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Ostracism, Sycophancy, and Deception of the Demos: [Arist.] Ath.Pol. 43.5*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

Matthew R. Christ
Matthew R. Christ
Affiliation:
Indiana University
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Extract

Several features of this compact passage have puzzled scholars ever since the discovery of the Aristotelian Constitution of the Athenians a century ago. First, did the Athenian Assembly really deliberate on all these disparate matters in the chief meeting of the sixth prytany, and if so, why? Second, why did it limit complaints (probolai) against sycophants to a total of six divided equally between citizens and metics? Since the answers we give to these questions are fundamental to our understanding of basic Athenian institutions, they deserve careful consideration. This paper will argue that the Assembly did deliberate on these matters at the same meeting and indeed that this was natural, since they are all symbolic, as well as practical, instruments for controlling behaviour inimical to the demos' interests. It will also suggest that the limitation on probolai against citizen and metic sycophants was introduced to safeguard against the sort of abuse of the label ‘sycophant’ that took place under the regime of the Thirty, and that the measures described in Ath. Pol. 43.5 were, therefore, most likely linked together in the early years of the restored democracy.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 42 , Issue 2 , December 1992 , pp. 336 - 346
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1992

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References

1 Rhodes, P. J., A Commentary on the Aristotelian Athenaion Politeia (Oxford, 1981), pp. 526–7Google Scholar, citing Gilbert, G., The Constitutional Antiquities of Sparta and Athens, tr. Brooks, E. J. and Nicklin, T. (Sonnenschein, 1895), p. 303 n. 3. Rhodes, p. 527Google Scholar, also questions the assignment of probolai against deceivers of the demos to the chief meeting of the sixth prytany. Bonner, R. J. and Smith, G., The Administration of Justice from Homer to Aristotle (Chicago, 1938), ii.67Google Scholar, cite Gilbert without further comment. Chambers, M., Staat der Athener (Berlin, 1990), p. 402CrossRefGoogle Scholar, citing Bonner and Smith, views the passage as problematic.

2 The arrangement of the material in Ath. Pol. 43.3–6 is orderly and unambiguous: after noting that the prytaneis convene four meetings of the Assembly in each prytany (43.3), the author first discusses the agenda of the κνρ⋯α ⋯κκλησ⋯α (43.4) and notes the additional (πρ⋯ς τοῖς εἰρημ⋯νοις) matters of business in the chief meeting of the sixth prytany (43.5), and then treats the remaining three regular meetings in turn (43.6).

3 For a survey of the abundant bibliography on ostracism, see Rhodes (n. 1), pp. 267–71. On h e institution's social and political implications, see esp. Rosivach, V. J., ‘Some Fifth and Fourth Century Views on the Purpose of Ostracism’, Tyche 2 (1987), 167Google Scholar and passim. Ober, J., Mass and Elite in Democratic Athens (Princeton, 1989), p. 75Google Scholar, rightly notes that whomever ‘Cleisthenes designed the weapon to be used against, those who ended up ostracized were members of the elite’.

4 On the problem of dating Hyperbolus' ostracism, see Gomme, A. W., Andrewes, A. and Dover, K. J., A Historical Commentary on Thucydides (Oxford, 1981), v.258–64Google Scholar, with earlier bibliography.

5 On this passage and Thuc. 8.73.3, see Rosivach's intelligent discussion (n. 3), pp. 166–7. Gomme et al. (n. 4), v.258, too readily dismiss the view of ostracism expressed in these passages as ‘conventional’.

6 For a discussion of fourth-century B.c. and later accounts of ostracism, see Keaney, J. J., ‘Theophrastus on Ostracism and the Character of his Nomoi’ (forthcoming).Google Scholar

7 Rhodes (n. 1), p. 271, conveniently lists known instances of ostracism. For the much longer list of names recorded on ostraka, see Thomsen, R., The Origin of Ostracism (Copenhagen, 1972), pp. 61–108.Google Scholar

8 Possible instances of probolai against sycophants and deceivers of the demos are discussed below, n. 20.

9 On the problem of defining ‘sycophant’ and ‘sycophancy’, see most recently Osborne, R., ‘Vexatious Litigation in Classical Athens: Sykophancy and the Sykophant’, in Nomos: Essays in Athenian Law, Politics and Society, ed. Cartledge, P. et al. (Cambridge, 1990), pp. 83–102Google Scholar, and Harvey, D., ‘The Sykophant and Sykophancy: Vexatious Redefinition?’, in Nomos, pp. 103–21Google Scholar. Harvey, pp. 103–4 n. 1, lists earlier bibliography, most notably Lofberg, J. O., Sycophancy in Athens (Chicago, 1917)Google Scholar. To Harvey's list, add Bockisch, G., ‘Sykophanten’, in Soziale Typenbegriffe im alten Griechenland, ed. Welskopf, E. C. (Berlin, 1981), iv.11–25.Google Scholar

10 Hansen, M. H., Eisangelia = Odense University Classical Studies, Vol. 6 (Odense, 1975), pp. 38–9Google Scholar, wrongly maintains that rhetores alone were subject to probolai against sycophants. Not only is this unlikely, given the diverse groups against whom the charge of sycophancy is levelled in our sources, but also contradicted by the fact that metics, whose status kept them from being rhetores, were subject to probolai against sycophants (Ath. Pol. 43.5).

11 The term most frequently associated with ‘sycophant’ is poneros, a term equally suitable, as Harvey (n. 9), p. 109, notes, to describe the sycophant's moral baseness and low social status. For evidence of the stereotype that sycophants are poor, lower-class men, see, e.g. Eup. fr. 193 K.-A., Ar. Av. 1416–21 (a sycophant dressed in rags), Isoc. 21.5, Aesch. Ctes. 255–6, [Arist.] Rhet. ad Alex. 1424a31–2, Men. Georgoi fr. 1 Sandbach. For the common representation of rich, upper-class men as victims of sycophants, see, e.g., [Xen.] Ath. Pol. 1.14, Ar. Eq. 258–65 and Av. 285, Eup. frs. 99.85–7 and 193 K.–A., Isoc. 21.5 and 21.8, Xen. Mem. 2.9.1–8, Pl. Rep. 565b–566a, Arist. Pol. 1304b. Osborne (n. 9), p. 86, Harvey (n. 9), pp. 110–11, and Humphreys, S. C., ‘Public and Private Interests in Classical Athens’, CJ 73 (1977/1978), 103Google Scholar, briefly discuss the Athenian characterisation of sycophancy in these terms. This conception of sycophants and their victims is, I believe, a social construct subject to diverse interpretation and manipulation by elite Athenians, on the one hand, and democrats, on the other.

12 Sycophants cause expulsion: see, e.g., [Xen.] Ath. Pol. 1.14, Ant. 5.78, Andok. 1.105, Lys. 18.9,25.26, all discussed, with additional evidence, by Harvey (n. 9), pp. 117–18. Cf. the frequent complaint of elite writers that ‘one can no longer live in Athens because of sycophants’: Xen. Mem. 2.9.1, Arist. fr. 667 Rose, Isoc. fr. 11 Mathieu, and Theophr. Char. 26.5.

Sycophants cause ostracism: see Plut. Alc. 13.5–6, and Suda s.v. θησε⋯οισιν (μετ⋯ γ⋯ρ τ⋯ χαρ⋯σασθαι τ⋯ν δημοκρατ⋯αν τοῖς Ἀθηνα⋯οις τ⋯ν Θησ⋯α Λ⋯κος τις σνκοφαντ⋯σας ⋯ξο⋯ησεν ⋯ζοστρακισθ⋯ναι τ⋯ν ἤρωα). Raubitschek, A. E., ‘Theophrastus on Ostracism’, C&M 19 (1958), 78 n. 3Google Scholar, plausibly traces the Suda's citation back to Theophrastus, though he argues unpersuasively that ⋯ξοστρακισθ⋯ναι is meant metaphorically. For further discussion of this passage, see Rosivach (n. 3), p. 169, with notes.

13 Cleon as sycophant: Eq. 62–70, 255–65, 299–302, 324–7, 436–7, 773–6, 977–85. Cleon as deceiver of the demos: Eq. 48, 633, 809, 1103, 1224, 1345. The two charges are combined at Eq. 1356–61. Cf. Pl. 864–6, where the sycophant makes sycophantic use of the charge of deception of the demos by levelling it against Wealth.

14 Suda s.v. ⋯να⋯ειν, as noted by Bonner and Smith (n. 1), ii.65, actually calls Callixenus a sycophant.

15 For further discussion of the connection between sycophancy and deception of the demos in Xen. Hell. 1.7.34–5 and Hyp. Eux. 33–5, see Bonner and Smith (n. 1), ii.49–50, 64–5, and Harrison, A. R. W., The Law of Athens (Oxford, 1971), ii.61.Google Scholar

16 Philochorus (FGrHist 328 F 30) appears to place the ostrakophoria in the eighth prytany. In his commentary on the fragment, F. Jacoby argues plausibly for this interpretation, but dismisses as ‘trivial’ Carcopino's, J. reasonable suggestion in L'Histoire de l'ostracisme Athénien Paris , 1909), p. 126Google Scholar, that the interval between the vote on holding the ostrakophoria and the ostrakophoria itself was a safeguard against its rash use.

17 On the character of probolai, see Lipsius, J. H., Das Attische Recht und Rechtsverfahren (Leipzig, 1905), i.211–19Google Scholar, Berneker, E., ‘προβολ⋯’ , RE xxiii. 1.43–8Google Scholar, Bonner and Smith (n. 1), ii.63–71, Harrison (n. 15), ii.59–64, MacDowell, D. M., The Law in Classical Athens (Ithaca, 1978), pp. 194–7Google Scholar, and Rhodes (n. 1), pp. 526–7 and 659–60. Since there are few direct references outside of Ath. Pol. 43.5 to probolai against sycophants (Isoc. Antid. 314, Theophr. Nomoi fr. 3 Szegedy-Maszak, Pollux 8.46, and cf. Lys. 13.65) and deceivers of the demos (Xen. Hell. 1.7.34–5), most of our information about the procedure derives from probolai arising from offences at festivals, for which see esp. MacDowell, D. M., Demosthenes: Against Meidias (Oxford, 1990), pp. 13–16.Google Scholar

The relation of probolai against sycophants to the graphe sycophantias is disputed: see esp. Harrison (n. 15), ii.62–3, with ii.61 n. 3. Crawley, L. W. A., ‘ΓРΑФН ΣΥΟФΑΝΤΙΑΣ’, in Auckland Classical Essays Presented to E. M. Blaiklock, ed. Harris, B. F. (Auckland, 1970), p. 85Google Scholar, questions the existence of a graphe of this type, but is rightly challenged by Harvey (n. 9), p. 106 n. 12. [Arist.] Ath. Pol. 59.3 is convincing testimony to its existence. The relation of probolai against deceivers of the demos and eisangeliai against (apprently) the same category of offender (D. 20.100, 135 and D. 49.67) is discussed by Hansen (n. 10), pp. 38–9. On ‘deception of the demos’ and related charges, see MacDowell, , Law (n. 17), pp. 179–81.Google Scholar

18 On the rules governing ostracism, see esp. Rhodes (n. 1), p. 270. One might well wonder why three was selected as the limit on probolai against sycophants in each category, citizen and metic. The number three, however, was significant in other Athenian institutions, as Garner, R., Law and Society in Classical Athens (London, 1987), p. 97Google Scholar, notes, and, in fact, appears repeatedly in the description of the Assembly's regular agenda in [Arist.] Ath. Pol. 43.6. On the similarity of ostracism and probolai against sycophants, see Garner, p. 70, who notes that ‘both procedures created a sort of inverse priamel by finding the worst rather than the best’.

There was apparently no limit on the number of deceivers of the demos subject to probolai. One explanation for this is that the label ‘deceiver of the demos’ was never abused in the way that ‘sycophant’ was by the Thirty (see below in the text) and, therefore, no numerical limit was I placed on probolai of this type.

19 For the view that the Assembly continued to vote each year on holding an ostracism, see Rhodes (n. 1), p. 526, and Rosivach (n. 3), p. 163, who infers that ‘ostracism continued to have a symbolic value for the Athenians even after it had apparently ceased to play any role in practical polities’.

20 Xen. Hell. 1.7.35 provides our only certain instance of probolai against deceivers of the demos, Lys. 13.65 the most likely candidate for an actual case of a probole against a sycophant. Hansen, M. H., The Athenian Ecclesia II (Copenhagen, 1989), p. 27 n. 8Google Scholar, wrongly cites the former as an instance of probolai against sycophants, and takes the probole alluded to in D. 21.218 as one for failure to fulfil a promise to the demos rather than, as MacDowell, , Meidias (n. 17), pp. 419–20Google Scholar, rightly notes, one arising from an offence at a festival.

21 Hansen (n. 10), p. 38, suggests that ‘the detailed rules of procedure laid down for the Assembly may not have been introduced until the second half of the fourth century. Aristotle's description of the agenda for the various meetings of the Assembly resembles his description of the division of powers within the Board of Generals which dates only from c. 340’. Even if this is true of much of the agenda described by Ath. Pol. 43.3–6, the matters of business outlined in 43.5 may have been joined together at an earlier date, as argued below in the text.

22 The controversy over the date of the introduction of ostracism is discussed by Rhodes (n.1), pp. 268–9.

23 The earliest use of a word based on the root sukophant- is perhaps [Xen.] Ath. Pol. 1.14, dating to the early years of the Peloponnesian War. On this and other early instances of words based on this root, see Marr, J. L., ‘Notes on the Pseudo-Xenophontic Athenaion Politeia’ C&M 34 (1983), 53 n. 9.Google Scholar

24 Miltiades was tried before the demos ⋯π⋯της εἴνεκεν after his failed expedition against Paros (Hdt. 6.136). Hansen (n. 10), p. 69, argues that the procedure used was eisangelia. The two probolai discussed above (n. 20) date to 406 B.c. (Xen. Hell. 1.7.35) and sometime in the last decade of the fifth century (Lys. 13.65). Isocrates' attribution of the probole against sycophants to Solon (Antid. 314) is surely fanciful and tells us nothing about its antiquity, pace MacDowell, , Meidias (n. 17), p. 14 n. 1Google Scholar. As MacDowell, , Meidias (n. 17), p. 14Google Scholar, rightly argues, probolai for offences at festivals do not appear to have been in use before the late fifth century (see esp. D. 21.147); those against sycophants and deceivers of the demos probably also came into use at about this time.

25 Harvey (n. 9), p. 106 n. 13.

26 Osborne (n. 9), pp. 94–5 n. 37. Harvey (n. 9), p. 106 n. 13, finds Osborne's translation appealing.

27 For this ideal, see esp. Eur. Suppl. 891–5, discussed by Whitehead, D., The Ideology of the Athenian Metic = Cambridge Philological Society, Vol. 4 (Cambridge, 1977), p. 37Google Scholar, and Carter, L. B., The Quiet Athenian (Oxford, 1986), pp. 126–7.Google Scholar

28 Non-citizens could address the Assembly but, as Rhodes (n. 1), p. 527, notes, only by special permission.

29 Osborne (n. 9), p. 92, notes that defendants in private suits (dikai) regularly accuse their opponents of sycophancy. Harvey (n. 9) collects the ancient sources associating sycophancy with blackmail (p. 111), perjury (p. 108, s.v. ‘plotter and perjurer’), and collaboration in legal abuse (p. 115 n. 39).

30 MacDowell, , Law (n. 17), pp. 65–6Google Scholar, rightly questions the existence of any legal definition of sycophancy. Harvey's suggestion (n. 9), p. 106, that ‘[t]here ought surely to have been some legal definition of sykophancy’ is unconvincing.

31 Aristophanes depicts apragmones as favourite victims of sycophants in Eq. 258–65 and ‘throttling’ (ἄγχων) as a sycophantic tactic (Eq. 775–6). Cf. Ar. Ach. 713, where malicious prosecutors interfere with the sleep of old men.

32 I follow here the interpretation of the passage advanced by Bonner and Smith (n. 1), ii.69 n. 2, and MacDowell, D. M., Aristophanes: Wasps (Oxford, 1971), p. 268.Google Scholar

33 Since metics were heavily involved in economic activity within the city, they may have been especially susceptible to the charge of venality that is so closely connected with sycophancy.

34 See, e.g., Ar. Ach. 515–19, 703–5, and D. 26.17 (cf. D. 25.63 and 25.82). Cf. Plato, Leg. 938b–c, where sanctions are provided against non-citizens, as well as citizens, who ‘multiply suits’ (πολυδικεῖν) or assist in such legal chicanery.

35 The Thirty's purge is also described in [Arist.] Ath. Pol. 35.3–4, D. S. 14.4–5, and Just. 5.8.11–5.9.2. Cf. the brief mentions in Plut. Mor. 959d and 998a–b. On the relation of the ancient accounts to one another and the different chronologies they offer, see Krentz, P., The Thirty at Athens (Ithaca, 1982), pp. 131–47Google Scholar, Rhodes (n. 1), pp. 415–22, and Ostwald, M., From Popular Sovereignty to the Sovereignty of Law (Berkeley, 1986), pp. 481–4.Google Scholar

36 Osborne (n. 9), p. 101 and p. 101 n. 54, rightly suggests that the Thirty used ‘the label sykophant as an excuse for attacking all and sundry’, but does not attempt to prove the point. That ‘sycophancy’ may have performed other functions as well in the propaganda of the Thirty is evident from [Arist.] Ath. Pol. 35.2, which states that the Thirty altered inheritance laws ‘in order that there might be no leeway for sycophants’.

37 The Old Oligarch, for example, characterises the entire demos as sycophantic, when he asserts that they ‘sycophant’ against aristocrats in the subject states ([Xen.] Ath. Pol. 1.14). On the class implications of the label, see above n. 11.

38 Xenophon apparently remained in the city under the Thirty (see, e.g., Cawkwell, G., Xenophon: A History of my Times [New York, 1979], p. 9Google Scholar) and was at least initially sympathetic to their rule. He, therefore, approves of their purge of democratic ‘sycophants’, but objects to the extension of the purge to men of his own class.

39 The common assertion in our sources that certain men ‘live off sycophancy’ is best regarded as a vivid slander against those perceived to abuse the courts (cf. Osborne [n. 9], pp. 87–8), and not as evidence of a professional class of legal tricksters (pace Harvey [n. 9], pp. 114–16).

40 The political basis of the purge from its start is explicit in [Arist.] Ath. Pol. 35.3, which notes that the Thirty ‘removed sycophants and those who were associating undesirably with the people so as t o win favour with them and who were malefactors and scoundrels’ (τοὐς σνκοφ⋯ντας κα⋯ τοὐς τῷ δ⋯μῳ πρ⋯ς χ⋯ριν ⋯μιλο⋯ντας παρ⋯ τ⋯ β⋯λτιστον κα⋯ κακοπ⋯γμονας ⋯ντας κα⋯ πονροὐς ⋯νᾐρουν). Rhodes (n. 1), p. 446, reasonably places the condemnation of Agoratus' victims – Strombichides and other generals and taxiarchs of 405/404 (Lys. 13.35–8) – during this early phase of the Thirty's rule.

41 Scholars have too readily believed Xenophon and other elite writers ([Arist.] Ath. Pol. 35.3 and D. S. 14.4.2–3) who assert that there was wide approval of the initial purge: see, e.g., Lofberg (n. 9), p. 25, Bonner and Smith (n. 1), ii.70, Crawley (n. 17), p. 77, and Garner (n. 18), p. 65. The only evidence for popular approval of the purge of sycophants is Lysias 25, whose oligarchic speaker asserts before a popular audience that they would have considered the Thirty to be ‘good men,’ had the Thirty restricted their violence to those who, under the democracy, embezzled public funds, took bribes, and ‘sycophanted’ the allies (25.19). Since we do not know the outcome of this trial, however, we cannot be at all sure that the public received this characterisation of the purge warmly. The fact that it does not appear elsewhere in the extant orations, which speak so frequently of sycophants, suggests that this view was not widely accepted.

42 For evidence that the attack on metics was motivated by both financial and political considerations, see Lys. 12.6 and [Arist.] Ath. Pol. 35.4.

43 Our sources provide a number of terms of abuse that the Thirty may have thrown against their opponents: σνκοφ⋯νται (Xen. Hell. 2.3.12 and passim, [Arist.] Ath. Pol. 35.3), πονηρο⋯ (Xen. Hell. 2.3.14, [Arist.] Ath. Pol. 35.3, D. S. 14.4.2), κακοπρ⋯γμονες ([Arist.] Ath. Pol. 35.3), ἄδικοι (Lys. 12.5), and νεωτερ⋯ζοντες (D. S. 14.4.4).

44 On this connection, see above n. 11. Diodorus Siculus (14.4.2), therefore, groups the first victims of the purge together as πονηρ⋯τατοι.