Why seize the acropolis?

Historia - Zeitschrift fur Alte Geschichte

Volumn 57, Issue 2, 2008, Pages 125-133

  Rosivach, Vincent J ^a  

^a FAIRFIELD UNIVERSITY   (United States)

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EID: 61049085936     PISSN: 00182311     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
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References (60)

1. There are several differences in the accounts of Kylon in our various sources, but fortunately they are unimportant for our present purpose. For a discussion of the more significant differences see conveniently P. J. Rhodes, A Commentary on the Aristotelian Athenaion Politeia (Oxford 1981) 79-84
2. for speculation on the source of these differences see M. Lang, "Kylonian Conspiracy," CP 62 (1967) 243-249
3. For the sense of the verb see LSJ s.v. The scholiast to Aristoph. Vesp. 1317 glosses it
4. Although he does not specifically say that the acropolis was the initial target of their coup
5. AthPol. 20.3 says less accurately that when Kleomenes, Isagoras et al. met with resistance they "fled" to the acropolis
6. While I am generally sympathetic with the approach that sees the archaic tyrant as an eminently successful player in the game of intra-elite politics, able to marshal social capital to obtain the complete acquiescence of his rivals to his leadership, the fact remains that, at least in Athens, Kylon and Peisistratos also did something their rivals could or would not do when they occupied the acropolis, something the doing of which specifically marked them as tyrants. For examples of this approach see G. Anderson, "Before Turannoi Were Tyrants: Rethinking a Chapter of Early Greek History," CA 24 (2005) 173-222
7. H. Sancisi-Weerdenburg, Peisistratos and the Tyranny: A Reappraisal of the Evidence (Amsterdam 2000) 1-15
8. 2 3.3.370. Sancisi-Weerdenburg, Peisistratos (as in n. 7) 9, is similarly correct in rejecting the notion that a would-be tyrant could use his control over the goddess' sacred objects to force the Athenians to do as he wished
9. So e.g. B. M. Lavelle, Fame, Money, and Power: The Rise of Peisistratos and "Democratic " Tyranny at Athens (Ann Arbor 2005) 94
10. Forcible occupation: Peisistratos used his club-bearers to seize the acropolis when he first took power (Hdt. 1.59.6; AthPol. 14.1)
11. that Kylon and his supporters, and later Kleomenes and his men, were besieged on the acropolis (Thuc. 1.126.7
12. Hdt. 5.72.2) also implies that their occupation was by force
13. W. R. Connor, "Tribes, Festivals and Processions; Civic Ceremonial and Political Manipulation in Archaic Greece," JHS 107 (1987) 42-47
14. So e.g. J. Kiegeland, "Wie wohnten die Tyrannen?" in W. Hoepfner and G. Zimmer (eds.) Die griechische Polis: Architektur und Politik (Tübingen 1993) 54
15. J. M. Hurwit, The Athenian Acropolis: History, Mythology, and Archaeology from the Neolithic Era to the Present (Cambridge 1999) 98
16. The AthPol. was also aware of other archaic officials (kōlakretai, 7.3; naukraroi and phulobasileis, 8.4) but it does not include them in this arkhaia politeia, presumably because they were much less important than the nine officials whom it does mention
17. Although it does imply a military role for the polemarkhos when it says the office was created because "some of the kings were soft in respect to the things of war" (AthPol. 3.2)
18. This prominence of the magistrates' judicial role is fully consistent with the view of archaic Athenian government as primarily a mechanism for peacefully resolving conflicts within the elite
19. AthPol. 3.4. The exact meaning of the passage is unclear. Some (e.g. J. E. Sandys, Aristotle's Constitution of Athens [London 1893] 8) would see these as judgments having the force of law - in effect, legal precedents - but it is doubtful that can have this meaning; perhaps more importantly, Athenian trial law did not work by precedent. On the other hand, if refers to legislation it is unclear what the thesmothetai would have recorded before Drakon, who was said to have given Athens her first code of laws. On the problem see Rhodes, Commentary (as in n. 1) 102-103, who suggests the notion that the thesmothetai recorded is simply a later extrapolation from their name meant to explain an office whose original function was unknown
20. Rhodes, Commentary (as in n. 1) 107-108, who sees similarities with the Senate of Republican Rome. Note also that the AthPol. does not define the membership of this early Council
21. Note, however, that while most recent discussion has centered on the Areopagos' judicial competence, its role as a consultative body, not its judicial competence, is the primary focus of this paper. As for that judicial competence, it is likely that, beyond homicide, the archaic Areopagos also had jurisdiction though probably not in Kylon's day; cf. E. Ruschenbusch, "Zum Recht Drakons und seiner Bedeutung für das Werden des athenischen Staates," Historia 9 (1960) 132-134, commenting on Solon's amnesty law cited at Plut. Sol. 19.3
22. For the Areopagos' early competence in murder trials see R. Wallace, The Areopagos Council, to 307 B.C. (Baltimore 1989) 7-11, who provides an effective response to Ruschenbusch and others who would deny such competence to the early Areopagos
23. The text adds that the magistrates all "came together" in the thesmotheteion "in the time of Solon" but it is hard to see any connection between this move and any of Solon's reforms, and the mention of the lawgiver may well mean only (as is often the case with references to Solon) that the move occurred at some unspecified point in the distant past. The statement is also a bit problematic since we know that in Classical Athens the basileus carried out at least some of his functions in the fifth-century stoa basileios (cf. Plat. Euthphr. 2a)
24. The Greek says that the magistrates "had" these places
25. AthPol. 3.5 says that a certain Epilykos the epikykeion, but the verb, despite its etymology, can also describe the construction of e.g. city walls (Xen. HG 4.14.9) and need not refer to an actual building
26. See, however, above, n. 15
27. On prytaneia in general see S. G. Miller, The Prytaneion: Its Function and Architectural Form (Berkeley-Los Angeles 1978)
28. G. C. R. Schmalz, "The Athenian Prytaneion Discovered?", Hesperia 75 (2006) 33-81. Note that the argument of this paper does not depend on identifying the location of the classical prytaneion
29. This view goes back through W. Judeich, Topographie von Athen (München 1905) 63
30. (second edition [München 1931] 59) to E. Curtius, Attische Studien (Göttingen 1862-1865) II 54-68
31. and cf. Id., Die Stadtgeschichte von Athen (Berlin 1891) 93
32. both Curtius and Judeich assume that the new prytaneion replaced an earlier one which stood on the acropolis under the kings. For more recent statements of this view see e.g. R. J. Hopper, The Acropolis (London 1971) 77-78
33. R. Parker, Athenian Religion: A History (Oxford 1996) 26-27
34. Miller, Prytaneion (as in n. 23) 52-53, believes that the prytaneion was a product of synoikismos (and hence without a predecessor on the acropolis), but nonetheless sees a contrast between this new, communal prytaneion and the earlier, "royal" hearths of the local nobles whom synoikismos brought to Athens
35. Schmalz, "Prytaneion" (as in n. 26) 57. Note, however, that most of the site still lies under modern structures, and only a small part has actually been excavated. Schmalz infers from the pottery shards, which are of black-figure drinking cups, that "[t]his deposit is likely to represent the debris of repeated, large-scale dining activity dating to the Peisistratid period" but cf. The pottery fragments, including parts of cups, found in the construction fill beneath the "old bouleuterion," where there is no reason to associate the site particularly with dining. The shards from the apparent prytaneion site are described in detail in the original excavation report in ArchDelt 17.B.1 (1961-1962 [1963] 37)
36. the fragments from the "old bouleutērion" fill are listed by T. L. Shear, Jr., "The Persian Destruction of Athens: Evidence from Agora Deposits," Hesperia 62 (1993) 472-477
37. Plut. Thes. 24.3, elaborating on Thucydides, says that Theseus made the one bouleutērion and prytaneion "there where the city is now located" suggesting that Plutarch believed that the prytaneion of his own day was the same as Theseus', but as Miller comments on this passage, "even if the beliefs of Plutarch were established, the validity of his opinions could not be proved" (Miller, Prytaneion [as in n. 23] 43
38. Plutarch himself acknowledges the unreliability of traditions about Romulus and Theseus, Thes. 1.1-3). Ael. Arist. 103.16 mentions the "unmovable hearth of the prytaneion" but he is talking about prytaneia in general; the scholiast ad loc. applies the words to Athens, but only in the sense that the Athenians were autokhthones and not migrants, not that their prytaneion had been in the same place forever
39. L. B. Holland, "The Hall of the Athenian Kings," AJA 43 (1939) 289-298
40. Holland, "Hall" (as in n. 30) 292-293
41. This advisory body sitting in the prytaneion is to be distinguished from the court of the prytaneion, which had a different membership (the four phulobasileis under the presidency of the arkhōn basileus as successor to the king) but met at or near the same place to judge cases of homicide when the killer was unknown, an animal or an inanimate object (AthPol. 57.4, cf. Dem. 23.76)
42. Wallace, Areopagus Council (as in n. 18) 33-39 would distinguish the king's council and its successor meeting in the prytaneion from the Areopagites, whom he sees as a separate body with a strictly judicial role until it was given further powers by Solon. The Areopagos, however, is the only early council named in our sources, and rather than multiplying entities it seems easier to assume that what was later known at the Areopagos Council and the prytaneion council were the one and the same. There is in fact a certain logic in the community's notables (i.e. The prytaneion council) sitting in judgment (as Areopagites) on crimes like (politically motivated) murder, which troubled political stability within the elite. Loss of powers by the council, as suggested above, is also more likely to account for the nostalgia for a once preeminent Areopagos that we find in our fourth-century sources
43. who properly notes that Harrison herself placed the boukoleion on the north slope of the acropolis, where she believed the prytaneion was located. Harrison proposed her theory in M. de G. Verrall and J. E. Harrison, Mythology and Monuments of Classical Athens (New York 1894) 428-429
44. For the strange rites of the Bouphonia see W. Burkert, Griechische Religion der archaischen und classischen Periode (Stuttgart 1977) 350-351
45. It is generally agreed that the building on the Dörpfeld foundation was the arkhaios neōs, the old temple of Athena Polias. The megaron = prytaneion should be located some place where nothing else was built down to the end of the fifth century, but unfortunately we cannot even locate accurately all the other sixth-century places we know were on the acropolis (notably the so-called "Bluebeard temple" and the hekatompedon, whatever this was), much less identify the unbuilt areas (on the possibilities see J. Hurwit, Acropolis [as in n. 12] 111-112). The question must remain open until more archaeological evidence is available
46. Miller's main argument against Holland (Miller, Prytaneion [as in n. 23] 39-41) comes down to a chain of unverified assumptions: that Thuc. 2.15.2 (quoted above) refers to the historical synoikism of Attica in the archaic period; that the passage implies the construction of a new prytaneion; and that Thucydides' statement later in the same paragraph (2.13.3) that "before this" sc. The synoikism) the city consisted only of the acropolis and the area to its south implies that the new prytaneion, being associated with the synoikism, most be located elsewhere
47. The substance of these assumptions is addressed briefly above. The words may not even refer to the time before the synoikism or before Theseus, and may simply mean "in earlier times" (A. W. Gomme, A Historical Commentary on Thucydides, vol. 2 [Oxford 1956] 49 ad loc.)
48. On Plut. Thes. 24.3 see above, n. 29
49. Whether the Peisistratids established their residence on the acropolis is a separate question that does not concern us here
50. Note that the seat of government, as understood here, remained on the acropolis until the changes under the Kleisthenic regime. The "offices" of the arkhontes, which may have been consolidated in the thesmotheteion in the time of Solon (AthPol 3.5, but see above, n. 19), were still on the acropolis
51. construction on the basileus' new "office," the stoa basileios, dates only to the late sixth century (Shear, "Destruction" [as in n. 28] 427-428)
52. It seems unlikely that Solon created a Council of 400, as asserted at AthPol. 8.4, but even if he did, it would not have replaced the proto-Areopagos Council assumed to be still meeting on the acropolis (for the case against a new Solonic council see C. Hignett, A History of the Athenian Constitution to the End of the Fifth Century B.C. [Oxford 1952] 92-96)
53. In Herodotos' account of Kleomenes' coup (Hdt. 5.72.2), when the boule (presumably the new Council of 500) resists Kleomenes' demands he seized the acropolis, at which "the rest of the Athenians" laid siege to the acropolis, where "the rest of Athenians" (but not the councilors) suggests that the councilors had been trapped while meeting (probably outdoors, given their number) on the acropolis. For the starting date for the construction of the Kleisthenic boulē's new home (the so-called "old bouleutērion") c. 500 see most recently Shear, "Destruction (as in n. 28)418-424
54. I thank Historia's anonymous referee for calling this to my attention
55. The author of the Athēnaiōn Politeia seems to have believed that the laws were displayed in the stoa basileios in Solon's day but this is impossible since the building is later in date (mid-sixth century or early fifth). On the conflicting evidence for the building's date see briefly J. M. Camp, The Athenian Agora: Excavations in the Heart of Classical Athens (London 1986) 53
56. Cf. R. Stroud, The Axones and Kyrbeis of Drakon and Solon (Berkeley-Los Angeles 1979) 12-13, 44. Could the substitution of bouleutērion in Harpokration/Euphorion/Anaximenes for Pollux' prytaneion reflect an understanding that the original prytaneion (on the acropolis) was also Athens' first council house?
57. On this transformation see G. Anderson, The Athenian Experiment: Building an Imagined Political Community in Ancient Attica, 508-490 B.C. (Ann Arbor 2003)
58. It is often said that the classical prytaneion was located in the "old agora" but there is absolutely no evidence for this. Its placement there is simply an elaboration of the assumption that the new "aristocratic" government wished to symbolize its new beginning by establishing the city's hearth, its symbolic center, some place other than on the acropolis (cf. above at n. 27)
59. One might also doubt that there ever was an "old agora" at all, i.e. a specific place formally laid out and dedicated to public assemblies. The only evidence for an "old agora" is found in Harpokrat. s.v. where we find that the historian Apollodorus (FGrHist 244 F 113) said that Pandēmos Aphroditē was so named because her shrine was located near the old agora where the whole dēmos used to gather in assemblies called agorai. This looks very much like an attempt to explain the obscure epithet pandēmos, but even if Apollodoros preserves here the memory of a long-forgotten place of assembly the silence of other authors, even when we would expect them to mention the "old agora" if they knew of it, strongly argues that most people had forgotten the identity of the "old agora" by classical times, and that it was not an important place at all. On the obscurity of the "old agora" see R. E. Wycherley, "Archaia Agora," Phoenix 20 (1966) 285-293. The shrine of Pandēmos Aphroditē on the acropolis beneath the temple of Nikē was also nowhere near the apparent site of the classical prytaneion discussed above (on the site of the Pandēmos Aphroditē shrine see conveniently Hurwit, Acropolis [as in n. 12] 41)
60. For the date of the "old bouleutērion" see above, n. 37