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Early Greek tyranny and the people

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

G. L. Cawkwell
G. L. Cawkwell
Affiliation:
University College, Oxford
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Extract

Over sixty years ago, it was written of early Greek tyranny that it ‘had arisen only in towns where an industrial and commercial regime tended to prevail over rural economy, but where an iron hand was needed to mobilize the masses and to launch them in assault on the privileged classes… But tyranny nowhere endured. After it had performed the services which the popular classes expected of it, after it had powerfully contributed to material prosperity and to the development of democracy, it disappeared with an astonishing rapidity… The people regarded tyranny only as an expedient. They used it as a battering ram with which to demolish the citadel of the oligarchs, and when their end had been achieved they hastily abandoned the weapon which wounded their hands.’ Thus Gustav Glotz, whose view found favour with de Ste Croix. He too concluded with appeal to Aristotle, who in a famous passage declared that unlike monarchy, which arises to help ‘the great and good’ (οί πιεικεȋς) against the People, and the monarch who is appointed as one of ‘the great and good’, ‘the tyrant comes from the People and the multitude to confront the men of note(οί γνώριμοι) and prevent the People being unjustly treated by them. This is clear from what actually happened, for, generally speaking, the majority of the tyrants became tyrants from being demagogues so to speak, having got themselves trusted by their abusive attacks on the men of note.’ Against this view of Aristotle and all his latter-day satellites, this paper is directed.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 45 , Issue 1 , May 1995 , pp. 73 - 86
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1995

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References

1 The Greek City (London, 1929), pp. 109 and 115Google Scholar.

2 The Class Struggle in the Ancient Greek World (London, 1981), pp. 278–83Google Scholar.

3 Pol. 1310b9–16. For πιεικεȋς, cf. Poetics 1452b34 where they are opposed to the μοχθηροί. For the influence of the Aristotelian view, cf. Berve, H., Die Tyrannis bei den Griechen (Munich, 1967), I. 10Google Scholar.

4 The word δημοτικός may be variously translated (see LSJ). For ‘democratic’, cf. Ath. Pol. 22.1.

5 Cf. the translation of Rhodes, P. J., The Athenian Constitution (Penguin edition, 1984) 55Google Scholar – ‘this is confirmed by the fact that….’ There is no good reason to take σημεȋον otherwise.

6 Cf. Solon F 10W.

7 τῷ λοуῷ is not equivalent to λοуῷ, which would suggest deception.

8 Notably by Hignett, C., A History of the Athenian Constitution (Oxford, 1952), p. 110Google Scholar, who cites Plutarch, , Solon 29. 1Google Scholar, a passage which may well derive from fourth-century discussion.

9 Cf. Andrewes, A., CAH2 III. 3 406Google Scholar.

10 Cf. Rhodes, P. J., Commentary 214Google Scholar.

11 Cf. Kraay, C. M., Archaic and Classical Greek Coins (London, 1976), p. 55Google Scholar.

12 Salmon, J. B., Wealthy Corinth (Oxford, 1984), p. 429Google Scholar is sceptical about Corinth using spits as currency, but see Kraay op. cit. 313f.

13 There is the possibility that the author was referring not to loans of money, but to loans of things, which is the story that Aelian got hold of (Var. Hist. 9.25), but all this is improbable; those who in that world did not work starved and their families with them, and Aelian's picture of idlers in the market-place being induced by grants of seed or a yoke of oxen to refrain from plotting against Pisistratus and get on with their jobs seems a piece of fiction.

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15 Hdt. 1.59.6, 5.65.3; Thuc. 6.54.5,6, 55.1 and 3, 1.20.2.

16 Perhaps Plato was somewhat thoughtless on the subject, for in the Symposium (182c) he spoke of Harmodius and Aristogiton ‘ending the rule of the tyrants’.

17 Cf. Lewis, D. M., CAH3 IV 287fGoogle Scholar.

18 Podlecki, A. J., ‘The Political significance of the Athenian “Tyrannicide” Cult’ Historia 15, (1966), pp. 129–41Google Scholar argued that the version exalting the role of the Tyrannicides in ending the tyranny was decisively fostered by Themistocles after the Persian invasion, but even if his thesis is correct it presupposes widespread uncertainty about who was who in the Pisistratid family and about how they ceased to count in Athenian affairs.

19 E.g. т Ίππάρχου τειχίον (Suda s.v.).

20 There is no justification for thinking that the rules of the full democracy concerning the holding of office applied in the sixth century. Cf. Forrest, W. G. and Stockton, D. L., Historia 36, (1987), pp. 235–40Google Scholar. The members of the family may have been archons repeatedly.

21 Much that happened between 560 and 510 may have been due to the contriving or with the assent of Pisistratus or his sons, but their method may have been to act through the archonship and their personal interest may not have been obvious to the populace. Hipparchus as a rich patron of literature (cf. Ath. Pol. 18.1 ϕιλόμουσος) attracted big names to Athens (Plato, , Hipparchus 228Google Scholar), who may not have much concerned ordinary citizens, but it is not to be presumed that his erection of herms (ibid. 229a) was done in any other way that that in which his nephew, Pisistratus the Younger, erected altars, viz. as archon (Thuc. 6.54.6f.). The same may be true of the fountain-house called Enneacrounus (ibid. 2.15.5). It is notable that the festival of Dionysus Eleuthereus was administered by the eponymous archon (Ath. Pol. 56.3–4), which has been taken as a sign of its ‘lateness’, but one cannot help wondering why, no matter when it was introduced, it was not simply assigned to the King Archon; perhaps the introducer, perhaps Pisistratus himself, acted during an archonship and wanted to see to the initial ceremony himself. To talk of ‘policies’ in all these matters is to go far beyond what is known (as Kolb, F., ‘Die Bau-, Religions- und Kulturpolitik der Peisistratiden’ JDAI 92 [1977], pp. 99–138Google Scholar; cf. Andrewes, A.' cautious approach in CAH III2.3 410ffGoogle Scholar.). What the Pisistratus family did may have been done largely in virtue of office and have thus prevented the people at large appreciating the tyrants' roles.

22 Cf. Connor, W. R., ‘Tribes, Festivals and Processions in Archaic Greece’ JHS 107 (1987), 46CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Herodotus' account (1.60.4f.) suggests that the Athenians were genuinely deceived, but Phye, strikingly tall and good-looking, must have been known of by a good number of members of her deme at least and Connor's remark seems apposite: ‘The citizens are not naive bumpkins taken in by the leader's manipulation but participants in a theatricality whose rules and roles they understand and enjoy.’ It was alleged that Phye was given in marriage to Hipparchus, (FGH 323 F15)Google Scholar.

23 I presume that all that the Ath. Pol. says of the establishment of the tyranny derives simply from Herodotus, but that its story of the disarming of the populace (15.4, 5) is a misuse of the story in Thuc. 6.58.2. Cf. Rhodes, P. J.Commentary ad 15.4Google Scholar for differing views.

24 Cf. Boersma, J. S., Athenian Building Policy from 561/0 to 405/4 BC (Groningen, 1970), 14ffGoogle Scholar.

25 There is one remarkable detail in the story of the expulsion of Hippias which one is at a loss to explain, viz. that he was given five days in which to clear out of Attica (Hdt. 5.65.2). The ostracisès were given ten days to settle up their legal business. Was Hippias given five days to finish his illegal business? or just to pack his bags? And what were the important People doing this while? If the former tyrant was not all that noticeable when he was there, another five days would not matter perhaps.

26 6.55.3, 56.2, 57.1&4, 58.2.

27 In Mytilene ‘clubs’ were used to cow rival aristocrats (Ar. Pol. 1311b28).

28 Plut, . Solon 30.3Google Scholar.

29 Busolt-Swoboda, , Griechische Staatskunde 979fGoogle Scholar., Ehrenberg, V., The People of Aristophanes (1962 edition), p. 175Google Scholar.

30 The most inconvenient evidence might be thought to be Hdt. 1.64.1, where Pisistratus ‘having got Athens for the third time’ is said to have ‘established the tyranny with many mercenaries’ (πίκουροι, a word he does not use elsewhere of the tyranny at Athens). But perhaps these mercenaries assumed a more regular role in the course of time. The exaltation of the tyrannicides began early; their statues were carried off by Xerxes (Paus. 1.8.5, Arr. Anab. 3.16.7).

31 Meiggs-Lewis, , G.H.I.2 no. 6Google Scholar.

32 Thirlwall, G., The History of Greece (1846 edition) II 486ffGoogle Scholar.

33 Opinion has differed on the date of Cimon's death. Cf. Wade-Gery, H. T., Essays in Greek History (Oxford, 1958), 158Google Scholar, who preferred 528/7, but if Herodotus had thought that Cimon won his third victory while Pisistratus was still alive and was murdered shortly after Pisistratus' death, one would expect him to have made that plain at 6.103.3. If, however, Cimon was murdered in 524/3, it will have been very shortly after his son became archon, which would be improbable only if it was indeed Hippias who was responsible, which one doubts.

34 References to Solon's poems are given for West, M. L. (ed.), Iambi et Elegi Graeci (Oxford, 1972)Google Scholar.

35 Thucydides (2.14.2) notes that ‘the majority were used ever to dwell in the country’. Aristotle (Pol. 1305a19) remarks that in the period of the tyrannies the δμος lived π τν уρν.

36 The very existence of a sixth-century wall has been denied, but the discussion of Bufè, H. Lauter and Lauter, H. ‘Die vorthemistokleische Stadtmauer Athens nach philologischen und archäologischen Quellen’ Archäologischer Anzeiger 1975 1–9Google Scholar puts the case for such a wall convincingly.

37 It may be noted that since pottery was an urban industry, the ever greater spread of black-figure ware in the sixth century (cf. Bailey, B. L., ‘The export of Attic Black-figure Ware’ JHS 60 [1940], 60–70)CrossRefGoogle Scholar is suggestive, for presumably other urban industries were also increasing.

38 Andrewes, A., CAH III2. 3 387Google Scholar.

39 Solon's measures touching the position of the humblest citizens in the constitution have been much debated, but, to judge by the ναρχία after Solon (Ath. Pol. 13), their effect was too slight to check the abuse of power by prominent individuals.

40 Morris, Ian, Burial and Ancient Society (Cambridge, 1987), 196Google Scholar states the view well.

41 Latacz, J., Kampfparänese, Kampfdarstellung und Kampfwirklichkeil in der Ilias, bei Kallinos and Tyrtaios (Munich, 1977)Google Scholar.

42 Hdt. 6.56 recounts the уέρεα of the Spartan kings but omits their ‘incomes’; Plato, Alcibiades 122d–123Google Scholar a fills the gap, as too [Xenophon] Lac. Pol. 15.3.

43 H. Berve, op. cit. 519 ‘nach seinen Sprachgebrauch sind mit πρόσοδοι die staatlichen Einkünfte gemeint.’ But at Thuc. 1.4 the πρόσοδοι of Minos come to him not to the state. Cf. L.S.J. s.v. II for the use of the word to denote personal income in the Orators as well as in Plato, Laws 847aGoogle Scholar (e.g. Andoc. 4.11 ἰδίας π τν κοινν προσόδους κατεσκευάσατο, Aesch. 3.173 τν βίον οὐκ κ τν ἰδίων προσόδων προσόδων πορίζεται…). The word used in Hdt. 1.64.1 for Pisistratus' income is σύνοδοι.

44 It is easy to belittle this. Cf. Thomas, Rosalind, Oral tradition and written record in Classical Athens (Cambridge, 1989), p. 3CrossRefGoogle Scholar ‘oral tradition provided most Greeks with a knowledge of their history.’ But Thucydides was on his guard against τò μυθδες (1.21.1, 22.4).

45 He refers to ‘the poets’ six times in the Archaeology.

46 For the date, cf. Davies, J. K., Athenian propertied families (Oxford, 1971), p. 371Google Scholar.

47 Cf. lines 523ff.

48 Bullion presumably, so early in the sixth century, if he really did give a talent of silver. Perhaps this detail should warn against taking the story literally.

49 Considering that there is no agreement even about the data of Pheidon (cf. Berve op. cit. 518), the part he plays in so many discussions about the rise of tyranny is surely his most notable achievement.

50 He gave his name to a type of oil can. Cf. L.S.J. s.v. Φείδων.

51 Cf. Salmon, J., ‘Political hoplites?’ JHS 97 (1977), 84–101CrossRefGoogle Scholar, esp. 97 and 100f.

52 Cf. Jacoby, F.FGH II. c p. 248Google Scholarad F 57.

53 Cf. Aristotle, , frag. 610Google Scholar(1556a9ff.) from Diogenes Laertius 1.98.

54 Cf. Salmon, art. cit. 97 ‘it is perhaps worth noting that Cypselus found it unnecessary to maintain a bodyguard when he achieved power; that makes it as good as certain that he could rely on hoplite support, which in turn makes it more than likely that they had given him help in the revolution itself.’