Alcibiades

Here's another of my essays.IMO,this is the crown in my jewel,so to say.It is also my longest work,so I will have to post it in 2 posts.I will also shortly put my next work,"Greeks of the 4th century BC-Characteristics,traits".If you liked this one,you will also enjoy that one.So,I sincerely hope that you WILL enjoy this one.Let me know what you think.

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Prelude

Century that was to bring to Greeks the darkest night after the brightest morning all in one was also the period when the sheer extent of Hellenic world was at it’s greatest (territorially speaking) previous to Alexander. Almost all colonies are still alive (only from the 430s those from Lower Italy are starting to suffer from the waves of Lucanians and Brutians). On the other side, Ionia has been regained from the clutches of the Persian Empire.

But THE main thing is, however, that thanks to Marathon, Salamis, Platae and Mycale, the feeling of one nation (if still not politically unified) was greatly strengthened in a victorious struggle with a world superpower #1 and with a great mercantile tribal Republic of the North Africa.

World monarchies are created when an early (and strongly) developed people, in either some particular major crises, or under a strong dynasty (with an emphasis on the founder) or through the help of some religion, transform into a militaristic state, which subdues all around itself (both more and less civilized nations). Then, the pride of the ruler and ruling class demands plundering all the world treasures and transporting it to a seat of government; pilling up hundreds of thousands of slaves to work on constructions as well as excluding the ruling class from tax paying. Since such a state was created by and through the premise of conquest, permanent peace is impossible; a wish to conquer and defeat strong primitive peoples is born, not so much for them to be exploited for manual work, as for them to be forced into military service (where they could be extremely useful). Another imperative becomes to defeat and subdue the coastal nations, in order to gain their navy (if the Empire in question is primarily a land power). During all this, organization and administration remains, for the most part, on a slightly primitive level (relatively speaking); it doesn’t much improve upon the original state-of-things (ie. how that state was organized when it started to expand, with slight variations, allowing for much wider territories). It must always remain in the state of alertness and always to be prepared for yet another conquest and expansion (often necessary due to internal conflicts).

Particular dangers, with which Greeks were faced when confronting such a world monarchy (of which Achaemenid Persia was almost a text-book example) were multiple and of varying type. First, parts of the nation have already been conquered and they have to give contingents of troops to fight their own fellow Greeks. Next, political exiles live on high standards at the Persian court and are giving all the information monarch needs (Demaratus, Hippias etc.). Finally, desperate Greek states are turning to Persia for help, for various reasons. Just like one of the greatest naval powers in the Greek world at the time, Aegina, is immediately submitting to Darius I in order to help him bring about the destruction of Athens, their rivals. For similar reasons, Argos and Thebes are also willing to submit (or at least not actively resist).

And while calls for help and intervention comes to Persia from all sides, in Ionia, after the successful putting down of the Revolt in 494 BC, Persians, through Mardonius, make one of the smartest moves in their 200 year-long existence. Preparing for an invasion of Greece in 492, he abolishes tyrannies (which they themselves established) and establishes democracies with the obligation for official submission and regular payment to Persia, having come to conclusion that disadvantages of having tyrants in Ionia far outweigh the positives (through the afore-mentioned Ionian Revolt). It was one of the rare times that Persians actually learned from their mistakes.

Without going into details about Greeco-Persian War, we could ask ourselves what would have happened had Xerxes won, destroyer of Bel-Marduk Temple, and slaughterer of it’s priests? Despite Mardonius’ wishes to be satrap of Greece, Xerxes would have surely cleared that country of most of it’s mainland population, and transfer it to the interior of his empire; like his father did with Eretrians, in order to ensure that he won’t have perpetual wars and uprisings in that part of his domain.

Another thing to consider is their religion. The belief that the Great King was the representative of Ahura-Mazda meant that the King was always right, was always entitled to do anything, and that all the peoples of the earth were his natural subjects (whether they were aware of it or not). That their religion was also monotheistic only made that “backing” more potent. It was one of the best-adapted religions in the history of the world for state purposes, and for backing the ruling elite. Who knows, if Greece had been conquered, to what manic heights this belief would have been furthered?

Since that danger was extremely successfully removed, what came next was a natural development of events: freeing the conquered parts of Mainland Europe (Macedonia, Paeonia, Thrace)as well as the Greek cities of Asia Minor (arguable the cradle of Hellenic culture). But, perhaps even the more important thing was that that liberation was the joint-project of Greeks (first under the leadership of Sparta, and then, after troubles with the arrogant Pausanias, under that of Athens), which much contributed to that pan-Hellenic pothos (at least for a while).This new position of the Greece and Sicily in relation to the rest of the world was a revolutionary thing, which much influenced the subsequent history of the world.

But, then as ever, actions of men teaches us a very bitter lesson: after every great victory comes the unavoidable troubles and decay. One should only remember how Argos treated Mycenae “in order to be able to defend itself against Sparta” or how Athens treated Aegina , and also how, first the tyrants and then the people, craving for hegemony, treated the populace of Sicilian cities generally, and Syracuse particularly (which was the scene of some of the most dreadful social experiments in recorded history, and which provided some of the saddest pictures of human nature, in late 5th/early 4th centuries BC). And worst of all: the numerous atrocities and destructions of old towns and cities in Peloponnesian War. That war is the culmination, presents the clearest picture and is the “natural” consequence of that process by which Greece, being filled with ambition, confidence and desire for rule (both internal and external), but without the ability to unite or to agree to who should lead, started to tear itself apart.

And to come full circle, that ultimate reward for defeating Persians earlier in the century, liberation of the Asiatic Greeks, was also the ultimate price to pay for being unable to be at peace internally and to co-operate, by giving those very same Greeks back to the Persia by Peace of Antalcidas, by means of which Sparta was ensured (short) hegemony in Greece. Descendants of Leonidas had sold their fellow Greeks to the descendants of Xerxes in order to be able to be tyrants of Greece. How poetic!

Beliefs of Athenians about themselves

If we want to get the true picture of life in Athens, we need to be first aware of the extraordinary bragging that permeates all our documents throughout her history. Let’s see what Athenians (and some others) had thought (falsely) about themselves.

Before everything else, we should like to know from where did myth about special piousness of Athenians came from. Read this excerpt (paraphrase): “Nowhere in the world have I seen such piousness like here, and mild way of speaking and avoidance of lies”, says Oedipus to Theseus in Sophocles’s play. To be able to hear these words amidst the events of the Peloponnesian War, amidst all the sycophants and bought witnesses for all kinds of trumped-up prosecutions, and to not blush!!

Furthermore, there was a widespread belief of the special kind of Athenian nobleness and honour, as well as warm generosity toward guests, especially refuges. And finally, there was a tradition of many inventions made by Athenians, which, when we now read, sound utterly ridiculous. According to it, Athenians were the first to use corn and water from well for irrigation, and not only olive and fig were for the first time planted there, but courts, laws and agon (as well as athletic exercise) are also their original contribution to mankind. In later times , the entire Hellenic world celebrated them as the first to learn people sophisticated way of life, first to implement laws that put an end to ungovernable and uncontrollable way of life, first to save and give shelter to refuges.

How widespread was the opinion of supposed Athenian hospitality is best confirmed by Greek mythology. Heraclids came to ask for help against Euristeus. After the defeat of the Seven against Thebes, it is Theseus who forces Thebans, as arbitrator, to give back the corpses of the Seven. It is here that Oedipus finds his peace, and even Heracles, in Euripides, after the deaths of his children, is accepted and given shelter by Theseus. Orestes is freed by Athenian Areopagus, and even Mesenians, before their First war with Sparta, wanted to be tried by that tribunal.

But, at the same time, Athens DOES take lead in Greece in education, art and social customs in this century, whereas before it, Hellenic spirit and it’s creative genius is equally divided between several regions (but with the main accent on Ionia). There are several factors for that (among other, it’s geographical position right in the smack of Hellenic world) but, by far, THE most important one is the sheer individual capability of all it’s citizens. It was like the nature had been collecting creative strengths and individual abilities for centuries and then suddenly dumped it into this small stripe of land. In the world history, the only parallel with the 5th century Athens could be drawn with Renaissance Florence, where a city becomes and achieves, everything which a state CAN possibly become and achieve. As far as culture goes, Greece (free part of it, that is) rightfully sees in this city it’s most distinguished part and it’s spiritual representative.

Speeches in Thucydides and their insight

If we wish to get to know Athenians of the 5th century, we should also look at speeches they have left us, particularly funeral orations. Event though often not true as far as details go, it still gives a nice and clear picture of their attitudes, values and what they thought of themselves (and others).

Idealized picture of Athens at the dawn of Peloponnesian War is given in the pages of Thycudides, in the words of Pericles. The speech in question is held in the winter of the first year of the War. It is obviously given to a critically-minded people, to whom you could (still) not give just any cheap enthusiasm. Most prominently, Pericles gives up on any mythology and legend, and restrict himself to the present generation and it’s living attributes of constant activity. He does it with a great deal of enthusiasm and force, to which it is extremely hard to resist to this day, but which evaporates very quickly once we examine it closer. He glorifies the Athenian Constitution, which gives equality and supports promotion on the sole basis of excellence and merit (while he spoke those words, Cleon was standing beside him, and was unstoppable rising toward the top of Athenian politics, fast eclipsing even Pericles himself). He brags about their moderate and well-regulated private life, enervated by agon (the spirit of which was almost dead by that time, especially in comparison to 6th century); no Laconic cheapness of life; no need for constant and never ending trainings but nevertheless constantly ready for war and brave in it as much as those who dedicate their whole lives to it (and conversely, in that very same “well-regulated private life” he was suffering greatly and was beset by all kinds of cases; Aspasia was being put to trial for “public immorality” and released only through Pericles’ tears; his mentor Anaxagoras barely escaped with his life and went to exile ,where he died a miserable death away from his friends in Athens; his best friend Phidias was condemned to prison for “putting his and Pericles’ “faces on the painting” and died there, even more miserable death – along with Michelangelo, the greatest sculptor in the history of mankind!). He admires how they are able to paid tribute to and glorify beauty without spending too much of their money (why should they, when they could simple tax 100 subject cities). He also praises how those who are into trade also have time for public duties and politics (again, we think of Cleon, who was a leather-seller). And he goes along these lines: “We will be an object of admiration for all posterity, we need no Homer; all the seas and lands of the world bear witness to our courage; we have raised the monuments of the good and evil we are capable of achieving...” etc. etc. and then the finishing: “and for this kind of city these men gave their lives”.

As I already said, it’s hard to resist this kind of enthusiasm (which was so soon punished with extreme calamities). But, truly, we DO get to know the real Athenians in it. For, man is not only that which he is, but that which he aspires to be, and even if he doesn’t live up to the ideal, the very desire marks at least a part of his nature.

Second speech of Pericles in Thycudides is also very interesting. In it, in the time when Attica was under occupation by Spartan troops and the estates of land-holding eupatrids burned to the ground, of the impossibility of going back, and the imperatives of honorable glory. To give up the Empire, which was greatest in extent in the Greek history up until then, is no longer a viable option. It is true, that Empire has already become highly oppressive and despotic to it’s subjects, and perhaps they made a mistake in forging it. But it is now too late for doubt and regret. They must carry on “all sail”, or else perish. ”The right belongs only to he who chooses to be envied for his great deeds and causes. Long live the Empire!”(obviously a paraphrase). It is highly characteristic and interesting that one could openly say all these things to Athenians.

A special picture of Athenians is drawn by Thycudides in the debate about the fate of Mitylene, where Cleon insists for them to be most severely punished. No matter how much of a buffoon and cruel he was, he is here shown very clear-headed (and very brave). He addresses his countrymen in his usual fashion, having the guts to say to their faces their worst flaws. He calls them “slaves of the extraordinary” and “despisers of ordinary”, where everyone wants to become orator, swift in attacking whatever was proposed in the Assembly, but slow in foreseeing consequences of actions. And, when he finally tells them that, if they are so squeamish and want forgiveness, they should give up the Empire, and go back to being modest and honest people. If not, then “Shut the hell up, and have the guts to properly punish rebels” (yep, another paraphrase, but this one is in the spirit of Cleon).

And finally, in the pages of Thycudides, we can find a description through the mouth of an enemy, Corinthian emissary (my personal favorite speech in the Thycudides, along with Sicilian Debate). He tells his Spartan listeners how Athenians are obsessed with novelty; quick in thinking and acting; madly bold (as opposed to Spartan’ bravery); unused to any kind of hesitation and doubt; lovers of foreign expeditions; they give their all for further gain and advantage: non-carried plans they consider a bitter failure; every gain they do get seems to them infinitely smaller to that which they could still potentially gain; are never satisfied with any achievement and mission accomplished, but instead immediately turn their thoughts and gaze to further directions; despise what they already posses and only value that which they do not yet have etc.

From all these speeches we get a clear picture of a passionate, restless collective will that drives these people ever onward. It’s true stimulant is the perpetual dissatisfaction if something hasn’t been done or hasn’t been carried successfully to completion. Since it’s the passion that drives them, by definition, these people are not quite able to control their urges and decisions, but they still manage to do extraordinary things. For instance, it looks nothing short of amazing, that Persian is being chased from all the parts of the Eastern Mediterranean (except the Levant), that Egypt is tried to be won over from Persians, that in one single year (458 BC), we have a list of Athenian dead, fallen in Cyprus, Egypt, Phoenicia, Aegina and Megara. But we should not forget the cost that Greece had to pay for that Athenian “Hegemony”.

Position and duties of rich men

A few words should be said about how much Athens had costed it’s richer citizens. The fullest picture is given by Antiphonus, in one of his works, where he gives a definition of an examplary Athenian. It is one who gives often and high taxes for property; was often a tetrarch (which is costly); has often gave monetary help to his friends whenever they ask for it; paid for numerous public works and festivals; often gave presents to temples and made sacrifice for the gods. We can ask ourselves, after all that, what would remain to that man?

And to all these material expenses, we can add the never-ending, constant threat of a public-suit, on numerous possible charges. If you were a prominent politician, the dangers from that particular quarter would increase tenfold, with the possibility of hired sycophants and bought witnesses being brought against you by a political rival.

In Plutarch, it is educative and enlightening to read how an extremely rich man like Nicias had felt, all his life, like he was under siege. Not even extreme moderation was sufficient to keep him out of reach of general obtrusiveness. On the contrary, everybody who wanted something from him would come to him, and they would almost always get it, not less those from he feared would bring a charge against him if he doesn’t do it (probable an accusation that he is behaving like a tyrant-wannabe) than those who really needed (and deserved) material help. That is why comic writers (Aristophanes, among others) mocked Cleon, that he was afraid of sycophants all his life (understandable enough).

When we see all this, we may not wonder that Cleon preferred to die in Sicily (along with the rest of the Fleet), than to return defeated to Athens, to be devoured (literally) by demagogues (he had a chance to get away, relatively safely, before it was too late). We should not forget that, during the closing stages of the Peloponnesian War, many artists went to the (otherwise so infamous) Archelaus I of Macedon, both non-Athenians (Zeuxis) and Athenians (Euripides and Agathon). For this last mentioned, it was said that, he, along with many others, remained permanently in Macedonia and felt very comfortable there. It makes one think.

Versatility of Athenians

We are not alone in viewing Athens of the 5th century through rose-tinted glasses (slavery and position of women notwithstanding). Athenians of the 4th century were already doing it, celebrating their (admittedly, much better) ancestors, whenever they would keenly feel all the misery of their current position. Here is what Demosthenes says in Third Olynthic: “Those who were not constantly flattered by their orators, like you are now, ruled Hellas for 45 years, who in their turn willingly accepted it (HA!). They brought more than 10.000 talents of gold to Acropolis. They made King of Macedon their subject, befitting a barbarian. Raised such a grand monuments of victory by their personal efforts and exertions; only among mortal men managed to reach such a height of glory, as unreachable by envy of men...In the name of state, they constructed so beautiful, grand and sacred buildings, and dedicated spoils and gifts such as could not be matched by any in posterity. As a private men, they were so modest and so devoted to the spirit of democracy, that even men such as Miltiades and Aristides, as you can still verify, did not lived in more splendid houses than any of their neighbours. For they did not used the state to enrich themselves, like it is done now, but were only concerned to enrich that which was public.” I suppose it is common to all mankind, that if one lives in less fortunate and brilliant times, to look upon past of his state with blind admiration.

However, Athenians of the 5th century, WERE, by far, the most important and central people in Greece. For them, it is said that they gave both truly good and truly bad people, just like the soil of Attica produced both the sweetest honey and the most bitter poison. Further, the entire Eastern Mediterranean world looked to Athens, so that we have these words in Aristotle: “All the other Hellenes are standing around Athens, and not only listen, but also look at everything she does and decides”.

Also, Athenian is the most versatile among Greeks, so that it could truly be said that he is a representative, in more ways than one, of the entire Hellenic race. Only Athenian paid attention to what everyone else were doing, and in what everyone else were good at, and so he would soak it all in. Therefore, we have a case, where Alcibiades (most complete representative of Athens of this century) is better than every other people in what they themselves are particularly good at. He parties harder in Ionia than Ionians; he practices and is doing gymnastic exercises in Thebes more frequently then themselves; he tames and rides horses in Thessaly better than the members of the ruling house of Aleudae; is more simplistic in way of life and shows more strength and endurance than Spartans; and in Thrace can drink more unmixed wine than Thracians (very, very, VERY few could do that).

Politics and aristocrats

Politically speaking, years following the great victory at Marathon in 490 saw a beginning of an important polarization. In 480s, one of the most curious legacies of Cleisthenes, ostracism, begun to be used against prominent nobles. Candidates were accused of “Medism” (favoring Persia), which, in the light of the recent events, became a most unambiguous crime. Further, in years 487-486, two other important political/social changes were introduced. One was that the access to the yearly magistracy, or archonship, was widened, and the other was that comic dramas became part of the public festivals (up till then, only tragedies were played). Very soon, they began to make fun at personal and political targets, which was to play such a prominent part in the latter stages of the Peloponnesian War and the closure of this century, under the great comic poet Aristophanes and his ilk.

Behind this, there were real contrasts of political outlook and political choices which members of the Athenian upper class made and confronted. On one side, there were those who, “simply happened to live under a democracy”, so to say. High-born men who basically had same values as their 6th century (aristocratic) ancestors: they appreciated athletic prowess and military skill, prized the all-Greek Olympic Games, and who saw monuments as sources for personal glory, while still thinking they could determine the course of events by their own prestige. In Athens in the 470s, the most prominent representative of this type was Cimon, son of the famous Miltiades, victor at Marathon. Cimon’s world was the old world of an all-Greek glory, and the all-Greek values of agon and competitive spirit of high-born men.

On the other side were those among aristocratic men who had seen how the popular tide was sure to run the course of events in this new democratic age. “Secure” (relatively speaking) political influence could not be obtained through an arrangement with a few political like-minders or through intermarriages among nobility, any more. It must be earned through and accountable to a public audience of equals. Themistocles, that political genius and victor of Salamis, was quickest to see how the future would develop (he was always the most far-seeing of politicians). Seeing from where new Athens’s strength lied and from where danger lurked, was the first to implement the policy “walls and ships”, that much hated policy by the city’s champions (rich and powerful), because (among other reasons) it relegated their prized land hoplite warfare to secondary importance, and made ships, manned by commoners, the city’s main arm of stability and prosperity. Through these changes, Themistocles, quite literally, set the foundations of Athenian Empire, and influenced the entire basic structure of Athens for the next 160 years (with even further implementations along the same line by Pericles).

After his (unjust) ostracism in 471 BC, mantle passed to others who were similarly willing to challenge the old-guard’s supremacy, and to reduce the importance of the old Areopagus council by putting a more open and accountable government into people’s hands. In 462, further democratic freedoms were approved in the Assembly. Magistrates were from now on to be vetted by the public council, instead of Areopagus (which was likely to be biased in favor of their own, aristocratic, class). Also, magistrates were no longer to have a primary power of judgement in Athenian lawsuits. From now on they had to pass them after a first hearing to one of the panels of public jurors whose members
were usually to number several hundreds, chosen yearly from 6,000 of the Athenian citizenry. It was an unprecedented victory for popular justice.

The victories over the Persians, then the years of expanding empire had helped to root Athenians' self-confidence and trust in their democracy. However, it was certainly not a level, egalitarian society. Culturally, it was still a place where the upper class enjoyed their hunting and cultivated their sexual advances with gifts to the ever-fickle young boys. In the evenings socially select groups of males still dined and drank luxuriously in their 'men's rooms' and sang the aristocratic anti-populist songs of the past. Taking the long view, aristocrats believed they needed only to wait until their political moment would come about again. Militarily, meanwhile, they were indispensable members of the cavalry which even the most committed of democrats were about to increase more than 5 times and honour with provisions for a public repayment on any registered horse which an upper-class warrior lost in battle.

Below the surface, young Athenians of noble birth, as late as early 430s, hoped that one day democracy would simply go away, but from the 470S to the 430S conquest abroad and the huge increase in the numbers and tribute of Athens' allies helped meanwhile to compensate for their discontent. The gains of Empire blurred class-tension for both the rich and the poor. Empire brought new land-holdings and revenues abroad for both classes of Athenian, and, as the rich knew well, it was on the poor and their hard days as oarsmen that this Empire's safety rested in the meantime.

Alcibiades

Major deficiencies of Athenian democracy

For us, the most distinctive fact about the Athenian culture is that it was a slave-society. Some 55.000 adult male citizens owned some 80,000-120,000 other human beings, 'objects', whom they could buy and sell at will. These slaves (almost all non-Greeks) were central to the Athenians' economy, working in the silver-mines and in agriculture. The prices of untrained slaves appear to have been low, because supply was abundant, from war or raids on barbarian Thrace or inland Asia Minor. Cheap slavery was a major asset to the class-distinctions and the purchasing-power for luxuries among the wealthier Athenians.

The absence of political participation for citizen women would also be striking. The Athenians were typical among Greeks (there were differences from city to city, of course) in ensuring that women could not vote; women could not even give evidence in a law court in their own person. Among the Athenians, their capacity to buy or sell was very limited; their choice in marriage was not entirely free and, essentially, they were in the power of their male 'guardian', or kyrios. These rules were supposedly for women's 'protection'. As for differences between women and slaves: unlike a slave, she could never escape her condition; she did, however, bring a returnable dowry with her, whereas slaves were bought for a non-returnable price. A woman's relative degree of 'freedom' depended greatly on her social class by birth or marriage. Humble women did work visibly in the fields, whereas those from upper class were even more restricted in their movements. They did not sit outdoors at leisure, drink in a shop or hang around in public spaces. In Attica, respectable households in any case kept their women indoors for the most part, to boring and never-ending tasks like weaving and spinning. 'Shopping' was left to slaves, although a free woman might go out to fetch water from a public spring (sometimes while wearing a veil).

Influence of democracy on arts

Two of the clearest influences of democracy were on oratory and on drama. Large meetings of the Assembly and the new courts with their big juries gave brand new opportunities for subtler type of oratory. Nothing like that is known to have existed in non-democratic states. After the Persian Wars (and as a consequence of it), there begun a practice of the so-called Funeral Orations (already mentioned), which was done by a chosen orator in praise of the fallen in war and their city. The bes-known example is the already discussed Pericles’s Funeral Oration as described in the pages of Thucydides (given in the winter of 431/430 BC). This is another custom unknown in non-democracies.

Set in the mythical royal past, tragedies explored issues of the family and community, sexual relations, religion and the nature of heroes. BUT they were NOT either confirming or questioning a “democratic ethos” in their spectators or instilling a lesson in civic duties. The tragedies that have survived in extent form could perfectly well have been composed and performed in, let’s say, an oligarchic state (after all, Attic tragedy flourished perfectly well when composed and performed for non-democratic audiences abroad).

But there WAS one true link of drama with democracy: political comedy. In it, prominent Athenian politicians and public figures were satirized and attacked. There was no way it could have arisen in a restricted oligarchy, much less in an autocratic monarchy.

Sexuality

Sexuality in 5th century Athens was thought of differently than in modern world, structured as a “vertical” rather than “horizontal” system. Sex was not thought of as reciprocal and egalitarian thing, but instead was to mirror the framework of hierarchical social relations. All intercourse in which at least one of the participants was adult citizen expected to conform to a dominance-submission dynamic. Adult citizen male would play an active role by penetrating the other person, who in turn, would assume a passive, feminized role, regardless of his/her gender. Public social standing was thus reaffirmed in private life, since a male would demonstrate his advantage over members of other groups by taking advantage of their bodies for his own pleasure. This has been commonly referred to as the “penetration model” in scholarly circles, and it has been disputed among some as too simplistic, but the majority has accepted it, arguing that it DOES clarify fundamental differences between ancient and modern world in this regard.

For the modern world, sexual preference is THE defining element of our sexuality. It forms an essential part of our personal identity, establishes a dichotomy of behaviors, and, for many people, determines the morality of any given act. In the penetration model, sexuality is based, not on sexual preference for one sex, but on notions of “active” and “passive”, which did not necessarily correspond to our genders; “active-passive” was not the equivalent of “male-female”. It was as much a social caste as a sexual marker, inseparable from the civic institutions in insisting that mass and elite householders were equal among themselves IN their superiority to others. Absolute bodily integrity characterized that equality: every male Athenian citizen, no matter how poor, was physically inviolable. To lay a hand on him without his consent was hybris, type of an assault that was punishable by death. However, this did not mean that he himself was free to do as he pleased. Oroikos, the head of a household, was legally responsible for the behavior of its other members (women, children and slaves); therefore, he was expected to display rational self-restraint in indulging his appetites, especially for sex.

Sexual passivity was not precisely gender-linked, but imputed to categories of persons, male and female, who were thought of as deficient. Citizen women, slaves, foreigners, freeborn male prostitutes, effeminate adult males, and (with qualifications) citizen youths were all “lesser” to some degree. Women were viewed as passive by nature, and there was no inherent shame in their sexual submission, but their presumed inability to restrain their sexual desires made male custody imperative. Slaves, being chattel, were at their owner’s disposal. Resident aliens, without the full rights of citizenship, had some legal protection but might still be harassed with impunity. Male prostitutes of citizen status were barred from performing civic functions, since, it was argued, they had voluntarily debased themselves for money. The kinaidos,or effeminateman who preferred the passive role in sex, was an object of bitter contempt, a moral “freak” who breached the essential rules of masculinity and whose lust, like that of a woman, was presumed insatiable.

Within this dominance-submission model, citizen youths occupied a curious place. On the very brink of manhood, nude figure of the adolescent, with toned muscles thanks to athletic exercises, was considered the incarnation of human beauty. Desire for a boy in his prime (commonly thought of as between fifteen and eighteen, though some allowance was acceptable on either end) was therefore considered as natural as desire for a woman. “Normal” men might be interested in both boys and women, or, alternatively, they might be partial to one or the other; but that was considered a matter of taste rather than involuntary bent. However, there was a special romantic and erotic charge attached to courtship of the beautiful youth. Though not yet possessed of full citizen status, he was considered a free moral agent, capable of making reasoned decisions about his conduct. Women’s sexual services could be bought or commanded, but his affections had to be won.

Because the citizen youth was inferior to adults only by virtue of his age and relative inexperience, and because in just a few years’ time he would take his father’s place as soldier, householder, and voting member of the assembly, the community took an interest in his welfare and worried over possible negative consequences of his erotic relationships. While no Athenian law expressly prohibited non-commercial consensual intercourse between two citizen males, several provisions guarded the chastity of boys—forbidding relatives to prostitute them, regulating access to schools, and perhaps punishing such intercourse when prosecuted by the junior partner’s family under the law of hybris. Greeks also feared that immoderate sexual submission in adolescence might produce a permanent craving for the passive role As a result, Athenian society imposed on erotic relations between adult men and youths a whole set of courtship practices intended to distinguish true affection from mere physical desire. Love of boys was valorized but also ritualized: “it had to be accompanied by conventions, rules of conduct, ways of going about it, by a whole game of delays and obstacles designed to put off the moment of closure, and to integrate it into a series of subsidiary activities and relations”.

Even more than beauty or athleticism, it was the boy’s character, his potential for moral development, that ideally aroused love in his admirer. The older man (erastes, “lover”) sought to win his beloved (the eromenos) through promises and entreaties, but the youth was expected to resist such advances until the erastes had proved his worth. Then, and only then, might the eromenos yield, in the expectation of bettering himself. Once they became lovers, the erastes assumed responsibility for training his protégé in skills of mind and body while serving as an exemplar of manly excellence. In a society where low life expectancy, late marriage for men (at approximately thirty), and frequent warfare meant that many adolescents would have already lost their fathers, such a mentoring relationship with an older male served pragmatic ends in guiding the transition from youth to adulthood. Institutionalized pederasty has in fact been characterized as a form of “displaced fathering” by Paul Cartledge.

In addition to its professed purpose of initiating young men into the behaviors and attitudes proper to elites, pederasty was a strategy for maintaining class privilege by establishing social ties across ages. Closeness that grew out of a pederastic association, for example, might be strengthen through a marriage pact whereby the former beloved married a kinswoman of his lover. When he examines the ethical aspects of friendship (philia), Aristotle is acutely aware of the difficulty of forging an altruistic bond out of a union motivated, to some degree, by sexual desire and self-interest. Still, he concedes that mutual affection can arise if the partners are like-tempered. Benevolent love between men, in turn, might encourage bravery on the battlefield and harmony in civic life. There was, then, a recognized possibility that the pederastic relationship, as it matured into true friendship, could serve the state as a whole, and not just class interests. For Greek society, that was ultimately its justification.

And now, it is fitting that we end this examination of 5th century Athenians with the war which, in a very real sense, represented the culmination of the 5th century Athens, and an end toward which all events were unavoidable lading toward, in hindsight.

Peloponnesian War and Thucydides

During the last three decades of the fifth century BC the Athenians and the Spartans, with their respective allies, were at war again with one another. This war, known as the 'Peloponnesian War', may seem clearevidence of the ancient Greeks' political failure. More than twenty years of fighting, with seven years' 'uneasy truce' in the middle, killed tens of thousands of Greeks (perhaps half of the Athenian male population),and cost large sums of money and manpower. The war was only resolved by help given by the Persian king to the Spartans which required, in return, the abandonment of all the Greek cities in Asia again to the Persian sphere. War, observers themselves said, increased human cruelty. There were spectacular acts of ferocity on either side, including the killing of prisoners by Spartan commanders and the massacre, after due warning, of the island population of Melos by the Athenians because the islanders had refused to join their Empire. It was promised initially to the Athenians' 'enslaved' allies by Spartan rhetoric, but it was grossly betrayed by the outcome. The eastern Greeks in Asia were handed over to the Persian king as tribute-paying subjects, while communities in the Aegean found themselves under the rule of hideous pro-Spartan juntas, the decarchies or the 'rule of ten', pro-Spartan men.

This war and all its ferocity were not driven by religion or nationalism: there were no crusades and there was no genocide (at least in a modern sense of the word). There were, however, real principles at stake, rather than killing for killing's sake. At first sight, the conflict appears to be one only of power. The war arose from the continuing expansion of the Athenians' power, especially as their attention turned ever-more to opportunities in Sicily and the Greek West. During the 430s these foreign ambitions increasingly alarmed Sparta's important ally Corinth, the mother-city of the dominant state in Sicily, Syracuse. Corinth also had important colonies on the coast of north-west Greece, which lay on the natural route for warships to the West. Against this background of anxiety, the Corinthians were in no mood to give Athenian ambitions the benefit of any doubt. Suspicions intensified during a diplomatic clash over the Corinthian colony Corcyra. Unless the Spartans would go to war against Athenian interventions, Corinthian envoys threatened to desert the Spartans' alliance, an act which would expose the Peloponnese to a much greater risk of potential invasion and the consequent breaking of the Spartans' hold on it.

The final breaking-point was Corinth's neighbour Megara, an ally of the Spartans. The Athenians issued a decree with commercial intent against her, known as Megarian Decree, banning Megarians from walking in to Athens' market-place or sailing into the harbours of her many allies. The aim, almost certainly, was to destabilize the Megarians' ruling oligarchy indirectly, without actually declaring war. If the Megarians could be turned into a democracy, they might become allies of the Athenians. The recent wars between 460 and 446 had shown what a vital strategic ally they could be, as they could block their mountain-passes against Spartan invaders and close the natural route for invasions of Attica. Around Sparta's vulnerable territories, her kings and elders worked to maintain a cordon of loyal oligarchies, in which a relatively few citizens ruled firmly over all others and denied them political rights. Athens, by contrast, was the great democracy, the seat of a culture which could be said tobe the 'education of Greece'. The thinking, the theatre, the arts, the varied lifestyle which we still admire were all Athenian or based in Athens. The Spartans did not trust it, fearing it would infiltrate and overthrow the protective cordon of allies on which their own way of life depended.

Ifonly the few oligarchs who ruled her northern Peloponnesian allies, especially Corinth, could have had the nerve to desert Sparta and join the Athenian allies, their fellow seafarers, Spartans would have found themselves in a highly un-enviable situation. Forty years later, democrats were indeed active among the Spartans' Isthmian allies, even in Corinth. Together with the Athenians, they could have mounted an unstoppable expedition to Sicily, south Italy and beyond. With the Greeks of Sicily as their allies, they could then have attacked the furthest point of Athenian ambitions, Carthage. Carthage's dependence on hired troops would probably have failed her; the Greek community in Carthage would have helped the Greek allies, and Carthage, the richest, most powerful alternative to the Greek way of life in the Mediterranean, would have submitted. Athenian values, democracy and prosperity would have blossomed all the way from north Africa to the Black Sea. Prominent Athenians would have found a new outlet abroad for their talents. I suspect that Alcibiades would have fitted extremely well as governor of Athenian Carthage, amidst all the gold, girls and luxury.

By contrast, the years of war became a dull, damaging stalemate. In 431 BC Greek opinion had expected a swift Athenian surrender, but the Athenians, on Pericles' advice, retreated behind their city's Long Walls which were far too strong for the Spartans' poor grasp of siege-warfare. Pericles had talked of “winning through”, but a man of his intelligence had surely more than a plan for survival in mind. The Athenians' fleet was some three hundred warships strong and was still brilliantly manned and trained. Itcontinued to dominate the sea, to assist imports of food into the city and to maintain security among the Athenians' allies. The Spartans' naval skills, by contrast, were minimal and they lacked the money to build and maintain first-class ships. They had helot-serfs, but no free lower-class citizens to serve as rowers. Their supreme strength lay in traditional hoplite warfare by land, conducted by their superb infantry who marched in step to music.

Pericles's strategy involved letting the Spartans do what little they could, while Athenians continued to put pressure on the crucial Megarians and Corinthians. If one or both would defect to the Athenian side, perhaps as a democracy, the Spartans would be blocked from Attica. Meanwhile, the Spartans' successes in subverting Athenian allies remained limited, not least because the Spartans' own system and the harshness of most of the Spartan commanders were such a grim alternative. The Spartans' main impact lay in their yearly invasion of Attica when they cut down the local trees and burned the land. Nobody could beat them in a pitched battle, but the Athenians denied them one, merely harassing their raiders and foragers with their recently enlarged cavalry. Sparta's allies could not stay long in Attica: they lacked a workforce of helots at home, and so they needed to return to gather in their own harvest with their own hands.

His reasoning was, in my view, for the most par sound, but it was ruined by chance. The Athenians became infected by an unforeseen plague (probably, typhus) and Pericles was one of the many victims. Aiming for pre-eminence, his followers proposed an increasingly active strategy, including an un-Periclean first venture to Sicily, a source of grain for Corinth and Spartan allies. Even so, Athenian failures did not undermine the basic model of Periclean planning: the Spartans could not win, and so they agreed a truce in 421 BC which left them with no real gain and no popularity among their allies.

In 415 BC, six years after an initial peace, the Athenians accepted a request from some of the Sicilian Greeks and other allies on the island and dispatched a huge armada, hoping to dominate the West. The venture came close to success, but was foiled above all by the skill and horsepower of their main Sicilian enemy, Syracuse. The Athenians had failed to send horses in boats or sufficient cavalry to oppose such a horse-rich enemy. A year later the expedition ended in a total disaster for the Athenians and their navy. Even so, the Spartans were very slow to profit from this unexpected gift. In September 411, they had their best chance of victory when an Athenian fleet was defeated off nearby Euboea and the Athenians in the city were deeply split by an anti-democratic coup. Yet the Spartans went away without pressing their advantage. And later, after the 411 Coup, and Alcibiades’s return, Athenians were firmly back in the war (for the moment).

Among the Spartans, the war's final years, from 411 to 404, were distinguished by continuing naval incompetence and the careers of some of the harshest thugs in Greek history, the dour Clearchus and the ruthless Lysander. Among the Athenians, despite the Sicilian fiasco and the brutal coup of 411, they were years, amazingly, of extreme cultural vigour. The tense early months of 4II saw two of Aristophanes' comic masterpieces, the Lysistrataand the Women at the Thesmophoria, both playing hilariously with gender-roles (and the latter with Euripides the tragedian).The latter poet withdrew to Macedon and composed his finest play, the Bacchaewith its tale of resistance, then submission to the god Dionysus' power. Sculptors back in the city carved a classical masterpiece too, the victory-figures and the procession of cattle for sacrifice on the parapet of the recently completed temple to Athena, goddess of victory. The citizens remained polarized, between oligarchic sympathizers and determined democrats but the tensions did not disintegrate their master-artists' skills.

The Spartans' eventual victory in 404 BC owed much to the Persians' funding for their fleet and to the harsh and aggressive tactics of their newly emergent leader, Lysander. Itwas also assisted by the extreme behaviour of the Athenians, who had exiled and executed most of their best generals in politically motivated proceedings (including Alcibiades, for the second time). In 404 the Athenians' 'second squad' of commanders lost a naval battle up at the Hellespont and exposed the sea-route on which the city's grain imports relied. The Athenians had to surrender their fleet, pull down their Long Walls and accept a narrow oligarchy, backed by Spartan support. Their neighbours in Thebes and Corinth are said to have pressed for the complete destruction of the city.

And now for the closure, a few words about the author of a work through which we know this war so well (and who is probably the greatest historian in Antiquity). The ancients themselves acknowledged Thucydides as the pinnacle of history-writing, harsh and difficult though his style seemed. Some thirty years younger than Herodotus, he belonged to a generation which had seen no technological revolution, no sudden change in its geography or material life. Yet his way of presenting his contemporaries belonged, intellectually, to a completely different mental universe. Like Herodotus and so many Greek historians, he wrote in exile from his home city, but not before he had listened, argued and learned from debates in Greece's most powerful city-state and had himself served briefly as one of its generals. He was formed and steeled at the centre of power in Athens, in a climate where political theory was being taught for the first time, where generalizations about human psychology were the talk of his class and where power, and its exercise, were questions of passionate concern. Athens was his New York. In his Histories, Thucydides claimed to have kept 'as close as possible to the general gist of what was actually said' when he gave the speeches of selected contemporaries. Frequently mistranslated here, Thucydides is not pretending at word-for-word accuracy, but he is claiming, nonetheless, to have kept as close to the reality as he possibly could. The implication is that, often, he has kept very close indeed. The style of these speeches at times may be Thucydides' own, but his gallery of speakers allows us to hear the voices of a new articulate realism, the style of the generation which was his own singular context. Through them, and his underlying insight, the Peloponnesian War remains the most instructive war in human history.

Thessalonian

It will take a long time to read that, but I will read it because I know it's worth it.
Comments will be posted afterwards. Thanks Alci.

Alcibiades

Take your time.However,I do expect some quality feedback from you when you do,Thess.
Alcibiades

Linschoten

I have read through this while having my tea, with great enjoyment too; real meat on this essay! A good idea to have that section on the speeches in Thucydides, the ambivalence of the Athenian state comes over so clearly in them, the enterprise and creativeness (we still picture Classical Greece primarily through the culture and creations of Athens at that period), but also the sheer ruthlessness of Athens as an inperial power. The section on sexual attitudes is excellent, although this remains an elusive area and our patterns of interpretation are perhaps a bit too schematic; the fact is, that as nowadays, peoples attitudes seem to have been full of contradictions, and attitudes toward pederasty, for instance, seem to have varied greatly in different strata of society; as often in later ages, what was acceptable among worldly aristocrats was not necessarily acceptable among the respectable middle classes!

Thessalonian

It is almost perfect.... The only imperfection is the reference to pederasty, not because it did not exist, but because it is too much overplayed around here at Historum.

Alcibiades

Just a remark.In these 2 cases:

Quote:

That is why comic writers (Aristophanes, among others) mocked Cleon, that he was afraid of sycophants all his life (understandable enough).

Quote:

When we see all this, we may not wonder that Cleon preferred to die in Sicily (along with the rest of the Fleet),

It should read Nicias instead of Cleon.My mistake.
Alcibiades

Alcibiades

Thanks for commenting,Linsch.And thanks for the praise.Yes,I was intrested what people will think about speeches in Thucydides and my intepretation of them.

As for sexuality,I suspect you are right when you say our views are too schematic.Real world is always more complex than we think.But,for the sake of essay,I presented the most accepted version among scholars.

What do you think about my points of versatility of Athenians,and about that paragraph at the beggining how "world empires" are created?
Alcibiades

Labienus

Good essay Janko, I enjoyed it a lot.

The Athenian democracy was a unique instance in history and it certainly contributed very significantly to our civilization. As you mentioned, the Athenian democracy brought both the best and the worst out of the Athenians. The freedom of expression and liberties was greatly beneficial to some fields (arts, philosophy, theater, science, etc.), which made her extremely prosperous but the radical nature of this democracy made the government take very rash and harsh decisions(the execution of Socrates, the trial of Alcibiades, the ostracization of Themistocles and Cimon, etc.)

arras

Sorry to let you wait but your essays requires time and proper reading

For shortage of time, I will react to parts of your essay as I follow them. Take them as my (critical but friendly) notes (I will not respond to parts with which I agree):

I object. First that Greeks felt as one nation. At last not in its modern sense. They felt more like related people. Sort of equivalent of modern Slavic unity. They felt like Greeks but always have put their citystate (or tribe) before their Greeknes. Practically without exception. That shows where their real and most strongest affinity was. I as a member of a nation would rarely put interests of my hometown before that of my country. Especially not in critical issues like war.

Second Greek feeling of unity was not based on victories over Persians. It was more based on common ancestry, language and cultural heritage. In other words, they saw their unity in mythology. Case of Macedonian ruling dynasty I think demonstrate the case: when Macedonian kings wanted to prove they are Greeks (Helenes) they did not join Athenes or Sparta in battles against Persians or other foes. No, in fact they joined Persians. To prove they are Greeks they claimed ancestry from legendary figures of Greek mythology.

That is hardly surprising. In ancient world, ancestry was the most defining aspect of your place in the society and world.