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Note on the Peace of Nikias

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 December 2013

A. Andrewes  and
D. M. Lewis
A. Andrewes
Affiliation:
Oxford
D. M. Lewis
Affiliation:
Oxford
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Extract

In the early part of the fourth century it was the regular practice for Athenian treaties to specify the authorities who were to swear the oath on either side, and, although the fifth-century material is more scanty, three clear instances suggest that the habit was already established by 425. The notable exception is the Peace of Nikias, and with it the Spartan alliance of 421, in which not the quality but the number is prescribed, seventeen from each city. Kirchhoff suggested that this odd number might be built up, on the Spartan side, from the two kings (who in fact head the list), the five ephors (the eponymous ephor Pleistolas comes third and the next four might be his colleagues; cf. Tod, GHI 99), and a board of ten. Kirchhoff refused to speculate about these ten beyond saying that it was a normal number, but this gap in his argument can perhaps be filled from a passage in Diodorus (below) which has received no satisfactory explanation. Normal Athenian practice would not oblige Athens to conform to the Spartan number, and if Kirchhoff is right we should perhaps suppose that Sparta asked for numerical parity. The next question will be, how the Athenians made up their seventeen.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Hellenic Studies , Volume 77 , Issue 2 , November 1957 , pp. 177 - 180
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1957

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References

1 IG i2 87 (SEG x 80); IG i2 90; Thuc. v 47.9.

2 For the text of Thuc. v 18.9 see Gomme ad loc. A similar formula has been found in IG ii2 40 (for the text see Wilhelm, , Wiener Studien xxxiv (1912), 416 ff.Google Scholar, for further discussion Accame, La Lega ateniese, 38–44), where Wilhelm restores 11. 1–2 . But the opening phrase and the content of the amendment which begins in l.4 makė it at least doubtful whether the main text on this stone was a treaty at all.

3 Thukydides und sein Urkundenmaterial, 63–4.

4 Commissions of three are more common in this period, e.g. Thuc. v 12.1, Xen. Hell, iii 2.6; but ten ξύμβουλοι were appointed to supervise Agis in 418 (Thuc. v 63.4).

5 Classical Weekly xliv (1951), 203.Google Scholar

6 The phrasing is sometimes obscure, especially at 760a7 where the text is not quite certain. But cf. 762e9 .

7 This observation by Lewis was the starting-point for our note.

8 Körte, , Hermes xlvii (1912), 295 n.Google Scholar, wondered in passing what Pauson stole if Theogenes' ships were unreal. It might be answered that the theft is not in any case literal and concrete; the real difficulty is to understand what part Theogenes plays in the argument of the chorus, and though we see no clear answer the difficulty is less if the ship existed.

9 would be possible here.

10 He and Erasinides were blockaded with Konon at Mytilene in the summer of 406 (Xen. Hell, i 6.16), but he did not, like Erasinides, take part in the battle of Arginousai nor does Xenophon mention him again; perhaps, as several commentators have suggested, Erasinides was on the ship which escaped to Hellespont and Athens and Leon on the other which was captured by the Spartans (i 6.21–2). If so he may have survived to the end of the war and Sauppe (Or. Att. ii 202) may be correct in identifying him with the father of the speaker of Lysias x who served many times as general (26) and was murdered by the Thirty (4, 27): there cannot have been many veteran generals in Athens in 404, and this general's elder on was named Pantaleon (5). Meyer, , GdA v 22, 24 Google Scholar, cautiously approved Sauppe's suggestion and (without argument) identified the general with Leon the Sala-minian the notorious victim of the Thirty, to which it has been objected (e.g. Swoboda, , RE xii 2007 Google Scholar) that this Leon was not an Athenian citizen (Kirchner does not admit him to PA). The objection will not hold. There were indeed distinguishable Salaminians in Cassander's time (Polyaen. iv 11.1, Paus. i 35.2), and Leon certainly lived on Salamis (Plato, Apol. 32c). But Xenophon's phrases in ii 3.39 suggest a citizen and so does his order (i.e. all the characters of 39–40 will be citizens as opposed to the metics of 41), and Andokides i 94, without suggesting any but the normal citizen procedure, said Leon's children might have prosecuted Meletos but or the amnesty. Plato (Ep. vii 324e) says definitely ἐπί τινα τῶν πολιτῶν. We prefer to accept the identification and suppose that ὁ Σαλαμίνιος was one of those by-names common in Athens, drawn from his residence not from his status. See Kahrstedt, Staatsgebiet 357 n. 3, who compares the case of Moirokles (PA 10400 and Suid. Phot, sub Μυροκῆς).

11 Βίων is attested early (IG i2 643). Lysias provides the earliest examples of Βόων (Harp, ἀνάγειν, ἐπιτρέπιν) and probably Θέων (MS. reading at x 12). The earliest Νέων is Tod 117.4 of 386—5. There are several fourth-century examples of Χίων, and cf. the early comic poet Χιωνίδης (Arist. Poet. 1448a34). Θόας (IG ii2 1641.10), Θύων (IG ii2 1745.7), Αἴων (IG ii2 358.6, 1641.10), Ἄγων (IG ii2 6985) and Δίος (PA 4340) all appear befor the end of the fourth century. The dubious name Ὄρος(IG ii2 1009.78) hardly comes into consideration.