniques, supported by complex theories, to study emotion’s cultural dimensions.32 Reddy finds a convergence of views in the fields of psychology and anthropology “toward a conception of emotions as largely (but not entirely) the products of learning” (x). He wants to bring these developments to the attention of those literary critics and historians who deny the reality of the self and view human nature, including the experience of emotion, as completely constructed and variable. Their insistence that human experience is wholly dependent on cultural context, he says, short-circuits efforts to understand historical change (xi). As a historian, Reddy is interested in the “collective shaping of emotional effort and collective elaboration of emotional ideals” (56). Tragedy Offstage attempts to ground Athenian concepts of pity, humanity, and empathy in the discursive practices of history and oratory—to uncover, in Reddy’s terms, their collective elaboration. It also tests the realization of those concepts through the purported behavior of a few moral agents whose stories have come down to us, and it tries to set them in the larger context of Athenian society.

T3801.indb 17

8/7/06 12:47:49 PM

18


Spheres of Quotidian Life The range of responses to suffering in everyday ancient Athens presents a complex and recalcitrant subject. It is not one that can be treated comprehensively; rather, it must be approached piecemeal. Each chapter here revolves around one or two of the most revealing stories found in Greek oratory and historiography. Each story, intriguing in itself, also opens for scrutiny an entire sphere of life that Athenians dealt with inside the household, or in the city streets, or abroad on military campaigns. All five spheres of quotidian life are linked by themes of social cohesion and the sense of obligation that people felt— or did not feel—toward one another. In each case, I examine the emotional responses and moral attitudes expressed, especially those that may have entered into any decision to act. Chapter 1 explores a speech by Isocrates called the Aegineticus, in which the speaker describes how he devoted six months to nursing a friend in his last illness. His courtroom statement, seen in the context of Greek healing, reflects attitudes toward illness and suffering and delineates expectations laid upon the friends and family of the sufferer. It takes us to the heart of the oikos, the household unit on which Athenian society rested. The friendship between the two men, as depicted by the speaker, features trust, closeness, and affection; and the speaker earns a place in his friend’s oikos in part by caring for the dying man as a kinsman should. Chapter 2 examines the ransom of captives through a close reading of Against Nicostratus, a speech in the Demosthenic corpus that recounts how Apollodoros responded when his neighbor in the country was captured, sold into slavery, and then ransomed. Capture and ransom were standard features of ancient warfare, and a peacetime phenomenon as well. Such an event created a challenge for the oikos of the captive, but that challenge spilled beyond the confines of the household. Friends and neighbors could be called upon to contribute ransom money, and wealthy citizens might step in to help. This chapter, then, examines the position of a moral agent within the neighborhood and polis. Chapter 3 analyzes a story found in Against Conon, a speech by Demosthenes in which the speaker is attacked and beaten in the agora of Athens by a group of men who hold a grudge against him. The story provides evidence for attitudes toward bystander intervention in street crime. The legal status of bystander intervention is considered, and modern social psychology is used to open up a range of questions about social behavior that seem to

T3801.indb 18

8/7/06 12:47:49 PM

i nt roduc t io n

19

apply as aptly to ancient Athenians as to modern Westerners. Possible answers are considered in the context of street life and street crime in Athens. The bystander confronted with an assault in progress had to decide what to do, whether to intervene. A relationship of kinship or close friendship with the victim would likely dictate action: such bonds created pressure to intervene. Yet bystanders might witness the mugging of a stranger, a fellow citizen whose predicament tested Athenian humanity and empathy. In that case, any decision to act would be calibrated quite differently. Chapter 4 takes up two stories about the long-distance transport of sick and wounded soldiers: the retreat from Syracuse, recounted in Book 7 of Thucydides; and a story that Xenophon, in the Anabasis, tells about a halfdead soldier on the march of the Ten Thousand. Here the moral agents are no longer in the oikos or the polis. Rather, they are far afield and under tremendous stress. Yet they have strong bonds to one another, especially in the tight-knit citizen army of the Peloponnesian War. Even the soldiers marching alongside Xenophon through Persia and the wilds of Armenia were bound together by their Greek identity. The logistics of carrying the sick and wounded, as well as the changing responsibilities of generals, are considered. Compassion emerges as an aspect of ideal leadership. Both case studies in this chapter reflect the expectation that the lives of the sick and wounded should, if possible, be saved. Finally, Chapter 5 takes up the torture of slaves for legal evidence. Here is a chance to examine the limits of Athenian pity, philanthro¯ pia, and empathy, for violence toward slaves was an ineluctable facet of Athenian society. Although slaves do not appear to have been routinely regarded as subhuman, their inferior social status made them ineligible for pity if the fate of a free man was at stake. Slaves were outside the network of friends, neighbors, and fellow citizens, and could expect no help if faced with whip or rack. The practice of slave torture therefore furnishes a dramatic counter-example to the themes of pity, humanity, empathy, and philia explored in the first four chapters. Although slave torture cannot reveal how Athenians treated their slaves overall, it does demonstrate the slave’s condition of friendlessness. It shows the citizen’s complicity in the infliction of suffering and the lack of any moral imperative to mitigate or intervene. In the end, I draw a number of conclusions about responses to suffering in everyday ancient Athens. Most of these conclusions are synchronic in nature: they apply generally to the entire period, which most scholars agree showed strong cultural continuity. A few are diachronic: they identify and

T3801.indb 19

8/7/06 12:47:50 PM

20


describe change over time, from the period of the Athenian empire at its height in the mid-fifth century b.c.e. through its destruction at the end of the Peloponnesian War in 404, the revival of Athens in the contentious environment of the first half of the fourth century and its political eclipse by the kingdom of Macedon under Philip II (d. 336) and Alexander the Great (d. 323). Events could have a large and immediate impact on moral attitudes. Isocrates, for example, depicts the 404 defeat by the Spartans as a moral low point in Athenian history, when people were so deeply embroiled in troubles of their own that they had no time to pity or help one another, reducing them to savagery (4.112):33 [The pro-Spartan decarchies] brought us all to this point of savagery (o¯ mote¯tos) that whereas before, because of the existing prosperity, every one of us had many to sympathize with him even in small misfortunes, but under the rule of these men, because of the multitude of our own ills, we ceased pitying one another. For they left no man enough leisure to share another’s burdens. At every turn, I attempt to find the place of pity, humanity, and empathy in the private lives of Athenian citizens—to discover what guided their personal behavior toward one another rather than the public decisions that they made in the Assembly or lawcourt. This quest therefore requires a departure from two well-known treatments of pity found in Thucydides’ Peloponnesian War and Aristotle’s Rhetoric. Thucydides, in the Mytilenean debate of Book 3, describes deliberations on the Pnyx in which opposing speakers, Cleon and Diodotus, both reject pity as a motive for political action, even as they tacitly acknowledge its power: the realpolitik of Athens made expediency, the interest or advantage of the city-state, a prime consideration. Aristotle, in Book 2 of the Rhetoric, offers an analysis of pity that is tailored to the courtroom setting: because jurors had to judge, he lays great emphasis on merit, on whether a suffering person deserved pity and hence a favorable outcome to the case. The present work respects Thucydides, with his emphasis on expediency, and Aristotle, with his emphasis on merit, but tries to go beyond them both, to explore a hidden realm, the emotional and ethical world of ordinary Athenian citizens faced with the painful challenges of everyday life.

T3801.indb 20

8/7/06 12:47:50 PM

one

Home Nursing

It’s better to be sick than nurse the sick. Sickness is single trouble for the sufferer: but nursing means vexation of the mind, and hard work for the hands besides. — eur ipides Hippolytus 186 –188 (trans. Grene)

P

haedra, young wife of Theseus, has fallen ill with suppressed love for her stepson Hippolytus. She suffers, she frets, she cannot stay still. In this scene from Euripides’ Hippolytus, the loyal and garrulous servant who is tending Phaedra expresses weary exasperation at the task. Her comment that nursing entails “vexation of the mind, and hard work for the hands besides” strikes an undoubted note of realism. Of the three great fifth-century tragedians, Euripides was held to have created the most life-like characters, and the Nurse in particular has been taken to represent an ordinary woman (Pearson 1962, 12). Her grumbling may be compared to the grumbling from a real-life sickroom captured in a forensic speech by Isocrates, the Aegineticus, dated to c. 390 b.c.e. In the Aegineticus, the speaker is defending his claim to the fortune he inherited from the late Thrasylochus. He argues, among other things, that he had been Thrasylochus’ dearest friend since childhood and earned the bequest in part by nursing him in his last illness, with the result that, on his deathbed, Thrasylochus made him his lawfully adopted son, gave him his full sister as wife, and named him heir. Replete with disagreeable details, the speech affords insights into the emotional responses of the able-bodied to the diseased in ancient Greece, their moral obligation to offer aid and comfort

T3801.indb 21

8/7/06 12:47:50 PM

22


to sufferers within the oikos, and the rhetorical strategies that might prompt Greek dikastai to favor a litigant who had nursed a dying friend. The tale of Thrasylochus merits close attention in part because it has been overlooked for the last 100 years or more. In fact, the entire Aegineticus, one of six extant forensic speeches written by Isocrates between 403 and 390, is seldom read nowadays. The orator himself tried to sweep his early career in the lawcourts under the rug (Isoc. 12.11), and modern scholars have largely obliged by looking instead at his voluminous educational, political, and philosophizing works (Too 1995; Poulakos 1997). Yet Blass (1874, 2:217) found the Aegineticus superior in terms of structure, reasoning, style, and pathos, and Jebb was inclined to agree (1876, 2:219): “This is perhaps the best of the extant forensic speeches of Isokrates.” The Aegineticus, the only non-Athenian courtroom speech to survive, was also mined for clues to Greek history and the circumstances under which Thrasylochus fled from war-torn Siphnos to Troezen and then to Aegina, where he died and where the inheritance suit was tried (Blass 1874, 2: 214 –215; Mueller 1817, 132 –133).1 Nevertheless, commentaries on the Aegineticus fail to analyze moral sensibilities in the tale of Thrasylochus,2 and only recently has the episode been exploited in discussions of Greek healing, despite its unique disclosures of the challenges inherent in home nursing.3 Ultimately, the story reveals much about familial obligations, close ties of friendship, and encounters between the sick and well within the confines of the household. First, however, it must be set in context. Greek Healing Health care in ancient Greece was a structure built and rebuilt over time using a variety of materials: folk remedy, magic, religion, and science.4 Knowledge of herbs and roots abutted unlikely superstition, while prayerful supplication to the gods adjoined observation, surgery, and systematic reasoning about the human body. A sick person would no doubt turn to as many healing methods as hope prompted and money allowed.5 Disparate materials and methods were used side by side in a style notoriously difficult to reconstruct today, but the resulting edifice, complex as it was, rested upon a simple foundation: nursing care. All sick or bedridden people required for their survival some form of attention, if only the most rudimentary feeding, cleansing, and bandaging.6 Table 1 sets forth every instance in Greek oratory and historiography where nursing care is mentioned.7 With certain exceptions, such as sick and wounded soldiers who might be attended on the battlefield, in camp,

T3801.indb 22

8/7/06 12:47:50 PM

hom e nurs in g

23

table 1. nursing care in orator y and histor iography Source Thuc. 2.51 Xen. An. 7.2.6 Isoc. 19.24 –29 Dem. 30.34 Dem. 54.9–12 Dem. 59.55 –56 Dem. Ep. 3.30 Xen. Cyr. 1.4.2 Xen. Cyr. 5.1.18 Xen. Oec. 7.37

Date

Description

430/29 b.c.e. The plague-stricken are nursed by family and friends 399 Persian soldiers in Byzantium are nursed by Cleander, the Spartan governor 394/3 Thrasylochus is nursed in last illness by a loyal friend assisted by one slave c. 364 Young Athenian woman who falls ill is cared for by Pasiphon; her husband or ex-husband Aphobus sits with her 355 or 341 Victim of street assault is nursed back to health 343 –340 Phrastor is nursed back to health by his cast-off wife and her mother, Neaera 323 Pytheas is nursed in last illness by two mistresses fictional Astyages is nursed by members of the royal Median household, including his young grandson Cyrus fictional Araspus, a Mede, receives care from Panthea via her servants fictional The wife of Ischomachus is to make sure that sick servants receive care

or in transit, the evidence suggests that most nursing care was administered at home (Schneider 1955, 262). Sometimes, it is true, one might leave home temporarily to seek healing in a religious sanctuary, especially one built for Asclepius, patron god of physicians. These existed by the fifth century at Athens, Corinth, Epidaurus, and Cos, among other sites.8 Aristophanic comedy (Wealth 653 –747) and epigraphic evidence9 combine to show that patients might sleep overnight within the sacred precincts, a ritual called incubation, in order to dream a divinely inspired vision and gain a miraculous cure. A few patients may have extended their stays to partake of therapeutic waters or the like, but the sanctuaries did not approximate hospitals until much later in antiquity (Hands 1968, 132). One also might leave home to consult a physician who, like any other craftsman, could set up shop in town. Aeschines, in Against Timarchus, mentions the iatreion, or doctor’s workshop, while explaining the flexible use and re-use of urban real estate (Aeschin. 1.124; Nevett 1999, 37): And if by chance a doctor moves into one of these workshops on the street, it is called a doctor’s shop. But if he should move out and a smith should move into this same shop, it would be called a smithy; if a fuller, a fuller’s

T3801.indb 23

8/7/06 12:47:50 PM

24


shop; if a carpenter, a carpenter’s shop; and if a brothel-keeper and harlots, from the trade itself it would be called a brothel. The workshop faced the street, but there were living quarters behind10 that would be occupied by the doctor, his family, and perhaps an apprentice. Aeschines (1.40) alleges that Timarchus stayed at the iatreion pretending to be a student, though all the while selling himself as a prostitute. The iatreion must not be thought of as a hospital. Patients came to it for medical attention but did not, so far as we can tell, sleep overnight or receive extended nursing care on the premises. Inside his workshop, the doctor would merely offer consultations,11 dispense medicine,12 or perform certain outpatient procedures. In the Surgery, one of the Hippocratic treatises that looks like a late abstract made from an earlier work,13 describes examinations and surgical procedures that took place in the iatreion and provides advice on lighting methods, the placement of medical instruments, the use of assistants, and bandaging techniques.14 There is no reference to overnight stays. The evidence of the Hippocratic Epidemics does not suggest that sick people necessarily undertook a visit to the doctor’s workshop.15 For instance, Epidemics I, a treatise that is usually assigned an early date,16 cites fourteen case studies that omit any mention of the iatreion. The author, a traveling physician who practiced medicine while in northern Greece, Thessaly, and the Aegean islands, appears to have checked in on each patient at home, where nursing care was administered over periods of days, weeks, or even months.17 Typically, the patient’s residence is cited near the top of each case study. Philiscus of Case 1, for example, lived by the city wall, Silenus of Case 2 lived on the broad street near the properties of Eualcides, Erasinus of Case 8 lived by the gully of Boötes, and so on. Only four of the fourteen case studies lack the equivalent of a street address.18 A person might not be able to call his place of residence his own: Phonocritus of Case 11, for instance, lay sick at the house of Gnathon the fuller. Yet whether the sick person was the master of the house, a male or female relative, an apprentice, a servant, a slave, or a guest, the private household remained the primary locus of care. Domestic Architecture The home setting, despite questionable sanitation, offered at least two advantages. First, compared to any premodern hospital or clinic, it was relatively free from germs that could further infect the patient and cause medical

T3801.indb 24

8/7/06 12:47:51 PM

hom e nurs in g

25

complications, though other members of the household risked contagion when the sick person was suffering from a communicable disease. Second, the home might offer emotional support that the patient could not expect to find elsewhere. Michel Foucault, writing about the history of French medicine, eloquently describes the early hospital as an “unkempt garden where the species cross-breed” and decries the patient’s loneliness (1973, 17): “Can one efface the unfortunate impression that the sight of these places, which for many are nothing more than ‘temples of death,’ will have on a sick man or woman, removed from the familiar surroundings of his home and family?” We need not altogether deplore the lack of hospitals in classical Greece. On the contrary, familiar surroundings could have conferred the same benefit then as they did in eighteenth-century France: emotional comfort.19 Greek domestic architecture—floor plans, room size, light and ventilation, water supply, kitchens, baths, latrines, bedrooms, furnishings, and eating arrangements—would directly affect care of the sick, especially the nursing chores, like feeding and bathing, that win frequent mention in the Hippocratic treatises. We possess house remains from the classical period in Athens, Piraeus, Eretria, Delos, and Thasos, among other sites (Nevett 1999, 81–123); the best-preserved and most extensively excavated residential districts lie far to the north, in Olynthus, the Chalcidic city destroyed by Philip of Macedon in 348 b.c.e. and never fully reoccupied. In its orthogonal neighborhoods, houses are built to a standard size and rectilinear plan. Those in Athens, on the other hand, are irregular in shape, probably because the streets on which they lay were a hodgepodge rather than a grid.20 But house plans from both Olynthus and Athens and, indeed, all over the Greek world share in common a number of features.21 The most striking of these is an open-air interior courtyard surrounded by rooms. The Greek house is turned inward on itself; it lacks exterior verandas, and in many cases the front door, which is usually the only door, opens onto an angled passageway that would prevent passersby from peering all the way into the courtyard.22 Millett remarks: “The outer and inner doors of the classical Athenian house remained firmly shut against the wider world of the city.” 23 An invalid sequestered in such a house would not be seen by outsiders; by the same token, he or she would be socially cut off from the life of the streets and alleys. In the fifth century, even the wealthy seldom owned large houses, and all but the privileged few continued to live in modest houses throughout the fourth century. Typical dwellings had rooms of medium or small size by today’s standards. Jones describes the rooms of a house measuring roughly

T3801.indb 25

8/7/06 12:47:51 PM

26


12 by 12.5 meters that was excavated on the northeast slopes of the Areopagus. It had a courtyard of 7.8 by 4.8 meters with six rooms ranged around it (J. E. Jones 1975, 84): The largest rooms were the three to the east, of which one was square (c. 4.4 by 4.4 m) and the others as deep but narrower (c. 2.2 x 3.3 m), while the room on the south and the two on the west were long and narrow, the latter two being mere cubicles (only c. 1.5 m deep), more likely to be store-rooms than living quarters. In a dwelling of this size and layout, with small rooms opening onto a central courtyard, it would be fairly difficult to avoid seeing or hearing a member of the household who was sick.24 Some houses had second floors, reached by steep wooden stairs; but the upper rooms, too, opened onto the common courtyard. In any case, a bed-ridden person would probably be accommodated on the ground floor to eliminate the problem of getting up and down the stairs. Euphiletus, the speaker in Lysias 1, arranges for his wife to stay downstairs after the birth of their child (9) “so that, whenever it needed to be washed, she might not hazard descending by the stair.” 25 Fresh air and sunshine entered through the court, although the presence of a porch or second floor would reduce the amount of light that reached the rooms. We know of windows, which are represented in vase paintings, but closely adjacent buildings would tend to shade them. As Jameson writes (1990, 177): “Space between houses—for privacy, for livestock, or for gardens—was exceptional.” Moreover, many homes were rowhouses with rooms that lacked windows altogether. Though class distinctions were not reflected in dramatically different house types (ibid., 181), one suspects that poor people had to make do with quarters that were cramped and dark, conditions hardly conducive to a rapid convalescence, whereas the well-to-do enjoyed homes that were more light and airy.26 As suggested by the story of Euphiletus, water for washing or drinking was available downstairs. It came either from a well or cistern in the courtyard27 or from heavy pithoi stored on the ground floor. Cooking was done either on a fixed hearth in a kitchen or, more often, in portable terracotta braziers (Robinson and Graham 1938, 185 –189; Jameson 1990, 193). Medical treatises focus above all on the importance of a special diet in the treatment of the sick, so caretakers will have devoted time to preparing barley water and the like. At Olynthus, many small bathrooms containing terracotta tubs big enough to sit in have been found. These would have facilitated the therapeutic bathing

T3801.indb 26

8/7/06 12:47:51 PM

hom e nurs in g

27

often recommended in extant medical treatises.28 The Olynthian bathroom is often situated next to the kitchen, presumably for the sake of warmth from the hearth and an easy supply of heated water. Some are equipped with floor drains.29 Few built-in latrines have been identified through excavation, but there is literary evidence both for them and for the chamberpot.30 We have little information about Greek bedrooms because these can rarely be identified through archaeological evidence. It seems clear, however, that the largest and best-situated room in a given house was used not for sleeping but for dining or banqueting.31 Bedrooms were smaller and would have contained sparse furnishings: a chest, perhaps, and a kline¯ , which could function as both bed and couch. Andocides, in On the Mysteries, claims that he was sick during the destruction of the Herms and never even left his bed (1.64). Gisela Richter (1966, 52 – 63) reviews the evidence for various types of kline¯ . Not all were light and portable, but one could easily improvise a bed by piling blankets on a floor or courtyard, or laying down a stibas, or mattress. Since well-to-do Greek men, at least, banqueted while reclining on couches, an invalid like Thrasylochus would not find it strange to eat lying down, with his food, perhaps, set on a side table.32 One may well ask in what sort of house Thrasylochus lived during his final illness on Aegina. Fortunately, the Aegineticus provides clues suggesting that he lived in an accessible spot, perhaps in a town along the coast, and that his house was no smaller than average. The speaker claims the place was easy to get to (30), and Thrasylochus, a recent arrival, would have had no reason to live in the remote countryside. The house must have been at least middling in size because Thrasylochus was well-to-do. His father had amassed a fortune working as a soothsayer (6), presumably the same fortune that the speaker risked his life to save during the Siphnian civil war (18). Even after his troubled exile and protracted illness, Thrasylochus possessed enough property to prompt the present inheritance suit. His house had to accommodate himself, his mother and sister (25), the speaker, more than one domestic servant (26), and at least one slave (25). One wishes the speech contained architectural information beyond the implied fact that disgruntled servants were able to distance themselves from the surly invalid (26). As for furnishings, Thrasylochus slept on a kline¯ (26), and more than that we do not know. The Caretakers The size and layout of most ancient Greek homes has, in recent years, been used to argue the lack of strict segregation between men and women (Nevett

T3801.indb 27

8/7/06 12:47:51 PM

28


1999, 68 –74, 87, 156 –157). Unless one owned a large house, both sexes would perforce have shared living and working spaces, although women were guarded from contact with male visitors.33 These conclusions have some bearing on the issue of home nursing: they suggest that the placement of a patient’s bed may have been guided by convenience rather than dictated by gender, and that most household members— hoi oikeioi—would have come into daily contact with the sufferer. Whose job was it to nurse the sick? In the Hippolytus, as we have seen, a matronly nurse attends Phaedra; in the Orestes, Electra cares for her brother. Several prose sources, moreover, seem to corroborate this view of gender roles. We learn in Xenophon’s Oeconomicus (7.37) that the mistress of the household had to make sure that sick slaves, male and female, received care (Pomeroy 1994, 281). Demosthenes, in a letter (3.30), mentions two courtesans who are caring for the consumptive Pytheas.34 And the speaker in Against Neaira notes explicitly “how much a woman is worth during illnesses, when she is there for a man who is suffering” (Dem. 59.56). King has recently contested the view that women were wanted in the sickroom of a man: the lack of references to female nurses in the Hippocratic corpus, she says, may be partly attributable to distrust of the sex (1998, 171). Nevertheless, it is clear from nonmedical texts that women did perform nursing tasks. Children will also have been called upon to help attend the sick. Xenophon, in the pseudo-historical Cyropaedia (1.4.2), gives us a touching portrait of little Cyrus caring for his grandfather Astyages: For when his grandfather fell sick, Cyrus never left him nor did he ever stop crying, but it was obvious to everyone that he was terribly afraid his grandfather might die. For even at night, if Astyages needed something, Cyrus was the first to perceive it and, the most untiring of all, he would jump up to perform whatever service he thought would please him, so that he won over Astyages completely. The household of the Median king is fictional but may well reflect the closeness and intimacy of Greek households in Xenophon’s day. In small houses, a sufferer almost necessarily imposed upon, and indeed challenged, the kindness of all the others. Whether or not the able-bodied members of the household felt active sympathy for a sufferer, they could hardly avoid sharing his or her pain, nor could they duck the heavy obligation to provide care.

T3801.indb 28

8/7/06 12:47:52 PM

hom e nurs in g

29

Evidence that women and children were valued in the sickroom, however, does not mean that the men of the household had no place there. Several of the Hippocratic treatises point to the use of male attendants, probably slaves.35 Other evidence, moreover, strongly suggests that male relatives and friends were expected to attend the sick. The rudiments of medicine formed a part of the cultivated male citizen’s education, at least in Athens.36 Soldiers must have nursed the wounded, as Xenophon suggests,37 and men performed similar services in a domestic setting. A young Athenian woman who has fallen ill is tended by a certain Pasiphon (Dem. 30.34). Thucydides’ account of the plague at Athens implies that men proved their moral excellence by entering the houses of stricken friends to help care for them. The Aegineticus provides compelling evidence for the role of men in nursing, since the speaker himself cared for the mortally ill Thrasylochus. He grumbles that the invalid’s mother and sister arrived too ill to be of any help; but he never complains that he was forced to do women’s work. Had the two females been healthy, it was their kinship with Thrasylochus, not their gender, that would have obligated them to care for him. As matters stood, they themselves needed care, and the speaker may be implying that he had to nurse them, too. The speech throughout treats nursing as an appropriate undertaking for a man. The paired pronouns in the generalizing phrase, “I nursed him in such a way as no one else I know of has ever nursed another (heteros heteron),” express an ethic of reciprocity between human beings irrespective of gender. The speaker’s claim of devotion, furthermore, draws a comparison between himself and anyone else he knows of—whether male or female— who has nursed a sick person. His complaint about the sick man’s neglectful blood relations implies, with the masculine pronoun oudeis, that any man or woman related to Thrasylochus had a moral obligation to nurse him. The friends who visit the household on Aegina worry about the speaker’s health (29); they warn him that “most of the people (hoi pleistoi to¯ n therapeusanto¯n) who had nursed this disease had also died.” The masculine pronoun hoi pleistoi need not refer exclusively to men, but it surely includes them. The same may be said of the masculine participle in the next sentence, where the speaker replies that he would rather die than allow Thrasylochus to perish too soon “through lack of someone willing to nurse him (tou therapeusontos).” Furthermore, the speaker’s direct appeal to the dikastai, who are all men, presupposes that they can relate personally to his experiences in the sickroom (28): “But you yourselves consider with how much lost sleep and what toilsome miseries one (tis) would nurse such a disease for so long a time.” The

T3801.indb 29

8/7/06 12:47:52 PM

30


speaker assumes that his listeners know very well how taxing it can be to care for sick and dying relatives. The indefinite tis invites each listener to imagine himself in the same position. This appeal seems cleverly designed to work at two levels. Those dikastai who have taken on the challenges of sick-nursing will empathize with the speaker; those who have shirked will be ashamed to admit it. The speaker can safely bet, then, that no one in the courtroom will openly scoff at the sacrifices he has made. In short, the assumption that men were sometimes expected to nurse the sick is implicit at every turn. Isocrates 1 9.24 –29 t he t a le o f th e d y in g th r a sylo c h us This picture of the domestic setting in which nursing care routinely took place in fifth- and fourth-century Greece has emphasized the physical closeness of the household, the difficulty of sequestering a sick person, and the heavy demands that an illness must have placed upon virtually everyone with whom he or she lived. The tale of Thrasylochus adds vivid detail to this general picture. The speaker, who is fending off a court challenge from the dead man’s half-sister, argues that he had been Thrasylochus’ dearest friend since childhood and earned the bequest by nursing him with unparalleled devotion. His purpose is to win the favor of the dikastai and make himself look as virtuous as possible, especially in comparison to the negligent halfsister. We as readers cannot know how much Isocrates exaggerates in order to win the case for his client, and there are no corroborating witnesses.38 One might further object that, as the inheritance suit took place on Aegina, it cannot be used as evidence for Athenian attitudes. Actually, some of the dikastai may have been second-generation Athenian transplants, since Athens threw many Aeginetans off the island in 431 and occupied their lands. At the end of the Peloponnesian War, the Spartans restored the island to the Aeginetans, but it is unclear what became of those Athenian families.39 More importantly, this speech was written by an Athenian orator and therefore was imbued with his cultural presuppositions and moral attitudes. It seems unlikely that he adjusted his discourse on family and friendship to address possible shades of difference between Athenian and Aeginetan jurors. In any case, the following account of Thrasylochus’ last months reveals what actions and attitudes were considered admirable (Isoc. 19.24 –29): Furthermore, they [my opponents] will not have this to say: that as long as Thrasylochus was doing well, I endured all these things, but when he

T3801.indb 30

8/7/06 12:47:52 PM

hom e nurs in g

31

fell on hard luck I abandoned him, for at that point I demonstrated more clearly than ever the kindness that I had for him. For when [Thrasylochus], having settled in Aegina, fell ill with this disease from which he died, I nursed him in such a way as no one else I know of has ever nursed another. Most of the time he was in a very bad way yet still able to get around, but finally he lay in bed for six months running. And no one of his blood relations saw fit to share these toilsome miseries; no one except his mother and his sister even came to check on him, and they made matters even worse, for they were ill when they came from Troezen, so that they themselves needed care. Although this is how the others were with respect to him, I nevertheless neither failed him nor did I leave the scene, but I nursed him with the help of one slave boy; for not a single one of the servants could stand it. For being difficult by nature, he became, because of his disease, still harder to handle. It is not surprising that they did not stay beside him, but much more so that I was able to hold out in tending such a disease; for he suffered suppuration for a long time and was unable to move from his bed; and his suffering was such that we did not get through a single day without tears, but we were continually lamenting both each other’s hardships and our joint exile and isolation. And these things went on without a break at any time; for it was not possible to leave him or to seem to neglect him, which to me would have been more dreadful than the existing evils. I wish it were possible to make clear to you what I became with respect to him, for I think you would not tolerate the voice of my opponents. Now it is not easy to tell the extremely difficult duties in my care of him, duties that were very hard to handle and involved most unpleasant tasks, and demanded the greatest care. But you yourselves consider with how much lost sleep and what toilsome miseries one would nurse such a disease for so long a time. In my case, I fell into such a bad state that all my friends, those who visited at least, said they were afraid that I, too, would die, saying that most of the people who had nursed this disease had also died. I answered them that, for my part, I would much rather die than look the other way as he expired before his fated day through lack of someone willing to nurse him. Isocrates has scripted a passage that drives home two important points: first, the work the speaker did was taxing; and second, it was dangerous. He wore down his own health and indeed risked his life by caring for Thrasylochus. Here, perhaps, we begin to find an answer to the question of what, in ancient

T3801.indb 31

8/7/06 12:47:53 PM

32


Greece, one was supposed to do in the face of another person’s misery. But first, we may look at what one might feel. e mot io n in is o c r a tes 19 . 24 – 29 Thrasylochus’ condition inspires mixed emotions: the speaker sympathizes with the suffering man but also feels an aversion that he must overcome in order to help him. Since details about the illness might help explain that aversion, it would be worth knowing exactly from what Thrasylochus was suffering. The diagnosis of diseases described in ancient texts is often problematic; this case, however, seems fairly simple. Early in the Aegineticus (11), the speaker says Thrasylochus “was gripped with a wasting disease ( phthoe¯ ) and was sickly for a long time. . . .” The term phthoe¯ is a little-used noun commonly supposed to denote consumption, that is, tuberculosis of the lungs, although it may be less precise than that.40 In the passage at hand, the speaker adds that Thrasylochus suffered from suppuration (empuos ¯e n) for a long time (26). The adjective empuos is used of people only two other times in nonmedical Greek literature of the classical period: once of Philoctetes’ festering foot (Soph. Phil. 1378), and once of the speaker in Against Conon who allegedly suffered internal injuries in a severe beating (Dem. 54.11–12).41 Both times, it describes a state of suppuration following an injury, without specifying the body part affected. On the other hand, empuos may possibly describe the malady known in Greek medicine as empue¯ ma, whose symptoms include incessant fever, blisters on the body, and poor appetite (Hippoc. Prognostics 17).42 These symptoms resemble those mentioned in Internal Affections and Diseases where Grmek believes pulmonary tuberculosis is being described. Thrasylochus’ condition, moreover, was feared to be contagious (Isoc. 19.29), a notorious aspect of tuberculosis. So whether viewed as phthoe¯ or empue¯ ma or both, his disease was probably consumption.43 If that diagnosis is correct, we may imagine any number of nursing duties that were extremely difficult, very hard to manage, and involved most unpleasant tasks (28): ta khalepo¯ tata. . . . kai duskherestata kai ponous ae¯ destatous ekhonta. The last superlative, ae¯ destatous, is particularly suggestive of disgust. Elsewhere in Greek literature, the word ae¯ de¯ s most often refers to displeasing statements or unpleasant interpersonal relations, but it can also refer to physical aversion, mainly toward food.44 Consumptives have a number of

T3801.indb 32

8/7/06 12:47:53 PM

hom e nurs in g

33

symptoms, such as sunken eyes, bent fingernails, and swollen extremities, that could give rise to physical aversion. They cough up blood, and they also suffer diarrhea in the final stages of the illness. The “most unpleasant tasks” certainly would have included, among other things, handling a chamberpot, since Thrasylochus was unable to move from his bed for the last six months. The speaker feels disgust, then, but he also feels active sympathy for Thrasylochus, despite the harsh ill-temper that drove the servants away (Isocrates 19.26). As a close and understanding friend, of the kind that Konstan (1997) describes, he often commiserates with the dying man (27). Isocrates more than once emphasizes the heightened emotional needs of the sick, and the importance of meeting those needs. Our common conception of pain developed by Western science since Descartes is limited to the physical. Recent studies, however, challenge the strict division between physical and mental pain, which one medical scholar considers misleading. “We might represent The Myth of Two Pains as two closed fists,” writes David B. Morris (1991, 277). “Now imagine that the hands are open and the fingers interlaced. Pain, especially chronic pain, calls forth such interlacing of mind and body.” The Greeks knew this well. For them, to algos meant either pain of the body or pain of the mind. The word for bodily disease, nosos, might also denote mental distress, and Isocrates (12.7) uses a single attributive phrase to speak of joint health in body and spirit. Yet pain is, by its very nature, isolating. Elaine Scarry discusses the distance that opens up between a sufferer, who experiences pain as a terrible certainty, and other people, who view that pain with doubt. Another person’s pain is unknowable, incommunicable, beyond language. “Thus pain comes unsharably into our midst,” Scarry writes (1985, 4), “as at once that which cannot be denied and that which cannot be confirmed.” No one who is free from pain can really understand it. Thucydides, for example, tells us that only those who, like him, had suffered the plague themselves could fully sympathize with its victims (Thuc. 2.51.6): Nevertheless, those who had gotten through the plague pitied more greatly (epi pleon . . . ¯o iktizonto) the ones who were dying and struggling from the disease, because they knew what it was like (dia to proeidenai ) and also felt confident about themselves, for the disease did not lay hold of the same person a second time, at least not fatally.

T3801.indb 33

8/7/06 12:47:53 PM

34


The speaker in the Aegineticus never pinpoints the physical sufferings of Thrasylochus, though we know that consumptives experience pain in the chest and back. The psychological pain of the dying man, however, does lie within his purview, partly because this kind of pain is susceptible to language, and partly because the two of them shared the misery of exile (27): “His suffering was such that we did not get through a single day without tears, but we were continually lamenting both each other’s hardship (tous ponous to¯ n alle¯ lon) and our joint exile and isolation.” 45 The phrase tous ponous to¯ n alle¯ lo¯ n, with its reciprocal pronoun, implies mutual empathy: each man imagined the toils of the other, independent of his own painful experiences. The speaker, as we have seen, goes on to say that his indifference (dokein amelein) would cause Thrasylochus a kind of suffering more terrible (deinoteron) than anything else, including the pain and horror of consumption, if that is what it was. Psychological distress, in other words, is the crowning blow. Thucydides expresses a similar view in his account of the plague. After describing the disease’s excruciating physical symptoms, he writes (2.51.4): “The most terrible thing (deinotaton) of all the evils was the despair (athumia) whenever someone realized he was falling sick.” It is striking that despite the speaker’s obvious sympathy with Thrasylochus, the Aegineticus contains no word for pity. One well might ask why not. Isocrates, elsewhere in his works, uses eleos words twelve times and oiktos words four times,46 and he nowhere disparages pity. To the contrary, he recognizes its social value. In the Panegyricus, for example, he deplores the oligarchic oppression that caused Athenians in the wake of the Peloponnesian War to cease pitying one another (Isoc. 4.112): “And [the pro-Spartan decarchies] brought us all to this point of savagery that . . . because of the multitude of our own ills, we ceased pitying one another.” The Panegyricus also contains other passages that place pity in a favorable light, as do the Plataicus and, to a lesser extent, the Trapeziticus.47 Authorial disapproval of pity, then, cannot explain the absence of pity words in the Aegineticus. Nor is it particularly helpful to consult Aristotle’s dictum (Rh. 1386a18 –19) that a certain detachment between observer and sufferer is a prerequisite for pity. It is hard to find much detachment here. True, the two men are merely lifelong friends rather than blood kin, so the speaker differs from the proverbial man who cannot weep for his doomed children because his sorrow is too great for tears (Arist. Rh. 1386a20 –22; cf. Hdt. 3.14). Yet the speaker, as he evokes their mutual weeping, seeks to demonstrate his closeness to Thrasylochus, not his distance from him.

T3801.indb 34

8/7/06 12:47:53 PM

hom e nurs in g

35

I believe that oiktos and eleos terms are missing for two reasons that may be operating simultaneously. The first reason lies in the speaker’s tears, which represent a direct response to the anguish of his friend Thrasylochus (27): “His suffering was such that we did not get through a single day without tears.” Here as elsewhere in Athenian oratory and historiography, tears may be used as literary shorthand for pity, making eleos and oiktos words superfluous. Greek folk psychology held that tears could trigger pity, whereas pity, in turn, could trigger tears (Sternberg 2005, 31–36); and the speaker’s tears could also be considered metonymic: one part of the emotional response stands for the whole. The second reason pity goes unnamed is that the speaker could gain a favorable verdict from the dikastai without emphasizing it. In ancient Athens, pity in and of itself was not regarded a virtue. If this speech is any indication, people judged one another not so much by what they felt as by what they did. The speaker could openly admit his disgust, because what really mattered was that he overcame it and stood by Thrasylochus. He seems to assume that his capacity for pity will register with the jury as a positive character trait, but he expects to be judged above all for the actions he undertook as a friend. moral o blig a t io n in is o c r a tes 19. 24 – 29 With the tale of Thrasylochus, Isocrates pinpoints specific moral obligations incumbent upon a man or woman who aspired to the virtues of eunoia, kindness (Isoc. 19.24), and epimeleia, vigilant care (28), in the context of home nursing, the care of one’s near and dear. These two virtues seem obscure compared to the better-known Greek virtues of dikaiosune¯ , justness, and so¯ phrosune¯ , self-control, yet they win frequent mention in the writings of the orators. Isocrates alone uses eunoia forty-eight times and epimeleia sixtyeight times, and both are among the “top ten” virtues identified by David Whitehead in his analysis of epigraphic evidence (1993, 65 – 66). Word frequency in and of itself says little: much more significantly, the Aegineticus can help us understand what eunoia and epimeleia entailed. Clearly, one should carry out the humble and often grueling tasks involved in caring for the sick. One should also, as we have just seen, provide the patient with emotional support. The speaker indicates that the single most important act he could perform was to stay with Thrasylochus to the very end. Sick-nursing is the ultimate example of his eunoia (24): “For at that point I demonstrated more

T3801.indb 35

8/7/06 12:47:53 PM

36


clearly than ever the goodwill that I had for him.” But for all these offices, loyalty and courage were required, as the speaker makes clear. He puts great emphasis on loyalty. Thrasylochus and the speaker had been friends from earliest childhood owing in the first place to a marriage between the father of Thrasylochus and the speaker’s aunt (10); the speaker assisted Thrasylochus and his relatives in wartime (18 –20), sailed with him to Troezen, a disastrous move (21–23), and stuck by him on Aegina (24 –29). Overall, the speaker’s key claim is that he remained constant to an ancestral friendship (8, 10, 50) in the face of adversity (24). His virtue is asserted positively, in terms of eunoia, and also negatively: his enemies cannot say that he abandoned Thrasylochus. In Chapter 4, I argue that the verb apoleipo¯ can convey abandonment or forsaking in a strongly pejorative sense. That sense of the word is very clear both here and a bit earlier (21), where Thrasylochus is said to have begged the speaker “to sail with him to Troezen and by no means to abandon him (me¯ damo¯s auton apolipein), mentioning the weakness of his body and the multitude of his enemies, and that if he were without me he would have no way to handle his own affairs.” Xenophon uses the same verb in his story of how Cyrus attended his sick grandfather (Cyr. 1.4.2): oudepote apeleipe. Isocrates deploys two other apo- compounds in the tale of Thrasylochus to send home the point that the speaker, unlike his legal opponents, did not fail the invalid. The compounds are paired to achieve a heightened rhetorical effect, with twin denials followed by a positive assertion (25): oud’ apeipon oud’ apeste¯ n all’ enose¯ leuon auton meta paidos enos. In other contexts within the Isocratean corpus, the paired verbs apeipon and apeste¯ n do not necessarily carry much moral weight. The latter often refers to political revolt.48 Elsewhere it refers to military withdrawal, emigration, renunciation of possessions, or the defection of allies. It can also refer to the qualitative difference between ideas or ways of life, the act of refraining or turning away from a given action, and the act of shrinking from danger.49 This range of available meanings is broad, though the defection of allies and the act of shrinking from danger both convey moral disapproval, just as apeste¯ n does in the Aegineticus. For the other apo- compound, apeipon, we have only a handful of examples with which to work.50 In positive formulations, the verb means “to grow weary or become worn out,” in a morally neutral sense, as at 6.47: “But we would grow weary of hearing and speaking if we examined all such doings.” 51 In negative formulations, on the other hand, the verb can assume a moral overtone of approval for the person or people who did not grow

T3801.indb 36

8/7/06 12:47:54 PM

hom e nurs in g

37

weary.52 So in the Panathenaicus, the Spartans are said to boast many proud exploits, including their early conquest of the Peloponnesus (12.256): “In this state of mind they undertook to fight and never to grow weary (ouk apeipein), though involved in many evils and dangers, until they made all the cities but that of the Argives subject to them.” Earlier in the same speech is another passage that provides an even closer parallel to the usage of apeipon in the Aegineticus. It comes in an encomium to Agamemnon, who did not grow weary of fighting at Troy or go away until he enslaved the city (Isoc. 12.83): ouk apeipen oud’ ape¯ lthe. The twin denials, employing two apo- compounds, are similar in form and moral tone to that of our speaker. It seems clear that the orator uses the construction of twin denials to imbue the apo- compounds with a morally laden meaning that they otherwise might not have. One last apo- compound, aperkhomai, is used in the tale of Thrasylochus to suggest abandonment when the speaker says it was not possible to leave the sick man or to seem to neglect him (19.27). I have translated apelthein as “to leave,” although “to desert his side” would also be possible. The verb aperkhomai usually means “to leave or go home” in a morally neutral sense, or “to leave with or without success,” but it can also mean, more forcefully, “to desert,” 53 as in Concerning the Team of Horses, where the speaker says his father did not see fit to desert to the enemy (16.8). So the theme of personal loyalty, of the speaker’s refusal to abandon Thrasylochus, represents one aspect of moral obligation in the narrative. Courage is another. Since consumption was believed to (and does) pose risks to those nursing the disease, we may take seriously the speaker’s claim that he was willing to risk his life to help Thrasylochus. “I would much rather die,” he says, “than look the other way as he expired before his fated day ( pro moiras) through lack of someone willing to nurse him.” The speaker implicitly lays claim to moral excellence; he also achieves an elevated tone by using the word moira, which is rare in oratory but common in epic and tragedy.54 Thucydides, in his account of the plague at Athens, similarly suggests that men proved their arete¯ by entering the houses of plague-stricken friends; their sense of shame prompted them to risk deadly contagion (2.51.5): “When people went in, they perished, especially those laying claim to some part of virtue (kai malista hoi arete¯ s ti metapoioumenoi ). For shame made them unstinting of their own lives (aiskhune¯ i gar ¯e pheidoun spho¯ n auto¯ n) as they went in to be beside their friends.” The Aegineticus speaker repeatedly avers courage in past dealings with Thrasylochus. The sick-nursing episode is morally equated with other

T3801.indb 37

8/7/06 12:47:54 PM

38


brave exploits he performed for his friend: the danger-fraught retrieval of his money from a tightly guarded island (18) and the rescue of his wounded brother from fighting on Siphnos (39). Nursing Thrasylochus wears down the speaker’s health so that his friends are shocked by his appearance (29). Worried for his life, they warn him to “take care” ( phulattesthai ). To care for a consumptive is both exhausting and dangerous. Such a patient will have required care both night and day. We are justified, then, in imagining that sleep deprivation was perhaps the most physically taxing aspect of the speaker’s ordeal, and indeed, he specifically complains about “lost sleep and toilsome miseries” (28): meta poso¯ n . . . agrupnio¯ n kai talaipo¯ rio¯ n.55 The toilsome miseries should probably be understood as physical hardships. Elsewhere in Greek prose, the word talaipo¯ ria often refers to hardships experienced by soldiers in the field, from the unfit Ionians at Lade (Hdt. 6.11.2, 6.12.2) to the Athenians retreating from Syracuse (Thuc. 7.84.2).56 Clearly, the speaker is making no light complaint, for his diction places nursing duties on the same plane as military feats. He has used the word before (25): “And no one of his blood relations saw fit to share with me the toilsome miseries (touto¯ n to¯ n talaipo¯ rio¯ n) of caring for him.” The relatives’ refusal to help with the nursing is one strike against them. Another is their apparent lack of concern. The speaker complains (25): “No one except his mother and his sister even came to check on him.” Later in the speech, the speaker points the finger at his legal opponent, the dead man’s halfsister (30): “[She] never even saw fit to check on him though he was ill such a long time, and though she had news of his condition every day, and though the journey was easy for her.” 57 This indictment of Thrasylochus’ relatives for their uncaring behavior contributes to an overall impression that, in the context of home nursing, epimeleia was an important virtue. The speaker states (19.28) that his toils demanded the greatest care ( pleiste¯ s epimeleias). Other words related to melo¯ and melomai occur in the Aegineticus, most conspicuously amelein, which is used twice. The first time, the speaker recalls the earlier exodus from war-torn Siphnos, contrasting his own vigilant care with the neglectful behavior of those less stalwart than he (20): After this, when there was a flight from the city with such uproar and fear that some people neglected (amelein) even their own relations, not even amid these evils was I content that I could save the members of my own household, but . . . I helped [Thrasylochus] evacuate his mother and sister and his entire fortune.

T3801.indb 38

8/7/06 12:47:54 PM

hom e nurs in g

39

The second occurrence of amelein is the one we have already noted (27): “And these things went on without a break at any time; for it was not possible to leave him or to seem to neglect him (dokein amelein), which to me would have been more dreadful than the existing evils.” The verb ameleo¯ is common, especially in the works of Xenophon, Isocrates, and Demosthenes.58 It does not always stand as a reproach. To the contrary, a good man may neglect his pleasures to serve a higher purpose (Isoc. 11.23, 15.71). But Demosthenes is particularly fond of condemning neglect and the people responsible for it,59 and Xenophon, too, deplores it.60 In the Memorabilia, Xenophon criticizes men who neglect their sick friends (2.4.3), and in the Cyropaedia he obligingly contrasts neglect with epimeleia (7.5.75 –76). Isocrates often uses ameleo¯ in a neutral sense, but neglectful behavior is held up as a fault in a number of passages.61 In the Aegineticus, he praises the adoption law that encourages people to take care of one another (49). And, finally, he excoriates the half-sister for being neglectful (32). In sum, the Aegineticus lays great emphasis on loyalty, the speaker’s refusal to abandon Thrasylochus, expressed with a series of apo- compounds. The speech also underscores the courage required to treat with kindness, eunoia, someone suffering from a deadly and contagious illness. In praising himself and condemning his opponent, the speaker shows that vigilant care, epimeleia, further required hard work and sensitivity to the emotional state of the sick man. Conclusions This account allows us to understand several important aspects of the oikos: not only the level of protection and care for its members to which it ideally aspired,62 but also what might be called the dynamic of belonging. One key fact about the Athenian family and household was the instability of membership within it, largely owing to high mortality rates. Other scholars have documented patterns of birth and death, marriage, widowhood or divorce, and remarriage; and forensic speeches furnish abundant evidence of how, even within the privileged class that owned the wealth and leisure to pursue disputes through the court system, family structures were constantly shifting. Indeed, it is deceptive to speak of the family as a fixed entity, since new members often had to be sought and accepted (Christ 1998, 168). The Aegineticus documents the attrition of Thrasylochus’ household through civil war and disease. It also provides a detailed view of an adoption predicated on an

T3801.indb 39

8/7/06 12:47:55 PM

40


inherited friendship so enduring that it created, first morally and then legally, a new family tie. The speaker usurps the claims of blood kin who want the dead man’s money but would just as soon leave his oikos bereft of any heir (3). A family and childhood friend becomes, through testamentary adoption, a son and heir; but he has earned his place in part by giving Thrasylochus the same care that might have been expected from the closest relative. In short, he acted in such a way as to belong. It seems that a friendship marked by both loyalty and compassion can transform the very oikos it has upheld. The Aegineticus reveals considerable sensitivity to the psychological sufferings and emotional needs of sick people, reflected on the tragic stage in the Philoctetes of Sophocles, which conveys the sense of helplessness that a caregiver would feel in the face of his or her patient’s pain. Neoptolemus, confronting the incurable wound of Philoctetes, cries, “You most unhappy man, / you that have endured all agonies, lived through them, / shall I take hold of you? Shall I touch you?” (759–761, trans. Grene).63 Isocrates’ reallife account of the moribund Thrasylochus alludes to the dreadful intimacy of such encounters. Moreover, at least one moral imperative is clear: Athenian (or Siphnian) men and women were expected to provide constant care to ailing relatives and friends. They needed to exercise loyalty, courage, vigilance, and sensitivity to the emotional state of the sick person. This was true even if the nursing was unpleasant; the imperative weakens in cases where a caregiver might place himself in danger and would be advised to “take care” ( phulattesthai ) . Even so, this was a high ideal, and many will have fallen short of it, including Thrasylochus’ half-sister, whom Isocrates morally indicts for shirking. Isocrates 19.24 –29 is interesting in its own right, but it also illuminates a more famous passage, Thucydides 2.51, in which Athenian men care for their plague-stricken friends, risking their lives to provide practical nursing and psychological support to the sick and dying. The circumstances of the plague in Athens in 430/29 were so extraordinary that one may justly hesitate to extrapolate from Thucydides alone. But Isocrates shows forty years later that under fairly routine conditions, a person suffering from a disease, even one both fatal and contagious, would look for help from that seldomrecognized figure in Greek social history: the nurturing male, who offered care and companionship, empathy and pity. Men and women alike might be called upon to set aside their own comfort and act upon the strong moral imperative that operated within the oikos. Here, within the first circle of moral

T3801.indb 40

8/7/06 12:47:55 PM

hom e nurs in g

41

obligation reflected in the Aegineticus, the friend of a dying man risks his own health and takes upon himself six months of unpleasant toil. He may well be sustained by the thought of his own long-term advantage: the bequest he hopes to gain. Yet his actions presuppose a high societal expectation of helping behavior among philoi.

T3801.indb 41

8/7/06 12:47:55 PM

two

The Ransom of Captives

In answer to him again spoke aged Priam the godlike: “Do not, beloved of Zeus, make me sit on a chair while Hektor lies yet forlorn among the shelters; rather with all speed give him back, so my eyes may behold him, and accept the ransom we bring you, which is great.” — homer Iliad 24.552 –556 (trans. Lattimore)

A

eschylus wrote a tragedy, now lost, on the ransom of Hector; it stood third in a trilogy based on Books 16 –24 of the Iliad.1 Unfortunately, we cannot know how the playwright dramatized the scene in which Priam, king of Troy, offers the Greek warrior Achilles an enormously rich ransom for the body of his slain son. In Homer, great attention is paid to the behavior of Achilles, who accepts the treasure and relinquishes Hector’s corpse: he does so at the behest of Zeus, but also in response to the old man’s supplication.2 This poignant scene, which was also a favorite subject for vase painting,3 focuses on the victor’s power to either accept or reject an offer of ransom (apoina). It mirrors the opening scene of the Iliad, in which Chryses, a priest of Apollo, attempts in vain to ransom his captive daughter from Agamemnon. As often noted, these two ransom episodes frame the poem at beginning and end; in between, a number of battlefield scenes depict a defeated warrior begging the victor to accept ransom and spare his life. Such offers are invariably rejected in a forceful display of enmity.4 A less frequently observed aspect of Homeric ransom is the magnitude of sacrifice that families were presumed willing to make for their children.

T3801.indb 42

8/7/06 12:47:55 PM

t he ranso m of capt ives

43

More than one desperate young Trojan at the point of death offers up bronze, gold, and wrought iron from his rich father’s house (Il. 6.47– 48, 10.379–380, 11.133 –134; cf. 22.50); the ransom Chryses offers for his captured daughter is “boundless” (Il. 1.13); and we see Priam assemble a dozen robes and an equal number of mantles, blankets, cloaks, and tunics, as well as two tripods, four cauldrons, and “a goblet / of surpassing loveliness that the men of Thrace had given him / when he went to them with a message, but now the old man spared not / even this in his halls, so much was it his heart’s desire / to ransom back his beloved son” (Il. 24.229–237, trans. Lattimore). The domestic crisis caused by the peril of a family member offered dramatic potential that ancient poets liberally exploited: the theme of captivity and rescue runs throughout Homer, tragedy, and satyr plays in which the satyr is held in captivity and has to be rescued (Tzanetou 2002). Ordinary Athenians were brought up with the stories of Andromeda chained to her rock and of the abducted Helen, for whom the entire Trojan War was fought. When Persephone is snatched by Hades, Demeter searches everywhere, abandoning all else until her daughter is returned. Orpheus follows Eurydice to the Underworld. In these myths, mortals and immortals alike make tremendous sacrifices to regain a loved one. A willingness to go the distance— even, with the mythical Orpheus, as far as the Underworld itself—was part of the culture. But how did that theme play out in real life, where ransom offered a practical means of rescue? Evidence from fifth- and fourth-century historiography and oratory once again provides a quotidian view—fourteen actual examples of captives or groups of captives in the Greek world between 506 and c. 323 b.c.e. whose ransom was either negotiated or fully accomplished.5 The epigraphical record is also helpful, since citizens who ransomed captives might be honored with a decree or crown or grant of proxenia that was recorded in stone; Pritchett identifies five secure examples from the classical period.6 Table 2 cites all twenty examples arranged in rough chronological order. This evidence, like that for bystander intervention or home nursing or the long-distance transport of sick and wounded soldiers, has certain obvious limitations. First, it is frustratingly fragmentary. As usual, we have too few examples—twenty of them spanning 283 years and stretching from Sardis to Sicily—to allow secure generalizations. Second, the facts are often uncertain because the received accounts are either muddled or biased. Xenophon, for example, tells us in the Hellenica (6.2.36) that Iphicrates set a fixed ransom for captured Syracusan sailors and then released them with sureties; Diodorus (15.47)

T3801.indb 43

8/7/06 12:47:55 PM

44


table 2. ransom of capt ives in orator y, histor iography, and epigraphy Source

Date

Hdt. 5.77.3

506 b.c.e.

Thuc. 6.5.3

mid-490s

Hdt. 9.99

480 – 478

Thuc. 4.69.3

424

Antiph. 5.20

c. 416

Androtion in Jacoby, 408/7 FGrH 324 fr. 44 Xen. Hell. 4.8.21 391

T3801.indb 44

Lys. 26.24

387

Xen. Hell. 6.2.36

372

Dem. 53.6ff.

c. 368

IG XII.7.5 (Biel. 2)

c. 356

Aeschin. 2.12

348

Dem. 19.169

348

Dem. 19.40 and Aeschin. 2.100 Aeschin. 2.156 –157

346 346

Occasion Athenians ransom 700 Boeotians and unknown number of Chalcidians at two minae each Hippocrates, tyrant of Gela, ransoms Syracusan captives for territory of nearby Camarina Samians ransom 500 Athenians captured by Xerxes’ army in Attica Nisaeans surrender to Athenians on terms that include payment of ransom Herodes, an Athenian cleruch in Lesbos, plans to ransom some slaves to Thracians; the slaves and Thracians set sail with him toward Thrace; a storm halts voyage; Herodes is apparently slain Spartans and Athenians exchange prisoners, but the surplus are ransomed for one mina Spartan general Diphridas captures Persian satrap’s daughter and son-in-law Tigranes on their way to Sardis; he wins enough ransom to pay his army Thrasybulus of Collytus, an Athenian naval commander, allegedly extorts 30 minae from his own sailor-soldiers whose triremes he has surrendered in battle; he pledges to ransom them; outcome unknown Iphicrates sets fixed ransom for captured Syracusan sailorsoldiers; he plans to negotiate hefty sum for their commander or else sell him, but the latter kills himself; outcome for sailor-soldiers uncertain Nicostratus, an Athenian, is captured by privateers and ransomed Androtion, Athenian governor of the Arkesinians, ransoms their prisoners of war Phrynon of Rhamnus is captured and ransomed by Macedonian pirates; Ctesiphon is sent to demand the money back; outcome is successful Athenians captured by Philip at Olynthus offer to borrow ransom money; outcome unknown? Demosthenes has one talent set aside to ransom prisoners from Philip Satyrus the comic actor begs from Philip the release of certain friends; furnishes ransom

8/7/06 12:47:55 PM


45

table 2. cont inued Source

Date

Dem. 12.3

c. 342

IG II2.283 (Biel. 4) IG II2.284 (Biel. 5)

mid or later 4th cent. c. 350 –340

IG II2.399 (Biel. 6) MDAI 72 (Biel. 7)

328/7 c. 320

Occasion Athenian general Diopithes extracts ransom of nine talents from captured Macedonian envoy named Amphilochus Citizen of Salamis ransoms captives taken in Sicily Cleomis of Methymna ransoms Athenians captured by privateers Eurylochus ransoms Athenians from Crete Antileon of Chalcis ransoms Samian exiles imprisoned in Athens and condemned to death

makes the contradictory claim that Iphicrates sold them outright and used the proceeds to pay his troops. Such a contradiction cannot easily be resolved. Personal or political bias warps certain other accounts. The Lysianic speech On the Scrutiny of Evandros includes a shrill anti-oligarchical invective in which a military commander, one Thrasybulus of Collytus, is accused of extorting ransom money from his own troops after surrendering them to the enemy (26.24). To take that accusation at face value is probably unwise. Demosthenes undoubtedly ransomed a number of fellow citizens, but when he and his political rival Aeschines bicker about precisely how many prisoners one talent would redeem (Dem. 19.40; Aeschin. 2.100), whom should we believe? Still, although the historicity of certain details is open to question, the overall picture in each case must have made sense to its original author and audience, who knew vastly more than we do about ransom in the classical period. Fortunately, the ancient sources offer many additional references to ransom—beyond these twenty actual examples of it—as well as other circumstantial evidence that can help us sort things out.7 Previous scholarly discussions of ransom have usually focused on it as a military phenomenon,8 and most of our examples do involve groups of prisoners, like the 700 Boeotians that the Athenians ransomed in 506 (Hdt. 5.77.3). This chapter will instead explore the domestic and personal sacrifices that Athenian men and women were expected to make on behalf of individual friends and relatives who had been captured. Only one of the twenty instances of ransom lends itself to such a project, and that is a long, detailed, and somewhat hair-raising story found in Against Nicostratus, one in a series of private

T3801.indb 45

8/7/06 12:47:56 PM

46


speeches in the Demosthenic corpus that were written by or for the highly litigious Apollodorus.9 Briefly, the story is this: Nicostratus, a neighbor of Apollodorus, was captured by a trireme and sold as a slave on Aegina. He was ransomed for twenty-six minae by xenoi or “strangers,” who gave him thirty days to pay back the money or owe double. Hurrying home, Nicostratus came to Apollodorus, weeping and showing the wounds from his fetters, and asked for help. Apollodorus took pity on him and, with no small effort, came up with the money. Nicostratus promised to make a collection from his friends so that he could pay Apollodorus back—but then decided that it would be easier to murder him instead. This account is full of dramatic and factual interest and fully merits a closer look, especially given the role of pity in the decision of Apollodorus. But first it will be necessary to investigate what it meant to be held for ransom in ancient Greece and who might be expected to pay up for reasons of sentiment, loyalty, or personal prestige. On Being Held for Ransom A miserable captivity awaited soldiers on the losing side in battle, inhabitants of defeated cities, or unlucky traders and travelers. Battles yielded male prisoners of war; the defeat of cities yielded women and children also. In the Plataicus of Isocrates, being made a prisoner of war is called the worst fate of all (Isoc. 14.18), one memorably depicted by Euripides in the Trojan Women of 415. The Athenians themselves were never subjected to the extreme measures they inflicted on Melos and certain other Greek city-states, but after the defeat by Sparta, they were terrified they would be (Xen. Hell. 2.2.3). War captives faced a broad range of outcomes, most of them bad.10 Some were executed or massacred, especially during the Peloponnesian War.11 Others died of disease, starvation, or exposure; anyone too old or too weak to accompany the victor’s army might be left behind for dogs or wolves (Xen. Ages. 1.22). Most of them, it appears, were sold into slavery, and individuals who were already slaves at the time of their capture could expect no better fate. In effect, all the prisoners formed part of the booty (Ducrey 1968, 176)—a rather inconvenient part, as they required food and water and some form of restraint and supervision. If lucky, citizen-soldiers might be released in a man-for-man exchange of captives or exchanged for territory. On the other hand, they might be held several years for political purposes; or they might sooner or later be ransomed.12 Captives presumably fetched a higher price if they were ransomed rather than sold into slavery. Either way, the proceeds

T3801.indb 46

8/7/06 12:47:56 PM


47

could be used to sustain further warfare. One account of the campaign of Iphicrates at Corcyra ends with the sale of prisoners that generated revenues of sixty talents, a sum given over to paying the troops (Diod. 15.47.7). The chief motive for ransoming prisoners was surely economic, but the decision to release them with or without ransom, or to ransom them at a given price or at a given time, did have a political impact: it could affect interstate relations and the lasting reputation of the parties. An exchange of Athenian and Peloponnesian prisoners, for example, formed part of the 421 Peace of Nicias. Although wartime conditions posed the greatest threat of capture, people were also kidnapped in peacetime. Abductions occur frequently in Greek literature, as in the tale of Eumaeus in the Odyssey or the tit-for-tat snatching of Io, Europa, and Helen with which Herodotus opens his Histories.13 Such stories belonged to legend but also resembled events that befell ordinary people. Indeed, the philosopher Plato was seized and sold on the island of Aegina in 388/7.14 Travelers were exposed to brigands by land and to pirates by sea; they might also fall victim to the semi-official activities of armies and warships in search of gain. It is difficult to distinguish in the ancient record between piracy, privateering, and reprisals.15 As Shipley argues, the Greeks did not differentiate the same way we traditionally have done between war and peace, and they employed a broad range of warlike activities, from piracy and banditry to organized battles, to alleviate economic hardship (Shipley 1993, 5, 18 –19). Certain stretches of coastline or inter-island waters were considered more dangerous than others, and the problem fluctuated over time, but it is clear that maritime raiding and reprisals posed a severe problem in the first half of the fourth century,16 and that the status of herald or envoy afforded only uneasy protection to a traveler. Three of our known examples of ransom derived from abductions (Dem. 53; Aeschin. 2.12; IG II2.284). The threat was so common that Apollodorus, in explaining what happened to Nicostratus, could be brief (Dem. 53.6): “In pursuing [some runaway slaves], he was seized by a trireme and taken down to Aegina, and there he was sold.” 17 One may well ask, why a trireme? The explanation is twofold, both economic and political. Even in Athens, where warships were owned by the city-state and outfitted for one year at a time by wealthy citizens holding the office of trierarch, some of the money and goods needed to support the ships were gained through plundering. The speaker of On the Trierarchic Crown (after 361) complains that Athenian trierarchs, then functioning within the Second Athenian Confederacy, mightily abused their office (Dem. 51.13): pantas anthro¯ pous agei kai ferei. The trireme that seized Nicostratus, meanwhile, was presumably an enemy

T3801.indb 47

8/7/06 12:47:56 PM

48


warship, perhaps belonging to Aegina (Trevett 1992, 9). Relations between Athens and Aegina were always tense; the two states appear to have been at war in the 360s, and maritime raids were an important aspect of Spartan and Aeginetan strategy in this period.18 For captives of every type, ransom and rescue may have appeared preferable to slavery or death, but a safe return home offered no guarantee that their lives were not ruined. They faced high costs for their misadventures. Some of those costs were no doubt psychological: Nicostratus, we are told, was unwilling to show the scars from the fetters he had worn during his ordeal.19 But the most obvious and potentially devastating costs were financial. Nicostratus had to pay back his ransom money, a seemingly impossible sum, or risk becoming the slave of his ransomers. Socrates observes in Xenophon’s Memorabilia (3.12.2) that many captives either are sold into slavery or, “after meeting with cruel sufferings and paying, sometimes, more than they have, live on, destitute and in misery.” The high price of ransom could be borne more easily by wealthy men than by those of moderate or meager means.20 On the other hand, the price was variable, and individuals identified as either rich or important were attractive targets and had to pay more. The Spartan general Diphridas, who in 391 captured a Persian satrap’s daughter and son-in-law, obtained in exchange for those two politically important individuals enough ransom to pay his entire army (Xen. Hell. 4.8.21). A distinction was drawn between soldiers and generals; Iphicrates in 372 set a fixed ransom for the rank and file but planned to negotiate a large sum for their commander. Aristotle (Eth. Nic. 5.7.1) mentions that the conventional ransom for an ordinary Athenian prisoner was one mina, an amount equivalent to a hundred drachmae. That was as much money as a skilled laborer working on the Erechtheum in 409 to 407 could earn if he worked a hundred days—and it would have taken a soldier or sailor twice as long to earn that same amount (Loomis 1998, 234).21 Whitehead contends that Aristotle’s remark has been taken out of context,22 but one mina was accepted for surplus prisoners after a man-for-man exchange of Spartans and Athenians in 408/7 (Androtion). The Athenians in 506 ransomed hundreds of Boeotians and Chalcidians for two minae each (Hdt. 5.77.3). Demosthenes (19.169) mentions the need for rank-and-file prisoners to borrow “three minae, five minae, or as the case may be.” Isocrates complains misogynistically that men spend twenty and thirty minae to redeem women whose extravagance will in any case ruin them (Isoc. 15.288).23 Demosthenes (19.40) boasts that, on the Second Embassy to Philip of Macedon in 346, he took along a talent of silver for the express purpose of ransoming Athenian prisoners.

T3801.indb 48

8/7/06 12:47:56 PM


49

How far would that sum have gone? One talent was equivalent to sixty minae, so it would have freed thirty men at two minae each, or several men at twenty to thirty minae each. The derogatory claim of Aeschines that the talent of Demosthenes could free only one man should be regarded as specious. As we have seen, Nicostratus was ransomed for twenty-six minae. Who was responsible for paying the ransom price? Was it ever the citystate? What was the role of the Athenian people, the de¯ mos, vis-à-vis war prisoners? Let us take the last question first. The de¯ mos was clearly involved in decisions involving war captives that Athens seized from the enemy. Although elected generals may sometimes have decided the fate of captives in the field, and perhaps did so with impunity,24 they appear by and large to have been following instructions they received from the Assembly. A few captives were even sent to Athens so that the Assembly could vote directly on what was to become of them (Hamel 1998, 51–52). Thus we find that in 407 the Athenians decided to release the controversial Rhodian aristocrat Dorieus without ransom (Xen. Hell. 1.5.19), even though he had apparently led a revolt against Athens. The de¯ mos also was concerned about the treatment of its own captured citizens and might plead on behalf of Athenians or allies who had fallen into enemy hands. So, for example, the Athenians sent a herald to Plataea asking for gentle treatment of Theban prisoners; unfortunately, it was already too late (Thuc. 2.6.1–3).25 Leading members of the Assembly—its speakers, or rhe¯tores—might attempt diplomacy. Demades claims that he won, through a speech flattering Philip, 2,000 captives free of ransom along with the bodies of 1,000 Athenian dead at Chaeronea (On the Twelve Years 9); this claim is partially corroborated by Diodorus (16.87). Negotiations for the release of war captives often took place at a command level, and we find defeated generals haggling with the victors. The sailor-soldiers who fell into enemy hands in 387 evidently expected their commander, who had surrendered the ships, to negotiate on their behalf (Lys. 26.24). Indeed, it is hard to imagine any other way in which the ransom of large groups of prisoners, numbering in the hundreds or thousands, could have been handled. More than half a dozen known examples undermine Pritchett’s conjecture (1971–91, 5 : 224; cf. Kelly 1970, 128) that “ransoming . . . was almost always an individual matter and relatively infrequent.” 26 Given that capture and ransom were standard features of ancient warfare, one might expect the Athenians to have allocated funds for the express purpose of buying back their citizen soldiers. Some situations described in the ancient sources, such as the 424 capture of Nisaea (Thuc. 4.69ff.),

T3801.indb 49

8/7/06 12:47:56 PM

50


involved an actual treaty under which a certain sum per man was paid to buy off the victor’s right to enslave the vanquished (Andreades 1933, 165). Unfortunately, we cannot tell where that money came from. There is only one piece of evidence that the public revenues of Athens could be used to ransom war captives. Demosthenes, in a letter (3.10), says that “if it were necessary to ransom the sons [of Lycurgus] from foreign captors by giving this sum out of the revenues, I believe you would all be eager to do it.” This hypothetical scenario may be the exception that proves the rule that such expenditures did not typically come from public coffers. To start with, the polis lacked any permanent mechanism for collecting war revenues that might be applied to ransom payments. Indeed, its methods of funding military activity appear improvisational by modern standards. The 300 wealthiest men, with fortunes of at least three or four talents, carried the greatest financial burden of the trierarchies.27 Ordinary soldiers paid for their own equipment; while on campaign, they foraged for food and otherwise lived off booty. They, unlike the rowers who were recruited from the poor, received no state pay. War was in part self-financing: victory generated wealth, which allowed the fighting to continue. At the same time, Athens did have a war chest that contained revenues from tribute and special taxes. The polis imposed tribute during its fifth-century empire and the syntaxis on allied states under the fourth-century Second Confederacy. Starting at least as early as the siege of Mytilene in 428/7 (Thuc. 3.19.1; Migeotte 1992, 11), it also imposed a special tax, the eisphora, on Athenian citizens with fortunes of at least one talent, who probably numbered 1,200 to 2,000 at any give time. Furthermore, the state solicited from the rich a voluntary contribution, the epidosis, to meet unusual exigencies. Literary evidence and inscriptions reflect the use of epidoseis at Athens for warfare, special sales of grain, public sacrifices, or the repair of public buildings; ransom payments are not mentioned (Andreades 1933, 133, 349; Migeotte 1992, 9– 46).28 Meanwhile, funds from tribute and special taxes were used to commission new ships and hire mercenaries, especially in the fourth century, when warfare became more expensive because Athens and other Greek cities had to maintain standing corps of mercenaries for year-round rather than seasonal fighting (Brun 1983, 143 –144). Again, we find no mention of ransom. It therefore seems safe to say that the role of the city-state in furnishing ransom money must have been minimal. Money could also be collected through demes, garrisons, cleruchies, or other such groups (Migeotte 1992, 7). In any case, part of the burden was assumed ex officio by wealthy men who, it will be argued, acted from at

T3801.indb 50

8/7/06 12:47:57 PM


51

least three distinct but overlapping motives—personal loyalty, disguised patronage, and a desire for public display. Those motives roughly correspond to social relationships that, as mentioned in the Introduction, can be imagined as a series of concentric rings with the moral agent standing at the center. The first ring, which lay immediately around him,29 contained his nearest and dearest family and friends, the people who can, according to Demosthenes (24.195), compel action. The second ring contained other people he knew who might be connected to him in dozens of ways, including guest-friendship, economic partnership, and membership in the same community (deme), brotherhood (phratry), or religious association (orgeon). The third and most distant ring contained fellow citizens with whom he had little or no personal connection. More will be said later about loyalty to people in the first ring. For now, suffice it to say that a rich man, like any other, would feel bound to help the people closest to him: father, mother, son, daughter, brother, sister, wife, cousin, childhood friend. Given a life-and-death scenario, one’s blood kin took priority. In the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle establishes the general rule that one should repay a creditor rather than give the money to a friend—but he then uses a hypothetical ransom case to show that, under extreme circumstances, giving to a friend would take priority (9.2.4, trans. Rackham): “For example,” he asks, “suppose one has been ransomed from brigands; ought one to ransom one’s ransomer in turn, whoever he may be— or even if he has not been captured himself but asks for his money back, ought one to repay him— or ought one to ransom one’s own father?” The answer is obvious. Aristotle adds, “For it might be thought a man’s duty to ransom his father even before himself.” 30 The second ring is diverse and complex. To start with, it will have contained some associates and companions and guest-friends of roughly equal wealth and social status—friends whom one ought to help should they fall upon hard times. A case in point: The comic actor Satyrus, during the Second Embassy of 346, sought the release of certain guest-friends (xenoi ) whom he saw fettered and digging in Philip’s vineyard. Demosthenes, we are told, publicly praised him for great-heartedness (Aeschin. 2.156 –157). There may have been many men with whom our ideal wealthy Athenian could have shared friendship based on mutual regard and even-handed reciprocity (Konstan 1997, 53 –92). Yet this second ring will also have contained many acquaintances who occupied somewhat lower rungs of the socioeconomic ladder. Relationships with them would have been characterized by forms of reciprocity that might be markedly unequal. Now, patronage may be defined as a reciprocal relation-

T3801.indb 51

8/7/06 12:47:57 PM

52


ship in which a rich patron builds and maintains his power base by aiding less fortunate clients or followers, who in turn owe him political and social support. Patronage was destined to become a pivotal social institution in Rome; it counted far less in Athens, and yet was not unknown. Despite the city-state’s democratic achievements, wealth and power were never evenly distributed, and people of unequal means did enter into relationships with one another that involved forms of exchange.31 Penia, in Aristophanes’ Wealth (553 –554), turns to the wealthy for relief.32 Our sources, predictably, highlight the favors that the rich bestowed rather than the benefits that they received. A speech in the Lysianic corpus, On the Property of Aristophanes, equates the ransom of war captives with the dowering of girls and the provision of funerals. All three are ways in which a man helps his “friends”—who are clearly less well-to-do (Lys. 19.59):33 “[My father] used to do these things thinking that a good man owed this to his friends even if no one ever knew; but now it is fitting that you should hear about it from me.” Demosthenes makes a similar equation between the ransom of captives and the dowering of daughters (Dem. 18.268). Surely the wealthy earned the gratitude of those they helped. Their motive could be described as “disguised patronage.” The term derives from Millett, who argues that as the scope for patronage, which may have been common in archaic Athens, diminished during the classical period, “efforts were made to conceal or disguise it.” 34 Oratorical passages on the ransom of captives suggest that speakers stood to gain the most from claims of dispassionate generosity. Humphreys carries the idea one step further: “In so far as patronclient relationships, or something analogous to them, existed in Attica, the ‘clients’ were collective rather than individual” (Humphreys 1977–78, 102). She is correct in saying that the object of generosity, if directed through the system of liturgies, was collective, but it would, in my opinion, be hard to prove that individuals of lesser means never felt bound to a rich benefactor nor expressed their gratitude in practical ways. This brings us to the third ring, containing fellow citizens with whom the rich man had little or no personal connection. Here was where he could win the most prestige, praise, and popular support for his proposals. Listen to how Demosthenes boasts of his ransoming activities—apparently the same that Aeschines derided. One finds no mention of xenoi, for he highlights his impartial generosity rather than friendship of any kind (19.229–230): One man [Demosthenes] . . . ransomed war captives at his own expense. . . . Though he was still paying for a chorus and outfitting a trireme,

T3801.indb 52

8/7/06 12:47:57 PM


53

he thought he should also do these things: spend money willingly, ransom prisoners, and never look the other way while a single one of his fellow citizens (me¯den’ . . . ton polito¯n) met with calamity on account of need. The ransom of war captives in this passage is represented as a form of service to the city. Elsewhere, Andocides (2.18) urges that the most worthy man is the one who risks his life and possessions to confer some benefit upon his fellow citizens. Since the rich had more, they were expected to give more, as Aristotle explains (Eth. Nic. 1122b). We have already seen that they were called upon to perform liturgies, pay special taxes, and make voluntary contributions (Millett 1993, 186). The performance of liturgies alone cost so much that it ruined some households (Brun 1983, 25 –26), and a burden that leading citizens voluntarily assumed in the early fifth century had become compulsory by the fourth, when liturgies were assigned on a rotating basis. Some litigants accuse their opponents of shirking liturgies (Ober 1989, 215 –217);35 they apparently assumed that the rich were entitled to their private wealth only insofar as they were willing to share it publicly, or pay their taxes. This assumption emerges clearly in the orations of Isaeus and Demosthenes, where speakers often defend the legitimacy of property ownership, which the city should protect; but the rich, in turn, should be accountable to the city (Vannier 1988, 139). Many speeches attack wealthy men for refusing to assist citizens of lesser means in official and unofficial ways.36 Demosthenes emphasizes the importance of fellow-feeling (18.291–292) and public-spirited assistance (18.311), and at one point equates trierarchies, choregies, special war taxes, the ransom of captives, and other such acts of philanthro¯ pia, all done for the polis (8.70). Many speakers who boast of liturgies make no mention of ransom,37 but the payment of ransom for poorer men was one form of expenditure that protected the possession of private fortunes that had to be publicly shared (Ober 1989, 226 –230, 291–292). In Against Eratosthenes, Lysias equates the ransom of prisoners with the payment of war taxes and the outfitting of a chorus (Lys. 12.20).38 Here, in the third ring of impersonal service to fellow citizens, a leading motive for action will have been public display.39 Men who made significant expenditures on behalf of the city, including the payment of ransom, were recognized with honorary decrees and crowns. Public recognition of this sort offered benefactors moral gratification, symbolic capital, and practical gratification, too, since the performance of liturgies and the like was one way that the rich protected themselves from enemies (Lys. 25.12).40 Any failure to act generously might be duly noted in court.41

T3801.indb 53

8/7/06 12:47:57 PM

54


In a speech by Isaeus, the speaker accuses Dicaeogenes of squandering his wealth without helping either the city or his friends. Interestingly, the complaint that he never provided ransoms (5.44) is sandwiched between his lack of expensive horses, which might have won races for the greater glory of Athens, and his failure to set up dedications that had already been paid for. The speaker then goes on to lambaste Dicaeogenes because he performed no public service, undertook no trierarchy, made no voluntary contributions, and did no military service.42 The line between public and private in a man’s life—from the luxury of racehorses to the rigors of military service—appears to have been profoundly blurred. The charge of failing to contribute ransom money could, as we have seen, damage a man’s reputation as a friend, or citizen, or both. Recent analyses of the public and private domains in classical Athens all seem to concur that there was no clear-cut dichotomy between the two; one may perhaps speak, as Cohen does (1991, 73), about an “articulated public and private space around which the citizen’s life was organized and given meaning.” So far we have considered the various ways ancient Greeks could and did fall captive to the enemy or kidnappers, and who might be expected to pay ransom were it demanded. The city-state, it has been shown, could not be counted on to ransom Athenian war prisoners, let alone those abducted by pirates or brigands. Well-to-do citizens sometimes stepped forward and performed this task, whether because of personal ties, or because of their ambition to perform public service and receive public praise. Fortunate indeed were captives who were themselves rich or whose rich friends paid their ransom and then bragged about it in court. Equally fortunate were those who happened by chance to be included in a group of prisoners for whom joint release was arranged. But what happened to individuals who were not so lucky? The most substantial direct evidence that can be brought to bear on this question comes from the extraordinarily detailed tale of Nicostratus, which strongly suggests that the responsibility for the payment of ransom often fell upon the family or household of the captive. Demosthenes 53.6 –13 t he ta le o f n ic o s tr a tu s Nicostratus was the luckless man captured by a trireme, sold as a slave, and ransomed for twenty-six minae by xenoi who gave him thirty days to pay back the money. He obtained the requisite sum from Apollodorus and

T3801.indb 54

8/7/06 12:47:57 PM


55

then, we are told, tried to kill him rather than settle the debt. Apollodorus, a well-known figure in mid-fourth-century Athens,43 was the son of Pasion, a freedman and the wealthiest banker of his day. Since he was involved in so many lawsuits, and since so many of his speeches remain extant, we know a great deal about him. The context for Against Nicostratus, dated to c. 365 (Gernet 1959, 3 : 87), is fairly simple. Apollodorus is bent on revenge against Nicostratus and his brother Arethusius. He has already won a conviction against the latter for giving false testimony. The court has imposed a gratifyingly large fine of one talent, which Arethusius has failed to pay outright, and now Apollodorus is trying to keep him from concealing property that the state is entitled to confiscate. The property in question consists of two slaves; Arethusius asserts that they belong to his brothers rather than himself. The passage below, excerpted from the narrative section of the speech (53.4 –18), has absolutely no bearing on the issue of who owned the slaves; rather, Apollodorus explains his grudge against Arethusius and Nicostratus, hoping thereby to win the support of the dikastai —a good example of how litigants in Attic lawsuits could further their case by establishing the motive of personal revenge.44 Gernet (1959, 3 : 82) objects to the passage’s “babbling that is sentimental and aggressive by turn.” That babbling can work to the advantage of scholars; the story is long and convoluted but deserves to be presented in its entirety: (6) While I was abroad, three house-slaves ran away from [Nicostratus], off his farm—two of which I had given him and one of which he himself bought. While pursuing them he was seized by a trireme and taken down to Aegina, and there he was sold. When I, serving as trierarch, had sailed back, Deinon, this man’s brother, came to me telling of his misfortune, and how he himself through lack of funds had not journeyed to him although Nicostratus had sent him letters, and at the same time he told me that he heard his brother was suffering terribly. (7) And I, having heard these things and having sympathized with the ill luck of this man, dispatched Deinon his brother directly to him, giving him travel money of 300 drachmae. And [Nicostratus], arriving home and coming to my house first, embraced me and praised me because I had provided travel money for his brother, and he bewailed his own misfortune, and, while complaining of his own relatives, begged me to help him, just as in times past I had been a true friend to him. At the same time he was crying, and saying that he had been ransomed for twenty-six minae, and he beseeched me to contribute something toward his

T3801.indb 55

8/7/06 12:47:58 PM

56


ransom. (8) Hearing these things and taking pity on him, and at the same time seeing how badly off he was, displaying the wounds on his calves that were made by fetters— of which he still bears the scars, although if you should order him to show them, he would not be willing to—I answered him that even in times past I had been a true friend to him, and now amid his calamity I would come to his aid, and the 300 drachmae, which I gave to his brother as travel money when he traveled to him, I released to him, and I would enter in 1,000 drachmae as a loan toward his ransom. . . . (10) Not many days later, coming to me crying, he said that the strangers who had loaned him the ransom money were demanding payment of the balance; and that the agreement allowed thirty days for him to pay it back or owe double the amount; and that, moreover, no one was willing to buy or take a mortgage on his farm, the one next to mine. . . . (11) “And so you,” he said, “provide for me the remainder of the money before the thirty days go by, so that what I have already paid, the 1,000 drachmae, may not be lost, and so that I myself will not become liable to seizure. Upon making a collection from my friends,” he said, “when I have gotten rid of the strangers, I shall pay you back whatever you lend me. You know,” he said, “that the laws command that a man ransomed from the enemy belongs to his ransomer, unless he pays back the ransom money.” (12) Hearing his words, and not realizing he was lying, I answered him in just the manner of a young man and close friend, not expecting to be wronged: “Nicostratus, even in earlier times I was a true friend to you, and now in your calamities I have helped you as much as I could. Since at present you cannot provide all the money—for me there is no cash at hand, nor do I myself have any, but I lend you whatever you want from my own property, for you to mortgage for the balance of your debt, and to use the money interest-free for a year, and pay back the strangers. When you have collected a loan from your friends, as you say, pay me off.” This passage offers exceptional insights into the moral, legal, and financial challenges that such an event might pose. The length, detail, complexity— the very richness of the text—will require considerable effort to disentangle. The permeable boundary between freedom and slavery that emerges—since Nicostratus is sold as a slave, ransomed, and then threatened perhaps with slavery should he fail to repay—will be examined in Chapter 5. At present, it will be enough to analyze the emotional responses and the complex web of social and moral obligations that the narrative implies. The tale of

T3801.indb 56

8/7/06 12:47:58 PM


57

Nicostratus illustrates the situation of a kidnapping victim who enjoyed no rapid intervention. From his point of view, the role of relatives, friends, and neighbors was paramount. moral o blig a t io n in d em o s t h en es 53 . 6 – 13 The first place Nicostratus turned for help was his own family. This was not easy, of course, because his misadventures had taken him far from home. In pursuing his runaway slaves, he must have gone down to the coast of Attica, near enough to the sea to fall prey to marauders from a trireme. After that, we know, he was sold on the slave market of the nearby island of Aegina.45 From there, his owner took him somewhere else within the Greek world. The speech fails to specify a location, but the amount of travel money (ephodion) that Apollodorus claims to have loaned him (8) suggests that it lay at a considerable distance: the 300 drachmae, which presumably allowed Deinon to reach his brother and then both men to journey home, was no small sum: each of the three one-way fares would have cost 100 drachmae.46 The place of his captivity must have been situated near the sea, for communications were relatively good. The newly enslaved Nicostratus was able to send one or more letters or messages (epistolas) to his brother Deinon (6). It thereafter became the responsibility of Deinon to rescue Nicostratus. The moral and social pressure on Deinon would have been intense, regardless of any fraternal affection that may have existed between them, for a man who failed to ransom an immediate relative would probably face the condemnation of his neighbors. Hunter notes that “at all levels Athenians were encouraged to pry and to probe, to know what their neighbours were doing and had done.” The treatment of kin was much discussed.47 As soon as Deinon received news of Nicostratus’s captivity, then, it was incumbent upon him to act. He therefore borrowed money, traveled to his brother, arranged for his release, and brought him home. Nicostratus, as we have seen, still had to pay back the xenoi who had ransomed him for twenty-six minae, or 2,600 drachmae—almost half a talent. Surely these xenoi (10 –11) are not guest-friends, but merely strangers who act as middlemen (Rosivach 1999, 138); they could be money-changers with friendly intent, or they could be slave-traders. Once again, it seems, he appealed to his family, allegedly without success, for when he approaches Apollodorus, he greets him, thanks him, and then complains bitterly about his relatives: kate¯goro¯ n hama to¯ n heautou oikeio¯ n, “complaining of his own

T3801.indb 57

8/7/06 12:47:58 PM

58


relatives” (7). The verb kate¯goreo¯ is strong language. It means “to speak against, accuse, arraign” and carries legal connotations. To what extent those relatives had actually failed Nicostratus we cannot know, and we may suspect him of exaggeration if not outright lies, but the structure of his argument shows that he was expected to seek their help first—and was likely to get it—before turning to his friends and neighbors. During this first meeting between Nicostratus and Apollodorus, the latter forgives him the 300 drachmae in travel money and promises in addition a gift of 1,000 drachmae toward his ransom (9). In their second meeting, however, just a few days later, Nicostratus pleads even greater desperation because, he says, time is running out: he has only thirty days to come up with the balance or owe double, and many of those thirty days are spent. And once again, he suggests, his relatives have let him down. He had hoped either to sell or to mortgage the family farm, but his brother Arethesius—perhaps the eldest of the siblings and certainly the richest (28)—blocked his efforts, claiming that the farm had already been mortgaged (10). The worst-case scenario that Nicostratus evokes now is very bad indeed: enslavement. The law, he says, provides that should he fail to reimburse the men who paid his ransom, he will become their property (11).48 Apollodorus at this point offers to mortgage some of his own real estate in order to supply, in the form of a yearlong interest-free loan, the 1,600 drachmae that are lacking. During both interviews, Nicostratus claims to have sought help from his family first. No doubt he did; perhaps in the process, he and Arethusius began conspiring to defraud Apollodorus. We hear no more of Deinon. Looking ahead in the speech, we find Arethusius accusing Apollodorus of owing money to the state (14), which Apollodorus then pays. There must be more to the story of their falling-out than Apollodorus chooses to reveal,49 but it is clear that the feud between these men develops on two fronts at once: at court and on the farm. In the dead of night, Apollodorus says, Arethusius trespasses on his farm and damages his fruits, vines, and olive trees (15). Moreover, one night not long thereafter, Nicostratus and Arethusius allegedly ambush Apollodorus and try to throw him in a quarry (17).50 Apollodorus, in recounting the story, at first names only Nicostratus, but soon declares that Arethusius, too, could be subject to the death penalty for this attempt (18). In the opening to his speech, he calls both of them together the unholiest of men, toutous t’ anosio¯tatous anthro¯po¯n (3). For better or for worse, the sense of family solidarity between Nicostratus and his brother Arethusius is very strong.

T3801.indb 58

8/7/06 12:47:58 PM


59

We may now examine the relationship that apparently existed between Nicostratus and Apollodorus before they became enemies, and consider any moral obligations that such a relationship entailed, especially in a crisis on the order of a man’s capture and ransom. Our examination must proceed in full awareness that Apollodorus has selected or even invented details that will help him establish a pleasing ¯ethos for himself and a disagreeable one for Nicostratus. Be that as it may, the story he tells is designed to strike the dikastai as credible within the broader context of Athenian social relations. Now, as he launches into the narrative portion of the speech (4), Apollodorus makes a number of interesting claims about his ties to Nicostratus. First, he says that Nicostratus was his neighbor in the country ( geito¯ n . . . en agro¯i ). Second, the two young men were roughly the same age (he¯likio¯tes). Third, they became closely associated after the death of Pasion, an event dated to 370/69, after which Apollodorus, then about twenty-four years old, started to spend more time on the farm than previously. He says he and Nicostratus had a great deal to do with one another (kai mallon alle¯lois ¯ede¯ ekhro¯metha, dia to geitones te einai kai he¯likio¯tai) and became quite close ( panu oikeio¯s diekeimetha). The emotional content of this passage will be considered in a later section; for now it is important to note that their friendship entailed the continuing exchange of favors in a relationship akin to that of client and patron. Nicostratus could call upon Apollodorus for whatever he needed—the language here is vague—and Apollodorus, meanwhile, counted on Nicostratus to watch over his farm whenever private business or public duty, such as a trierarchy, called him away from home. Indeed, Apollodorus was serving as trierarch on a voyage between the Peloponnese and Sicily, probably in 368/7 (Trevett 1992, 33), when some other trireme abducted Nicostratus, setting into motion the chain of events to which this speech bears witness. Their reciprocal relationship sprang from the fact that they were neighbors: the accidental circumstance of physical proximity first brought them into contact and later encouraged their mutual cooperation and sense of moral obligation toward one another. Social historians have only lately started to examine the role that neighbors in the ancient city of Athens and the surrounding demes of Attica played in one another’s lives. The ancient sources often fail to distinguish between relatives, friends, and neighbors— depending on the context, all three may be indicated by the catch-all term philoi, which adequately expressed the lived experiences of individuals—but sometimes they do supply information about who lived next to whom. Cox has recently reviewed the role of Athenian neighbors in household affairs

T3801.indb 59

8/7/06 12:47:58 PM

60


(1998, 195). The tale of Nicostratus is a case in point: it illustrates the links between proximity, cooperation, and reciprocal favors—and the ways in which neighborly friendship could be both used and abused. 51 And of course, neighbors could behave inimically and threaten one’s property, too.52 Apollodorus and Nicostratus may have developed a relationship of considerable mutual reliance in part because they occupied isolated farmsteads in rural Attica. One traditional pattern of settlement outside the city was that of small villages or demes; the farmers who lived in those nucleated settlements would walk to their fields, often divided among scattered holdings.53 But the last generation of archaeological evidence from certain districts of Attica, especially the mining district around Laurium, suggests that there were also isolated farmsteads that, by definition, possessed houses in which people lived as well as farm buildings where they stored plows and seed.54 It would be wonderful to know exactly where in Attica the farmsteads of Nicostratus and Apollodorus lay. The speech fails to provide that information—they were probably southwest of the city, within walking distance of Piraeus, since Apollodorus is ambushed late one night on his way home from there (17)—but it does indicate unequivocally that they were neighbors in the countryside who lived on farms situated side by side, like those of Cnemon and Gorgias in Menander’s Dyskolos. Apollodorus says he went to live in the country, where he still lives (4); this is the place from which he departed for the trierarchy and to which he returned, and he calls it home (5 – 6). His house, when plundered by Nicostratus, yields furniture worth twenty minae (15). There are flower-beds on the farm (16): when Nicostratus sends over a boy to pick or pull up roses, in hopes that Apollodorus will lose his temper and strike the lad, the scheme assumes that he is living in a house that overlooks the flower-bed. In villages, one would have many close neighbors; on isolated farmsteads, few. How serendipitous for Nicostratus, then, that his neighbor Apollodorus happened to be rich. The son of the successful banker Pasion, whose fortune amounted to at least seventy talents at the time of his death, Apollodorus was wealthy enough to live well and perform expensive liturgies (Trevett 1992, 27–31). Against Nicostratus mentions one trierarchy, probably of 368/7. Apollodorus went on to hold the office other times. In 362, he outfitted his ship splendidly, paid the rowers extra (Dem. 50.7–9ff.), and treated them so well, in fact, that his successor Polycles said he corrupted them (Dem. 50.34 –36). In the course of his lawsuits, Apollodorus sometimes found it convenient to represent himself as poor;55 although he makes his estate sound

T3801.indb 60

8/7/06 12:47:59 PM


61

much diminished, he clearly has real property and other resources on which to draw. Over time, he continued to do well. In the speech For Phormio of c. 350, Demosthenes accuses him of licentious living (Dem. 36.45). Nicostratus, on the other hand, is prosperous enough to pursue litigation, but can hardly rival Apollodorus, whom he regards as a benefactor. Apollodorus throws in a telling detail about the runaway slaves: though Nicostratus had purchased one of them himself, the other two were given to him by Apollodorus (6). Apollodorus says that Nicostratus, on his first visit, “begged me to come to his aid, just as in times past I had been a true friend (ale¯thinos philos) to him” (7). In response, Apollodorus reiterates in almost identical language: “I answered him that even in times past I had been a true friend to him, and now amid his calamity I would come to his aid” (8). In the subsequent interview, this language recurs a third time: “Nicostratus, even in times past I was a true friend to you, and now in your calamities I have come to your aid as much as I could . . .” (12). Aristotle, in the Eudemian Ethics and the Rhetoric, uses the same term.56 There is no evidence in this speech regarding the affective dimension of their friendship, but the insistent repetition of these phrases helps Apollodorus convince the dikastai that he acted as a friend, in good faith and disinterestedly. He implies that he had helped Nicostratus in the past—that all the benefits had flowed from him. This last, we know, was not precisely true, since Nicostratus had served as a kind of steward on his estate (4 –5). But when Nicostratus needed a large sum of money to reimburse his ransomers, it was Apollodorus to whom he and his brother Deinon turned, as client to patron. Though deprived of at least some of his paternal inheritance (9), Apollodorus still had plenty of resources and friends (1). He had multiple property holdings, any one of which could be mortgaged (12). Since he was significantly richer than Nicostratus, the reciprocity between them was lopsided. From the vantage point of Apollodorus, Nicostratus must have fallen within the second ring of people, to whom he owed certain social and moral obligations and where, I have argued, disguised patronage took place. Apollodorus boasts of “all the good things [Nicostratus and his brother] have received from me” (3). As he explains to the dikastai, the least he could expect from his largess was gratitude, but this he did not get: “And having taken the money, [Nicostratus] did not so much as thank me (oukh hopo¯ s kharin tina moi apodido¯sin) for the things from which he benefited, but immediately began to plot against me” (13). If the sum had been smaller, and the mood of Nicostratus commensurably less desperate, we may imagine that he would

T3801.indb 61

8/7/06 12:47:59 PM

62


have remained an honest neighbor, one who accepted his subordinate status and, by borrowing from his other friends, paid Apollodorus back (11). He could also have supported him in lawsuits (Blundell 1989, 50). Instead, Nicostratus conspires with his legal opponent Phormion and secures a judgment against him as a public debtor (14). He establishes between them a state of enmity, eis ekhthran katastaie¯ (13), and after that the situation devolves into all-out feud. e mot io n in d em o s th en es 5 3. 6 – 13 The dominant emotion throughout Demosthenes 53 is indignation against the treachery of Nicostratus, and in sections 6 through 13, the speaker’s principal aim is to convince the dikastai that he has been treated outrageously by Nicostratus, who willfully inflicted harm on him despite all the good he had received. Apollodarus knows he can convey his right to vengeance only if he acts and speaks for himself; were he to use a proxy, he would undermine his case (2). If he could tell the whole story from the beginning, the dikastai would understand his anger, but there is time to explain only the greatest and most obvious of his opponents’ wrongdoings (3). There is probably more to the enmity between them than Apollodorus is willing to admit.57 Apollodorus seems to anticipate that some dikastai will wonder how he got into such a situation in the first place. Why did he loan so much money to Nicostratus? How could he have been so foolish? Surely, as a mere neighbor, one need not go to the excessive lengths that Apollodorus did in furnishing a total of 2,900 drachmae. Apollodorus now realizes he made a mistake in responding so generously to the appeals of Nicostratus. I will argue that by recounting his interviews with Deinon and Nicostratus, Apollodorus seeks to demonstrate several points. First, he was young and therefore gullible. Second, he yielded to pity, but any of the dikastai might have done so in his place. Third, the mistake he made is not only natural and understandable, but also characteristic of a good and generous man who fully deserves the sympathy of the court. These three points will all be examined in turn. First, Apollodorus represents himself as young and gullible.58 He fell into a friendly relationship with Nicostratus because the two were neighbors and the same age, a point that Apollodorus repeats pointedly within a few lines (4). His trust rested partly on the length of their acquaintance ( gno¯ rimo¯ s men moi eikhe kai palai ), but much more so on the closeness that had developed in recent years (4), so that Nicostratus, upon his return, came to him first

T3801.indb 62

8/7/06 12:47:59 PM


63

(eltho¯n ho¯s eme pro¯ton) (7). Apollodorus, to justify his incautious generosity to Nicostratus, emphasizes his youth. In responding that he would mortgage his own property, he says it is “just the sort of thing a young man and close friend does, not expecting to be wronged” (haper an neos te anthro¯pos kai oikeio¯s khro¯menos, ouk an nomisas adike¯the¯ nai, 12). When Nicostratus decides to become his enemy, he allegedly expects to foil Apollodorus because the latter is young and inexperienced: neos ¯o n ho ti khre¯saime¯n kai apeiros pragmato¯ n (13). The term neos anthro¯pos, “young man,” turns up twelve other times in classical Greek literature.59 In an inheritance suit by Isaeus, for example, the speaker says that young men sometimes ruin themselves by falling in love with bad women (3.17). In Against Conon, the defendant is expected to claim that rakish behavior involving clubs and brawls is typical of young men (Dem. 54.14); since Conon is more than fifty years old, he should have restrained the younger men who also happened to be his sons (54.22). Most famously, perhaps, the young men of Athens are the ones whom Socrates is accused of corrupting (Xen. Mem. 1.2.1, etc.). Taken together, these parallel passages suggest that a neos anthro¯pos is both impulsive and gullible— exactly the qualities that Apollodorus needs to evoke in this section of Against Nicostratus.60 The second and most significant point that Apollodorus wants to make is that he yielded to pity, as any of the dikastai might have done in his place. The affecting interviews show why he felt pity and acted upon it. When Deinon first comes to him with news of the calamity (sumphoran), he says that he has heard, though we are not told how, that Nicostratus is “suffering terribly” (kai hama lego¯n pros eme ho¯s akouoi auton deino¯s diakeisthai) (6). Hearing this, Apollodorus shares the pain of his misfortune (sunakhthestheis epi te¯i atukhiai te¯i toutou) (7). The similar phrase kako¯s diakeisthai is found in the first meeting with Nicostratus (8) and in six other instances.61 But deino¯s is a potent adverb, since elsewhere in oratory and historiography to “suffer terrible things” makes one a candidate for pity. In Against Timocrates, the defendant is expected to assert that he pities people who suffer terrible things, deina paskhontas anthro¯ pous (Dem. 24.196), but Demosthenes criticizes him for failing to pity his own father, whose indebtedness to the state has led to his disenfranchisement— once again, a terrible thing that he suffers (Dem. 24.201). Similar wording is found in a speech by Lysias (18.12). The pitiability of Nicostratus in the wake of his harrowing experience fits nicely into other reported cases of pity in oratory and historiography that involve people captured or defeated in war.62

T3801.indb 63

8/7/06 12:47:59 PM

64


The next scene, in which the newly returned Nicostratus visits Apollodorus, is pivotal. In some respects, it resembles a scene of supplication, not all that far removed from the world of epic or tragedy, in which the person in need would humble himself before the person whose help he sought. In Greek tradition, a suppliant was expected to embrace the knees of the prospective benefactor, to touch his chin or hands, to weep and plead—thereby acknowledging his superior power. Gould (2001, 58) says the suppliant engaged in “a series of gestures and procedures that together constitute total self-abasement.” The practice, while imbued with religious power, also constituted a quasi-legal procedure (Naiden 2004). I am not arguing that Nicostratus presents himself as a formal suppliant, but he does weep, plead, and humble himself, and he does assume that Apollodorus has the power to help him (7– 8). Elsewhere I have demonstrated in detail how ancient Greeks described the emotional response of pity: the power of sight, hearing, and tears that is emphasized repeatedly in fifth- and fourth-century oratory and historiography, and the way in which eleos and oiktos were thought to “enter into” a person.63 Let us look at the situation of Apollodorus. Here was a friend and neighbor, a man of his own age, weeping and begging and showing his wounds. The tears and wounds of Nicostratus act directly on Apollodorus. For the most part, the family and philoi of a captive could only imagine his suffering, as Deinon clearly does. They would not see him first-hand. When Nicostratus visits Apollodorus, his wounds evoke the calamity from which he has been rescued. They also evoke the fate that impends if he cannot scrape together twenty-six minae. When Nicostratus comes again a few days later, he is again weeping (10), and this time he raises the specter of being liable for seizure under the law (11). Aristotle says one pities a person who is the same age and suffers a reversal of fortune that could happen to oneself—precisely the conditions present here.64 Having demonstrated that he was young, and susceptible to pity, Apollodorus aims to show that the mistake he made is not only understandable but also characteristic of a good and generous man who fully deserves the sympathy of the court. To do this, he emphasizes his own goodness and the wickedness of Nicostratus. Apollodorus acted in good faith on the basis of friendship. From the outset, he presents himself as a man who has been wronged and violated: adikoumenos kai hubrizomenos (1). When he makes a promise, he keeps it (9). It never occurs to him that Nicostratus, in promising to collect money from his friends, might be lying (12): doko¯ n ou pseudesthai. He turns the loan of 300 drachmae for travel money into a gift (8), and also the

T3801.indb 64

8/7/06 12:47:59 PM


65

next 1,000 drachmae (9), in a passage that contains four words for gift and giving crammed into three short clauses: ekeleusa dounai touto¯i khilias drakhmas, kai touto edo¯ka do¯reian auto¯i to argurion, kai homologo¯ dedo¯kenai. He acts swiftly to mortgage his boarding-house for the remaining 1,600 drachmae (13). When the brothers send the young boy to pluck (or pull up?) roses and provoke Apollodorus to violence, he refrains, and merely calls witnesses to note the wrongs he suffered (16). But the key emotion that explains how Apollodorus came to give Nicostratus so much money is pity. In a way, we have come full circle with the ransom of Hector, where Priam supplicates Achilles and wins his pity.65 In the Homeric scene, the object of ransom is the body of Hector rather than a living person. In Demosthenes 53, Nicostratus pleads on his own behalf and Apollodorus feels pity, together with the conviction that he should help. Readers of the Iliad generally feel that Achilles made a good decision in yielding to Priam’s supplication. Apollodorus, on the other hand, in yielding to Nicostratus, made a mistake—as he realizes in retrospect. The tale of Nicostratus shows that oiktos or eleos, though a natural response, was sometimes inappropriate. Pity was not a virtue to be cultivated but rather an impulse to be governed. This is clear from dozens of passages in the genres of oratory and historiography. In oratory, pity is not to be trusted because it can be played upon so easily. More than twenty references to the manipulation of pity found in the orations deal with the manner in which a litigant might elicit pity from the dikastai in order to win a favorable verdict.66 The manipulation of emotion, including pity, is an oratorical skill, or tekhne¯ .67 Dikastai in roughly one-fifth of the extant courtroom speeches are warned to resist pity (Sternberg 1998, 52 –58). In Thucydides, both Cleon and Diodotus in the second Assembly on the fate of Mytilene likewise warn their fellow citizens not to yield to pity. In Herodotus, also, it can lead to undesirable consequences, as when assassins spare the infant Cypselus out of pity—and he then grows up into a bloodthirsty tyrant (Hdt. 5.92). Apollodorus’ pity has less dire consequences but is still regrettable. Practical Household Issues We cannot enter the household of Nicostratus at his hour of greatest need— when he himself was far from home, shackled and enslaved. Our information is too sparse, and after all, this is not his speech but that of his legal opponent. We do know that his brothers helped him via fair means and foul. Deinon,

T3801.indb 65

8/7/06 12:48:00 PM

66


using borrowed travel money, journeyed to wherever Nicostratus was enslaved and found a way to redeem him. Arethusius later connived with Nicostratus to extract twenty-six minae from Apollodorus and never pay it back. Their father must have been either legally incompetent or dead, since decisions about property rested in the brothers’ hands. Arethusius was the richest of the three (28). Their mother was still alive (28 and 29), but no mention is made of sisters, wives, or other female relatives—though, to be sure, respectable Athenian women were not alluded to in courtroom speeches without good cause (Schaps 1982). If Nicostratus was the same age as Apollodorus, namely, still in his 20s, he was unlikely to be married.68 Disappointingly, our evidence for the family life of Nicostratus is soon exhausted. And yet several issues require further exploration: the response of families to a crisis of this magnitude, the practical measures within their reach, and the impact of a man’s absence on his household. Although the tale of Nicostratus can furnish a point of departure, this section will also evoke other Athenian households and explore parallel situations in order to develop a fuller picture of the pressures and demands that capture and ransom placed upon Athenian families. It will be necessary, for example, to walk through the nature of legal imprisonment, credit and lending practices, means of communication, and the plight of widows and orphans. Only via this circuitous route can we hope to discover the fuller significance of all-too-brief mentions of ransom found in the ancient sources. The use of circumstantial evidence to recreate a picture of practical household issues in ransom cases entails a level of generalization about Athenian society that can never do justice to the great variety of situations that individuals faced. Nevertheless, it reveals genuine issues that no doubt pressed upon the relatives of many a captive and would have influenced their emotional reactions and their decisions as moral agents. This section will also allow some discussion of the role of women in family affairs—a welcome opportunity given that the tale of Nicostratus, like the other key stories in this book, is focused on men. The first step must be to consider the immediate reaction of families to a fresh crisis of this kind. The situation thrust upon Deinon and Arethusius is not wholly unlike the situation Athenian families faced when they had to come up with money to rescue relatives from lawful imprisonment in Athens. Classicists used to think that prison was merely a holding place for individuals awaiting trial or execution; this view, common in nineteenth-century scholarship, was disputed first by Barkan (1936, 338 –341) and more recently by

T3801.indb 66

8/7/06 12:48:00 PM


67

Allen (1997) and Hunter (1997), all of whom argue convincingly that prison was itself a punishment. Aristotle, for example, names fines, imprisonment, and death as possible penalties (Ath. Pol. 45.1), and the Council of Five Hundred may imprison state debtors who were in default (Ath. Pol. 48.1; Andoc. 1.93; Dem. 24.96 –98).69 The penalty of imprisonment was common enough to be listed, along with madness and the influence of a woman, as cause for legal incompetence (Lacey 1968, 125). In Demosthenes 53, Nicostratus and Arethusius allegedly were prepared to testify that Apollodorus was a state debtor and thereby put him in prison (14). It was clearly incumbent upon the family and friends of imprisoned debtors to furnish missing monies or pay a fine, thereby securing their release. In On the Murder of Herodes, the philoi of a certain Lycinus, who owed seven minae, purchased his release from prison, where he had been bound and maltreated (Antiph. 5.63). More famously, the friends of Socrates stood ready to discharge any fine the court imposed and help him flee to Thessaly (Pl. Cri. 44b5 – 45c4). It is worth looking at the situation of the Athenian family whose relative was incarcerated in the city. We know little of the prison itself, since archaeological investigations have failed to turn up a building that can be securely identified as such, but literary evidence indicates a building with at least some large rooms where men were held in fetters and to which relatives and friends had access. Socrates in his last hours enjoyed the company of more than a dozen companions (Pl. Phd. 59b – c). Prisoners apparently were allowed to cook meals (Din. 2.9), but relatives were expected to provide the ingredients and other food. This task would have been easy enough for citydwellers, but much harder for those who lived in outlying demes of Attica, a region that encompassed 1,000 square miles. Families must have endured intense anxiety and hardship, especially if the prisoner’s life was at stake. Several passages suggest the emotional impact of imprisonment and the sense of urgency that it could create, as in Book 3 of Herodotus, where Darius, king of Persia, has just imprisoned Intaphernes and all the men in his household for suspected treason (Hdt. 3.119.2 –3): “He seized them and put them in prison to await their death. The wife of Intaphernes, coming constantly to the doors of the king, wailed and lamented.” Again, in On the Mysteries, Andocides recalls how he and more than forty other suspects in the mutilation of the Herms in 415 were rounded up, shackled, and shut inside a prison; mothers, sisters, wives, and children gathered outside, and there was much crying and wailing: ¯en de boe¯ kai oiktos klaonto¯ n kai oduromeno¯ n ta paronta kaka (Andoc. 1.48). How much more terrible the fate of the captive held at

T3801.indb 67

8/7/06 12:48:00 PM

68


some great distance, under conditions of misery and danger that allowed for no amelioration; and how much harder for relatives to make the necessary arrangements. The second step, then, is to examine the practical measures within the reach of families. Ransom payments, we may assume, were typically in cash. Promissory notes existed, but when it came to paying up, one needed hard currency. Wartenberg (1995, 39) notes an unusual find from Olympia that may have been dedicated by an individual grateful for having been ransomed. It is an Aeginetan stater bearing this inscription: “To [the goddess] Matrobia, the sacred staters—ransom money.” The economy of Athens by the middle of the fifth century had come to rely more and more on coinage. People would stash their coins in coffers or hiding places on their property; the archaeological evidence of coin hoards validates the ancient comic topos of a hidden pot of gold.70 Lysias, in Against Eratosthenes, keeps in his bedroom a chest containing three talents of silver, 400 staters of Cyzicus, and 100 Persian darics (12.9–10). If ready cash were wanting, families had a number of ways to come up with it. Our evidence, again, is skewed toward the wealthy, who typically owned land that might be sold or mortgaged (as at Dem. 53.10 –13) and slaves that might be sold (Lys. 4.13), as well as valuables, including silver and gold plate, jewelry, ivory, fine furnishings, and so forth. Lysias’ chest contained, in addition to the money, four silver cups. These were probably worth whatever they weighed (Vickers and Gill 1994, 40). In Against Nicostratus, when Apollodorus wants 1,000 drachmas, he takes to the banker Theocles some drinking cups and a gold crown that were part of his inheritance (9). The wealthy could also have depended on the benefits of ritualized guestfriendship; loans between friends were apparently interest-free, and repayment could be handled through counter-favors.71 But more formal credit transactions were available to families of both greater and lesser means. Millett observes (1991, 5) that “the sheer quantity of evidence is itself a crude indicator of the extent to which lending and borrowing permeated Athenian society.” Professional money-lenders offered cash on terms that included interest and securities. A less pressured arrangement was the eranos loan collected among friends. The term originally referred to a shared dinner but came to designate a loan that the borrower collected from a number of people who might or might not belong to an eranos club.72 Such loans were interestfree and rested on the presumption that the borrowers would pay them back as soon as possible (Millett 1989, 41). This system, to which Nicostratus

T3801.indb 68

8/7/06 12:48:00 PM


69

promised to resort (11), offered people of middling or scarce means the ability to meet financial crises. The precise arrangements, however, could be convoluted. Millett (1991, 58) notes that the ransoming of Nicostratus “sets up a chain of seven separate credit operations.” Coming up with the cash was one problem; delivering it was another. When Athenians were held for ransom at some far-flung spot, distance vexed communications and made rescue harder. Recent work by Hunter (1990) and Lewis (1996) has illuminated the ways in which news spread in ancient Greece. For news of an official nature, heralds and envoys would be employed. They might be sent overland or via triremes or smaller boats, as at Demosthenes 50.46.73 This could take time. Private business and personal communications might be conducted via letter or oral message. In Against Polycles, the sick mother of Apollodorus sends word both ways (Dem. 50.60 – 63). Such messages appear to have been entrusted to travelers, who might be engaged in trade, military business, or religious observances such as the pan-Hellenic festivals at Delphi or Olympia and visits to the cult shrines of the healing god Asclepius (S. Lewis 1996). Word also spread through rumor and gossip. Most gossip probably pertained to goings-on within the community, but sometimes it included outside news.74 Deinon claims to have heard—we are not told how—that the captive Nicostratus was in a bad way (6). So news did travel, but it seems likely that geographical constraints sometimes contributed to the breakdown of ransom negotiations. De Souza agrees that long distances made intervention by relatives or fellow citizens less likely, and he notes that mechanisms for coping with such situations had developed by the Hellenistic period.75 Decisions about ransom arrangements would have fallen to the ankhisteia, the close family circle consisting of parents, siblings, and other near relatives who customarily dealt with issues of inheritance that the prolonged absence of any head of household would certainly have raised. Ostensibly, it was men who made the decisions, for an Athenian woman was not a legally autonomous being. Rather, she spent her entire life under the protection of a master or kurios—father, husband, nearest male relative.76 It was primarily men who handled the financial affairs of the household, mediating between the family and the outside world. And yet there is some evidence to suggest that women, despite their legal constraints and comparative lack of education,77 might have enjoyed considerable status or authority within the family. In Against Polycles, the mother of Apollodorus upon her death was no longer mistress (kuria) of her property or able to give him as much as she pleased (Dem.

T3801.indb 69

8/7/06 12:48:00 PM

70


50.60, emphasis added), and Hunter adduces several other passages in oratory where the possibility of a woman as kuria is entertained.78 In Demosthenes 47.57, the wife of an absent trierarch defends her marriage portion against intruders; the speech represents her as knowing the disposition of her husband’s property (Lacey 1968, 21–22). We have several examples of wills where the beneficiary was a woman.79 Cox finds that some women understood the financial circumstances of the family well enough to manage the estate after a husband’s death,80 and Harris (1992) urges that resourceful women will have found a way around the law that prohibited them from handling transactions worth more than one medimnos of barley; he notes a boundary stone from the Athenian agora that refers to an eranos loan collected by a woman. Most noteworthy of all, Against Diogeiton reveals a widow who is said to have defended her children against their guardian, also their uncle and grandfather, by speaking eloquently at a family council.81 She cites every financial and practical detail: the children were cast out of their house in worn-out clothes, without shoes, attendants, bedding, cloaks, or the furniture and money that was their due.82 Then the speaker continues (Lys. 32.18): At that point, gentlemen of the jury, after many terrible things had been said by the woman, all of us present were so affected by this man’s conduct and by her statements, seeing the children, the sorts of things they were suffering; remembering the dead man and how he had left his estate to an unworthy guardian; reflecting on how difficult it is to find a person who can be trusted with one’s affairs; so that, gentlemen of the jury, no one of us present was able to say a thing, but weeping no less than the sufferers, we left to go our ways in silence. Against Diogeiton illustrates the dangers to a household whose kurios departed for war, never to return. He made a will, as other upper-class men sometimes did before departing to trade or fight,83 though the guardian to his estate failed to carry out his wishes. His widow, at least, had the advantage of knowing that her husband was dead. In the case of captives, uncertainty must have inflicted even greater hardships on wives, children, brothers, sisters, and other relations, as the families of modern prisoners of war can attest. Lycurgus (1.40) mentions a daughter worried about her father on campaign.84 Cox (1998, 212) has noted that “the almost continuous warfare left many households destitute of their adult male members for at least some time. . . . The whole concept of absence and its effects on Athenian society

T3801.indb 70

8/7/06 12:48:00 PM


71

need more investigation.” Third and last, then, I would like to consider the impact of a man’s indefinite absence on his household.85 For a glimpse of how uncertainty worked upon the minds of those back home, we must turn to imaginative literature and the dissembling Clytemnestra in Aeschylus’ Agamemnon, who describes what it was like to wait for news of one’s husband gone on a long campaign (863 – 868): A lonely woman “hears so many hateful rumors. . . . If this man here had had as many wounds as streams of rumors would have it, he would have had more holes in him than a net.” 86 Clytemnestra, left to her own devices, takes a lover and murders her husband upon his return. Edith Hall (1997, 107) has pointed out that the disruptive women of tragedy commit transgressions only when the head of household is gone, a convention that she interprets “as a symptom of the Athenian citizen’s anxiety about the crises which might afflict his household during his absence.” The figure of Penelope presents another long-suffering wife, this one faithful, who lives with the absence of Odysseus for twenty years, the last ten in complete uncertainty. She waits at home while her son Telemachus journeys in search of news.87 Her life is complicated by the fact that she does not know for certain whether she is the wife or widow of Odysseus. If a widow, then she should marry again.88 If not, she should continue to wait. This is poetry, the heroic world of Homer, yet surely the wives of the missing or captured could identify with Penelope. One major concern of the household was the performance of funeral rites in the event of a soldier’s death. The bodies of those who died within a certain distance were consigned to the earth; the ashes of those who died far away, likewise (Aesch. Ag. 437ff.). Sometimes the survivors would have remains to bury, sometimes not. In 431 b.c.e., with the famous state funeral depicted in Book 2 of Thucydides, the polis took over rites that normally fell to the family (Garland 2001, 90), and the missing battle dead were honored by an empty wagon (Thuc. 2.34). Still, without the corpse, how could one be sure? The term “second-fated ones”— deuteropotmoi—apparently applied to individuals who came home after having been presumed dead. According to Plutarch (Mor. 264f.), they had to undergo purificatory rites before they could mingle with other people or enter a religious sanctuary (Garland 2001, 100 –101). But what of missing soldiers who met their ends as unransomed prisoners of war, or whose fates were never ascertained? Since they were not among the battlefield dead, it seems unlikely that the state supported their orphaned sons or honored them with funeral rites. Were their names inscribed in the annual

T3801.indb 71

8/7/06 12:48:01 PM

72


casualty lists for the ten tribes? Were they assimilated to the unknown fallen? In Homer, cenotaphs are owed to the missing dead, and when Menelaus is believed dead in the Helen of Euripides, sacrifices must be offered (Johnston 1999, 152). In real life, families would hold an ekphora and construct a tomb. According to the Aristotelian Constitution of Athens (55.2 –3), a citizen under consideration for the office of archon was questioned, among other things, about his family burial mound. Sometimes communities built “empty tombs” and performed funeral rites for heroes whose bodies could not be recovered, in the hope that their souls might settle there. Johnston observes (1999, 155): “The paying of funeral honors to even the ordinary dead in absentia bespeaks a similar concern and means of addressing it.” One wonders whether religious guilt or pollution attended the person whose parent or child died for want of ransom, but evidence on this point is lacking. Were the spirits of the unransomed dead believed to pursue the living? Again, we do not know, but murder victims were thought to hound family members who failed to avenge them, as well as the culprits who had taken their lives. Johnston (1999, 156) discusses the state festivals that might have supplemented individual or family attempts to appease the souls of the angry dead: “These rites aimed to ensure that if there were any disgruntled ghosts lingering about whose anger extended beyond those whom they held immediately responsible for their plight, they might be appeased.” Another difficulty, one imagines, was the legal status of a wife whose husband was missing or sold into slavery. Extant funeral orations promise help to widows and orphans,89 and the eponymous archon was expected to oversee and protect orphans, heiresses (epikle¯roi), and pregnant widows (Just 1989, 30),90 but the sources say nothing of the wife whose husband was sold into slavery. With a husband long missing or possibly dead, what was a woman’s status? Did she remain in his oikos or return to that of her natal family?91 Would her father or brothers simply take her back, or would she, with their support, appear before the archon and ask for a divorce?92 If widowed or divorced, she could remarry without stigma,93 especially for the purpose of bearing children. Roger Just cites Isaeus 2.7– 8 and 8.36 to argue that women had a moral right to motherhood: a wife’s continued childlessness was a problem that her father and other male kin should solve. Members of the phratry may also have become involved; it was the phratry that handled the right to inherit (Lambert 1993, 40). So might demesmen or neighbors, who were often called on as legal witnesses (Humphreys 1985, 340 –345) and might verify marital status, as at Isaeus 6.10 –11.94

T3801.indb 72

8/7/06 12:48:01 PM


73

Conclusions Clearly, the capture and ransom of Athenians had a major impact on households and families back home, where the pressure to bring about a captive’s release must have been intense. The situation posed serious practical challenges. Financial decisions had to be made, and for families of modest means, those were tough decisions that could affect family finances and the lives of family members for years to come. One can easily imagine, for example, that funds reserved for a young daughter’s dowry might suddenly be spent on her father’s release, jeopardizing her chances for a satisfactory marriage. The borrowing of large sums could create severe burdens, and the desperate measures taken by Nicostratus and Arethusius illustrate some possible repercussions: the breakdown of philia, the breaking of the law. Such events also affected the neighborhood, the deme, and, in the aggregate, the polis. In the absence of any statistically valid evidence, it is impossible to comment on the proportion of families affected by capture and ransom from one generation to the next. It has often been argued that the fourth century witnessed the diminished ethos of the Greek citizen-soldier and the growth of mercenary service.95 The shift is usually attributed to (a) the trend toward long-distance campaigns that required year-round absences that the citizen-soldier was unable to handle, (b) the need for troops with a greater technical expertise in new aspects of warcraft (Popowicz 1995, 241; Couvenhes 1998, 717), and (c) changes wrought by thirty years of intensive fighting during the Peloponnesian War, which created, according to Griffith (1935, 4), the “habit and discipline of war . . . reinforced by hard necessity.” Isocrates (4.167ff.) notes that poverty drove many fighting men to sell their services; he describes the mercenaries of his day as wandering bands that took their wives and children with them (4.168, 5.96, 9.9).96 Most Athenian men who hired themselves out will have had few ties to home (Xen. Hell. 6.1.5ff.), and when foreign mercenaries were fighting for Athens, their captivity or death could have no direct impact on Athenian households. The city-state of Athens, which first hired mercenaries during the Peloponnesian War, did so increasingly thereafter until Demosthenes in the mid-fourth century reproached his fellow citizens for being unwilling to fight their own battles. From the standpoint of household stability, it is easy to imagine why they preferred not to. One more example from oratory will demonstrate the impact of a prolonged captivity. The speech Against Eubulides, delivered c. 345 by a certain Euxitheus, who is defending his rights of citizenship, reveals a fascinating

T3801.indb 73

8/7/06 12:48:01 PM

74


case in which the father of the speaker was captured in the Decelean War, sold into slavery, and brought home after an absence so extended that he spoke with a foreign accent (Dem. 57.18). It is possible that he was ransomed, but the term used twice in the text, eso¯the¯ , means simply that he “was brought to safety” and does not say how.97 In his absence, we are told, his wife worked as a wet nurse and sold ribbons in the agora (34 –35, 42). The story reflects extraordinary family solidarity, since the man’s uncles actually gave him his share of property when he returned (19 and 29).98 Here, at any rate, is one wife who waited for her long-lost husband, and one family that dealt with the financial repercussions of his captivity for years on end. For an Athenian in wartime or peacetime, being held for ransom was a hazard that created significant problems for the family and community of the captive. By and large, it was up to the members of each oikos to help their own.99 A moral agent standing amid the concentric rings of moral obligation would be expected to furnish ransom money for members of his inner circle regardless of any hardships it might impose. People in the second circle also had some claim upon him, but he had no fixed obligation to them, and it was up to him to be careful in how he used his resources. People in the third circle had no direct claim on the moral agent, but if he chose to help them, he could claim public credit for generosity and patriotism. One difficulty lay in discerning who exactly fell into the first and second rings. Family life in classical Athens was anything but clear-cut. Few households consisted of a neat and tidy nuclear family. Rather, there were halfbrothers and half-sisters, nieces married to uncles, with crisscrossing blood lines and moral ties much more complex than the modern “blended family.” Women as well as men were among a man’s kin; but a man needed close friends and so would draw into the first circle some people who were not related to him by blood.100 Individuals could fall out of either the first or the second circle into a state of enmity, where the moral agent owed them no help at all, but only harm in return for harm. This is what happened with Nicostratus, a friend in the second circle who became an enemy. In retrospect, Apollodorus exercised poor judgment in offering him as much help as he did. Although the situation of Nicostratus was pitiable, Apollodorus should have stuck to the social rules of moral obligation rather than give way to sentiment. It would have been better for him had he acted like the speaker in On the Murder of Herodes (Antiph. 5.63). There, as we have seen, the philoi of Lycinus paid seven minae to release him from prison, but the speaker did not help: he claims he was not a close enough

T3801.indb 74

8/7/06 12:48:01 PM


75

friend to make such a payment (ou sphodra ekhro¯me¯ n ego¯ Lukino¯i philo¯ i). Apollodorus represents himself as having been generous to a fault. But he should have been shrewder; he should have observed the proper limits of a relationship between neighbors. In Homeric epic, suppliants enjoyed success more often than not (Gould 2001, 32), and it seems clear that Achilles had to yield to pity and accede to Priam’s request. In real life, however, a man ought to think again—to temper sympathy, if he felt it, with caution and reason.

T3801.indb 75

8/7/06 12:48:01 PM

three

Bystander Intervention

Chorus: Listen, let me tell you what I think is best to do. Let the herald call all citizens to rally here. No, better to burst in upon them now, at once, and take them with the blood still running from their blades. — aeschylus Agamemnon 1348 –1351 (trans. Lattimore)

I

n the Agamemnon, the old men of the chorus hear the terrible cries of their king as he is being stabbed to death by Clytemnestra. Speaking one after another, expressing contradictory views, they form the very picture of indecision and confusion. Should they rally the citizens, or should they rush inside the palace and catch the murderer with “fresh-flowing sword”? Should they put their own lives at risk? For what purpose? Can they prevent tyranny? It seems the king must already be dead, but is it possible that he still breathes and could be rescued? If we set aside the political dimensions of the crime in progress, this moment in tragedy captures the quandary of bystanders who perceive a crime in progress and feel that they should act but don’t know how. How true to life in ancient Athens is it? How does it compare to scenes from historiography and oratory? We have a fair amount of evidence, direct and indirect, for street life and street crime in Athens. Two passages from historiography and twelve from oratory explicitly refer to the role of bystanders in scenes where certain men, for whatever reason, have laid or are in the process of laying violent hands on someone.1 These are arranged in rough chronological order in Table 3.

T3801.indb 76

8/7/06 12:48:01 PM

b yst ande r inter vent io n

77

table 3. bystander response in orator y and histor iography Source

Date

Hdt. 3.137

6th century

Antiph. 2.3.2

hypothetical c. 440 – 420 hypothetical

Antiph. 2.4.5 Xen. Hell. 2.3.52 –55

404

Lys. 3.6 –7

after 394

Lys. 3.15 –18

after 394

Lys. 23.9–11

c. 387

Dem. 53.17

366

Dem. 47.36 – 40

after 356

Dem. 47.52 – 61

after 356

Dem. 54.5

355 or 341

Dem. 54.7–9, 32

355 or 341

Dem. 24.208

hypothetical from c. 535 Aeschin. 1.60 – 61 345

Dem. 9.60 – 61

T3801.indb 77

344

Description Bystanders help Democedes resist arrest by Persians at agora in Croton Bystanders would question the survivor of a mugging about the identity of the criminals A bystander stumbling across dying men late at night would run away rather than risk his life investigating Under rule of the Thirty, intimidated council members watch the Eleven wrongfully drag Theramenes from the altar Bystanders halt a night-time house-breaking in a neighborhood of Athens Brawl that started over a desirable youth draws in 200 bystanders and spills down Athens street for four stades, about 800 yards Friends of Pancleon, apparently a runaway slave, keep him from being apprehended on the streets of Athens two days in a row Bystanders keep Nicostratus and his brother from throwing Apollodorus into a quarry late one night along the road from Piraeus Speaker summons bystanders in a neighborhood of Athens, who then see Theophemus punch him in the mouth Neighbors and bystanders in farm outside Athens witness seizure of flock, slaves, household goods by Theophemus and Evergus, who fatally beat a freedwoman and start to drag off the speaker’s son Military commanders and other soldiers at Panactum garrison intervene when sons of Conon strike Ariston, verbally abuse his tentmates, and create an uproar one night Bystanders see sons and friends of Conon beat up Ariston one evening in the Athenian agora In a jail-break, civic-minded jurors would rally to the rescue and summarily execute the ringleader Bystanders rush to the spot when Pittalacus, a public slave or ex-slave who had been savagely beaten, sits upon the altar of the Mother of the Gods Bystanders fail to defend Euphraeus as he is dragged off to prison by agents of Philip II

8/7/06 12:48:02 PM

78


Scenes from wartime are omitted, since my purpose is to gauge bystander response in peacetime, even the uneasy peace imposed by the Thirty (Xen. Hell. 2.3.52 –55) and the ominous years that witnessed the rise of Philip II of Macedon (Dem. 9.60 – 61). Some of the scenes are hypothetical cases (Antiph. 2.3.2, 2.4.5, and Dem. 24.208); the rest are purportedly real, even though we have no way to check the so-called facts, most of which were doubtless disputed in the courtroom. Two scenes are set in Greek cities outside Attica—the arrest of Democedes (Hdt. 3.137) takes place in southern Italy and the arrest of Euphraeus (Dem. 9.60 – 61) in Euboea—but all reflect the attitudes of their Athenian authors, and all will be taken into account as I attempt to answer the following questions: What were ancient Athenians supposed to do when they witnessed street violence? Were they expected to intervene? To put themselves in danger? Under what circumstances? What responses, as a rule, were considered morally appropriate? How did the Athenians construe their obligations? Whereas the oikos was the principal setting for situations treated in the earlier chapters on home nursing and the ransom of captives, the topic of bystander intervention shifts my inquiry from indoors to outdoors, from the privacy and intimacy of the oikos to the rather more impersonal and public streets of the ancient polis, populated by strangers as well as by kinfolk, friends, enemies, and neighbors. In this setting, the Athenian moral agent will have confronted situations that tested his mettle, perhaps, but also his sense of identity with other human beings who traversed the city—that tested his propensity to sympathize or empathize with others, his capacity for philanthro¯ pia. I begin by considering the attitude of ancient Athenian law toward bystander intervention and, in the following section, the nature of street life. The latter topic has attracted considerable attention in recent years, yielding a potent mixture of controversy and consensus that I will review. Two scenes from oratory will then be subjected to a close reading. Both feature street fights: Lysias’ Against Simon describes a spectacular brawl over a male prostitute, whereas Demosthenes’ Against Conon, written a generation later, depicts a vicious beating. Each story will be analyzed separately for its distinctive elements, then the elements they share in common—and there are many—will be treated together. Neither of these real-life narratives, it must be conceded, reflects the bystander’s point of view as well as the fictional Old Men in the Agamemnon do. Nor do the narratives employ the language of pity or empathy or humanity. On the other hand, the passages can be mined for subtle clues that reflect moral expectations in everyday Athens. Finally, since

S N L 78

T3801.indb 78

8/7/06 12:48:02 PM


79

bystander intervention is also a modern concern, relatively recent work by social psychologists will be deployed to help analyze the ancient evidence. Bystander Intervention and the Law Book 9 of Plato’s utopian Laws outlines penalties for certain types of assault and prescribes sanctions against bystanders who fail to intervene. In his imaginary Magnesia, a bystander of appropriate age must try to break up a fight between a younger and an older man (880b – c). He must step in if a man is beating his own father or mother or grandparent (881b); and any bystander, whether a child, a man, or a woman, must drive off the attacker and denounce him as unholy (881c). A bystander must also intervene if a slave is striking a metic or citizen (882a). Citizen bystanders who fail to help should be fined (880d); metics should be honored if they help, but banished from the country if they do not; and slaves should either be set free if they help or receive a hundred lashes if they do not (881c). These injunctions are part of Plato’s larger project of creating efficient instruments of law enforcement (Morrow 1978, 146) for this “second-best ideal state” (Saunders 1992, 484). In the philosopher’s new Cretan city, as in Athens, the private citizen has the right and duty to prosecute wrongdoers, and bystander intervention becomes a significant part of that project.2 What are we to make of this? Could Plato’s laws concerning bystander intervention have been drawn from life? Scholarly opinion suggests not. Admittedly, the Laws, the last of Plato’s dialogues, is a more pragmatic work than the Republic. The philosopher’s theory of Forms, for example, is almost entirely absent from it (Saunders 1992, 465), while many features of the constitution appear to be based upon the actual practice of various Greek citystates, especially Athens (Stalley 1983, 7). Yet Plato necessarily goes well beyond actual practice, and one of his most important innovations, according to Saunders, is “the institution of a . . . more interventionist and inquisitorial legal procedure than prevailed in Athens” (1992, 477). Plato also makes bystanders responsible for inflicting certain punishments that, in Athens, fell to the state (Hunter 1994, 162). So although Plato’s Laws requires bystanders to intervene and halt certain crimes in progress, we have no hard evidence that the laws of Athens ever did so.3 Scenes from tragedy suggest that members of the community might be summoned to the site of a dire public emergency. In the Agamemnon, while the king is being murdered, the first old man in the Chorus advises that a

T3801.indb 79

8/7/06 12:48:02 PM

80


proclamation be issued: “Bring aid here to the palace! ( pros do¯ ma deur’ astoisi ke¯ russein boe¯ n).” 4 In Sophocles’ Oedipus at Colonus, Oedipus first cries, “io¯ xenoi ” (822), and then, “io¯ polis! ” (834), as Creon’s guards seize Antigone.5 The chorus of old Athenian men then challenges the guards, in words if not deeds, and in turn summons more countrymen, especially the foremost (884): “io¯ pas leo¯ s, io¯ gas promoi.” 6 Such scenes, according to a standard interpretation, probably reflect the ancient call to arms, a summons to “run to the shout” or boe¯ thein (Lintott 1982, 18 –19); they may also reflect a custom later paralleled in medieval Germany, where the cry for help obligated those who heard it to respond (Fraenkel 1950, 2 : 30, 3:613 – 614). Similarly, in medieval England, members of a community had to raise the “hue and cry” and capture a suspected felon within forty days or pay damages (Holdsworth 1924, 1 : 294, 7 : 521). The latter practice had less to do with intervention—though one might arrest the criminal red-handed—than with pursuit and arrest. Indeed, the medieval arrangement is reminiscent of ancient Athens in that the power of English magistrates or other officials to conduct arrests was no greater than that of common citizens until the second half of the seventeenth century (Holdsworth 1924, 3 : 601). Yet it remains unclear what specific obligations the cry of io¯ polis might have imposed upon the Athenian citizenry. Did those who rushed to the spot have to bear witness, rescue the victim, apprehend the attacker, or some combination of the three?7 In contemporary Western societies, where policing is conducted by the state, the issues are rather different. The United States in particular has seen a great deal of ethical and legal soul-searching ever since the 1964 murder of Kitty Genovese in New York unfolded before thirty-eight unhelping witnesses (Dorman 2000). Should not bystanders be required, at a minimum, to call police? The modern controversy reached a new pitch in the late 1990s after a teenager molested and murdered a little girl named Sherrice Iverson in a Las Vegas casino bathroom while his friend watched and did nothing (Ziegler 2000). Some states in recent years have enacted so-called Good Samaritan laws; one U.S. congressman even proposed legislation that would encourage other states to require bystanders to intervene in certain crimes against children.8 Yet traditionally the English and American criminal codes, more so than the European, are reluctant to penalize people for acts of omission (A. M. Smith 1993). In classical Athens, male citizens could be prosecuted for shirking military service or failing to pay debts owed to the state (MacDowell 1978, 160,

S N L 80

T3801.indb 80

8/7/06 12:48:02 PM


81

164 –167). But, then as now, a person was far more likely to be accused of committing a wrongdoing, such as theft or assault, than of omitting to do good, and he apparently had no legal obligation to assist a victim while the crime was still in progress. Did he have a legal obligation to testify later about what he had seen? Not exactly. The court could not force witnesses to appear, so most were volunteers (Harrison 1998, 2:138 –142). A litigant could summon a witness—the verb is kle¯ teuo¯ 9—and the witness who refused to comply would automatically be fined 1,000 drachmae. The extant speeches, however, furnish hardly any examples of the summons employed in a private suit.10 A litigant could also bring a private indictment—the dike¯ lipomarturiou —against a defaulting witness, but probably only against someone who had earlier promised to testify. Meanwhile, the apparently rare procedure of exo¯ mosia, or “oath of denial,” allowed a witness in court or at public arbitration to swear, over sacrificial victims, that he either was not present at the event in question or had no knowledge of it.11 Meanwhile, official law-enforcement was minimal. Certain limited tasks fell to the Eleven—magistrates who controlled the prison, oversaw the execution of self-confessed or condemned criminals, and sometimes arrested wrongdoers. Public slaves, including the famous fifth-century Scythian archers, helped maintain public order in the Council and Assembly and may have carried out arrests, but they performed no other function of a modern police force, such as patrol or investigation (Hunter 1994, 144 –147). When Lycurgus (1.3) says the polis relied on the law code, the vote of dikastai, and the krisis (trial or prosecution) that turned wrongs over to them (Sinclair 1988, 72), he does not mention policing, and indeed, this was something the Athenians often had to do themselves. For certain offenses against the citystate, the Areopagus could investigate and submit a report (apophasis) to the Assembly, which could then appoint official prosecutors (MacDowell 1978, 190 –191; de Bruyn 1995: 144). The Areopagus could also arrest individuals (Dem. 18.133). The Council and the Assembly, similarly, could appoint official prosecutors in cases involving a threat to public order (eisangeliai ) (MacDowell 1978: 251; Harrison 1998, 2:50 –59). But the prosecution of wrongdoers very often fell to whatever private person was willing to undertake it: ho boulomenos. Law enforcement and therefore public safety relied heavily upon citizens who employed so-called self-help measures, where “parties have to summon help and witnesses as best they can from friends, neighbours and passers-by” (Fisher 1976, 37). Certain procedures allowed

T3801.indb 81

8/7/06 12:48:02 PM

82


bystanders to apprehend suspected culprits themselves. In ago¯ ge¯ , they might join in arresting a runaway slave or, in apago¯ ge¯ , a defendant with citizen status (Hunter 1994, 134 –135). The legal system of Athens both reflected attitudes and guided behavior. The very fact that Plato concerned himself with bystander intervention suggests its importance in his day. Indeed, without citizen participation, the law code and the lawcourts simply could not work. What Hunter calls “spontaneous policing” was vital (1994, 121). Equally vital were less spontaneous actions that citizens carried out upon the injunction of a magistrate, court judgment, or decree. Hunter observes (ibid., 137): “Policing, no matter how it was effected, depended on a citizen’s perception of criminal activity, and his willingness to act on it.” She and Fisher (1999, 68) suggest that it was incumbent upon bystanders to intervene in street crimes and altercations as an act of social responsibility.12 I will argue instead that other responses and attitudes prevailed. Before considering the position of bystanders, however, let us first try to imagine what street life was like in ancient Athens. Street Life and Street Crime in Athens Despite an irremediable lack of crime statistics, there are other sorts of evidence that scholars use to gauge violence and civility in classical Athens. The first sort is literary, consisting of references to everyday life found in Thucydides, Plato, Aristotle, tragedy, and comedy. The second sort is comparative and relies on matching certain indicators to more recent and betterknown societies, often nineteenth- and twentieth-century Greece, Italy, and Sicily. To what extent did provocation meet with self-restraint, or the thirst for vengeance play itself out through litigation rather than violent means?13 Gabriel Herman (1994) argues that the Athenians were peaceful and by and large rejected blood-feud. As Thucydides explicitly states, Athenians did not typically carry weapons in peacetime; Aristotle makes a similar claim. Violent acts, including murder, appear to have been committed less often with swords or knives than with bare hands, sticks, stones, or jagged potsherds.14 Nick Fisher finds enough violence and theft to make Athenians ill at ease, but relatively little organized crime (1999, 59, 83). Andrew Lintott (1982, 173) draws attention to the bands of young men bent upon private vengeance, while Donald Lateiner (2002) adduces further evidence from epic, drama, philosophy, oratory, and vase-painting to argue that life in everyday Athens was positively raucous with status competition among males expressed

S N L 82

T3801.indb 82

8/7/06 12:48:02 PM


83

in taunts, threats, and humiliation, both verbal and nonverbal, all of which could and often did escalate to physical attack. Street fights were, in his view, routine, and bystanders doubtless enjoyed the spectacle of insults and abuse (Lateiner 2002, 16). Most scholars, with Lateiner, no longer measure Athenian citizens against the standard of the English gentleman.15 To judge by the incidents assembled in Table 3, street life in Athens was lively and sometimes violent. Crowds gathered easily. It would be gratifying to know more about the composition of such crowds—how well those who stopped to watch an altercation knew one another, how likely they were to recognize the men who were scuffling, striking, and sometimes bleeding at the center of the fight. How often did they see friends, enemies, neutral acquaintances, or complete strangers? The response of bystanders undoubtedly would have been guided by preexisting relationships and influenced by the kind of event in progress, whether brawl or property crime. And finally, it would also have varied according to the time of day or night and the specific setting in which a given incident occurred. Time, place, the composition of the crowd, and the perception of the event all played a role, as we shall see. Daylight was the time for official business, as illustrated in Against Meidias, when an arbitrator renders his decision despite the defendant’s absence because evening has come and daylight is waning (Dem. 21.85). Persians try to arrest Democedes in Croton in broad daylight while he shops in the marketplace (Hdt. 3.137). This would have been a bustling place in the sixth century b.c.e., for Croton, on the coast of southern Italy, was at that time a highly prosperous Achaean colony famed for its physicians, athletes, and philosophers. Since Democedes was a celebrated physician, most of the bystanders probably recognized him; as Herodotus tells it, they unite to rescue him. A less happy outcome of an official arrest is recorded a century or so later, when the Eleven drag Theramenes from the altar one day during a Council meeting (Xen. Hell. 2.3.52 –55); it is presumably daytime when agents of Philip II drag away Euphraeus (Dem. 9.60 – 61) from democratic Oreos. Some daytime incidents involve citizens who are attempting to use self-help measures against alleged wrongdoers. Nicomedes tries to arrest Pancleon, whom he claims is his runaway slave (Lys. 23.9). A trierarch tries to force his predecessor to comply with the rules (Dem. 47.36 – 40, 52 – 65). Bystanders also get drawn into quarrels, like the one over a desirable youth (Lys. 3) or between Conon’s sons and the targets of their hybristic pranks (Dem. 54), or over Pittalacus, who was a public slave or ex-slave (Aeschin 1.60 – 61).

T3801.indb 83

8/7/06 12:48:03 PM

84


But night, with its drunken revelry and desperate temptations, with its cover of darkness unrelieved by street lighting, is the quintessential time for crime. The first house-breaking by Simon allegedly occurred at night after he had been drinking: nukto¯ r methuo¯ n (Lys. 3.6; cf. 3.23). The sons of Conon allegedly commit their worst misdeeds at night (Dem. 54.5 and 7). Other skullduggery by night recounted in the speeches includes a raid on the home of Pittalacus (Aeschin. 1.58), alleged secret messages between Aeschines and Philip (Aeschin. 2.124 –126), the murder of Herodes (Antiph. 5.26 –28, 44 – 45), voting fraud (Dem. 57.13), a raid on property of the recently disfranchised Euxitheus (Dem. 57.65), Meidias’ alleged raid on a goldsmith’s house to despoil festal costumes (Dem. 21.16, 22, 62), and the adulterous affair of Euphiletus’ wife (Lys. 1.13 –14). Under laws attributed to Solon, thefts committed by night were treated more harshly than those by day (Dem. 24.113; MacDowell 1978, 148). Indeed, one was entitled to kill a nocturnal thief no matter how trivial his theft (ibid., 114).16 The hypothetical crime in Antiphon’s First Tetralogy takes place at night in a deserted spot; contestants in this set of model speeches speculate about what bystanders would do if they stumbled across crime victims in such a time and place. One speaker claims that passersby would investigate (2.3.2); the other contradicts him (2.4.5). A real-life attempted murder in a lonely spot at the dead of night is found in Against Nicostratus, discussed above in Chapter 2: the defendant and his brother allegedly ambush Apollodorus and try to throw him in a quarry. This cannot have been one of the well-known quarries of Acte, on the far peninsula south of the Grand Harbor,17 because Apollodorus was walking northeastward from Piraeus to Athens, but it may have been a large quarry that lay near the northern fortification wall, perhaps next to the gate that led between the Long Walls (Dworakowska 1975, 13). Some ancient quarries employed tunneling, but in others, stone was removed from the surface layer by layer, creating a vertical rock face of sometimes formidable height; those on Pentelicus and at Syracuse were more than twenty-seven meters high;18 Dworakowska cites ten meters as a typical height (1975, 148 – 49), more than enough for a fatal fall.19 The stones had to be transported to building sites; quarries were of little use without roads, and it can be easily imagined that Apollodorus was walking along the principal route from Piraeus to Athens when he ran into trouble. Fortunately for him, others were traveling that road as well, and rescued him. Of the half-dozen or so bystander incidents set in or around Athens,20 what were the physical settings, and how did those settings shape bystander

S N L 84

T3801.indb 84

8/7/06 12:48:03 PM


85

responses? Athenians occupied villages and farms spread all over the large province of Attica, but much of the population and most of these situations are focused on the astu. Archaeological and literary evidence may be combined in an attempt to distinguish districts in the ancient city devoted to diverse activities and perhaps dominated by certain classes of people. We know the most about the city center: the lofty and remote Acropolis, the busy agora with its public spaces and a “villains’ market” near the Heliaea; nearby disreputable establishments, like that of the disabled man in Lysias 24; and the Cerameicus, which accommodated potters and prostitutes (Fisher 1999, 57– 58; Davidson 1998, 85 –90). In residential neighborhoods, there must have been some sorting out of households in accordance with their social standing, though the difference between the houses of the rich and poor was seldom dramatic (J. E. Jones 1975, 65 – 66; Hölscher 1991, 369). Forensic speeches typically reflect life among men prosperous enough to hire a speechwriter, a fact that lends an inevitable bias to any analysis. Most of our known plaintiffs and defendants lived in relative ease; the crimes in which they were involved often related to personal excess in drink or sex and hubristic claims over others, as opposed to lower-class crimes arising from privation (Fisher 1999, 61; cf. Lateiner 2002). Class distinctions therefore must be kept in mind. Let us start on the periphery and work our way into the heart of the city, noting the physical setting for each scene and the apparent makeup of the crowd. The key incident in Against Evergus takes place on a farm outside the city (Dem. 47.63) near the Hippodrome, where the speaker has lived since childhood (Dem. 47.53). This farm, like certain excavated Attic farmsteads, has a tower (J. E. Jones 1975, 116 –122). The speaker mentions two properties adjacent to the farm, and two different streets that cut through the neighborhood. The servants of an absent neighbor, when they realize there is a problem, summon passersby, including Hagnophilus, apparently the speaker’s friend (47.60); another neighbor by the name of Hermogenes also helps (47.61). The immediate neighborhood, in other words, springs to the defense of the threatened household. Most of the other incidents take place in unspecified neighborhoods apparently within the astu. We know little about the setting for the attempted arrests in Against Pancleon, except that they must have taken place in the streets with a good number of people going about their affairs. This probably was a downtrodden neighborhood frequented by naturalized Plataeans, since the speaker was seeking Pancleon there. It seems quite intimate. When Nicomedes moved to arrest him, some of the bystanders knew Pancleon well

T3801.indb 85

8/7/06 12:48:03 PM

86


enough to claim he had a brother (Lys. 23.9). On the next day, no such man appeared, but instead a woman who now blocked Pancleon’s arrest on the grounds that he belonged to her. Meanwhile, Pancleon’s friends used force to carry him away to safety. Jebb (1962, 1: 303) says he was “rescued by a gang of bullies”—but they were his bullies. The neighborhood of Lysias 3.6 –7 is probably more up-scale: the speaker, who is rich enough to have been involved in an antidosis, maintains his household there. He has abundant leisure to devote to the pursuit of a boy, and when the rivalry of Simon causes him discomfort, he can afford to take his loved one abroad. The bystanders who intervene at his house fall into two categories. First, there are friends who arrive with the drunken Simon when he breaks down the door and bursts in upon the speaker’s sisters and nieces. Second, there are men who simply gather at the scene, hoi paragenomenoi; these were probably neighbors and passersby who heard the ruckus. Both categories of people, we are told, decided that Simon was doing terrible things and drove him out by force. Greater impersonality is suggested in a couple of other scenes. The brawl of Against Simon will be fully analyzed in the next section; very briefly, the event unfolded in a neighborhood so busy that a large crowd was drawn into the fray, and surely most of these were random passersby. We are told nothing about the neighborhood of the first incident from Against Evergus, but when a boy is sent to summon citizen passersby, there is no suggestion that they were known to the disputing parties (Dem. 47.36). Finally, it remains to review the bystander incidents that took place in the busy agora, a setting that will be described below in the section on Against Conon. As we have seen, Theramenes was dragged from the altar while members of the Council, possibly meeting in the brand new Bouleuterion on the western side of the agora, looked on (Xen. Hell. 2.3.52 –55; Camp 1986, 90 –91). All of them knew Theramenes and must have realized that he was, in violation of his sacred right of protection at an altar, being taken to his death, but they were too stunned and too afraid to act.21 There is no indication in Against Timarchus that the crowd that gathered in the agora to watch Pittalacus crouch upon the altar of the Mother of the Gods, perhaps in front of the Metroön, knew him personally (Aeschin. 1.60 – 61; Camp 1986, 93). Why would they? Pittalacus was either a public slave or an exslave (Fisher 2001, 190 –191). Nevertheless, his suppliancy was respected: he was coaxed down from the altar, not forcibly dragged. Demosthenes, in Against Timocrates, offers a hypothetical (24.208) that assumes a courageous,

S N L 86

T3801.indb 86

8/7/06 12:48:03 PM


87

civic-minded crowd of male citizens serving as dikastai in a courtroom on the agora: in a jailbreak, he says, they would collectively rush forth, apprehend the escaping prisoners, and execute the ringleader. All of these incidents in the agora imply some sense of social cohesion. Bystanders in the most public square of Athens knew what they should do: rescue Theramenes (although they failed to do so); respect a suppliant; catch runaway convicts. None of these incidents, however, tests bystander intervention in street crime per se. This is why the mugging in Against Conon is so important: we have no other extant example of violent crime in the agora, nor any better evidence for the behavior of bystanders there, whoever they might be. Much will be gleaned from this narrative in succeeding pages. For now, one must simply note that evening foot-traffic through the agora, especially along the Street of the Panathenaia, was such that some passersby were known to Ariston (Dem. 54.10) and others not (Dem. 54.9, 32). Where does this quick overview leave us? How should we think of street life in Athens? The notion of Athens as a face-to-face society is problematic: given a population of perhaps 30,000 male citizens, it is impossible that everyone could be known to all the rest, though it is tempting to think of discrete demes or neighborhoods that way. Support for this is found in Aristophanic comedy: Strepsiades, as he is being beaten by his own son, stumbles out of his house and into the street shouting for neighbors, kinfolk, and demesmen (Clouds 1321–1323).22 Some neighborhoods, to be sure, would have had a high turnover of residents; Simon had recently rented the house next to the speaker’s friend Lysimachus. Yet other districts might have enjoyed a more stable population, like the farming neighborhood where the speaker of Against Evergus lived from his boyhood. It is impossible to pinpoint the location of the farm where another man allegedly uprooted a sacred olive-stump, but in questioning why his accuser has adduced no witnesses, the defendant draws a picture of his immediate neighborhood as one where, for better or worse, everyone knows him and takes an interest in his affairs (Lys. 7.18 –19): How would it have been possible to persuade all the passersby, or the neighbors, who not only know those things about each other that it is possible for all to see, but also those things that we hide so that no one will know and about which they inquire? Now, of those people, some are friends to me, but others happen to be at variance with me about my property.

T3801.indb 87

8/7/06 12:48:03 PM

88


This passage conveys a sense of life in the outlying demes—but even in the agora, a place where the whole city mingled, one might well encounter a friend or enemy. With this general introduction to street life and street crime in Athens, we may now proceed to an analysis of the central episodes from Against Simon and Against Conon, each of which entails the eruption of personal enmity into open violence and bloodshed before numerous witnesses. In Against Simon, bystanders enthusiastically intervene; in Against Conon, the beating of Ariston proceeds without interruption. One goal of this chapter will be to explain these different outcomes. Since several decades divide the incidents, it seems best to take them in chronological order, starting with Against Simon.

Lysias 3.12 –18 t he t a le o f th eo d o tu s Against Simon is a defense speech delivered in a case heard before the Areopagus sometime after 394. The speaker, a rich Athenian man who is no longer young, has been charged with traumatos ek pronoias, or intentional wounding. He seeks to prove that, to the contrary, there was no intent because the wounding took place in the context of a brawl that was started by the plaintiff, a man named Simon. Lamb, in his 1930 Loeb translation, discerned in this speech the “practiced skill of Lysias,” especially in “the contrast between the honest, peace-loving character of the defendant and the reckless, insolent and violent temper of the prosecutor” (1988, 71). If held to the high standards later set by Dover (1968), the authorship of Against Simon must remain in doubt.23 Nevertheless, its detailed account of homoerotic wrangling over a boy named Theodotus, which led to house-breaking and the breaking of heads—to damage inflicted upon persons, property, and reputations—holds considerable interest for students of Athenian law and social mores. The background to the brawl is vital to the speaker’s case (3 – 4, 9). His story is this: He and Simon both desired Theodotus (5), and it was the speaker who won him over (5, 31). Simon, looking for the boy, broke into the speaker’s house one night and had to be restrained by his companions and other bystanders (6 –7). Neither the speaker nor the boy was there, so Simon proceeded to the place where they were in fact dining. He called the speaker outside (8) and laid hands on him as if to strike. The speaker warded off the blows. Simon then started throwing stones. He missed the speaker but hit

S N L 88

T3801.indb 88

8/7/06 12:48:03 PM


89

another man. Given the violence of this incident, the speaker decided to sail away from Athens (9, 32) with the boy in tow and stay abroad until tempers cooled and Simon forgot Theodotus (10). He declines to say how long he stayed away, but clearly it was not long enough for passion to fade. The speaker came back to Athens; leaving Theodotus at the home of his friend Lysimachus, he went off to the Piraeus. Now, as it happens, Simon had rented the property next door. He had observed Theodotus’ return and decided to lay a trap for him. Inviting friends to wine and dine, he posted scouts on the roof to wait for Theodotus to come out (11). The speaker, returning from Piraeus, joined Theodotus inside until it was time for them to leave (12): (12) And then these men, who were already drunk, jump out at us—some who were present were not willing to join in this wrongdoing, but this man Simon and Theophilus and Protarchus and Autocleus dragged the boy. And he, ripping away his cloak, took off running. (13) And I, thinking that he had eluded Simon, and that they, as soon as they ran into people, would turn away in shame—having this in mind I took off by another path. Thus I really tried to avoid them, and I considered all the things that had happened because of them an enormous calamity for me. (14) And there, where Simon says the fight happened, not one of them and not one of my friends either broke his head or received any other ill, and I shall provide bystanders (tous paragenomenous) as witnesses of these matters. [Witnesses are called.] (15) That this man, then, was the wrongdoer, Council, and had plotted against us, and not I against him, has been testified to you by the bystanders (hupo to¯ n paragenomeno¯ n). After that, the boy fled to a fuller’s, and these men, falling together upon him, led him away by force as he shouted and called and asked for witnesses (boo¯ nta kai kekragota kai marturomenon) (16). Many people ran to the spot and became indignant over the matter and said that what was happening was terrible; they paid no attention to what was being said, but struck Molon the fuller and some others who were trying to protect the boy (17). They were already beside the house of Lampon when I, walking by myself, came upon them. And thinking that it would be terrible and disgraceful to look the other way while the young man was thus lawlessly and violently subjected to hubristic behavior, I seized hold of him. And these men, when asked why they were behaving

T3801.indb 89

8/7/06 12:48:04 PM

90


lawlessly toward him, were not willing to answer, but letting go of the young man they hit me (18). And a battle started, Council. The boy was pelting them and warding them off from his body, and they were pelting us; and in their drunken state they kept hitting him, while I tried to protect him, and all the bystanders came to our aid on the grounds that we were being wronged (kai to¯ n paragenomeno¯ n ho¯ s adikoumenois he¯ min hapanto¯ n epikourounto¯ n), and in this din we all broke our heads. Such are the supposed facts of the case, and two sets of witnesses were called in to support them (14 –15, 20 –21). The speaker provides so much detail that we can easily picture the setting. It is a busy neighborhood of Athens, probably full of shops and businesses as well as residences, since 200 bystanders are said to have been drawn into the afternoon fray (27). Imagine two house facades, a door in each. One house belongs to the speaker’s friend Lysimachus. The other house is being rented out to Simon (11). Both dwellings are large enough and fine enough to accommodate upper-class guests who spend their time eating, drinking, and talking. The nearby streets form the usual tangled warren (J. E. Jones 1975, 66): Theodotus, pursued by Simon and his friends, runs one way, and the speaker runs another (13, 35), yet they meet up again outside the house of Lampon, not far from the fuller’s shop (15 –16). On the whole, bystander intervention in this scene may be described as avid. The fuller’s shop is where the real fight begins: Theodotus flees inside and, as his assailants come in after him, he shouts and cries and calls upon bystanders to witness what is going on. Molon and some others try to defend him and consequently receive a beating (16). Outside on the street again, more people join the melee: they push and shove, they throw stones, they create a din or thorubos, and they end up getting hurt (18). Although many of them were no doubt strangers, all are represented as angrily protesting against Simon’s terrible doings. This view serves the speaker in this lawsuit, since he seeks to put Simon wholly in the wrong and expose him as a violent character. But in such confusion, it seems unlikely that most who joined in the fight even knew what it was about. The speaker, meanwhile, provides our only first-hand musings of a reallife intervening bystander. For at a certain point, that is what he is. Remember that he flees the scene outside Lysimachus’ house when Simon and his friends first start dragging Theodotus down the street (12 –13). By the time the speaker encounters these men again, after the frenzied scene at the

S N L 90

T3801.indb 90

8/7/06 12:48:04 PM


91

fuller’s shop,24 he has in effect become a bystander to their violence (cf. 37). His loved one, who also happens to be a Plataean boy, is their victim. What should he do? e mot io n a n d m o r a l o blig a t io n i n lysi as 3 . 12 – 18 The speaker’s erotic passion for the boy is the driving motive in this case: the conflict between him and his rival Simon derives from it. Next in importance, I would argue, is the speaker’s sense of shame. Both of these emotions influence his behavior at the moment of decision in the street outside the house of Lampon. Taken together, they generate a sense of obligation—in a man of good character, which the speaker claims to be. Let us first examine this claim of moral goodness, which is imperiled by the speaker’s lust for Theodotus but salvaged by his propensity for shame. The speaker admits from the start that, considering his years—he must be middle-aged or older—his disposition toward the boy makes him look foolish, but he has tried to handle his infatuation as a virtuous and prudent man ought (beltistos . . . kai so¯ phronestatos, 4). He wants to be an upright citizen (khre¯ stos, 9). He was kind to Theodotus (5). He never sought out trouble or initiated violence (passim). He held his peace to avoid being talked about (30) and refrained from denouncing Simon because he felt that their quarrel over a boy was a terrible reason to seek his rival’s exile (40). On behalf of his country, he has faced many dangers and performed many liturgies. Neither he nor his ancestors ever did Athens any harm but, to the contrary, did it much good (47). The speaker forges for Simon a devastating characterization. The first three words of the speech are polla kai deina, the many terrible things proper to Simon, while his boldness surpasses the speaker’s imagination (1). Simon, lusting after Theodotus, thought he could force the boy to do whatever he wanted, and he did many bad things to him (5). He drunkenly smashed his way into the speaker’s house; he intruded on the privacy of respectable young girls (6 –7). He is prone to madness and behaved most strangely and unbelievably (atopotaton pragma kai apistotaton epoie¯ sen, 7) in tracking down the speaker where he was dining, calling him outside to fight, striking him, and pelting him with stones (8). The drinking of Simon and his friends made them violently inebriated (6, 12, 18, 19), a loss of self-control liable, in fourth-century Athens, to be portrayed in a bad light (Davidson 1998,

T3801.indb 91

8/7/06 12:48:04 PM

92


236 –238). Their bad behavior culminated in the brawl. In sum, the speaker accuses Simon of being audacious, lawless, hubristic, violent, unrepentant, wicked, in error, shameless, a wrongdoer, heedless, and a liar.25 Independent evidence of Simon’s bad character may be found in his military record (44 – 45): he fought with a taxiarch and beat him, was extremely insubordinate and wicked (akosmotatos . . . kai pone¯ rotatos), and was the only Athenian to be drummed out by the generals. So how does the speaker, clinging to his dignity, characterize his feelings for Theodotus? Lust, he says, is a foible to which all human beings are prone (4). He and Simon both lusted after the boy, but he alone resolved to secure the object of his affection by treating him well (5). In this, he was successful, for the boy lived with him and hated Simon most among men (31). It is striking that the speaker ascribes to Simon the same lust that he himself feels: so far as that goes, the two are equal.26 But Simon, unlike the speaker, handles his lust badly, displaying a lack of self-control (so¯ phrosune¯ ) that is frowned upon in Athenian society (Davidson 1998). His actions are overbearing and his words untrue. He uses force in place of kindness toward the boy (5, 31) and, the speaker says, must be incapable of love because of his villainous nature (44). Indeed, he has antagonized Theodotus, who refuses even to speak to him (31): this, surely, is an intimate and triumphant statement on the speaker’s part. Yet who is this boy at the center of the storm? He is a Plataean (5).27 He is probably a prostitute, hence Simon’s allegation that he paid him 300 drachmae (22 –26).28 The boy is not the fitting object of a mature man’s affection. It is easy to see why the speaker immediately and repeatedly confesses to a sense of shame over the affair and would rather not have his fellow citizens know anything about it (aiskhunomenos, 3). Even after Simon struck and pelted him, and he felt completely misused, he remained quiet because he felt ashamed (aiskhunomenos, 9); and he refrained from bringing suit because he did not wish to appear foolish before his fellow citizens or become a laughing-stock. He is embarrassed to admit he took the boy abroad (10). He should, he says, be pitied for having to stand trial (48). Erotic passion and shame coincide during the infamous brawl, and both help to account for the speaker’s response to the violence he sees. The victim of violence is the boy for whom he has strong feelings; and his sense of shame prompts him to act. It would, he says, be a terrible and disgraceful thing— deinon . . . kai aiskhron —to look the other way while the youth is being lawlessly and violently subjected to hubristic behavior (17). And so

S N L 92

T3801.indb 92

8/7/06 12:48:04 PM


93

he intervenes by laying hold of him. Implausibly, he even asks the assailants why they are treating the boy lawlessly. The result is two-fold: the men release Theodotus—and start beating the speaker instead (17).29 Yet the real significance of this testimony lies in the precise moral valuation placed upon the act of intervention. The speaker does not speak of eros here. Rather, he asserts he was defending Theodotus against the lawless hubris of Simon and his ilk. It is well to remember that, as an Athenian, the speaker belongs to a polis that prided itself on defending the wronged (Tzanetou 2005). His rhetoric echoes that of civic ideology; his behavior conforms to expectations laid upon the city-state. Meanwhile, this explanation of his inner thoughts is designed to blacken Simon and burnish his own image as a good man. In the final analysis, he scrambles to maintain the moral high ground by intervening in hubristic violence—an action far more dignified than scrapping over a male prostitute.

Demosthenes 54.7–9 t he t a le o f a r is to n The setting of the alleged assault in Against Conon is a most public place: the agora of Athens. One evening after dinner, Conon and some younger men allegedly assault Ariston—the speaker—as he is strolling there with a friend. They beat him severely and leave him lying cloakless, speechless, and nearly motionless in the mud. Bystanders then carry Ariston first to his home, and thence to the baths; a physician is summoned. Ariston is slowly nursed back to health, whereupon he brings the present charge of battery, aikeias dike¯ , against Conon. It seems that quite a few people saw what happened, including three friends of Conon who declined to join in; four strangers who have testified for Ariston; and perhaps some slaves. Three other cronies of Conon have deposed—falsely, we’re told—as eyewitnesses in his support, and we know there were passersby who carried the injured Ariston away. Amid claims and counter-claims, we cannot be sure who was present that night, but clearly the agora was far from deserted. Dated to the mid-fourth century, Against Conon is a speech firmly attributed to Demosthenes himself. This is owing to its undoubted literary merit: clarity of thought and fineness of phrase. Dionysius of Halicarnassus praised it. Although Lang criticizes the account as “agitated and biased” (1994, 9), Gernet finds that it has strength and a cutting edge especially evident in the

T3801.indb 93

8/7/06 12:48:04 PM

94


use of apostrophe, antithesis, and interrogation; the phrases are robust (1959, 3 : 100). The narrative is certainly vivid: (7) Not much later, when I was out walking, as was my habit, by evening in the agora with Phanostratus of Cephisia, one of my age-mates, along comes Ctesias, this man’s son— drunk— down by the Leocorium, close to the property of Pythodorus. He saw us and shouted and mumbled something to himself the way a drunken man does, so that one cannot tell what he is saying. He then proceeded up toward Melite. For as we learned later, this man Conon was there drinking at the house of Pamphilus the fuller, along with a certain Theotimus, Archebiades, Spintharus the son of Euboulus, Theogenes the son of Andromenes, and quite a few others, whom Ctesias roused and led into the agora. (8) And he encountered us as we were turning back from the temple of Persephone and were again strolling opposite the spot where the Leocorium is, and we ran into these men. As we mixed in together, one of them, I don’t know who, fell upon Phanostratus and held him down, while this man Conon and his son and the son of Andromenes assaulted me. First they stripped me, then they tripped me and dragged me in the mud, and jumping on and beating me they treated me in such a way that my lip was cut and my eyes were swollen shut. They left me in such a bad state that I could neither stand up nor utter a sound. (9) While I was lying there, I heard them saying many and terrible things. There was a lot they said, and some blasphemy that I would shrink from saying among you, but the definitive sign of this man’s hubris and the proof that the whole affair began with him, I will tell you: he started to crow, mimicking victorious cocks, and they begged him to crook his arms against his sides like wings. And after that I was carried away naked by passersby (hupo to¯ n paratukhonto¯ n), since these men had gone off, taking my cloak. As I reached my door, there was a wail and a shout from my mother and the servants, and with difficulty they carried me to the bath and, having washed me off, showed me to the physicians. This assault took place in the civic center and chief marketplace of the city, with its venerable shrines and buildings given over to the tasks of democratic self-governance; the space had been devoted to communal purposes since shortly after 600 b.c.e. (Hölscher 1991, 363), and private houses were eventually forbidden here. Businesses, too, were limited, though traders and craftsmen kept pressing inward from the borders of the agora (ibid., 365): potters

S N L 94

T3801.indb 94

8/7/06 12:48:05 PM


95

dominated the Cerameicus to the northwest; metalworkers toiled on the west side around the Hephaisteion; cobblers, marbleworkers, and bronzeworkers occupied the southwest and south, where dozens of houses with workshops have been excavated (Camp 1986, 135 –150). Within the sacred boundaries of the agora lay the old and new Council chambers, the strategeion, the lawcourts, the mint, the fountain house, various stoas, monuments, and shrines, and the Altar of the Twelve Gods. Was it unwise of Ariston to stroll through the agora at night? Torches in ancient Athens could be easily procured if moonlight failed,30 but let us think for a moment like modern city-dwellers, who consider that one should simply know better than to enter certain neighborhoods after dark. Could the fourth-century agora be such a neighborhood? Surely not. Most business was conducted by day, but there were always Council members who dined and slept in the agora so that, in an emergency, they would be at hand.31 The northwest corner, where Ariston was walking, lay across from the Leocorium, a shrine dedicated to the daughters of the hero Leos. Excavation has revealed the foundations of a shrine that faced the crossroads at the Painted Stoa and has been tentatively identified as the Leocorium (Lang 1994, 9; disputed by Camp 1986, 78 –79). If so, Ariston was also near the Royal Stoa. The evidence found in Against Conon suggests that the agora was a likely spot for after-dinner strolls: Ariston says it was his habit to go there, and plenty of other law-abiding citizens seem to be passing through at this hour.32 His assailants, moreover, are not lowborn clothes-snatchers and thieves, but members of the aristocracy. The sons of Conon belong to clubs of mischievous young men; they are insolent and idle. Although they could, strictly speaking, be charged as kakourgoi, the indictment would be socially inappropriate because they are among the kaloi kai agathoi and they stripped Ariston for the sheer joy of it, not because they had any use for his clothes. e mot io n a n d m o r a l o blig a t io n i n d em o sth en es 54. 7 – 9 The prevailing emotion that runs throughout Against Conon is a sense of outrage that is closely related to the ¯e thos of the speaker. Many, though by no means all, scholars have admired the deft self-portrait that Ariston’s words create. Modern detractors have called him ordered and timid (Gernet 1959, 3 : 98), or even “pompous, self-righteous, not ‘one of the boys’ but readier with his tongue than his fists, and a little spiteful” (Lang 1994, 11). It is unclear, however, how such an ¯e thos would have helped him in court,

T3801.indb 95

8/7/06 12:48:05 PM

96


and there are other ways to read the speech. In my opinion, Ariston appears young, diffident, and angry—and also, unlike the defendants, restrained and reasonable. The trait of diffidence is vital to any interpretation of the key episode in which he is beaten up. This is because, despite his oft-mentioned youth, Ariston seems to have a fine grasp of social hierarchy, accepts the advice of others (1), and expresses well-defined views of appropriate versus inappropriate behavior. Hence his careful exposition of the available charges and his explanation of why he chose the one he did. Ariston’s blend of anger and restraint arises from his conviction that he was mightily abused. From the very first word of the speech— hubristheis— he establishes himself as a victim of violent insolence. He needs to project security and confidence lest the scene that he describes be discounted by the dikastai as ludicrous, or trivial, or both. In the narrative, he achieves a high level of detail and apparent objectivity. He records facts, names names, calls witnesses, cites laws, and notes the ways and limits of knowing: he couldn’t understand what Ctesias was mumbling, he did not find out until later where Ctesias and his friends were dining; he doesn’t know who pinned Phanostratus. The emotion lies not in the diction but in the content of the passage: what happened to Ariston was outrageous. He does not describe his feelings, except to say that he would shrink from repeating in court some of the things his assailants said (9). The extremity of his physical distress is indicated by his prostrate position, by his having to be carried, by the wailing of his mother and servants, by his egregious and well-documented injuries and his close escape from death. What clues to moral obligation does the speech offer? The speaker, in the argument section of the speech, comments explicitly on the role of bystanders: he deplores those who incite wrongdoers instead of intervening.33 He says this in order to press his case against Conon, who is expected to claim that being an older man, he simply stood by and watched his sons carry out their high-spirited prank. Ariston says Conon would justly be hated if that is what he did (22): touton emiseit’ an dikaio¯ s. But, to the contrary, Conon actually assaulted him and was indeed the ringleader and the most abominable person of all (22): autos he¯ gemo¯ n kai pro¯ tos kai panto¯ n bdeluro¯ tatos. Ariston goes on to suppose that if Conon’s sons felt no shame acting badly in front of their father, then Conon himself must have felt no shame in front of his father (23). Furthermore, had Ariston died, Conon could have been charged with murder—simply for encouraging the crime, regardless of whether or

S N L 96

T3801.indb 96

8/7/06 12:48:05 PM


97

not he had struck a blow (24). This passage, then, has as much to do with the culpability and liability of instigators to a crime as it does with the role of bystanders. Bystanders are mentioned only briefly in the narrative of Against Conon, and their point of view is suggested only by the actions that they took. The overly succinct text would seem to leave us at an impasse. On the other hand, the notion of bearing witness is often expressed by the inconspicuous compound paragignomai. As Hunter notes (1994, 226 n. 5), bystanders are the paragenomenoi, “those who happened to be present.” The word means “to be beside, to be near,” but also “to come to one’s side, stand by, second, support.” Liddell and Scott support this second definition with citations from Hesiod, Herodotus, Thucydides, Aeschylus, and Aristophanes; Plato’s Laws employs the term in Book 9, where a bystander, ho paragenomenos, must offer help in assault cases or pay a fine (880d). Greek oratory, however, affords numerous instances in which paragignomai seems to mean not merely “to be present” or “to support,” but “to be present as an eyewitness.” The speaker in Prosecution of the Stepmother for Poisoning, for example, asks, “How could anyone know for sure what he had not witnessed in person (me¯ paregeneto autos)?” (Antiph. 1.28), and at Antiphon 2.1.10, the fictitious prosecutor says it would be impossible to convict criminals without eyewitnesses—to¯ n paragenomeno¯ n. Keep in mind that an eyewitness needs to be not just passively present, but actively observant. Apollodorus, in Against Stephanus II, cites the laws governing witnesses: according to him, those laws let a man testify to what he knows and things that were done while he was present as an eyewitness—ha an eide¯ i tis kai hois an paragene¯ tai prattomenois (Dem. 46.6). Todd and Millett (1990, 17) have noted that in Athens, “the language of the street was itself the language of the law.” It is tempting to suggest that the verb paragignomai may have had legal implications in Athens in the context of eyewitness testimony. At the very least, the word carries moral implications, since “to be present as an eyewitness” was what the Athenian bystander was largely expected to do.34 A Sequential Analysis Since, as we have seen, the role of bystanders confronted with a crime in progress is also a modern concern, one may draw upon the work of social psychologists such as Bibb Latané and John M. Darley, who launched their

T3801.indb 97

8/7/06 12:48:05 PM

98


study of contemporary bystander intervention after the murder of Kitty Genovese. Latané and Darley offer the useful observation that bystanders to an event “must make not just one, but a series of decisions” (1970, 31). In order to intervene, a bystander must notice the event, interpret it as an emergency, decide that it is his or her responsibility to act, figure out specifically what to do, and finally do it. A sequential analysis therefore can help us sort through the ancient evidence one more time, as we imagine ourselves into the position of the Athenian bystander. The first step, according to Latané and Darley, is to notice and interpret the crime in progress. Shouting and shrieking and a general uproar can command the attention of strangers. But observers must immediately begin to interpret the event, and this cannot have been easy. To start with, how could bystanders in Against Conon have known for sure whether to interpret what they saw as a crime in progress or as mere horseplay? The attack took place after supper, and daylight had faded. Laughter would have been heard as Conon imitated a cock crowing over his prostrate victim; his friends were egging him on (10). One might have thought, as Conon has suggested, that “boys will be boys”—tauta einai neo¯ n anthropo¯ n (14). The speaker feels obliged to point out that this was no trifling unruliness on the part of young men belonging to clubs with names like Ithyphalloi and Autolecythoi (16). This was serious: his assailants almost killed him. He tells the dikastai that the assault was no laughing matter (20). In other contexts, the ancient bystander might also have needed to decide whether the event he had noticed was a crime or a legal proceeding. The prevalence of “self-help” measures in Athenian law will have made it difficult to determine whether one was watching an assault or an arrest, a burglary or a constrainment. In Against Evergus, the home of the speaker was entered under a legal pretext, but he says the neighbors’ servants “heard the shouting and saw my house being plundered (te¯ n oikian porthoumene¯ n)” (Dem. 47.60). In Against Pancleon, as we have seen, bystanders argue over whether Pancleon should or should not be arrested by Nicomedes, who says he is his master. Unable to sort through rival claims on the spot, one would likely be swayed by the crowd, as in Against Simon, where many people gather around the boy who is being seized—and collectively wax indignant. Latané and Darley (1970, 41) emphasize that a bystander “faced with an ambiguous situation, uncertain what to believe or what to do, is likely to look to others for guidance.” The outcome, in other words, rests in part upon group dynamics.

S N L 98

T3801.indb 98

8/7/06 12:48:05 PM


99

After noticing and interpreting the event, the bystander must next decide that it is his responsibility to intervene. In ancient Athens, that responsibility would appear to be moral rather than legal. As we have seen, the extant speeches suggest several reasons why a bystander might feel he ought to act. To start with, he might have personal ties to the victim. Alternatively, he might be mindful of the demands of reciprocity. Or perhaps he might also wish to safeguard the polis or defend justice, as Hunter implies. Unfortunately, I was unable to discover any clear articulation of the bystander’s sense of disinterested social responsibility. What one finds, instead, are oblique suggestions, as in Against Simon: “And all the bystanders came to our aid on the grounds that we were being wronged (ho¯ s adikoumenoi )” (Lys. 3.18). Less lofty but no less real, one reason to leap into the fray might simply be that others were doing the same, and this, I think, is the best explanation for the brawl in Against Simon, allegedly witnessed by more than 200 people, which spilled down the street for four stades— 800 yards—and resulted in numerous broken heads. Conversely, it is worth considering briefly the possible reasons not to intervene. Clearly, one might fear bodily injury, whether in the altercation itself or afterward. As the defendant says in Antiphon’s First Tetralogy (2.4.5): “I, for my part, do not believe there is any man so reckless or brave that, stumbling at night upon dead men gasping their last, he would not turn and run rather than risk his life trying to find out who committed the crime.” And then, might not one wish to avoid being called upon subsequently to serve as a legal witness? We have seen that a private indictment could be brought against a person who refused to witness, so the willingness to perform this service cannot be considered universal. But let us return to our hapless bystander. Finally, having noticed and interpreted the event, and having decided to intervene, he would need to decide how to intervene, and then actually do it. What were his choices? That would depend, of course, on the situation. First, one might be able to halt the crime simply by appearing on the scene, like the hypothetical passersby in the First Tetralogy who interrupt a crime. Similarly, in Against Conon, the general and taxiarchs interrupt an altercation between Ariston and Conon’s son at military camp (Dem. 54.5). Second, one could remonstrate, as in Against Simon, where bystanders protest that what’s happening is terrible—though the perpetrators simply ignore them (Lys. 3.16). Third, one could bodily interpose oneself in a violent struggle, like the speaker and other adventuresome bystanders in Against Simon who get their heads broken. The most conspicuous

T3801.indb 99

8/7/06 12:48:05 PM

100


example of high-risk intervention is the supposed rescue of Apollodorus on a dark road above a quarry in Against Nicostratus (Dem. 53.17). Finally, one could simply act as a witness. Surely this is the most common demand placed upon bystanders, as Lintott has noted (1982, 21). When the victim in Against Simon is set upon, he shouts and shrieks and calls not for rescuers but for witnesses—marturomenon (Lys. 3.15). In Against Evergus, the speaker tells his slave to bring in passersby to serve as witnesses for what was being said—hina martures moi eie¯ san to¯ n legomeno¯ n (Dem. 47.36). Moments later, when his enemy punches him, he calls for those present to bear witness—and punches him back (47.38). The significance of the paragenomenoi has already been discussed. My argument that the verb paragignomai, “to be present as an eyewitness,” had moral and possibly legal connotations makes sense in the context of several interrelated procedures regarding the apprehension of criminals in Athens—apago¯ ge¯ to the Eleven, endeixis, and the rather obscure ephe¯ ge¯ sis.35 With apago¯ ge¯ to the Eleven, a citizen could arrest a wrongdoer (kakourgos), especially one caught “in manifest guilt” (ep’ autopho¯ ro¯ i), if the evidence for his culpability was overwhelming.36 With endeixis, a citizen could denounce the offender in writing before a magistrate. With ephe¯ ge¯ sis, a somewhat later development (Hansen 1976, 114), a citizen could cause a magistrate to arrest the offender either during or after the commission of the act (ibid., 25). In all of these self-help procedures, bystanders could play a role in apprehending culprits. So in the case of apago¯ ge¯ , a thief (klepte¯ s) or violent clothes-snatcher (lo¯ podute¯ s) or burglar (toikho¯ rukhos) or cutpurse (ballantiotomos) will sometimes have been caught during the commission of the act—though Ariston claims that the procedure is still available to him long after the incident (Dem. 54.1 and 24; Harrison 1998, 2 : 224). But it is important to note that with endeixis and ephe¯ ge¯ sis, the citizen did not personally interrupt the crime by seizing the wrongdoer himself; indeed, he was not required to do anything at all. Hansen states (1976, 121): “Every citizen had a moral obligation to exercise his right of bringing a public action, but his obligation did not entail any liability and nobody could be punished for not denouncing an offender or for not bringing a public action against him.” So if there were citizen bystanders, what were they doing as the crime unfolded? Watching, taking mental notes, and preparing perhaps to take the matter to a magistrate—but not necessarily flinging themselves into the fray. Rather, they might expect to “stand by as eyewitnesses.”

S N L 100

T3801.indb 100

8/7/06 12:48:06 PM


10 1

Conclusions It is fascinating to see how the dikastai in Athenian courts are summoned, in a sense, as bystanders to a wrongdoing—but long after the event, when they can interpret it at leisure, when they can intervene with little risk to themselves. The speaker in Against Conon deploys vivid description and a particularizing pronoun to place each juror, in his own imagination, at the scene of the crime: “No one of you would have been seized with laughter had he been there when I was dragged and stripped and outraged” (20). And as he wraps up the speech, he asks (43): “Is it beneficial to each one of you, that a man should be able to beat up someone and commit outrages, or not?” In Against Meidias, Demosthenes also admonishes the dikastai with something very like the principle of reciprocity that applies to bystanders (Dem. 21.220): “Whenever one victim fails to obtain justice, then each one must expect to be the next victim himself.” Yet how much easier it is to support the victim in the courtroom rather than at the scene of the crime! It is striking that the verb boe¯ theo¯ , which means “come to the rescue,” is a frequent figure of speech in deliberative and forensic oratory—having lost much of its physical immediacy, having faded into a plea to cast the right vote. Bystander intervention will always have depended upon the specific circumstances of the violence and the perceptions of participants. Are enough people present to intervene effectively? The citizens of Croton join together against the Persians who seek to arrest Democedes (Hdt. 3.137), and bystanders enjoy strength of numbers in the brawl of Against Simon. In Against Pancleon, neighborhood passersby who spring to the defense of Pancleon have only Nicomedes to contend with (Lys. 23.9–11). Do the bystanders feel intimidated by the type of violence they see? This is conspicuously the case in the arrest of Theramenes, where members of the Council know that the Eleven, unlike them, are carrying weapons (Xen. Hell. 2.3.52 –55), while the agents of Philip II are surely armed when they arrest Euphraeus (Dem. 9.60 – 61). In Xenophon’s account, the Eleven also represent authority, however illegitimately applied. The military commanders at Panactum37 use their authority to break up the fight at Ariston’s camp; their presence encouraged other soldiers to help (Dem. 54.36 – 40). Although Plato expects women and children to intervene, and the valor of Greek women in warfare (Schaps 1982) shows that they could rise to the occasion, our evidence for peacetime incidents provides no examples of intervening women. The hypothetical situations offered by Antiphon and Demosthenes involve men only.

T3801.indb 101

8/7/06 12:48:06 PM

102


The young female relatives of Against Simon are the ones who need protecting. In the brutal beating of the freedwoman in Against Evergus, women and children are present but do not appear to intervene. A highly significant factor in the willingness of bystanders to intervene in violence must have been the relationship between bystander and victim. Theodotus, the sexual plaything of Against Simon, is hard to categorize, but the speaker clearly cannot stand to watch his favorite abused. Disappointingly, perhaps, none of the recorded incidents involves a relationship within the first circle of moral obligation: immediate family members and closest friends. Several, however, fall into the second circle, where reciprocity comes into play. Friends were expected to help friends, hence Ariston’s companion in Against Conon has to be restrained while the beating takes place. The neighbors in Against Evergus take a keen interest in the events next door. Blundell writes about the transitivity of both friendship and enmity (1989, 47), and bystander intervention aptly illustrates this concept. In the third circle, among strangers, behavior is less predictable, although the principle of reciprocity, broadly construed, may still apply: “For if bystanders,” says the speaker in Against Conon, “instead of preventing those who on account of wine or anger or some other reason are undertaking to commit a crime, are themselves urging them on, there is no hope of safety for one who falls in with lawless people” (Dem. 54.25). Isaeus (3.19) says we take close friends as witnesses—but sometimes we have to take whoever happens to be there. What were ancient Athenians supposed to do in the face of street crimes such as robbery or assault? Was Hunter right in suggesting that bystanders were expected to intervene in street altercations as an act of social responsibility? Perhaps so, but I have argued that, from the individual bystander’s point of view, the question was more complex than that. As Latané and Darley suggest, bystanders must have faced a series of decisions. And although bystanders were encouraged to intervene, and might well behave heroically, they were not on the whole expected to risk their lives for strangers. When the speaker in Against Simon tries to protect Theodotus and gets hurt in the process, he is intervening on behalf of his favorite, not someone unknown to him. Let us return once more to the Athenian agora, and that memorable fourthcentury evening when Ariston was beaten. The speaker in Against Conon claims there were bystanders present, people he did not know—agno¯ tes ontes. Their names were Lysistratus, Paseas, Niceratus, and Diodorus (Dem. 54.32). He says they have testified that they saw him being beaten, stripped of

S N L 102

T3801.indb 102

8/7/06 12:48:06 PM


10 3

his cloak, and subjected to violent outrage. The fact that they were previously unknown to him enhances their integrity (Lang 1994, 11). If we are to believe Ariston, there were at least these four strangers present— paragenomenoi to¯ pragmati —who stood by and watched but did not physically intervene. Yet Ariston does not complain.

T3801.indb 103

8/7/06 12:48:06 PM

four

The Transport of Sick and Wounded Soldiers

I know that there is horrible discomfort in having me on board. . . . Take me and put me where you will, in the hold, in the prow or poop, anywhere where I shall least offend those that I sail with. — sophocles Philoctetes 473 – 474, 481– 483 (trans. Grene)

I

n the tragedy by Sophocles, the warrior Philoctetes has been abandoned on an island by his fellow Greeks because of an incurable and painful snakebite; his anguished cries hamper the performance of religious rites (9–11). For ten years he languishes in terrible isolation until the Greeks revisit the island; he then begs to be taken aboard their ship. Despite the mythical and symbolic dimensions of his plight, Philoctetes may remind us of a real enough problem: how fighting men on the move should handle their sick and wounded comrades.1 The two narratives considered in this chapter come from the sphere of military history, the first from Thucydides’ account of the Athenian retreat from Syracuse, and the second from the central section of Xenophon’s Anabasis, where he tells of the hard march of the Ten Thousand through Armenia. Both historians describe situations in which soldiers retreating with their armies had to deal with sick or wounded soldiers too weak to continue marching. I begin by discussing the practical context for these two stories: the survivability of wounds in ancient warfare and the logistics of carrying live casualties. Table 4 lays out the direct evidence for transport of incapacitated

T3801.indb 104

8/7/06 12:48:06 PM

Source

Date

Identity

Occasion

Thuc. 7.75.2 – 4

413

Athenians

Retreat from Syracuse

Diod. 13.18.6

413

Athenians

Retreat from Syracuse

Thuc. 8.27.4

411

Athenians

Xen. An. 2.2.14

401

Xen. An. 3.4.32

401

Ariaeus, a Persian noble Greeks

Naval retreat from Miletus to Samos Retreat from Cunaxa

Xen. An. 4.5.22 Xen. An. 5.8.6 –11 Xen. An. 5.3.1

401 401 400

Greeks Greek warrior Greeks

Retreat along the Tigris

Retreat through Armenia Retreat through Armenia Removal from Trapezus to Cerasus

Description Incapacitated soldiers are abandoned as the able-bodied decamp; they beg to be carried Incapacitated soldiers are placed between the vanguard and the rear for overland march Phrynichus orders the wounded to be placed aboard ships The wounded Ariaeus travels by wagon

t he t ranspo r t o f sick an d wo un d ed so ldier s

T3801.indb 105

table 4. long-distance transpor t of sick and wounded soldiers in orator y and histor iography

Greeks cannot both march and fight because so many are hors de combat: the wounded, the soldiers carrying them, and the soldiers in charge of the carriers’ arms Able-bodied troops carry weakened soldiers to the nearest camp Half-dead soldier is carried by mule The wounded are placed aboard ships; the able-bodied march overland

10 5

8/7/06 12:48:06 PM

T3801.indb 106

106

table 4. cont inued Source

Date

Identity

Xen. Hell. 3.3.1; Plut. Lys. 22.4; Paus. 3.8.7 Isoc. 19.39

c. 398

Agis II of Sparta

Diod. 17.63.4

c. 331

Curtius 7.6.8

328

Curtius 9.10.15

325

Arr. Anab. 6.25.2 –3

325

c. 394 Agis III of Sparta Alexander the Great Macedonian army

Occasion Removal from Arcadia toward Sparta via Heraea; versions differ slightly Removal from Siphnos to Lycia Removal from Megalopolis toward Sparta Advance to Maracanda Advance across Gedrosian Desert

Description Agis II, sick and near death, is carried through Arcadia; exact mode of transport is unclear Servants and a friend, carrying the wounded man on their shoulders, place him aboard a ship The wounded Agis III is carried by soldiers; exact mode of transport is unclear

8/7/06 12:48:06 PM


Alexander’s infantry soldiers carry him by litter, the way they customarily carry their wounded comrades Men fall by the wayside because no transport animals are available; able-bodied can barely carry their arms Men fall by the wayside because no transport animals are available, no wagons, nor anyone to help them forward or stay behind


10 7

soldiers over extended distances in the fifth and fourth centuries. Each story discussed here is analyzed separately to uncover the emotions and moral obligations either stated or implied by the author. In the case of the Xenophon passage, which is told from the point of view of a commanding officer, I consider evidence pertaining to the legal responsibility of generals vis-à-vis the sick and wounded. I also discuss compassion as an ideal quality in military leadership, a notion first fully articulated by Xenophon. The transport of the sick and wounded over extended distances has received little attention in modern studies of Greek warfare.2 W. Kendrick Pritchett, for example, in his authoritative five-volume work, The Greek State at War, does not discuss it. Victor Davis Hanson, in The Western Way of War, devotes a chapter to the wounded without considering the problem of long-distance transport. Compared to weaponry, strategy, tactics, command structures, and the many other aspects of warfare that contribute to victory or defeat on the field of battle, the handling of incapacitated soldiers is strictly a side issue. Yet another side issue, burial of the war dead, has been much studied, perhaps because the theme is prominent in Homer and Sophocles, with the maltreatment of Hector’s corpse in the Iliad and Antigone’s insistence on burying her brother. History also points to the importance of interment: Nicias, for example, in 425 compromised a recent Athenian victory at Solygia by asking for a truce so that he could retrieve two corpses that had been left behind (Thuc. 4.44; Plut. Nic. 6.5). Pritchett, accordingly, includes a section on the unburied dead, and scholars of Greek religion have often underscored the moral horror of leaving a corpse exposed.3 By contrast, the plight of sick and wounded soldiers is hardly an issue in Homer, where death is swift or recovery miraculous.4 In tragedy, only Philoctetes touches on the difficulties of transporting a wounded comrade. Therefore questions pertaining to the sick and wounded have often gone unasked. Yet their transport is an important problem and must have been of great concern to fighting men in ancient Greece. Fortunately, extant Greek prose offers just enough evidence to allow a useful discussion of the problem. One wishes there were more, but ancient historians had too little interest in logistics to tell us everything we would like to know about supply and transport, let alone transport of incapacitated soldiers.5 Indeed, they rarely discuss the fate of sick and wounded warriors except for the commanding officers. Diplomacy seems to have ignored them. The armistice that followed the Athenian victory at Pylos in 425, for example, contains no stipulations about the wounded among 292 Spartan

T3801.indb 107

8/7/06 12:48:07 PM

108


captives. All in all, my own search of Herodotus, Thucydides, Xenophon, Aeneas Tacticus, Diodorus Siculus, Quintus Curtius Rufus, Plutarch, Arrian, Pausanias, and the canon of ten Attic orators turns up about a dozen direct references to the carrying of sick and wounded soldiers over extended distances, that is to say, over any distance beyond the short span between the battlefield and the nearest camp or resting spot.6 Table 4 cites all the available evidence, whether the army in question was retreating or advancing. To fill out the picture, one must rely on indirect or circumstantial evidence. Alexander the Great, for example, settled soldiers who were unfit for fighting in garrisons and cities along his route of conquest.7 Presumably many had been brought along with the army up to that point, though we are not told how, nor are we told how many of these soldiers, if any, were nonambulatory and therefore needed to be carried. The handling of sick and wounded warriors is a subject worth pursuing for several reasons. First, it ought to have some bearing on troop morale: the expectations with which individual warriors entered service would, arguably, affect the cohesion and effectiveness of fighting units.8 Was it each man for himself, or did soldiers take care of each other? Second, the handling of the sick and wounded poses a logistical puzzle. If incapacitated soldiers were carried, then by whom, and how? Third and last, the issue tests certain moral attitudes: the value placed on human life, the significance of hardship and labor undertaken for the benefit of another, the questionable role of pity and humanity in the harsh environment of war. From the close confines of the household in the first and second chapters, to the more open but still familiar setting of the city streets in the third chapter, we now move out of Athens entirely— first to Sicily, and then to Armenia, where our putative Athenian moral agent will have faced daunting challenges and confronted situations that tested his fellow-feeling for the soldiers fighting and dying alongside him. All of these questions of troop morale, logistics, and humane sentiment will be considered, to varying degrees, in the course of this chapter, but my starting point must be the life expectancy of wounded men. The Survivability of Wounds In real life, as in Homer, many warriors died where they fell, wounded in the head or chest.9 Indeed, when hoplites fought in the dense rows of a phalanx, they often died because they fell, and so were trampled to death by their comrades (Thuc. 5.72.3). The same thing could happen in any tight space (Xen. Hell. 4.4.11). Horses might do the trampling in a cavalry engagement.10

T3801.indb 108

8/7/06 12:48:07 PM


10 9

Wounds inflicted by weapons, combined with other injuries sustained in the melee, resulted in terrible scenes of carnage like that at Coroneia in 394: “The earth dyed red with blood, the corpses of friend and foe stretched out side by side with one another, shields smashed to pieces, spears snapped in two, daggers bared of their sheaths, some on the ground, some in bodies, others still gripped by hands” (Xen. Ages. 2.14). Or again, after the Spartan slaughter of Corinthians and Argives in 392 (Xen. Hell. 4.4.12): “On that day, at any rate, so many fell within a short time that men accustomed to seeing heaps of corn, wood, or stones, beheld then heaps of corpses.” When Diodorus repeatedly depicts piles of corpses left behind on battlefields, he may be exaggerating.11 Still, there is no doubt that killing was serious business in Greek warfare.12 The wounded lay among the dead,13 and their immediate removal from the battlefield merits brief consideration. Just as Homer depicts the wounded Sarpedon being carried by his comrades (Il. 5.663 – 664), so ancient historians depict the removal of heroic generals from the battlefield, such as Brasidas, Epaminondas, Agesilaus, or Alexander the Great.14 Occasionally we hear of rank-and-file hoplites being carried, like the handsome Callicrates, who was wounded by an arrow in the ribs just before the Battle of Plataea began; though carried out of the action, he died (Hdt. 9.72.1). Alcibiades was rescued by Socrates at Potidaea in 432;15 and in the retreat of the Ten Thousand, a Mysian was picked up wounded after a sham ambuscade (Xen. An. 5.2.32). If one had the good fortune to be rescued from the battlefield, many wounds were survivable. Hippocratic treatises, at least some of which date to the fifth and fourth centuries,16 reflect considerable medical expertise in war wounds. Severe blows to the head or vital organs were generally fatal, but slighter blows, or blows to the limbs that did not lead to profuse bleeding, offered a chance of recovery. True, the risk of infection was present, but Guido Majno has shown that the poultices known to the Greeks contained antiseptic lead, and zinc and copper oxides; wounds were sometimes washed with wine, which also had an antiseptic effect.17 Many warriors survived to fight another day, or at least survived.18 A striking example, found in Roman mid-Republican history, is M. Sergius Silus, who Pliny tells us was wounded twenty-three times in two campaigns of the late third century.19 But we need not rely on Roman models. Demosthenes assures us that Philip of Macedon survived many battle wounds,20 which cost him, among other things, an eye.21 According to Arrian, Alexander the Great was wounded in the thigh, the shoulder, the leg, the neck, the shoulder again, the ankle,22 and very seri-

T3801.indb 109

8/7/06 12:48:07 PM

110


ously in the chest (Arr. Anab. 6.10.1), “so that, according to Ptolemy, breath as well as blood spouted from the wound.” In Book 7, Alexander boasts of his wounds (Anab. 7.10.1–2): Come then, let any of you strip and display his own wounds, and I will display mine in turn; in my case there is no part of the body, or none in front, that has been left unwounded, and there is no weapon of close combat, no missile whose scars I do not bear on my person, but I have been wounded by the sword hand to hand, shot by arrows and struck by a catapult, and I am often struck by stones and clubs for your interest. In keeping with the heroic picture of Alexander,23 Curtius and other historians also make much of his multiple wounds.24 Alexander may have owed his survival to superior medical care provided by a coterie of physicians,25 but ordinary warriors who received less expert medical attention might also survive. In Herodotus, for example, the severely wounded Pytheas is cared for by the enemy and lives (Hdt. 8.92). A certain Athenian named Polystratus comes home wounded from Eretria in 411 (Lys. 20.14). In Xenophon’s Memorabilia, Nicomachides shows off his battle scars (3.4.1). By the time of Xenophon, surgeons were being hired to accompany Greek armies, a practice reflected both in his fictionalized account of Cyrus the Great26 and in the Anabasis (3.4.30). Case studies in the Hippocratic treatises offer chilling descriptions of treatments for men pierced by arrows or spears, as well as for one man who was struck in the chest with a missile fired from a catapult.27 Epigraphy tells of yet other cases, including one warrior wounded in the lung whose pus filled sixty-seven pots for a year and a half until he sought help from the god Asclepius.28 Clearly, many wounds were survivable. Thus a sick or wounded soldier could not automatically be considered as good as dead. But the difficulties of evacuating thousands, or tens of thousands, of troops from hostile territory meant that almost inevitably some who had survived recent battle wounds but could not walk would be left behind. The greater the overland distance to be traversed, the greater the problem, as the Persians had realized by the second invasion of Greece: Xerxes left his sick behind on the homeward route, charging Thracian cities to care for them (Hdt. 8.115.3). Attempts to quarter sick soldiers in cities were not always successful: the Cotyorites on the south shore of the Black Sea refused to receive enfeebled soldiers from among the Ten Thousand (Xen. An. 5.5.6). Sometimes the incapacitated were simply abandoned, without any provision being made for their care. In 373, after

T3801.indb 110

8/7/06 12:48:07 PM


111

their siege of Corcyra failed, the Lacedaemonians embarked upon their ships in confusion and sailed off, “leaving behind them much grain, much wine, many slaves and enfeebled soldiers” (Xen. Hell. 6.2.26). The implication in this last example, it seems to me, is that enfeebled soldiers would, in less harrowing circumstances, have been taken aboard. The Logistics of Carrying the Sick and Wounded Some of the wounded would have been able to limp along by themselves, but others probably needed the support of one or two able-bodied men. This humble and obvious fact wins little mention in our sources. Alexander is said twice to support, with his own body, soldiers weakened by cold (Curtius 7.3.17, 8.4.9), though it is unclear how even Alexander, for all his prowess, could have helped more than one person at a time. Actually lifting up and carrying a man on one’s own shoulders, even with another’s help, is a form of transport so exhausting that it seems better suited to short than to long distances. During the march of the Ten Thousand, troops from the vanguard sent to check on the rear carried incapacitated soldiers into camp (Xen. An. 4.5.22). During fighting on Siphnos, c. 394, a loyal friend and his attendant carried the wounded Sopolis to port (Isoc. 19.39): “When we were unlucky in the attack on the city, and when the retreat did not happen the way we wanted, I and my own servant carried him—wounded and unable to walk and in a fainting condition—to the ship on our shoulders.” Curtius implies, in his accounts of Alexander’s advance across the Gedrosian Desert in 325, that men were left by the wayside partly because the able-bodied could not carry them.29 This observation suggests that under less extreme circumstances—if they had not been near their own limit of exhaustion, hunger, and thirst—those soldiers would have been expected to pick up their comrades. There were, however, other and easier methods to transport the sick and wounded: they could be borne in a litter, slung over pack animals, carried by cart or wagon, or (where appropriate) placed aboard a ship. Curtius indicates that the Macedonian infantry routinely used litters to carry the sick and wounded with them as they marched (7.6.8 –9): Then camp was broken and [Alexander] was carried in a soldier’s litter ( lectica militari ). Each cavalryman and foot-soldier vied to carry it; the cavalry, with whom the king had been accustomed to enter battle, thought it was a part of their privilege; the infantry, on the other hand, since they themselves were used to carrying their wounded comrades, complained that

T3801.indb 111

8/7/06 12:48:08 PM

112


their proper duty was being taken from them just when the king had to be carried. Alexander, in so great a contention between either part, thinking that a choice would be difficult for him and displeasing to those who were passed over, ordered them to carry him by turns. [Emphasis added.] Since Curtius was writing no earlier than the Augustan principate,30 and in any case hundreds of years after the death of Alexander, the inclusion of Romanera details is always a possibility. Most scholars agree, however, that he drew heavily on the lost history of Cleitarchus, a near contemporary of Alexander.31 Cleitarchus is considered prone to romantic embellishment,32 but even if his story about the rivalry to carry Alexander was fiction, he would have been unlikely to fabricate background information about the use of litters. In the classical period, references to litters fall into two categories.33 One category consists of litters for the well-to-do, which afforded their riders a pleasant and, for them at least, effortless means of transportation. Highranking Persians in Herodotus are seen to ride in litters (Hdt. 3.146.3), and several generations later, Dinarchus accuses Demosthenes of living in luxury and going to the Piraeus in a litter (Din. 1.36). The other category consists of litters that were used to carry the injured, like Andocides, who claimed to have suffered a fractured skull and collarbone when thrown from a horse and so had to be taken home on a litter (Andoc. 1.61). Other examples include the victim of a street assault (Dem. 54.20) and an unnamed litigant in a Lysianic speech who supposedly had himself carried by litter so that he could feign serious injuries, though he had suffered only a black eye (Lys. 4.9). One hint that litters were used in Greek armies before Alexander the Great is found in Xenophon (Hell. 4.3.20): the wounded Agesilaus was carried around to his troops after their victory at Coroneia in 394.34 Moreover, the fact that litters were routinely employed to carry injured civilians argues that their use on fifth-century military campaigns cannot be ruled out.35 Mules and other pack animals—mainly donkeys, but also camels in the desert reaches of Alexander’s campaign—were used to carry provisions for the army36 but could, on occasion, be rededicated to the purpose of carrying sick or wounded men. Casualties, in that case, might have joined the baggage train. Both Curtius and Arrian cite the lack of pack animals as another reason for the abandonment of weakened soldiers in the Gedrosian Desert. In Armenia, during the crossing of the Ten Thousand, we shall see that a half-dead soldier is placed on a mule that was, moments before, being used for the transport of soldiers’ personal belongings (Xen. An. 5.8.5 –11). Wagons, like pack animals, were an ordinary accoutrement in both Greek

T3801.indb 112

8/7/06 12:48:08 PM


113

and Persian baggage trains, although they were not well suited to every terrain. They had multiple uses. They could carry food, water, armor, arms, military machines, unspecified supplies, cauldrons, or implements.37 The number of wagons could be very large. Anderson (1970, 52) notes that Cyrus the Younger had 400 wagon-loads of flour and wine.38 Once emptied of provisions, the wagons could carry loot, prisoners, corpses, the bones of the dead— or the wounded.39 We are told of one Ariaeus, a wounded Persian, who traveled long-distance by wagon accompanied by his attendants (Xen. An. 2.2.14). Because of the wood from which they were made, wagons were a valuable commodity: according to Hesiod (Op. 456), in a passage that Plato’s Socrates discusses (Tht. 207a), each wagon required 100 timbers. Therefore, when the army was desperate for fuel, the wagons could be burned (Xen. An. 2.1.6). Wagons were also a liability in rugged territory: Xenophon, upon assuming the leadership of the Ten Thousand, ordered the wagons destroyed so that the Greeks would have a better chance of escaping through the mountains (An. 3.2.27). Without wagons, however, the army would have to rely all the more heavily on pack animals and the men’s own strength. The use of wagons in the Macedonian army is disputed. Citing a passage in Frontinus (Strat. 4.1.6), which states that Philip of Macedon prohibited the use of wagons in his reorganized army of 359, Engels assumes that Alexander, too, refused to use wagons (1978, 15). Cawkwell objects: “Since no army can survive without transport of some sort and since in general the wheel is more economical of effort than the hoof, to do without the most effective number of wagons would not only slow down the army but also antagonize the men. . . . The Persians and the Spartans used wagons. Why should Alexander not?” 40 Arrian, in the Gedrosian Desert episode (Anab. 6.25.2), says that the men kept breaking up wagons because it was impossible to drag them through the sand and cites this as yet another reason for the abandonment of weakened men. It appears that throughout the fifth and fourth centuries, armies employed wagons for transporting goods and, in principle, could have re-employed them for transporting the sick and wounded. On board ship, where possible, must have been the least troublesome way to transport live casualties. Before the naval retreat from Miletus to Samos in 411, Phrynichus orders his Athenian sailors to take the wounded on board (Thuc. 8.27.4). When the Ten Thousand removed from Trapezus to Cerasus, the wounded were boarded on ships while the able-bodied marched overland (Xen. An. 5.3.1). And the same Sopolis who was carried to port on two men’s shoulders was next carried by ship from Siphnos to Lycia (Isoc. 19.39).

T3801.indb 113

8/7/06 12:48:08 PM

114


It is easy, then, to identify the possible means of conveyance: able-bodied men, litters, pack animals, wagons, and ships. It is more difficult to determine who, if anyone, was responsible for the transport of incapacitated soldiers. As Greek armies fought further and further away from Greece, whether in Persia, Egypt, Bactria, or beyond, the difficulties of returning home increased. Most of the sick and wounded Macedonian soldiers never did return, but stayed in garrisons and cities that Alexander established along the way. The following section argues that Greek generals were by custom not accountable for individual sick and wounded soldiers down through the time of the Peloponnesian War; combatants, when wounded, expected their attendants and comrades to carry them. Furthermore, some evidence (admittedly indirect) suggests that the evacuation of the sick and wounded became more centrally organized perhaps as early as the fourth century. The Responsibility of Generals In the Rhesus, a play sometimes ascribed to Euripides but perhaps written in the next century, the Trojan guards of the chorus complain of generals who put their lives in danger (132): “I do not like it when the general uses power that is unsure” (trans. Lattimore). From a strictly historical point of view, it is clear that Greek generals were broadly responsible for the safety of their land or naval forces, a fact attested to by numerous passages in Thucydides and Xenophon where Greek commanding officers plan for a safe retreat.41 Generals might be suspected of bribe-taking or cowardice if their concern for safety seemed excessive,42 but by the late fifth century, a general guilty of any large-scale failure to rescue the living could expect to go on trial for his life back home in Athens. This is exactly what happened after the Battle of Arginusae in 406, when eight victorious generals were tried and condemned, and six actually executed, for their failure to pick up shipwrecked men. The verdict was considered scandalous both because of extenuating weather and because of unjust legal proceedings.43 According to Xenophon, twenty-five ships were lost (Hell. 1.6.34), a number equal to one-sixth of the total fleet of 150 ships.44 Euryptolemus, in his defense speech, says there were twelve disabled ships (Hell. 1.7.30). If each of those twelve ships had started with a crew of 200 sailors, then 2,400 men were aboard them. A few men were brought safely to shore (Hell. 1.6.34). But assuming that up to 20 percent were slain, drowned, or brought to shore during the actual engagement, nearly 2,000 men still needed to be rescued. Euryptolemus states

T3801.indb 114

8/7/06 12:48:08 PM


115

that forty-seven ships were assigned to the abortive rescue operation; there were supposed to be four rescue ships for each disabled ship (Hell. 1.6.35, 1.7.30), another indication that the number of men to be rescued was very large. It should be noted that Xenophon consistently refers to the missing combatants as living men, not corpses, at the critical juncture when they might have been retrieved. Four times (Hell. 1.7.4, 5, 17, 29) he calls them the nauagoi, a word denoting shipwrecked people who are still alive, as in Euripides’ Helen, where Menelaus is referred to three times this way (408, 449, 539), or in Herodotus (4.103.1) and Pausanias (1.43.1), who both ascribe to the Tauri the practice of using shipwrecked people for live sacrifice.45 In the waters off the Arginusae Islands, then, perhaps 2,000 men perished for want of a timely rescue. But the case proves nothing about the accountability of generals toward individual combatants, because the scale of the disaster was very large. A parallel situation is described by Diodorus, who recounts how the Athenian admiral Chabrias, at the Battle of Naxos in 376, actually suspended his attack against the Spartan fleet in order to retrieve corpses and survivors from disabled ships, as well as men who were struggling to stay afloat in the waters of the Aegean (Diod. 15.35.1). Pritchett (1971–91, 2 : 31) considers this “the clearest example of the threat of possible legal proceedings acting as a deterrent to a commander in the field.” But once again, many lives were at stake, and there is no evidence at all that generals were accountable for smaller numbers of men drowned at sea, or for the loss of sick and wounded soldiers. In some seventy trials of hegemones reviewed by Pritchett (1971–91, 2:5 –10), not one contains a charge of this nature. When Xenophon, who was not an elected general and had no obligation to report back to Athens, was tried at an assembly of the Ten Thousand, he stood accused merely of hubris—not of leaving behind the sick and wounded, as he was sometimes forced to do (An. 4.5.4 and 11). Especially in hasty or dangerous retreats, it is hard to see how generals could have been held responsible for the sick and wounded. We know that pack animals and baggage were often left behind, as Thucydides makes clear in his account of how the troops of Brasidas, following in the path of the retreating Macedonians, made use of what the latter had left behind (Thuc. 4.128.4): The soldiers themselves, who were enraged at the Macedonians for having gone ahead in retreat, whenever they came upon ox-teams of theirs in the road or any baggage that had been dropped, as was likely to happen in a

T3801.indb 115

8/7/06 12:48:08 PM

116


retreat made by night and in a panic, loosed the oxen and slaughtered them, but appropriated the baggage. [Emphasis added.] Armies could also lose a significant number of fighting men during a retreat, as did the Corinthians c. 458 after fighting at Megara (Thuc. 1.106.1); the Athenian allies in Sicily in 426/5 (Thuc. 3.103.2); and the Messenians defeated in 425 by the Naxians (Thuc. 4.25.9): “Those who survived retreated home with difficulty, since the natives kept up their attacks on the roads and killed most of them.” During the fifth century, commanding officers intent on a safe retreat could try to maintain a fighting formation, like the Mantineans at Olpae in 426/5 (Thuc. 3.108.3) or the Spartans in Lyncus in 423 (Thuc. 4.125.2). Brasidas, in the latter instance, formed the hoplites into a square (tetrago¯ non taxin) with light-armed troops in the center: the hoplites were prepared to fight on any side. In the Sicilian expedition of 415 –13, two other Thucydidean hollow squares, each called a plaision, contained unarmed baggage-carriers (6.67.1 and 7.78.2). Xenophon, in 401, proposed forming a plaision with the baggage train and the general multitude inside (An. 3.2.36; 3.3.6); another of his plaisia contained the booty from a raid: cattle, sheep, and slaves (An. 7.8.16). According to Xenophon, Agesilaus marched through hostile Thessalian territory with a plaision in 394 (Hell. 4.3.4). Clearly, the hollow square was a marching formation that placed heavily armed soldiers on the outside, affording protection to those within.46 But we have no contemporary evidence that fifth-century generals placed incapacitated soldiers inside a hollow square, or indeed, that they organized any kind of overland transport for the sick and wounded. All available information suggests, to the contrary, that wounded casualties looked for help from personal attendants and from comrades. We know that Greek hoplites normally were accompanied by at least one attendant, whether a slave, a servant, or a young relative. Pritchett (1971–91, 1:49–51) presents evidence for this practice drawn from Thucydides, Xenophon, Isaeus, Antiphanes, Demosthenes, and Theophrastus.47 The attendants were expected to carry weapons or provisions, and they could also carry the wounded, as Xenophon makes clear in his account of a skirmish near Corinth in 390 (Hell. 4.5.14): And when the Lacedaemonians were being attacked with javelins, and here or there a man had been wounded and another slain, they ordered the

T3801.indb 116

8/7/06 12:48:08 PM


117

shield-bearers to pick up the wounded and carry them back to Lechaeum; and these were the only men in the regiment who were in truth saved. The use of attendants apparently remained standard as the fourth century progressed, for Philip II of Macedon is said to have restricted their number to one for every ten infantrymen (Frontin. Str. 4.1.6). One can reasonably conjecture that in the classical period, a Greek hoplite’s personal attendant was supposed to see to his safety if he were incapacitated in any way. The role of comrades was also important and will be explored later in this chapter. The best evidence for how the sick and wounded struggled homeward comes from Book 7 of Thucydides and Books 4 and 5 in the Anabasis of Xenophon. Both historians were ex-generals who understood contemporary Greek military practice; Xenophon was an eyewitness to and a leading participant in the events that he describes. Therefore, even if some details of these narratives suggest literary license, the attitudes they reflect are authentic, and the dilemmas they record must have been real. The accounts complement one another: Thucydides emphasizes the feelings of soldiers placed in the terrible position of having to abandon the sick and wounded, whereas Xenophon stresses the importance of saving as many individuals as possible. Despite their differences of tone, I argue that both reflect respect for human life and a heavy sense of moral obligation toward all casualties of war, not least the living. Thucydides 7.75.2 –5 the tale of the departure from syracuse In Book 7 of the Peloponnesian War, Thucydides tells of the Athenian departure from Syracuse in a passage that, it will be shown, is suffused with pathos. In 413, after two years in Sicily, the Athenians had just met with final defeat in the Great Harbor. The fleet was lost, and Nicias belatedly staged an overland retreat. It is worth looking closely at this justly admired narrative,48 because its poetic language happens to reflect considerable prosaic knowledge. Thucydides writes with the vividness of an eyewitness; he himself was not at Syracuse, but presumably he interviewed survivors. Hornblower (1987, 150) speculates that the account was written soon after the events that it describes. Every aspect of the business was terrible, for not only were they, having lost their ships, retreating, and instead of their great hope now found

T3801.indb 117

8/7/06 12:48:09 PM

118


themselves and the whole state of Athens in danger, but also in the deserting of the camp there were painful things for each man to perceive with his eye and his mind. The dead were unburied, and when any man saw one of his friends lying among them he was brought to distress mixed with fear; and the wounded or ill who were being left behind alive were more distressing to the living than were the dead, and more wretched than those who had perished. For turning to entreaty and lamentation, they brought [the departing soldiers] to a sense of helplessness, begging them to take them and crying out to every single friend or relative they saw; they clung to those who had shared tents with them and were on the point of leaving, following after them as far as they could, and, when their strength and bodies failed them, were being left behind not without a few appeals to the gods and lamentations. So the whole army was filled with tears and a sense of helplessness such that it was not easy to decamp, even from the land of the enemy and even though they had already suffered things too great for tears and feared lest they suffer others beyond in the unseen future. They also had a great sense of despair together with self-blame. The departing soldiers are filled with painful feelings because, among other things, they are abandoning their comrades. Although no eleos or oiktos word is used, pity may be inferred. The reader, in turn, is made to feel the distress of the entire army. A close examination of emotional and moral overtones within the passage reveals that Athenian soldiers felt an obligation to carry their weakened comrades, and that the failure to fulfill that obligation caused them—along with grief for the dead and fear of their own demise— considerable anguish. emotion in thucydides 7.75.2 – 5 The departure scene in Thucydides 7.75 occurs at the beginning of a narrative sequence that is longer, more detailed, and more dramatic than any other retreat narrative in Thucydides. It runs to eleven chapters (7.75 – 85), including the last speech of Nicias, the inland march, and the final destruction of the Athenian army. The unusual length of the account in part reflects the unusual length of the retreat itself: eight days, according to Gomme.49 Other retreats in the Peloponnesian War occupy three or four chapters at most: the Spartan retreat at Sphacteria (425), the retreat of Perdiccas and Brasidas in Macedonia (423), the Athenian rout at Amphipolis (422), the rout of Sparta’s

T3801.indb 118

8/7/06 12:48:09 PM


119

opponents at Mantinea (418), and the Athenian rout at Epipolae (413).50 Indeed, most retreats merit one chapter or less.51 A typically terse account is found in Book 4, where Demosthenes in 424/3 lands his fleet in the territory of Sicyon (4.101): Before all his ships had come to shore, the people of Sicyon came up in force, routed the troops who had landed, and drove them back to their ships, killing some and making prisoners of others. They then put up a trophy and gave back the dead bodies under an armistice. The wounded at Sicyon receive no mention, nor does the historian discuss the fate of sick or wounded warriors more than a handful of times in the entire work. One example comes before the Athenian fleet retreats from Miletus, when Phrynichus gives the order to embark the wounded (8.27.4). Such an order may have been routine in naval operations—we have no way of knowing—but Thucydides’ mention of it is certainly an anomaly. The only other practical arrangements for the wounded that he notes are those made before the last sea battle at Syracuse, when the Athenians decide to build a cross wall near the ships, enclosing a space sufficient for their baggage and their sick (7.60.2). They then garrison the space and sally forth. At both Miletus and Syracuse, the baggage and the sick are grouped together; all of the baggage and presumably some of the sick needed to be carried, though the same cannot be said of the land army that was also embarked at Miletus. In the retreat narratives that stretch to three or four chapters, the wounded are mentioned only if they happen to be commanding officers, like the Spartan officers Hippagretas at Sphacteria (4.38) and Brasidas at Amphipolis (5.10). The retreat from Syracuse at 7.75, then, is wholly exceptional in its depiction of sick and wounded soldiers of unspecified rank. The dramatic style of the passage can be measured by its highly emotional diction.52 Two words that refer, directly or indirectly, to painful emotions are found only here in Thucydides: athliotera, “more wretched” or “more pitiable,” and kate¯ pheia, “despair.” Another two words, describing the pleas of the sick and wounded, are likewise found in this passage alone: antibolian, “entreaty,” and ekkremannumenoi, “clinging to.” The dakrusi and dakrua in 7.75.4 are the only tears in the entire history. Several more words for emotion, or its expression, are not sole occurrences but are rare in Thucydides, being used only two, three, or four times. These are oimo¯ ge¯ , “lamentation,” used one other time, in the account of how the Athenians watching from land

T3801.indb 119

8/7/06 12:48:09 PM

12 0


reacted to their fleet’s final naval battle at Syracuse (7.71.6); and katamempsis, “self-blame,” which Nicias refers back to in his speech (7.77.1). The noun is found in Pericles’ Funeral Oration (2.41.3), where Athens is said to give its subjects no cause for blame on the grounds of unworthiness to rule. The infinitive katamemphesthai is used after the battle at Cynossema (8.106.2), when the victorious Athenians stop blaming themselves. But these words occur nowhere else. All eight words contribute to the emotional coloring of the passage. Pathos is not unusual for Thucydides, but in other retreat narratives he achieves it through a minimalist style. The 426 Athenian rout in Aetolia (3.98), for example, focuses sharply on the death of 120 warriors, leading to the brief observation: “So many men and all of the same age, certainly the best men from Athens who were in this war, perished.” By comparison, the pathos in the Book 7 departure scene seems lush indeed, as Thucydides dwells on the subjective experience of the individuals who fall victim to this great calamity. Consistent with the descriptions of pity elsewhere in fifthand fourth-century historiography and oratory, sight, hearing, and tears all contribute to the distress and, arguably, pity of the departing soldiers. First, the departing soldiers see their fallen comrades. With rare emotional detail, Thucydides refines the notion of sight, showing how vision affects thought: “There were painful things for each man to perceive with his eye and his mind.” 53 Any man who saw the unburied corpse of a friend was brought to a state of distress mixed with fear.54 I have translated lupe¯ as “distress” instead of “pain” because it is clearly psychological as opposed to physical. This interpretation is in keeping with the usage of lupe¯ at its three other occurrences in Thucydides. One of these (6.59.1) is found in a passage discussing the motive for the tyrant-slaying conspiracy of Harmodius and Aristogeiton: love-stricken pain, ero¯ tike¯ n lupe¯ n. The other two occurrences (2.44.1–2) lie side by side in the Funeral Oration, where Pericles speaks about the grief of parents who have lost their sons in battle: It is good fortune when men win a most glorious death, as these men have now—and you a like grief (lupe¯ )—and when life has been measured out to them to be happy in no less than to die in. It will be difficult, I know, to persuade you of this, when you will meet constant reminders of your loss by seeing others with blessings that you once enjoyed; and grief (lupe¯ ) is felt, not for the want of the good things that a man has never known, but for what is taken away from him after he has become accustomed to it.

T3801.indb 120

8/7/06 12:48:09 PM


121

In all of these passages, lupe¯ refers to some kind of psychological distress, a form of suffering that Thucydides ranks of first importance in his Book 2 account of the plague. There, after describing the disease’s excruciating physical symptoms, he says that the psychological distress of its sufferers was worst of all (2.51.4): “The most terrible of any evil was the despair (athumia) into which people fell when they realized that they had caught the plague.” In the departure scene at Syracuse, we are told nothing of the thoughts that contribute to the men’s lupe¯ . Another form of psychological distress, their fear or phobos, also goes unexplained. Much has been made of the religious fear that the departing soldiers experience at the sight of the unburied dead.55 It is also possible, however, that they fear meeting the same fate as the corpses: death in a hostile land without funeral rites. Next, the men hear the pleas of the wounded and the sick, who turn to entreaty and lamentation and are “more distressing (to the living) than the dead.” The words and cries to which the decamping soldiers must listen all heighten the impact of the terrible sights they see. Moreover, they know that the wounded and the sick are still actively suffering, as the next phrase implies: to¯ n apolo¯ loto¯ n athlio¯ teroi. Dover (1965, 62) agrees that we should understand luperoteroi as “more distressing (sc. in sight and sound).” He argues that Thucydides intends a contrast between lupe¯ roteroi and athlio¯ teroi, in which “lupe¯ ros describes the sick and wounded from the point of view of the ablebodied, and athlios from their own point of view” (ibid., 62). He translates: “More distressing than the dead . . ., and less fortunate than those who had perished.” Dover explains the difference between “the dead,” who are described as objects, and “those who had perished,” who are described “as beings whose capacity to do and suffer is ended” (Gomme et al. 1970, 4 : 451). This explication of the variatio wrongly excludes, I believe, the sense of athlio¯ teroi as “more pitiable.” 56 In fact, the double comparison does not insist on any strong contrast between its two halves. Thucydides may wish to imply that the dead are pitiable, and the sick or wounded even more so. I would translate: “More distressing than the slain . . . and more pitiable than the dead.” Affecting cries are mentioned again when Thucydides describes the incapacitated men as epiboo¯ menoi, and again when they are being left behind, not without a few appeals to the gods and lamentations. The “few” has troubled commentators, who either insist that ouk aneu ouk oligo¯ n or perhaps ouk aneu pollo¯ n must have been intended, or else imagine that the men are too weak to utter more than “a few” appeals to the gods.57 According to Orwin (1994,

T3801.indb 121

8/7/06 12:48:09 PM

12 2


136) the men “call down the wrath of the gods on them.” The correctness of Orwin’s view is supported by wording later in the chapter (7.75.7), where Thucydides contrasts this setting-out with the setting-out from Athens two years before. In place of prayers and paeans, the men utter imprecations. At the departure from Syracuse, the sick and wounded also issue oimo¯ ge¯ , inarticulate wailing and lamentation. All in all, the sights and sounds of the camp arouse painful emotions in the departing soldiers, and the emotions aroused surely include what we would call pity. Finally, Thucydides tells us, the entire army is filled with tears. At this point, one must recall the immediate context of the passage: the departure scene is framed by a grim assessment of the entire two-year expedition, a tale of doom fit for the tragic stage.58 And indeed, the warriors’ tears contain a touch of tragic poetry: Poppo and Stahl note the rare dative dakrusi with ple¯ sthen, which normally takes the genitive, and compare it with a passage in Aeschylus.59 A few lines later, the statement that the men’s earlier sufferings had already been “too great for tears” recalls the famous story of Psammenitus, who refused to weep at the sight of his doomed son and enslaved daughter because these misfortunes were likewise too great for tears.60 Thucydides, though dealing with an entire expedition rather than a leading individual,61 consciously builds a sense of tragedy by emphasizing the greatness of Athenian hopes, compared to the ghastly reality of defeat; this, in the larger scheme of things, must be the prime justification for the rich language of this passage.62 The impossibility of rescuing their comrades casts the departing soldiers into aporia, a state of difficulty, helplessness, or impasse. Thucydides first writes, “For turning to entreaty and lamentation they brought [the departing soldiers] to a sense of aporia.” Several lines later, he comments on the depth of their aporia and how difficult it is to bear. The word aporia is fairly common in Thucydides, and this is not the only place he uses it twice in a row.63 Nonetheless, its repetition in 7.75.4 emphasizes the moral anguish the men experience when forsaking the sick and wounded: they want to take action but cannot. The reader is invited to share the feelings of the departing soldiers rather than of those left behind, for Thucydides does not name the emotions of the sick and wounded, he merely describes their actions: they entreat, lament, cry out, cling, and follow as far as they are able. We see and hear these wretched men, but we feel the emotions of those who are decamping: their pain, fear, helplessness, despair, self-blame. Though the historian achieves his immediate effects without using any words from the eleos or oiktos groups, he does elicit compassion for the sick and wounded,

T3801.indb 122

8/7/06 12:48:10 PM


123

and also for the able-bodied soldiers.64 Thucydides finally uses the word oiktos in Nicias’ last speech, when he tells the departing men that they are more deserving of the gods’ pity than envy (7.77.4). It remains to consider the absence of oiktos words in the departure scene itself.65 If pathos is intended, why is there no word for pity? There would seem to be two possible reasons: Thucydides may have felt that direct mention of pity was either unnecessary or inappropriate. It may have been unnecessary in the sense that pathos was achievable without it. This explanation is uninteresting, though not necessarily incorrect, because it is basically tautological: Thucydides can achieve pathos without naming pity, therefore that is what he does. The other possibility, that a direct mention of pity was inappropriate, is more interesting and, obviously, more speculative. In what sense might the naming of pity have seemed inappropriate—in some way unsuitable or inapplicable—at the time of writing? Once again, two explanations are possible, but these are not mutually exclusive. The first explanation is that pity goes unnamed because Thucydides considers oiktos less important than aporia, the agonizing sense of helplessness that assails the men. Indeed, the key point in this passage is the departing soldiers’ terrible inability to act. They feel pity; they want to redress the situation, but they cannot; hence their aporia, which overshadows every other emotion. The second explanation is that Thucydides thinks of oiktos as implying the superiority of the pitier over the pitied. In his Book 2 account of the plague at Athens, people who have survived the disease are the ones who most pity the sufferers (2.51.6). Thucydides says that the survivors know what the plague is like and feel protected from it. A sense of strength, in other words, allows them to experience pity. Unlike others, they can visit the sick unscathed and try to mitigate their misery. The only other contexts in the Peloponnesian War where oiktos words occur are in Book 3, with the Mytilenean debate and the fall of Plataea. In both, the potential recipients of pity are completely powerless: the Mytileneans are at the mercy of the Athenians, and the Plataeans are at the mercy of the Spartans. Cleon, in urging the destruction of the entire adult male population of Mytilene, treats pity as a source of error (3.37.2); he argues against oiktos or eleos toward subject states (3.40.2) and enemies (3.40.3). Diodotus, who counters that it is more expedient to destroy only the anti-Athenian ringleaders, urges the Athenians not to be swayed by pity or mercy (3.48.1). Later in the book, after the surrender of Plataea, the Plataeans ask for pity (3.59.1), and the Thebans warn the Spartans not to yield to pity (3.67.2) on the grounds that the Plataeans do not deserve it (3.67.4).

T3801.indb 123

8/7/06 12:48:10 PM

12 4


Much could be said about the theme of pity and compassion in Book 3. My limited point is that the issue of pity is raised only in the context of a radical power gap: the Athenians and Spartans possess the power to exact from the Mytileneans and the Plataeans, respectively, whatever punishment they choose. If oiktos, for Thucydides, implies that the pitier enjoys a superior position and perhaps even the power to determine the fate of the pitied, then the word is clearly inappropriate in a context where the departing men have, precisely, no power to mitigate or determine the fate of the sick and wounded. The historian knows, too, that they face an outcome that is no less wretched: a terrible march, the slaughter of some, the long-drawn imprisonment of others in a Syracusan quarry. This may explain why in Book 7, the only occurrence of oiktos, which is found in Nicias’ speech, is that of gods for men. However one chooses to explain the absence of oiktos in 7.75.2 –5, I would maintain that pity, in our English sense, is among the painful emotions that the departing soldiers feel as they leave behind their sick and wounded comrades. One may appreciate how Thucydides has infused the departure scene with a pathos that makes the reader feel pity for the entire Athenian army. The passage, which names aporia rather than oiktos, also demonstrates the moral precedence of action over feeling. moral obligation in thucydides 7.75.2 – 5 The language of emotion in the departure scene is intertwined with a subtle rhetoric of moral obligation. Thucydides says that the able-bodied, as they leave the camp, experience self-blame, katamempsis spho¯ n auto¯ n, perhaps what we would call guilt. The historian explicitly comments on the magnitude of this self-blame, which is accompanied by despair. Now, it is possible that the men’s self-blame, in the greater context, attaches strictly to their military failure and the abandonment of the fleet. I would argue, however, that it arises from the immediate context, and follows logically and thematically from the preceding sentence, which depicts the sick and wounded begging to be taken along.66 Nicias, in his later speech (7.77.4), may be endorsing both explanations when he exhorts the Athenians not to blame themselves too much for their misfortunes (xumphorais) or for their present undeserved sufferings (kakopathiais). Scholars often interpret the xumphorai as referring to recent military reversals;67 the kakopathiai are probably their physical hardships together with their miseries, including the distress of leaving behind the sick and wounded. Thucydides opens the departure scene at 7.75.2 by describing the Athenians’ situation as terrible and cites two aspects of its ter-

T3801.indb 124

8/7/06 12:48:10 PM


125

ribleness: the military disaster and the painful sights in camp. By 7.75.5, the men’s despair and self-blame have come full circle in the narrative. Nicias adroitly exculpates the men. He is vague about their xumphorai and calls the sufferings of the present undeserved. The ailing general reflects upon his own moral record of piety and justice, trusting in the efficacy of these (7.77.2): “Yet throughout my life I have worshiped the gods as I ought, and my conduct toward men has been just and without reproach.” Nicias derives hope from the thought that the gods may yet reward his virtue, and he encourages his men to do the same.68 He yearns to make the troops feel better, to improve their spirits and infuse them with the energy they need to save themselves. To this end, he downplays their guilt. To grasp the intensity of their unmitigated self-blame, then, we must ignore Nicias and examine the departure scene closer still. In this section, I will discuss the sense of moral obligation conferred by the historian’s use of the pronoun hekastos, the noun apoleipsis, two participles based on leipo¯ compounds, and, arguably, the verb axioo¯ . The singular hekastos in the phrase xunebaine te¯ i opsei hekasto¯ i algeina, together with the singular indefinite pronoun tis twice in the phrase hopote tis idoi tina, individualizes the men’s distress.69 A little later, Thucydides will touch on the impact of communal suffering (7.75.6), but here in 7.75.2 he imagines how each man felt, and a few lines later, in the phrase “crying out to every single friend or relative they saw,” 70 how each man was susceptible to the cries of the incapacitated men. Thucydides uses hekastos a total of 227 times, often in the plural. The use of the singular to emphasize the impact of events on individuals, however, finds a significant number of parallels. In the Funeral Oration of Pericles, it is used to particularize each mourner (2.34.2), each fallen soldier (2.34.3), or both (2.46.2). In the description of the plague, Thucydides particularizes each case of the illness (2.50.1) and each of its victims (2.51.1). In the last speech of Pericles, hekastos is used to particularize each individual Athenian’s misfortunes (2.60.4, 2.61.2). When residents of Attica withdraw behind the walls of Athens in 431 (2.16.2), hekastos is used to particularize the impact of the outbreak of war on individuals. These citizens, collectively, are heavy-hearted upon leaving behind their homes and temples; each man is forsaking his own town. The parallel is interesting in another respect: their homes, temples, and towns are being left to the depredations of the Lacedaemonians, while in the Book 7 departure scene, the sick and wounded are being left to the mercy of the Syracusans and their Spartan allies.71 The word hekastos sometimes suggests each person’s sense of individual responsibility. The Book 2 speech attributed to Peloponnesian naval officers

T3801.indb 125

8/7/06 12:48:10 PM

12 6


at Rhium, for example, deploys hekastos and tis in tandem to stress individual responsibility. When the officers warn their men not to desert (2.87.8), Thucydides interlaces plural nouns, participles, and verbs with hekastos and tis in the singular: the alternation of plural and singular is difficult to recapture in translation, though the meaning of the command is clear enough: “And so, taking courage, you steersmen and sailors, do your duty, each one his own, not leaving the post to which each is assigned.” Similar appeals to conscience that use hekastos to emphasize individual responsibility are found in a number of other orations,72 and in his own voice as narrator, Thucydides shifts from plural to singular using hekastos to describe the action of the Spartans at Sphacteria (4.14.2): “Rushing into the sea in full armor, they seized hold of the ships and tried to drag them back; and each man (hekastos) thought that nothing was getting done if he wasn’t there.” At a minimum, the use of hekastos twice in 7.75.2 –5 achieves a focus on the individual feelings of the departing soldiers. The parallels suggest that those feelings likely include pangs of conscience, each man’s sense of failed obligation toward his comrades. Since this was a naval expedition, the Athenians probably possessed fewer wagons or pack animals than a land army would have had; the use of all these, and litters, too, in this particular campaign is debatable because Thucydides never mentions them. Attendants were in short supply by that point (7.75.5): “Both the hoplites and cavalry, contrary to usual practice, carried their own provisions in addition to their arms, some for the want of attendants and some out of distrust of them; for some [attendants] had deserted some time before, and the greatest number did so now.” 73 Without them, the warriors not only lacked extra hands to help carry sick and wounded comrades or the dead, but also were burdened with the food and arms they required for their own survival. In such a dire situation, all casualties had to be abandoned. Though the Athenians lacked the wherewithal to carry their comrades, even on their shoulders, that fact would not necessarily efface their sense of individual responsibility toward relatives and friends who hoped and perhaps expected to be carried along with the departing army. The noun that refers to the exodus itself, apoleipsis, is much stronger than our bland “departure.” It is used only one other time in Thucycides, at 4.126.1, where Brasidas has found that his Macedonian allies are gone and that the Illyrians are planning to attack. Addressing his troops, Brasidas encourages them to be brave despite the desertion, the apoleipsis, of their allies. Thucydides often uses the cognate verb apoleipo¯ in a pejorative sense, to denote the act of abandoning or deserting. It is applied to allies forsaking an alliance, soldiers deserting their posts, or sailors leaving their ships.74 The

T3801.indb 126

8/7/06 12:48:10 PM


127

same force is, I believe, at work here. The men are not merely “going away” in a morally neutral sense; rather, they are forsaking the expedition and their comrades. The enormity of a naval expedition’s abandonment of its ships is undeniable, as Plutarch’s Nicias points out (Nic. 24.3): “He said it would be a terrible thing to abandon so many transports, and triremes almost two hundred in number.” In giving up their ships, the Athenians are giving up their only way home. At the same time, the departing soldiers are forsaking their comrades, and though the situation makes it impossible for them to act otherwise, their sense of self-blame is nevertheless great. The verb leipo¯ comes into play twice more in the departure scene: two middle-passive participles taken from leipo¯ compounds are used to describe the situation of the incapacitated men. First comes kataleipomenoi in the phrase, “the wounded and sick who were left behind alive” (C. F. Smith 1886, 143). The verb kataleipo¯ often characterizes the action “to leave behind” matter-of-factly, as in Book 4, where the Athenians leave behind Demosthenes at Pylos (4.5.2). It can, however, color it with overtones of “forsake” or “desert.” We have seen, in the discussion of hekastos, that country-dwelling Athenians forced to withdraw behind the walls of Athens were heavy-hearted because they were leaving behind (kataleipontes) their homes and temples (2.16.2) to the depredations of the enemy. Later in the departure scene comes the other leipo¯ compound, in the phrase ouk aneu oligo¯ n epitheiasmo¯ n kai oimo¯ ge¯ s hupoleipomenoi. The manuscripts offer alternative readings at this point: almost all of them contain the passive apoleipomenoi. Perhaps because this form occurs nowhere else in the Peloponnesian War, most editors75 prefer the intransitive hupoleipomenoi, which is found only in the Vatican manuscript but is paralleled elsewhere.76 It can be translated as “dropping behind.” But the Vatican option is, I believe, the weaker reading, because hupoleipomenoi misses half the point: the sick and wounded don’t merely drop behind, they are left behind. The first action is morally neutral, the second implies culpability on the part of those departing. So far, I have argued that hekastos, the noun apoleipsis, and two participles based on leipo¯ compounds combine to suggest a feeling of failed obligation on the part of the departing soldiers, one that leads directly to their aporia and self-blame. The last word I wish to discuss, the participle axiountes, is difficult to translate with any certainty, because Thucydides uses axioo¯ to express a very broad range of meanings: think, deem worthy, think fit, expect, resolve, beg, wish, and expect. If translated here as “expecting,” the participle axiountes would support my argument that able-bodied soldiers were in fact expected to carry the sick and wounded. The validity of such an

T3801.indb 127

8/7/06 12:48:11 PM

12 8


interpretation, however, is open to doubt. Bétant, in his 1843 Lexicon Thucydideum, includes the axiountes at Thuc. 7.75.2 among the many instances in which the verb means “aequum censere, postulare, petere.” Following Bétant, we would have to translate the phrase agein te sphas axiountes as “begging them to carry them.” This is natural and plausible, and Book 6 offers a close parallel when the Syracusans beg their generals to lead them forward to Catana (6.63.2). Yet at 7.75.2, the participle occurs in a passage thick with words that describe aspects of the begging of the incapacitated men (antibolian, olophurmon, ekkremannumenoi), including the very next phrase, kai hekaston epiboo¯ menoi. The redundancy of axiountes in the sense of “begging” may be deliberate. The possibility exists, however, that the participle here means something else: that the sick and wounded are hoping or expecting to be carried, in the sense of thinking that they deserve to be carried. The notion of just deserts, or valuation, is often implicit in words related to the adjective axios (Chantraine 1968, 94). Thucydides employs the verb axioo¯ in this sense at 1.102.4, where the Athenians rebuffed in their effort to aid the Spartans at Ithome are offended because they “had not expected to suffer this treatment at the hands of the Lacedaemonians.” Another parallel is found at 8.45.4, where Alcibiades is reported as saying that Chians expect others to risk themselves for their freedom. Whether the sick and wounded at Thuc. 7.75.2 are begging, wishing, or expecting their comrades to carry them, they undeniably want help. Thucydides states that they looked for help from friends, relatives, or tent-mates. These categories correspond to those mentioned by Plato’s Socrates (Alc. 115b) when he speaks of rescuing a comrade or kinsman in battle, and they make sense in the context of fifth-century citizen armies in which soldiers, like the Achaeans in Book 2 of the Iliad, may have been grouped by tribe, fighting alongside men with whom they shared ties in Athens.77 Although the Sicilian expedition consisted of land and naval forces from far-flung citystates as well as Athens (Thuc. 6.25 –26), Thucydides evokes at this point in the narrative a close-knit citizen army. Interestingly, Diodorus contradicts Thucydides when describing the departure from Syracuse (13.18.6): And the Athenian generals, dividing the soldiers into two parts, putting the pack animals and the sick soldiers in the center and marshaling those who were able to fight in the van and the rear, then set out for Catane, with Demosthenes commanding one group and Nicias the other.

T3801.indb 128

8/7/06 12:48:11 PM


129

This account resembles Thucydides 7.78.2, where the able-bodied Athenians, having taken leave of the wounded, begin to march away: “The army withdrew, marshaled into a hollow square—first the troops of Nicias, and then those of Demosthenes in the rear. The hoplites held inside the baggagecarriers and general multitude.” But Diodorus, unlike Thucydides, puts sick soldiers in the middle of his marching formation instead of leaving them behind. Where did Diodorus, writing in the first century b.c.e., find this version of the story? It is possible that the difference is owing to Diodorus’ penchant for attributing kindness to the heroes of his Historical Library. Kenneth Sacks (1994, 217) notes that “the key concept of moderate behaviour is a hallmark of Diodoran thought. He employs epieikeia and philanthro¯ pia nearly 300 times in assessing the behaviour of individuals or nations.” Nicias apparently commands the admiration of Diodorus, for an old Syracusan named Nicolaus calls him “by common consent the most humane of the Athenians” (Diod. 13.27.4). But Diodorus does not comment on the placement of incapacitated soldiers inside the hollow squares or explicitly connect it with Nicias’ philanthro¯ pia. A more useful approach to the passage is to remember that an established view, recently reformulated by Pearson (1987, 145 –146), holds that Diodorus based Book 13.1–19 on the fourth-century historian Ephorus.78 In that case, we must ask why Ephorus “improved” on the Thucydidean retreat by omitting the abandonment of the sick and wounded. Could his account reflect the standard military practice of his own day? Simon Hornblower (1983, 157–166) describes how the Peloponnesian War brought about substantial changes in military theory and practice, including the increased use of mercenary soldiers, more systematic military training, and a shift toward greater professionalism among generals.79 Hornblower notes: “The transition from amateur to professional comes with Xenophon himself.” 80 As armies traveled greater distances, their generals will have faced a greater logistical challenge in the return of the dead to their home city-states. It seems plausible that they were gradually expected to take on more responsibility for the sick and wounded, a change that I suggest was reflected in a lost book of Ephorus and, consequently, Diodorus’ Book 13. It is possible, of course, that generals actually did direct the transport of incapacitated soldiers throughout the period, and that our sources simply pass over the fact. But it is also possible that in the fifth century they did not usually assume this responsibility—that soldiers unable to walk on their own had to look to attendants and comrades for assistance and care—until

T3801.indb 129

8/7/06 12:48:11 PM

13 0


after the Peloponnesian War. Their evacuation from hostile territory was a more highly organized affair in the fourth century than it had been in the fifth. Xenophon Anabasis 5.8.8 –11 the tale of the half-dead soldier The writings of Xenophon help to bridge the gap between the disorganization reflected in Thucydides and the orderly evacuation described in Diodorus. Xenophon promotes an ideal of leadership that demands considerable care and planning on the part of a commanding officer. In the historical work Anabasis, a dominant theme is the saving leadership of Xenophon himself,81 who in 401 took command of the pan-Hellenic mercenary army of Ten Thousand stranded in Persia and led the difficult retreat to the Black Sea, doing his utmost to preserve the lives of Greek soldiers, especially the sick and wounded. In Book 5, once the army has reached the coastal city of Cotyora, Xenophon must clear himself of charges of hubris for striking soldiers. He is tried along with three other generals at an assembly of the army (Xen. An. 5.7.34). In Athens, a hubreo¯ s graphe¯ was a public prosecution on charges of malicious injury or outrage; the hubreo¯ s dike¯ , a private prosecution on similar charges, is also known.82 The defendant’s state of mind in a case of hubris was of critical importance; to gain acquittal, Xenophon can admit to having struck some of his soldiers, and this he does, but he must demonstrate that he did not strike them in a spirit of wanton and violent arrogance. Responding to his first accuser, Xenophon denies that he struck the man to force him to relinquish some object or favorite, or in a fit of drunken violence (An. 5.8.4). Next, he explains the principles that guided him during the ordeal in Armenia, using the tale of the half-dead soldier to illustrate the care he took for his men, and continuing with further stories discussed below. Xenophon was acquitted,83 so his defense must have seemed convincing. Like most forensic speeches, this one contains some sophistry and perhaps some fabrication. But issues of truth and accuracy in Xenophon’s selfflattering narrative, whether in the Book 5 trial or the Book 4 march through Armenia, matter little to an analysis of moral attitudes. If the facts have been tailored to please an audience, so much the better, for then we can learn something about the audience. Actually, there is more than one audience: not only the soldiers at the trial, but also the soldiers who witnessed the prior episode with the half-dead soldier. All of these men belonged to the same army, one drawn from across the Greek world. G. B. Nussbaum, writing

T3801.indb 130

8/7/06 12:48:11 PM


131

about its political organization, calls the Army of Ten Thousand a “hybrid Panhellenic community” (1967, 11): In it can perhaps be seen something of a common or predominant political outlook of the “average Greek” when for once, as the result of a unique combination of circumstances, it is not subordinated to the forces of the narrow world of the polis. It is thus in a special sense “typical” of the actual practice and the popular idea of political life in Greece at the end of the fifth century, in the full stream of its “classical” epoch. If Nussbaum is correct, the moral outlook reflected in the Anabasis should also be “typical” and Panhellenic. This is no less true because the Anabasis is believed to have been published about thirty years after the events that it recounts, and is directed at yet another audience well removed in time and space from the Ten Thousand. Yet continuity in moral outlook is implied by the fact that despite the proliferation of levels within the text, Xenophon consistently presumes that Greek soldiers, whether at Cotyora or in Armenia, and Greek readers of his history a full generation later, should all view weakened soldiers with something like compassion and should respect their lives. The first accuser to step forward at Xenophon’s dike¯ is a muleteer. After a brief exchange, Xenophon recognizes the man, and remembers why he hit him. It turns out that he had ordered this muleteer to carry on his mule a desperately ill soldier in place of the regular baggage. Xenophon bids the court to listen to the story: “Listen to what sort of affair this was,” he said, “for it is worth hearing: “A man was being left behind because he was no longer able to proceed. I recognized the man only so far as to know that he was one of us; and I forced you to carry him so that he might not perish; for, I believe, the enemy was following after us.” The fellow agreed to this. “Well,” said Xenophon, “after I had sent you on ahead, I caught up with you again as I came along with the rearguard, and you were digging a hole to bury the man in, and I stopped and praised you. But when, as we were standing there, the man drew up his leg, the bystanders cried, ‘The man is alive,’ and you said, ‘Let him be alive as much as he likes. I, for my part, will not carry him.’ Then I struck you, you speak the truth, for you seemed to me to know he was alive.” “Well, so what?” he said, “he nonetheless

T3801.indb 131

8/7/06 12:48:11 PM

13 2


died, didn’t he, after I showed him to you?” “All of us, too,” said Xenophon, “are going to die; and so on account of this, should we be buried alive?” And the men cried out that Xenophon had given this fellow fewer blows than he deserved. It might be objected that in ordering the muleteer to carry the half-dead soldier, Xenophon was merely doing his job. But as we have seen, an Athenian general was not accountable for the personal safety of individuals within his company. Xenophon’s actions therefore cannot be explained as the perfunctory fulfillment of a routine duty incumbent upon him as a commanding officer. Indeed, little in the march of the Ten Thousand can be considered routine, because this was an unusual army in an unusual situation. Xenophon himself, so far as we know, had not previously been a general. He assumed the leadership of the Greeks only after their regular generals were killed. Here, he appears to have been going above and beyond the call of military duty, and a discussion of alternative motives, including the possible role of pity or empathy, is called for. The following sections will argue that Xenophon, responding to the charge of hubris, represents himself as a compassionate leader. He says, in effect, “I am a good man, and I tried to take care of my soldiers.” moral attitudes in anabasis 5.8.8 –11 In the tale of the half-dead soldier, Xenophon orders the muleteer to carry the sick man, and the muleteer disobeys by trying to bury the man alive. Xenophon then strikes him. At his trial, Xenophon seeks to justify the blow by convincing his audience that the muleteer deserved it. But Xenophon’s defense, I argue, does not rest upon the insubordination of the muleteer. Instead, it rests upon his callous disregard for human life, a connection drawn by Xenophon himself in no uncertain terms: “Then I struck you, you speak the truth, for you seemed to me to know he was alive.” In his capacity as a military commander, Xenophon can verbally constrain his subordinates to obey, as he did in ordering the muleteer to carry the half-dead soldier. But presumably he was not supposed to strike them, for if striking had been a normal and widely acceptable form of military discipline, Xenophon would hardly have been charged with hubris on that account. Unfortunately, little is known about discipline in Greek armies. With

T3801.indb 132

8/7/06 12:48:11 PM


133

the exception of Sparta, it appears to have been somewhat lax.84 Herodotus, for example, recounts how the Ionian sailors at Lade in 494, after a week of unaccustomed naval drilling, refused to obey orders (Hdt. 6.12.3); they apparently faced no reprisals. In the context of citizen armies, most Greeks may have placed relatively little emphasis on strict obedience to orders. Cowardice and treason, on the other hand, were serious offenses,85 so that in the Against Alcibiades I of Lysias, the speaker states that soldiers who were destitute or ill did not desert because they feared the law (14.14 –15). A blow in return for disobedience or shirking finds several parallels in the Anabasis. Clearchus, a Lacedaemonian general, strikes men who shirk from bridge-building (2.3.11), and rank-and-file soldiers strike and revile a shirking comrade, forcing him to take up his shield and march (3.4.47–9). The response of Cleander, the Spartan governor of Byzantium, demonstrates the unpopularity of summary corporal punishment (6.6.25): Upon hearing this, Cleander said that he had no praise for Dexippus if he had done these things, but that he nevertheless thought that even if Dexippus were a complete scoundrel, he ought not to have suffered violence but should have had a trial, just as you yourselves are seeking in the present case, to obtain justice. Nonetheless, as Nussbaum (1967, 22) points out, Xenophon’s trial “indicates how on both sides, Xenophon’s and the public’s alike, the use of physical force for disciplinary ends is felt to be unacceptable, except under the legitimate stress of unusual provocation in an emergency.” Xenophon, to exonerate himself fully, wishes to show that the muleteer was not only a shirker but also morally reprehensible. In doing so, he adopts the strategy of Agasias, who in Book 6 admits that he gave the order to stone Dexippus but goes on describe him as a traitor in no uncertain terms (An. 6.6.22 –24). Xenophon, like Agasias, blackens the character of the person he is accused of injuring, and in so doing wins over the soldiers who are judging him in Cotyora. It is worth examining exactly how Xenophon’s narrative undercuts respect or sympathy for the muleteer. Xenophon starts by emphasizing the muleteer’s low social status. Neither hoplite nor peltast, the man is obliged to drive a pack mule even though, he says, he is a free man, eleutheros ¯o n. The participle is clearly concessive. He has been assigned the task by his tent-mates, who thereby relegate him to a subordinate position that he considers beneath his dignity.86 Xenophon holds

T3801.indb 133

8/7/06 12:48:12 PM

13 4


him in no very high esteem; he scornfully calls him an anthro¯ pos.87 The word, which is used seventy-five times in the Anabasis, has several distinct uses. First, it may be employed whenever human beings are generically paired or contrasted with livestock, pack animals, horses, wild beasts, lands or territory, property, weapons or missiles, or the gods.88 Second, it can refer to human beings as vulnerable mortals who are subject not only to death but also to heat, cold, hunger, injury, fear, suspicion, ignorance, and the desire for glory.89 Third, it can be used to describe people collectively, as in a party of 1,000 peltasts and spearmen, a plundering expedition of 2,000 men, or the inhabitants of a given region or city.90 Fourth and last, Xenophon uses anthro¯ pos to connote scorn. He applies the term to a barbarian who bears a false message.91 He addresses Apollonides (An. 3.1.26), who gives treacherously bad advice, as “you amazing fellow” and lambastes him (3.1.30): In my opinion, gentlemen (o¯ andres), we should not simply refuse to admit this fellow (ton anthro¯ pon touton) with us, but should deprive him of his captaincy, lay packs on his back, and treat him like that. For he is a disgrace both to his native state and to all Greece, because, although a Greek, he is such a one. Apollonides turns out to be Lydian, and is promptly driven away. Other bad people whom Xenophon calls anthro¯ poi are the twenty men who decamp with the corrupt Nicarchus (3.3.5). It is reasonable to categorize the muleteer, who tries to bury a Greek warrior alive, with these other low characters. The half-dead soldier, on the other hand, is referred to four times as an ane¯ r, a very common word in the Anabasis, where it appears 205 times. Sometimes ane¯ r specifies a married man, or refers to men in conjunction with women.92 But most often it is used as an honorific term of address,93 to designate warrior status,94 to denote leading individuals in a respectful manner,95 or to encourage or praise bravery.96 It rarely appears in a context of disapproval.97 The contrast between ane¯ r and anthro¯ pos is not absolute,98 but it is clearly implied by Cyrus in his welcoming speech to the Greek commanding officers (1.7.3 – 4): Greek men (andres helle¯ nes), it is not for lack of barbarian men (anthro¯ pon . . . barbaro¯ n) that I have brought you here as allies, but because I believe you are braver and stronger than many barbarians; on account of this I took you, too. And so see to it that you will be men (andres) deserving

T3801.indb 134

8/7/06 12:48:12 PM


135

of freedom. . . . I am ashamed, I assure you, to think what sorry fellows you will find the people (anthro¯ pous) in this land to be. But if you be men (humo¯ n de andro¯ n onto¯ n). . . . Only once, when Xenophon believes him dead, is the half-dead soldier called an anthro¯ pos. The implication throughout Anabasis 5.8.8 –11 is that the muleteer, an anthro¯ pos, is an exceptionally brutish fellow of low rank and commensurate character. He is morally insensitive. He does not understand his place, nor why he should aid the half-dead soldier, and he entirely fails to grasp Xenophon’s scale of values. He is, by implication, incapable of pity, empathy, or any act of compassion. When lodging his complaint against Xenophon, he expresses strong concern for his tent-mates’ baggage and none for the sick man: “[Xenophon] recognized him, and asked, ‘Are you the fellow who carried the sick man?’ ‘Yes, by Zeus,’ he replied, ‘for you forced me to, and you scattered my tent-mates’ baggage all about.’” When caught in the act of digging the grave he is callous, for in response to the outcry, “The man lives,” he answers insolently: “Let him be alive as much as he likes. I, for my part, will not carry him.” 99 The muleteer also refuses to acknowledge any difference between a natural death and death by suffocation in a grave. “‘Well, so what?’ he said. ‘He nonetheless died, didn’t he, after I showed him to you?’” Xenophon claims for himself the moral high ground. He not only denies the charge of hubris, but also implies that the blow was well deserved because the muleteer was on the verge of consigning a Greek warrior to live burial. Xenophon’s narrative showcases his impartial concern for the soldiers he commands: he barely recognizes the sick man and has no special tie to him. The warrior is merely one of the company. Xenophon can either leave him lying on the ground100 or cause the muleteer to carry him. He wants him carried because the enemy is following behind. Xenophon is convinced that if left behind, the sick man will perish, and he clearly hopes that the man’s life may yet be saved. He goes to some trouble to rearrange the baggage to make room for him on a mule. Later, when Xenophon overtakes the muleteer who has halted and is busy digging, his interest in the case prompts him to stop and commend the muleteer, who at that moment appears to be providing the good services of a burial as decent as one could hope for during a harried retreat in freezing weather. Xenophon, together with his rearguard, is all the more shocked to realize that the soldier is still alive, a fact that transforms the muleteer’s

T3801.indb 135

8/7/06 12:48:12 PM

13 6


grave-digging from a good deed into an unacceptable act. Live burial was a practice that the Greeks appear to have regarded as barbaric. The Athenians cast men condemned for crimes against the city-state into a chasm or pit, the barathron, but are not thought to have suffocated them with earth.101 Other methods of execution included hemlock poisoning, hanging, or the cruel and shaming apotympanismos, which resembled crucifixion in that the condemned person was shackled to a post and left to die slowly before the eyes of the community.102 Live burial, however, was not a method of execution known in Athens, nor could it have been used in the court-sanctioned torture of slaves, the purpose of which was to extract spoken testimony from the sufferer.103 Herodotus mentions live burial several times as a form of torture or human sacrifice performed by Persians. In Book 3 of the Histories, the mad Persian king Cambyses buries a dozen of his own blameless noblemen up to the neck. In Book 7, where Xerxes crosses the River Strymon, the Persians bury alive nine Thracian boys and girls. Herodotus notes: “It is a Persian custom, this burying-alive; for I learn that Amestris, wife of Xerxes, when she had grown old, had fourteen children of noble Persians buried alive as a gift on her own behalf to the so-called god of the underworld.” 104 In the Histories, Greeks can be vicious,105 but certain cruel acts are committed only by barbarians: impalings and mutilations, as Edith Hall points out (1989, 158), but also cannibalism, the use of human hides, and live burials. The muleteer’s attempt to bury someone alive clearly evinces horror and outrage on the part of other Greeks. On the march through Armenia, when the half-dead soldier shows a sign of life, Xenophon physically strikes the muleteer. At his trial in Cotyora, he ends the tale with a rhetorical question, one that invokes empathy. “All of us, too, are going to die,” he says. “And so on account of this, should we be buried alive?” The question, which clearly enunciates the principle of mutual respect for human life, is highly effective. With it, Xenophon finally persuades his audience that the blow he dealt the muleteer was justified: “And the men cried out that Xenophon had given this fellow fewer blows than he deserved.” By beginning his defense with the tale of the half-dead soldier, Xenophon establishes a moral distinction between good men, like himself, and bad men, like the muleteer who is accusing him. Later, he warns his listeners to be alert to men’s characters, which are consistent over time (5.8.22): “For I think, if you are willing to look into the matter, you will find it is the very same men who were then most cowardly that are now most wanton.” In the course of his trial, he continues to portray himself as a general deeply committed to the

T3801.indb 136

8/7/06 12:48:12 PM


137

welfare of his troops, a man who would go to any length to hold the army together. His role in the tale of the half-dead soldier is best understood in the context of his other actions during the march through Armenia. Some of these are recounted in Book 4, which covers that segment of the journey. Xenophon, for example, rescues soldiers who start to succumb to hungerfaintness (4.5.7– 8): And Xenophon, guarding the rear and overtaking men who were falling by the way, did not know what the trouble was. But when someone who was experienced in these matters told him that they clearly had hungerfaintness and if they ate something would be able to get up, he went around among the pack animals, and wherever he saw anything that was edible, he would distribute it among the sick men, or send hither and thither people who had the strength to run along the lines to give it to them. And when they had eaten something, they would get up and continue the march. Once he understands the problem, Xenophon takes swift action, foraging among the pack animals, distributing food with his own hands, and organizing others to help, although the weakest men, unable to reach shelter that night, die anyway. Later he comes upon soldiers suffering from snowblindness and frostbite who have collapsed beside a spring (4.5.16): But when Xenophon with some of the rearguard observed them, he begged them by every means and contrivance not to be left behind, telling them that a large body of the enemy had gathered and were pursuing, and at last he became angry. Xenophon prides himself on the concern he shows for his men. He pleads with them, and when his pleading fails, he becomes angry. A few lines later, he arranges for the rearguard to charge the enemy while the men too weak to fight raise a frightening shout. The ruse works: it keeps the enemy at bay. The next morning, Xenophon forces the men to struggle on, and relief finally comes when Cheirisophus, the Spartan general in command of the vanguard, sends rested troops to check on the rear (4.5.22): “Xenophon’s party was glad to see them, and handed over the sick to them to carry on to the camp while they themselves continued their journey.” At his trial in Book 5, Xenophon summarizes the good services he performed for his men in the following way (5.8.24):

T3801.indb 137

8/7/06 12:48:12 PM

13 8


“But really,” he said, “I am amazed that if ever I incurred the hatred of any of you, you remember and are not silent, but if I aided any one against wintry weather, or warded off an enemy, or helped to provide something for him when he was sick or in want, nobody remembers any of these things.” Xenophon asks to be judged by his actions: he protects the sick and wounded from the elements and the enemy; he provides for them when they are ill or in need. He also drives them along like pack animals when necessary (5.8.14): “When a man became enervated and was not willing to get up, but was giving himself up to the enemy, I struck him and forced him to proceed.” The most remarkable feature of the Anabasis narrative is Xenophon’s insistence that a desperately ill soldier be carried at a time when cold and hunger press bitterly on the entire expedition. He could have chosen otherwise. He could simply have decided, as Nicias did at Syracuse, to abandon all sick and wounded soldiers so that the rest of the army might escape alive. But in fact, most of his rescue efforts entail increased risk and hardship for the rest of the army as well as for himself, and presuppose a real compassion for the actual and prospective suffering of the weakened men (5.8.16): “I struck [a laggard] with the fist,” he says, “in order that the enemy might not strike him with the lance.” emotion in anabasis 5.8.8 –11 Unlike the departure scene in Thucydides, the tale of the half-dead soldier names no emotions. It neither strives for pathos nor dwells on sensitive responses. If anything, the focus is on anger: the churlish anger of the muleteer, and the righteous indignation of Xenophon himself. At no point does Xenophon name pity as a motive for his actions in Armenia. Yet he indicates that he did feel, at least, a kind of empathy106 for the struggling soldiers (5.8.14 –15): For in the wintry weather once I myself was seated for a long time, waiting for some people who were packing up, and I learned that I could scarcely get up and stretch my legs. Having gained experience in my own case (en emauto¯ i ), after that I used to drive on another man (allon) whenever I saw one sitting down and slacking off; for to move around and act like a man supplied a certain warmth and suppleness, while to sit and keep still, as I

T3801.indb 138

8/7/06 12:48:12 PM


139

saw, tended to make the blood freeze and the toes rot off, the very things that many suffered, as you yourselves know. Owing to personal experience, Xenophon understands why it is so hard to move, and grasps the devastating effects of yielding to the inertia brought on by extreme cold. He is anxious, for their sake, to prevent frostbite and gangrene. A reasoned empathy allows and encourages Xenophon to act for the benefit of another human being, allon. The latter term should be understood in a generalizing sense, as in the maxim of Epicharmus of Syracuse, “Know how he treated another man.” 107 Xenophon’s use of allon is also reminiscent of the allon that forms part of Cyrus’ reflections in the Histories (Hdt. 1.86.6), where he decides not to burn Croesus at the stake partly because he realizes that Croesus, like him, is human. For a mere pronoun, allon carries surprising moral weight. Xenophon is explaining what he did to help other people, and why he did it, even when that help entailed the use of force. Xenophon puts forth several reasons for hitting soldiers other than the muleteer: he struck those who displayed a lack of discipline that undermined the common safety (5.8.13), or whose failure to proceed jeopardized others (5.8.16). Ultimately, he claims that his actions were other-directed, that he struck the soldiers for their own good (5.8.19): My defense is simple. If it was for his good that I punished anyone, I think I should render the sort of account that parents render to sons and teachers to pupils; for that matter, surgeons also burn and cut patients for their good.108 In Book 7, when Xenophon is harshly criticized for leading the Ten Thousand into service with Seuthes in Thrace, he again defends his actions as other-directed and reproaches the Greeks, “for whom I have not even to this moment ceased doing whatever good I may” (7.6.35). The value of acting for the good of others is, as we have just seen, based on a paternalistic model in which parents act for the good of their children, teachers for the good of their pupils, and surgeons for the good of their patients. Yet Xenophon elsewhere praises a more egalitarian model of other-directed action: joint effort for the common good. In the Cyropaedia, for example, the fictional Cyrus notes that “common dangers make allies kindly disposed to-

T3801.indb 139

8/7/06 12:48:13 PM

14 0


ward one another . . . since they recognize in one another fellow-workers for the common good” (3.3.10). Even more significantly, Xenophon’s Socrates, in the Memorabilia, links the notion of joint effort with the human capacity for pity: “For men possess by nature some friendly elements: they need one another and feel pity (eleousi ) and by working together they benefit and, conscious of this fact, are grateful to one another” (2.6.21). Mutual need and the capacity for pity are the preconditions for social cooperation and joint effort toward a common goal or good. The march of the Ten Thousand illustrates the principle of joint effort, as the Greeks coalesce into an organized community to achieve a common good: their safe return. G. B. Nussbaum (1967, 2 –3) writes that the Anabasis, starting with the death of Cyrus, “tells how this temporary polis of fighting men, transported almost before they knew it and against their will into the heart of that empire which not so long before had all but engulfed Greece herself, now defied its power . . . and worked out its own salvation out of its own unaided resources.” Xenophon himself is both a citizen of that temporary polis and its leader. He both works with the other Greeks for a shared goal and directs them for their own good. Although neither eleos nor oiktos is named in the tale of the half-dead soldier or, for that matter, anywhere in the account of the Armenia ordeal, Xenophon’s continuous exertion to preserve the lives of his men presupposes concern for others, as he himself claims in the course of his trial. Another point, which Xenophon does not make and which cannot be proved, is that a sense of pity like that enunciated in the Memorabilia, where men are said to “need one another and feel pity,” may also be implied. A parallel for the compassionate care of the sick and helpless is found in Book 7 of the Anabasis, when Cleander, the Spartan governor of Byzantium, nurses sick Persian soldiers whom he might profitably have sold into slavery. He did so, Xenophon says, because he pitied them (An. 7.2.6): “As for Cleander, he had not sold one of them, but had even been caring for their sick out of pity (oiktiro¯ n) and compelling the Byzantines to receive them in their houses; but the moment Aristarchus arrived he sold no fewer than 400.” The same motive may be implied in the tale of the half-dead soldier. I have argued that caring for individual sick and wounded soldiers was not a legal or military responsibility incumbent upon Greek generals in the classical period. Therefore, Xenophon’s actions in Armenia, especially his attempted rescue of the half-dead soldier, cannot be dismissed as merely obligatory or routine. Xenophon’s defense against the charge of hubris rests, as we have seen, upon a claim of moral superiority. First of all, he, unlike the mule-

T3801.indb 140

8/7/06 12:48:13 PM


141

teer, respects human life. Second, he is a good man who cares for his men, and for that reason he deserves to be acquitted. Xenophon explains his motives in terms of empathy and a desire to benefit his fellow human beings. It remains to be argued that Xenophon, in other of his writings, articulates an ideal for military leadership that includes a limited degree of caring and compassion. Compassion as an Aspect of Ideal Leadership Xenophon opens his Cyropaedia with the question, “How does a ruler rule?” (1.1.1–3). As Higgins observes (1977, 44): “Xenophon wished to discuss how government succeeded, in view of the fact that in his own age none seemed to.” Throughout the Cyropaedia, Xenophon explores the qualities of the ideal leader as exemplified by his fictional Cyrus the Great. These include daring and ferocity in battle, self-restraint, and piety. A ruler should have the power to harm his enemies and help his friends.109 He should also be capable of kindness and compassion. Cyrus is praised and remembered for his philanthro¯ pia and on his deathbed characterizes himself as philanthro¯ pos.110 In that respect, he resembles Agesilaus, the Spartan king who cares for stray children and elderly prisoners of war and wins the devotion of conquered cities by his philanthro¯ pia (Xen. Ages. 1.20 –22). Cyrus is also praised for euergesia (8.7.13). He often shows oiktos, when he pities Panthea, the lovely war captive, or spares valiant Egyptian fighters, or pities the emasculated Gadatas or the vanquished Croesus.111 Cyrus, as an ideal general, cares for his troops. Again, he is like Agesilaus, who orders that fire-pots be taken to his freezing soldiers (Xen. Hell. 4.5.3). Cyrus hires physicians to attend the rank-and-file, orders supplies for the sick, and even establishes a board of health and a dispensary.112 After the Cadusians in his army are worsted by the Assyrians, he personally cares for the survivors (Cyr. 5.4.18): It was clear, however, that he was strongly distressed, so that, when the rest were eating their main meal at the usual hour, Cyrus with his attendants and physicians would not willingly leave anyone uncared for, but he either looked after them in person, or, if he did not succeed in doing that, was conspicuous in sending others to take care of them. In the Anabasis, Xenophon presents the Ten Thousand as a “model society, a ‘blueprint’ utopia in action” (Dillery 1995). We are also led to believe that Xenophon lived up to at least some of his leadership ideals: he is courageous

T3801.indb 141

8/7/06 12:48:13 PM

14 2


and pious, and he takes care of his men. Interestingly, the other-directed behavior of which he boasts takes on a different hue in the Cyropaedia, where Cyrus the Great often has self-directed motives for his ostensible good deeds, his “calculated shows of philanthropy” (Tatum 1989, 71). As prince, Cyrus uses kindness to win friends and earn the love of his subjects. As general, he uses it to maintain fighting strength among the troops.113 To be effective, a military leader must inspire obedience in his troops, and this Cyrus does by showing consideration for them, following the advice of his father Cambyses (Cyr. 1.6.42): “You must know well this, too, that all those from whom you expect obedience will expect you to take thought for them.” 114 The portrait of Cyrus recommends ruling by kindness as well as by fear. One must not lose sight of the fact that this approach represented an ideal, not an accurate reflection of contemporary practice. De Romilly, indeed, views the ideal monarchs of both Isocrates and Xenophon as a critique of tyranny (1979, 127): “That is why the gentleness of princes was praised whenever the occasion presented itself. In the fourth century, the matter went further, until the image was first sketched, then filled in, of an idealized monarch characterized by gentleness, among other things.” In the Hellenica, Xenophon uses incidents in Greek history to point out the drawbacks of brutality. Alexander, the cruel tyrant of Pherae and tagus of Thessaly, is assassinated (Hell. 6.4.35). And during the Lacedaemonian siege of Corcyra, Mnasippus mistreats his army, with bad results (Hell. 6.2.19): And when some captains replied that it was not easy to keep men obedient without giving them provisions, he struck one of them with a staff and another with the spike of his spear. Thus when his forces marched out, they were all dispirited and hostile to him, the very thing that is least conducive to fighting. Incidentally, the concept of kindness as an ingredient of successful leadership is found in traditional accounts of Alexander the Great, the most famous of all fourth-century generals. One story tells how Alexander, though exhausted and cold, gave his chair by the fire to a frozen foot-soldier.115 Curtius also makes much of Alexander’s behavior at the crossing of Mount Parapanisus (Curtius 7.3.17), and again in the journey to Gazaca (8.4.9), when he bodily supported men who were prostrated by the winter weather. These flattering tales, however, have no claim to historical authenticity. “From the moment they plunged into eastern Iran they were off the known map,” Peter Green observes (1991, 337–338): “It was now that the legends and tall stories began

T3801.indb 142

8/7/06 12:48:13 PM


143

to proliferate.” Arrian, who is more judicious and restrained than Curtius, never flatly praises Alexander the Great for compassion.116 He does, however, show him visiting the wounded after the battle of Granicus (Arr. Anab. 1.16.5): “[Alexander] had much forethought ( pronoia) for the wounded, going around to each of them himself, looking at their wounds, asking how they were received, and allowing them to recount and brag about their exploits.” His motive, arguably, was to build morale and make men more enthusiastic about fighting.117 Like Xenophon’s Cyrus the Great, then, he is pragmatic. Alexander’s sick-bed visits would have required a minor effort on his part, in no way comparable to the considerable sacrifices that Xenophon made on behalf of his troops in Armenia. But Xenophon’s tale of the half-dead soldier, in the context of his defense at Cotyora, fits comfortably into his wider advocacy of kindness and compassion in the ideal ruler or military leader as set forth in the Cyropaedia and other works. Conclusions The transport of sick and wounded soldiers in classical Greece has been neglected by ancient and modern historians alike. Generally speaking, their plight goes unremarked. Pritchett, for example, in writing about the Thucydidean retreat from Syracuse, lays all his emphasis on the response of the departing soldiers to their unburied dead (1971–91, 4:197): The historian expresses the full measure of wretchedness felt by the Athenian army of 40,000 men . . . when he describes their departure from camp on the third day after the battle, according to the Greek mode of reckoning time. The departing soldiers sorrowed over the unperformed duty of caring for the slain. The corpses were unburied . . .; each man was plunged into grief whenever he saw the body of a dead friend. Pritchett allows the affecting cries and pleas of the abandoned men (Thuc. 7.75.4) to go unnoticed. This general tendency to overlook the sick and wounded can be traced back to the historiography of Herodotus and Thucydides. So can the tendency to focus on the war-dead. Diodorus, for example, in his account of the battle of Arginusae, interprets the botched rescue expedition as an effort to retrieve corpses (Diod. 13.100): “After this, some of the generals thought they should pick up the men who had died, because of the harsh view that Athenians take of those who allow the dead to go unburied.” His version

T3801.indb 143

8/7/06 12:48:13 PM

14 4


directly contradicts the Hellenica, the Aristotelian Constitution of the Athenians, and physical law: the bodies of the drowned do not float on the day of death.118 Diodorus repeats the same mistake when he tells about the trial (Diod. 13.101–103), saying that the generals were condemned for their failure to retrieve the dead. He omits any mention of the shipwrecked survivors who were waiting to be rescued. Yet in the aftermath of battle, there were not only corpses to be buried but also incapacitated soldiers who required care and transport. Evidence for ancient logistics is meager. Clearly, however, the wounded were carried a number of different ways: bodily or by litter, pack animal, wagon, or boat. Until after the Peloponnesian War, a soldier’s attendant or his comrades probably assumed responsibility for him; commanding officers, so far as we know, did not. In a harassed retreat, those comrades faced a tough choice: they could either try to carry the sick and wounded, or they could leave them behind. Actually, there was a third option, but it receives only fleeting mention. The soldiers who collapse next to a spring in Armenia beg Xenophon to kill them (An. 4.5.16): “They told him to cut their throats, for they could not go on.” In ancient warfare, death may well have seemed preferable to captivity or a painful execution by the enemy. Herodotus tells how Boges of Eion, besieged by the Athenians, held out as long as he could, but when all hope was lost, he cut the throats of his children, wives, concubines, and servants, threw their bodies onto a great bonfire, then jumped in himself (Hdt. 7.107). Pausanias tells of Greeks in the early third century who killed their own wounded rather than leave them to the mercy of the Gauls (Paus. 10.23.7). In the Anabasis, however, Xenophon does not accede to the despairing request of his men. “In this situation,” he writes, “it seemed best to frighten the pursuing enemy.” Thucydides (7.75.2 –5) and Xenophon (An. 5.8.8 –11) focus attention, in strikingly different ways, on a soldier’s obligation to carry the sick and wounded. The Anabasis is a success story: the Ten Thousand did, by and large, survive the dangers and hardships of Armenia, the army did return to Greece, and, in the tale of the half-dead soldier, the moral high ground is still an attainable goal. Xenophon is usually able to take care of his troops, like the beneficent monarch he invents in the Cyropaedia. Even in the difficult conditions of an Armenian winter, he arranges for the transport of the half-dead soldier. The man dies anyway, but Xenophon, at least, had done his best. In contrast, the Peloponnesian War is a story of defeat, and since the narrative breaks off in 411, eight years before the Spartan occupation of Athens,

T3801.indb 144

8/7/06 12:48:14 PM


145

the debacle at Syracuse carries a meaning far beyond the immediate loss, as Thucydides himself points out (2.65).119 Part of the pathos in the departure scene arises from the terrible humiliation that has robbed the Athenians of the power to protect and save their own. Under the circumstances, they have no choice but to abandon their comrades. They blame themselves: the whole army is in tears. Thucydides himself withholds censure for the troops and for their generals. If anything, the men’s self-blame reflects their moral dignity, and W. Robert Connor notes a “hint of sympathy” for Nicias in the narrative (1984, 203): “As the withdrawal continues, his deeds bring out his concern, his courage, his compassion.” Warfare throughout the classical period remained brutal and chaotic. Soldiering was always a high-risk occupation. The difficulties of evacuating thousands, or tens of thousands, of troops from hostile territory meant that almost inevitably, some who had survived recent wounds but could not walk would be left behind. The greater the overland distance to be traversed, the greater the problem, as the Persians had realized by the second invasion of Greece: Xerxes left his sick behind on the homeward route, charging Thracian cities to care for them (Hdt. 8.115.3). Attempts to quarter sick soldiers in cities were not always successful: the Cotyorites on the south shore of the Black Sea refused to receive enfeebled soldiers from among the Ten Thousand (Xen. An. 5.5.6). Generals were never, so far as we know, held legally accountable for the sick and wounded. It is possible, of course, that commanding officers actually did direct the transport of casualties throughout the period and that our sources simply pass over the fact. It appears likely, however, that in the fifth century they did not usually assume this responsibility until after the Peloponnesian War; soldiers unable to walk on their own had to look to attendants and comrades for assistance and care. It is generally accepted that the conflict brought about changes in military theory and practice. Amid a fourth-century trend toward the systematic study of warfare, generals may have come to realize, as Xenophon did, that they could improve morale by organizing the rescue of the sick and wounded. The same century witnessed a literary trend, at least, toward praise of kindness and compassion, often with an emphasis on the pragmatic benefits that could derive from both. And finally, the narratives in Thucydides and Xenophon demonstrate that, with or without prospective benefits, some of the able-bodied pitied the sick and wounded and felt a strong moral obligation to preserve their lives and carry them home if they could.

T3801.indb 145

8/7/06 12:48:14 PM

five

The Judicial Torture of Slaves

Chorus: He would be iron-minded and made of stone, indeed, Prometheus, who did not sympathize with your sufferings. I would not have chosen to see them, and now that I see, my heart is pained. Prometheus: Yes, to my friends I am pitiable to see. — aeschylus[?] Prometheus Bound 242 –246 (trans. Grene)

T

he immortal Prometheus stands shackled to towering rocks in desolate Scythia, exposed to the bright blaze of the sun. An adamantine wedge pierces his chest and pins him to the spot. He is there because Zeus is punishing him for giving to mankind the gift of fire. For the duration of Prometheus Bound, every character that enters the stage must respond somehow to the spectacle of his suffering. Hephaestus, compelled to inflict pain upon kin and companion (39), expresses anguish. Kinsman and friend Oceanus (288 –297) grieves with Prometheus and wants to intercede; the daughters of Oceanus feel tearful sympathy that springs from their philia (128). But Kratos, or Might, is pitiless. The mortal Io, who suffers torments of her own, barely notices Prometheus’ pain, whereas Hermes, whom Prometheus scorns as a servant of the gods (954, 983), calls him sick and obstinate for refusing to divulge the fate of Zeus. Prometheus himself observes that it is friends who find him pitiable to look upon (246): kai me¯ n philois eleinos eisoran ego¯ . He expects his enemies to deride him (159).1 Only a limited parallel can be drawn between the mythological torture of Prometheus and the actual torture of slaves in classical Athens. Prometheus

T3801.indb 146

8/7/06 12:48:14 PM

t he j udi cial to r ture of slaves

147

is a god, not a slave. He enjoys divine stature and a kind of willful autonomy even when bound to a craggy rock. So the attitude of Hephaestus, who fixes the shackles and the wedge, cannot resemble the attitude of real torturers, whose task it was to rack or whip the most wretched members of Athenian society. Yet Prometheus Bound explores the brute application of force, and it is important to note that the original goal of Zeus, which was to punish Prometheus, becomes superimposed with a new goal: to extract knowledge from him. Turning to prose sources, not a single detailed scene of penal or judicial torture exists, but reported instances of it are listed in Table 5.2 Earlier chapters have explored how a good person was expected to behave when confronted with a sick friend or relative, a neighbor in need of ransom money, a street crime in progress, or a debilitated war comrade unable to keep up with the ranks. Such situations tested individual mettle in ways we cannot know, but they also tested societal ties of kinship, friendship, and shared citizenship. The citizens of Athens enjoyed certain rights and privileges, among them the right to have families and develop friendships. They were bound together by intricate connections and therefore owed one another a certain level of concern or care. This chapter is different from the rest in that it offers a powerful counter-example to philia. It starkly confronts the plight of the slave, who, by definition, lacks such rights and privileges—who cannot marry, who cannot have legitimate children, who cannot enjoy socially sanctioned bonds of friendship. A comprehensive analysis of emotional responses and moral attitudes toward slaves in ancient Athens would require a separate book, and the present chapter looks at the treatment of slaves in only a single and extreme situation: judicial slave torture. This situation, this type of suffering, is fundamentally different from those considered up until this point: Athenians obviously were expected not to intervene in the judicial torture of slaves. To the contrary, they were sometimes called upon to witness it. Slavery itself was an indispensable feature of Athenian society, and slave torture was intrinsic to the Athenian legal system. Yet questions remain. How did slave torture fit into the moral universe of the Athenians? How did they justify the practice? Were they ever troubled by it? How did they reconcile the cruelty and injustice of this practice with their civic ideology of kindness and fairness? Did pity or empathy have any place in this sphere of everyday life, or were slaves faced with torture inexorably shut off from humane sentiment? This chapter, then, scrutinizes the line between freedom and slavery in Athens. It reviews the practice of judicial torture and slave torture, and the rhetoric surrounding it, and it offers a close reading of two remarkable

T3801.indb 147

8/7/06 12:48:14 PM

14 8


table 5. instances of tor ture of free persons and slaves in classical athens Source

Date

Antiph. 1.20

420s

Antiph. 5.29–52

c. 415

Antiph. 5.29 –52

c. 415

Andoc. 1.64 –65

415

Plut. Nic. 30.2

413

Andoc. 2.15; Lys. 6.27

411

Thuc. 8.92; cf. Lyc. 1.112

411

Lys. 13.54

404

Lys. 13.59– 60

404

Lys. 5.3 –5

after 403?

Isoc. 17.15 –16 Dem. 37.40 – 42

c. 393 c. 345

Dem. 18.132 –133; Din. 1.63

344 or 343

Dem. 48.14 –19

c. 343

Dem. 12.3 –5

c. 342

Aeschin. 3.224 –225

341

Description Concubine implicated in homicide is broken on wheel and executed A free Mytilenean is tortured in homicide investigation A slave is fatally tortured in the same homicide investigation as above Male slave of Andocides and female slaves of a conspirator are tortured by order of the Council; they corroborate his account of the mutilation of the Herms Barber from Piraeus is tortured for spreading unpatriotic rumors The Athenian aristocrat Andocides, imprisoned by the 400, is maltreated in prison and is later said to have been tortured Argive man is tortured by the 400 after assassination of Phyrnichos Xenophon of Courium, a Cypriot, is tortured and executed by the Thirty Aristophanes of Cholleis, probably an Athenian citizen, is tortured and executed by the Thirty Case against Callias, a citizen accused of impiety, rests on slave testimony Challenge accepted: Cittus is almost tortured Challenge accepted: slave is manhandled and almost tortured Antiphon, a disfranchised Athenian agent of Philip, is tortured and executed Slave named Moschion, who embezzled money, confesses under torture Macedonian ambassador Amphilochus is tortured, ransomed Demosthenes is said to have twice racked Anaxinus of Oreos, a Euboean, who was then executed as a spy

Note: Examples of slave torture are in italic.

T3801.indb 148

8/7/06 12:48:14 PM


149

stories. The first comes from Against Pantaenetus (Dem. 37) and takes us to the scene of a tussle that occurred when one litigant allegedly roughed up his legal opponent’s slave rather than wait for him to be questioned under torture by a designated official. The second story comes from a speech by Isocrates, the Trapeziticus, in which Pasion, father of the same Apollodorus whom we met in Chapter 2, offers his slave for torture and then, at the last minute, changes his mind. Pasion was a metic at that date and an ex-slave, so his point of view, insofar as we are able to discern it, will be especially meaningful. Because the judicial torture of slaves could entail the deliberate infliction of pain and harm upon a human being who stood accused of no crime, it posits a severe test of Athenian humaneness. The very existence of a system mandating the torture of slaves for evidence suggests that, from a modern standpoint, the Athenians fail the test: slave torture describes the limit of their philanthro¯ pia. We shall soon see how. The Line between Freedom and Slavery In recent years, scholars have often urged that a bipolar distinction between free men and slaves was crucial to the ideology of the democratic city-state. By “ideology” I mean the nexus of ideas that sustained the Athenians as they built a political community, struggled to exercise power over other city-states, and developed a coherent ethos for Athens that was a source of civic identity and strength. Slavery helped shape that ideology. Cartledge (2002, 4) observes that “the characteristically ‘Greek’ way of defining the citizen was precisely by negative polar opposition to a whole series of ‘others’—the unfree, minors, females, and non-Greeks, not to mention . . . the gods.” 3 Indeed, the very concept of freedom appears to have emerged side by side with the practice of chattel slavery.4 Throughout the classical period, from the Persian Wars to the rise of Macedon, that concept spurred the Athenians to resist tyranny. One cannot applaud the connection between slavery and freedom, nor can one overlook it. There it stands, a disconcerting paradox for modern admirers of the ancient Greeks.5 Whether for ideological reasons, or practical reasons, or both, the Athenians never seriously challenged the institution of slavery,6 which was a feature of ancient economies throughout the Mediterranean region. Slavery was deeply embedded in their construction of the world and, figuring as it did in Homeric society, had the patina of antiquity. Slaveholding enabled citizens to delegate much of the hard work of farming, manufacturing, and mining;

T3801.indb 149

8/7/06 12:48:14 PM

150


they could build the economy of individual households and the city-state without consuming all of their own time and energy in toil. The reforms of Solon meant that Athenian citizens could no longer slip from indebtedness into slavery in their own polis, but by the fifth century, chattel slavery of foreigners was in full swing. These slaves were non-Athenian and mostly non-Greek. They reached Athens as war captives, or via the slave trade, or were born into slavery. To judge by their names, most came from Thrace, Phrygia, Lydia, Caria, and finally Syria in the fourth century.7 It would be helpful to know how many public and private slaves there were, compared to how large a citizen population, but firm demographic information is lacking.8 Their use in agriculture appears to have been widespread, and slaves were ubiquitous in the city.9 The unluckiest slaves performed hard labor, mainly in the mines. A less extreme perdition confronted the many slaves who lived within the oikos. Meanwhile, a fortunate and talented few, the kho¯ ris oikountes, were permitted to maintain separate abodes and engage in commercial activities more or less on their own. They owed a payment, the apophora, to their masters, but otherwise acted independently and could accumulate savings.10 By the middle of the fourth century, they could also draw up contracts and engage in commercial lawsuits.11 This is the point where slaves start to resemble free men, for the kho¯ ris oikountes had many of the rights enjoyed by metics, or resident aliens.12 The status of certain individuals, like the Plataean boy Theodotus whom we met in Chapter 3, is difficult to determine now—and was apparently difficult to determine even then, as shown by disputes in the forensic speeches over whether a given individual, like Milyas in Demosthenes 29, was a free man or a slave.13 The end result, according to the pamphleteering “Old Oligarch,” was that a man had better refrain from striking anyone at all in case he struck a citizen by mistake.14 In real life, the line between free men and slaves became increasingly blurred over time. Slaves could rise out of servitude through manumission, especially from the fourth century on; most freedmen were registered as metics, but the Assembly could grant them citizenship.15 Sometimes slaves were recruited to fight battles or row triremes, mostly famously at Arginusae in 406 b.c.e., when a shortage of rowers prompted the Athenians to free some slaves and make them citizens.16 Conversely, metics could lose their status: enslavement remained a punishment for certain crimes.17 And abroad, Athenians were always vulnerable to mishap. As prisoners of war, they could be enslaved; and random individuals were sometimes kidnapped and sold into

T3801.indb 150

8/7/06 12:48:15 PM


15 1

slavery, as we saw in Chapter 2. A hefty ransom payment could fix the problem, but Vidal-Naquet rightly notes that “many Greeks . . . could envision enslavement as the boundary of their own individual fates,” whereas Westermann long ago observed the “astonishing fluidity of status in both directions, from slavery to freedom as from freedom to slavery.” 18 This surely made it more difficult for Athenians to dismiss slaves as subhuman—but perhaps heightened the need for sharp bipolar thinking.19 Freedmen or the children of freedmen, meanwhile, might seek to reinforce their nonslave status by being hard on slaves: Apollodorus, the son of Pasion, demands basanos, interrogation by torture, with frequency and gusto.20 Another level of difficulty was posed by the ambiguous status of the slave, who was both property and person.21 Insofar as slaves were property, their owners could prosecute anyone who struck or damaged or killed them without due cause. But their owners were not supposed to kill them without official sanction, though some surely did just that (Antiph. 6.4).22 For slaves were persons. One ancient term, the neuter noun andropoda, or “man-footed beings,” equated them with tetrapoda, “four-footed beings” or cattle, another category of war booty, and strikes us as thoroughly dehumanizing. Yet other and more common terms, such as doulos or oikete¯ s or pais, seem less so.23 Garlan writes (1988, 40), “It was universally agreed that a slave was a human being (anthro¯ pos), not an animal.” In effect, slaves were human beings with very limited rights and protections.24 They participated in religious rituals of the oikos25 and, if Greek-born, could participate in the Eleusinian Mysteries and the like. As Wiedemann puts it, slaves possessed “certain moral rights.” Athenian law protected them against hubris, probably because an affront against a slave could amount to an affront against his or her owner (Murray 1990, 145). In the highly timocratic culture of ancient Athens, however, they had little share in honor.26 Since most slaves were barbarians, it was easy for the ethnocentric Greeks to regard them as morally and intellectually inferior.27 The work they did at the behest of others, sometimes under the whip, reinforced their reputation for cowardice, weakness, and so forth.28 In the fourth century, Aristotle, who produced our sole surviving formal analysis of slavery from classical Greece, found the institution “good and just” (Pol. 1254a18). He posited a theory of natural slavery that presupposed the slave’s inherent inferiority29 and explicitly denied that natural slaves possessed logos or reason (Pol. 1254b).30 Yet this was, as Finley observed, an “extreme position” (1973, 81– 82), framed in response to critics who had asserted that slavery was grounded in

T3801.indb 151

8/7/06 12:48:15 PM

152


convention and force rather than nature.31 Garnsey (1996, 107) calls it a “battered shipwreck of a theory.” And even Aristotle had to acknowledge that certain individuals—and here he may have been thinking of fellow Greeks enslaved in his own day— did not fit the negative caricature.32 The masses of peasants from Egypt or the Near East, brought under the yoke in the wake of Alexander’s conquests, were easily denigrated (Vidal-Naquet 1986, 166), but onlookers found it obvious that some people were not born to be slaves. They were simply unlucky.33 So the modern commonplace, that cruelties are most easily perpetrated upon victims marked off as subhuman, like the “vermin” killed in Nazi concentration camps, does not necessarily help to explain the Greek practice of judicial torture. Unless consigned to work in mines or mills or factories,34 slaves were hardly subhuman strangers to those who owned them. The typical Athenian house was small, as shown in Chapter 1, and so within the oikos, masters and slaves lived at close quarters and knew a great deal about each other’s lives (Hunter 1994, 70 –95). Relations were complex and must have varied from household to household, and even within households, depending on incalculable factors, including individual temperament.35 An owner could be as kind or as cruel as he liked. Comedy and tragedy suggest that a master and slave could be friends, and scattered examples of such friendships are found in oratory.36 Aristotle in the Nicomachean Ethics (1161b5 – 6), either prior to articulating his theory of natural slavery in the Politics (Garnsey 1996, 114) or simply in spite of it, allows for friendly relations with slaves. But William V. Harris is probably correct in seeing the master-slave relationship, on the whole, as “a constant source of anger” (2001, 317).37 Sometimes there were practical incentives to be kind, especially in times of war or widespread societal crisis, when disgruntled slaves might more easily escape (Aristophanes Clouds 6 –7). On the other hand, cruelty and coercion could enforce a certain level of cooperation. Could close contact between citizens and slaves—who in many cases worked side by side in house and field, on building sites, and in workshops of every kind38— open the door to empathy? This is not an easy question. Mark Golden, for example, hypothesizes that ties of affection between Athenian children and their slave nurses or paidagogoi led, paradoxically, to “intensified violence” toward other slaves (Golden 1988, 472). Festivals that featured a temporary reversal of roles, such as the Chronia, served merely to reinforce the hierarchy.39 But in my opinion, the ancient evidence indicates a broad range of behavior, some of it empathic or even amicable. And certainly,

T3801.indb 152

8/7/06 12:48:15 PM


15 3

owners who wished to manage their slaves well, to make the most of them, had to understand their mentality.40 With the possible exception of a single letter from the agora—written on a lead tablet by a certain Lesis, probably a slave, who complains of being beaten in the foundry where he works41— modern scholars have virtually no direct access to a slave’s point of view. But the ancient Athenians did, and the men who wrote and delivered forensic speeches consistently assumed that slaves possessed intelligence, agency, and knowledge of facts germane to the case.42 Demosthenes, for example, says in Against Aphobus III (29.11): I was willing to offer for questioning under torture a slave who knew how to read and write, who was present when this man [Aphobus] agreed to these things, and who wrote down his testimony. He had not in any way been ordered by us to contrive mischief—to write one thing but hide another of what this man was saying about these matters—but simply to write the whole truth on his behalf and the things that were said by him. This slave of Demosthenes is a literate and reasonable person who obeys orders. Unless this is a completely empty threat, what may strike us as puzzling is his master’s professed willingness to hand him over for interrogation under torture. Slave Torture in Context The use of torture for intelligence-gathering in today’s war on terrorism, especially in the wake of the Abu Ghraib prison scandal, has focused public attention on two key questions, one moral and the other pragmatic (Slackman 2004). First, does the attempt to save lives ever justify the use of torture? Second, does torture or “torture lite” yield useful information? In other words, do the victims of torture tell the truth, or do they simply say whatever they think will make the torture stop? The first question, which presupposes the concept of human rights, has a modern ring to it, but the second is ancient indeed, and the Athenian polis as a whole did regard torture as a valid source of useful information. Edward Peters traces the long and terrible history of torture in legal and public settings back to Greek law, focusing on “torment inflicted by a public authority for ostensibly public purposes” (1985, 3). A somewhat broader definition—the deliberate infliction of pain for either punishment

T3801.indb 153

8/7/06 12:48:15 PM

154


or coercion—is perhaps better suited to the Greek material as a whole.43 Torture thus defined could occur in either private or public contexts, in a slave owner’s oikos or in a public temple. The coercion could be aimed at information or some other goal, such as a promise to turn over money. It is important to note that just as the mythical torture of Prometheus began as punishment and shifted to coercion, so actual torture could be driven by mixed motives. Documented incidents of torture in fifth- and fourth-century Athens occurred in three contexts: crimes against the state, homicide investigations, and the extraction of evidence for legal cases. First, it is clear that Greeks of free status—and even Athenian citizens, despite the emphasis placed on the inviolability of their bodies— could be tortured in connection with treason or other crimes against the state (Bushala 1968, 62 – 63), including theft from the Parthenon treasury (Dem. 13.14). All of our known cases occurred in the context of great political tension,44 another point of comparison with our use of torture today. A notorious instance reported by Plutarch is the hapless barber from Piraeus, racked for spreading unpatriotic rumors about the loss at Syracuse in 413.45 In 411, the Athenian aristocrat Andocides, incarcerated by the Four Hundred, is sometimes cited as an example; he was probably maltreated in prison rather than actually tortured.46 That same year, a man from Argos complicit in the assassination of Phrynichus, one of the leading oligarchs, was reportedly seized and tortured for information (Thuc. 8.92): basanizomenos hupo to¯ n tetrakosio¯ n.47 The next two cases date to the city’s second bout of oligarchy in 404. A Cypriot man, Xenophon of Courium, was racked by the Thirty (streblo¯ theis) before being put to death (Lys. 13.54). A similar fate befell Aristophanes of Cholleis, whose Athenian citizenship was first impugned, perhaps a necessary step before putting a man to torture (Lys. 13.59– 60). The era of confrontation with Philip II of Macedon in the mid-fourth century produced several more cases. A certain Antiphon, a disfranchised Athenian48 and an agent of Philip, was racked and executed by the de¯ mos (Dem. 18.132 –133): humeis streblo¯ santes auton apekteinate.49 So was Anaxinus of Oreos.50 His case is especially interesting because the orator Demosthenes was personally involved in it. Anaxinus had come to Athens purportedly to make purchases for Olympias, but Demosthenes (18.137) claimed he was spying for Philip. He had him arrested and eventually put to death. This was part of Demosthenes’ larger political project of driving from Euboea all supporters of Philip (E. M. Harris 1995, 152). The two men were guest-friends,

T3801.indb 154

8/7/06 12:48:15 PM


15 5

however, so Aeschines (3.224 –225) accused his distinguished political rival of having twice racked with his own hand (te¯ sautou kheiri ) a man who had been his host. Demosthenes, we are told, defended the action by saying that the city’s salt was more important than the table of guest-friendship. A final case features a man who was certainly free, though not necessarily Greek: Amphilochus of Macedon. According to one version of Philip’s letter to Athens, a virtual declaration of war preserved in the Demosthenic corpus (Dem. 12), the Athenian general Diopeithes seized Amphilochus, Philip’s ambassador, in violation of international custom. Then, upon the approval of the Athenian Assembly, Diopeithes inflicted upon Amphilochus the most extreme sufferings (tas eskhatas anankas epitheis) to extract the promise of a large ransom (Dem. 12.3.5).51 In ordinary cases, including those involving homicide, Athenian citizens enjoyed legal protection from interrogation via torture thanks to the Skamandrian decree (Harrison 1998, 2 : 150). Whether non-Athenian free Greeks also did remains open to doubt.52 One of two men racked for evidence by the prosecution in On the Murder of Herodes was apparently free (Antiph. 5.49), but may or not have been Greek.53 We know only that he was traveling on the same ship as the defendant and the homicide victim. Legal interpretation of the case is tricky: the murder occurred on Methymna; the defendant resided in Mytilene, where the interrogation via torture took place; but the trial was held in Athens. The victim had been an Athenian citizen.54 Slaves, as we have seen, had little legal protection: their bodies were subject to forms of violence from which the bodies of citizens and metics were exempt. They paid for crimes with physical pain rather than a fine (Dem. 22.55; cf. Dem. 24.167) and were subject to the whim of their masters. Tragedy alludes briefly to slave torture. Oedipus, desperate to learn the truth about his origins, orders that the herdsman’s arm be twisted (Soph. OT 1154); the messenger speech in the Ion recounts how an old slave who handed the young master a poisoned cup was forced against his will to reveal Creusa’s plotting (Eur. Ion 1214).55 In everyday life, violence toward slaves was commonplace; it expressed and reinforced the fundamental relation between free men and slaves (Hunter 1992). In Finley’s words (1980, 95): “If a slave is a property with a soul, a non-person and yet indubitably a biological human being, institutional procedures are to be expected that will degrade and undermine his humanity and so distinguish him from human beings who are not property.” In Athens, torture was one of those procedures.

T3801.indb 155

8/7/06 12:48:16 PM

156


In Antiphon’s Prosecution for Poisoning, a speech dated to the late 420s, a concubine ( pallake¯ ) who was almost certainly a slave56 unwittingly served lethal drinks to two men. Her fate (Antiph. 1.20): In return for this, the woman who did the serving and carried out the deed has the wages she deserved, though in no respect was she the cause—for she was turned over to the public executioner after having been racked on the wheel (to¯ i gar de¯ mokoino¯ i trokhistheisa paredothe¯ )—and so will the other woman who was the cause and planned the deed, if you and the gods are willing. Slave owners could easily use force to exact a confession, though a mere threat sometimes sufficed, as shown by the choice that Euphelitus gave the female slave who had served as go-between in his wife’s adulterous affair (Lys. 1.18): And so it is possible for you to pick whichever you prefer: either to be whipped and thrown into the mill (mastigo¯ theisan eis mulo¯ na empesein) and never once cease from enduring evils of this sort, or to tell the whole truth and suffer no harm, but obtain pardon from me for your mistakes. His goal was not punishment so much as coercion (16): he wanted information. After brief resistance, she confessed all the details and agreed to help catch the guilty pair (19). The speech Against Olympiodorus (Dem. 48) furnishes an example of a slave whose owner actually did put him to the torture. The slave, named Moschion, was a color-grinder in a textile establishment and had embezzled money from his late master, Comon. Under the threat of torture ( prin basanizesthai, 16), he confessed to stealing 1,000 drachmae, but that was not the end of the matter. A short time later, Comon’s heir, suspecting that more money was at stake, put Moschion to the torture (ebasanisen). On the rack (katateinomenos hupo te¯ s basanou, 18), he confessed to having taken a further 7,000 drachmae (seventy minae), which he agreed to give back. It is important to note that the confessions of Moschion and of the go-between in Lysias 1 occurred within the household and did not form part of a legal proceeding; the lawsuits were initiated later.57 Finally, and most notoriously, slaves could be tortured in private disputes, from homicide cases to inheritance suits, not for any suspected wrongdoing on

T3801.indb 156

8/7/06 12:48:16 PM


15 7

their part but simply to produce courtroom evidence for a litigant. Slaves were often intimately acquainted with the doings of their masters, so a typical question might be: Was so-and-so living in the house at that time? And the slave’s answer, or testimony, was valid only if it had been obtained under torture.58 The basic idea was that torture yielded truth. Page duBois (1991) focuses upon this use of torture and explores its philosophical and social underpinnings in ancient Greek culture. Basanos, the term for “interrogation under torture,” also denoted a “touchstone” for determining the purity of gold. Free men had honor and could be counted upon to tell the truth (Patterson 1982, 86ff.); slaves had to be tortured in order to be believed, and they especially could not be trusted to testify against a master who could punish them later. Since basanos required the consent of both parties (Harrison 1998, 2:148; Mactoux 1980, 47– 48), there was a preliminary procedure, the prokle¯ sis eis basanon, which generally worked as follows: One party to the lawsuit would challenge his opponent to hand over a slave for torture. Whoever refused such a challenge would appear to be covering up facts deleterious to himself. On the other hand, whoever accepted a challenge or voluntarily offered a slave would appear confident in the strength of his case.59 The place of prokle¯ sis eis basanon in Athenian legal procedure remains something of a puzzle. Scholars have long observed that the extant speeches contain no slave testimony obtained through a challenge. Why not? One possible explanation is that a challenge, if accepted, would settle the case out of court, and so the resulting testimony would not appear in any courtroom speech (Headlam 1893; Mirhady 1996). An alternative explanation is that the practice was virtually obsolete (Thür 1977; Gagarin 1996). The challenges and counter-challenges are essentially dares (Johnstone 1999, 70 –92). They look like mere rhetorical ploys, and it has even been suggested that the term basanos is shorthand for prokle¯ sis eis basanon—referring to the challenge, not the torture. This suggestion, however, is undermined by evidence from the Rhetoric to Alexander, in which cities are said to rely upon basanos in matters of state. Now, the polis did not engage in challenges; its torturers simply got down to work, as illustrated above in the cases of the Argive man, Xenophon of Courium, Aristophanes of Cholleis, the disfranchised Antiphon, Anaxinus of Oreos, and Amphilochus of Macedon. Therefore basanos must denote either the torture itself or, in some passages, the testimony resulting from it. The intricate procedural questions surrounding prokle¯ sis eis basanon must be left to legal scholars (Todd 1990). But I will argue that basanos was not

T3801.indb 157

8/7/06 12:48:16 PM

158


a legal fiction, nor did the term denote nonviolent interrogation. DuBois (1991, 24 –25) is surely correct in finding in Greek texts a “cultural acceptance of the meaning ‘torture’ for basanos, and an assumption that torture occurred.” Working along the same lines, Mirhady (1996, 122) convincingly insists that the rhetorical ploys involving basanos would have been pointless unless actual torture of slaves for legal testimony sometimes occurred. Finally, slave owners worried about the testimony a slave might give would not free him or her to prevent the interrogation (Antiph. 2.3.4) unless torture was real. We have plenty of evidence that slave testimony—whether extracted by the owner, or by a legal opponent, or by a public torturer employed by the polis—was certainly used in Athenian courts for a broad range of cases. In 415, after Andocides decided to provide information on the mutilation of the Herms, he turned over a male slave for torture.60 Meanwhile, the Prytanes arrested female slaves from the house where the perpetrators had gathered (Andoc. 1.64). The subsequent investigation conducted by the Council and commissioners, which corroborated Andocides’ account on every point (65), must have included interrogation under torture of those slaves.61 At some point after the restoration of democracy in 403, the impiety case against a citizen named Callias ostensibly rested upon the testimony of slaves who hoped to gain their freedom (Lys. 5.3),62 and they must have undergone torture. The legal opponent in Lysias 4 claimed to have put his slaves to the torture (4.15). All in all, torture was part of the culture: it was a familiar practice for which Athenians were emotionally prepared. “Let us suppose,” says Demosthenes to the dikastai (29.40), “that Milyas is being racked on the wheel (epi tou trokhou streblousthai), and let us explore what [Aphobus] would most especially wish him to say.” Just as citizens who felt they had been wronged had personally “to bring the apparatus of authoritative political power to bear against the wrongdoer” (Allen 2000, 4), so the responsibility for judicial torture lay with the particular individuals rather than an impersonal state. Meanwhile, the infrastructure for judicial torture was securely in place.63 Basanos could be conducted in private (Isae. 10.12), or one could use a public venue, including the temple of Hephaestus, the Bouleute¯ rion or Council chamber in the agora below, the Heliaea, and the dikaste¯ rion, wherever it happened to be. One could invite members of the Areopagus to attend.64 The reality of basanos, as well as its public nature, is captured in the following description of typical arbitration proceedings at the Heliaea in the agora (Dem.

T3801.indb 158

8/7/06 12:48:16 PM


15 9

47.12): “Once challenges of this sort have been made, and when someone brings the body [to so¯ ma: the slave in person] and hands it over, many people stand forth and listen attentively to what is said.” Standard methods of torture involved binding the victim to a ladder (klimax), wheel (trokhos), or rack (streble¯ ), where he or she could then be stretched, twisted, whipped, or burned;65 more exotic techniques are listed in Aristophanes’ Frogs for comic effect.66 As discussed in Chapter 4, certain forms of violence were considered barbaric: impalings, mutilations, cannibalism, the use of human hides, and live burial. No one, however, complained that judicial torture was overly cruel. To the contrary, stretching and whipping were accepted forms of coercion. Elaine Scarry observes (1985, 29): “For the torturers, the sheer and simple fact of human agony is made invisible, and the moral fact of inflicting that agony is made neutral by the feigned urgency and significance of the question.” There were public torturers, but sometimes the litigants themselves undertook the task.67 This last fact is highly significant: it suggests a certain comfort level with the infliction of pain. We may recall that Demosthenes could be accused—plausibly as it would seem— of racking Anaxinus of Oreos with his own hand.68 The Discourse of Basanos Challenges Inflicting pain on an innocent witness to gain evidence seems to modern observers very different from and much worse than inflicting pain on a criminal to force confession: it strikes us as juridically absurd and morally horrifying.69 Ancient Athenians, however, do not seem to have been overly concerned with its absurdity, and they declined to comment on its horror. Not that they could forget what pain was: Xenophon, in the Anabasis (1.3.29), says that Greek officers being tortured by Persians surely longed for death. As noted above, the pain of torture is a source of humor in Aristophanes’ Frogs. In forensic speeches, the disputatious rhetoric surrounding basanos focused on the quality of the evidence so obtained without acknowledging the cruelty of torture or any unfairness to the slave. On the one hand, basanos was supposed to yield truth and unmask the lies of others; it offered accuracy, clarity, and the beauty of simplicity and truth.70 If you trusted yourself, and expected to receive compensation for damage to the slave, you would accept a challenge (Dem. 45.62). Basanos was a way to confirm belief or inspire trust (Isae. 8.10, 28, 29). Indeed, it was the strongest kind of evidence—it was impartial, and even democratic.71 Slaves, it was

T3801.indb 159

8/7/06 12:48:16 PM

160


said, tell the truth when tortured (Lycurg. 1.32), in contrast to free men, who do so in accordance with their oaths and pledges (Antiph. 6.25) and out of their respect for justice, to dikaion (Antiph. 6.23). On the other hand, owners worried about what slaves would say: the damning truth (e.g., Dem. 47.10 and 17) or an equally damning untruth, for basanos was a double-edged weapon. True testimony could be incomplete or irrelevant (Dem. 29.40; Gagarin 1996, 16), and the truth itself was in doubt because slaves had incentives to lie. The rhetoricians occasionally imagine the victim’s calculations, offering a sort of folk psychology of torture. Most immediately, the person would want to make the pain stop, as explained in On the Murder of Herodes, a case in which, as we have seen, two people actually were tortured, one fatally. Such a witness, the speaker asserts, will say whatever is likely to please his chief torturers and induce them to stop hurting him (Antiph. 5.31–32); hence, torture does not lead to the truth, as the law supposed. Second, a slave had an incentive to lie because the polis would set him free if he gave evidence against his master that led to a conviction (Antiph. 5.31; see Lys. 5.4 in a case involving a metic; Dorjahn 1971). But folk psychology aside, how would one know whether the slave had told the truth under torture? Demosthenes says that no slave had ever been convicted of giving untrue testimony (30.37). There apparently was no check on what slaves said, since they could not suffer disfranchisement or fines as a perjured citizen would (Antiph. 2.4.7). And finally, we are told that if there was no strict correlation between torture and truth, then a free person, whether citizen or metic, should not be at risk because of a slave (Lys. 4; Antiph. 2.2.7, 2.4.7), especially when citizen testimony was available (Andoc. 1.22). These arguments for and against basanos are more profuse and varied than those recommended in Aristotle’s Rhetoric or in the Aristotelian Rhetoric to Alexander, two late fourth-century handbooks for speech-writers.72 According to the latter, a courtroom speaker who wants to buttress basanos testimony should assert that slaves under torture tell the truth to gain release from suffering—a point that is never spelled out in the extant speeches, though it is generally implicit. To undermine basanos testimony, a speaker should assert that slaves tell lies to gain release from suffering. This argument closely resembles that deployed at Antiphon 5.31–32. In the Rhetoric, Aristotle explores the idea that, depending on their character, some people subjected to force are just as likely to say false things as true, and that testimony obtained in that way is not at all trustworthy. One last criticism of basanos is that slaves

T3801.indb 160

8/7/06 12:48:16 PM


16 1

angry at their masters for turning them over for torture will tell lies against them; this argument is not found in surviving examples of oratory. The Rhetoric and the Rhetoric to Alexander do reflect overall trends in argumentation. They also acknowledge the power of pain and speculate on the psychological state of a person subjected to torture. When it comes to challenges and counter-challenges in the speeches themselves, most references to basanos, including both offers and refusals, are marked by cold indifference.73 Aeschines, for example, in On the Embassy, unflinchingly offers during the trial a number of slaves to support his alibi (2.126): We also introduce our slaves and offer them for interrogation under torture (eis basanon). I will even halt my speech, if the prosecution agrees, for the public torturer (ho de¯ mosios) is present and will conduct the interrogation (basanisie) in front of you, if you so command. Even more typical is the following passage from Against Onetor, where Demosthenes describes a pretrial challenge that met with refusal (30.35 –36): I demanded of him [Onetor] three female slaves, who knew that the woman was living with him and that the property was under the control of these men, so that there might be not only statements about the matters but also testimony extracted through torture (basanoi ). And when I had issued the challenge, and all those present had declared I was saying just things (dikaia), this man [Onetor] was unwilling to have recourse to this accurate test. When a speaker alludes to justice, his concern is always justice for himself as he sees it—in other words, a favorable outcome to the lawsuit. Basanos is either the most just way to resolve disputes (dikaiotaton, Lycurg. 1.29; cf. Antiph. 6.24) or should not be used to condemn a man ( po¯ s dikaion? Antiph. 5.7). For the slaves subjected to torture, there is no such thing as justice or injustice. Slave owners should simply use their property to greatest advantage: the speaker in On a Wound by Premeditation finds it more just (dikaioteron) to have a slave woman tortured than to sell her to raise money (Lys. 4.13). There is at most one exception to the unwritten rule that basanos, for slaves, is not about justice. In Antiphon’s Prosecution for Poisoning, discussed above, the pallake¯ who administered the deadly potion and was therefore

T3801.indb 161

8/7/06 12:48:17 PM

162


tortured and executed is said to have been punished as she deserved (Antiph. 1.20): ekhei ta epikheira ho¯ n axia ¯e n.74 But even here, the speaker seeks to justify her execution, not the torture, for he wants the true culprit to receive the same penalty: death.75 Our sources give the impression that slaves have a moral right to live, which they can compromise by committing a crime; but they do not have a moral right to be spared suffering. Were suffering slaves in ancient Athens ever considered fit objects of pity? Or did their inferior status place them below the realm of the pitiable? Of twenty-nine reported cases of eleos or oiktos in oratory and historiography, the object of pity is never explicitly referred to as a slave.76 But a number of cases involve people defeated in war, or captured, or threatened with same.77 For a free person, the prospect of slavery is inherently pitiable, as reflected in the “reversal of fortune” theme so prominent in Greek literature and aptly illustrated by the real-life tale of Nicostratus from Chapter 2. It is a lesson taught by Homer, when Andromache faces enslavement (Il. 6.450 – 458), and famously dramatized by Euripides in the Trojan Women. The general pitiability of actual slaves is suggested by the existence of slave refuges. The Theseium in Athens, a shrine that may have stood northeast of the Acropolis, offered asylum for slaves fleeing abusive masters; they would hope to be either resold or retained as temple slaves.78 The shrine of the Furies did the same.79 But slaves would be turned away from the shrine of Athena Polias,80 and the general condition of enslavement might be acknowledged as pitiable without any concomitant pity for specific human beings who were already marked off, sometimes literally, as slaves.81 Not surprisingly, the language of pity is altogether absent from passages from forensic rhetoric that deal with basanos, especially the business-like challenges and counter-challenges. My best explanation for the cold tone of basanos passages is that many people felt no pity for slaves subjected to torture, while those who did could not admit it in judicial contexts. So far, I have argued that despite rhetorical grandstanding, the threat of torture was palpable and real, and the discourse surrounding it must be taken seriously. My remaining task is to move closer, if possible, to actual scenes of torture. In our forty-two instances of prokle¯ sis eis basanon, only two challenges are accepted. In both cases, legal opponents involved in pre-trial arbitration meet at the place where the interrogation under torture is supposed to occur, but the procedure breaks down. I propose taking a careful look at both of these accounts on the grounds that (1) they bring us to the brink of basanos, as close as we ever get; (2) they depart briefly from standard rhetorical

T3801.indb 162

8/7/06 12:48:17 PM


16 3

statements for and against slave testimony and instead tell a story. Although their veracity is open to question, these are the most promising texts for pursuing further the emotional responses and moral attitudes of Athenians with regard to the torture of slaves.82 That is to say, we cannot be certain of the purported facts; nevertheless, we can identify and interpret assumptions that are being made. Demosthenes 37.40 – 43 the tale of the moneylender’s slave The speech Against Pantaenetus, found in the Demosthenic corpus but almost certainly composed by someone other than the famous orator, is obscure and difficult. Dated to c. 346, it concerns a dispute over a silver mine. Pantaenetus had been leasing a mining property in Maroneia in the region of Laurium in southeast Attica. He was having trouble paying his debts to Mnesicles, its effective owner, and so a new arrangement was reached: Mnesicles sold the mine to moneylenders Nicobulus and Evergus. Pantaenetus continued to run it, but once again ran short of funds and could not pay the required interest, so Evergus seized the property, along with thirty mining slaves and some silver. The moneylenders then sold the property to someone else (29–31). Pantaenetus successfully sued Evergus and received two talents. He then sued Nicobulus, the other moneylender, who in this speech protests his innocence: Nicobulus was in Pontus when the mine was seized, sold it only at Pantaenetus’ request, holds a release that his opponent earlier signed, and seeks to convince the dikastai that the case is inadmissible. Nicobulus complains of what happened after Pantaenetus demanded to torture a slave: (40) He reads me a long challenge, demanding that a house slave who he said had knowledge of these things be put to the torture, and if [his suspicions] were true, I would owe him the disregarded penalty, and if false, the torturer Mnesicles would judge the value of the boy. Having taken securities for this from me, and after I sealed the challenge—not as if it were just (dikaion), (41) for where is it a just thing (pou gar esti dikaion) to owe two talents, or for a bringer of frivolous suits to be fined nothing, all depending on the body and life of a house slave? But I, wishing very much to excel in what is just ( pollo¯ i to¯ i dikaio¯ i perieinai boulomenos), went along. And after this he summons me in the suit again, as soon as he had taken up his deposits. Thus it was immediately clear that he was not going

T3801.indb 163

8/7/06 12:48:17 PM

164


to stick with the rules that he himself had defined. (42) And when we came to the torturer, instead of opening the challenge and showing what had been written and doing in accordance with it what seemed best—for on account of the din when he issued the challenge, and the fact that the case was about to be called, it was like this: “I challenge you.” “I accept.” “Produce your ring.” “Take it.” “Who provides the securities?” “This man here.” Nor did I make a copy, nor did I do anything of that sort. Instead of following the steps as I say, he demanded to torture the man himself, and grabbing hold of him he dragged him, and he left undone no insult. (43) And for my part I thought, men of the jury, how great an advantage it is to shape one’s own life.83 For it seemed to me that I suffered these things (tauta paskhein) being scorned for living life simply and as I was made to, and that I was paying the penalty by enduring these enormities ( pammegethe¯ taut’ anekhomenos). The passage has attracted the attention of legal scholars because it contains a prokle¯ sis in the form of a dialogue, complete with details of the ring, securities, the sealing of the challenge, and the rules governing the basanos, each one of which seems to have been broken. My focus will be the moral rather than the legal content of the passage. emotion and moral attitudes in demosthenes 37 The ethos of the speaker in Against Pantaenetus clearly presented a difficulty for the logographer. As we are told, Nicobulus is a moneylender, and Athenians hate moneylenders (52, 54). It will therefore be easy for his opponent to paint the man as odious, epiphthonos. Pantaenetus will exploit Nicobulus’ admittedly unpleasant demeanor. He supposedly plans to say that Nicobulus walks fast, talks loudly, and carries a stick: takheo¯ s badizei, kai mega phthengetai, kai bakte¯ rian phorei (52). The speaker, though unable to deny these flaws, which he blames on nature (55),84 must somehow distance himself from others of his occupation. He therefore says that he does not like hardhearted moneylenders either (53). He merely does a bit of lending on the side and should not be considered one of them (54). Rather, he is a fair and honest businessman who treats debtors well (54). He takes risks by going to sea (54). He suffered serious losses on his recent trip to Pontus and was confronted with a strange situation upon his return home (10). He asked Mnesicles, who had made the arrangement, to set matters straight (11). He

T3801.indb 164

8/7/06 12:48:17 PM


16 5

sought the simplest way out, without scheming (13), and reached an independent settlement with Pantaenetus (15 –16). He is innocent of any wrongdoing toward the man (1, 2, and passim). He is a clear thinker who perceives the contradictions in his opponent’s stories (6), and his unpleasant demeanor is wholly irrelevant (57). The character portrait of Pantaenetus, on the other hand, is straightforward and easily managed. According to the speaker, his opponent is shameless and malicious (3). Pantaenetus has filed a baseless suit (2, 13, and passim). He changes his story (6) and wants to receive damages for the same loss twice (8). He is a thoroughly bad person, kakoe¯ the¯ , who double-crossed Evergus and Nicobulus (15). He is an all-round shameless liar (21, 45) who deceives the dikastai (48). The speaker, in apostrophe, addresses Pantaenetus as the most worthless of men: ¯o phaulotat’ anthro¯ po¯ n (30). Pantaenetus has rolled disparate charges into a single case (33), cannot satisfy his creditors, and deserves to be hated (49). Nicobulus opens and closes his speech with the fact that Pantaenetus signed a release: the present suit is groundless and should never have come to court. How does the basanos scene fit in with the overarching argument of the speech? Why is it there? The reason, I suggest, is two-fold and closely linked to the purposeful character portraits just described. First, the scene emphasizes the fact that the moneylender, honest and clear in the strength of his own position, accepted the challenge to submit his slave for torture. Second, it illustrates the erratic behavior of Pantaenetus, who seems to have his own agenda and cannot follow rules. This behavior consists of suddenly rejecting the terms for the basanos that he himself had set, and attempting to torture the slave himself, presumably so that he could secure the answers he desired. It is not clear what actually happened to the slave: Pantaenetus allegedly “dragged” him (heilke) and “left undone no insult” (eneleipen ouden aselgeias). With this, the interrogation collapsed. The most striking element of this passage, for a modern reader, is the unabashed juxtaposition of the physical violence directed at the slave— whatever that may have consisted of—with the moneylender’s whining complaint about his own psychological sufferings. Earlier, Nicobulus asked rhetorically how it could be just (dikaion) that the outcome of the case might rest upon the body and life of a slave (41). This question is consistent with the discourse of basanos that restricts issues of justice to the slave owner, as discussed above. Nicobulus complains about the treatment he has suffered and says he is paying the penalty for being himself, namely, a moneylender

T3801.indb 165

8/7/06 12:48:17 PM

166


with an unpleasant demeanor. The slave is incidental, and we are given no particulars about him. He is not identified with the slave who allegedly dispossessed Pantaenetus (23 –26, 44, 50 –51) and whom Nicobulus presents in court (44). Rather, he is simply “a house slave who shared knowledge of these affairs” (40). His owner expresses neither empathy nor pity for him. Nicobulus is prepared to accept fair recompense if the slave is damaged (40). And just when Nicobulus appears to be objecting to the rough handling of his slave, it turns out what he really objects to is the insult dealt him via his slave property (43): “For it seemed to me that I suffered these things being scorned for living life simply and as I was made to, and that I was paying the penalty by enduring these enormities.” 85 Nicobulus clearly expects the dikastai to sympathize with him for the blow to his pride, assuming that his own self-promoting character portrait has won them over. The tale of the moneylender’s slave, then, would tend to confirm my suspicion that many Athenians felt no pity for the real or prospective suffering of slaves, most of whom were regarded as mere proxies or tools.

Isocrates 17.15 –16 the tale of cittus The seventeenth oration of Isocrates, the Trapeziticus, is one of several speeches involving Pasion, the father of the Apollodorus of Chapter 2. Pasion is a fascinating figure because, starting from the position of slavery, he gained his freedom, earned the trust of the bankers for whom he worked, and eventually took over their bank.86 Subsequently he made generous gifts to the city, and the Athenians voted him the rights of citizenship. He represents the single most celebrated example of upward mobility in ancient Athens (Hervagault and Mactoux 1974). The Trapeziticus was written c. 393 for a wealthy foreigner, a Pontine, who brought suit against Pasion over a missing deposit. The speaker’s father was a powerful vassal of Satyrus, the king of Pontus; he himself had come to Athens to conduct business and see the sights. When the father fell briefly from favor, Satyrus demanded that the speaker send all his money back to Pontus. As the story goes, Pasion promised to help him hide part of it. That sum was so well hidden, however, that the banker later denied its existence and refused to restore it. Hence the lawsuit, in the course of which the speaker issued a challenge: he demanded for basanos one of Pasion’s slaves,

T3801.indb 166

8/7/06 12:48:17 PM


16 7

a man named Cittus, who knew about the deposit. Pasion allegedly hid Cittus; and when Cittus was found, Pasion said he was a freedman, not a slave, and therefore could not be subjected to basanos. Eventually, however, he admitted that Cittus was a slave, accepted the prokle¯ sis, and arranged for the interrogation: (15) So this was what he had done, men of the jury; and deeming that he had clearly missed the mark so far, and thinking that henceforth he would set things straight, he came to us claiming that he was ready to turn over the boy for torture. Having chosen torturers, we met in the temple of Hephaestus, and I demanded that they flog the proffered slave and rack him until he should seem to them to be speaking the truth. But this fellow Pasion claimed that they had not been chosen as torturers, but he told them to question the boy orally if there was something they wanted. (16) Since we were in disagreement, the torturers themselves said they would not torture him, but approved that Pasion should turn over the boy to me. But this man wanted so much to avoid the basanos that he was unwilling to obey their request to turn him over; but he was ready to pay back the money, if they decided against him. [Witnesses are brought forward.] The interrogation in the temple of Hephaestus, a setting that may recall the role of the smithy god in the mythical torture of Prometheus, thus reaches a curious impasse: Pasion abruptly withdraws permission to torture Cittus. The public torturers will not commence; they merely recommend that Pasion turn the slave over to the speaker, and he chooses to ignore their recommendation.87 What is going on here? How can we account for the breakdown of the agreed-upon arrangement? How does this scene fit in with the rest of the speech? emotion and moral attitudes in isocrates 17 Overall, the speaker is seeking to gain or regain a large sum of money without ruining his reputation; reputation is the keynote on which the speech opens and closes. Our man from Pontus is relatively young and very rich, with powerful connections (3). Thanks to the help of his logographer Isocrates, he seems comfortable with Athenian legal procedure, but that will not have surprised the dikastai. Instead, they are asked to consider his prestigious link to the king of Pontus: he actually carries a letter of support written by

T3801.indb 167

8/7/06 12:48:18 PM

168


Satyrus (52). They are also reminded of the tangible friendliness that Satyrus and the speaker’s father have shown Athenian merchants: in the past, they allowed them to export grain from Pontus when other ships were sent away empty (57). Within this context of impressive associations, the dikastai are encouraged to observe that the speaker behaves reasonably, whereas Pasion does not. In the matter of the disputed financial arrangement, it was one man’s word against another’s. Neither was an Athenian, but Pasion had lived in the city a long time, and his standing was excellent. His success as a banker depended upon his reputation for honesty. The speaker therefore needs to undermine his listeners’ confidence in Pasion, a project he announces early in the speech (2). He never mentions Pasion’s former status as a slave, but does impugn his character. This is our only unflattering depiction of the banker, who elsewhere in the corpus emerges as a person who is highly respected despite his servile birth (Trevett 1992, 177). Ultimately, the present lawsuit seems not to have damaged Pasion: he was later made a citizen and continued banking until he died a rich man in 370/69. But it is necessary to examine more closely the negative character portrait of Pasion, and especially his response to the prokle¯ sis eis basanon. The speaker first establishes how great had been his initial confidence in the banker. He entrusted him with his problems as well as his money because he was on such familiar terms with him (6): oikeio¯ s pros auton diekeime¯ n. Later in the speech, he says that Pasion had been his closest associate in Athens (47). The two men put their heads together and came up with a plan to keep a substantial sum hidden from Satyrus (7). The speaker, perhaps to appease dikastai who know and respect Pasion, says that he counted on his eunoia—but that the banker immediately began scheming, because the sum to be gained justified disgraceful means (8): axi’ anaiskhuntias. A long, strident, and often redundant denunciation follows, in which the speaker purports to know exactly what was going on in Pasion’s mind (e.g., 9, 16, 22, 29). Pasion is bold, shameless, fearless (14). He breaks his pledge of secrecy (19). Most outrageous of all, he bribes some slaves to falsify the letter of agreement (23): in so doing he becomes the most presumptuous of all men, thrasutatos hapanto¯ n anthro¯ po¯ n. Pasion’s case consequently rests upon a forged document, and the speaker must unmask his wickedness, pone¯ rian (24). Pasion does not want to be caught at trickery, panourgo¯ n (28). The dikastai should believe the speaker rather than Pasion, whose motives are bad

T3801.indb 168

8/7/06 12:48:18 PM


16 9

(29). Pasion keeps bad company and makes dishonest schemes (33, 46, etc.). He has tried to persuade some people that the speaker owed him money; he bolsters his case with poor proofs in order to deprive the speaker of what is rightfully his (35). He dared deny the existence of the deposit (45): to pro¯ ton etolme¯ sen exarnos genesthai. He takes advantage of the speaker’s misfortunes (46). His claims are absurd and unbelievable (48): te¯ n atopian kai te¯ n apistian. He contradicts himself (49). He cannot be trusted in one-on-one dealings, monos pros monon (50). The dikastai should not believe Pasion’s arguments since they are lies (58): tous Pasio¯ nos logous pseudeis ontas. The banker’s alleged behavior vis-à-vis Cittus is designed to demonstrate two intertwined points: his dishonesty and his desperation. Cittus, who sat at the banking table and handled large sums of money (12), was fully aware of the arrangement between Pasion and the rich man from Pontus: sune¯ idei peri to¯ n khre¯ mato¯ n (11; cf. 27, 53). Pasion therefore would do anything to keep Cittus from being interrogated under torture. First, Pasion hides Cittus (11). Then he tells the strangest story of all, logon panto¯ n deinotaton (12): he says the speaker and the speaker’s friend Menexenus bribed Cittus, then kidnapped and hid him themselves. Pasion lodges a counter-charge, and at this point seems to be losing his grip: he is vexed and weeping as he drags the speaker before the Polemarch: kai tauta lego¯ n kai aganakto¯ n kai dakruo¯ n heilke me pros ton polemarkhon (12). Menexenus then discovers Cittus and demands basanos (13). At this point, Pasion claims that Cittus is not a slave at all (14). He secures his release on those grounds—and by paying an implausibly large security of seven talents. Yet later he realizes that he has made a mistake and says he is ready to turn over the slave for torture (15). During and after the basanos scene at the temple of Hephaestus, signs of emotional imbalance allegedly continue. Pasion admits that he had behaved unjustly and had done terrible things (17): adikein kai deina poiein. From here on out, Pasion is made to look desperate. Despite his professional standing and expertise, he resorts to emotional displays that suggest loss of control. He begs for a meeting at a temple on the Acropolis (17). Then, when the two men meet (18), Pasion covers his head and weeps, enkalupsamenos eklae. He says he was compelled by aporia to deny the deposit: he was at an impasse but would try to come up with the money soon. He begs the speaker’s forgiveness and discretion. A similar scene occurs when the speaker’s friend Menexenus takes separate legal action against Pasion. The banker begs the speaker to appease Menexenus, since he doesn’t wish to become a laughing-stock,

T3801.indb 169

8/7/06 12:48:18 PM

17 0


katagelastos (21). He is dejected (tapeinos) and afraid (ededoikei) and doesn’t know what to do (22). His actions are illogical (48), and he contradicts himself (49): enanti’ autos hauto¯ i kai lego¯ n kai pratto¯ n phaneros estin. Let us now return to the interesting juncture at which the basanos almost takes place. There, inside the temple, with the torturers close at hand, and witnesses who will observe the proceedings (summoned after 16), Pasion retracts his permission. He suddenly changes his mind. Why? The standard interpretation is the one promoted by the speaker: Pasion vehemently wishes to escape the basanos procedure (16) because he has something to hide. His sudden refusal, we are assured, reflects his guilt. From a technical point of view, such a refusal would have only one meaning in a court of law. And the motive of guilty concealment can certainly explain why Pasion, in a typical ploy, earlier denied that Cittus was a slave (14).88 The same motive, however, cannot adequately account for the remarkable scene at the Hephaesteion. Let us suppose that Pasion is guilty. If Cittus, under torture, reveals the whole truth, as the speaker hopes (21), Pasion will be incriminated. But who knows what the man will actually say? And Pasion’s repeated refusal of basanos also incriminates him—as he obviously realizes, or he would never have agreed to surrender Cittus in the first place. He would not have chosen basanistai or kept his appointment in the temple, actions confirming that Cittus really was a slave and therefore subject to basanos, a fact he had earlier denied.89 Pasion is caught in a muddle and at this point has nothing to gain by refusing basanos again. Indeed, his sudden and very public refusal becomes the single most crucial piece of evidence in the case against the banker: it is the megiston . . . tekme¯ rion (53). It “proves” that he is lying about the deposit. It makes him look desperate. He is even represented as offering to pay back the missing deposit—thereby tacitly conceding the case and accepting the financial consequences. For a modern historian, the only secure facts are that Pasion agreed to basanos and then backed out. Other details must be regarded as suspect: the speaker goes on to exploit and embellish this episode as often as he can (17, 28 –29, 53 –54). But the scene at the temple of Hephaestus undoubtedly signified a loss of face for Pasion, a sharp blow in a society where status competition, played out on the streets and in the courts, was tremendously important. If Pasion is innocent, he should be willing to put Cittus to the test. Why back out now? But even if Pasion is guilty, he might as well let the basanos

T3801.indb 170

8/7/06 12:48:18 PM


171

take place. This change of heart is not in his best interests, because jurors are bound to read Pasion’s refusal as a concession of guilt. An alternative interpretation would attribute to Pasion a protective motive. Gagarin has suggested that Pasion wished to protect Cittus, his valued property, from damage, “since if he were seriously injured, no ordinary compensation would be adequate” (1996, 15). This is possible, and the high value of Cittus is indicated by the large sum that Pasion allegedly paid as a security for him, but the scene contains no discussion of compensation, as there was in Against Pantaenetus. Therefore we should consider yet another possibility—that Pasion empathized with Cittus and wanted to protect him from pain and suffering. It is important to consider how closely he has worked with Cittus, and for how long—years, perhaps, since Cittus handles such important tasks. The designation pais is misleading: male slaves, young or old, could be called “boy.” Cittus was clearly a mature male, Greek-speaking, and probably literate. He was deeply involved in the day-to-day workings of the bank (12). Whatever his dress and bearing may have been, he could pass for a free Greek (17). On his trip to Pontus, where he represented Pasion, he posed as a freeman from Miletus (51). Indeed, Cittus and the speaker shared an audience with Satyrus (52). So his master, who had given him this assignment, must regard him highly. And Pasion has much in common with Cittus, for Pasion himself was once a slave, working in this very bank, having risen above the other slaves to perform skilled labor as chief cashier and manager.90 It would be surprising if Pasion did not empathize with Cittus. They were probably friends. When trouble started, Pasion first hid Cittus, then denied his servile status, but then gave in to the pressure for basanos. Perhaps, at the last moment, confronted with the basanistai and their implements, Pasion simply could not stand to let Cittus be tortured. A sympathetic and protective motive furnishes the most convincing explanation for his sudden change of mind. I admit that this explanation cannot be proved. There is no trace of empathy in the language of the passage itself. Rather, my case is based on circumstantial evidence. Conclusions Narratives discussed in previous chapters have shown the varying degrees of pity, empathy, or philanthro¯ pia that ought to be extended to kin, friends, and

T3801.indb 171

8/7/06 12:48:18 PM

17 2


fellow citizens in particular circumstances. Taken together, they corroborate the self-image of Athenians who thought of their city as kindly and humane: houto¯ s he¯ meroi kai philanthro¯ poi tous tropous (Dem. 21.46 or 48). But such attitudes did not apply to slaves under torture. Citizens jealously defended the line between free men and slaves, often through violence, and Finley finds only rare hints of “doubts or guilt-feelings in the master class” (1980, 99). With the exception of Trapeziticus, the speeches reveal no hint of pity or empathy for slaves faced with basanos. References to it are uniformly detached and pitiless. When the speaker of On the Murder of Herodes objects that his opponents tortured a slave witness and then illegally put him to death, his point is not that this treatment was cruel, but that he, the defendant, has been wrongly deprived of the opportunity to interrogate the slave in the same way himself (Antiph. 5.46). Demosthenes, eager to keep Milyas from being tortured, insists that he is free, but blithely offers for basanos another servant who is indisputably a slave (Dem. 29.14, 21), and also some female slaves who could testify to the free status of Milyas (25). Is there any chance that some Athenians shrank from basanos because it was cruel and inhumane, or because it was unfair to the slave? Did they ever try to protect servile members of the household? Surely the answer is yes. Most slaves threatened with or subjected to torture were necessarily close to the oikos (Lycurg. 1.33). Some will have been on amicable terms with their owners, or even sexually close (Lys. 4),91 and Hunter speculates that “ethical or sentimental considerations” might have induced the head of an oikos to refuse to turn over his slave (1994, 91). It seems likely that free people who embraced an ¯e thos of pity while participating in a cruel system sometimes experienced psychological conflict. Moreover, the line between slave and free, so sharp in Athenian ideology, was in reality blurred, and that fact must have created special problems for some individuals. The tale of Cittus in the Trapeziticus, where Pasion attempts to shield his slave, illustrates the problem. Basanos was double-edged because you could not know what the slave would say—and for Pasion, himself an ex-slave, it was doubly so. This situation, however, should probably be regarded as exceptional. The moneylender’s tale in Against Pantaenetus, which indicates a stark indifference toward the slave, most likely represents the rule. In the end, we cannot know how most Athenians actually felt about slave torture, but we do know they were not expected to display pity. It might be argued that the rhetorical context is deceptive, that the cold language is strictly a function of genre. But courtroom posturing cannot account for it

T3801.indb 172

8/7/06 12:48:18 PM


173

all. Rather, it indicates that the status of slaves marked them off as ineligible for pity when the court case of a free man was at stake. Slavery in most societies creates a world apart, to which the term “social death” has aptly been applied (Patterson 1982). That term resonates in ancient Athens, too, though slaves were not typically regarded as subhuman. They lived and worked in close proximity with free men, so the Athenians knew them well. It was not Aristotle’s human logos that slaves lacked, but honor. They were shut off from each level of a citizen’s concentric rings of obligation, and the city’s vaunted philanthro¯ pia did not apply to them. Evidence from oratory, supplemented by evidence from historiography, upholds the despairing insight offered by Prometheus. Condemned to cruel suffering, the god did not expect to be pitied by anyone but philoi. The plight of slaves, who lacked legally recognized philoi, was that much worse.

T3801.indb 173

8/7/06 12:48:18 PM

Conclusions

The social historian attempts to find out, among other things, what life was like for ordinary people and how society worked: its cultural ideals and its everyday realities. The task is difficult in the case of ancient Greece, since modern scholars must rely upon a limited corpus of literary works that are skewed toward the upper classes, the educated few whose wealth and leisure gave them the freedom to explore ideas. Most ancient literature was written both by and for the male citizen elite; insofar as it commented on the lives of ordinary people, it did so with an elite bias. Evidence from archaeology and epigraphy helps correct this bias and creates additional sources of information about all classes of society. Soil and stone yield up house plans, bathtubs, and honorary decrees that complement the manuscript tradition. These fresh discoveries also spur us to question old texts in new ways. The Athens that has emerged from the latest generation of scholarship is less schematic and idealized, more detailed and gritty than it often was during the nineteenth century and much of the twentieth. The image of sun-struck marble columns and statues against a lofty azure sky has given way to dark mixed with light, forming many shades of gray. Democracy and chattel slavery developed hand in hand; the civic prosperity that sponsored the Parthenon arose in part from silver extracted in state-owned mines by thousands of slaves working under lethal conditions; women in Athens were demonstrably more oppressed than those in other Greek city-states. The achievements of the Greeks are now measured against their flaws, and the philhellenic reverence that has sustained Americans from Isadora Duncan to Victor D. Hanson and Jon Heath in Who Killed Homer? has for the most part been replaced by a more complex understanding.1 Indeed, the last thirty years have seen tremendous advances in our knowledge of the ancient

N L 74

T3801.indb 174

8/7/06 12:48:19 PM

c onc l usi ons

175

world: thanks to the painstaking work of scholars posing fresh questions, we know much more than we did before about the fabric of ancient society. Our view of ancient Athens now incorporates the rural demes of Attica as well as the urban center; we know more about how Athenians organized both oikos and polis; we understand better than before the social structures and networks that tied Athenians together, including the bonds of kinship, friendship, and citizenship. It would be interesting to examine how the Athenians, at an institutional level, dealt with suffering—through the state-sponsored dole, for example, or the pooled resources of clubs and associations—in a much-needed update to A. R. Hands’ Charities and Social Aid in Greece and Rome (1968). But it is also worthwhile to consider the standpoint of the individual moral agent confronted with the pain or jeopardy of another human being—to follow in this way the theme of other-concern that winds like Ariadne’s thread through the labyrinth of social relations, linking one part of society to the next, contributing to social cohesion. The architecture of Greek houses “suggests that a concept of privacy and of private (as opposed to public) life was already emerging by . . . the late fifth century” (Nevett 1999, 155), but the emotional responses and moral attitudes inculcated through close relationships among philoi could be carried from the household into the courtroom or agora: eleos was explicitly something that one might “bring from home” (Dem. 25.81). Conversely, the notion of shared humanity may have served as a reminder, within the oikos or on the city streets or on military campaign, of how one should behave— of what it meant to be an Athenian and hence part of a community that imagined itself to be especially civilized and compassionate. For this was an important aspect of the self-image of Athens. The speaker of For the Invalid, dated to 403 or shortly thereafter, says that Athenians are the most pitying: elee¯ monestatoi.2 Fifty years later, Isocrates uses similar language in his Antidosis, where the Athenians are said to be the most pitying and gentle.3 Demosthenes, in a letter dated to 323, urges leniency toward the sons of Lycurgus on the grounds that Athenians are always ready to show pity and humanity (Dem. Ep. 3.22): eleon kai philanthro¯ pian. In the courtroom, meanwhile, litigants could be praised for their capacity for pity or excoriated for a lack thereof.4 It would seem that other-concern could serve as a yardstick for measuring the worth of the polis or ethnos and the people in it. To the question of what, in ancient Athens, one was supposed to do in the face of another person’s misery, there can be no simple answer. Yet Athenian society did embrace certain unwritten rules of behavior, normative or

T3801.indb 175

8/7/06 12:48:19 PM

17 6


perhaps idealized expectations, that can be recovered piecemeal through systematic study and close readings of literary texts. The morality tales examined in this book, subjected to a close reading, reveal ordinary ways of speaking about moral obligation, through rhetoric that in its own day was neither didactic nor exhortatory: it more quietly reflected and invited judgments about good and bad behavior. These tales, taken in context, pinpoint how Athenians were, at their best, expected to behave in the various crises with which life presented them. They also illustrate how moral rhetoric could forge a connection between the collective ideal and individual citizens, as Athenians were encouraged to bring their personal behavior into line with the ideals of the polis. Ultimately, the rhetoric evokes the imagined bonds that helped to hold Athenian society together. Summary of Results The tale of the dying Thrasylochus, found in the Aegineticus of Isocrates and analyzed in Chapter 1, reveals ideal standards of behavior within the first circle of moral obligation: the aid and succor that the speaker claimed to have given his mortally ill friend. The two men were friends from childhood. Although they did not belong to the same oikos, they shared a home in exile. When female relatives declined to nurse the consumptive, the speaker devoted six months to his care. Throughout that period, he was obliged to confront the suffering of his friend, for whom he felt sympathy mixed with disgust. Pity is implied but never named. Ultimately, the argument in the speech rests not so much on what the speaker felt for Thrasylochus as on what he did for him: acts that entailed vigilance, caring, and endurance. In cataloging his disagreeable nursing duties, the speaker hopes to win the admiration of the dikastai and a clear title to the late man’s estate. But even allowing for rhetorical exaggeration, the speaker’s claim to perhaps exceptional devotion, the story shows that care of the sick, especially in a painful or prolonged or contagious illness, would have been a taxing and sometimes perilous undertaking. It also contradicts our common assumption that nursing was women’s work in ancient Athens. Men as well as women, it appears, could become deeply involved with caring for the sick. They had to perform nursing tasks for other males at the very least—though information on care that men may have offered to women or children is lacking—and men were also expected to offer emotional comfort and commiseration. The tale of Nicostratus, found in Demosthenes 53 and analyzed in Chapter 2, takes us into the second circle of moral obligation. The ties of

S N L 176

T3801.indb 176

8/7/06 12:48:19 PM

c onc l usi ons

177

philia between the two principal characters, the speaker Apollodorus and his neighbor Nicostratus, were recently formed and superficial. Yet the latter, having been ransomed for 26 minae, pressed Apollodorus to pay off the debt. This story furnishes a glimpse into a world marked by radical insecurity: the threat of capture, the difficulties of redeeming a captive complete with financial repercussions and the stress placed on families and friends. It also provides a rare model of relations between neighbors, one rich and one of middling means, enmeshed in an unequal friendship. In this instance, pity governed the actions of the moral agent but produced bad results, and we are made to realize that pity in and of itself is an unreliable guide to action. In the end, the tale of Nicostratus suggests that reasonable limits should be placed on aid to friends and acquaintances within the second circle. In Chapter 3, one story from Lysias and another from Demosthenes take us to the third circle of moral obligation, among fellow citizens in Athens. The tale of Theodotus in Against Simon and the tale of Ariston in Against Conon suggest the range of expectations laid upon Athenians who happened to be present at the scene of a street crime. Although a man will have felt obliged to physically defend a relative or close friend, and even risk his life, he did not have to do so for a stranger. A good citizen, it would appear, was obliged only to stand by as an eyewitness to street crime. He could defend the principle of justice verbally, either on the spot or later, in the courtroom; he could, in effect, offer solidarity without self-sacrifice. In the context of street life in Athens, a sense of shared citizenship and shared humanity proves important, and these are all facets of philia. Chapter 4 studied the behavior of Athenians whose military service carried them far away from Athens and Attica. It also dealt with two narratives: the tale of the retreat from Syracuse, found in Book 7 of Thucydides, and the tale of the half-dead soldier, found in Book 5 of Xenophon’s Anabasis. These stories suggest that able-bodied fifth-century warriors were expected to carry their sick and wounded comrades. Obviously, this would have been no easy feat: it would have required considerable effort and sacrifice on the part of the able-bodied. The departure from Syracuse is imbued with a sense of pity for all the sick and wounded soldiers abandoned by the rest; it strongly suggests the closeness of ties men felt for relatives and friends. The tale of the half-dead soldier from the Anabasis shows that Xenophon felt responsible for the anonymous man he found collapsed by the wayside: he tried to save the soldier, as he tried to save others among the Ten Thousand, and for actions like these he expects appreciation. In justifying the blow he dealt a muleteer who tried to bury the sick man, he invites his listeners to empathize with the

T3801.indb 177

8/7/06 12:48:19 PM

S N L 177

17 8


latter, and this appeal to shared humanity proves effective. Taken together, these two stories reveal the expectations laid upon soldiers with respect to all three circles of moral obligation. Indeed, on military campaign and far from home, expectations for helping behavior in the context of philia expand beyond the circle of fellow Athenians to encompass fellow Greeks as well. Chapter 5 brought us back to Athens and subjected Athenians to an anachronistic test that they were bound to fail. When it came to the torture of slaves for legal evidence, their vaunted philanthro¯ pia fell short, and the real or prospective suffering of slaves seemed to evoke, in most cases, no fellow-feeling at all. The discourse of the Athenian courtroom obviously did not encourage expressions of sympathy. But the evidence from Against Pantaenetus and many other speeches also suggests that pity or humanity or empathy for slaves was mostly lacking—that such thoughts and emotions were reserved for kin, friends, fellow citizens, or even fellow Greeks, social categories from which slaves were, by definition, excluded. The stark conceptual opposition between slave and free gave Athenians a kind of ideological armor that inured them to the suffering of slaves. Yet that armor did have chinks, and the exslave Pasion, in Trapeziticus, seems to have wanted to protect his slave from torture. A Final Reckoning Real suffering is a sordid business, difficult to transcend. Tragedy, as I see it, tended to make suffering sublime— conferred on it a sort of grandeur.5 Tragedy also made people’s responses to suffering clearer and cleaner than in everyday life, and held up ideal standards of behavior. The realities, one may imagine, often fell short of the ideal, and it is not surprising to hear Isocrates complain that some people weep in the theater but take pleasure in the actual sufferings of others (4.167–169). The present study of responses to suffering in ancient Athens has been one-sided, for it has failed to explore the dark and negative emotions that someone else’s pain can inspire: sadism, malicious joy, the pleasure of vengeance against enemies. Most of the narratives yield fresh insights about philia, the positive affective bonds that held Athenian society together, treated at length by Aristotle in Books 8 and 9 of the Nicomachean Ethics. Aristotle, too, dwells on the bright side of philia, though he occasionally notes its importance in adversity as well: friends are a refuge from penury and other misfortunes (8.1.2, cf. 8.5.3); military comrades call on one another (8.9.1). A friend’s precise obligations, he says, vary

S N L 178

T3801.indb 178

8/7/06 12:48:19 PM

c onc l usi ons

179

according to the tie (8.9.2 –3). My results in no way disagree with the observations of the philosopher. Rather, a close reading of the selected narratives helps to fill in the picture that Aristotle barely sketches, and identifies specific actions that Athenians were expected to perform but for which they seldom or never get credit. Ancient Greeks have often been measured against standards of Christian compassion and been found lacking. The Reverend Mahaffy, writing in the late nineteenth century, called Athenian society “deeply selfish” (1875, 146). He commented that, “with all their intellect, and all their subtlety, the Greeks were wanting in heart. Their humanity was spasmodic, not constant. Their kindness was limited to friends and family, and included no chivalry to foes or to helpless slaves” (243). More recently, Kenneth Dover (1974, 201) remarked: “In certain important respects we may judge the Athenians lacking in compassion, notably in the individual’s reluctance to involve himself in the . . . misfortunes of another.” I believe, however, that the Athenians deserve more credit than that.6 Mahaffy and Dover both underestimate how taxing it must have been merely to fulfill one’s immediate obligations to relatives and friends and fellow citizens. Life was hard, and most Athenians will have had more than enough to do. If we remove the Christian lens of Mahaffy, and focus more sharply on pity and compassion than Dover was able to do, we find that Athenians during the classical period did something quite remarkable: they invented a humanitarian ideal that extended, in theory, to fellow Greeks. It became part of civic ideology when Athens, having fended off Persia, assumed the leadership of the Delian League and acquired an empire. For concrete historical reasons, Athens claimed to be not only powerful but also compassionate (Tzanetou 2005). In the exercise of political power at Athens, there was little room for pity (Lateiner 2005); but on the level of individual and personal decisions, the ideals of the city-state might be put into practice. Scholars have often claimed something of a sea change—from harshness and austerity in the fifth century to greater gentleness in the fourth, as de Romilly (1979) has shown. Of the eight tales analyzed in this book, the earliest is the retreat from Syracuse, which dates to 413. It and all the rest therefore reflect attitudes that postdate the watershed defeat of Athens in the Peloponnesian War. Given these narrow chronological limits, it would be reckless to posit change over time, but the writings of Xenophon and Isocrates and Demosthenes do suggest that Athenians in the fourth century thought of themselves as pitying and humane. This civic self-image, it would seem, was not unfounded. Toward

T3801.indb 179

8/7/06 12:48:19 PM

S N L 179

18 0


kin, friends, and fellow citizens, many of them probably were helpful— or tried to be—because that sort of behavior was expected. Tragedy, which showed how to help friends and harm enemies (Blundell 1989), often promoted pity and compassion. And tragedy was part of civic education: it fed popular morality. Plato could worry that tragedy weakened its viewers, while Aristotle defended the katharsis that it offered, but both philosophers knew that Athenians attended the dramatic festivals in large numbers and imbibed the lessons of their poets. Tragedy called attention to the problem of suffering and modeled appropriate responses to it (Johnson and Clapp 2005; Falkner 2005). The connection between tragedy and everyday life remains problematic, but it cannot be dismissed on that account. If Isocrates (4.168) questioned the relevance of tragic pity to pity in everyday life, we may legitimately ask how the poetic material of tragedy and epic compares with prosaic accounts from oratory and historiography. The complaint of the Nurse in Hippolytus presupposed that members of the oikos should offer constant care to the sick, and this expectation is strongly present in Isocrates’ Aegineticus. The ransom of Hector, a Homeric theme and the subject of a lost tragedy, suggests that families should give up great wealth to win back a captured relative, and that same picture emerges from the tale of Nicostratus in Demosthenes 53. The dithering Old Men in the chorus of the Agamemnon reflect the ambivalence of bystanders to crime, an observation borne out by Lysias’ Against Simon and Demosthenes’ Against Conon. In Sophocles’ Philoctetes, companions of the wounded man should never have abandoned him, as Thucydides’ retreat from Syracuse and Xenophon’s Anabasis show. And the god Prometheus, chained to his rock, expected pity only from his philoi, a relationship denied to Athenian slaves, while the courtroom discourse of basanos highlights a slave’s social and moral isolation. In the end, one must bear in mind the admonition of Isocrates, who notes the risk of showing kindness in the wrong places (Isoc. 1.29). A streak of pragmatism runs throughout the material. Not surprisingly, popular morality set sensible Aristotelian limits for compassion: a person nursing the sick must guard his own health; a man should not give his neighbor too much money; a bystander to crime need not risk his life to save a stranger; retreating soldiers should help their incapacitated comrades if possible, yet keep on going. Nevertheless, Athenians embraced high standards for helping behavior. Citizens who met— or appeared to meet—those standards reaped tangible and intangible rewards: the successful outcome of a court case, the

S N L 180

T3801.indb 180

8/7/06 12:48:20 PM

c onc l usi ons

181

inner satisfaction of having been a true friend, an ale¯ thinos philos. Finally, the stories examined in these chapters corroborate the normative values of humanity and pity with which Greek tragedy is imbued—and offer real-life detail besides. The discourse of the narratives considered here expresses certain responses—and also invokes them. It is dynamic. Emotional expression can trigger historical change, and Reddy urges upon scholars “a unified conception of emotions as part of the historical unfolding of politically significant institutions and practices” (2001, 50). Emotional expressions, he says, “do something to the world” (111). Insofar as the emotional and moral climate of ancient Athens can be reconstructed from scattered shards of textual evidence, it is worth asking what historical result, if any, that climate produced. This is not an easy question, but I would like to suggest a tentative answer, one that can only be validated by further work: If the fifth-century genre of tragedy was also a form of civic education that, ahead of its time (Zeitlin 1990), inculcated humane values and behavior, then tragedy may have combined with the city-state’s experiences of military defeat, from 404 in Athens down to 338 in Chaeronea, to endorse and nurture an unprecedented sensitivity to suffering. Such sensitivity is refracted through the discourse of Isocrates and Demosthenes; oratorical praise of a humane ideal was disseminated beyond Athens; and such praise may have contributed to philanthropic tendencies in the succeeding Hellenistic age. But that speculative connection remains to be explored through further inquiry.

S N L 181

T3801.indb 181

8/7/06 12:48:20 PM


Notes

Introduction 1. The English words “pity” and “compassion” are commonly used to translate the Greek words oiktos and eleos. “Compassion” has more positive connotations, but it is less satisfactory than “pity” for two reasons. First, Christian compassion ranks as a virtue, whereas Greek oiktos and eleos on the whole did not. Second, “compassion” in the strict sense requires that the compassionate person share the emotional state of the sufferer; but oiktos and eleos are sometimes felt for individuals who are blissfully unaware of their impending misfortune. 2. Famous because captivatingly told by Herodotus (1.29–33); impossible because the dates of Solon (traveled abroad c. 593 –583) and Croesus (ruled Lydia c. 560 –546) do not coincide. 3. Cf. Andoc. 4.23, though the latter speech is probably a Hellenistic forgery: “When you view these sorts of things in tragedies, you deem them terrible (deina nomizete), but when you see them happening in Athens, you think nothing of them (ouden phrontizete).” Translations throughout the book are my own, unless otherwise indicated.

T3801.indb 183

4. At 4.54 Isocrates cites the two standard examples: aid to Adrastus and to the sons of Heracles. Cf. Lys. 2.14, Xen. Hell. 6.5.45, and Ar. Peace 138. 5. The theme emerges most prominently in the Demosthenic corpus, where a number of speeches remind Athenians of their humanitarian reputation, as in For the Rhodians (15.22): “For I wouldn’t want you, who have a reputation for always rescuing the unfortunate, to appear in this affair worse men than the Argives.” Cf. Dem. 10.3, 16.14, 18.203, 20.109, 21.48, and 24.51. 6. Admired by Ober (1989, 4) for characterizing the ethos of democratic Athens, and commented on by Garland, who says that the “[Athenians] themselves seem to have believed that they were uncommonly compassionate” (1995, 38). Cf. Pericles in the Funeral Oration, where he lays special emphasis on laws written for the protection of the wronged (Thuc. 2.37). For a full discussion of pity in Athenian civic ideology, see Tzanetou 2005. 7. Not, as it would seem, in the old Athenian agora, since Pausanias 1.17.1–2 must refer to the commercial market, the Roman agora (Vanderpool 1974; pace H. Thompson 1952; cf. Zuntz 1953).

8/7/06 12:48:20 PM

18 4

8. Aristotle, in Book 2 of the Rhetoric, assumes this, and extant speeches bear him out: dozens of passages raise the issue of whether, from the standpoint of justice, a given person deserves to be pitied. See Solmsen 1938; Konstan 2001, 27– 48; Sternberg 2005, 40 – 43. 9. See, for example, recent books by social psychologist Candace Clark (1997); anthropologist Catherine Lutz (1988); philosopher Elliott Sober and biologist David Sloan Wilson (1998); and philosopher Martha Nussbaum (2001). 10. The intrinsic shortcomings of case studies are well known: given their limited data, they cannot support quantitative generalizations. Nevertheless, they often surpass other methodologies in elucidating qualitative values, meanings, and questions. Sociologist Robert K. Yin (1994, 3) explains that “the distinctive need for case studies arises out of the desire to understand complex social phenomena. In brief, the case study allows an investigation to retain the holistic and meaningful characteristics of real-life events.”

1979, 63). Relevant passages are preserved in the early fifth-century c.e. writings of Stobaeus. 14. Goff (1995, 1–37) usefully surveys the new historicism. See Hall 1997 for the sociology of tragedy; and Griffin 1998 for a provocative statement on the social function of tragedy. 15. See, e.g., Frijda 1986, and the very accessible explanations in Damasio 1994. 16. Considered by Walter Burkert in his 1955 dissertation, and by the present author in her 1998 dissertation. See also Sternberg 2005, a collection of essays. 17. The virtues catalogued by Xenophon (Ages. 1–11.6, Cyr. 8.1.23 –33, Mem. 4.8.11) and Isocrates (To Nicocles 15 –54, Cyprians 29– 64, On the Peace 63, Evagoras 22 – 46, and Panathenaicus 30 –32) never include oiktos or eleos, though Isocrates does sometimes praise mildness and love of humanity. 18. The earliest example, Lysias 24.7, dates to c. 403 or shortly thereafter.

11. For a concise treatment of the inherent difficulties in interpreting these texts, see Christ 1998, 4 – 6; and for methodological principles to be applied in weighing their factual content, see Harris 1995.

19. Snell (1953, ch. 11) was convinced that the Peloponnesian War made people more inclined to recognize the suffering of others. Much of his work is dated, but many scholars would still agree on this point.

12. Here I rely on the path-breaking scholarship of Victor Ehrenberg (1951), who half a century ago turned to Aristophanic comedy for sociological insights into ancient Athens. I do not seek to retrace the steps of Ehrenberg, or of Dover, but use only those passages from comedy that bear directly upon my case studies.

20. Praise for individuals who showed pity: Dem. 21.185; Xen. Cyr. 6.1.47. General praise for Athenian pity: Lys. 24.7; Isoc. 15.20; Dem. 22.57, 24.171, 27.65, Ep. 3.22. Excoriation of pitilessness: Antiph. 1.26 –27; Dem. 19.309, 21.182, 24.197, 24.201, 25.84, 27.65; Aeschin. 1.188; Din. 1.24.

13. This useful image of concentric circles was first introduced by Hierocles, a Stoic philosopher, to illustrate ethical precepts of other-concern in Roman society during the reign of Hadrian, c.e. 117–138 (Den Boer

T3801.indb 184

n o tes to pa g es 3 – 14

21. De Romilly (1979, 37) observes that praos and philanthro¯ pos are adjectives for gentleness that “suddenly invade the world of Greece in the fourth century.” For a concise history of philanthro¯ pia, see Finley 1973, 38 –39. My own computerized

8/7/06 12:48:20 PM

not e s t o pages 14 – 20

word searches in historiography and oratory turned up philanthro¯ pia only in Xenophon (10 times), Isocrates (4 times), Demosthenes (26 times), Aeschines (5 times), and Hyperides (once) —and never in the five earlier authors. 22. Fire is characterized as a sign of the gods’ philanthro¯ pia (Xen. Mem. 4.3.7); the art of agriculture is called philanthro¯ pon (Xen. Oec. 15.4); and Isocrates refers to the philanthro¯ pia and eunoia of Heracles (Isoc. 5.114). 23. Aeschin. 2.13, 2.15, 2.30, 2.39; Dem. 18.209, 18.316, 19.140, 19.301, 35.47. Even Xenophon (Cyr. 1.4.1, 4.2.10) employs the word in this mild sense when he explains how Cyrus, as a young boy, secured favors for his friends out of philanthro¯ pia. Very occasionally the friendliness is exposed as a sham, as at Isoc. 15.153 and Dem. 18.231, 24.156. 24. Cf. Dem. 23.156, where philanthro¯ pia saves all human beings. 25. This and other word counts for oratory and historiography are based on computerized word searches in the Thesaurus Linguae Graecae (TLG) and Perseus. The numbers include all the works attributed to each author. In the case of Lysias, for example, where at least seven speeches are commonly suspected and Dover’s stringent standard (1968) would leave us but one genuine speech, I include the entire corpus. I do the same for Demosthenes, though some twenty-five of the orations attributed to him are considered spurious. This is justifiable because I am more interested in oratory as a genre than I am in individual orators. For the historian Xenophon, I include his entire body of work, even though only the Hellenica, the Anabasis, and perhaps the Agesilaus are in fact histories. 26. It is found once each with eunoia (Dem. 18.5), dikaiosune¯ (Dem. 36.55), eusebeia (Dem. 21.12), and epieikeia (Dem.

T3801.indb 185

185

36.59). Isocrates employs cognates of philanthro¯ pia in advising Nicocles (Isoc. 2.15) and praising Evagoras (Isoc. 2.43). See de Romilly 1979, ch. 8. 27. The noun is linked twice with pity (eleos), at Dem. 25.76, 25.81; twice with pardon (sugnome¯ ), at Dem. 21.148, 25.81; and three times with gentleness (praote¯ s), at Isoc. 5.116, Dem. 24.51, Hyp. 5 fr. 6. 28. Xenophon, writing several generations after Herodotus, says that Cyrus pitied Croesus. His Cyropaedia omits the burning at the stake, but features Croesus telling Cyrus his life story, to which Cyrus replies (7.2.26): “I pity you (oikteiro¯ se) and now give back to you your wife whom you used to have and your daughters.” 29. See Liddell and Scott 1996 for this translation of the adverb anthro¯ pino¯ s. It is used ten times in my thirteen authors, at Aeschin. 3.133; Andoc. 1.57, 2.6; Dem. 23.44, 23.58, 23.70, 23.82, 45.67; Isoc. 12.38; and Thuc. 3.40.1. 30. Hume 1998, 8 –12; Rousseau 1972, 175, 181–196. 31. The visual arts offer another window on the mental world of Athens. See Oakley 2005 and Ajootian 2005 on pity in ancient Athenian art. 32. Research on the emotions is a rapidly developing multidisciplinary field. Oatley and Jenkins 1996 furnishes an excellent introduction. Principal trends, from the neurophysical to the psychological and cultural, are reflected in Lewis and HavilandJones 2000. 33. For the moral condemnation of savagery, see Dem. 9.26, 18.231, 18.275, 20.109, 21.88, 21.97, 21.109, 24.171, 25.83 – 84, 27.26 –28, 29.2; Isoc. 12.90, 15.300, 15.315. Thucydides uses the adjective ¯o mos just three times: once to describe the initial vote of the

8/7/06 12:48:20 PM

18 6


Athenian Assembly that condemned the Mytileneans to wholesale destruction (3.36.4), and twice to characterize the civil war in Corcyra (3.82.1, 3.84.1).

Chapter 1

9. The well-known Epidaurian tablets from the second half of the fourth century b.c.e. describe forty-three temple cures. See Edelstein and Edelstein 1945, 1:221–237; and LiDonnici 1995.

A short version of this chapter appeared in Greece and Rome (Sternberg 2000), and the material is reused here with kind permission of the publisher.

10. Excavations at Olynthus revealed numerous storefronts, some of which connected with the living quarters behind and some of which did not.

1. More recently, Figueira (1993, 339) has found in the Aegineticus evidence for the role of Aegina in the late 390s as “a haven for pro-Spartans dislodged by Konon’s sweep through the Cyclades and the fall of oligarchic governments that ensued.” 2. See Brindesi 1963; Mathieu and Brémond 1928, 1 : 94 –106. Cloché (1963, 13 –14) offers merely a plot summary. 3. See King 1998, 163; and Sternberg 2000. 4. The essays in Faraone and Obbink 1991 explore overlapping approaches to healing. Cf. Temkin 1953. For a concise discussion of the transmission of medical recipes in antiquity, see Ann Ellis Hanson’s introduction to Youtie 1996, xv–xxv. 5. Ariston, for example, whose injuries resulted from a crime scene analyzed in Chapter 3, had multiple doctors (Dem. 53.1). 6. See in general Majno 1975, 141–206; and Bullough and Bullough 1978, ch. 1. For a summary of Hippocratic nursing care, see Manchester 1932.

T3801.indb 186

390 –370 b.c.e., but a shrine existed on the site in the fifth century.

11. Xenophon (Hell. 2.1.3) mentions a man with ophthalmia who was leaving an iatreion when set upon by assassins. Cf. Plato Laws 4.720c, where slave doctors wait for slave patients in their iatreia. 12. Plato (Laws 1.646c) mentions iatreia as places where one can drink medicine. 13. Withington 1927. For further discussion of the iatreion, see Cohn-Haft 1956, 48 – 49 n. 18. 14. Cf. fr. 208 of the fourth-century comic poet Antiphanes: “Preparing for himself an iatreion altogether most resplendent with bathtubs, unguent-boxes, pots for medical preparations, cupping instruments, suppositories.” 15. The tale of Thrasylochus mentions neither visits to a sanctuary nor to an iatreion. Indeed, there is no reference to any remedy, whether medical or magical, nor to any physician. The only medical advice the speaker mentions comes from friends who warn him that the disease is probably contagious (Isoc. 19.29).

7. The nursing or wet-nursing of infants and small children is deliberately excluded from this discussion, which is devoted strictly to sick-nursing.

16. Nutton (1995, 22) dates Epidemics I to c. 410 b.c.e. Most of the sixty or so Hippocratic treatises appear to have been written between 450 and 350 b.c.e. (Dean-Jones 1994, 6).

8. Tomlinson 1976, 96 –103. The famous sanctuary at Epidaurus dates to

17. Of the fourteen cases described in Epidemics I, Case 9 occupied two days, Cases

8/7/06 12:48:21 PM


7 and 8 five days, Cases 1 and 11 six days, Cases 2, 12, 13, and 14 eleven days, Case 3 seventeen days, Case 4 twenty days, Case 10 forty days, and Cases 5 and 6 a grand total of eighty days each. 18. Cases 3, 7, 11, and 12 give no location. Two others, 4 and 9, vaguely place the patient “in Thasos.” The other eight, however, are quite specific. 19. Foucault (1973, 17) idealizes the family, praising its “gentle, spontaneous care, expressive of love and a common desire for a cure, [which] assists nature in its struggle against the illness, and allows the illness itself to attain its own truth.” In the Aegineticus, the ideal is much the same but proves difficult to carry out in practice. 20. Lawrence (1983, 317) writes of Athens in the late fifth century: “The heart of the city was crowded with blocks of mean little houses, separated by tortuous alleys; spacious houses were rare except in the suburbs outside the town walls.” Cf. Jameson 1990, 175 –178; and Jones 1975, 66, 71. 21. See Robinson and Graham 1938; Jones 1975; Lawrence 1983, 315 –371; Jameson 1990; Nevett 1999, 123 –126, 154. 22. Lawrence (1983, 16): “The typical Greek house, from this time [c. 500 b.c.e.] onwards, is secluded from the public view by a bent entrance.” Cf. Jameson 1990, 179; and Nevett 1999, 89. 23. Millett (1998, 206 –211; quote from p. 207) analyzes the ideological implications of Athenian housing. 24. Hunter (1994, 81) notes the “singular lack of privacy in an Athenian house. . . . Houses were lightly built, with no areas secluded by long corridors or set off in wings. Most rooms issued from a central court, where sound would echo and reverberate.”

T3801.indb 187

187

25. Morgan (1982) notes correspondences between the house of Euphiletus and the excavated ruins of “House D” in Athens. 26. See Dem. 3.25 –26, 13.29, and 23.207, for fifth-century simplicity, contested by Graham (1974, 53); and Dem. 3.29 and 23.208 for fourth-century opulence. For interpretation of social and economic differences among households at Olynthus, see Nevett 1999, 77–78. 27. Jones 1975, 70, 72, 91, 95, etc. 28. Bullough and Bullough (1978, 16) summarize: “Baths are to be given, either almost continuously or at intervals, according to the illness of the patients. At times the writers in the Hippocratic corpus indicate that baths cannot be given because the houses of the patients do not have the suitable apparatus or attendants (nursing attendants?) to manage the bath.” 29. Robinson and Graham (1938, 198 –201) report that bathing facilities have been found on the ground floor of one-third of Olynthian houses; they speculate that portable basins may have been used for bathing on the upper floor. 30. E.g., Ar. Thesm. 485, Dem. 25.49, cited by Robinson and Graham 1938, 205; cf. Lawrence 1983, 318. 31. The andro¯ n can often be identified by the raised platforms around the wall, which could have supported couches, and by floor drains, which would have facilitated cleaning after the revelries. Robinson and Graham 1938, 170 –172. 32. Boardman (1990, 127) notes that in most Greek houses, “the sleeping-room was the eating-room, and living-room, and the dying-room. In the richer houses, once provision was made for a dining-room accommodating klinai, sleeping was surely a matter for some other part of the house.”

8/7/06 12:48:21 PM

18 8

33. Gould (1980, 46 – 49) and Susan Walker (1983) argued that Athenian women were spatially secluded, but many scholars now think that the segregation of the sexes even in “polite Athens” has been much exaggerated. See Jameson 1990, 185 –191; D. Cohen 1996; Nevett 1995, 363, and 1999, 154 –155. 34. Blass (1874, 3 : 388 –393) and Goldstein (1968) consider this letter authentic. 35. Case histories in Epidemics are based on intermittent observation perhaps reported by medical attendants; we also have direct references to hoi therapeuontes, as in The Art 11. The same treatise twice mentions a male attendant in the singular. Male attendants are called for in some of the more spectacular treatments described in On Joints. 36. Jaeger (1944, 3 : 10 –15) presents evidence for so-called medical amateurs, especially Xen. Mem. 4.2.8 –10: Euthydemus has books on medicine as well as architecture, geometry, and astronomy. Cf. Aristotle Politics 1282a1–7. Edelstein and Edelstein (1945, 2 : 164 –165) observe that people living in districts that lacked a physician will have done their own doctoring. 37. Xen. An. 7.2.6; Cyr. 5.4.17–18, 8.2.25. 38. Todd (1990, 32) notes that Isoc. 19, written for a court in oligarchic Aegina rather than in democratic Athens, is our only complete speech from a family-property case that summons no witnesses. 39. See Dearn 1995. For a concise history of Aegina, see Stillwell 1976, 19–21. For more detail on the Aeginetans in exile, see Figueira 1993, ch. 10. 40. According to Grmek (1989, 185), phthoe¯ is mentioned twice in the Hippocratic corpus. The more common term for consumption is phthisis, mentioned forty-two times. Cf. Phillips 1973, 73.

T3801.indb 188


41. See Chapter 3 for a fuller discussion of the beating in Against Conon. 42. Carey and Reid (1985, 85) also compare the maladies in Dem. 54.11–12 and Hippoc. Prognostics 17. 43. Grmek (1989, 404 n. 57) obliquely identifies the case as pulmonary tuberculosis. 44. Displeasing statements: Hdt. 7.101.3; Isae. 3.11; Dem. 24.132 and 48.8; Isoc. 12.19, 12.62, 12.156. Unpleasant interpersonal relations: Lys. 16.; Dem. 19.225 and 37.11; Isoc. 1.31 and 5.37. Physical aversion toward food, Xen. Cyr. 1.2.11, Mem. 3.11.13, 3.13.2. 45. Mathieu and Brémond (1928, 100) note that Isocrates uses closely similar language to describe the feelings of the Plataeans (14.47). 46. Eleos words occur, sometimes twice in the same chapter, at Isoc. 4.112, 4.132, 4.168, 12.232, 14.52, 15.20, 16.48, 18.39, and 18.62. Oiktos words occur at Isoc. 5.67, 10.27, 14.52, and 14.56. 47. See esp. Isoc. 4.132, 4.168, 14.52, and 18.62. 48. In roughly one-third of its forty-five occurrences. 49. Political revolt: Isoc. 4.135, 4.140, 4.141, 4.161, 4.162, 5.101, 5.102, 5.104, 5.126, 6.11, 6.64, 9.62, 9.63, 12.103, 15.318, 16.10, 16.15. Military withdrawal: 6.38, 6.57, 8.23. Emigration: 4.122. Renunciation of possessions: 14.44. Defection of allies: 8.21, 14.26, 14.34, 16.20. Difference between ideas or ways of life, 5.2, 5.8, 5.76, 15.41, 15.272. Refraining or turning away: 5.24, 5.129, 8.15, 8.81, 9.29, 10.20, 15.11. Shrinking from danger: 4.83, 5.100. 50. We have only seven examples from the works of Isocrates. 51. See Isoc. 4.92, 6.47, 6.69, 12.142. 52. See Isoc. 12.83, 12.256, 19.25.

8/7/06 12:48:21 PM


53. To leave or go home: Isoc. 4.59, 4.70, 4.187, 5.23, 8.25, 18.48. To leave with or without success or on even terms: 4.154, 5.101, 17.57. To desert: 10.50, 12.83, 16.8. 54. Moira occurs 108 times in Homer and 106 times in the three tragedians. It occurs only eight times in the orators: Aeschin. 1.149; Dem. 18.289, 23.61, 43.51; Isoc. 11.8, 19.29; Lycurg. 1.64; Lys. 2.78. 55. Sleep deprivation undermines health by leaving a person not only exhausted but also susceptible to sicknesses that he or she might normally resist. Medical researcher Michael Irwin (1995, 11), for example, has correlated sleep loss with reduced activity in lymphocyte cells, which fight off viral infections, while James Krueger has linked sleep deprivation with reduced counts of T-cells and B-cells (Blakeslee 1993). 56. Hardships experienced by soldiers: Andoc. 2.17; Hdt. 4.134.3, 6.11.2, 6.12.2; Thuc. 2.70.2. Hardships in athletic competition: Aeschin. 3.180; in traveling: Dem. 18.218; in war-time: Thuc. 4.117.1; in plague: Thuc. 2.49.3, 2.49.6. 57. Cf. Xen. Cyr. 5.4.10, where Cyrus checks on Gadatas to see whether his wound is healing. Mathieu and Brémond (1928, 100) observe that the term used by the orator, episkeptesthai, rapidly became the technical term for visits paid to the sick, whether by the doctor or by friends.

189

61. E.g., Isoc. 1.48, 2.10, 4.76, 7.24, 7.66, 10.50, 12.164, 14.24, 14.51. 62. Such care is one facet of the autarchy or self-sufficiency of the household explored by Booth, who also describes its thick bonds, reciprocity, altruism, and intimacy (1993, 12 and passim). 63. See Kosak 1999 for full discussion. Chapter 2 1. Radt 1985, 364 –370. The play was entitled Fruges or Hectoros lutra. Disappointingly, there are no scenes of ransom in surviving tragedies. 2. For a discussion of pity in the ransom of Hector, see Macleod 1982, 13 –16; Crotty 1994, 3 –23; Kim 2000, 62 – 63 and passim. For an analysis of ritual supplication, see Gould 2001, 32; of the apoina theme, Wilson 2002, 126 –133. 3. Oakley 2005, 213 –214. 4. Iliad 6.45 – 60; 10.374 –381, 454 – 457; 11.128 –142; cf. the slaying of Lycaon at 21.64 –135. Also noted by Pritchett (1971–91, 5:246) and by Pedrick (1982), who observes (140) that “the most vivid scenes of supplication [in the Iliad] promote the theme of vengeance.”

59. E.g., Dem. 1.15, 10.7, 10.29, 10.47, 14.6, 21.167, 24.110, 24.130, 25.66, 50.63, 51.2, 55.11.

5. Pritchett (1971–91, 5:245 –269) cites almost a dozen further examples from this period that are attested by much later Greek and Roman historians: Diod. 14.35.7, 14.102.2 –3, 14.111.4 (cf. Ps.-Aristotle Oec. 2.2.20.1349B); Plut. Mor. 849E and 851A, Cim. 9 (cf. Polyainos 1.34.2), Dion 20.4 and 48.2 (contradicted by Diod. 16.17.5), Alex. 7.3; Justin 9.4.6; Memnon of Heraclea Pontica (Jacoby FGrH 434 fr. 16); and Polyainos 5.40. See also the scholion to Demosthenes 5.5 (no. 21).

60. E.g., Xen. Cyr. 1.6.11, 4.2.39, 5.3.33, 5.5.41; Mem. 2.2.14, 2.3.3, 2.3.18, 2.5.1, 3.7.9.

6. Pritchett 1971–91, 5:273 –274. He also cites epigraphical and literary evidence

58. Xenophon uses it 92 times, Isocrates 58 times, Demosthenes 29 times, Lysias 7 times, Thucydides 5 times, Herodotus 3 times, Isaeus twice, and Andocides, Aeschines, Lycurgus, and Dinarchus once each.

T3801.indb 189

8/7/06 12:48:21 PM

190

for ransom in the Hellenistic and Roman periods.

mafioso-like aggression of aristocrats in early Greece.

7. Passages sometimes adduced as evidence for ransom include: (a) the exaction of tribute for land (Hdt. 3.58) or populations (Ps.-Arist. Oec. 2.2.20) or the exchange of prisoners where no money changed hands, as at Thuc. 4.18.7 and 5.3.4; (b) cases where the manner of release is unclear and ransom can only be conjectured, as at Isae. 6.1 and Dem. 57.18 –20; (c) outright release without ransom, as at Aeschin. 2.15; (d) the freeing of courtesans that appears closer to manumission than to ransom, as at Hdt. 2.134 –135 and Dem. 59; (e) the refusal of ransom, as at Hdt. 9.120.

14. Conflicting traditions on Plato’s misadventure are analyzed in Figueira 1993, 347–349.

8. Pritchett’s fifty-odd pages on ransom as a military phenomenon are invaluable. Much briefer discussions are offered by Ducrey (1968, 238 –246) and Lonis (1969, 51–54). De Souza (1999, 64 – 69) considers abduction and ransom mainly in the context of Hellenistic piracy. 9. The authorship of Demosthenes himself is ruled out by the early date of the speech, c. 366, since the famous orator, born in 384, would have been too young (Trevett 1992, 51; Schaefer 1858, 147). 10. The hazards of captivity have been well documented by Pritchett, Ducrey, and others. 11. Panagopoulos (1978, 219): “The treatment of captives, except for a period toward the end of the war, grew progressively harsher and the customs of war became grimmer.”

T3801.indb 190


15. Figueira 1990; Ducrey 1968, 44; Ormerod 1927, 61–72. 16. Isocrates (c. 380) complains bitterly that pirates hold the seas (4.115). See De Souza 1999, 34 –36; and Ormerod 1927, 113 –120. 17. Cf. Aristotle Eth. Nic. 9.2.4 for a hypothetical ransom case that also suggests the frequency of abduction. 18. Figueira 1990, 45 – 49. Athenians who disembarked on Aegina could be sold as slaves. 19. Sian Lewis (1996, 37) notes that the ignominy of misfortune could induce reticence among the victims, which does not make our recovery of details any easier. 20. Ober 1989, 204 –205. The speaker in Lysias 4 says a prosperous man can always secure his return (4.13). For the disparity between the purchasing power and lifestyle of the wealthy elite versus ordinary people, see Vickers and Gill 1994, 33 –54. 21. Loomis (1998, 257) finds variation in wages over time, including a “very slight and gradual inflation” in the fourth century down to c. 330. 22. See Whitehead 1997; and Lammert’s article on ransom in RE 14, cols. 72 –76, s.v. lutron.

12. Corcyrans captured in 433 were released after 427 (Thuc. 3.70.1); Spartans captured at Sphacteria in 425 were released in 421 (Thuc. 5.3.4, 5.18.7).

23. Other examples of ransomed women are Panthea in Xen. Cyr. 5; Dem. 19.194 –195; Aeschin. 3.156 –157. I found only one reference to the ransoming of children (Dem. Ep. 3.10).

13. Homer Od. 14.425 – 429, 469– 484; Hdt. 1.1–3. Van Wees (1999, 12 –13) argues that kidnap and ransom in Homer reflect the

24. In his discussion of seventy trials of generals, Pritchett (1971–91, 2:5 –10) identifies none relating to the treatment of captives.

8/7/06 12:48:21 PM


25. Defeated commanders could negotiate for humane treatment, as the general Demosthenes did upon surrendering with 6,000 troops at Syracuse in 413 (Thuc. 7.82.2). 26. Groups of prisoners: Hdt. 5.77.3, 9.99; Thuc. 4.69.3, 6.5.3; Androtion in Jacoby, FGrH 324 fr. 44 (see Table 2); Lys. 26.24; Xen. Hell. 6.2.36. 27. Ober 1989, 14 n. 24. Those 300 were the richest and most conspicuous of the 1,200 men organized in the mid-fourth century into summoriai (Gabrielsen 1989, 159). Each year, the wealthy took turns assuming scores of other liturgies, such as the provision of choruses, athletic teams, and public banquets. Davies (1971, xxiv) observes that “men with more than four talents were very unlikely to escape such obligations in the long run.” 28. Contemporary evidence for public subscriptions in the classical period as cited by Migeotte: Isae. 5.37–38, capture of Lechaeum, 392 b.c.e.; Dem. 21.160 –161, trierarchies, 357–348 b.c.e.; Dem. 18.171, defense of the city, 339/8 b.c.e.; Dem. 18.312, defense of the city, 335 b.c.e.; IG II1.360, purchase of grain, 328/7 b.c.e. 29. The masculine pronoun is used advisedly here, as women in classical Athens were not entitled to own or dispense very much wealth. 30. For a full discussion of idealized father-son relations, see Strauss 1993, 61–99. 31. Dillon (1995) argues that public allowances to the adunatoi were designed to forestall or undercut aristocratic patronage. 32. See Rosivach 1991, 189–190 and 196 n. 5. 33. See Konstan 1997, 56 –59; and Blundell 1989. Konstan (1997, 53) says the word philos denotes a person involved in “a voluntary bond of affection and good

T3801.indb 191

19 1

will, and normally excludes both close kin and more distant acquaintances, whether neighbors or fellow-citizens.” Other scholars have found that the term can have a broader connotation that includes family, friends, and neighbors. 34. Millett 1989, 18. Connor (1992, 18 – 22) discusses the “politics of largess.” For the shrinking of patronage in early Greece, see also van Wees 1999, 29–35. Christ (1998, 122) cites the relationship between Apollodorus and Nicostratus described at Dem. 53.4 as an example of “one-on-one patronage” that was “probably a local phenomenon.” 35. For an amusing account of Dicaeogenes, a famous shirker, see Davidson 1998, 241, based on Isae. 5.36 –38. 36. Millett 1991, 26: “There are . . . close connexions between the obligations of the wealthy to help out fellow-citizens directly by gifts and interest-free loans, and indirectly through the performance of liturgies.” 37. Examples of speeches that play up liturgies without mention of ransom include Lys. 7, 25, and 26. 38. This speech, dated to c. 403, is our earliest example of ransom payments held up for public praise. It clearly refers to the period of the Peloponnesian War. 39. Contrast Aristotle in Book 4 of Nicomachean Ethics; he urges a high-minded motive. 40. Carter (1986, 104) cites also Davies (1971, xvii). 41. Andreades 1933, 361. Cf. Xen. Symp. 4.30 –33. 42. David Cohen (1991, 77) comments on how easy it is “for a speaker to manipulate these [public and private] categories for his particular rhetorical purposes.” 43. His dates are c. 394 to after 343 b.c.e. The speeches attributable to

8/7/06 12:48:22 PM

192

Apollodorus are: Dem. 46, 49, 50, 52, 53, and 59. Trevett (1992, 73) concludes that all these were written by the same person, probably Apollodorus. He thinks Demosthenes himself wrote Dem. 45 and 51, whereas the authorship of Dem. 47 remains uncertain. 44. Todd 1990. Rubinstein (2000, 179–180) points out that most prosecutors declined to cite private conflicts as grounds for a public action, but the speaker at the outset cites revenge as a motive (1): adikoumenos kai hubrizomenos hupo touto¯ n kai oiomenos dein timo¯ reisthai te¯ n apographe¯ n epoie¯ same¯ n. 45. The slave market on Aegina appears to have thrived on the islanders’ sustained involvement in piracy, often directed at the Athenians (Figueira 1981, 211–214; 1993, 351–353). Figueira notes (1993, 352): “When Aristotle compiled the Metaphysics, a typical vicissitude was still the accident of being diverted to Aigina either by a storm or through capture by le¯i.stai [pirates] (1025a25 –27).” 46. The journey to Aegina could have been long and expensive, since direct access from Athens was lacking in wartime (Thomas Figueira, personal communication).

T3801.indb 192

n o tes to pa g es 5 5 – 6 1

49. Trevett (1992, 88 n. 36) mentions an unpublished letter that may impugn the candor of Apollodorus. 50. See Chapter 3 on bystander intervention for further discussion of this reported incident. 51. Osborne 1985, 146; see also the discussion of this case at Christ 1998, 176 –177. 52. Achilles worries that neighbors will “grind down” his father (Homer Il. 24.489– 490; Od. 11.494 –503), Hesiod recommends self-reliance (Works and Days 407– 409, 451– 457), and the reformer Solon supposedly wrote laws regulating boundaries between neighbors and access to water (all noted in van Wees 1999). 53. Pecirka (1973, 115 –116) cites previous scholarship. 54. See Morris 1994, 363. Osborne (1985, 28), it should be noted, vigorously denies the importance of this settlement type, and argues that the sites in Laurium are exceptions that prove the rule.

47. Hunter (1990, 323 –324) cites passages where the treatment of kin and of parents are the subject of gossip in extant lawsuits, though Athenians embraced the ideal of tolerance (Thuc. 2.37).

55. Hunter (1990, 308) cites the following sources for the liturgical activities of Apollodorus: Dem. 50, passim; 53.4.5; IG II2 1609, 83 and 89; IG II2 1612, 110; cf. Davies 1971, 440 – 442. Ober (1989, 222) notes that Apollodorus absurdly claimed to live in poverty (Dem. 45.73).

48. Dem. 53.11: oi nomoi kelousi tou lusamenou ek to¯ n polemio¯ n einai ton luthenta, ean me¯ apodido¯ i ta lutra. Gernet (1959, 3 : 85) postulates that this law, which resembles the Law of Gortyn 6.9, is probably a common law of Greece. E. M. Harris (2002, 425) explains: “Nicostratus became a slave when he was captured by the enemy. His enslavement was the result of warfare, not debt. The law states that he will remain in the power of those who paid his ransom until he repays the money they spent to buy him from his captors.”

56. At Eudemian Ethics 7.1.3, where “true friends do not wrong one another” (hoi gar ale¯ thinoi philoi ouk adikousin); at Eudemian Ethics 7.2.24 –25, in a discussion of affection, where “the true friend is absolutely pleasant” (ho ale¯ thinos philos kai he¯ dus estin haplo¯ s); and at Rhetoric 2.21.13, where he coins a maxim, “For it is necessary to love the true friend as if one were going to love him forever (dei gar ton g’ale¯ thinon philon ho¯ s phile¯ sonta aei philein).” The only other occurrence of the phrase is in the Third Philippic of

8/7/06 12:48:22 PM


Demosthenes (9.12). Konstan (1997) discusses warmth and affection in Greek friendship; cf. Foxhall 1998. 57. Trevett (1992, 127) finds that “Apollodorus’ vagueness suggests that he is being less than candid.” Gernet (1959, 3 : 86) suspects that his supposed inexperience disguises prudence. 58. His naiveté is noted by Trevett (1992, 87). Cf. Dover 1974, 104. 59. Dem. 54.14 and 22; Isae. 3.17; Pl. Cri. 53c, Grg. 485c and 521e, Theages 127e, Laws 762e, 770c, and 890b; Xen. Mem. 1.2.1 and 35. 60. The evidence for this view of youth is too extensive to be considered here. Youth and folly (neote¯ s te kai anoia) are paired at Andoc. 2.7, noted by Strauss (1993, 180). Moses Finley (1989, 8) comments on the ancient belief that “the young were not to be trusted with public affairs, that they were easily ‘corrupted’ intellectually and morally and therefore a threat not only to themselves but to society at large.” 61. Aeschin 1.26; Arist. Metaph. 1022b and Eth. Nic. 1173b20; Dem. 9.28, 19.81 and 306. 62. Hdt. 1.165.3, 3.119.13, 3.14.11; Xen. Ap. 18, Cyr. 6.1.47, 7.1.41, 7.2.26, 7.3.14, Hell. 1.5.19; Lys. 2.67; Dem. 19.309, 53.8; Din. 1.20. 63. Sternberg 2005, 15 – 47. 64. Isocrates (14.56) makes his supplicating Plataeans plead that Athenians both old and young should imagine people of their own age in dire straits. Cf. Lys. 20.36. 65. Richardson (1993, 272) observes that for the Iliad ’s Book 24, the “keynote is pity, on both the divine and human planes.” Macleod before him (1982) agreed. 66. Antiph. fr. D1; Andoc. 4.39; Lys. 6.55, 20.34, 27.12; Isae. 11.38; Dem. 21.99,

T3801.indb 193

19 3

21.186 –187, 21.194 –196, 21.204, 27.53, 37.48 – 49, 38.27, 39.35, 40.53, 45.88, 53.29, 54.43; Aeschin. 3.209–210; Lycurg. 1.33; Din. 1.92, 1.108 –111. 67. Thrasymachus of Chalcedon, a late fifth-century sophist and rhetorician who serves as interlocutor to Socrates in the first book of Plato’s Republic, is said to have written a treatise called the Eleoi that told orators how to stir pity in their listeners, possibly focusing on techniques of delivery. Aristotle, in the fourth century, devoted a substantial section of his Art of Rhetoric to the analysis of various emotions, including pity (2.8), as an aid to orators. 68. Apollodorus, on the other hand, apparently was. See Trevett 1992, 10 and 23, where he notes that in 361, the children of Apollodorus were described as small (Dem. 50.61). 69. Cited by Hunter 1997, 304. 70. For the topos, see Davidson 1998, 244. 71. Herman 1987, 92 –93. He adds (97): “There must have been a fair degree of coincidence between those involved in xenia networks and those described by Davies as members of the liturgical class.” He juxtaposes the routine exchange of goods and services with gift exchange, which created a long-term involvement with moral dimensions. 72. Harris 1992, 311. Plato (Laws 9.855b) refers to friends who may or may not be willing to give bail and, through their combined contributions, to set free a wrongdoer who has been assessed a large fine. 73. Also found in Thuc. 4.16.2, 3.49, and 3.72.2, as noted by S. Lewis (1996, 65). 74. The most famous example describes how word of the loss in Sicily reached Athens: according to Plutarch (Nic. 30.1), the report spread from a barbershop in the Piraeus.

8/7/06 12:48:22 PM

194

75. De Souza (1999, 62): “Decrees of proxenia (appointment as the official local representative of a foreign state), asylia (immunity from reprisals) and isopoliteia (equal citizenship rights) are very well attested for the Hellenistic period, indicating a network of agreements and alliances which could offer some chance of rescue for the victims of pirates.” 76. Just (1989, 26) provides an excellent summation. Women in certain other Greek city-states appear to have enjoyed more property rights than did female citizens of Athens (de Ste. Croix 1970). 77. Cole (1981, 225) finds that an educated woman in the fifth century “must have been the exception and not the rule.” 78. Dem. 27.53 –57, 45.74; Isae. 10.23, cited by Hunter 1989, 43 – 44. Hunter urges (44) that in the familial realm “there was some recognition that women could possess property and that they were kyriai in their own right.” Cf. E. E. Cohen 2000, 36 – 45. 79. Isae. 7.9, 11.8, 11.41– 42, cited by Schaps 1979, 21. 80. Cox (1998, 74) cites Dem. 17.40, 29.40 – 48, 36.14ff., 55.24 –25. 81. Gould (1980, 50) calls this a “striking instance of free and equal interchange between men and women on the domestic interests of the family.” Just (1989, 131) adduces Lysias 32 as evidence that individual circumstances could permit “a good deal of de facto female authority.” 82. Gagarin (2001, 166) demonstrates that the logographer put words into her mouth that mimicked the style and language of forensic oratory, which she could hardly have mastered. The text, then, is not a transcript; yet there remains the scenario of a family council at which a woman speaks. It is hard to know whether such a scenario was as exceptional as Allen suggests (2000, 113).

T3801.indb 194

n o tes to pa g es 6 9 – 72

83. It was not unusual for a kurios without a legitimate son and heir to make a will before departing on a military campaign or other voyage, although Cohn-Haft (1995, 7 n. 28) argues that he was more likely to issue an oral injunction assigning authority to a close male relative. The speaker in Isaeus 9 (14 –15) claims that Astyphilus failed to make a testament before departing on military campaigns. Rubinstein (1993, 23) notes that in twelve extant examples of testamentary adoption, six testators died during a prolonged absence. 84. See Cox 1998, 92ff., for fatherdaughter relationships. 85. This is not to say that each captured soldier was the head of household; the citizensoldiers were eligible for military service from age 18 through age 60, so that many will have been sons, not fathers; and mercenaries, almost by definition, will not have been in the position to be head of household. 86. Translated by David Grene and Wendy O’Flaherty (1989). 87. Hyllus likewise seeks news of his father Heracles in Sophocles’ Trachiniae. 88. Felson-Rubin (1996, 164) argues that Penelope is not “unproblematically faithful,” but is enmeshed in a thoroughly ambiguous situation that remains unresolved until Od. 23.205. 89. Lacey (1968, 81) refers to Lys. 2, Dem. 60, Hyp. Epitaphios, and the Menexenus of Plato. Of these, only the Hyperides is held to be genuine. 90. Just further explains (1989, 32): “The concern of the law in this respect was to ensure the correct transmission of property and, importantly, of religious rights and duties via direct male descent, rather than to compensate women for their legal incapabilities.” We know of forty-eight widows in classical Athens. See Hunter 1989.

8/7/06 12:48:22 PM


91. For actual widows, the options were clear: a childless widow would return to the oikos of her father or kurios, while a widow with children could either do that or remain in the oikos of her late husband (Den Boer 1979, 35). 92. Cohn-Haft (1995, 3 – 8) discusses the legal procedures apoleipsis (divorce initiated by the wife) and aphaeresis (divorce initiated by her father). He also considers a late parallel from Plautus’ Stichus (1– 48), a comedy in which the father of two sisters whose husbands have been absent and incommunicado for three years threatens to take them back into the paternal household. 93. Thompson 1972, 221; Schaps 1979, 127; Just 1989, 67. Thompson identifies fiftythree cases of remarriage in the orations and other literary sources; sixteen followed upon the heels of divorce, seventeen upon the death of a prior spouse, and information is lacking in the remaining twenty cases. 94. The deme has been held up as a “face-to-face” unit of society where everyone knew everyone. See Osborne (1985, 44) and Hunter (1990, 301), who also cites Whitehead 1986, 230 –234. 95. Brun 1983, avant-propos. According to Brun, the fourth century brought a massive enrollment of mercenaries by Greek city-states. 96. Quoted in Ogden 1996, 310. Hansen (1982, 180) speculates that some married mercenaries may have left their wife and children behind in Attica, but cites no evidence for this. 97. The same wording on inscriptions is sometimes taken to mean that ransom took place. 98. Lacey 1980. 99. The lack of centralized effort on the part of the polis to deal with the ransom issue

T3801.indb 195

19 5

is in line with Rubinstein’s argument (1993, 4) that the perpetuation of the oikos via adoption was an individual matter. 100. I owe this insight to Kathryn Gutzwiller, personal communication, October 29, 2002.

Chapter 3 1. The exception is Lys. 3.6 –7, where the misbehavior consists of drunkenly breaking in at night upon respectable females in their own homes. Hunter (1994, 232 n. 41) cites other oratorical references to bystanders who may serve as witnesses to various legal maneuvers, including challenges: Dem. 21.85, 29.12, 30.32, 45.13, 47.12, 59.123. They may also serve as witnesses to nonviolent events in neighborhood or agora: Lys. 7.15, 18; Dem. 27.58; Lycurg. 1.19; Din. 1.30. 2. Other passages in Plato’s Laws that prescribe bystander intervention refer to nonviolent offenses: the refusal to pay a fine to Hera (774b – c), the stealing of objects left by the wayside (914b), and the sale of defective goods (917c–d). In the first instance, Plato requires that a bystander who fails to intervene be declared a coward and a bad citizen. 3. Lintott (1982, 19–21) reviews tangential evidence, including the fourthcentury decree from Cius in Bithynia protecting an Athenian named Athenodorus and his descendants. 4. The word boe¯ n is here equivalent to boe¯ theia. See Denniston and Page (1957, 193) on line 1349. 5. His cry introduces a strophe whose lines are broken among agitated speakers (Campbell 1879, 1:360). The effect is echoed in the antistrophe at 876 with the cry io¯ talas.

8/7/06 12:48:23 PM

196

6. Cf. Aesch. Supp. 904; Eur. Or. 1353; Ar. Ach. 567. See Fraenkel 1950, 3 : 614. 7. The Roman cry for help, endoplorare, summoned neighbors to witness that the slaying of an attacker or nighttime thief was justified (Nippel 1995, 35). 8. In September 1998, Congressman Nick Lampson (D-Texas) introduced the Sherrice Iverson Act, a bill that would have rendered ineligible for certain federal grants any state that did not have a Good Samaritan law aimed at protecting children from sexual crimes. The bill died in committee owing to questions about its constitutionality. 9. The verb is employed at Ar. Clouds 1218 –1219 and Wasps 1406 –1414, as well as Dem. 18.150 and 32.30. Harrison (1998, 2 : 141 n. 4) cites further allusions to the procedure: Aeschin. 1.46, 2.68; Dem. 19.176, 198; Dem. 58.7, 42; Dem. 59.28; Lycurg. 1.20. 10. Dem. 32.30; Harrison 1998, 2 : 140 n. 4; cf. Aeschin. 1.67. 11. Todd 1990, 24 –25; Carey 1995. The respective functions of the summons and another procedure, the private action for damages (dike¯ blabe¯ s), remain obscure. 12. Christ, on the other hand, describes obligations to strangers as “minimal,” and says Hunter overestimates the willingness of passersby to help (1998, 124 and 257 n. 18). 13. D. Cohen 1991; Herman 1994, 108 –110. 14. Lateiner (2002, 9–10) emphasizes the use of walking sticks as defensive and offensive weapons. Stone-throwing was a military specialty (Pritchett 1971–91, 5 : 1– 67), and crowds could express their hostility against offending individuals by stoning them (Hdt. 9.5; Xen. An. 5.7.19–23, 6.6.7, 7.6.10). 15. See, for example, Mahaffy’s droll comment on Against Simon (1853, 341):

T3801.indb 196


“The men who had been drunk and had assaulted the speaker came afterwards and apologized, which was the gentlemanly thing to do, as the penalties for assault and battery were at Athens very severe.” 16. Cf. the Twelve Tables of midfifth-century Rome (Nippel 1995, 35). 17. Epigraphical evidence suggests the importance of stone from Acte, which had a quarry large enough to accommodate a large number of Syracusan captives who managed to tunnel their way out in 410/09. Xenophon tells the story in the Hellenica (1.2.14). See Dworakowska 1975, 50; and Garland 1987, 147. 18. According to Orlandos (1968, 16 n. 6), more than 40,000,000 square meters of stone had been extracted at Syracuse; the Syracusans imprisoned 7,000 Athenian captives there in 413. 19. The rock face may have been sheer and smooth, or it might have been broken into horizontal steps leading down into the interior of the quarry (Orlandos 1968, 16). The absence of a fence has been taken to suggest that the quarry was then out of use (Dworakowska 1975, 54 –55). 20. Lys. 3.15 –18, 23.9; Dem. 47.36 – 40, 52 – 65, and 54.7–9, 32; Aeschin. 1.60 – 61. 21. Xenophon’s main point here is not the quiescence of the bystanders, but the lawlessness and impiety of the Thirty (Dillery 1995, 156). 22. He cries, “iou iou. / ¯o geitones kai xungeneis kai de¯ motai, / amunathete moi tuptomeno¯ i pase¯ i tekhne¯ i” (“Oh, oh! / Oh, neighbors and kinsmen and demesmen, / protect me in every way you can as I am being beaten!”). 23. One unusual feature of the speech consists of its generalizations about human

8/7/06 12:48:23 PM


beings, something seldom found in forensic oratory of that generation (Dover 1968, 76). The speaker says that all human beings are susceptible to lust (4); most men deprived of the object of their lust seek immediate vengeance (39); and the same person cannot love and be a false accuser (44). 24. Note that the speaker was not with the boy at this point. He could not have observed either the behavior of the crowd or the severity of the beatings (17). 25. Audacious (1, 20, 22, 25, 26, 29, 45), lawless (5, 10, 17, 37), hubristic (5, 17, 23, 26, 40), violent (5, 6, 8, 12, 15, 16, 17, 23, 29, 37, 40, 46), unrepentant (7, implied at 11), wicked (9, 44, 45), in error (10, 12), shameless (implied at 13), a wrongdoer (15), heedless (16), and a liar (21–36). 26. The speaker opens the narrative portion of the speech with the statement (5): “We lusted, Council, after Theodotus, a Plataean youth (he¯ meis gar epithume¯ samen, ¯o Boule¯ , Theodotou, Plataikou meirakiou).” Later (at 40) he says, “We were rivals (ephilonike¯ samen he¯ meis).” 27. Some scholars have thought he was a slave, but Bushala (1968, 65 – 68) argues that he was a free noncitizen. E. E. Cohen (2000, 168 –171) goes even farther by arguing that Theodotus enjoyed citizen status. 28. The speaker refers to Theodotus in several ways: meirakion (4, 5, 6, 10, 11, 12, 15, 18, 22, 26, 27, 29, 31, 32, 35), neaniskos (10, 17), paidion (33), pais (40). 29. Later in the speech, this picture is muddied: the speaker says the assailants started beating him but kept dragging the boy (37). 30. Aristophanic comedy furnishes six references to torches: Clouds 607, 1476; Eccl. 690, 1145; Frogs 340, 1078.

T3801.indb 197

19 7

31. Others, too, dined at public expense, a complaint at Hyp. 2.2. 32. By day it was the hub of the city, with so much going on that one could easily encounter the full range of friends and enemies. See Millett’s vivid reconstruction of life in the agora (1998, 213 –218; cf. 228). 33. Dem. 54.25: ei gar hoi parontes anti tou ko¯ luein tous ¯e di’ oinon ¯e di’ orge¯ n ¯e tin alle¯ n aitian examartanein epikheiroutas autoi paroxunousin, oudemi’ estin elpis so¯ te¯ rias to¯ i peripiptonti tois aselgainousin, all’ heo¯ s an apeipo¯ sin, hubrizesthai huparxei: hoper emoi sunebe¯ (“For if bystanders, instead of preventing those who on account of wine, or anger, or some other cause put their hand to wrongdoing, are themselves goading them on, there is not a single hope of safety for one who falls in with the insolent; but until they leave off, there will be violent arrogance done, just as happened to me”). 34. Cf. Antiph. 2.1.9 and Dem. 30.22. 35. Hansen 1976, 21–28; Harrison 1998, 2:221–232. 36. E. M. Harris (2004) demonstrates that “caught red-handed” is a correct translation for the term, as “in the act” is too narrow. The translation “in manifest guilt” comes from Fisher 2001, 225. 37. Panactum was one of a string of garrisons along the frontier between Athens and Boeotia; it lay on the northern flank of Mount Kithairon.

Chapter 4 A short version of this chapter appeared in Phoenix, Journal of the Classical Association of Canada (Sternberg 1999), and the material

8/7/06 12:48:23 PM

198

is reused here with kind permission of the publisher. 1. Stephens (1995) argues rightly that the wound of Philoctetes creates a nontrivial moral dilemma for the Greeks. 2. The problem has been overlooked by historians, including Pritchett (1971–91), Hanson (1989), Anderson (1970), Adcock (1957), Tarn (1930), Kromayer and Veith (1928), Delbrück (1990 [1920] ), and Müller and Bauer (1893). 3. Pritchett 1971–91, 4 : 235 –241. See also Clairmont 1983; Loraux 1986; Phillipson 2001 [1911]; Vaughn 1991. For further bibliography, see Sage 1996, 232. Parker, discussing the threat of religious pollution, notes (1983, 44): “At Athens, those who neglected this minimum human obligation were threatened by one of the ‘Bouzygean curses.’ ” 4. Grmek devotes seven pages to Trojan War wounds. He remarks (1989, 33): “It is a surprising and completely abnormal thing that the Homeric heroes are never sick as a result of their wounds. They either die of them or return very quickly to normal activity.” 5. Badian (1979, 54) laments the scarcity of logistical details: “They are mentioned in passing, for the historian cannot keep the ordinary world out of his picture; but they were never the proper topic of history or biography, except (fortunately for us) for the unique account that Xenophon wrote of the march of the Ten Thousand.” 6. Several overlapping methods were employed in the search. First, I perused all extant works of Herodotus, Thucydides, Xenophon, Aeneas Tacticus, Curtius, Arrian, and the Attic orators. I then conducted English word searches, via Perseus, with key words such as “wounded,” “sick,”

T3801.indb 198


“retreat,” “wagons,” and so forth, to pick up references in later authors—Diodorus Siculus, Plutarch, and Pausanias—in addition to those of the classical period. Greek word searches in Perseus, with words such as kline¯ or plaision, were also helpful. 7. Arrian 3.9.1, 4.21.5, 5.1.5, 5.8.3, 5.27.5 – 6, 5.29.3; cf. Curtius 9.4.8. 8. For example, Philon of Byzantium, c. 200 b.c.e., recommends providing good medical care to foreign mercenaries so that they will face danger willingly (5.3.45 – 48, 72 –73). Quoted in Garlan 1975, 136. 9. Grmek (1989, 28) reproduces a statistical table of wounds in the Iliad originally compiled by a German army doctor, Hermann Frölich, in 1879. The table reveals that of 114 fatal wounds, sixty-seven were to the trunk, thirty-one to the head, thirteen to the neck, two to the upper limbs, and one to the lower limbs. 10. Hdt. 9.69.2; Xen. Hell. 3.4.12; Diod. 17.12.5, 17.34.8. 11. See Diod. 15.55.5, 15.86.3, 17.34. Bosworth remarks (1988, 12): “[Diodorus] has an eye for the sensational and has favourite themes, usually banalities such as epic pictures of slaughter and fighting in relays.” 12. Greek warfare stands in contradistinction to less bloody forms of warfare, like that formerly practiced by some Native American tribes, or by the mercenaries of Renaissance Italy. 13. Our earliest observation of this grim fact is found in Homer’s Iliad (16.25), where the dead and wounded lie among the ships. Thucydides recounts that by the final Athenian victory on Sphacteria in 425, the Spartan commander Hippagretas, “though still alive, was lying among the dead bodies and was thought to be dead himself ” (Thuc. 4.38).

8/7/06 12:48:23 PM


14. Brasidas (Thuc. 4.12.1, 5.10.8, 5.10.11; Diod. 12.62), Epaminondas (Diod. 15.87.5 – 6; Paus. 8.11.6 –7), Agesilaus (Xen. Ages. 2.13, Hell. 4.3.20, 5.3.19; Diod. 14.84.2; Paus. 3.9.13), Alexander the Great (Diod. 17.20.2; Curtius 4.6.20, 7.6.4, 7.6.8, 6.1.5, 7.25.3; Arr. Anab. 4.4.9, 6.11.1). A highly heroic removal is the one Curtius (9.5.15) ascribes to Alexander among the Mallians: he actually falls onto his shield and is carried out of battle on it, in keeping with Spartan tradition. (Cf. Curtius 6.1.5 and Arr. Anab. 6.11.1, where Alexander is also carried on his shield. He is carried in his soldiers’ arms at Curtius 4.6.20, and on his couch at Arr. Anab. 7.25.3.) 15. Plato Symp. 220e; cf. Plut. Alc. 7.3. 16. Jones assigns Epidemics I and Epidemics III, for example, to the later fifth century. Phillips writes (1973, 35): “To attempt to date them closely is for the most part a foolish enterprise; all that can be said is that they appear to belong to the second half of the fifth century, with some continuation into the fourth.” Ann Hanson (1991, 76) regards most Hippocratic treatises as dating to the fifth century. Nutton (1995, 21) says the treatises were mainly written between 420 and 350. 17. Majno 1975, 185. If the bleeding, purging, and dieting that Greek physicians routinely prescribed at home were impractical for sufferers on military campaign, that fact probably worked to their advantage. Majno (177ff.) deplores the purging and dieting. See, in general, Majno 1975, 141–206; cf. Hanson 1989, 215 –218. 18. Cf. Hanson 1989, 215. Garland (1995, 22) judges that “the style and tactics of ancient warfare were such that the battlefield must have produced a vast number of disfiguring and disabling injuries.” 19. Pliny HN 7.104.

T3801.indb 199

19 9

20. Dem. 11.22; Dem. 1.13 tells us that Philip also survived a serious illness. 21. Riginos studies various embellishments found in Philip’s ancient biographical tradition, but notes (1994, 104): “That Philip was gravely wounded on several occasions in the course of his many campaigns is beyond doubt.” 22. Thigh (Arr. Anab. 2.11.12), shoulder (2.27.2 –3), leg (3.30.11), neck (4.3.3), shoulder again (4.22.3), ankle (4.26.3). 23. Pearson 1960, 12: “Once the comparison with Achilles is accepted, it inevitably follows that Alexander’s battles will include a monomachia and that his aristeia and his wounds will receive special prominence.” 24. Curtius 3.11.10, 4.6.17–19, 4.6.24, 7.6.4, 7.6.22, 8.10.6, 8.10.28, 9.5.10. 25. See especially the accounts of Alexander’s illness after bathing in the Cydnus in 333 (Arr. Anab. 2.4.8). 26. Xen. Cyr. 1.6.15 –16, 3.2.12. 27. Majno (1975, 197–200) discusses case studies drawn from the Hippocratic Epidemics V, including the catapult-inflicted wound that caused an uncanny laughter followed by death. 28. The case is reported on the Epidaurian tablets. See Edelstein and Edelstein 1945, 1:235. Cf. Majno 1975, 201. 29. Curtius 9.10.15: et miles vix arma portabat. Arrian (Anab. 6.25.2 –3) says there were no men to carry them and no men to stay behind and take care of them. For a recent analysis of the Gedrosian episode, see Bosworth 1996, 166 –185. 30. Atkinson, in the introduction to his commentary on Curtius (1980, 19–73), discusses the dating problem at length. He

8/7/06 12:48:23 PM

2 00


concludes that Curtius was writing under Claudius. 31. Jacoby 1922, 630; Pearson 1960, 217; Hornblower 1994, 20; Atkinson 1980, 64 – 67; Hammond 1983b, 142. 32. Brown 1950, 152; Pearson 1960, 153. 33. Lamer 1925; cf. Girard 1904. 34. Plutarch employs the term phorade¯ n, meaning “borne in a litter” (Ages. 19). He also depicts the very ill Eumenes of Cardia borne in a litter with curtains in 317 (Eum. 14 –15). 35. I found no references in fifth- and fourth-century historiography and oratory to the use of one’s shield as a makeshift litter, though Curtius (6.1.5, 9.5.15) and Arrian (Anab. 6.11.1) show the wounded Alexander on his shield. The second alternative in a Spartan mother’s maxim, “with your shield or on it” (Plut. Mor. 241f. = Lacainon Apophthegmata 16), perhaps meant that her son might return on the shield either dead or wounded; a passage in Plutarch’s Apophthegmata Laconica (51 = Mor. 234f–235a) supports the usual interpretation that he would be dead. 36. Engels (1978, 14 –18) discusses the carrying capacity and food requirement of pack animals. He estimates that horses and mules can carry a load of 200 pounds. Badian (1979, 54), citing the U.S. Army Regulations and the War Department’s Manual of Transportation, raises that estimate to 250 pounds. See also Hammond 1983a, 27–31. 37. Food (Xen. An. 1.10.18; Diod. 17.81.1), water (Hdt. 1.188), armor (Diod. 16.9.5), arms (Xen. An. 1.7.20), military machines (Thuc. 4.100.3), unspecified supplies (Hdt. 9.39.2), cauldrons (Hdt. 9.80.2), or implements (Xen. Lac. 11.12). 38. The use of vehicles in ancient military campaigns was treated at some length

T3801.indb 200

by Sheffer (1671, 280 –286, still useful), though he does not mention transport of the wounded. 39. Loot (Xen. Cyr. 7.3.1), prisoners (Xen. Hell. 6.59), corpses (Hdt. 9.25; Thuc. 4.48.4), the bones of the dead (Diod. 13.75.2 –3). 40. Cawkwell 1980, 245. Devine (1979, 273) notes that “the use of wagons as ambulances in the Gedrosian Desert . . . can only have been an incidental use for empty supply wagons.” 41. The Ambraciots send for reinforcements in part to ensure a safe retreat (Thuc. 3.105.4). The Spartans at Sphacteria see a fort that might be useful in retreat (Thuc. 4.31.2). Lamachus recommends the Sicilian port of Megara as a place of retreat for the Athenian fleet (Thuc. 6.49.4). At Syracuse, Nicias and Demosthenes both seek a place of retreat for the fleet (Thuc. 7.36.6, 7.38, 7.49). Xenophon plans for an easy retreat in the land of the Taochians (Xen. An. 4.7.7). 42. Pausanias reports that the seventhcentury general Aristocrates of Orchomenus, having effected a safe retreat in a battle against the Spartans, was stoned to death on the grounds that he had accepted bribes (Paus. 4.17.2, 85.13). The story of Aristocrates is reminiscent of three Spartan kings who failed to attack the enemy: Cleomenes, who was accused and acquitted after failing to attack Argos in 449 (Hdt. 6.82); Pleistoanax, who was exiled for turning back from Attica c. 446, supposedly having been bribed (Thuc. 2.21); and Agis II, who barely escaped a heavy penalty for declining to attack Argos in 418 (Thuc. 5.60, 5.63). In his speech to the Spartan army before the battle of Amphipolis, Brasidas (Thuc. 5.9.6) derides the enemy for thinking more of retreat than of maintaining their position.

8/7/06 12:48:24 PM


43. For a fairly recent discussion, see Baumann 1990, 69–76. Bonner and Smith (1930 –38, 1 : 266) discuss the technical shortcomings of the trial. Cf. Bonner 1933, 78 –79. 44. Xenophon (Hell. 1.6.24 –25) numbers the total fleet at 150 ships: 110 Athenian ships, 10 Samian ships, and 30 ships from other allied states. 45. The only other occurrences of the word nauagos, both in Pausanias, confirm this definition. In describing the Messenian Straits (5.25.3), Pausanias says that “a shipwrecked man has no hope of getting out alive.” In describing a painting (10.31.1), he says one hero is painted a color “like that of a shipwrecked sailor with the brine still rough on the surface of his skin.” 46. See Kromayer and Veith 1928, 82; and Vollbrecht 1872, s.v. plaision. The hollow square is discussed by Roman-era military writers: the first-century b.c.e. Asclepiodotus (11.6); the first-century c.e. Onasander (6.6); and the first/second-century c.e. Aelianus (48.1– 4). Asclepiodotus (11.8) adds that the baggage train can go inside a square. 47. Cf. Hunt 1998, 55; Gabrielli 1995, 115; Kromayer and Veith 1928, 111; and Delbrück 1990, 56, noting that a Greek hoplite “could hardly get along without a helper to act as porter, forager, cook, and in case of their being wounded, nurse.” 48. E.g., Marchant (1893, 201) and Connor (1984, 198), who admires the narrative power of the entire retreat and quotes T. B. Macaulay’s praise for it as “the ne plus ultra of human art.” 49. For a timetable of the retreat, see Gomme et al. 1970, 4 : 455. 50. Sphacteria, Thuc. 4.36 –38; Macedonia, 4.125 –128; Amphipolis, 5.10 –11; Mantinea, 5.72 –74; Epipolae, 7.43 – 45.

T3801.indb 201

20 1

51. Thrace, 429 (Thuc. 2.79); Crissaean Gulf, 429 (2.92); the Odrysians in Thrace, 429/8 (2.101); the Athenians in Aetolia, 426 (3.98); the Spartans at Olpae, 426/5 (3.109–111); the Corinthians and Athenians at Solygia, 425 (4.44); the Athenians at Delium, 424/3 (4.96); the Thracians in Boeotia, 413 (7.30); and the Athenian fleet at Miletus, 412/11 (8.27). 52. For a close analysis of the diction and its relation to Homer, see Allison 1997, 499–516. Huart (1968, 65 – 66) also comments on the vocabulary of suffering in the Sicilian expedition. 53. Cf. the phrase gno¯ me¯ s opse¯ that Majno (1975, 181) translates as “the sight of the mind.” It is the faculty that ancient medical thinkers needed in order to visualize microscopic phenomena like tiny blood vessels, or venules. 54. The phrase lupe¯ meta phobou vaguely anticipates Aristotle’s tragic pity and terror, the emotions aroused by a terrible spectacle. 55. Thus commentators Lamberton 1886; Smith 1886; Marchant 1893, ad loc.; and Pritchett 1971–91, 4:197. For pollution, see Parker 1983. 56. Liddell and Scott define athlios as both wretched and pitiable. 57. Marchant (1893, 200) objects to any emendation of the text. “The wounded and weak did not stop until they were so utterly exhausted both in body and mind that they could utter only a few appeals and groans.” Dover (1965, 63) favors a change to ouk aneu pollo¯ n. “The point is that the sick and wounded did not lightly accept their fate, and hearing their lamentations was the price which the able-bodied had to pay for leaving them behind.”

8/7/06 12:48:24 PM

2 02


58. Marchant (1893, 201) admires the chiastic structure of the passage. Thucydides, starting at deinon, points briefly to the failure of the expedition and the pain of departure. He then describes the departure in detail, and finally elaborates on the Athenians’ failure. 59. Poppo and Stahl (1886, ad loc.) cite Aesch. Pers. 133. Charles F. Smith (1886, ad loc.) further notes Eur. Or. 1363. 60. Hdt. 3.14. Marchant also notes the similarity. The fame of the story is suggested by its retelling in Aristotle Rhet. 2.8.12, though there the key figure is Amasis, not Psammenitus. Poppo and Stahl (1886, ad loc.) note a parallel sentiment in fr. 11 of Bacchylides. 61. Thucydides leans toward giving Nicias this role, which may account for the unparalleled encomium to him at 7.86.5. 62. Macleod (1983, 141) also views the Sicilian expedition as a tragic reversal of fortune. 63. See also Thuc. 1.11, 4.10, and 7.44. 64. Andrew Walker (1993) shows how Thucydides, describing the decisive naval battle at Syracuse (Thuc. 7.71), elicits in the reader the same emotions as the original spectators. Walker (360) quotes Plutarch to the same effect (Plut. De glor. Ath. 347a). 65. The historian prefers oiktos to eleos: he uses oiktos words nine times and eleos but once, apparently as a variatio for oiktos. 66. Kagan (1981, 337) observes that although it was sacrilege for the departing soldiers to leave the dead unburied, “the guilt that they felt about the living must have been even more painful.” 67. See Dover 1965, 64; and C. F. Smith 1886, 147. Rex Warner, in the 1954 Penguin edition, translates it as “disasters of the past.” 68. Cf. Connor 1984, 202. He observes: “Through his speech we recognize that

T3801.indb 202

Nicias has never fathomed the Thucydidean world of grand and impersonal processes in which the scale of events and the measure of suffering are far beyond the limits of human comprehension or endurance.” 69. Classen (1875 – 82, 2:134 –136) notes the emphasis on personal experience. 70. See 7.75.4: kai hena hekaston epiboo¯ menoi, ei tina pou tis idoi ¯e hetairo¯ n ¯e oikeio¯ n. 71. Pritchett (1971–91, 5:203 –312) presents voluminous evidence on the fate of captives. Death and enslavement were common. 72. These include the last speech of Pericles (Thuc. 2.60.2), Cleon’s speech in the Mytilenean debate (3.38.6), and Diodotus’ response (3.45.6). 73. The translation of the final clause is that suggested by Dover (1965, 63). 74. Allies forsaking an alliance, Thuc. 3.9.1, 3.64.3, 6.34.5; soldiers deserting their posts, 4.116.1; sailors leaving their ships, 8.45.2. The verb apoleipo¯ does not invariably carry this significance. See Thuc. 8.22.1, where the Chians do not abandon their zeal. 75. Including Poppo and Stahl (1886), Classen (1875 – 82), and Dover (1965). 76. Thuc. 1.11.1, 3.22.5, 3.40.3, 3.40.6, and 6.102.2. 77. Victor David Hanson (1989, 121–125) argues from literary and epigraphic evidence that soldiers were marshaled according to tribal affiliation. Cf. Pritchett (1971–91, 4:138 –243) in his chapter on the burial of the war dead. 78. It is generally accepted that Diodorus relied heavily on Ephorus for the narrative portion of Books 11–15. See, for example, Sacks 1990, 13; and Andrewes 1985, 189. According to Barber (1935, 98 –99 and App. I), Ephorus used Thucydides as his main

8/7/06 12:48:24 PM


source for the Athenian expedition, though he altered certain facts to put Athens in a more favorable light. Pearson (1987, 28) notes that Ephorus may also have borrowed from the Sicilian historian Philistus. Cf. Schwartz 1905, 681. Meister (1970) ascribes portions of the Diodoran narrative to Timaeus, but 13.18 is not among them. 79. See Hornblower 1983, 157–166; Garlan 1994, 678 – 680; Adcock 1957, 88 –90. 80. Hornblower 1983, 158. Tritle (1992, 71– 89) objects to the term “professional” on the grounds that it connotes a fully modern conception of generalship. Nevertheless, fourth-century military handbooks and treatises do seem to represent a body of expertise that may have been expected of a general.

20 3

post, and throwing away one’s shield. Military officers or citizens could institute a graphe¯ ; a guilty verdict led to the disfranchisement of the coward. Generals on military campaign could summarily execute a soldier who communicated with the enemy (see Lys. 13.67; Xen. Hell. 1.1.15), though they appear to have lost this power by the time of Aristotle. 86. According to commentator Paul Masqueray (1930 –31, 186), the assignment of this servile duty to a free man indicates that the Ten Thousand had no more slaves. 87. Vollbrecht (1870, ad loc.) also detects contempt. The use of anthro¯ pos as a term of contempt, often in reference to a slave, is common in oratory. See, for example, Lys. 1.8.

81. Nussbaum (1967, 5) writes of “the figure of this young man of 27 or 28 arising like a saviour amongst this band of highspirited companions,” and goes on to compare Xenophon’s leadership to that of Pericles in the Peloponnesian War.

88. Livestock, Xen. An. 4.7.14; pack animals, 4.5.25; horses, 1.7.17; wild beasts, 5.7.32; lands or territory, 1.5.9, 7.7.22; property, 1.10.2; weapons or missiles, 4.4.11, 4.8.11; the gods, 1.6.6, 2.3.22, 2.5.20, 2.5.39, 3.2.13, 5.7.12.

82. See MacDowell 1978, 129–132; Bonner and Smith 1930 –38, 2 : 3; and J. W. Jones 1956, 118.

89. Death, Xen. An. 3.1.43; heat, 1.7.6; cold, 4.5.3; hunger, 4.1.13, 4.5.7; injury, 1.9.13, 4.7.4; fear, 3.1.18; suspicion, 2.5.5; ignorance, 6.1.21, 7.6.11; the desire for glory, 6.1.26.

83. The other generals who stood trial at the same time were found guilty on other charges and fined (Xen. An. 5.8.1). 84. See Kromayer and Veith 1928, 56: “Auch die Disziplinargewalt des Höchstkommandierenden war selbst im Felder sehr gering.” In the context of citizen armies, most Greeks may have placed relatively little emphasis on strict obedience to orders (Carney 1996, 20). Nussbaum (1967, 21–24) views consent and incentive as the usual form of discipline, rather than compulsion. Cf. Pritchett 1971–91, 2 : 244. 85. MacDowell 1978, 160. Athenian law about cowardice (deilia) apparently applied to evasion of military service, desertion of one’s

T3801.indb 203

90. Peltasts and spearmen, Xen. An. 5.2.4; the expedition of 2,000 men, 6.4.23; inhabitants of a given region or city, 3.4.8, 4.1.8, 4.6.11, 5.7.16, 7.3.47. 91. Xen. An. 2.4.15, 2.4.16, 2.4.22. 92. Xen. An. 4.5.24, 4.7.13, 5.3.9, 5.4.33, 7.3.31, etc. 93. Xen. An. 1.3.3, 1.4.14, 1.7.3, 1.7.6, 3.1.15, etc., about fifty occurrences. 94. Xen. An. 1.1.11, 3.1.23, 3.2.18, 3.4.35, 6.4.8, 7.2.33, 7.2.34, etc. 95. Cyrus is an ane¯ r at Xen. An. 1.3.12, 1.9.1; Clearchus at 2.6.1; Xenophon at 7.6.36 and 7.6.39, etc.

8/7/06 12:48:24 PM

2 04


96. Xen. An. 3.1.21, 3.1.44, 3.2.3, 3.2.15, 3.2.18, 3.2.39, 4.1.18, 4.1.26, 4.2.23, 5.8.25, 6.6.17, 6.6.24, etc. 97. Xen. An. 5.7.10, referring to foolish men; and 6.6.24, referring to a coward and a scoundrel. 98. The terms are used interchangeably at Xen. An. 4.1.23. 99. Commentator Friedrich Hertlein (1849, 233) notes that hoposa ge bouletai is an expression of callousness: “ist Ausdruck der Gleichgültigkeit.” 100. See the note on kataleipeto (5.8.8) in Vollbrecht 1870. A more recent commentary (Lendle 1995, ad loc.) offers no detailed analysis of this passage. 101. The Athenians in 490 also cast two envoys of Darius into the pit (Hdt. 7.133.1). For a discussion of the barathron in Athens and elsewhere in the Greek world, see Cantarella 2000, 86 –93. According to MacDowell (1978, 254), the condemned men were either killed by the fall or left to die of their injuries. He further suggests that by the age of Xenophon, Athenians may have killed criminals by some other means and then tossed their corpses into the pit as a final disgrace. Cantarella, however, doubts that this form of execution disappeared entirely (2000, 93). 102. For hemlock poisoning, see Cantarella 2000, 95 –106, Bloch 2002; for apotumpanismos, Cantarella 2000, 35 – 40. 103. In the Frogs of Aristophanes, Xanthias provides a comic catalogue of tortures (lines 615 – 625), one of which is piling rocks upon the victim. The rack or the wheel (Andoc. 1.41– 42; Antiph. 1.20) appear to be the usual methods. See Chapter 5. 104. Hdt. 7.114, trans. Grene. The incident at the Strymon is found at Hdt. 3.35. 105. Mob violence is the typical venue.

T3801.indb 204

See, for example, Hdt. 5.87, where Athenian women supposedly use their brooch pins to kill the sole survivor of a battle with Aegina, each one asking, “Where is my man?” At Hdt. 5.38, the Mytileneans stone Coes; at 9.5, the Athenian men stone Lycidas and Athenian women his wife and children. At 9.120, Greeks under Athenian leadership crucify Artayctes and stone his son to death before his eyes. In Xenophon’s Anabasis, the Ten Thousand perpetrate several stonings, which Xenophon deplores. See Xen. An. 5.7.19–23 and 32; 6.6.7–11. See also Cantarella 2000, 67–78. 106. I use the term “empathy” in a sense employed by modern psychologists to explain how people come to know about the psychological states of other human beings. See Eisenberg and Strayer 1987. 107. Epicharmus of Syracuse 21, in Diels and Kranz 1954, 1:202. 108. The schoolroom analogy echoes that found in Xenophon’s earlier description of Clearchus’ leadership abilities (Xen. An. 2.2.20): “The feeling of the soldiers toward him was that of schoolboys to a master.” 109. Ferocity in battle, Xen. Cyr. 1.4.24, 5.4.21, 7.1.13 –14; self-restraint, 6.1.47, 8.1.30; piety, 6.1.47, 8.1.27; the power to harm enemies and help friends, 5.3.32, 8.7.7, and 8.7.28, his last word or teleutaion. 110. Xen. Cyr. 1.2.1, 1.4.1, 8.2.1, 8.4.7, 8.7.25. 111. Panthea, Xen. Cyr. 6.1.47, 7.3.14; Egyptian fighters, 7.1.41; Gadatas, 5.4.32; Croesus, 7.2.26. On gentleness as a key aspect of leadership in Xenophon, see de Romilly 1988, 6. 112. Physicians, Xen. Cyr. 1.6.15 –16; supplies, 6.2.32; board of health and dispensary, 8.2.24. 113. To win friends, Xen. Cyr. 8.2.1,

8/7/06 12:48:24 PM


8.7.13; earn subjects’ love, 1.6.24; maintain strength of troops, 6.1.15. 114. Cf. Xen. Cavalry 6.2, where Xenophon says a commander wins loyalty by providing safety in retreat. 115. The tale recurs three times in extant sources: see Curtius 8.4.13; Val. Max 5.1, ext. 1; and Frontin. Str. 4.6.3. 116. Arrian’s treatment of Alexander’s supposed kindness toward the captured women of Darius is guarded (Arr. Anab. 2.12.8): “If it really happened, I approve of Alexander’s compassion (katoiktiseo¯ s) for the women.” In his final assessment of Alexander (7.28.1–20.3), Arrian does not list kindness or compassion among his virtues. 117. Green (1991, 181) comments that Alexander usually had an “ulterior pragmatic motive,” and cites this incident as an example. 118. Pritchett (1971–91, 4 : 236) remarks: “Xenophon was a man experienced in military affairs, and not a word does he say about floating bodies after the battle of Arginusae.” 119. Macleod (1983, 141) observes that the “whole history, or what remains of it, finds its culmination at [the end of Book 7].”

Chapter 5 1. Allen (2000, 25 –35) explores the sufferings of Prometheus, and spectator responses to those sufferings, in terms of authority, punishment, and desert. 2. Some scholars have argued that torture to obtain evidence was a legal fiction, and this possibility will be duly considered below. But no one can deny that torture was used to exact confessions from or punish slaves, and even citizens could be tortured if the safety of the city-state was deemed at risk. 3. Cf. Hunter 1992. 4. Finley famously formulated this

T3801.indb 205

20 5

idea in an essay first published in 1959: “One aspect of Greek slavery, in short, is the advance, hand in hand, of freedom and slavery” (1960, 72). For the emergence of the ideology of slavery as early as the mid-sixth century, see Rosivach 1999, 155 –156. Patterson (1982, 88) doubts that there was a causal connection: “The best guess is that the large-scale slavery and the timocratic culture of classical Greece had independent historical sources before they came to reinforce each other.” 5. See Cartledge’s 1993 article, “Like a Worm I’ the Bud?” 6. Neither, for that matter, did the slaves. See Finley 1960, 61– 68. Plato and Aristotle both justify slavery. 7. Diller 1971, 142 –143; Garlan 1988, 46 – 49; Rosivach 1999, 155. 8. Fisher speculates that slaves constituted 15 to 30 percent of the total population (1993, 35); most recently, Cartledge would cap the proportion at 40 percent (2002, 150). 9. Agriculture: Jameson 1977; de Ste. Croix 1981, 505 –506. The city: Ehrenberg, while downplaying the economic importance of slaves, admits their large role in everyday life as reflected in Aristophanes (1951, 176 –184). 10. MacDowell 1978, 81– 82. See also E. E. Cohen 2000, 145 –154, and 2003, 148 –152. 11. For dikai emporikai, see Diller 1971, 145, and Fisher 1993, 64. 12. Daremberg and Saglio 1904, 5:147 s.v. testimonium, testis; Garnsey 1996, 7. 13. Modern difficulties are explored in Bushala 1968, 65 – 68. For ancient disputes over status, see also the woman in Lysias 4, Cittus in Isoc. 17 (discussed below), and Aeschrion in Dem. 49. 14. Ps.-Xen. Constitution of the Athenians 1.10 –12. Ehrenberg (1951, 184 –185) notes

8/7/06 12:48:25 PM

2 06


that certain garments were worn chiefly by slaves, but that their attire overlapped with that of metics and poor citizens. And many slaves doubtless lived in greater security and comfort than free laborers (Garnsey 1996, 5). 15. Garlan 1988, 74; de Ste. Croix 1981, 174. Most grants of citizenship seem to have been made to bankers, whose capital enabled them to make generous gifts to the city (Trevett 1992, 161). 16. Xen. Hell. 1.6.24; Aristophanes Frogs, discussed by Cartledge (2002, 147–149). Hunt (1998) argues that ancient historians downplayed the role of slaves in fifth-century Greek warfare. 17. Garlan 1988, 46. 18. Vidal-Naquet 1986, 171; Westermann in Finley 1960, 15. 19. DuBois (1991, 40) finds that “references to slave torture in the legal corpus indicate not only how deeply this opposition [between free and slave] was felt, but with what difficulty free men sustained it.” Peter Hunt (1998, 6) on the discrepancy between ideology and practice: “What people say is usually interesting and revealing; it is not always true.” 20. Dem. 45.61; 49.52, 55; 52.22; 59.120 –125; discussed by Trevett 1992, 175. 21. Noted by Finley (1973, 65) and many others. 22. MacDowell 1963, 21. 23. For the use of the terms douloi, oiketai, therapontes, and andropoda, see Gschnitzer 1963. Cf. Mactoux 1980 on the discursive uses of doulos in oratorical and other texts. 24. Patterson (1982, 22) observes: “As a legal fact, there has never existed a slaveholding society, ancient or modern, that did not recognize the slave as a person at law.” For the juridical status of Greek slaves, see MacDowell 1978, 79– 83; Garlan 1988, 40 – 45; E. E. Cohen 2000, 160 –164.

T3801.indb 206

25. Garlan (1988, 41) described a slave’s initial entry into the oikos: “Here he received a new name, was welcomed, like a bride, with a showering of nuts and fruits, symbols of prosperity, and took part in the cult of the household gods.” 26. Wiedemann in Finley 1960, 15; Antiph. 6.25. Fisher (1993, 64) comments that the law “assumes that slaves were not only ‘persons’ but had some minimal honour that deserved to be protected.” 27. Rosivach 1999, 152 –154. 28. See Hdt. 4.1– 4 for a paradigmatic story about the inherent slavishness of slaves and their obedience to the whip. Discussed by Finley 1980, 118; Hunt 1998, 51. 29. Pol. 1253b –1255b30. For recent discussions, see Garnsey 1996, 12 –15; Cartledge 2002, 135 –141. 30. Aristotle claims that a slave can apprehend logos but not possess it; duBois (1991, 65 – 66) shows how the philosopher’s logic vindicates slave torture. 31. For the ancient debate over bodily differences between free men and slaves, see Cambiano 1987. 32. Rosivach 1999, 145. Those fellow Greeks included women and children from defeated Torone, Scione, and Melos during the Peloponnesian War (Thuc. 5.3, 32, 116). Male captives were often executed, but in the fourth century, internecine warfare became a significant source of adult male Greek slaves as well. 33. The standard view in Hellenistic and Roman times ascribed slavery to ill fortune (de Ste. Croix 1981, 418 – 423). 34. Nicias owned 1,000 miners, and Lysias 120 shield-makers, discussed by Fisher (1993, 50). 35. Finley 1980, 93. Cf. Ehrenberg 1951: 185 –191; Fisher 1993, 58, and many others.

8/7/06 12:48:25 PM


Hervagault and Mactoux (1974, 64 –71) analyze examples of household intimacy and sexual intimacy. 36. Discussed by Foxhall 1998, 62. 37. Harris notes Plato’s complaint that some masters treated their slaves like animals (Laws 6.777a); the philosopher warns against degrading them with extreme punishments (Laws 7.793e). Garnsey observes that the “anxieties, fears, thoughts and theories that surface in the literary texts . . . are precipitates out of the day-to-day, face-to-face contact of exploiter and exploited” (1996, 6). 38. Finley 1980, 100 –101; E. E. Cohen 2000, 179–180. 39. Patterson 1982, 67. 40. Ancient advice on how to treat slaves is found in the Oeconomicus of Xenophon and the Aristotelian Oeconomicus, discussed by Fisher (1993, 65 – 66). 41. E. M. Harris, personal communication. See also Jordan 2000. 42. Cf. Allen 2000, 104. 43. In the present context, I decline the even broader definition that includes the infliction of pain for sadistic pleasure. Virtually every society has its sadists, and no doubt Athens did, too. My purpose is not to explore “abnormal” psychology but rather to delineate “normal” social attitudes and moral expectations. 44. Peters (1985, 17) notes that “in political cases torture may have been more frequent than in routine civil or criminal litigation.” 45. The story is told in fantastic detail in Plutarch’s De garrulitate (Mor. 509), where the incensed crowd cries, “Torture and rack the accursed man! (basanize kai streblou ton alastora),” and more briefly at Nic. 30.2. 46. Andocides himself (2.15) complains vaguely of “the sorts of things I endured in

T3801.indb 207

20 7

my body” (hoia to¯ i so¯ mati ¯e neskhome¯ n). The claim of Lysias (6.27) that Andocides was tortured (e¯ ikisthe¯ ) may be a political fabrication (as noted by Bushala 1968, 63 n. 10). 47. Later accounts depart sharply from that of Thucydides. Lysias (13.70 –76) mentions neither an interrogation nor an Argive man; he says that after the fall of the Four Hundred, Thrasybulus of Calydon and Apollodorus of Megara were given citizen rights as a reward for killing Phrynichus. Lycurgus (1.112) agrees that an interrogation took place (basano¯ n genomeno¯ n), though at the behest of the de¯ mos, not the Four Hundred, and he does not specify who was tortured. 48. Goodwin (1901, 96 –97) says the disfranchisement of Antiphon probably occurred during a comprehensive revision of citizen lists that took place in 346 –345. 49. Dinarchus (1.63) corroborates Demosthenes’ account. 50. Oreos is the same city where, in Chapter 3, bystanders failed to defend Euphraeus in 344 as he was dragged off to prison by agents of Philip II. The island of Euboea would end up fighting against Philip at Chaeronea in 338, but during the 340s, two of its major towns, Oreos and Eretria, were pro-Macedonian (Ellis, in CAH vol. 6, 2d ed., 1994, 772). 51. Discussed briefly above in Chapter 2. 52. Bushala (1968) argues that free aliens could be tortured in a homicide investigation; Carey (1988) argues that they probably could not. 53. Carey (1988, 243) questions the witness’s status: “Was the man freed only after the torture? Was his claim to free status rejected by Herodes’ family? Is this status pure invention by the speaker?” Nevertheless, Carey admits (244) the possibility that the man may have been a free noncitizen. 54. Bushala explains (1968, 62): “Since

8/7/06 12:48:25 PM

2 08


all trials for crimes involving the death penalty were transferred to Athens, any preparatory investigation would probably have been carried out in accordance with Athenian legal procedures and under the supervision of a local Athenian legal administrator.” 55. Discussed by Edith Hall in the context of social class in Athenian tragedy (1997, 112 –118). 56. Carey (1988, 242) insists that the woman must have been the property of the man she unwittingly poisoned: he was about to exercise his legal right to consign her to a brothel (Antiph. 1.14). 57. The speeches offer neither written testimony nor witnesses to support these accounts, but that torture took place is generally accepted (Mirhady 1996, 122). 58. There were rare exceptions, cited by Levicrain in Daremberg and Saglio 1904, 5 : 147. See also the fictitious case in which a slave fatally wounded in an assault made a statement and then died before his evidence could be taken under torture (Antiph. 2.1.9). 59. Hunter (1994) tabulates the challenges (demands) and offers. 60. A legal opponent claimed that Andocides killed the slave so that he could not testify (Lys. 6.21–22). 61. The female slaves were tortured without permission of their master, as indicated at Andoc. 1.22. Such permission was in fact the rule. This is the only known exception, doubtless resulting from special powers given to the Council (MacDowell 1962, 79). 62. See Dorjahn 1971. 63. See Hunter 1992, 283 –284; 1994, 91–95. Schumacher (2001, 276 –291) reviews archaeological evidence for the punishment, torture, and execution of slaves.

T3801.indb 208

64. Temple of Hephaestus: Isoc. 17. Council chamber with Council members and the Eleven: Dem. 53.23; one could invite members of the Areopagus to attend: Dem. 54.28. Heliaea: Dem. 47.6 and 12. Courtroom: Dem. 19.70, 47.6, and, with a herald, 47.17, probably for the sake of his curse; Lycurg. 1.31; Aeschin. 2.126. See Hunter 1994, 92. 65. DuBois 1991, 30 –31; Faraone 1989, 12 –13; Schumacher 2001. The torture strikes some commentators as mild compared to that employed today. See Levicrain in Daremberg and Saglio 1904, 5:147 s.v. testimonium, testis. 66. Lines 618 – 622, translated by duBois (1991, 30): “Skin him alive . . . / Vinegar up his nose . . . bricks on his chest . . . / Or hang him by his thumbs . . . what have you . . . But / No lashing with a leek or onion top!” Ehrenberg (1951, 187) wishfully thought this scene suggested “that torture was seldom actually used.” 67. Public torturers: Aeschin. 2.126; Dem. 53.24. Private torturers: Antiph. 1.10, 18; Dem. 53.24 –25. The latter passage explains why a public torturer is preferable. 68. Cf. the alleged crimes of Aristarchus, whom Aeschines accuses of mutilating and killing Nicodemus of Aphidna (Aeschin. 1.172). 69. Headlam (1893, 1): “No custom in antiquity has excited such natural surprise and contempt.” It strikes MacDowell as “wanton and purposeless barbarity” (1978, 246). Gagarin calls it a “bizarre institution” (1996, 1). Harrison prefers to think that most Athenians recognized its absurdity (1998, 2:148): “If the average Athenian really believed that a slave could be normally expected to speak the truth under torture, surely at least one case would have survived where a challenge actually produced a piece of evidence.” Finley is less optimistic: modern history has shown that the senseless-

8/7/06 12:48:25 PM


20 9

ness of torture cannot prevent its practice (1980, 95).

The Loeb emends to katapeplasthai, “to have been plastered over.”

70. Reveal truth: Lys. 7.37; Dem. 47.35, 49.56, 59.120; Lycurg. 1.29. Unmask lies: Isae. 8.11; Dem. 52.22, 59.125. Offer accuracy: Isae. 10.11; Dem. 29.5, 30.37, 59.122; Lycurg. 1.34. Clarity: Dem. 29.14, 30.36. The beauty of simplicity and truth: Dem. 29.11–12. There is no reason to think the orators, in praising basanos, were speaking tongue-in-cheek, as Dorjahn once suggested (1951–52, 188).

84. Apollodorus admits to some of the same flaws—fast walking and loud talking—at Dem. 45.77.

71. Lys. 7.34; Dem. 47.8. Classic formulations are found at Dem. 47.58 and 59.120. For impartial, see Antiph. 1.8 and Dem. 47.9; for democratic, see Lycurg. 1.29. 72. Rhetoric 1.15, 1376b31–1377a7; Rhetorica ad Alexandrum 16, 1432a12 –31. 73. Also noted by Fisher 1993, 61. 74. Contrast with Antiph. 5.47– 48, where the speaker points to the illegality of putting a slave witness to death without official sanction. 75. Cf. Antiph. 5.47, where the slave could be tortured but not killed without a decision from court or magistrate. 76. Sternberg 1998, 30 –36. 77. Hdt. 3.14.11; Xen. Apol. 18; Dem. 19.309, 53.8. 78. Christensen 1984; Chaniotis 1996, 79– 83. 79. Fisher 1993, 64. 80. Naiden 2004, 73 and 89 n. 21. 81. Some slaves were branded or tattooed by their masters. For the branding of runaways, see Ehrenberg 1951, 188. For tattoos, see duBois 1991, 69–74. 82. Gagarin (1996, 14 –15) reviews both. 83. The text here is uncertain. The manuscripts have katapeple¯ khthai, “to have been struck down,” which makes no sense without the negative me¯ , suggested by Wolf.

T3801.indb 209

85. Dem. 29.14 also shows that the “sufferers” in discussions of basanos were the owners, not the slaves. 86. It is unlikely that he inherited it outright; he probably leased it at first and purchased it when he could (Trevett 1992, 2, 18 –19). Oikonomides (1992) has identified a later inscribed stele from the agora that refers to Pasion’s bank after its transfer to Phormion. The bank by that time had two offices: one in the agora, the other in Piraeus. 87. If a slave’s owner denied permission for interrogation by torture, the interrogation could not go forward— except, as shown above, in crimes against the state. Pasion’s curious proposal that the torturers ask Cittus whatever they want without using force has been adduced as evidence that the testimony of slaves could be accepted if both parties agreed (Levicrain in Daremberg and Saglio 1904, 5:147). A more plausible interpretation, however, is that this proposal is supposed to strike the jurors as wholly ludicrous. 88. Here and at Lys. 4, Dem. 29, and Dem. 49. 89. The speaker claims that Pasion listed Cittus as an item in his property assessment but does not introduce the document in court (49). 90. Trevett 1992, 5. This position, occupied first by Pasion and then by Cittus, was later given to Phormion. 91. In Antiphon’s Prosecution for Poisoning, an Athenian woman sympathizes with a slave woman whose master, despite their sexual liaison, is about to put her in a brothel: adikeisthai emellen (Antiph. 1.14 –15). This

8/7/06 12:48:25 PM

2 10

is the same slave woman who, after the poisoning, was tortured and killed.

Conclusions 1. For a recent treatment, see Winterer 2002. Isadora Duncan in her autobiography My Life effusively describes her first visit to the Acropolis (1927, 122): “We arrived at violet-crowned Athens that evening, and the daybreak found us, with trembling limbs and hearts faint with adoration, ascending the steps of her Temple. As we mounted, it seemed to me that all the life I had known up to that time had fallen away from me as a motley garment; that I had never lived before; that I was born for the first time in that long breath and first gaze of pure beauty.”

T3801.indb 210


2. Lys. 24.7: kai peri tous ouden ekhontes kakon elee¯ monestatoi dokountes einai. 3. Isoc. 15.20: epi men to¯ n allo¯ n pragmato¯ n elee¯ monestatous omologeisthai kai praotatous hapanto¯ n einai to¯ n Helle¯ no¯ n. 4. See above, Introduction, note 13. 5. Eagleton (2003, 23 – 40) explores and critiques multiple versions of this theme that have been enunciated over the long history of literary criticism. He rightly points out that two Sophoclean heroes, Philoctetes and Heracles, endure “raw, pointless, unbearable pain” without “a shred of stoicism” (31). 6. Pearson (1962, 136) also defends the Greeks against unqualified charges of having “a selfish and calculating attitude.”

8/7/06 12:48:26 PM

Works Cited

Adcock, F. E. 1957. The Greek and Macedonian Art of War. Berkeley: University of California Press. Ajootian, Aileen. 2005. “The Civic Art of Pity.” In Sternberg 2005, 223 –252. Allen, Danielle S. 1997. “Imprisonment in Classical Athens.” Classical Quarterly 47:121–135. ———. 2000. The World of Prometheus: The Politics of Punishing in Democratic Athens. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Allison, June W. 1997. “Homeric Allusions in the Sicilian Narrative.” American Journal of Philology 118 : 499–516. Anderson, J. K. 1970. Military Theory and Practice in the Age of Xenophon. Berkeley: University of California Press. Andreades, A. M. 1933. A History of Greek Public Finance. Vol. 1. Trans. Carroll N. Brown. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. Andrewes, A. 1985. “Diodorus and Ephorus: One Source of Misunderstanding.” In The Craft of the Ancient Historian, ed. J. W. Eadie and J. Ober, 189–197. Lanham, Md.: University Press of America. Annas, Julia. 1993. The Morality of Happiness. New York: Oxford University Press. Atkinson, J.E.A. 1980. Commentary on Q. Curtius Rufus, Historiae Alexandri Magni, Books 3 and 4. Amsterdam: Gieben. Badian, Ernst. 1979. “Alexander’s Mules.” New York Review of Books 26.20:54 –56. Barber, G. L. 1935. The Historian Ephorus. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Barkan, Irving. 1936. “Imprisonment as a Penalty in Ancient Athens.” Classical Philology 31 : 338 –341. Bauman, R. A. 1990. Political Trials in Ancient Greece. London: Routledge. Bétant, É.-A. 1843. Lexicon Thucydideum. 2 vols. Geneva: Carey. Bielman, Anne. 1994. Retour a là liberté: Libération et savetage des prisonniers en Grèce ancienne. Athens: École Française d’Athènes. Blakeslee, S. 1993. “Mystery of Sleep Yields as Studies Reveal Immune Tie.” New York Times, August 3, 1993, B5, B8. Blass, Friedrich. 1874. Die attische Beredsamkeit. 3 vols. Leipzig: Teubner.

T3801.indb 211

8/7/06 12:48:26 PM

2 12


Bloch, Enid. 2002. “Hemlock Poisoning and the Death of Socrates: Did Plato Tell the Truth?” In The Trial and Execution of Socrates, ed. Thomas Brickhouse and Nicholas Smith, 255 –278. New York: Oxford University Press. Blundell, Mary Whitlock. 1989. Helping Friends and Harming Enemies: A Study in Sophocles and Greek Ethics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Boardman, John. 1990. “Symposion Furniture.” In Sympotica, ed. Oswyn Murray, 122 –131. Oxford: Clarendon. Bonner, Robert J. 1933. Aspects of Athenian Democracy. Berkeley: University of California Press. Bonner, Robert J., and Gertrude Smith. 1930 –38. The Administration of Justice from Homer to Aristotle. 2 vols. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Booth, William James. 1993. Households: On the Moral Architecture of the Economy. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press. Bosworth, A. B. 1988. From Arrian to Alexander: Studies in Historical Interpretation. Oxford: Clarendon. ———. 1996. Alexander and the East. Oxford: Clarendon. Brindesi, Fausto. 1963. Eginetico. Florence: La Nuova Italia Editrice. Brown, T. S. 1950. “Clitarchus.” American Journal of Philology 71:134 –155. Brun, Patric. 1983. Eisphora, Syntaxis, Stratiotika: Recherches sur les finances militaires d’Athenes au IV e siecle av. J.-C. Paris: Les Belles Lettres. Bullough, Vern, and Bonnie Bullough. 1978. The Care of the Sick: The Emergence of Modern Nursing. New York: Prodist. Burkert, Walter. 1955. “Zum altgriechischen Mitleidsbegriff.” Ph.D. diss., Friedrich-Alexander University, Erlangen. Bushala, E. W. 1968. “Torture of Non-Citizens in Homicide Investigations.” Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 9 : 61– 68. Cambiano, Giuseppe. 1987. “Aristotle and the Anonymous Opponents of Slavery.” In Finley 1987, 21–39. Camp, John M. 1986. The Athenian Agora: Excavations in the Heart of Classical Athens. New York: Thames and Hudson. Campbell, Lewis. 1879. Sophocles. 2 vols. Oxford: Clarendon. Cantarella, Eva. 2000. Les peines de mort en Grèce et à Rome. Trans. Nadine Gallet. Paris: Albin Michel. Carey, C. 1988. “A Note on Torture in Athenian Homicide Cases.” Historia 37:241–245. ———. 1995. “The Witness’s Exomosia in the Athenian Courts.” Classical Quarterly 45 : 114 –119. Carey, C., and R. A. Reid, eds. 1985. Selected Private Speeches: Demosthenes. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Carney, Elizabeth. 1996. “Macedonians and Mutiny: Discipline and Indiscipline in the Army of Philip and Alexander.” Classical Philology 91:19– 44. Carter, L. B. 1986. The Quiet Athenian. Oxford: Clarendon. Cartledge, Paul. 1993. “Like a Worm I’ the Bud? A Heterology of Classical Greek Slavery.” Greece and Rome 40 : 163 –180. ———. 2002. The Greeks: A Portrait of Self and Others. 2d ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

T3801.indb 212

8/7/06 12:48:26 PM

works ci t ed

213

Cartledge, Paul, Paul Millett, and Sitta von Reden, eds. 1998. Kosmos: Essays in Order, Conflict and Community in Classical Athens. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Cartledge, Paul, Paul Millett, and Stephen Todd, eds. 1990. Nomos: Essays in Athenian Law, Politics and Society. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Cawkwell, G. L. 1980. Review of Engels 1978. Classical Review 30:244. Chaniotis, Angelos. 1996. “Conflicting Authorities: Asylia between Secular and Divine Law in the Classical and Hellenistic Poleis.” Kernos 9:65 – 86. Chantraine, P. 1968. Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue grecque. Vol. 1 of 4. Paris: Klincksieck. Christ, M. 1998. The Litigious Athenian. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press. Christensen, K. A. 1984. “The Theseion: A Slave Refuge at Athens.” American Journal of Ancient History 9 : 23 –32. Clairmont, C. W. 1983. Patrios Nomos: Public Burial in Athens during the Fifth and Fourth Centuries B.C. Oxford: B.A.R. Clark, Candace. 1997. Misery and Company: Sympathy in Everyday Life. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Classen, J. 1875 – 82. Thukydides. 2 vols. Berlin: Weidmann. Cloché, Paul. 1963. Isocrate et son temps. Paris: Les Belles Lettres. Cohen, David. 1991. Law, Sexuality, and Society: The Enforcement of Morals in Classical Athens. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ———. 1995. Law, Violence and Community in Classical Athens. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ———. 1996. “Seclusion, Separation, and the Status of Women in Classical Athens.” In Women in Antiquity, ed. Ian McAuslan and Peter Walcot, 134 –145. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Cohen, Edward E. 2000. The Athenian Nation. Princeton: Princeton University Press. ———. 2003. “The High Cost of Andreia at Athens.” In Andreia: Studies in Manliness and Courage in Classical Antiquity, ed. Ralph M. Rosen and Ineke Sluiter, 145 –165. Leiden: Brill. Cohn-Haft, Louis. 1956. The Public Physicians of Ancient Greece. Northampton, Mass.: Department of History of Smith College. ———. 1995. “Divorce in Classical Athens.” Journal of Hellenic Studies 115:1–14. Cole, Susan G. 1981. “Could Greek Women Read and Write?” In Reflections of Women in Antiquity, ed. Helene P. Foley, 219–245. New York: Gordon and Breach Science Publishers. Connor, W. Robert. 1984. Thucydides. Princeton: Princeton University Press. ———. 1992. The New Politicians of Fifth-Century Athens. Indianapolis: Hackett. Cooper, John M. 1999. “Friendship and the Good in Aristotle.” In Aristotle’s Ethics: Critical Essays, ed. Nancy Sherman, 277–300. Lanham, Md.: Rowman and Littlefield. Couvenhes, Jean-Christophe. 1998. “De L’individualité du soldat dans la defense de l’Attique (IVe et IIIe siècles av. J.-C.).” Revue des études grecques 111:714 –721. Cox, Cheryl Ann. 1998. Household Interests: Property, Marriage Strategies, and Family Dynamics in Ancient Athens. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Crotty, Kevin. 1994, The Poetics of Supplication: Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press. Damasio, Antonio R. 1994. Descartes’ Error: Emotion, Reason, and the Human Brain. New York: Putnam’s Sons.

T3801.indb 213

8/7/06 12:48:26 PM

2 14


Daremberg, C., and M. E. Saglio, eds. 1904. Dictionnaire des antiquités grecques et romaines. 5 vols. Paris: Hachett. Davidson, James. 1998. Courtesans and Fishcakes: The Consuming Passions of Classical Athens. New York: St. Martin’s Press. Davies, J. K. 1971. Athenian Propertied Families, 600 –300 B.C. Oxford: Clarendon. Dean-Jones, Lesley. 1994. Women’s Bodies in Classical Greek Science. Oxford: Clarendon. Dearn, Alan. 1995. “The Long Conflict between Athens and Aegina.” Ancient History 25 :125 –138. de Bruyn, Odile. 1995. La compétence de l’Aréopage en matière de procès publics. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner. Delbrück, H. 1990. Warfare in Antiquity. Trans. W. J. Renfroe, Jr. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press. (Based on 3d ed., Berlin, 1920.) Den Boer, Willem. 1979. Private Morality in Greece and Rome. Leiden: Brill. Denniston, J. D., and D. L. Page, eds. 1957. Commentary on Aeschylus’ Agamemnon. Oxford: Clarendon. de Romilly, Jacqueline. 1979. La douceur dans la pensée grecque. Paris: Les Belles Lettres. ———. 1988. “Le conquérant et la belle captive.” Bulletin de l’Association Guillaume Budé 1988 : 3 –15. De Souza, Philip. 1999. Piracy in the Graeco-Roman World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. de Ste. Croix, G.E.M. 1970. “Some Observations on the Property Rights of Athenian Women.” Classical Review, n.s. 20 : 173 –178. ———. 1981. The Class Struggle in the Ancient World. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press. Devine, A. M. 1979. Review of Engels 1978. Phoenix 30:272 –276. Diels, Herman, and W. Kranz. 1954. Fragmente der Vorsokratiker. 2 vols. Berlin: Weidmann. Diller, Aubrey. 1971. Race Mixture among the Greeks before Alexander. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood. (First published in 1937.) Dillery, John. 1995. Xenophon and the History of His Times. London: Routledge. Dillon, Matthew P. J. 1995. “Payments to the Disabled at Athens: Social Justice or Fear of Aristocratic Patronage?” Ancient Society 26:27–57. Dobson, J. F. 1974. The Greek Orators. Chicago: Ares. (First published 1918.) Dorjahn, Alfred P. 1951–52. “On Slave Evidence in Greek Law.” Classical Journal 47:188. ———. 1971. “On Slave-Evidence in Athenian Courts.” Classical Bulletin 47:45 – 46. Dorman, Michael. 2000. “The Killing of Kitty Genovese.” http://www.newsday.com /community/guide/lihistory/ny-history-hs818a.0.7944135.story. Dover, Kenneth J. 1965. Thucydides Book VII. Oxford: Clarendon. ———. 1968. Lysias and the Corpus Lysiacum. Berkeley: University of California Press. ———. 1974. Greek Popular Morality. Oxford: Basil Blackwell. duBois, Page. 1991. Torture and Truth. New York: Routledge. Ducrey, Pierre. 1968. Le traitement des prisonniers de guerre dans la Grèce antique. Paris: Boccard. Duncan, Isadora. 1927. My Life. New York: Boni and Liveright. Dworakowska, Angelina. 1975. Quarries in Ancient Greece. Wrocław: Polish Academy of Sciences, Institute of the History of Material Culture.

T3801.indb 214

8/7/06 12:48:26 PM

works ci t ed

215

Eagleton, Terry. 2003. Sweet Violence: The Idea of the Tragic. Oxford: Blackwell. Edelstein, Emma J., and Ludwig Edelstein. 1945. Asclepius. 2 vols. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press. Ehrenberg, Victor. 1951. The People of Aristophanes: A Sociology of Old Attic Comedy. Oxford: Blackwell. Eisenberg, Nancy, and Janet Strayer, eds. 1987. Empathy and Its Developments. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Engels, Donald W. 1978. Alexander the Great and the Logistics of the Macedonian Army. Berkeley: University of California Press. Falkner, Thomas M. 2005. “Engendering the Tragic Theate¯ s: Pity, Power, and Spectacle in Sophocles’ Trachiniae.” In Sternberg 2005, 165 –192. Faraone, Christopher A. 1989. “The Wheel, the Whip and Other Implements of Torture: Erotic Magic in Pindar’s Pythian 4.213 –19.” Classical Journal 89:1–19. Faraone, Christopher A., and Dirk Obbink, eds. 1991. Magika Hiera: Ancient Greek Magic and Religion. New York: Oxford University Press. Felson-Rubin, Nancy. 1996. “Penelope’s Perspective: Character from Plot.” In Reading the Odyssey: Selected Interpretive Essays, ed. Seth L. Schein, 163 –183. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Figueira, Thomas J. 1981. Aegina: Society and Politics. Salem, N.H.: Ayer. ———. 1990. “Aigina and the Naval Strategy of the Late Fifth and Early Fourth Centuries.” Rheinisches Museum für Philologie 113 : 15 –51. ———. 1993. Excursions in Epichoric History: Aeginetan Essays. Lanham, Md.: Rowman and Littlefield. Finley, Moses I., ed. 1960. Slavery in Classical Antiquity: Views and Controversies. Cambridge: Heffler. ———. 1973. The Ancient Economy. Berkeley: University of California Press. ———. 1980. Ancient Slavery and Modern Ideology. New York: Viking Press. ———, ed. 1987. Classical Slavery. London: Frank Cass. ———. 1989. “The Elderly in Classical Antiquity.” In Old Age in Greek and Latin Literature, ed. Thomas M. Falkner and Judith de Luce, 1–20. Albany: State University of New York. Fisher, Nick R. E. 1976. Social Values in Classical Athens. London: Dent and Sons. ———. 1993. Slavery in Classical Greece. Bristol: Bristol Classical Press. ———. 1999. “ ‘Workshops of Villains’: Was There Much Organised Crime in Classical Athens?” In Organised Crime in Antiquity, ed. K. Hopwood, 53 –96. London: Duckworth. ———. 2001. Against Timarchos: Aeschines. Introduction, translation, and commentary by Nick Fisher. Oxford: Clarendon. Foucault, Michel. 1973. The Birth of the Clinic: An Archaeology of Medical Perception. Trans. A. M. Sheridan Smith. New York: Pantheon Books. Foxhall, Lin. 1998. “The Politics of Affection: Emotional Attachments in Athenian Society.” In Cartledge et al. 1998, 52 – 67. Fraenkel, Edward, ed. 1950. Commentary on Aeschylus’ Agamemnon. 3 vols. Oxford: Clarendon. Frijda, Nico H. 1986. The Emotions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

T3801.indb 215

8/7/06 12:48:27 PM

2 16


Gabrielli, M. 1995. “Transports et logistique militaire.” Pallas 43:109–122. Gabrielsen, Vincent. 1989. “The Number of Athenian Trierarchs after ca. 340 B.C.” Classica et mediaevalia 40 : 145 –159. Gagarin, Michael. 1996. “The Torture of Slaves in Athenian Law.” Classical Philology 91:1–18. ———. 2001. “Women’s Voices in Attic Oratory.” In Making Silence Speak: Women’s Voices in Greek Literature and Society, ed. André Lardinois and Laura McClure, 161–176. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Garlan, Yvon. 1975. War in the Ancient World. Trans. Janet Lloyd. New York: Norton. ———. 1988. Slavery in Ancient Greece. Revised and expanded ed. Trans. Janet Lloyd. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press. ———. 1994. “Warfare.” In The Cambridge Ancient History VI2: 678 – 692. Garland, Robert. 1987. The Piraeus: From the Fifth to the First Century B.C. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press. ———. 1995. The Eye of the Beholder. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press. ———. 2001. The Greek Way of Death. 2d ed. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press. Garnsey, Peter. 1996. Ideas of Slavery from Aristotle to Augustine. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Gernet, Louis. 1959. Plaidoyers Civils: Démosthène. Vols. 2 and 3. Paris: Les Belles Lettres. Girard, P. 1904. “Lectica.” In Daremberg and Saglio 1904, 3:1002 –1006. Goff, Barbara, ed. 1995. History, Tragedy, Theory: Dialogues on Athenian Drama. Austin: University of Texas Press. Golden, Mark. 1988. “The Effects of Slavery on Citizen Households and Children: Aeschylus, Aristophanes and Athens.” Historical Reflections/Réflexions historiques 15:455 – 475. Goldstein, Jonathan A. 1968. The Letters of Demosthenes. New York: Columbia University Press. Gomme, A. W., A. Andrewes, and K. J. Dover. 1970. A Historical Commentary on Thucydides. 4 vols. Oxford: Clarendon. Goodwin, William Watson. 1901. Demosthenes, On the Crown; with Critical and Explanatory Notes. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Gould, John. 1980. “Law, Custom and Myth: Aspects of the Social Position of Women in Classical Athens.” Journal of Hellenic Studies 100:38 –59. ———. 2001. Myth, Ritual Memory, and Exchange: Essays in Greek Literature and Culture. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Graham, Walter J. 1974. “Houses of Classical Athens.” Phoenix 28:45 –54. Green, Peter. 1991. Alexander of Macedon, 356 –323 B.C. Berkeley: University of California Press. Grene, David, trans. 1955. “Hippolytus.” In Euripides I, ed. David Grene and Richmond Lattimore. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. ———, trans. 1956. “Prometheus Bound.” In Aeschylus II, ed. David Grene and Richmond Lattimore. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. ———, trans. 1957. “Philoctetes.” In Sophocles II, ed. David Grene and Richmond Lattimore. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. ———, trans. 1987. Herodotus’ History. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Grene, David, and Wendy Doniger O’Flaherty, trans. 1989. “Agamemnon.” In Oresteia. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

T3801.indb 216

8/7/06 12:48:27 PM

works ci t ed

217

Griffin, Jasper. 1998. “The Social Function of Attic Tragedy.” Classical Quarterly 48:39– 61. Griffith, G. T. 1935. The Mercenaries of the Hellenistic World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Grmek, Mirko D. 1989. Diseases in the Ancient Greek World. Trans. Mireille Muellner and Leonard Muellner. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press. Gschnitzer, Fritz. 1963. Studien zur griechischen Terminologie der Sklaverei. Vol. 1, Grundzüge des vorhellenistischen Sprachgebrauchs. Wiesbaden: Akademie der Wissenschaften und der Literatur in Mainz. Hall, Edith. 1989. Inventing the Barbarian. Oxford: Clarendon. ———. 1997. “The Sociology of Athenian Tragedy.” In The Cambridge Companion to Greek Tragedy, ed. P. E. Easterling, 93 –126. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hamel, Debra. 1998. Athenian Generals: Military Authority in the Classical Period. Leiden: Brill. Hammond, N.G.L. 1983a. “Army Transport in the Fifth and Fourth Centuries.” Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 24 : 27–31. ———. 1983b. Three Historians of Alexander the Great. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hands, A. R. 1968. Charities and Social Aid in Greece and Rome. London: Thames and Hudson. Hansen, Mogens H. 1976. Apagoge, Endeixis and Ephegesis against Kakourgoi, Atimoi and Pheugontes. Odense: Odense University Press. ———. 1982. “Demographic Reflections on the Number of Athenian Citizens, 451–309 B.C.” American Journal of Ancient History 7 : 172 –189. Hanson, Ann Ellis. 1991. “Continuity and Change: Three Case Studies.” In Women’s History and Ancient History, ed. Sarah B. Pomeroy, 73 –110. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. Hanson, Victor Davis. 1989. The Western Way of War. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. Harris, Edward M. 1992. “Women and Lending in Athenian Society: A Horos Re-Examined.” Phoenix 46 : 309–321. ———. 1995. Aeschines and Athenian Politics. New York: Oxford University Press. ———. 2000. “Open Texture in Athenian Law.” Dike 3:27–79. ———. 2002. “Did Solon Abolish Debt-Bondage?” Classical Quarterly 52.2:415 – 430. ———. 2004. ‘In the Act’ or ‘Red-Handed’? Apagoge to the Eleven and Furtum Manifestum. In Symposion 1993: Vorträge zur griechischen und hellenistischen Rechtsgeschichte, ed. Gerhard Thür, 169–184. Cologne: Böhlau. Harris, William V. 2001. Restraining Rage: The Ideology of Anger Control in Classical Antiquity. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. Harrison, A.R.W. 1998. The Law of Athens. 2 vols. 2d ed. with foreword by D. M. MacDowell. London: Duckworth. (First published 1971.) Headlam, J. W. 1893. “On the prokle¯sis eis basanon in Attic Law.” Classical Review 7:1–5. Herman, Gabriel. 1987. Ritualised Friendship and the Greek City. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ———. 1994. “How Violent Was Athenian Society?” In Ritual, Finance, Politics: Athenian Democratic Accounts, ed. Robin Osborne and Simon Hornblower, 99–117. Oxford: Clarendon.

T3801.indb 217

8/7/06 12:48:27 PM

2 18


Hertlein, F. K. 1849. Anabasis. Leipzig: Weidmann. Hervagault, Marie-Paule, and Marie-Madeleine Mactoux. 1974. “Esclaves et société d’après Démosthène.” In Actes du Colloque 1972 sur L’Esclavage, 57–103. Paris: Les Belles Lettres. Higgins, W. E. 1977. Xenophon the Athenian. Albany: State University of New York Press. Holdsworth, William Searle. 1924. A History of English Law. 7 vols. Boston: Little, Brown. Hölscher, Tonio. 1991. “The City of Athens: Space, Symbol, Structure.” In City States in Classical Antiquity and Medieval Italy, ed. Anthony Molho, Kurt Raaflaub, and Julia Emlen, 355 –380. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner. Hornblower, Simon. 1983. The Greek World, 479 –323 B.C. London: Methuen. ———. 1987. Thucydides. London: Duckworth. ———. 1994. “Sources and Their Uses.” The Cambridge Ancient History VI2:1–23. Huart, Pierre. 1968. Le vocabulaire de l’analyze psychologique dans l’oeuvre de Thucydide. Paris: Librarie C. Klincksieck. Hume, David. 1998. An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals: A Critical Edition. Ed. Tom L. Beauchamp. Oxford: Clarendon Press. (First published 1751.) Humphreys, S. C. 1977–78. “Public and Private Interests in Classical Athens.” Classical Journal 73 :97–104. ———. 1985. “Social Relations on Stage: Witnesses in Classical Athens.” In The Discourse of Law, ed. Sally Humphreys, 313 –369. London: Harwood Academic Publishers. Hunt, Peter. 1998. Slaves, Warfare, and Ideology in the Greek Historians. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hunter, Virginia. 1989. “Women’s Authority in Classical Athens.” Echos du monde classique 33, n.s. 8 : 39– 48. ———. 1990. “Gossip and the Politics of Reputation in Classical Athens.” Phoenix 44 : 299–325. ———. 1992. “Constructing the Body of the Citizen: Corporal Punishment in Classical Athens.” Echos du monde classique 36, n.s. 11:271–291. ———. 1994. Policing Athens. Princeton: Princeton University Press. ———. 1997. “The Prison of Athens: A Comparative Perspective.” Phoenix 51:296 –326. Irwin, Michael. 1995. “Fail to Snooze, Immune Cells Lose.” Science News 147:11. Jacoby, F. 1922. “Kleitarchos.” Paulys Realencyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft 11 : 622 – 654. Jaeger, Werner. 1944. Paideia: The Ideals of Greek Culture. Vol. 3, The Conflict of Cultural Ideals in the Age of Plato. Trans. Gilbert Highet. New York: Oxford University Press. Jameson, Michael H. 1977. “Agricultural Slavery in Classical Athens.” Classical Journal 73 :122 –145. ———. 1990. “Private Space and the Greek City.” In The Greek City: From Homer to Alexander, ed. Oswyn Murray and Simon Price, 171–195. Oxford: Clarendon. Jebb, R. C. 1962. The Attic Orators from Antiphon to Isaeos. 2 vols. New York: Russell and Russell. (First printed 1876.) Johnson, James F., and Douglas C. Clapp. 2005. “Athenian Tragedy: An Education in Pity.” In Sternberg 2005, 123 –164.

T3801.indb 218

8/7/06 12:48:27 PM

works ci t ed

219

Johnston, Sarah Iles. 1999. Restless Dead: Encounters between the Living and the Dead in Ancient Greece. Berkeley: University of California Press. Johnstone, Steven. 1999. Disputes and Democracy: The Consequences of Litigation in Ancient Athens. Austin: University of Texas Press. Jones, John Ellis. 1975. “Town and Country Houses of Attica in Classical Times.” In Thorikos and the Laurion in Archaic and Classical Times, ed. H. Mussche, Paule Spitaels, and F. Goemaere-De Poesck, 63 –136. Ghent: Belgian Archaeological Mission in Greece. Jones, J. Walter. 1956. The Law and Legal Theory of the Greeks. Oxford: Clarendon. Jordan, David R. 2000. “A Personal Letter Found in the Athenian Agora.” Hesperia 69:91–103. Just, Roger. 1989. Women in Athenian Law and Life. London: Routledge. Kagan, Donald. 1981. The Peace of Nicias and the Sicilian Expedition. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press. Kelly, D. H. 1970. “What Happened to the Athenians Captured in Sicily?” Classical Review n.s. 20 : 127–131. Kim, Jinyo. 2000. The Pity of Achilles: Oral Style and the Unity of the Iliad. Lanham, Md.: Rowman and Littlefield. King, Helen. 1998. Hippocrates’ Woman: Reading the Female Body in Ancient Greece. London: Routledge. Konstan, David. 1997. Friendship in the Classical World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ———. 2001. Pity Transformed. London: Duckworth. Kosak, Jennifer Clarke. 1999. “Therapeutic Touch and Sophokles’ Philoktetes.” Harvard Studies in Classical Philology 99 : 93 –134. Kovacs, David, trans. 1999. “Trojan Women.” In Euripides: Selections. Loeb Classical Library. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. Kromayer, J., and G. Veith. 1928. Heerwesen und Kriegführung der Griechen und Römer. Munich: Beck. Lacey, W. K. 1968. The Family in Classical Greece. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press. ———. 1980. “The Family of Euxitheus (Demosthenes LVII).” Classical Quarterly 30:57– 61. Lamb, W.R.M. 1988. Lysias. Loeb Classical Library. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. Lambert, S. D. 1993. The Phratries of Attica. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Lamberton, W. A. 1886. The Sixth and Seventh Books of Thucydides. New York: Harper and Brothers. Lamer, H. 1925. “Lectica.” Paulys Realencyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft 12 : 1056 –1108. Lampson, Nick. 1998. Proposed Iverson Act. http://www.house.gov/lampson /missing_iversonact.htm Lang, Mabel. 1994. Life, Death and Litigation in the Athenian Agora. Agora Picture Book 23. Princeton: American School of Classical Studies at Athens. Latané, Bibb, and John M. Darley. 1970. The Unresponsive Bystander: Why Doesn’t He Help? New York: Appleton-Century Crofts.

T3801.indb 219

8/7/06 12:48:27 PM

220


Lateiner, Donald. 2002. “Streetlife: Civic Honor and Insult in Ancient Athens.” Lecture delivered at The College of Wooster. ———. 2005. “The Pitiers and the Pitied in Herodotus and Thucydides.” In Sternberg 2005, 67–97. Lattimore, Richmond, trans. 1951. Homer’s Iliad. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. ———, trans. 1953. “Agamemnon.” In Aeschylus I, ed. Richmond Lattimore. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. ———, trans. 1958. “Rhesus.” In Euripides IV, ed. David Grene and Richmond Lattimore. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Lawrence, A. W. 1983. Greek Architecture. Revised with additions by R. A. Tomlinson. Middlesex: Penguin. Lendle, Otto. 1995. Kommentar zu Xenophons Anabasis. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. Levicrain, C. “Testimonium, Testis.” In Daremberg and Saglio 1904, 5:146 –156. Lewis, Michael, and Jeannette M. Haviland-Jones, eds. 2000. Handbook of Emotions. 2d ed. New York: Guilford. Lewis, Sian. 1996. News and Society in the Greek Polis. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. Liddell, H. G., and R. Scott. 1996. Greek-English Lexicon. 9th ed. Oxford: Clarendon Press. LiDonnici, Lynn. 1995. The Epidaurian Miracle Inscriptions: Text, Translation, and Commentary. Atlanta, Ga.: Scholars Press. Lintott, A. W. 1982. Violence, Civil Strife and Revolution in the Classical City. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press. Lonis, Raoul. 1969. Les usages de la guerre entre Grecs et Barbares des guerres médiques au milieu du IV e s. avant J.-C. Paris: Les Belles Lettres. Loomis, William T. 1998. Wages, Welfare Costs and Inflation in Classical Athens. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Loraux, N. 1986. The Invention of Athens: The Funeral Oration in the Classical City. Trans. A. Sheridan. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. Lutz, Catherine A. 1988. Unnatural Emotions: Everyday Sentiments on a Micronesian Atoll: Their Challenges to Western Theory. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. MacDowell, Douglas M. 1962. Andokides: On the Mysteries. Oxford: Clarendon. ———. 1963. Athenian Homicide Law in the Age of the Orators. Manchester: University Press. ———. 1978. The Law in Classical Athens. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press. Macleod, Colin W. 1982. Homer: Iliad Book XXIV. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ———. 1983. “Thucydides and Tragedy.” In Collected Essays, 140 –158. Oxford: Clarendon. Mactoux, Marie-Madeleine. 1980. Douleia: Esclavage et pratiques discursives dans l’Athènes classique. Paris: Les Belles Lettres. Mahaffy, J. P. 1875. Social Life in Greece from Homer to Menander. 2d ed. London: Macmillan. Majno, Guido. 1975. The Healing Hand: Man and Wound in the Ancient World. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. Manchester, H. H. 1932. “Nursing in Graeco-Roman Times.” Trained Nurse and Hospital Review 88 :33 –37.

T3801.indb 220

8/7/06 12:48:27 PM

works ci t ed

221

Marchant, Edgar Cardew. 1893. Thucydides: Book VII. London: Macmillan. Masqueray, Paul. 1930 –31. Anabase. Commentary in 2 vols. Paris: Les Belles Lettres. Mathieu, Georges, and Émile Brémond. 1928. Isocrate. Budé ed. 4 vols. Paris: Les Belles Lettres. Meister, K. 1970. “Die sizilische Expedition der Athener bei Timaios.” Gymnasium 77: 508 –517. Migeotte, Léopold. 1992. Les souscriptions publiques dan les cités grecques. Quebec: Les Éditions du Sphinx. Millett, Paul. 1989. “Patronage and Its Avoidance in Classical Athens.” In Patronage in Ancient Society, ed. Andrew Wallace-Hadrill, 15 – 47. London: Routledge. ———. 1991. Lending and Borrowing in Ancient Athens. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ———. 1993. “Warfare, Economy, and Democracy.” In Rich and Shipley 1993, 177–196. ———. 1998. “Encounters in the Agora.” In Cartledge et al. 1998, 203 –228. Mirhady, David C. 1996. “Torture and Rhetoric in Athens.” Journal of Hellenic Studies 116 : 119–131. Morgan, Gareth. 1982. “Euphiletos’ House: Lysias I.” Transactions of the American Philological Association 112 : 115 –123. Morris, David B. 1991. The Culture of Pain. Berkeley: University of California Press. Morris, Ian. 1994. “The Athenian Economy Twenty Years after The Ancient Economy.” Classical Philology 89 : 351–366. Morrow, Glenn R. 1978. “Plato and the Rule of Law.” In Plato: A Collection of Critical Essays, vol. 2, ed. Gregory Vlastos, 144 –165. Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press. Mueller, Carolus. 1817. Aegineticorum Liber. Berolini: Libraria Reimeriana. Müller, Iwan von, and Adolf Bauer. 1893. Die griechischen privat- und kriegsaltertümer. Munich: Beck. Murray, Oswyn. 1990. “The Solonian Law of hubris.” In Cartledge et al. 1990, 139–145. Naiden, F. S. 2004. “Supplication and the Law.” In The Law and the Courts in Ancient Greece, ed. Edward M. Harris and Lene Rubinstein, 71–91. London: Duckworth. Nevett, Lisa C. 1995. “Gender Relations in the Classical Greek Household: The Archaeological Evidence.” Annual of the British School at Athens 90:363 –381. ———. 1999. House and Society in the Ancient Greek World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Nippel, Wilfried. 1995. Public Order in Ancient Rome. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Nussbaum, G. B. 1967. The Ten Thousand: A Study in Social Organization and Action in Xenophon’s Anabasis. Leiden: Brill. Nussbaum, Martha C. 2001. Upheavals of Thought: The Intelligence of Emotions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Nutton, Vivian. 1995. “Medicine in the Greek World, 800 –50 B.C.” In The Western Medical Tradition, ed. Lawrence I. Conrad, Michael Neve, Vivian Nutton, Roy Porter, and Andrew Wear, 11–38. The Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine, London: Cambridge University Press.

T3801.indb 221

8/7/06 12:48:28 PM

222


Oakley, John. 2005. “Pity in Classical Athenian Vase Painting.” In Sternberg 2005, 193 –222. Oatley, Keith, and Jennifer M. Jenkins. 1996. Understanding Emotions. Oxford: Blackwell. Ober, Josiah. 1989. Mass and Elite in Democratic Athens. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Ogden, Daniel. 1996. Greek Bastardy in the Classical and Hellenistic Periods. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Oikonomides, Alcibiade. 1992. “An Epigraphical Mention of the Bank of Pasion and Phormion from the Athenian Agora.” Ancient World 23:107–108. Orlandos, A. K. 1968. Les Matériaux de Construction et la technique architecturale des anciens grecs. Part 2. Paris: Éditions E. de Boccard. Ormerod, Henry A. 1927. Piracy in the Ancient World. Liverpool: University Press of Liverpool. Orwin, Clifford. 1994. The Humanity of Thucydides. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Osborne, Robin. 1985. Demos: The Discovery of Classical Attika. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Panagopoulos, Andreas. 1978. Captives and Hostages in the Peloponnesian War. Athens: Grigoris. Pangle, Lorraine Smith. 2003. Aristotle and the Philosophy of Friendship. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Parker, Robert. 1983. Miasma. Oxford: Clarendon. Patterson, Orlando. 1982. Slavery and Social Death: A Comparative Study. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. Pearson, Lionel. 1960. The Lost Histories of Alexander. New York: American Philological Association. ———. 1962. Popular Ethics in Ancient Greece. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press. ———. 1987. The Greek Historians of the West: Timaeus and His Predecessors. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Pecirka, Jan. 1973. “Homestead Farms in Classical and Hellenistic Hellas.” In Problèmes de la terre en Grèce ancienne, ed. Moses I. Finley, 113 –147. Paris: Mouton. Pedrick, Victoria. 1982. “Supplication in the Iliad and the Odyssey.” Transactions of the American Philological Association 112 : 125 –140. Peters, Edward. 1985. Torture. Oxford: Basil Blackwell. Phillips, E. D. 1973. Aspects of Greek Medicine. New York: St. Martin’s Press. Phillipson, Coleman. 2001. The International Law and Custom of Ancient Greece and Rome. 2 vols. London: Macmillan. (First published 1911.) Pomeroy, Sarah B. 1994. Xenophon, Oeconomicus: A Social and Historical Commentary. Oxford: Clarendon. Popowicz, Eric. 1995. “La guerra total en la Grecia clasica (421–338).” Polis 7:219–245. Poppo, Ernst F., and Johannes M. Stahl. 1886. De bello peloponnesiaco. 4 vols in 3. Leipzig: Teubner. Poulakos, Takis. 1997. Speaking for the Polis: Isocrates’ Rhetorical Education. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press. Pritchett, W. Kendrick. 1971–91. The Greek State at War. 5 vols. Berkeley: University of California Press. Rackham, H., trans. 1990. Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.

T3801.indb 222

8/7/06 12:48:28 PM

works ci t ed

223

Radt, Stefan, ed. 1985. Tragicorum graecorum fragmenta. Vol. 3 of 3. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht. Reddy, William M. 2001. The Navigation of Feeling: A Framework for the History of Emotions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Rich, John, and Graham Shipley, eds. 1993. War and Society in the Greek World. London: Routledge. Richardson, Nicholas J. 1993. The Iliad: A Commentary. Vol. 6, Books 21–24. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Richter, Gisela M. A. 1966. The Furniture of the Greeks, Etruscans, and Romans. London: Phaidon. Riginos, Alice Swift. 1994. “The Wounding of Philip II of Macedon: Fact and Fabrication.” Journal of Hellenic Studies 114 : 103 –119. Robinson, David M., and J. Walter Graham. 1938. The Hellenic House. Excavations at Olynthus, pt. 8. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press. Rosivach, Vincent J. 1991. “Some Athenian Presuppositions about ‘The Poor.’” Greece and Rome 38 : 189–198. ———. 1999. “Enslaving Barbaroi and the Athenian Ideology of Slavery.” Historia 48.2 :129–157. Rousseau, Jean-Jacques. 1972. Émile. Trans. B. Foxley. London: Everyman Library. (First published 1762.) Rubinstein, Lene. 1993. Adoption in Fourth-Century Athens. Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press. ———. 2000. Litigation and Cooperation: Supporting Speakers in the Courts of Classical Athens. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner. Sacks, Kenneth S. 1990. Diodorus Siculus and the First Century. Princeton: Princeton University Press. ———. 1994. “Diodorus and His Sources.” In Greek Historiography, ed. Simon Hornblower, 213 –232. Oxford: Clarendon. Sage, M. 1996. Warfare in Ancient Greece: A Sourcebook. London: Routledge. Saunders, Trevor J. 1992. “Plato’s Later Political Thought.” In The Cambridge Companion to Plato, ed. Richard Kraut, 464 – 492. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Scarry, Elaine. 1985. The Body in Pain: The Making and Unmaking of the World. New York: Oxford University Press. Schaefer, Arnold D. 1858. Demosthenes und seine Zeit. Leipzig: Teubner. Schaps, David M. 1979. Economic Rights of Women in Ancient Greece. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. ———. 1982. “The Women of Greece in Wartime.” Classical Philology 77:193 –213. Scheffer, Johannes. 1671. De re vehiculari veterum. Vol. 1. Frankfurt: Zunneriana. Schneider, K. 1955. “Valetudinarium.” In Paulys Realencyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft 8a:262 –264. 2d ed. Schumacher, Leonhard. 2001. Sklaverei in der Antike. Munich: Beck. Schwartz, E. 1905. “Diodorus.” Paulys Realencyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft 5 : 662 –704. Shipley, Graham. 1993. “Introduction: The Limits of War.” In Rich and Shipley 1993, 1–24.

T3801.indb 223

8/7/06 12:48:28 PM

224


Sinclair, R. K. 1988. Democracy and Participation in Athens. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Slackman, Michael. 2004. “What’s Wrong with Torturing a Quaeda Higher-Up?” New York Times, Week in Review, May 16, 2004. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/16 /weekinreview/ Smith, Alexander McCall. 1993. “The Duty to Rescue and the Common Law.” In The Duty to Rescue: The Jurisprudence of Aid, ed. Michael A. Menlowe and Alexander McCall Smith, 55 –91. Aldershot: Dartmouth Publishing. Smith, Charles Forster. 1886. Thucydides Book VII. Boston: Ginn. Snell, Bruno. 1953. The Discovery of the Mind: The Greek Origins of European Thought. Trans. T. G. Rosenmeyer. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. Sober, Elliott, and David Sloan Wilson. 1998. Unto Others: The Evolution and Psychology of Unselfish Behavior. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. Solmsen, Friedrich. 1938. “Aristotle and Cicero on the Orator’s Playing upon the Feelings.” Classical Philology 33 : 390 – 404. Sontag, Susan. 1977. Illness as Metaphor. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Stalley, R. F. 1983. An Introduction to Plato’s Laws. Indianapolis, Ind.: Hackett. Staub, Erwin. 1987. “Commentary on Part I.” In Eisenberg and Strayer 1987, 103 –115. Stephens, J. Ceri. 1995. “The Wound of Philoctetes.” Mnemosyne ser. 4, 48:153 –168. Sternberg, Rachel Hall. 1998. “Pity and Pragmatism: A Study of Athenian Attitudes toward Compassion in Fifth- and Fourth-Century Historiography and Oratory.” Diss., Bryn Mawr College. ———. 1999. “The Transport of Sick and Wounded Soldiers in Classical Greece.” Phoenix 53 : 191–205. ———. 2000. “The Nurturing Male: Bravery and Bedside Manners in Isocrates’ Aegineticus (19.24 –9).” Greece and Rome 47 : 172 –185. ———, ed. 2005. Pity and Power in Ancient Athens. New York: Cambridge University Press. Stillwell, Richard, ed. 1976. Princeton Encyclopedia of Classical Sites. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Strauss, Barry W. 1993. Fathers and Sons in Athens: Ideology and Society in the Era of the Peloponnesian War. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Tarn, W. W. 1930. Hellenistic Military and Naval Developments. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Tatum, James. 1989. Xenophon’s Imperial Fiction. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Temkin, Oswei. 1953. “Greek Medicine as Science and Craft.” Isis 44:213 –225. Thompson, Homer A. 1952. “The Altar of Pity in the Athenian Agora.” Hesperia 21:47– 82. Thompson, Wesley E. 1972. “Athenian Marriage Patterns: Remarriage.” California Studies in Classical Antiquity 5 : 211–225. Thür, G. 1977. Beweisführung vor den Schwurgerichtshöfen Athens: Die Proklesis zur Basanos. Vienna: Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften. Todd, Stephen. 1990. “The Purpose of Evidence in Athenian Courts.” In Cartledge et al. 1990, 19–39.

T3801.indb 224

8/7/06 12:48:28 PM

works ci t ed

225

Todd, Stephen, and Paul Millett. 1990. “Law, Society and Athens.” In Cartledge et al. 1990, 1–18. Tomlinson, R. A. 1976. Greek Sanctuaries. London: Paul Elek. Too, Yun Lee. 1995. The Rhetoric of Identity in Isocrates: Text, Power, Pedagogy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Trevett, Jeremy. 1992. Apollodorus the Son of Pasion. Oxford: Clarendon. Tritle, Lawrence A. 1992. “Virtue and Progress in Classical Athens: The Myth of the Professional General.” Ancient World 23 : 71– 89. Tzanetou, Angeliki. 2002. “Something to Do with Demeter: Ritual and Performance in Aristophanes’ Women at the Thesmophoria.” American Journal of Philology 123 : 1–39. ———. 2005. “A Generous City: Pity in Athenian Oratory and Tragedy.” In Sternberg 2005, 98 –122. Vanderpool, Eugene. 1974. “The ‘Agora’ of Pausanias I, 17, 1–2.” Hesperia 43:308 –310. Vannier, François. 1988. Finances publiques et richesses privées dans le discourse Athénien aux Ve et IVe siècles. Paris: Les Belles Lettres. van Wees, Hans. 1999. “The Mafia of Early Greece.” In Organised Crime in Antiquity, ed. K. Hopwood, 1–51. London: Duckworth. Vaughn, Pamela. 1991. “The Identification and Retrieval of the Hoplite Battle-Dead.” In Hoplites, ed. Victor Davis Hanson, 38 – 62. London: Routledge. Vickers, Michael, and David Gill. 1994. Artful Crafts: Ancient Greek Silverware and Pottery. Oxford: Clarendon. Vidal-Naquet, Pierre. 1986. The Black Hunter. Trans. Andrew Szegedy-Maszak. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press. Vollbrecht, Ferdinand. 1870. Anabasis. Leipzig: Teubner. ———. 1872. Wörterbuch zu Xenophons Anabasis. Leipzig: Teubner. Walker, Andrew D. 1993. “Enargeia and the Spectator in Greek Historiography.” Transactions of the American Philological Association 123 : 353 –377. Walker, Susan. 1983. “Women and Housing in Classical Greece: The Archaeological Evidence.” In Images of Women in Antiquity, ed. Averil Cameron and Amélie Kuhrt, 81–91. Detroit: Wayne State University Press. Warner, Rex, trans. 1954. Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War. London: Penguin. Wartenberg, Ute. 1995. After Marathon: War, Society, and Money in Fifth-Century Greece. London: British Museum Press. Whitehead, David. 1986. The Demes of Attica, 508/7– ca. 250 B.C.: A Political and Social Study. Princeton: Princeton University Press. ———. 1993. “Cardinal Virtues: The Language of Public Approbation in Democratic Athens.” Classica et mediaevalia 44 : 37–75. ———. 1997. oi»on to; mna'~ lutrou§oqai. In Esclavage, guerre, économie en Grèce ancienne: Hommages à Yvon Garlan, ed. Pierre Brulé and Jacques Ouhlen, 139–146. Rennes: Presses Universitaires de Rennes.

T3801.indb 225

8/7/06 12:48:28 PM

226


Wilson, Donna F. 2002. Ransom, Revenge, and Heroic Identity in the Iliad. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Winterer, Caroline. 2002. The Culture of Classicism: Ancient Greece and Rome in American Intellectual Life, 1780 –1910. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press. Withington, E. T. 1927. Hippocrates. Vol. 3. Loeb Classical Library. London: Heinemann. Wuthnow, Robert. 1991. Acts of Compassion. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Yin, Robert K. 1994. Case Study Research: Design and Methods. 2d ed. Thousand Oaks, Calif.: SAGE Publications. Youtie, Louise C. P. 1996. The Michigan Medical Codex. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Zeitlin, Froma. 1990. “Playing the Other: Theater, Theatricality, and the Feminine in Greek Drama.” In Nothing to Do with Dionysos? ed. John Winkler and Froma Zeitlin, 63 –96. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Ziegler, Marcia M. 2000. “Nonfeasance and the Duty to Assist: The American Seinfeld Syndrome.” 104 Dickinson Law Review 525. Zuntz, Günther. 1953. “The Altar of Mercy.” Classica et mediaevalia 14:71– 85.

T3801.indb 226

8/7/06 12:48:28 PM

Subject Index

A Aeschylus, 11, 42, 71, 76, 79– 80, 146, 180, 189n1 age-mates, 6, 59 Alexander the Great, 108, 109–110, 111–114, 142 –143, 205n116 anêr and anthrôpos, 134 –135 anger and abuse, 33, 62, 83, 90, 136 –138, 152 apo- compounds, 36 –37, 126 –127 Apollodorus, 18, 54 – 65, 84, 100, 149, 151 aporia, 122 –124, 127, 169 apprehension of criminals, 80, 100 aretê, 13 Arginusae, battle of, 14, 114, 143 –144, 150 Aristophanes, 23, 52, 87, 152, 159, 196n22, 204n103, 208n66 Aristotle basanos in, 160, 209n72 everyday pity in, 4, 10, 20, 34, 193n67 friendship in, 5 – 6, 61, 178 –179, 192n56 limited usefulness of, 4 – 6 ransom in, 48, 51 slavery in, 151–152, 206n30 tragic pity and katharsis in, 2, 180 B barbarians, 136, 151, 159 basanos, 146 –173, 180 criticism of, 160 –161

T3801.indb 227

praise of, 159–160, 209n70 and proklêsis, 157–158, 162, 163 –164, 166 –171 burial of war dead, 107, 121, 143 –144 bystander intervention, 18 –19, 76 –103 and Athenian law, 79– 82 table of instances, 77 in tragedy, 76, 79– 80 in the United States, 80, 97–98, 196n8 C captivity in literature, 42 – 43 rescue or escape from, 73 –74, 196n17 See also ransom character assassination in tale of Cittus, 168 –170 in tale of half-dead soldier, 133 –136 in tale of moneylender’s slave, 165 in tale of Theodotus, 91–93 chattel slavery, 149–153, 174 Cittus, 166 –171 civic ideology of Athens, 3, 7, 13 –14, 93, 147, 149, 172, 175, 179–181, 183n5, 210n2, 210n3 compassion, 3, 7– 8, 19, 135, 138, 140 –143, 179–181, 183n1. See also pity concentric rings of moral obligation, 9–10, 51–53, 61, 74, 102, 173, 176 –178, 184n13

8/7/06 12:48:29 PM

228

Conon, 93 –97 courtroom, 3, 6, 29–30, 62, 65, 101, 158 credit and lending, 68 – 69, 163 crime, 79– 88, 99–103 Croesus, 2, 15 –16 crowds, 83, 90, 93, 98 –103, 204n105 Cyrus the Great, 14, 15 –16, 28, 185n28 D daylight activities, 83 departure from Syracuse, 117–130 dikaiosunê, 13, 35 dikastai, 29–30, 55, 59, 61, 62 – 65, 81, 87, 96, 98, 101, 158, 163 –166, 168 –169, 176 discourse. See moral rhetoric domestic architecture, 24 –27 E eleos and cognates, 12 –14, 34 –35, 64 – 65, 118, 123, 140, 146, 162, 175, 183n1, 210n2, 210n3 emotion biological underpinnings of, 13 culture and, 13, 17 study of, 3 –5, 13, 17, 181 emotional needs of the sick, 33 – 41 empathy, 12, 15 –16, 34, 135, 138 –141, 147, 152 –153, 166, 171–173 enmity, 10, 58, 62 – 63, 74 epigraphic evidence, 35, 43 – 45, 100, 186n9 epimeleia, 35 –39 erotic passion, 88, 91–93, 102 ethos of Athens, 3, 172, 178 –181 in forensic speeches, 30, 38, 59, 64, 88, 91–92, 95 –96, 133, 135 –136, 140 –141, 164 –165 eunoia, 35 –39, 168 Euripides, 11–12, 21, 28, 72, 114, 115, 155, 180 expediency, 3, 10, 20 F face-to-face society, 87, 195n94 family, Greek

T3801.indb 228


instability of, 39– 41, 74 role in nursing, 18, 27–30 role in ransoming, 57–58, 65 –75 farmsteads, 60, 85, 87 friends, 5 – 6, 18 –19, 40 – 41, 51, 58 – 62, 64, 67, 73 –75, 102, 145, 146 –147, 171, 176 – 178, 192n56. See also philoi and philia funeral rites, 71–72 G generosity excessive, 75 impartial, 52 –53, 63 – 65 H healing, 22 –24, 27–30 helping behavior, 3 – 4, 8 –10, 16, 180 –181 Herodotus, pity in, 14, 65 Hippocratic treatises, 24, 26, 28, 29, 32, 109–110, 199n16 historiography, 6 – 8, 180, 185n25 and bystander intervention, 76 –78 and home nursing, 22 –23 philanthrôpia in, 14 pity in, 7, 63 – 64, 65 and ransom, 43 – 45 and slave torture, 147–149 and transport of soldiers, 104 –108 Homer corpse of Hector in, 13 –14, 42 – 43, 65, 75, 107, 180 importance of, 2, 7 Penelope in, 71 pity in, 13 –14 ransom in, 42 – 43, 47, 65, 75 unmixed evil in, 5 war wounds in, 108, 109, 198n4, 198n9 hospitals, lack of, 4, 23 –25 households, 18, 22, 28, 149–150, 152 –153, 157, 172, 175. See also oikos hubris, 64, 85, 89, 92 –93, 94, 96, 103, 115, 130, 132, 135, 140, 151 humane ideals, 3, 13 –16, 141–143, 147,

8/7/06 12:48:29 PM

sub j e c t i ndex

171–173, 175 –176, 179–181, 183n5, 210n2, 210n3 humanity, concept of, 5, 12, 14, 16, 19, 147, 177–181 I iatreion, 23 –24 ideal leader, qualities of, 141–143 Isocrates, pity in, 19, 176 J joint effort, 139–140 K katharsis, 2, 180 kidnap in literature, 42 – 43, 47, 190n13 victims of, 47– 48, 150 –151, 177 kindness, 3, 39, 92, 129, 141–143, 147, 205n116. See also eunoia kinship. See family kurios, absence of, 71–72, 194n83 L lawcourts. See courtroom law enforcement, 81– 82 leipo compounds, 126 –127 liturgies, 50, 52 –54, 60, 91, 191n27 live burial, 135 –136 M March of the Ten Thousand, 19, 111, 130 –131, 140, 141, 144, 177 mercenaries, 50, 73, 129 merit, 20 metics, 150 military logistics, 19, 107–108, 177 baggage trains, 113, 116, 119, 128 –130, 144 –145 hollow squares, 116, 128 –129, 201n46 personal attendants, 116 –117, 129–130, 145 military service, 73, 92, 101 moral rhetoric, 7–9, 17, 176, 181 Mytilenean debate, 20, 65, 123 –124

T3801.indb 229

229

N neighborhoods, 84 – 88, 90, 94 –95, 102 –103 neighbors, 18, 58 – 61, 64, 72, 75, 102, 177, 192n52 news and gossip, 57, 69 Nicobulus, 163 –166 Nicostratus, 47, 54 – 65, 84 nighttime activities, 84, 95 nursing and aversion to illness, 32 –33 at home, 4, 19, 21– 41, 93, 176 on military campaign, 29, 109–110, 140, 141 table of instances, 23 in tragedy, 21, 28 O oikos, 18, 21–22, 39– 41, 65 –75, 78, 150 –152, 154, 172, 175, 176, 180 oiktos and cognates, 12 –14, 34 –35, 64 – 65, 118, 123 –124, 140, 141, 147, 183n1 “Old Oligarch,” 150, 205n14 oratory, 4, 6 – 8, 17, 180, 185n25 and bystander intervention, 76 –78 and home nursing, 22 –23 philanthrôpia in, 14 pity in, 63 – 64, 65, 162, 193n67 and ransom, 43 – 45 and slave torture, 147–149 and transport of soldiers, 104 –108 P pain. See suffering Pantaenetus, 163 –166 paragenomenoi, 86, 89–90, 97, 100 –103 Pasion, 55, 60, 149, 151, 166 –171, 209n86 pathos, 117, 118 –124, 145 patronage, disguised, 51–52, 59– 62, 191n34 Peloponnesian War effects of, 14, 20, 34, 179, 184n19 and Peace of Nicias, 47, 107 and war prisoners, 46 Persian Wars, 109

8/7/06 12:48:29 PM

230

philanthrôpia, 12, 14 –15, 19, 53, 129, 141, 149, 173, 175, 178, 184n21 philoi and philia, 3, 5 – 6, 19, 41, 59, 61, 64, 67, 73 –75, 146 –147, 173, 175, 176 –179, 192n56 pity altar to, 3, 183n7 capacity for, 14, 135 concepts of, 4, 12, 13 –14, 183n1 dangers of, 65, 74 –75, 177 and expediency, 3, 10, 20 lack of, 2, 19, 146, 166, 172 –173 manipulation of, 13, 65, 193n67 and merit, 20 and pragmatism, 16 –17, 180 praise of, 13 –14, 34, 175, 184n20 rejection of, 13, 20 tragic, 2, 12, 13, 178, 180 yielding to, 62, 63 – 64 See also eleos and oiktos plague at Athens, 33 –34, 121, 123 Plato on bystanders, 79, 82, 97, 195n2 kidnap and sale of, 47 on tragedy, 180 on treatment of slaves, 207n37 prison, 66 – 68, 87 prisoners of war, 46 – 47, 49–50, 150 pronouns with moral weight, 29–30, 101, 125 –126, 139 prosecution of wrongdoers, 81– 82, 83, 98 public and private, 3, 5, 25, 54, 175 public display, 53 –54 public revenue, 49–50 R ransom of captives, 18, 42 –75, 151, 176 –177 cost of, 45 – 46, 48 – 49 in Homer and tragedy, 42 – 43 payment of, 49–50, 68 – 69 table of instances, 44 – 45 reciprocity, ethic of, 6, 19, 51–52 between neighbors, 59– 62 demands of, 99, 101, 102, 197n33 religion, 10, 72, 151

T3801.indb 230


responsibility of generals, 114 –117, 137–138, 140 –141 revenge, 55, 62 rhetoric, moral. See moral rhetoric S segregation by gender, 27–28 self-blame, 124 –128 shame, 91–93 ships and shipwrecks, 113, 114 –115, 119, 143 –144, 201n45 slaves in banking, 171 in households, 55, 151, 206n25 judicial torture of, 19, 146 –173 in nursing, 29 and pity, 147, 162, 178 public, 81, 83 refuges for, 162 and “social death,” 173 sources of, 150, 152, 206n32 in warfare, 150, 206n16 social responsibility, 82, 99, 102 Sophocles, 11–12, 32, 40, 80, 104, 107, 155, 180 sôphrosunê, 13, 35, 91–92 strangers, 57, 78, 102 street life, 19, 82 – 88, 112, 177. See also crime suffering concepts of pain and, 33 negative responses to, 2, 19, 20, 32 –33 physical, 33 –34, 96, 153 –163, 176 psychological, 2, 33 –34, 120 –124, 165 –166, 176 sensitivity to, 2 –3, 8, 11–12, 19–20, 33 –35, 39– 40, 63, 92, 147, 172, 178 –181 in tragedy, 2, 12, 13, 178, 180 suppliants and supplication, 3, 64, 75, 86 – 87 survivability of wounds, 108 –111 sympathy. See pity T tears, 13, 15, 34 –35, 64, 67, 119, 122, 145, 169 Theodotus, 88 –93, 150, 197n27 Thrasylochus, 21, 27, 29, 30 – 41, 176

8/7/06 12:48:29 PM

sub j e c t i ndex

231

Thucydides, pity in, 10, 14, 20, 65, 118 –124, 177, 202n65 torture, 19, 136 of free persons, 154 –155 methods, 159 of slaves, 155 –173 table of instances, 148 testimony under, 158 –161 in tragedy and comedy, 146 –147, 155, 159 tragedy, 2 –3, 5, 10 –12, 13, 21, 42, 71, 76, 104, 107, 146, 178, 180 –181, 183n3 transport of soldiers, 104 –145, 177–178 table of instances, 105 –106 in tragedy, 104 via bodily carrying, 109, 111, 116 –117, 126, 128, 137 via litters, 111–112, 126 via pack animals, 112, 126, 128, 131–132, 134 –135, 137 via shield as makeshift litter, 200n35 via shipboard, 111, 113 via wagons, 112 –113, 126 troop morale, 108, 145

discipline in, 130, 132 –133, 139, 142, 203n84 killing in, 109, 198n12 quartering of soldiers in, 110 –111, 145 responsibility of generals in, 19, 114 –117, 129–130, 132, 140 –141, 145, 203n80 retreats in, 114, 118 –119, 145 wounded casualties in, 22 –23, 29, 104 –145 See also military logistics wills and testaments, 70, 194n83 witnesses, 81, 93, 97, 99, 100 –103, 147, 170, 177 women capture or ransom of, 48, 141, 190n23 in home nursing, 28 –29, 40, 176 oppression of, 174, 194n76 role of, as bystanders, 86, 101–102 role of, in family affairs, 9, 66, 69–71, 194n78, 194n82 segregation of, 27–28, 188n33 as slaves or prostitutes, 28, 156, 161, 172, 208n56, 209n91 as wives and widows, 70, 72, 74, 194n90

V virtue, 5, 7, 29, 35 –39, 62 – 64, 91–93, 136, 164 –165, 184n17. See also aretê

X xenoi and xenia, 46, 51, 52, 54, 57, 80. See also strangers Xenophon, empathy and compassion in, 138 –143

W warfare, Greek burial of the dead in, 107, 121, 143 –144 citizen armies in, 19, 128, 133, 202n77

T3801.indb 231

Y young men, 63, 82, 92, 95, 96, 98, 193n60

8/7/06 12:48:29 PM

Index of Ancient Passages

A Aeschines 1.40: 24 1.58: 84 1.60 –1.61: 77, 83, 86 1.124: 23 2.12: 44, 47 2.100: 44, 45 2.124 –2.126: 84, 161 2.156 –2.157: 13, 44, 51 3.224 –3.225: 148, 155 Aeschylus Agamemnon 437: 71 1348 –1351: 76, 79– 80, 180 Fruges 42, 189n1 Prometheus Bound 146, 180 Andocides 1.22: 160 1.41–1.42: 204n103 1.48: 67 1.57: 16 1.61: 112 1.64 –1.65: 27, 148, 158 1.93: 67

2.15: 148 2.18: 53 4.23: 183n3 Antiphon 1.20: 148, 156, 162, 204n103 1.28: 97 2.1.10: 97 2.2.7: 160 2.3.2: 77, 78, 84 2.3.4: 158 2.4.5: 77, 78, 84, 99 2.4.7: 160 5.7: 161 5.20: 44 5.26 –5.28: 84 5.29–5.52: 148, 155, 160 5.44 –5.45: 84 5.46: 172 5.63: 67, 74 6.4: 151 6.23 – 6.25: 160 –161 Aristophanes Clouds 6 –7: 152 1321–1323: 87, 196n22 Frogs 615 – 625: 159, 204n103, 208n66

N L 32

T3801.indb 232

8/7/06 12:48:29 PM

i nde x of a n cien t passag es

Wealth 553 –554: 52 653 –747: 23 Aristotle Constitution of the Athenians 45.1: 67 48.1: 67 55.2 –55.3: 72 Nicomachaean Ethics 4.2: 53 5.7.1: 48 8.1.2: 178 8.1.3 – 8.1.4: 5 8.4.2: 6 8.5.3: 178 8.6.4: 6 8.9.1– 8.9.5: 6, 178 –179 8.11.7: 152 8.12 – 8.13: 6 9.1–9.2: 6 9.2.4: 51 9.11: 6 Politics 151 Rhetoric 1.15: 160, 209n72 2.8: 34, 193n67 Rhetoric to Alexander 160, 209n72 Arrian Anabasis 1.16.5: 143 6.10.1: 110 6.25.2 – 6.25.3: 106, 113 7.10.1–7.10.2: 110

C Curtius 7.3.17: 111, 142 7.6.8 –7.6.9: 106, 111

T3801.indb 233

233

8.4.9: 111, 142 9.10.15: 106

D Demades 1.9: 49 Demosthenes 8.70: 53 9.60 –9.61: 77, 78, 83, 101 12.3 –12.5: 45, 148, 155 13.14: 154 15.22: 183n5 18.132 –18.133: 81, 154 18.137: 154 18.268: 52 18.291–18.292: 53 18.311: 53 19.40: 44, 45, 48 19.169: 44, 48 19.229–19.230: 52 21.16: 84 21.22: 84 21.46 –21.48: 172 21.62: 84 21.85: 83 21.185: 15 21.196: 13 22.55: 155 22.57: 3 24.96 –24.98: 67 24.113: 84 24.167: 155 24.171: 3 24.195: 51 24.196: 63 24.201: 63 24.208: 77, 78, 86 25.81: 175 25.87: 14 29.11: 153 29.14: 172 29.21: 172

8/7/06 12:48:30 PM

234


29.25: 172 29.40: 158, 160 30.34: 23, 29 30.35 –30.36: 161 30.37: 160 36.45: 61 37.1–37.8: 165 37.10 –37.11: 164 37.13 –37.21: 165 37.23 –37.26: 166 37.29–37.33: 163, 165 37.40 –37.43: 148, 163 –166, 172, 178 37.44 : 166 37.48 –37.49: 165 37.50 –37.51: 166 37.52 –37.55: 164 37.57: 165 45.62: 159 46.6: 97 47.10: 160 47.12: 158 47.17: 160 47.36 – 47.40: 77, 86, 100 47.52 – 47.65: 77, 83 47.53 – 47.63: 85, 98 47.57: 70 48.14 – 48.19: 148, 156 50.7–50.9: 60 50.34 –50.36: 60 50.46 –50.63: 69 51.13: 47 53.1: 61, 64, 192n44 53.2 –53.3: 58, 61, 62 53.4 –53.6: 59, 60, 61, 62, 84 53.6 –53.13: 18, 44, 47, 54 –75, 84, 176 –177, 180 53.14 –53.18: 58, 60, 62, 65, 67, 77, 100 53.28 –53.29: 58, 66 54.1: 96, 100 54.5: 77, 99 54.7–54.9: 18, 77, 87, 93 –97, 177, 180 54.9–54.12: 23, 32, 87, 98 54.14: 63, 98 54.16: 98

T3801.indb 234

54.20: 98, 101, 112 54.22 –54.23: 63, 96 54.24: 97, 100 54.25: 96, 197n33 54.32: 87, 102 54.36 –54.43: 101 57.13: 84 57.18 –57.42: 74 57.65: 84 58.59: 16 59.55 –59.56: 23, 28 Epistle 3: 23, 28, 50, 175 Dinarchus 1.36: 112 1.63: 148 2.9: 67 Diodorus Siculus 13.1–13.19: 105, 128, 129 13.27.4: 129 13.100 –13.103: 143 –144 15.35.1: 115 15.47: 43, 45, 47 16.87: 49 17.63.4: 106 E Euripides Helen 115 Hippolytus 186 –188: 21, 180 Ion 1214: 155 Rhesus 132: 114 Trojan Women 11 H Herodotus 1.29–1.33: 2, 183n2

8/7/06 12:48:30 PM


1.86.4 –1.86.6: 15, 139 1.88 –1.90: 16 3.14: 34 3.35: 136, 204n104 3.119.2 –3.119.3: 67 3.137: 77, 78, 83, 101 3.146.3: 112 4.103.1: 115 5.77.3: 44, 45, 48 5.92: 13, 65 6.11.2: 38 6.12.2 – 6.12.3: 38, 133 7.107: 144 7.114: 136, 204n104 8.92: 110 8.115.3: 110, 145 9.72.1: 109 9.99: 44 Hesiod Works and Days 456: 113 Homer Iliad 1.13: 43 5.663 –5.664: 109 6.47– 6.48: 43 6.450 – 6.458: 162 10.379–10.380: 43 11.133 –11.134: 43 22.50: 43 24.229–24.237: 43 24.531–24.533: 5 24.552 –24.556: 42 I Isaeus 2.7–2.8: 72 3.17: 63 3.19: 102 5.44: 54 6.10 – 6.11: 72 8.10: 159

T3801.indb 235

235

8.28 – 8.29: 159 8.36: 72 10.12: 158 Isocrates 1.29: 180 4.52: 3 4.54: 183n4 4.80: 3 4.112: 20, 34 4.167– 4.169: 2, 73, 178, 180 5.96: 73 6.47: 36 9.9: 73 11.23: 39 12.7: 33 12.11: 22 12.83: 37 12.256: 37 14.18: 46 15.20: 175, 210n3 15.71: 39 15.288: 48 16.8: 37 17.2 –17.9: 167–168 17.11–17.14: 168 –171 17.15 –17.16: 148, 166 –171, 172, 178 17.17–17.58: 168 –171 19.6: 27 19.8: 36 19.10 –19.13: 32, 36, 68 19.18 –19.23: 27, 36, 38 19.24 –19.29: 18, 23, 27, 29, 30 – 41, 176, 180 19.30: 27, 38 19.32: 39 19.39: 38, 106, 111, 113 19.49: 39 19.50: 36 L Lycurgus 1.3: 81 1.29: 161

8/7/06 12:48:30 PM

236


1.32: 160 1.33: 172 1.40: 70 1.112: 148 Lysias 1.13 –1.14: 84 1.16 –1.19: 156 3.1: 91 3.3 –3.5: 88, 91, 92 3.6 –3.7: 77, 84, 86, 88, 91 3.8 –3.11: 88, 89, 91, 92 3.12 –3.18: 77, 88 –93, 99, 100, 177, 180 3.20 –3.27: 84, 90, 92 3.30 –3.32: 89, 91, 92 3.40 –3.48: 91–92 4.9: 112 4.13: 68, 161 4.15: 158 4.19: 91 5.3 –5.5: 148, 158, 160 6.27: 148 7.18 –7.19: 87 12.9–12.10: 68 12.20: 53 13.54 –13.60: 148, 154 14.14 –14.15: 133 18.12: 63 19.59: 52 20.14: 110 23.9–23.11: 77, 83, 86, 101 24.7: 175, 210n2 25.12: 53 26.24: 44, 45, 49 32.18: 70 P Pausanias 1.43.1: 115 3.8.7: 106 10.23.7: 144 Plato Alcibiades 128

T3801.indb 236

Crito 67 Laws 79, 97 Phaedo 67 Theaetetus 113 Plutarch Lives Lysander 22.4: 106 Nicias 6.5: 107 24.3: 127 30.2: 148, 154, 207n45 Moral Essays 71, 154, 207n45 S Sophocles Oedipus at Colonus 80 Oedipus the King 155 Philoctetes 9–11: 104 473 – 483: 104 759–761: 40 1378: 32 T Thucydides 1.102.4: 128 1.106.1: 116 2.6.1–2.6.3: 49 2.16.2: 125, 127 2.34: 71, 125 2.37: 183n6 2.41–2.44: 120 2.46.2: 125 2.50 –2.51: 23, 33 –34, 37, 40, 121, 123, 125 2.60 –2.61: 125

8/7/06 12:48:30 PM


2.65: 145 2.87.8: 126 3.19.1: 50 3.37–3.67: 123 3.98: 120 3.103 –3.108: 116 4.5.2: 127 4.14.2: 126 4.25.9: 116 4.38: 119 4.44: 107 4.69: 44, 49 4.101: 119 4.125.2: 116 4.126.1: 126 4.128.4: 115 5.10: 116 5.72.3: 108 6.5.3: 44 6.25 – 6.26: 128 6.59.1: 120 6.63.2: 128 6.67.1: 116 7.60.2: 119 7.71.6: 120 7.75.2 –7.75.5: 19, 105, 117–130, 143 –145, 177 7.75 –7.85: 118, 120, 122 –125 7.78.2: 116, 129 7.84.2: 38 8.27.4: 105, 113, 119 8.45.4: 128 8.92: 148, 154 8.106.2: 120 X Xenophon Agesilaus 1.20 –1.22: 46, 141 2.14: 109 Anabasis 1.3.29: 159 1.7.3 –1.7.4: 134 2.1.6: 113 2.2.14: 105, 113

T3801.indb 237

237

2.3.11: 133 3.1.26 –3.1.30: 134 3.2.27: 113 3.2.36: 116 3.3.5: 134 3.3.6: 116 3.4.30: 110 3.4.32: 105 3.4.47–3.4.49: 133 4.5.4: 115 4.5.7– 4.5.8: 137 4.5.11: 115 4.5.16: 137, 144 4.5.22: 105, 111, 137 5.2.32: 109 5.3.1: 105, 113 5.5.6: 110, 145 5.7.34: 130 5.8.4: 130 5.8.6 –5.8.11: 19, 105, 112, 130 –141, 144 –145, 177 5.8.13 –5.8.24: 136 –139 6.6.22 – 6.6.25: 133 7.2.6: 23, 140 7.6.35: 139 7.8.16: 116 [Constitution of the Athenians] 150, 205n14 Cyropaedia 1.1.1–1.1.3: 141 1.4.2: 23, 28, 36 1.6.42: 142 3.3.10: 140 5.1.18: 23 5.4.18: 141 5.5.8 –5.5.28: 15 7.2.26: 185n28 7.5.73: 14 7.5.75 –7.5.76: 39 8.2.1: 14 8.4.7– 8.4.8: 14 8.7.13: 141 Hellenica 1.5.19: 49 1.6.34 –1.6.35: 114, 115

8/7/06 12:48:30 PM

238


1.7.4 –1.7.5: 115 1.7.17: 115 1.7.18: 14 1.7.29–1.7.30: 114, 115 2.2.3: 46 2.3.52 –2.3.55: 77, 78, 83, 86, 101 3.3.1: 106 4.3.4: 116 4.3.20: 112 4.4.11: 108 4.4.12: 109 4.5.3: 141 4.5.14: 116 4.8.21: 44, 48

T3801.indb 238

6.1.5: 73 6.2.19: 142 6.2.26: 111 6.2.36: 43, 44 6.4.35: 142 Memorabilia 1.2.1: 63 2.4.3: 39 2.6.21: 140 3.4.1: 110 3.12.2: 48 Oeconomicus 7.37: 23, 28

8/7/06 12:48:30 PM

Tragedy Offstage: Suffering and Sympathy in Ancient Athens

Lending and Borrowing in Ancient Athens

Lending and Borrowing in Ancient Athens

Myth and Tragedy in Ancient Greece

Myth and Tragedy in Ancient Greece

Myth and Tragedy in Ancient Greece

Greek Tragedy: Suffering under the Sun

Greek Tragedy: Suffering under the Sun

Tragedy in Athens: Performance Space and Theatrical Meaning

Pictorial Dictionary of Ancient Athens

Sympathy

Sympathy

The Divided City: On Memory and Forgetting in Ancient Athens

Trauma, Tragedy, Therapy: The Arts and Human Suffering

Civic Rites: Democracy and Religion in Ancient Athens

Sacred and Public Land in Ancient Athens (Oxford Classical Monographs)

Pharmakon: Plato, Drug Culture, and Identity in Ancient Athens

Remembering Defeat: Civil War and Civic Memory in Ancient Athens

Suffering

Tea and Sympathy

Tea and Sympathy

Democracy and Participation in Athens

Tea and Sympathy

Athens

On sympathy

Misery and company: sympathy in everyday life

Apartment in Athens

Deadline in Athens

Suffering Religion

Ancient tragedy and the origins of modern science

Tragedy Offstage: Suffering and Sympathy in Ancient Athens

Lending and Borrowing in Ancient Athens

Lending and Borrowing in Ancient Athens

Myth and Tragedy in Ancient Greece

Myth and Tragedy in Ancient Greece

Myth and Tragedy in Ancient Greece

Greek Tragedy: Suffering under the Sun

Greek Tragedy: Suffering under the Sun

Tragedy in Athens: Performance Space and Theatrical Meaning

Pictorial Dictionary of Ancient Athens

Sympathy

Sympathy

The Divided City: On Memory and Forgetting in Ancient Athens

Trauma, Tragedy, Therapy: The Arts and Human Suffering

Civic Rites: Democracy and Religion in Ancient Athens

Sacred and Public Land in Ancient Athens (Oxford Classical Monographs)

Pharmakon: Plato, Drug Culture, and Identity in Ancient Athens

Remembering Defeat: Civil War and Civic Memory in Ancient Athens

Suffering

Tea and Sympathy

Tea and Sympathy

Democracy and Participation in Athens

Tea and Sympathy

Athens

On sympathy

Misery and company: sympathy in everyday life

Apartment in Athens

Deadline in Athens

Suffering Religion

Ancient tragedy and the origins of modern science

Recommend Documents