Week 5 – Sparta and Athens

Readings : Dunstan, chapter 5; Crawford, chapter I, 5-6.

Sparta

• Not a typical town.
• Portrayed as being prominent in Homer.
• Conquered by Dorians.
• Negative perception of Sparta in the historiography.
• But most of the sources come from Athens, rival of Sparta.
• Sparta and Athens: two opposed concepts of the Greek polis and of the individual's relationship to the state.
• Many Greeks greatly admired the Spartans.
• Sparta famed for its military prowess (whole state oriented exclusively toward warfare). Peloponnesian League organized under Spartan leadership.

The Messenian War

• 8^th cent. BC: Sparta was a monarchy with a limited oligarchy.
• Spartans first controlled all the Laconia.

Crawford # 44: The Spartan occupation of Laconia.

• 735: needing land, they annexed all the territory of Messenia (fertile plain).
• Now, more than enough land to support themselves and their newly conquered people.
• Messenians revolted (650-620 BC) and they almost destroyed Sparta itself.

Crawford # 45: The Messenian wars.

• Outnumbered after their victory, the Spartans turned their state to a military state to prevent other revolts.

Crawford # 47: about Lykourgos, who established the Spartan constitution.

• Focus on warfare; the arts quickly degenerate.

The Helots

• Messenians turned into agricultural slaves called helots.
• They were tied to the land in almost the same way as medieval serfs.
• In theory, they belonged to the state and were attached to a piece of land (kleros).
• Citizens held them in usufruct and Helots were assigned to do domestic work.
• Required to hand over a predetermined portion of their harvest, keeping only the surplus.
• Unlike chattel-slaves, they lived in family units and could contract unions amongst themselves.
• Helots reproduced and their numbers increased.
• At the same time, the population of citizens continued to decrease.
• Subjected to humiliations.
• Ritually flogged each year to affirm their servitude.
• The Ephors (magistrates) yearly declared war on the Helots, thereby allowing Spartans to kill them without repercussion.
• This hatred of the Spartans towards the Helots originates in fear of their number (hence the Spartan military state).

Spartan Education

• Helots were doing all the work on land and Spartans could consecrate themselves on the defense of the polis.
• The military and the city-state became the center of Spartan existence.
• The life of a Spartan was all determined by the state.
• Weakling infants left in the hills to die of exposure (decided by the state).
• Seven years old children were undertaken by the state, which supervised their training.
• Removed from their parents' control and organized into small bands (hard life).
• Gymnastics and military exercises (little time for music and literature).
• They learned to endure pain and hardship without complaint and to obey orders absolutely.
• At the age of thirteen, young men sent off into the countryside with nothing, and expected to survive on wits and cunning.
• To steal was permitted, but it was forbidden to be caught.

Spartan life

·        At twenty, the Spartan became a soldier.

·        He spent his life with his fellow soldiers (lived in barracks and ate with his fellow soldiers); he didn't live with his wife.

Crawford # 54: the messes.

·        At the age of thirty, the Spartan became an "equal": allowed to live in his own house with his own family (but still served in the military until the age of sixty).

·        Each soldier was granted a piece of land, farmed by the helots.

Crawford # 53: land and property.

Discipline

• Life of discipline, self-denial, and simplicity.
• No luxuries, expensive foods, or opportunities for leisure.
• Civilization seen as bringing decline in moral values.
• Other Greeks admired the simplicity, discipline, and order of Spartan life.
• Ideology was oriented around the state: the individual lived (and died) for the state.
• This gave stability to Sparta after the Messenian revolt.

Women

• Sparta: the most liberal state in regards to the status of women.
• Spartans took seriously the education of women: physical and gymnastics training.
• Must be physically fit to give birth to strong children.
• Their lives, as men’s lives, were dedicated to the state.
• Spartan women, unlike other Greek women, were free to move about (domestic freedom).

Three main social classes

• The Spartan (original inhabitant of the city), who served in the army and enjoyed the full political and legal rights.
• The perioikoi ("dwellers around or about"): foreign people (in Laconia); buffer population between the Spartans and the helots; great deal of freedom; allowed to trade (forbidden to the Spartans).
• At the bottom: the helots.

Spartan government

• A democratic timocratic monarchical oligarchy.

Crawford # 48: the mixed constitution.

• Is main characteristic was stability ("political stagnation"?).
• At the top of government: a dual monarchy.

1) Kings

• Two royal lines: probably the reflection of merger of two separate communities.
• Duties: religious, judicial, and militaristic.
• Chief priests of the state.
• Their judicial power was gradually restricted to minor cases in the historical period.
• They led the Spartan army in war.

Crawford # 50: About the kings.

2) Gerousia

• Oligarchic council of elders: 28 members, plus the kings.
• Members elected by assembly, had to be over 60.
• It heard criminal cases, and arranged matters to put before the assembly.
• Very influential. Members sat for life.

Crawford # 51: about the gerousia.

3) Assembly

• For the citizens aged of 30 and more.
• The gerousia and kings had to approve the measures voted in the Assembly.
• The assembly could only decide matters put before it.
• It elected the members of the Gerousia and the ephors.

4) Ephors

• Five ephors elected every year.
• They oversaw the kings' activities and could indict them.
• Could not be reelected.
• Provided a balance for the two kings.
• Presided over meetings of the Gerousia.
• In charge of civil trials, taxation, the calendar, foreign policy, and military training for young men.
• Two ephors accompanied the army in battle.
• They gradually assumed executive authority in non-military affairs.

Crawford # 52: about the ephors.

The Peloponnesian League

• End of the 6th century: Sparta was the most powerful state in the Peloponnese.
• Rival state: Argos.

Crawford # 59: about Sparta and Argos.

• Two powerful allies, Corinth and Elis.
• They other states in the central and northern Peloponnese eventually joined the league, except Argos and Achaea.
• Sparta defeated Argos in battle in 546.
• 5th century BC: Sparta was the most powerful nation in all of Greece.
• Only one colony: most of its power came from alliances.

Organization of the League

• Not an empire: no tribute except in times of war.
• League organized with Sparta as the hegemon (leader), and controlled by the council of allies which was composed of two bodies:
• Assembly of Spartans,
• Congress of Allies (each allied state had one vote).
• Only Sparta could call a congress of the League.
• All alliances were made with Sparta only.
• Sparta was not compelled to abide by any resolutions voted by the League.
• The league provided protection and security to its members, and to Sparta.
• A very stable alliance, supporting Oligarchies and opposing tyrannies.

Crawford # 60: Sparta and the tyrants.

Early Athens

Athens only polis of Attica

• The only place that seems to have remained intact at the end of the Mycenaean period.
• Number of communities in Attica that were independent oat first.
• During the Dark Ages, Athens became the single polis of the area.
• The Athenians thought that Theseus unified Attica.

Constitution of Early Athens

1) Magistrates replace kings

• Theseus was said to be a king.
• In the historical period, a magistrate, called the king (basileus), handles certain religious practices (former prerogative of the king?).
• No kings in the historical record, but polemarch (war leader), originally hereditary in one family.
• Probably an aristocratic attempt to restrict the power of the king.
• Later, power was transferred to an official called the archon ("ruler").
• Originally for life, eventually restricted to ten-years and finally (682/3 BC) to one year.
• 7^th century: King replaced by three magistrates:
• Archon (day to day administration),
• Polemarch (army),
• Basileus or “king” (religious matters).

2) Council and Assembly

• Council of the Areopagus.
• In the later period, murder trials were held here, but originally it must have had greater powers.
• In the later period, it was made up of ex-archons.
• Derives probably from the old king's council.
• In addition, the popular assembly (ecclesia), whose powers at this time are unknown.

Crawford # 63: the early constitutional development of Athens.

3) Social organization

• In earlier times, Athenians divided into four tribes, based on origin.
• Clans: privileged families claiming descent from a common ancestor (eupatrids).
• Eupatrids:
• Only them could hold office under the aristocratic constitution.
• Owned much land and were most powerful in the countryside.
• Phratries ("brotherhoods"): families whose land adjoined.
• Rivalries of associations by blood (clans) and local loyalty (phratries).

Tyranny: Cylon’s attempt

• Around 632 Cylon tried to set himself up as tyrant of Athens.
• He failed and the archon Megacles, of the Alcmaeonid clan, had him killed.
• Megacles and the family of the Alcmaeonidae were later exiled.

Crawford # 64: Cylon: an unsuccessful attempt at tyranny.

Crawford p. 133: a simplified stemma of the Alcmaeonidae.

Dracon

• Political struggles and social disorder in Athens.
• Dracon asked to write down and codify the Athenian laws for the first time (around 620 or 621 BC).
• The first written constitution of Athens.
• Several major innovations:
• All laws written, and made known to all literate citizens.
• Dinstinction between murder and involuntary homicide.
• But harsh laws (draconian).
• However, a significant step for justice in Athenian society.
• But these laws did not address economic and social problems.

Crawford # 65: Dracon the Lawgiver.

Solon

• Typical social problems:
• overpopulation,
• lack of cultivable land,
• an old aristocracy (eupatrids) which was too powerful,
• many peasants forced to sell theirs land;
• Some even enslaved.

Crawford # 66: about this economic and political crisis.

• In 594, Solon was given a special commission to institute reforms.
• Respected by everybody, and trusted by both the aristocracy and the new wealthy families.

Crawford # 67: Solon’s measures.

Solon's economic policies

• He cancelled the land debts of the poor.
• But no confiscation or general distribution of land.
• No more enslavement for debt.
• He limited the growth of overly large estates.
• He encouraged trade and commerce.
• He gave full citizenship to foreign craftsmen who would migrate to Athens.
• He halted the export of wheat.

Solon's political policies

• New ruling body, the boule (council), composed of 400 members.
• Four new classes based on wealth (timocracy).
  • Pentakosiomedimnoi (500 measure men).
  • Hippeis (mounted warriors).
  • Zeugitae (men of the yoke): provided the bult of the hoplites.
  • Thetes (hired laborers).
• Top offices open only to the first or second class, lower offices to the third class.
• Offices were elected by the assembly.
• The thetes entitled to a voice in the assembly.
• This new timocracy breached the eupatrid monopoly of power.
• Solon also reformed the criminal code.
• The courts were made up from all citizens, and the panels of judges were selected by lot.
• His solutions were not permanent, but postponed the inevitable.

Pisistratus becomes tyrant

• At this time, Attica divided politically into two groups:
• inhabitants of the plain (supporters of the eupatrids) and inhabitants of the shore (led by the Alcmaeonidae).

Crawford # 68: Athens after Solon (the factions).

• Peisistratus championed a new set of people, the hill dwellers, and the poor in general.
• Through ruse and with the alliance of Megacles (of the Alcmaeonidae), he becomes the tyrant (546) after three attempts.

Crawford # 69: the rise of Peisistratus.

Peisistratus’ tyranny

• He maintained a mercenary bodyguard, yet he preserved the constitutional forms of government.
• Many aristocrats exiled.
• His internal policies: to increase the unity and majesty of the Athenian state.
• Religious:
• The great shrine of Demeter at Eleusis now under state control.
• First major Hall of the Mysteries (Telesterion).
• Athena now became the main deity.
• Entry gate (Propylaea) on the Acropolis.

Crawford # 70: the character and content of Peisistratus’ tyranny.

His contribution to the growth of Athens.

• Athens was becoming a city.
• Building of an aqueduct.
• Improvement of the marketplace itself.
• He began a temple to Olympian Zeus.
• On his death, the religious and patriotic unification of Athens had made great progress.

End of tyranny

• In 528/7, he is succeeded by his son Hippias (helped by his brother Hipparchus).
• At first they were popular, but after Hipparchus’ assassination by Harmodius and Aristogeiton,  Hippias became very suspicious and unbearable.

Crawford # 72, 73: the sons of Peisistratus and the tyrannicides.

• Megacles' son, Cleisthenes, persuaded the Spartans to get rid of Hippias in 510.
• Crawford # 74: the expulsion of Hippias.
• But political disorder followed.
• Cleisthenes finally assumed the leadership of Athens.

Crawford # 75: how Cleisthenes came back to Athens.

Reforms of Cleisthenes (508 BC)

• Political organization shifted from tribal kinship to geographical localities.
• Instead of the four hereditary tribes, he divided the country into 10 new tribes on a regional basis, each divided into 3 sections (trittyes) formed of portions from the 3 areas (city, coast, interior).
• These trittyes were composed of new units called demes (local parishes).

Crawford # 76: demes and trittyes.

• Once one's family was put in tribe, membership in it was hereditary.
• Old clans now possessed far less political significance.

The army

• All tribes contributed contributed a regiment of hoplites and a squadron of cavalry.
• Commanding the army were the 10 strategoi (or generals) under the control of the polemarch.
• Later they became the chief magistrates.

The boule

• Enlarged to five hundred, 50 from each tribe.
• Divided into 10 committees of 50, called prytanies.
• Each committee was in charge of administration and government for a month.
• Supreme administrative, deliberative and judicial body of Athens.
• Made all laws and could convene as a court to try a case to impeach a public official.

Crawford # 77: the new boule.

Other institutions

• The areopagus still had powers of censorship and dealt with homicide cases.
• The assembly (ecclesia): all citizens decided matters that affected their daily lives.
• The people's courts were enlarged, with juries being selected by lot.
• Ostracism: once a year, voters named a person to be sent into exile for ten years (6,000 votes were needed; safeguard against tyranny).

Crawford # 79: ostracism.

Results of Cleisthenes' reforms

Positive aspects:

• Broke down old allegiances and jealousies.
• Athenians came to see themselves as citizens of Athens first and foremost.
• The number of citizens now involved in government was considerable (about 30,000).
• Citizens came to see themselves involved at both a local and state level.
• Guarantee of political rights in the election of public officials.
• Now a country of free peasant farmers and independent workers.
• Ostracism weakened the areopagus and protected Athens against tyranny.

Crawford # 80: democracy or oligarchy?

Negative aspects:

• Archons still elected from the two top classes.
• The aristocratic areopagus still retained considerable power.
• Poorer citizens could not take public office.