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Literate education in classical Athens1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

T. J. Morgan
T. J. Morgan
Affiliation:
University College, Oxford
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Extract

In the study of education, as in many more travelled regions of Classical scholarship, democratic Athens is something of a special case. The cautions formulation is appropriate: in the case of education, surprisingly few studies have sought to establish quite how special Athens was, and those which have, have often raised more questions than they answered. The subject itself is partly to blame. The history of education invites comparison with the present day, while those planning the future of education rarely fail to invoke the past. The place of Classical Athens in European culture has ensured a place for Athenian education in almost every debate from the relation between education and democracy to the value of education versus training, and as the original champion of causes as varied as mass education, co-education, and the national curriculum. Desirable as it is to be in demand, such treatment is not calculated to produce the most circumspect account of the subject. The study of education is further hampered by the fact that our knowledge of Athenian culture is so vibrant and diverse in some ways and so partial in others. Plato and Aristophanes present a vivid fictional picture of education in the late fifth century. If we add a few passages from Xenophon and Aristotle, a large number of vases depicting men, women, and children reading, playing the lyre, and doing athletics, and one or two archaeological finds of an educational appearance, it is tempting to take the result as a clear portrait of a society at school.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 49 , Issue 1 , May 1999 , pp. 46 - 61
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1999

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Footnotes

1

Prof. John Crook and Prof. Malcolm Schofield read an earlier version of this paper and their acute eyes and trenchant pens, as always, saved me from many errors.

References

2 Marrou, H.I.,Histoire de I' Education dans l'Antiquité (7th edn, Paris, 1975), pp. 142ff.Google Scholar; Von Schmitter, P., ‘Compulsory education at Athens and Rome?’, AJP 96 (1975), 276–89Google Scholar; Beck, F. A., Greek Education (London, 1964), pp. 80ff.Google Scholar

3 Jaeger, W., Paideia, trans. G., Highet (3 vols, Oxford, 1939–45)Google Scholar deals brilliantly with intellectual culture as a whole but only incidentally with education. Pfeiffer, R., History of Classical Scholarship, vol. I (Oxford, 1968)Google Scholar likewise only touches on education as an institution. Marrou(n. 2)deals with every form of education, including physical and professional, in necessarily summary form, but his is still the best monograph on the subject. Others include F.A. Beck (n.2); Bowen, J., A History of Western Education, vol. I (London, 1972)Google Scholar; Freeman, K., Schools of Hellas (London, 1907).Google Scholar

4 Morgan, T., Literate Education in the Hellenistic and Roman Worlds (Cambridge, 1998), pp. 9ff.Google Scholar

5 Cicero, De Or. 1.42; Philo, De Cong. 11–12; Quintilian, Institutio Oratoria 1 passim: cf. papyri from Graeco-Roman Egypt in T. Morgan (n.4). Elements of the “curriculum”, identified with the phrase enkyklios paideia from the Hellenistic period onwards, include reading and writing, reading Greek and Latin authors, grammar, rhetoric, arithmetic, geometry, and sometimes music. I exclude philosophy, rhetoric in its most advanced stages, and astronomy on the grounds that educational material cannot be distinguished from that used by professionals, scholars, etc. The term ‘curriculum’ refers only to perceived regularity in the contents and order of exercises; it is intended to have no implications for other institutional features of education. Contrary to, e.g., Lodge, R. C., Plato's Theory of Education (London, 1947), pp. 11–12Google Scholar, there is no indication, at least in the vocabulary of the sources, that education per se was always defined as an institution separate from the rest of society.

6 ‘The old days’ is supposed to refer to the Marathon generation; since the Clouds was first performed in 423 and appears to have a contemporary setting, there is room for two generations between ‘then’ and ‘now’. When did what Aristophanes is calling the ‘new education’ come in ? Sophists did not appear in Athens before c. 460 and later so it is unlikely that the ‘new education’ was perceived to make much impact until the 440s and perhaps not much negative impact until after the death of Pericles in 429, when their influence on the conduct of politics became more obvious. We may not be far out if we regard it as a problem, if not strictly a phenomenon, of the last third of the century at most.

7 Immorality is supposed to have increased. On the ethical uses of literature from pre-Classical times, see Marrou (n. 2), pp. 9–13; Pfeiffer (n.3), pp. 3–15. Cf. Knights 987–95.

8 Frogs 52–4 (Dionysus sits on deck reading the Andromeda.); 1113 (everyone has a book in his hand and no-one practises gymnastics any more).

9 Woodbury, L., ‘Aristophanes’ Frogs and Athenian literacy’, TAPHA 106 (1976), 349–57Google Scholar; more plausible than Harvey, F.D., ‘Literacy in the Athenian Democracy’, REG 79 (1966), 585–635CrossRefGoogle Scholar, whose argument—though not his evidence—tends to the conclusion that Athenian literacy was widespread. The fifth century sees a sudden spate of vases with reading scenes, but this, too, should be interpreted with caution. Overall such scenes are not many in number compared with, for instance, athletic, military, mythical, or domestic scenes. Many of them are among the most sophisticated paintings we possess, suggesting a wealthy audience. And the fact that reading scenes became a familiar icon in the early fifth century attests the literate revolution in society which accompanied the democracy (or even slightly pre-dated it); it does not attest widespread literacy in practice.

10 Apol. 20d6ff., 26. This might be any time from about the 430s. But we should not take this as evidence of widespread reading of Anaxagoras or texts in general at this period. That anyone can read them—they only cost a drachma in the agora—sounds like the arrogant élitism of Plato talking. A drachma at the time represented at least a labourer's daily wage: Socrates might have spent a day's wages on a book, but not many would. Lewis, N., Papyrus in Classical Antiquity (Oxford, 1974), p. 132; cf.Google Scholar Jones, A. H. M., Athenian Democracy (Oxford, 1957), ch. 4.Google Scholar

11 Plato is being deliberately archaic—elsewhere we see him in radical form. His ambivalent attitude to letters often leads him to ignore their importance.

12 The age of this law is unclear, though there is no reason whatsoever to think it Solonic, as Aeschines would like us to do. Plato (Crito 50c4ff.) has a different interpretation of the supposed law of Solon about paideia, no more authoritative than Aeschines’.

13 N.E. 1180a25ff.; Pol. 1337a34ff.

14 Protag. 312a–b; Arist. Pol. 1337b23ff. dismisses banausikê education as cramping the intellect. Cf. Plutarch, Eumenes 1 on Eumenes of Cardia, who though poor received the education of an eleutheros in letters and the palaestra.

15 Aristoph. Kn. 190–3; Plato, Protag. 312a–b; Xen. Oec. 4.2; Arist. Pol. 1332b12ff., 1334a23–4, 1337b4ff.; Plut. Demos. 4.3; Solon 1.3–4; Eumenes 1–1; Phocion 4.1–2.

16 Nowhere in the sources is it stated, as often assumed, that grammata constitute purely the earliest, mechanical stage of education and that once pupils begin to read literature it counts as mousikê. The distinction between the two is consistently blurred; reading literature is often referred to directly after learning to read and write with no indication of a change of discipline or teacher; grammatistai and grammatodidaskaloi both taught literature; later we have abundant evidence that lines from literature were used among the earliest writing exercises: PI. Prof. 325d–326a; Charm. 159c; Isoc. Antid. 267; Soph. 10. Booth, A.D. (‘Douris’ cup and the stages of schooling in Classical Athens’, EMC 19 [1985], 275–80)Google Scholar argues on the too-slender evidence of the Laws and a doubtful passage in the Protagoras that pupils went first to the grammatistês, then the kitharistês. Across the range of references no such clear pattern emerges, though he is right to refuse a simply synchronic interpretation of the Cup itself. The early Hellenistic inscription from Teos (SIG 3. 578. 8–20) which he cites in support of his argument is itself ambiguous; even if it clearly supported sequential teaching of letters and music it would be no help for the Classical period, since it is precisely the institutions of education which develop over time. The meaning of the inscription may be that letters are fundamental, so come first, while music is an optional extra; this would fit with the evidence of literary sources and papyri from the Hellenistic period on wards.

17 ‘Music’ in later authors seems to refer to music theory rather than practice; it was relatively rare and probably confined to the very wealthy, being absent from schooltext papyri altogether. Singing could be used to teach vocal pitch in oratory, however; viz. Quintilian, I.O. 1.10.27.

18 Stobaeus, Flor. 98.

19 Cf. a fragment of Sophocles (p. Oxy. 1083.1) in which a satyr chorus advertizes its suitability to marry a king's daughter: the members are accomplished not only in games, poetry, music, and dancing (the conventional components of mousikê and gymnastikê) but also in science and scholarship, which are evidently felt to be distinct—though whether because they are not a normal part of education or because they are a separate part of education is unclear. On verbal skill characterized as ‘verbal wrestling’ and an alternative in competition with physical prowess, especially in the Sophists and fourth-century writers, see O'regan, D., Rhetoric, Comedy and the Violence of Language in Aristophanes’ Clouds (Oxford, 1992), pp. 11–17, 39.Google Scholar

20 Plautus, Bacch 420ff., probably after Menander. The rest of the description is much like e.g. Aeschines, Tim. 9–11. Cf. Plutarch, Eumenes 1. Aristotle claims (Poet. 6. 1450b18–19) to prefer reading drama to seeing it.

21 Cf. Kerferd, G.B., The Sophistic Movement (Cambridge, 1981), pp. 34–41 and 42ff.Google Scholar, though he presses PI. Protag. 318d7ff. too far (p.38) in cluding a ‘curriculum’ of sophistic studies. The passage makes as much sense and fits the other evidence better if taken as rhetorical hyperbole.

22 Plato, Protag. 318e–19a: Sophists teach technai just when young men think they have escaped from learning technai.

23 E.g. Philo, De Cong 25–18; Quintilian,I.O. 1.10.34ff. Note, though, both writers concentrate on the spiritual benefits of geometry and astronomy.

24 There is no comprehensive catalogue of mathematical schooltexts but many are included in Zalateo, G., ‘Papiri scolastici’, Aegyptus 41 (1961), 160–235Google Scholar and MPER n.s. XV.

25 Euclid does not count, though he was used in education, at least occasionally (e.g. P.Mich. 3.143: bk. 1 definitions 1–10 [3rd centuary C.E.]) because he is usuable material; he does not discuss or reflect on mathematics.

26 By distinguishing between practical and cultural uses of education I do not imply that culture was not functional.

27 Harvey (n. 9); Thomas, R., Oral Tradition and Written Record in Classical Athens (Cambridge, 1989).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

28 Though Aristotle denies it at N.E. 1181b1ff.

29 On the (atypical) education of Ischomachus’ wife and on the education of women in general, see Pomeroy, S. B., Social and Historical Commentary on Xenophon Oeconomicus (Oxford, 1994), pp. 38–9, 267–9Google Scholar; Cole, S. G., ‘Could Greek Women read and write?’, in Foley, H. P. (ed.), Reflections of Women in Antiquity (New York, 1981), pp. 219–46.Google Scholar

30 Three myths of the invention of the alphabet current in the fifth and fourth centuries uniformly stress the practical uses of writing (Gorgias, Pal. 30/Stobaeus, peri grammaton 7; Aesch. P.V. 459–62; Pl. Phaedr. 274d1–2), which suggests that the absence of practical uses of literacy in educational texts does not reflect the attitude of society as a whole. Cf. many statements of the practical uses of literacy to be found in schooltext papyri: e.g. P. Bour. I; Mon Epiph. 2.615; D. Hagedorn and M. Weber, ‘Die Griechisch-Koptische Rezension der Menandersentenzen’ ZPE 3 (1968), 15–50 (several quotations). Knowing your letters can be a help in life, a means of livelihood, and a source of wealth as well as wisdom. Many of these quotations are certainly or putatively taken from lost New Comedies. There is no reason, however, to assume with von Schmitter (n. 2), pp. 276–89 that such texts depend on a degree of literacy in their entire audience, much less with A. Burns, (‘Athenian literacy in the fifth century B.c.’, JHI 42 [1981], 371–8) that the scattered references to letters in fifth-century sources indicate that the vast majority of Athenians were literate from the end of the sixth century.

31 Robb, K., Literacy and Paideia (Oxford, 1994)Google Scholar; Thomas, R. (n. 27); Harris, W., Ancient Literacy (Cambridge, MA, 1989)Google Scholar; cf. Beard, M. et al, Literacy in the Roman World, JRA suppl. 3 (Ann Arbor, 1991)Google Scholar; Samuel, A. E., The Shifting Sands of History (London, 1989), p. 35.Google Scholar

32 Isocrates must mean ‘literacy’ by grammatam, not simply being able to speak. Grammata are not used of the spoken word except occasionally in grammatical theory. Everyone can speak and the Sophists did not teach speaking in a non-technical sense, so the point is meaningless unless the distinction lies between literate education in general and reasoned discourse in particular.

33 Diels–Kranz 1.41.4.

34 Diogenes Laertius 6.5.

35 Xen. Mem. 4.2.9–10 and above p. 54.

36 Though for the view that Socrates only warns against reading, not condemns it, see Ferrari, G. R. F., Listening to the Cicadas (Cambridge, 1987)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, ch. 7; cf Leg. 810e–811b: ‘those who have heard [sic] much have learned much’.

37 Perhaps because he has no interest in educational skills, only in the virtue they produce, and reading and writing are morally neutral; on which see Annas, J., An Introduction to Plato's Republic (Oxford, 1981), pp. 83ff.Google Scholar

38 Isocrates, who in other passages is keen to stress the importance of literacy, can still say in To Nicocles (11–14) that it is listening to poets which will teach his future ruler what he needs to learn. On the continuing importance of orality and personal relationships in teaching into the fourth century, see Robb (n. 31), pp. 197ff., 214. Scepticism towards the written word and the pedagogical text was still lively in the Roman period (Alexander, L., ‘The living voice’, in D., Clines et al. [edd.], The Bible in Three Dimensions. JSOT suppl. 87 [1990], 221–47).Google Scholar Nor, for that matter, was the idea that poetry and other things could be read as well as heard and recited new to the Classical period. Most obviously, we possess in written form a great deal of poetry from before the fifth century, beginning with Homer. Peisistratus’ campaign to educate the Athenians, according to Plato, included not only compelling rhapsodes to recite Homer at the Panathenaea but also setting up herms inscribed with moral maxims in the countryside. Vases of the early fifth century show people reading; where the writing is decipherable it is almost always poetry(Immerwahr, H., ‘Book rolls on Attic vases’, Classical, Mediaeval and Renaissance Studies 1 [1964], 17–48Google Scholar; ‘More book rolls on Attic vases’, Antike Kunst 16 [1973], 143–7). References to pre-Classical literary criticism suggest something written. Cf. Marrou (n. 2), pp. 41–3; Pfeiffer (n.3), pp. 3–15.

39 Not perhaps virtue, at least on their own claims, but certainly maths, oratory. etc.

40 At the same time merely being able to read and write was downgraded as a skill and we have comments such as ‘he can barely read’, meaning ‘he's a boor’, and ‘he's either dead or a teacher of letters’ (Booth, A.D., ‘Some suspect schoolmasters’, Florilegium 3 [1981], 1–20.)Google Scholar

41 Pol. 1337' a11ff.; Antid. passim.

42 Though the Republic and Laws have much in common with and may have inspired some of the prescriptions of Aristotle or Isocrates, or both.

43 Note that conflicting opinions are often expressed by the same writers in different contexts, reflecting the turmoil and divergence of opinion in society at large. Cf. Eurip. fr. 370 Nauck– from the writer whom Aristophanes characterizes as the far wing of the new education. A soldier, returning from the wars, looks forward to spending his old age, ‘unfolding the voice of the tablets which wise men recite.’

44 Ar. Frogs 943, 1114, cf. Harris (n. 31), p. 87, n. 6;Birds 1288; Xen. Anab. 7.5.14 appears to regard ships carrying many books as normal; on the fifth and fourth centuries, see the summaries of Kenyon, F. G., Books and Readers in Ancient Greece and Rome (2nd edn, Oxford, 1950)Google Scholar and Turner, E. G., Athenian Books (2nd edn, London, 1977).Google Scholar

45 Thomas (n. 27), pp. 38–42. Note too the strong growth in the authority o the written text. On Aristotle's reading, see Strabo 13.608; Pfeiffer (n. 3), p. 67; cf. Eupolis fr. 304KA (cf. Lewis [n. 10], p. 74).

46 E.g.Davies, J. K., Wealth and the Power of Wealth in Classical Athens (New York, 1981)Google Scholar; Hansen, M. H., The Athenian Democracy (Oxford, 1991), pp. 266ff.Google Scholar; Boeckh, A., The Public Economy of Athens (London, 1842), pp. 116–23.Google Scholar

47 Harris (n. 31), pp.3–24.

48 On Isocrates as ‘the ancient author who more than any other establishes writing as a medium of political expression and activity’, see the discussion of Too, Y. L., The Rhetoric of Identity in Isocrates (Cambridge, 1995)Google Scholar, ch. 4. Cf. Pl. Phaedr. 264b7ff. where the organization of a speech is described as being ordered by logographic necessity—the requirements of correct speech are dependent on writing. This principle is implied, though never explicitly stated, throughout Aristotle's Rhetoric where proper speaking is characterized as the product of education (e.g. 1408a30ff.) and rhetorical education heavily based on literate-dependent grammatical analysis of language.

49 In particular we have no indication whether sophists used the texts they wrote for teaching. The few descriptions of sophists teaching are always oral: cf. Guthrie, W. K. C., The Sophists (Cambridge, 1971), pp. 41–4CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Kerferd (n.21), pp. 28–33, through his statement ‘It is clear that sample speeches … were provided for students to study and imitate’ is only an inference. Xen. Mem. 4.29ff.: (n. 27 above) implies that handbooks were used for teaching, but Contra see Arist. N.E. 1181b1ff.: we do not find men becoming expert physicians by reading medical handbooks; they are only useful to those who are already experts.

50 Plato, Protag. 325aff; Hipparchus 228b–229a; Xen. Cyneget. 13; that is the implication of Isocrates sending ‘letters’ of moral instruction (highly gnomic in form) to NIcocles, Nicocles’ subjects, and Demonicus.

51 Xen. Mem. 4.2.1.

52 Isoc. Antid. 259ff,; Arist,N.E. 1181b9ff.

53 Two anonymous technai of the late fifth or early fourth century, Airs, Waters, Places and the ‘Anonymus Iamblichi’, may indicate that texts were already used for teaching: they share what may have been a stereotypical opening: ‘Whoever wishes to learn … let him… ’ (Cole [n. 29], p. 86).