WEBVTT 00:01.710 --> 00:05.570 Professor Donald Kagan: We were examining 00:05.566 --> 00:09.176 Sparta, the most important, I think, of the early 00:09.178 --> 00:12.218 poleis, certainly once you get into the 00:12.216 --> 00:17.296 seventh and sixth centuries. And I was describing the formal 00:17.300 --> 00:22.990 constitution of the Spartans, having mentioned the kings and 00:22.991 --> 00:26.941 the gerousia, the council of elders 00:26.943 --> 00:31.573 consisting of twenty-eight elected men over sixty and the 00:31.567 --> 00:34.867 two kings to create a body of thirty. 00:34.870 --> 00:41.270 Then there is the Spartan Assembly which consists of all 00:41.272 --> 00:47.112 the adult male Spartan citizens, and as in most states, 00:47.113 --> 00:52.253 it really originated from the idea of having the fighting men 00:52.249 --> 00:57.209 participate in decisions and they're the kinds of decisions 00:57.214 --> 01:02.954 that undoubtedly were the first decisions the assemblies made. 01:02.950 --> 01:07.030 And in the case of Sparta, I would guess almost the only 01:07.032 --> 01:10.972 decisions they made were questions of whether to go to 01:10.966 --> 01:13.216 war, whether to make peace, 01:13.217 --> 01:16.227 whether to make alliances and so forth. 01:16.230 --> 01:19.430 Now, it's worth mentioning that that assembly--you want to 01:19.431 --> 01:22.691 distinguish that assembly from what I'll describe shortly about 01:22.685 --> 01:25.745 the Athenian Assembly. In this assembly, 01:25.750 --> 01:31.650 it is true that all adult male Spartans were participants, 01:31.650 --> 01:36.900 and let me also say that they came to the meeting dressed in 01:36.903 --> 01:41.373 their military uniform, apparently including their 01:41.367 --> 01:46.357 shields, because when a question was put to the Spartans, 01:46.360 --> 01:51.990 the way they responded was by shouting and banging on their 01:51.989 --> 01:54.939 shields. Whereupon, the presiding 01:54.941 --> 01:59.651 official would try to determine which side had the loudest 01:59.647 --> 02:02.887 noise. It's like a voice vote in one 02:02.888 --> 02:06.508 of our own meetings, only a little bit more 02:06.506 --> 02:09.216 colorful. And only, of course, 02:09.224 --> 02:13.774 if the presiding official decided that he couldn't tell 02:13.771 --> 02:18.261 which side had the most noise, would they resort to a 02:18.261 --> 02:22.781 separation like the British Parliament, those in favor over 02:22.775 --> 02:26.055 on that side, those opposed on the other 02:26.055 --> 02:30.435 side, and he would count and out would come the result. 02:30.439 --> 02:37.079 It looks as though the debates in the assembly were 02:37.076 --> 02:43.096 probably infrequent, because as best we can figure 02:43.098 --> 02:46.458 it out, we would guess that most issues 02:46.459 --> 02:49.829 that came before the assembly--let me back up and say 02:49.830 --> 02:53.590 probably not very many issues came before the assembly, 02:53.590 --> 02:57.300 but those that did, if there was an agreement on 02:57.300 --> 03:01.090 the part of the gerousia and the kings, 03:01.090 --> 03:04.500 in other words, the upper groups in society, 03:04.496 --> 03:08.136 if they agreed there would be no need to go, 03:08.139 --> 03:10.709 there might be some legal need to go to the assembly, 03:10.710 --> 03:13.580 but there would be no debate and the matter would simply go 03:13.576 --> 03:15.846 forward. However, some scholars go far 03:15.853 --> 03:19.163 too far in suggesting that there never was a debate in the 03:19.163 --> 03:21.943 assembly. There are debates reported to 03:21.937 --> 03:25.227 us in Thucydides, which make it perfectly clear 03:25.232 --> 03:28.822 that they did, but it is worth pointing out 03:28.815 --> 03:33.965 that so far as our information goes, the only people who spoke 03:33.969 --> 03:37.179 at those assemblies were the kings, 03:37.180 --> 03:41.820 the gerousia, or a group of people I haven't 03:41.815 --> 03:45.705 mentioned to you yet, the ephors, 03:45.710 --> 03:49.000 the five ephors. I'll describe their situation 03:48.997 --> 03:52.577 for you, but for the moment they are annually elected officials 03:52.584 --> 03:56.734 of the state. In short, the average Spartan 03:56.726 --> 04:02.046 did not ever speak in the assembly, it appears. 04:02.050 --> 04:05.670 So it's not a democratic assembly, even though every 04:05.667 --> 04:08.857 single citizen is there, if he wants to be. 04:08.860 --> 04:16.120 So, that's part of the mixed and rather confusing aspect of 04:16.121 --> 04:19.171 the assembly. Let me turn now to the 04:19.166 --> 04:21.936 ephors. These, according to Spartan 04:21.943 --> 04:26.313 tradition, were invented somewhat late in the development 04:26.305 --> 04:30.575 of the Spartan constitution. The word ephor comes 04:30.578 --> 04:34.708 from the word which means to oversee, to oversee what's going 04:34.707 --> 04:37.767 on. They were, in a certain sense, 04:37.773 --> 04:40.953 the overseers. One of their duties was to keep 04:40.951 --> 04:44.121 watch on the kings and to see that the kings didn't do 04:44.115 --> 04:47.385 anything improper, illegal, irreligious, 04:47.388 --> 04:52.678 or anything of that kind, and some scholars have focused 04:52.676 --> 04:56.966 on that and suggested that, at least originally, 04:56.971 --> 04:59.581 that was what their main function was: 04:59.582 --> 05:02.972 to protect the Spartans from excessive power, 05:02.970 --> 05:06.950 excessive behavior by the kings, and that their sort of 05:06.948 --> 05:11.368 watching the king's thing was always their chief function. 05:11.370 --> 05:15.550 That, I think, is not right. I think by the time the 05:15.554 --> 05:19.114 Spartans appear to us in history, let us say late in the 05:19.107 --> 05:22.847 sixth century and fifth century, the ephors don't do 05:22.853 --> 05:25.233 that. I mean, they still have the 05:25.233 --> 05:28.253 technical constitutional requirement to do that, 05:28.250 --> 05:30.690 but that's not what they're up too. 05:30.689 --> 05:34.909 When we see them they are usually engaged in dealing with 05:34.909 --> 05:38.349 foreign policy. So, if a neighboring state 05:38.354 --> 05:42.274 wanted to communicate something to the Spartans, 05:42.268 --> 05:47.178 either it might be an offer of an alliance or it might be an 05:47.180 --> 05:51.510 order to do something or else war would follow, 05:51.509 --> 05:54.139 or a negotiation for peace, any of those things, 05:54.135 --> 05:56.645 first they would come to the ephors, 05:56.649 --> 06:00.619 of which there were five and the ephors would then 06:00.622 --> 06:03.912 decide what should be done. I would say, 06:03.905 --> 06:07.345 in most cases, they would, unless it was very, 06:07.350 --> 06:10.720 very serious, they would be able to give some 06:10.719 --> 06:14.429 sort of answer to it, but when it involved something 06:14.425 --> 06:16.995 fundamental like war and peace or alliances, 06:17.000 --> 06:22.770 then they would have to go to the assembly to get their 06:22.773 --> 06:25.763 approval. But my guess is that it would 06:25.763 --> 06:29.333 have been wildly reckless and therefore never done for the 06:29.328 --> 06:32.828 ephors not to go to the gerousia first, 06:32.829 --> 06:37.369 because the gerousia was, by far, the most 06:37.369 --> 06:40.679 significant council in the state, 06:40.680 --> 06:45.700 most able to have the necessary prestige and yet to be small 06:45.700 --> 06:49.870 enough truly to discuss what needed to be done. 06:49.870 --> 06:52.460 And since the gerousia included the kings, 06:52.464 --> 06:55.334 it involved the most important people in the state. 06:55.329 --> 06:58.119 So, if the ephors wanted to do something, 06:58.118 --> 07:00.968 it would be damn foolish not to clear it with the 07:00.967 --> 07:05.217 gerousia first; although if they wished to be 07:05.224 --> 07:08.504 reckless, they could do otherwise. 07:08.500 --> 07:10.460 Now, another thing about the ephors is that 07:10.456 --> 07:12.796 they're very different. The people who are elected to 07:12.800 --> 07:15.740 the gerousia are old men who have proven themselves, 07:15.740 --> 07:19.290 they are truly elected by a process in which their 07:19.285 --> 07:21.885 individual qualities are relevant, 07:21.889 --> 07:26.339 and so they have tremendous prestige in the Spartan state. 07:26.339 --> 07:29.939 This is not true necessarily and typically of the 07:29.939 --> 07:34.379 ephors. Aristotle tells us that they in 07:34.376 --> 07:40.846 fact were just any Joe Spartan, that they were ordinary people, 07:40.849 --> 07:46.029 not distinguished in any way. Although we don't have a clear 07:46.033 --> 07:48.863 picture of the way in which they were chosen, 07:48.860 --> 07:53.960 it is clear that they were--it looked it was some kind of a 07:53.955 --> 07:57.465 combination of election and sortition; 07:57.470 --> 08:01.430 there's a strong element of chance involved in selecting who 08:01.428 --> 08:05.548 was going to be an ephor. So, you must think of them, 08:05.552 --> 08:09.582 not as distinguished people who have some clout in their own 08:09.577 --> 08:11.897 person, but ordinary people who only 08:11.900 --> 08:15.300 achieve what clout they're going to have by virtue of being 08:15.298 --> 08:18.998 chosen as ephors. They're only there for a year. 08:19.000 --> 08:21.790 Now, the kings are there for life and the gerousia 08:21.790 --> 08:25.050 is there for life, and I suppose the assembly is 08:25.052 --> 08:28.672 there for life, but the ephors are only 08:28.671 --> 08:33.341 going to be ephors for a year and only once in their 08:33.335 --> 08:35.845 life. These are not politically 08:35.854 --> 08:39.134 powerful people. I think the idea was to sort of 08:39.129 --> 08:43.209 have a representation of the ordinary Spartan to carry on the 08:43.213 --> 08:45.803 functions that I have talked about. 08:45.799 --> 08:48.389 On the other hand, they were given the 08:48.394 --> 08:52.604 responsibility of seeing that the kings were in line and they 08:52.602 --> 08:56.462 had various techniques or various policies and processes 08:56.459 --> 09:00.879 which had them make judgments as to whether the kings were doing 09:00.877 --> 09:04.047 anything wrong, and if they did, 09:04.053 --> 09:08.823 they could make that point. They could go to Delphi and ask 09:08.822 --> 09:12.692 the god, if they were right in thinking something was wrong, 09:12.692 --> 09:16.432 and if they came back the kings would be put on trial. 09:16.429 --> 09:20.509 The ephors would be the accusers, the trial would be 09:20.507 --> 09:24.367 held in the gerousia, and don't imagine that that 09:24.374 --> 09:27.934 didn't matter. Kings were brought to trial in 09:27.926 --> 09:32.346 this way frequently in the history of Sparta and very often 09:32.347 --> 09:36.007 they were convicted, and often exiled, 09:36.007 --> 09:41.307 and in other ways punished. So, there's nothing just 09:41.307 --> 09:46.697 theoretical about this capacity to control them and something 09:46.699 --> 09:51.369 rather important about this accidental element in who 09:51.373 --> 09:54.893 becomes an ephor. All right, 09:54.893 --> 09:58.873 those are the elements of the Spartan constitution and I think 09:58.873 --> 10:02.273 it's self evident that it deserves a title of a mixed 10:02.265 --> 10:04.295 constitution. At the same time, 10:04.299 --> 10:07.389 you don't want to lose sight of something even more basic than 10:07.385 --> 10:09.625 that. Remember that all the 10:09.627 --> 10:14.087 Spartiates that there are, whether they are ordinary 10:14.090 --> 10:17.770 citizens, all the way up through king, 10:17.766 --> 10:23.676 are a small minority of all the people who are under the control 10:23.677 --> 10:27.387 of the Spartans. People try to guess from the 10:27.393 --> 10:30.853 evidence that we have what percentage of the entire 10:30.845 --> 10:34.775 population of the Peloponnesus or of their own part of the 10:34.780 --> 10:37.680 Peloponnesus the Spartans were--well, 10:37.679 --> 10:41.779 it looks as though the number of Helots may have been 10:41.782 --> 10:45.492 something like seven Helots to every Spartan. 10:45.490 --> 10:50.600 Then you have to add to that the number of perioikoi 10:50.599 --> 10:55.229 who were also not Spartiates. So, whatever the mixed 10:55.227 --> 10:59.607 character of the constitution was, when you look at the whole 10:59.607 --> 11:04.277 of Laconia and its possessions, it is very much an oligarchy. 11:04.279 --> 11:09.209 The Spartans normally will like to see other states 11:09.214 --> 11:13.684 oligarchically governed. They will not like to see 11:13.682 --> 11:17.212 either extreme. They won't like democracies and 11:17.213 --> 11:21.093 they won't like any form of autocracy which in Greece 11:21.094 --> 11:23.934 typically took the form of tyranny. 11:23.929 --> 11:28.259 So, the Spartans gain a reputation of being--because 11:28.264 --> 11:32.944 they often fight against tyrants--they gain a reputation 11:32.940 --> 11:38.000 of being hostile to tyranny, which brings our attention to 11:37.995 --> 11:42.745 the subject of foreign policy, very important for Sparta and 11:42.747 --> 11:46.917 for the Greek world, because as I think I mentioned 11:46.918 --> 11:51.708 before, the Spartans became the first state to be in command, 11:51.710 --> 11:54.540 or in control, or to be the leaders of a 11:54.542 --> 11:58.712 coalition of states. Not for a specific purpose 11:58.706 --> 12:04.426 only, but a permanent coalition of states which the ancient 12:04.431 --> 12:09.861 Greeks referred to as the Spartans and their allies, 12:09.860 --> 12:13.120 which modern scholars have come to call the Peloponnesian 12:13.117 --> 12:16.657 League, and I guess I will use that term and you'll see it all 12:16.664 --> 12:20.254 over the place. It's an imprecise term 12:20.245 --> 12:25.855 because some of the members of the--let me say a better term 12:25.861 --> 12:29.671 for it would be the Spartan alliance, 12:29.669 --> 12:32.699 which is what pretty much the Greeks called it, 12:32.700 --> 12:36.590 because not everybody in the Peloponnese was a member of the 12:36.586 --> 12:40.406 Peloponnesian League and not every member of the league was 12:40.407 --> 12:43.957 in the Peloponnesus, but still we all will know what 12:43.963 --> 12:47.123 we're talking about when we speak of the Peloponnesian 12:47.115 --> 12:49.575 League. I shall try to remember to 12:49.582 --> 12:53.042 speak of the Spartan alliance most of the time. 12:53.039 --> 12:55.789 Well, how did it come to exist? 12:55.789 --> 12:58.349 Again, as in most things in Greek history, 12:58.350 --> 13:02.040 the beginnings are shrouded in legend and are not absolutely 13:02.035 --> 13:06.375 clear, but perhaps the place to start 13:06.380 --> 13:12.620 is to say maybe around 570 B.C. The Spartans who had been 13:12.619 --> 13:18.069 successful apparently in turning around, to some considerable 13:18.065 --> 13:23.505 degree their defeat back in the seventh century in fight with 13:23.511 --> 13:28.591 Argos and were expanding their influence and power in the 13:28.594 --> 13:33.914 Peloponnesus, suffered a defeat in the region 13:33.906 --> 13:39.876 of Arcadia to the north of Laconia--that by the way is 13:39.883 --> 13:44.623 mountainous country and poor typically, 13:44.620 --> 13:49.140 relatively speaking and it provided some of the toughest 13:49.136 --> 13:53.146 warriors in the Greek world. So, it's no miracle that the 13:53.151 --> 13:55.091 Spartans had a hard time up there. 13:55.090 --> 14:00.000 It looks as though at that point, that somebody in Sparta 14:00.001 --> 14:05.001 came up with a bright idea which changed the nature of the 14:05.000 --> 14:09.530 Spartan situation, and also introduced something 14:09.527 --> 14:13.377 new into the Greek world at the same time. 14:13.379 --> 14:20.369 They defeated the town of Tegea, which is located just to 14:20.370 --> 14:24.510 the north of Laconia. It's a very important state for 14:24.505 --> 14:26.285 the Spartans, not just because it's the 14:26.289 --> 14:28.119 neighbor right to the north of them, 14:28.120 --> 14:30.790 but because remember what I told you, if you want to get to 14:30.794 --> 14:33.474 Mycenae from Sparta you can't go across those mountains, 14:33.470 --> 14:37.930 you got to go up north and then go left, go west into Mycenae. 14:37.929 --> 14:41.469 Tegea is right there where the road turns west. 14:41.470 --> 14:45.230 So, its strategic importance is very great. 14:45.230 --> 14:50.660 The Spartans got into this war with Tegea and they gained 14:50.664 --> 14:56.204 control of Tegea where they claimed to have discovered the 14:56.196 --> 15:02.826 bones of the great Homeric hero, Orestes and taken it away from 15:02.825 --> 15:08.255 Tegea, the bones I mean, and buried them at Sparta. 15:11.500 --> 15:15.110 Also, there was a legend that maybe they propagated that 15:15.109 --> 15:17.249 showed up in some poetry we have, 15:17.250 --> 15:21.690 that Agamemnon had moved from his home base in Mycenae to 15:21.686 --> 15:24.636 Sparta, an attempt, in other words, 15:24.642 --> 15:29.382 to connect these Dorian Spartans with the legends of the 15:29.382 --> 15:33.952 great men of the Achaean world described by Homer. 15:33.950 --> 15:37.270 Finally, we are told late in the sixth century, 15:37.274 --> 15:41.474 King Cleomenes who was one of the aggressive Spartan rulers 15:41.466 --> 15:44.136 who expanded the power of Sparta, 15:44.139 --> 15:48.639 said on one occasion, "I am no Dorian, 15:48.639 --> 15:52.839 I am an Achaean." What's this all about? 15:52.840 --> 15:56.070 Well, it looks like as the Spartans begin to extend this 15:56.069 --> 15:59.239 league that I will be telling you about in a minute, 15:59.240 --> 16:03.790 they want to reduce the amount of resistance that they're going 16:03.792 --> 16:07.552 to get into. Dorian's versus Achaeans still 16:07.553 --> 16:11.383 seems to have some meaning to the Greeks. 16:11.379 --> 16:15.309 Remember the business about what happened in Sicyon when the 16:15.305 --> 16:19.025 tyrants of Sicyon made this sharp distinction in favor of 16:19.030 --> 16:23.340 Achaeans against Dorians. It suggests that that division 16:23.344 --> 16:28.274 among the Greek peoples hadn't died down yet and I think that's 16:28.272 --> 16:32.872 what's going on here. Spartans are trying to claim 16:32.867 --> 16:37.567 union with the Achaeans not dominance over them. 16:37.570 --> 16:41.090 Anyway, nonetheless, the Spartans start taking on 16:41.089 --> 16:45.019 other Greek states trying to establish their domination and 16:45.015 --> 16:49.725 are very successful. They defeated the powerful and 16:49.731 --> 16:55.301 important state of Argos. And in the process they took 16:55.295 --> 17:01.165 away a piece of land that is between the area of Argos and 17:01.169 --> 17:05.309 Sparta, the name of it is Cynuria and 17:05.314 --> 17:10.044 they took it away, next to their own state. 17:10.039 --> 17:12.749 That's interesting, because the Argives never 17:12.753 --> 17:16.703 forgave that and never gave up on the idea of getting it back. 17:16.700 --> 17:19.930 You find the Argives and the Spartans fighting each other at 17:19.932 --> 17:22.892 least once a century and what they're fighting about is 17:22.891 --> 17:26.991 gaining control of Cynuria. Its common people referred to 17:26.988 --> 17:31.288 Cynuria as the Alsace-Lorraine of the Peloponnesus. 17:31.289 --> 17:34.089 Everybody who doesn't have it and wants it back between these 17:34.092 --> 17:34.702 two states. 17:37.809 --> 17:41.929 Finally, the Spartans also take the island just off the 17:41.931 --> 17:46.131 southeastern edge of the Peloponnesus called Cythera, 17:46.130 --> 17:50.460 which gives them a good strategic base there as well, 17:50.461 --> 17:54.261 so they are expanding. Now, what happens--I'll go 17:54.257 --> 17:57.727 back to Tegea for a moment because that's the first case we 17:57.732 --> 18:01.442 hear and it's the model. When they defeat the Tegeans, 18:01.441 --> 18:04.471 instead of simply annexing their territory, 18:04.470 --> 18:08.330 subordinating the people, or subjecting the people to 18:08.333 --> 18:11.273 Spartan rule, they do something different. 18:11.269 --> 18:15.879 They offer the Tegeans an alliance. 18:15.880 --> 18:20.070 The character of the alliance, certainly in the full fledged 18:20.072 --> 18:23.482 history of the Spartan alliance--we can't be sure 18:23.482 --> 18:27.822 whether the words I'm going to speak to you now were all there 18:27.817 --> 18:31.727 in the original oath that the Spartans made their allies 18:31.725 --> 18:34.255 swear, but it was there by the end of 18:34.262 --> 18:37.072 the fifth century anyway. I think something like it, 18:37.071 --> 18:40.071 either was in the oath or was understood, and that is: 18:40.072 --> 18:42.112 the state that was defeated said, 18:42.109 --> 18:47.809 agreed to accept the leadership of Sparta, and the word that's 18:47.814 --> 18:52.214 involved here is hegemonia and the leader 18:52.209 --> 18:58.009 is called a hegemon and that is something different from 18:58.007 --> 19:02.757 being your master here, your despotes. 19:02.759 --> 19:07.639 It's a little bit less, or at least you want it to seem 19:07.637 --> 19:12.597 that way and to have the same friends and enemies as the 19:12.604 --> 19:17.114 Spartans had, and to follow them wherever the 19:17.111 --> 19:21.881 Spartans should lead. A short way of saying it 19:21.876 --> 19:26.806 was that they turned their foreign policy over to the 19:26.810 --> 19:31.460 Spartans and accepted their leadership in war. 19:31.460 --> 19:34.920 What do they get in exchange? One, the Spartans didn't take 19:34.916 --> 19:37.346 away their land, destroy their houses, 19:37.348 --> 19:40.108 make them slaves or anything like that. 19:40.109 --> 19:43.879 Besides that, they also provided them, 19:43.880 --> 19:50.100 promised them and provided them protection against attack from 19:50.095 --> 19:53.925 somebody else. When the Peloponnesian League 19:53.930 --> 19:57.450 is in place, one of its consequences for most of the 19:57.448 --> 20:00.158 time, is the end of warfare between 20:00.156 --> 20:02.676 the states inside the Peloponnesus, 20:02.684 --> 20:06.184 at least that was the theoretical situation. 20:06.180 --> 20:09.870 As we shall see, it will be broken from time to 20:09.865 --> 20:12.905 time, but still it's generally true. 20:12.910 --> 20:15.820 So now, what does this mean? The Spartans have done 20:15.815 --> 20:18.705 something that is similar to what the Romans would do 20:18.713 --> 20:22.063 centuries later and really an enormous achievement if you can 20:22.057 --> 20:24.547 do it. When you conquer people, 20:24.554 --> 20:28.464 one of the problems you have, is every state you conquer is 20:28.457 --> 20:31.577 potentially a problem. You have to rule it, 20:31.582 --> 20:35.982 and that's going to take more soldiers and you will have to do 20:35.981 --> 20:39.691 something with them. You acquire responsibilities 20:39.688 --> 20:43.708 that are greater than they used to be, but the point is, 20:43.711 --> 20:46.931 normally you don't gain any fighting men. 20:46.930 --> 20:53.310 Spartan way of doing it means you gain more troops for your 20:53.309 --> 20:56.919 army. When the Spartans go to their 20:56.916 --> 21:02.386 allies, and they want to go war, they tell them send your 21:02.394 --> 21:07.094 allotment of troops to the place we tell you, 21:07.090 --> 21:11.740 on the day we tell you. That allotment could well be 21:11.740 --> 21:16.290 two-thirds of their army. They will go to where the 21:16.287 --> 21:20.877 Spartans want to go and the general of the army overall will 21:20.883 --> 21:24.213 be a Spartan, and they will be fighting for 21:24.212 --> 21:27.662 Spartan purposes, unless the Spartans have chosen 21:27.659 --> 21:30.459 to fight for their allies' purposes. 21:30.460 --> 21:33.960 But the Spartans now have increased their military 21:33.962 --> 21:37.822 strength enormously by the invention of this new thing, 21:37.822 --> 21:43.652 the Spartan Alliance. Now, the debate continues 21:43.649 --> 21:51.449 to exist as to just what that alliance was really like. 21:51.450 --> 21:56.090 Were the Spartans free to do anything that they liked in 21:56.085 --> 22:01.225 foreign affairs or did they need to have the approval of their 22:01.227 --> 22:05.247 allies before going to war? I'm talking now about a 22:05.246 --> 22:08.546 constitutional question rather than reality question. 22:08.549 --> 22:11.089 Scholars bat it around both ways; 22:11.089 --> 22:15.149 my prejudices are that the leagues' constitution, 22:15.145 --> 22:19.285 whatever it may have been, was less important than 22:19.286 --> 22:21.756 reality. That is to say, 22:21.761 --> 22:26.731 not all states in the Spartan Alliance were equal. 22:26.730 --> 22:33.100 Some were large and numerous, and strong militarily. 22:33.099 --> 22:39.889 Some were also wealth, and some were at some distance 22:39.891 --> 22:43.481 from Sparta. Others were small, 22:43.484 --> 22:46.724 weak, poor, and close to Sparta. 22:46.720 --> 22:49.360 I would say, and I think the evidence will 22:49.362 --> 22:52.652 support this as a fact, whatever the theory may have 22:52.649 --> 22:54.939 been, that the closer you were to 22:54.937 --> 22:58.097 Sparta the smaller you were, the weaker you were, 22:58.099 --> 23:01.089 the more you did what the Spartans told you. 23:01.090 --> 23:04.360 How's that for a shock? And vice versa. 23:04.359 --> 23:06.959 The stronger, the more distant, 23:06.960 --> 23:11.470 the wealthier you were, the more independent you were 23:11.466 --> 23:16.056 of the Spartans.I would say much of the time, 23:16.059 --> 23:18.809 most of the time, people did what the Spartans 23:18.808 --> 23:22.138 wanted them to do. But we have many occasions in 23:22.135 --> 23:26.415 which states refused to do so and even get in the way of the 23:26.418 --> 23:28.878 Spartans. Now, I think the Spartans very 23:28.878 --> 23:31.738 often when they had to do something called a meeting of 23:31.738 --> 23:35.498 the Spartan Alliance, consulted their allies, 23:35.502 --> 23:41.902 but it's not necessary true that they took a vote as to what 23:41.895 --> 23:45.605 the allies thought; sometimes they did. 23:45.610 --> 23:49.560 I think sometimes they didn't; it all depended on the 23:49.559 --> 23:52.739 situation. If you want your allies to come 23:52.737 --> 23:57.457 and fight with you it's better to have them to do so willingly 23:57.455 --> 24:00.655 than under orders, and so that will explain, 24:00.664 --> 24:03.524 in my opinion, some of the reasons for calling 24:03.515 --> 24:05.855 it a Peloponnesian League meeting, 24:05.859 --> 24:09.709 not necessarily that they were required to do so. 24:09.710 --> 24:13.100 But I've given you a mixed and rather vague picture, 24:13.102 --> 24:15.632 and I think that's the real picture. 24:15.630 --> 24:18.800 I think you can't be very sure, either because this 24:18.797 --> 24:22.487 evidence doesn't allow us to be sure how the league was supposed 24:22.492 --> 24:24.782 to work and how it really did work, 24:24.779 --> 24:30.429 but I also think nobody could tell in advance how it was going 24:30.431 --> 24:35.251 to work, whatever the understood constitution was. 24:35.250 --> 24:38.850 After all, one of the most important things that is 24:38.845 --> 24:41.645 involved in membership in the league, 24:41.650 --> 24:45.460 is that when the Spartans say, I want you to come and fight 24:45.463 --> 24:49.153 with me for these purposes, you come and you bring your 24:49.151 --> 24:51.591 army to do it, but we have a period in 24:51.593 --> 24:55.023 Thucydides' account of the Peloponnesian War in which 24:55.024 --> 24:58.064 important states like Corinth and Thebes, 24:58.060 --> 25:02.400 among others, simply say "no." And when the Spartans say, 25:02.398 --> 25:05.038 why aren't you doing what you're supposed to do, 25:05.035 --> 25:08.455 they come up with a very nice cock-and-bull story supported by 25:08.458 --> 25:11.878 theoretically religious motives why they can't do what they're 25:11.881 --> 25:15.361 supposed to do and the Spartans have to put up with it; 25:15.359 --> 25:16.989 there's nothing they can do about it. 25:16.990 --> 25:19.680 So I think, now that I've mentioned the 25:19.679 --> 25:23.459 constitutional technicalities, I think the real thing to ask 25:23.457 --> 25:27.297 in each case is what are the realities of the situation, 25:27.299 --> 25:31.369 and by which I mean mainly, questions of power that 25:31.370 --> 25:34.220 determine what's going to happen. 25:34.220 --> 25:38.240 All right, but by the end of the sixth century there is this 25:38.244 --> 25:40.704 Spartan alliance and Sparta alone, 25:40.700 --> 25:44.990 among the Greek states, is a hegemonal power and able 25:44.988 --> 25:49.878 to use, by Greek standards, a much vaster military force 25:49.881 --> 25:55.331 than the Greeks have ever known, so that when the Persian Wars 25:55.331 --> 25:59.291 come upon them, there will be no hesitation and 25:59.291 --> 26:01.601 no doubt; the Greek league that will 26:01.596 --> 26:04.506 fight the Persians, will be led by the Spartans. 26:04.509 --> 26:10.089 So great was their respect in which they were held that not 26:10.085 --> 26:13.445 only did they command the armies, 26:13.450 --> 26:16.600 even though they had no navy and no naval tradition, 26:16.601 --> 26:19.321 they were even put in charge of the fleet, 26:19.319 --> 26:23.159 although they often had the brains to use other people who 26:23.162 --> 26:26.332 had more experience to do the actual leading. 26:26.329 --> 26:32.559 But Sparta is in this position and I think that's important. 26:32.559 --> 26:37.039 Well, let's step back a moment and take a look at the 26:37.043 --> 26:41.773 Spartan state as we've been describing it and ask what is it 26:41.767 --> 26:45.207 that motivates the Spartans as a state, 26:45.210 --> 26:51.470 first of all, in its foreign policy? 26:51.470 --> 26:55.010 Because, as we shall see, there's this remarkable thing 26:55.013 --> 26:58.953 that even though they are by far the strongest military force 26:58.951 --> 27:02.501 among the Greeks, they are more than usual 27:02.504 --> 27:06.764 reluctant to fight, and they don't like to fight 27:06.761 --> 27:11.771 wars if they can avoid them, especially they don't like to 27:11.770 --> 27:16.250 go any great distance to fight a war away from home and they 27:16.248 --> 27:20.948 don't like to fight for any long period of time if they have to 27:20.954 --> 27:24.914 be away from home. The reasons for that are really 27:24.911 --> 27:29.281 what I want to make you see. At the core of it all, 27:29.278 --> 27:34.228 according to Thucydides, it was the fear of the Helots. 27:34.230 --> 27:39.090 It's not just that the Helots were so numerous compared to the 27:39.094 --> 27:43.804 Spartans, but I want to remind you again of their tremendous 27:43.800 --> 27:47.070 dissatisfaction with their situation, 27:47.069 --> 27:50.939 their backs may have been broken, but their spirits were 27:50.938 --> 27:53.668 not. They always were hoping to have 27:53.669 --> 27:58.359 a rebellion in which they could undue this extraordinarily heavy 27:58.363 --> 28:01.753 burden that they carried, and somehow in spite of the 28:01.748 --> 28:04.198 hundreds of years in which this has been going on, 28:04.200 --> 28:07.210 they did not lose sight of their nationality, 28:07.213 --> 28:11.123 of the fact that they were Mycenaeans and that they were a 28:11.116 --> 28:13.826 people, and that they had to throw off 28:13.827 --> 28:17.347 Spartan control of them if they could possible could. 28:17.349 --> 28:20.269 Their feelings towards the Spartans were as you might 28:20.270 --> 28:22.500 expect. There's a story of a rebellion 28:22.496 --> 28:25.946 I think I mentioned this to you earlier, early in the fourth 28:25.950 --> 28:29.240 century in Sparta, somebody is trying to stir up 28:29.235 --> 28:33.415 the people against the Spartan government and he mentions to 28:33.417 --> 28:37.597 the people he's trying to enlist in his side the Helots, 28:37.599 --> 28:42.849 he says, who would gladly eat the Spartans raw. 28:42.849 --> 28:45.539 I think that's what you have to have in your mind, 28:45.537 --> 28:48.387 if you want to understand what the Spartans think. 28:48.390 --> 28:51.920 If we take our whole army, leave town, go three days march 28:51.917 --> 28:55.937 away, how do we know we'll find anybody alive when we get back? 28:55.940 --> 28:58.490 That's always on their minds and Helot rebellions, 28:58.485 --> 29:00.715 although they don't take place every day, 29:00.720 --> 29:06.220 take place very sparsely, but they keep happening so that 29:06.217 --> 29:11.057 the fear is never irrational. To that is added the 29:11.063 --> 29:15.203 permanent enmity of Argos, which never gives up the idea 29:15.195 --> 29:19.545 of returning to the great days of Pheidon with Argos as the 29:19.552 --> 29:23.532 dominant state in the Peloponnesus and that means that 29:23.534 --> 29:28.124 the Spartans have to be defeated for that to happen and so the 29:28.117 --> 29:32.547 Argives come back to the Spartans time after time, 29:32.549 --> 29:35.679 good stretches in between, because the Spartans always 29:35.678 --> 29:39.158 beat them and do great harm so that it takes a long time for 29:39.161 --> 29:42.101 them to come back. But they're there, 29:42.103 --> 29:45.313 they don't go away; it's a problem. 29:45.309 --> 29:48.989 So, the Spartans, of course, have a need of a 29:48.987 --> 29:54.247 collection of states that stand between them and their potential 29:54.253 --> 29:58.853 enemies of whom the Argives are the most important. 29:58.849 --> 30:03.619 So, you can look at the Peloponnesian league in general 30:03.621 --> 30:09.191 as the way in which the Spartans dealt with the danger they felt 30:09.188 --> 30:13.688 internally and externally. Another element that the 30:13.692 --> 30:16.872 Spartans always worry about--remember why are the 30:16.869 --> 30:22.309 Spartans so successful? Numerically they aren't many, 30:22.309 --> 30:28.849 enough to actually just defeat anybody by numbers. 30:28.849 --> 30:30.429 It is, because they are the best. 30:30.430 --> 30:33.790 Why are they the best? It's because of this training 30:33.788 --> 30:37.268 system, these values, this way of life that is the 30:37.268 --> 30:40.868 purely Spartan way. So, there are always, 30:40.871 --> 30:44.761 I would argue, likely to be a majority at 30:44.761 --> 30:50.301 least of Spartans who are suspicious of and hostile to any 30:50.303 --> 30:54.293 kind of change internally certainly, 30:54.289 --> 30:56.479 and externally, because external things have 30:56.484 --> 30:59.784 internal implications. They're always worried about 30:59.778 --> 31:03.028 corruption seeping into the Spartan system. 31:03.029 --> 31:07.679 Corruption normally has the concept of money, 31:07.681 --> 31:11.951 wealth behind it. If money comes into the picture 31:11.954 --> 31:16.124 and people start being bought by it, they will cease to be 31:16.117 --> 31:19.547 thinking the way good Spartans should think, 31:19.549 --> 31:21.679 only of the state, but they will think of 31:21.680 --> 31:23.810 themselves and their wealth and so on. 31:23.809 --> 31:28.119 Another thing that corrupts is the search for power beyond 31:28.120 --> 31:31.230 what is appropriate in the Spartan system. 31:31.230 --> 31:34.980 Remember that incredible contradiction where everybody is 31:34.978 --> 31:39.428 a similar, almost an equal, but each one isn't vying for 31:39.425 --> 31:43.895 honor, which is not available universally to all, 31:43.900 --> 31:47.330 and so that means if you are a conservative Spartan, 31:47.331 --> 31:50.361 and the two words are practically the same, 31:50.359 --> 31:52.919 you're going to be worrying about that. 31:52.920 --> 31:56.440 That leads to conservatism in foreign policy. 31:56.440 --> 32:01.170 War, if you win, you are going to have booty; 32:01.170 --> 32:04.480 loot of some kind will come back into Sparta. 32:04.480 --> 32:08.040 Moreover, some people will gain reputations because of their 32:08.035 --> 32:11.465 fighting in the battle will bring them excessive honor, 32:11.470 --> 32:15.440 will fill their heads with a sense of their own greatness, 32:15.444 --> 32:19.424 and again, threaten the stability of the Spartan state. 32:19.420 --> 32:23.590 So, all of that is going to explain the paradox of the 32:23.589 --> 32:27.129 greatest military power in the Greek world, 32:27.130 --> 32:31.750 reluctant to fight and their power is not used to acquire 32:31.750 --> 32:36.160 economic benefits. What they focus on is 32:36.159 --> 32:43.249 discipline and the state versus freedom, individuality, 32:43.253 --> 32:48.163 and even family. There you have this strange 32:48.160 --> 32:52.900 society, a closed society that does not normally permit people 32:52.903 --> 32:57.123 to come and visit Sparta, and even those that it permits 32:57.115 --> 33:00.435 to come to Sparta during one period of the year, 33:00.440 --> 33:04.980 they actually force all foreigners out of town and do 33:04.980 --> 33:09.940 whatever strange things they do. Now, when we're talking about 33:09.942 --> 33:13.932 the fully developed Spartan state there are no exercises of 33:13.927 --> 33:18.047 the arts, such as existed before this system was created. 33:18.049 --> 33:22.709 There are no luxuries legally in Sparta. 33:22.710 --> 33:28.870 There are few creature comforts. Again, I suspect at some fairly 33:28.871 --> 33:33.201 early time, there were violations of these things, 33:33.200 --> 33:36.080 as individuals who had the power to do so, 33:36.084 --> 33:40.244 might well try to enjoy these things in spite of their being 33:40.236 --> 33:42.816 barred. But the main thing is, 33:42.815 --> 33:46.505 if you had them you couldn't really show them, 33:46.507 --> 33:50.117 you couldn't flaunt it, because that would be 33:50.117 --> 33:52.257 disastrous. Why? 33:52.259 --> 33:55.339 Because in a way, necessity becomes a 33:55.335 --> 33:59.085 virtue.We human beings--that's one of our 33:59.093 --> 34:02.513 typical ways of dealing with things. 34:02.509 --> 34:06.539 That is, we need to do something, we have to and so one 34:06.537 --> 34:11.087 way we cope is to do it and say it's the greatest thing in the 34:11.086 --> 34:14.326 world to do, and doing anything else is no 34:14.326 --> 34:16.866 good. That's what the Spartans did. 34:16.869 --> 34:20.269 Their way of life was imposed upon them by the decision to 34:20.268 --> 34:23.848 maintain their command of the Helots, after that it all makes 34:23.846 --> 34:26.256 perfect sense. Look what they had to give up, 34:26.262 --> 34:28.502 to do it. They said, of course, 34:28.501 --> 34:32.251 we gave that up, because that's what makes us 34:32.254 --> 34:37.124 the great people we are and that's the system that was the 34:37.117 --> 34:40.627 Spartan way of life. I remind you again that 34:40.628 --> 34:43.538 even though this is very extreme and other Greeks say that 34:43.539 --> 34:45.479 they're not going to live that way, 34:45.480 --> 34:49.690 they admire it tremendously, because it suits the ideology 34:49.692 --> 34:53.682 of all polis that subordinates individual family 34:53.682 --> 34:57.232 concerns to those of the community at large. 34:57.230 --> 35:00.770 As I mentioned earlier, the utopian philosophers of the 35:00.766 --> 35:03.906 fourth century, Plato being the most striking, 35:03.909 --> 35:08.499 Aristotle to a lesser degree, they admire this, 35:08.501 --> 35:14.091 although they have their wrinkles about how it's going to 35:14.091 --> 35:17.261 be. Nothing could be greater as a 35:17.255 --> 35:22.605 contrast to this way of thinking than the way that the Athenians 35:22.610 --> 35:26.860 will develop when they go through their growth as a 35:26.860 --> 35:31.680 polis. So let's take a look now at 35:31.682 --> 35:35.952 Athens to see how they came along. 35:46.219 --> 35:50.439 Athens, I hope you'll remember from your maps, 35:50.443 --> 35:55.963 is located in the southeastern portion of the Greek peninsula. 35:55.960 --> 36:00.690 It sticks out there into the Aegean Sea. 36:00.690 --> 36:06.730 Its geography--it's about 1,000 square miles is Attica. 36:06.730 --> 36:08.580 I think we talked about it already. 36:08.580 --> 36:15.640 The city is Athens; the region in which they live 36:15.641 --> 36:19.191 is Attica; the people are Athenians and 36:19.187 --> 36:21.757 that's an important point I think I made too, 36:21.761 --> 36:25.101 which is everybody who is a citizen who lives in Attica is 36:25.095 --> 36:27.725 an Athenian, no matter if he lives sixty 36:27.729 --> 36:30.279 five or seventy miles away from the city. 36:30.280 --> 36:34.600 He's still an Athenian. One of the things they achieved 36:34.598 --> 36:38.968 early was the unification of that whole region and they made 36:38.974 --> 36:42.914 it one polis, although that certainly doesn't 36:42.914 --> 36:46.664 mean that there are no independent villages and towns 36:46.661 --> 36:50.491 in the polis of Athens, because they certainly are. 36:50.489 --> 36:57.889 Now, Attica was not one of the most desirable, 36:57.890 --> 37:05.140 certainly agriculturally rich areas in Greece. 37:05.139 --> 37:09.219 It was relatively speaking rather barren. 37:09.219 --> 37:11.029 Now, there are of course great exceptions; 37:11.030 --> 37:15.850 the central valley so to speak, of Attica has the richest soil 37:15.846 --> 37:20.346 and in the ancient world it was able to grow the very best 37:20.347 --> 37:25.287 grain, including wheat. But very much of the Athenian 37:25.288 --> 37:29.738 soil is mountainous and pretty close to barren, 37:29.742 --> 37:34.102 so that you don't have a lot of rich soil. 37:34.099 --> 37:36.869 This is not one of the most admirable places to come. 37:36.869 --> 37:41.239 On the other hand, it has certain advantages that 37:41.239 --> 37:46.159 the Athenians used well to achieve wealth and power and 37:46.155 --> 37:48.895 greatness. First of all, 37:48.904 --> 37:55.664 it has one splendid harbor; up in the northwestern part of 37:55.655 --> 38:02.915 Attica is Piraeus. It is the port of Athens. 38:02.920 --> 38:07.970 Once Athens becomes a naval state and it is both spacious, 38:07.969 --> 38:11.069 it has three nice little harbors, 38:11.070 --> 38:16.390 and it is very easily defended, because these harbors can be 38:16.385 --> 38:20.165 closed off and attacks can be prevented. 38:20.170 --> 38:23.700 So, that is one strength. Another, 38:23.704 --> 38:27.514 and this is very rare, among Greek states, 38:27.510 --> 38:33.360 Attica contained silver mines in the south of the peninsula, 38:33.360 --> 38:37.410 and that gave the state, because these mines were 38:37.409 --> 38:42.269 ultimately owned by the state, it gave the state a source of 38:42.274 --> 38:45.934 income that was very, very unusual among the Greek 38:45.930 --> 38:49.130 city states, and the availability of that 38:49.125 --> 38:53.275 silver would turn out to be crucial at various moments in 38:53.277 --> 38:56.917 Athenian history. One reason why the soil wasn't 38:56.924 --> 39:01.184 so great for agriculture was that a lot of it is red clay, 39:01.179 --> 39:06.099 but that turns out to be wonderful for making pottery and 39:06.101 --> 39:11.181 of course Athenian pottery, and I'm thinking especially 39:11.178 --> 39:16.048 about painted pottery, fine ware, stuff that is meant 39:16.048 --> 39:21.158 for the upper classes, stuff that artists will work on 39:21.157 --> 39:25.527 that will be exported, all of that is made of that 39:25.532 --> 39:30.422 great red clay, the basis for the pottery that 39:30.421 --> 39:35.031 the Athenians did. Another natural resource of 39:35.026 --> 39:40.076 great value and great blessing to those of us who can still see 39:40.080 --> 39:44.640 the remains of the Athenian experience is the marble that 39:44.644 --> 39:48.744 comes from Mount Penteli. The Greeks call it now Pendel, 39:48.741 --> 39:51.661 and Pentelikon is what the ancient Greeks called it. 39:51.659 --> 39:56.349 In the northeastern portion of the Attica Peninsula and it 39:56.354 --> 40:00.064 produce--you can still go see it wonderful, 40:00.059 --> 40:04.489 beautiful fine grain, white marble and that's the 40:04.487 --> 40:09.557 stuff that the Parthenon and all the other buildings, 40:09.559 --> 40:15.509 temples, on the Acropolis and around Attica was made of and 40:15.511 --> 40:21.161 that enabled the Athenians to build those temples as few 40:21.155 --> 40:24.845 cities could, because there it was sitting in 40:24.845 --> 40:27.535 their territory, not a source of the kind of 40:27.543 --> 40:31.433 tremendous expense it would be for other states that would have 40:31.434 --> 40:35.924 to buy it and bring it in. Now, on the other hand, 40:35.919 --> 40:41.839 Athens was able as I told you-- let's start in the early days to 40:41.844 --> 40:47.124 grow wheat and other grains, but more to the point, 40:47.118 --> 40:52.798 it was very good for olive trees and for grapevines, 40:52.800 --> 40:57.120 so as we will see when the Athenians begin to exploit all 40:57.124 --> 41:00.454 of their land, not just the bottom land that 41:00.445 --> 41:04.265 works for grain, but also the less desirable 41:04.274 --> 41:09.104 land and produced wine and olive oil, that was a source of 41:09.098 --> 41:14.258 agricultural wealth that would play an important part in their 41:14.259 --> 41:18.579 history. Now, their own story about 41:18.582 --> 41:22.452 their past was something like this. 41:22.449 --> 41:27.489 They, unlike the other inhabitants of southern Greece, 41:27.491 --> 41:32.341 according to their story, never experienced a Dorian 41:32.343 --> 41:36.653 invasion. Now, the Dorians did come down 41:36.653 --> 41:43.013 and sort of bang at the door of Attica, but they were driven by 41:43.006 --> 41:48.126 the Athenians and never made their way into it. 41:48.130 --> 41:52.710 So, the Athenians claimed that they were, in a certain sense, 41:52.705 --> 41:57.505 the purest of the pure Greeks and they went to great lengths. 41:57.510 --> 42:02.100 One of their stories claims they were, as the Greek word 42:02.102 --> 42:06.192 goes autochthonous, that is, they were sprang from 42:06.193 --> 42:11.533 their own soil. In fact, they said they were in 42:11.526 --> 42:16.356 Attica before the creation of the moon. 42:16.360 --> 42:19.720 Guess you don't have to believe that, but on the other hand, 42:19.722 --> 42:23.272 it's their picture; we were always here, 42:23.266 --> 42:28.116 the original indigenous people. Their tradition, 42:28.122 --> 42:31.982 and this one is surely right, is that at an early time in 42:31.979 --> 42:35.429 their history, Attica became a refuge for 42:35.425 --> 42:40.495 people escaping what they would have regarded as the Dorian 42:40.500 --> 42:43.990 invasion. There's no doubt that people 42:43.987 --> 42:48.597 from the Peloponnesus after the fall of the Bronze Age 42:48.601 --> 42:53.391 civilizations did a lot of running away and some of them 42:53.389 --> 42:57.919 ran to Attica and were greeted and settled down there 42:57.915 --> 43:01.765 permanently. Some of the most important and 43:01.773 --> 43:06.113 most aristocratic Athenians traced their ancestry not to the 43:06.106 --> 43:10.216 Athenians who were there before the moon was created, 43:10.219 --> 43:14.169 but to people who had come in this flight sometime after the 43:14.172 --> 43:15.782 end of the Bronze Age. 43:20.619 --> 43:25.789 It is a tradition not of producing conflict but of 43:25.789 --> 43:28.809 producing harmony. These exiles, 43:28.809 --> 43:32.269 we are told, were brought into the Athenian 43:32.266 --> 43:36.376 people and lived among them as Athenians, no split, 43:36.380 --> 43:40.770 no division. Similarly, there is nothing 43:40.772 --> 43:45.962 like the helot class in Athens. There are no serfs, 43:45.956 --> 43:50.256 there is no suppressed population waiting to get at 43:50.262 --> 43:53.862 their rulers, so that there's a kind of a 43:53.861 --> 43:58.221 historical good fortune, which says Athens is going to 43:58.221 --> 44:03.781 be without internal strife. I don't mean totally but to a 44:03.783 --> 44:09.013 great degree compared to the other Greek states. 44:09.010 --> 44:12.860 Now, one important example of what happens in Athens that 44:12.860 --> 44:15.680 doesn't happen in other states is this. 44:15.679 --> 44:20.659 There's a tradition in Athens of an event called 44:20.656 --> 44:25.766 synoikismos; it's on the site so you can 44:25.769 --> 44:29.729 look it up, which means unification. 44:29.730 --> 44:35.300 It really, if you take the word apart, it means the bringing of 44:35.302 --> 44:39.542 households together. There is no set of local 44:39.540 --> 44:44.910 rebellions against the major city, no need to go to war. 44:44.909 --> 44:51.559 Now, there were obviously wars back there in the early days of 44:51.563 --> 44:58.003 the polis when the city of Athens became the dominant 44:57.998 --> 45:01.398 city, but we know so little of them, 45:01.404 --> 45:06.254 it's as though the memory has been entirely forgotten and the 45:06.254 --> 45:10.944 picture that is painted is one of everybody sort of happily 45:10.942 --> 45:15.222 living together, no conflict. 45:15.219 --> 45:18.799 Compare that to Sparta where it's obvious Sparta gained 45:18.796 --> 45:22.426 control of the Peloponnesus through war and that many of the 45:22.434 --> 45:25.214 people there were very unhappy with them, 45:25.210 --> 45:30.170 not to mention the Helots. But in neighboring Boeotia, 45:30.173 --> 45:36.733 the chief city of Thebes, traditionally was at war trying 45:36.733 --> 45:42.243 to subdue the other major cities of Boeotia, 45:42.239 --> 45:47.849 in order to make themselves the boss and they never were fully 45:47.849 --> 45:51.329 successful in this. So, Boeotia is torn, 45:51.332 --> 45:54.522 to some degree, by this internal conflict, 45:54.516 --> 45:58.706 which makes it harder for Thebes to achieve the kind of 45:58.709 --> 46:03.449 power in its own home territory that the Athenians are able to 46:03.445 --> 46:04.605 achieve. 46:09.739 --> 46:15.289 Let's take a look at the earliest society of Athens as 46:15.290 --> 46:20.230 first we come to know it. One thing about this is that 46:20.231 --> 46:24.861 the story often comes to us through people like Aristotle 46:24.855 --> 46:30.135 who liked to make things neater and put them nicely together, 46:30.139 --> 46:37.279 rather than to leave little bumps or anything like that. 46:37.280 --> 46:41.440 The society we're talking about, this earliest society, 46:41.435 --> 46:45.745 is aristocratic and remember it's important to notice the 46:45.745 --> 46:49.665 difference between aristocratic and oligarchic. 46:49.670 --> 46:53.890 Aristocratic implies means ruled by the best, 46:53.889 --> 46:58.779 and best in that time means simply best by birth. 47:37.380 --> 47:41.340 It means best by birth and that means if you're going to be in 47:41.344 --> 47:43.794 the ruling group, in a dominant, 47:43.788 --> 47:49.048 an aristocrat--the only way to get there is if your father was 47:49.052 --> 47:52.952 an aristocrat. Doesn't matter how rich you 47:52.953 --> 47:57.353 are, doesn't matter what a magnificent warrior you are, 47:57.349 --> 48:02.769 all that matters is birth and that is different from oligarchy 48:02.769 --> 48:07.299 which gives rule to a few but that usually means, 48:07.300 --> 48:12.220 I would say just about every case, that wealth plays a role 48:12.219 --> 48:17.219 that you can be one of the few in the ruling group if you're 48:17.223 --> 48:20.643 rich enough. I don't mean that they didn't 48:20.635 --> 48:24.525 have aristocrats within an oligarchy, I'm sure that they 48:24.534 --> 48:28.224 did, it's that that was not the critical element. 48:28.219 --> 48:32.079 Now, also in the Athenian aristocracy, you can imagine 48:32.078 --> 48:36.298 that most aristocrats are rich but some of them are not, 48:36.300 --> 48:41.770 and that's the distinction that matters and we will come back to 48:41.770 --> 48:46.550 that point as we see Athens move out of the aristocratic 48:46.547 --> 48:51.407 condition and into one that is more based on wealth, 48:51.410 --> 48:58.210 than it is merely on birth. Well, we are told that in 48:58.206 --> 49:02.706 the earliest times, Athens was divided up; 49:02.710 --> 49:08.580 the people of Athens were divided up into four tribes just 49:08.577 --> 49:14.237 as were all the other Ionian cities and the Athenians of 49:14.239 --> 49:18.749 course were Ionians; this is a point worth making, 49:18.754 --> 49:22.844 because most Ionians lived on the coast of Asia Minor or on 49:22.844 --> 49:26.654 the Islands of the Aegean and the Athenians were pretty 49:26.652 --> 49:30.602 much--I'm exaggerating but mostly the only Ionians on the 49:30.601 --> 49:32.981 mainland. They sort of were an 49:32.975 --> 49:36.205 interesting middling group between the Dorians of the 49:36.213 --> 49:39.703 Peloponnesus and the Greeks of other types elsewhere, 49:39.699 --> 49:43.809 and the Athenians sort of stood between the mainland where they 49:43.810 --> 49:49.340 existed, where they were, and the islands and across the 49:49.341 --> 49:50.091 seas. 49:54.260 --> 50:00.100 Each one of these four traditional tribes contained, 50:00.102 --> 50:06.522 according to this tradition, three subdivisions that were 50:06.517 --> 50:11.227 called phratres. An easy way to translate 50:11.233 --> 50:16.213 phratres is brotherhood. Notice it's again about family 50:16.207 --> 50:18.977 and birth. You are in phratres; 50:18.980 --> 50:22.750 you're in that phratres, because so is your father and 50:22.754 --> 50:25.584 you inherit it, and these phratres were 50:25.584 --> 50:29.844 very important. I should have mentioned that 50:29.838 --> 50:35.628 the tribes had important religious functions that also 50:35.626 --> 50:42.066 the army consisted of four regimens, one for each tribe. 50:42.070 --> 50:46.760 So, these tribes had great reality for the Spartans. 50:46.760 --> 50:50.170 You went not only to the religious festivals of the 50:50.167 --> 50:53.097 entire state, but you went to those only for 50:53.098 --> 50:56.978 your fellow tribesmen, which gave you a sense of 50:56.982 --> 51:01.632 belonging in that tribe, and I think that's important. 51:01.630 --> 51:05.550 The phratres were smaller versions of the same 51:05.547 --> 51:08.777 thing; phratres had religious 51:08.777 --> 51:11.587 rites of their own, and in fact, 51:11.585 --> 51:17.015 the phratres appears to have been the unit that really 51:17.021 --> 51:22.371 mattered in terms of the place where you sort of established 51:22.366 --> 51:26.046 your belonging. I mean, if somebody came 51:26.053 --> 51:29.203 along to an Athenian in the seventh century and said, 51:29.198 --> 51:32.218 you say you're an Athenian, how do I know you're an 51:32.223 --> 51:34.183 Athenian? Well, after you got through 51:34.181 --> 51:36.281 saying, well you can ask my friends, my neighbors. 51:36.280 --> 51:39.700 Yeah what do they know? You say, well how would you do 51:39.699 --> 51:42.429 it? Well, I guess come down to a 51:42.428 --> 51:47.628 meeting of my phratres, they will have a record of my 51:47.631 --> 51:52.221 being a member of that phratres and that makes 51:52.216 --> 51:56.616 me an Athenian. So that's the importance, 51:56.619 --> 52:01.049 in a way, one part of the importance of the 52:01.053 --> 52:04.763 phratres. Now, the phratres, 52:04.761 --> 52:08.101 because it was established by birth and tradition, 52:08.096 --> 52:12.666 was an aristocratic stronghold. Everywhere you can imagine, 52:12.666 --> 52:16.926 tribe, phratres, and so on, some aristocratic 52:16.928 --> 52:22.358 family or families would have had a leading role by tradition. 52:22.360 --> 52:26.250 The Greek religion did have priests, but it didn't have a 52:26.251 --> 52:30.491 separate priestly class and during the aristocratic period, 52:30.489 --> 52:34.519 and I would say probably throughout its history, 52:34.520 --> 52:37.950 Athenian religion had the priesthoods, 52:37.949 --> 52:41.989 the chief religious places in the state were held by 52:41.991 --> 52:46.271 aristocrats, which in a primitive society in itself, 52:46.269 --> 52:50.519 gives them tremendous prestige and a lot of clout. 52:50.519 --> 52:53.729 Probably, although I'm not sure we have 52:53.729 --> 52:57.549 hard evidence on this, probably the phratres 52:57.550 --> 53:01.830 fought side by side in the tribal regiments as well; 53:01.829 --> 53:05.519 of course they would always be commanded by aristocratic 53:05.519 --> 53:06.189 leaders. 53:11.269 --> 53:15.559 Another way the Athenian people were divided involved names of 53:15.559 --> 53:20.269 classes of people and we'll come back to that in another context, 53:20.269 --> 53:23.759 but one class, the highest class in the 53:23.761 --> 53:28.081 aristocratic state were the eupatrids, 53:28.079 --> 53:32.789 it means the well-born, the well-sired and it turns out 53:32.791 --> 53:36.821 that in the early polis, no surprise, 53:36.823 --> 53:41.733 they dominated the best farmland, they had the chief 53:41.727 --> 53:46.027 jobs in religion, they were the government, 53:46.034 --> 53:51.764 because as early as we can tell that there was a regime after 53:51.757 --> 53:57.417 the legendary kings are gone, the number one governmental 53:57.417 --> 54:00.407 organization, you might call it, 54:00.410 --> 54:03.790 is the council of the Areopagus; 54:03.789 --> 54:06.559 gets its name from the place where it meets. 54:06.559 --> 54:09.919 If you look to the west side of the Acropolis, 54:09.921 --> 54:14.031 immediately there's a pretty good size hill which is the 54:14.028 --> 54:17.388 Areopagus, the hill of Ares, the war god. 54:17.389 --> 54:21.529 There the council of the Areopagus met and did what it 54:21.528 --> 54:26.288 had to do, and it's clear that the members of the Areopagus in 54:26.291 --> 54:29.181 its earliest stage were noblemen. 54:29.179 --> 54:32.939 We don't know enough to know whether it was all noblemen 54:32.941 --> 54:36.831 or just the leaders of the clans or whatever, but that's where 54:36.829 --> 54:39.709 decisions were made. It's important though to 54:39.707 --> 54:42.847 realize that in these early days of the polis they 54:42.851 --> 54:46.221 probably had very little to decide and very little to do. 54:46.219 --> 54:51.119 Most of the real life of the state in the earliest days would 54:51.117 --> 54:56.257 have been out in the countryside where the overwhelming majority 54:56.260 --> 55:00.480 of the people lived. You must imagine that it is 55:00.477 --> 55:03.647 something like, nothing like precisely, 55:03.654 --> 55:08.674 but something like the feudal manners that we find in western 55:08.670 --> 55:12.600 Europe after the fall of the Roman Empire. 55:12.599 --> 55:16.869 These noblemen would typically have held a lot of 55:16.865 --> 55:21.335 land and have been well to do, have had all the powers I've 55:21.338 --> 55:24.968 described, and were looked up to and were listened to. 55:24.969 --> 55:29.079 They would have led the military units into battle when 55:29.083 --> 55:33.813 that was necessary and we know that one of the things that they 55:33.805 --> 55:38.295 did was to serve as the source of justice in the state. 55:38.300 --> 55:41.090 If there was a quarrel between a couple of guys, 55:41.090 --> 55:44.370 they would bring it to a court. You think of Hesiod, 55:44.369 --> 55:47.599 his complaints where his noblemen, his barons were 55:47.602 --> 55:50.772 crooked, but that doesn't mean they all were. 55:50.769 --> 55:53.129 In any case, that's where you went. 55:53.130 --> 55:57.770 They settled any disputes that you didn't settle by feud or by 55:57.769 --> 56:02.799 some other primitive technique. It was pretty clear that it was 56:02.802 --> 56:07.442 right to have the noblemen do it, not just because they're 56:07.440 --> 56:11.920 aristocrats but because they would know what the law was 56:11.916 --> 56:16.636 since there was no writing before the eighth century and it 56:16.636 --> 56:21.056 was very rare after that, there was nothing like a 56:21.061 --> 56:24.401 written law code until the seventh century. 56:24.400 --> 56:26.910 Before that, if you wanted to get justice 56:26.909 --> 56:30.239 you went to a nobleman, and if you wanted to go beyond 56:30.235 --> 56:32.905 that, you went to the Areopagus, 56:32.914 --> 56:36.264 which is made of noblemen. That's the picture in the 56:36.257 --> 56:38.687 earliest polis as best we can reconstruct it. 56:43.050 --> 56:47.180 Now, Aristotle tells us that beginning in the early 56:47.180 --> 56:50.240 seventh century, the date he gives us, 56:50.239 --> 56:55.239 of course we shouldn't put too much credence in it, 56:55.239 --> 56:58.939 it's too precise, but it's 683 B.C. 56:58.940 --> 57:02.550 This is the date he gives us and he tells us on that 57:02.547 --> 57:05.727 occasion, we are introduced to a new thing, 57:05.730 --> 57:11.610 magistrates are chosen from the aristocracy to do various jobs 57:11.610 --> 57:18.010 in the city. In Athens, the magistrates were 57:18.011 --> 57:24.541 called archons. It means, in the most technical 57:24.537 --> 57:28.387 sense, rulers, but it means really important 57:28.390 --> 57:34.940 magistrates in the state. One of these was called the War 57:34.940 --> 57:38.980 archon, polemarch, 57:38.980 --> 57:45.620 presumably he led the army. Next came the archon who 57:45.616 --> 57:49.566 was actually the most important archon, 57:49.574 --> 57:53.184 the one who gave his name to the year. 57:53.179 --> 57:57.739 I think I mentioned the Greeks did not have a system of dating, 57:57.738 --> 58:01.408 which has a starting point, and so you can say one, 58:01.414 --> 58:03.404 two, three, four, five. 58:03.400 --> 58:07.300 Instead, like many ancient peoples, they named the year 58:07.300 --> 58:11.710 after the leading archon, the leading magistrate of the 58:11.707 --> 58:14.327 state; Mesopotamian cities did the 58:14.333 --> 58:17.303 same thing. So that archon was 58:17.302 --> 58:22.062 called the archon eponymous, the one who gives his 58:22.057 --> 58:25.587 name to the state. So, if you wanted to know 58:25.589 --> 58:28.729 when did a thing happen, somebody would say it was in 58:28.725 --> 58:31.495 the archonship of so and so, and so and so. 58:31.500 --> 58:34.900 Well, you wouldn't have that in your head, you would have to go 58:34.900 --> 58:37.590 someplace and look it up where there was a list of 58:37.587 --> 58:40.367 archons. Anyway, he was the most 58:40.368 --> 58:43.938 important. A third archon was known 58:43.943 --> 58:47.753 as the King archon, the archon 58:47.748 --> 58:51.688 basileus. His responsibilities were 58:51.685 --> 58:56.015 mainly religious, but I should point out that all 58:56.015 --> 58:59.715 the archons, whatever else they did, 58:59.715 --> 59:02.915 every one of them also did justice, that is, 59:02.922 --> 59:07.622 they had courts to which people could come to get their quarrels 59:07.620 --> 59:10.090 settled. Sometime after that, 59:10.087 --> 59:14.727 after these three major figures that I have mentioned to you, 59:14.730 --> 59:20.870 there was established a body of men called thesmothetes, 59:20.868 --> 59:24.728 you'll see this on the list of words, 59:24.730 --> 59:29.570 which were six men whose functions were apparently 59:29.573 --> 59:35.963 strictly judicial. They presided over courts that 59:35.964 --> 59:41.414 you could to for specified purposes. 59:41.409 --> 59:45.039 Every one of these nine archons--they are 59:45.038 --> 59:49.448 sometimes referred to as the college of nine archons. 59:49.449 --> 59:52.709 They had a secretary which would have brought them up to 59:52.711 --> 59:55.441 ten, but only nine were true archons. 59:55.440 --> 1:00:03.320 They were elected from the aristocracy by the assembly of 1:00:03.320 --> 1:00:10.080 all Athenian adult males. That means mainly not 1:00:10.078 --> 1:00:14.318 aristocrats; they chose from among the 1:00:14.319 --> 1:00:17.789 aristocrats for these archons, 1:00:17.788 --> 1:00:21.738 who served for one year and not again. 1:00:21.740 --> 1:00:27.130 That's a very important concept. Nobody in Athens holds an 1:00:27.129 --> 1:00:31.849 office at this time, or as far as I can tell, 1:00:31.845 --> 1:00:36.125 at any time--well, back up, at this time, 1:00:36.133 --> 1:00:41.133 for more than a year. The only thing in town that has 1:00:41.132 --> 1:00:44.992 continuity, that can develop power and influence over a 1:00:44.985 --> 1:00:48.645 period of time, is the council of the Areopagus 1:00:48.646 --> 1:00:52.936 and that's what aristocratic and oligarchic regimes do. 1:00:52.940 --> 1:00:57.060 They are very nervous about individuals who acquire too much 1:00:57.057 --> 1:01:00.337 power, popularity, influence which will threaten 1:01:00.337 --> 1:01:02.917 the character of the aristocracy. 1:01:02.920 --> 1:01:07.950 Aristocracies--this may seem funny, but aristocracies 1:01:07.952 --> 1:01:12.012 love equality; equality among aristocrats, 1:01:12.006 --> 1:01:18.016 and then tremendous inequality between them and everybody else, 1:01:18.015 --> 1:01:22.275 sort of the way Yalies feel about things. 1:01:22.280 --> 1:01:26.990 Yalies are very nervous about anybody sticking his head up 1:01:26.989 --> 1:01:30.789 above the crowd, because the question is always 1:01:30.790 --> 1:01:34.210 why not me? You have high expectations of 1:01:34.208 --> 1:01:38.338 yourself and so sometimes unless you're invaded by later 1:01:38.339 --> 1:01:41.869 religious ideas that the Greeks didn't have, 1:01:41.869 --> 1:01:46.889 you're not humble, you're vying for honor. 1:01:46.889 --> 1:01:49.339 I always seek Greeks in front of me when I see Yalies. 1:01:52.929 --> 1:01:56.469 An aristocratic republic is what we have, 1:01:56.469 --> 1:01:59.389 not a monarchy, but a republic. 1:01:59.389 --> 1:02:02.179 Dominated insofar as it's dominated by anybody but 1:02:02.176 --> 1:02:05.016 individual aristocrats, by the areopagus, 1:02:05.019 --> 1:02:11.299 and at some point in the history of that institution it 1:02:11.302 --> 1:02:17.122 consists now of men who have been archon. 1:02:17.119 --> 1:02:21.059 The year after their archonship they automatically go 1:02:21.062 --> 1:02:25.152 into the areopagus and remain areopagites for 1:02:25.146 --> 1:02:28.106 life. Well, that gives the counsel of 1:02:28.114 --> 1:02:32.034 the areopagus even more power and influence, 1:02:32.030 --> 1:02:35.310 because they consist now, exclusively after awhile, 1:02:35.308 --> 1:02:39.238 of people who have been chosen for their individual qualities 1:02:39.243 --> 1:02:43.113 to be the leading magistrates in the state and now they will 1:02:43.112 --> 1:02:46.872 oversee what's going on, and you can bet they will be 1:02:46.872 --> 1:02:50.712 looking very carefully over the shoulders of the aristocratic 1:02:50.714 --> 1:02:54.814 archons whenever they are in power to see that they're not 1:02:54.811 --> 1:02:57.741 screwing up, but also to see that they are 1:02:57.743 --> 1:03:00.353 not getting too mighty and too powerful. 1:03:00.349 --> 1:03:05.379 The weight and the power of the Areopagus must have been 1:03:05.382 --> 1:03:09.662 enormous in this system. So the rich and the well-born, 1:03:09.663 --> 1:03:13.583 because they are pretty much the same in the early days of 1:03:13.584 --> 1:03:17.554 the polis, run the state in this official 1:03:17.548 --> 1:03:21.518 constitutional way, but I would also remind you 1:03:21.516 --> 1:03:26.516 that on their estates out there in the country they run the 1:03:26.520 --> 1:03:31.440 thing just as well with the farmers and everybody else out 1:03:31.438 --> 1:03:34.798 there, kowtowing to them and seeking 1:03:34.796 --> 1:03:38.446 their favorite. That's the kind of world that 1:03:38.446 --> 1:03:42.716 we have at the start. Then it comes to Athens as it 1:03:42.715 --> 1:03:47.585 did to every other Greek state, a little bit later it looks 1:03:47.588 --> 1:03:52.348 like in Athens, all of the change and turmoil 1:03:52.352 --> 1:03:58.412 that we've seen in Argos and Corinth and other place. 1:03:58.409 --> 1:04:03.429 If we are right in talking about something like a hoplite 1:04:03.432 --> 1:04:06.842 revolution, it occurs in Athens too. 1:04:06.840 --> 1:04:10.580 Athens grows slowly, and again late, 1:04:10.583 --> 1:04:16.363 but it begins to engage in commerce to a greater degree 1:04:16.358 --> 1:04:21.028 than before, and in ancient handcrafted 1:04:21.027 --> 1:04:26.027 manufacturing, and just as it does elsewhere, 1:04:26.031 --> 1:04:32.061 it leads to new wealth and new class distinctions, 1:04:32.059 --> 1:04:36.859 which are now based not on birth but on wealth. 1:04:36.860 --> 1:04:39.960 We hear new terms, not all of them new, 1:04:39.960 --> 1:04:44.040 a couple of them new that come into the picture. 1:04:44.039 --> 1:04:51.349 We hear about Athenians divided into different classes. 1:04:51.349 --> 1:04:54.399 One of these you remember was the Eupatridae, 1:04:54.399 --> 1:04:56.779 the well-born, that's the old story and they 1:04:56.783 --> 1:04:59.713 were really only two, those who were and those who 1:04:59.713 --> 1:05:02.743 weren't. But now we hear about people 1:05:02.743 --> 1:05:06.723 called hippeis, and it means horseman, 1:05:06.723 --> 1:05:10.243 cavalryman. Well, you can't own a horse and 1:05:10.241 --> 1:05:13.511 ride a horse unless you have a lot of money. 1:05:13.510 --> 1:05:17.680 Horses are expensive. So, there are rich people now 1:05:17.675 --> 1:05:21.435 who are these cavalrymen. Well, they've had cavalry in 1:05:21.442 --> 1:05:25.262 the past, they've always been aristocrats, but what we will 1:05:25.257 --> 1:05:29.137 see in the future is that men who are hippeis who are 1:05:29.139 --> 1:05:34.449 not necessarily aristocrats. At the bottom of the barrel 1:05:34.451 --> 1:05:38.811 we hear about people called thetes. 1:05:38.809 --> 1:05:41.999 They've always been around, they are the poor; 1:05:42.000 --> 1:05:45.680 they don't own land. They live at the mercy of 1:05:45.675 --> 1:05:47.905 chance; they work for other people. 1:05:47.909 --> 1:05:50.579 They do anything they can to stay alive. 1:05:50.579 --> 1:06:00.689 But now comes the new thing, people called zeugitai. 1:06:00.690 --> 1:06:04.290 What does it mean? It means yoke fellows. 1:06:04.289 --> 1:06:08.849 Now, there are two senses of the work yoke that seem to be 1:06:08.849 --> 1:06:11.899 involved in this. You could say that, 1:06:11.899 --> 1:06:16.729 and this is one way that makes sense, these were men who were 1:06:16.729 --> 1:06:21.559 sufficiently well off that they could own a team of oxen, 1:06:21.559 --> 1:06:25.779 two oxen, who were yoked together to pull the plow. 1:06:25.780 --> 1:06:29.680 That would make them respectably well off farmers. 1:06:29.679 --> 1:06:34.809 We are talking about people of the hoplite class. 1:06:34.809 --> 1:06:38.109 Another theory is that they were indeed named that, 1:06:38.106 --> 1:06:40.476 because they were hoplites, 1:06:40.480 --> 1:06:44.240 because they lined up in the phalanx and they were 1:06:44.243 --> 1:06:46.263 yoked together, so to speak, 1:06:46.260 --> 1:06:49.510 by their shields touching one another. 1:06:49.510 --> 1:06:52.950 It hardly matters which of the stories you prefer or 1:06:52.952 --> 1:06:56.632 whether you choose both; we're talking about the same 1:06:56.634 --> 1:06:59.794 people and that tells us the important fact, 1:06:59.789 --> 1:07:03.529 that this new class of independent family farmer has 1:07:03.532 --> 1:07:07.372 arrived in Athens, and as in other states is not 1:07:07.365 --> 1:07:11.945 satisfied with his position in the state, as his own importance 1:07:11.954 --> 1:07:15.214 to the state becomes greater and greater. 1:07:15.210 --> 1:07:19.010 We will come back to this story when we talk about Solon, 1:07:19.008 --> 1:07:22.058 but think about these changes as happening, 1:07:22.059 --> 1:07:26.149 as the next change that I want to tell you about occurs. 1:07:26.150 --> 1:07:30.060 A change that didn't happen, but if it had, 1:07:30.064 --> 1:07:34.914 it would have changed the entire course of events. 1:07:34.909 --> 1:07:38.919 According to tradition in the year 632, 1:07:38.921 --> 1:07:44.271 an Athenian nobleman who had become famous because of his 1:07:44.270 --> 1:07:50.190 victory in an athletic contest and who had married the daughter 1:07:50.192 --> 1:07:55.352 of a very wealthy and powerful tyrant in Megara, 1:07:55.350 --> 1:07:59.990 right next door to Attica. So, this guy was a young big 1:07:59.992 --> 1:08:04.212 shot of extraordinary character named, Cylon, 1:08:08.616 --> 1:08:14.166 establish a tyranny in Athens, just as his father-in-law had 1:08:14.165 --> 1:08:18.435 established one in Megara. His father-in-law's name was 1:08:18.435 --> 1:08:21.335 Theagenes. Well, as the story goes, 1:08:21.340 --> 1:08:24.750 he tried his best to gain control of the city. 1:08:24.750 --> 1:08:26.490 What did you do in Athens in the early days, 1:08:26.489 --> 1:08:28.269 if you wanted to take control of the city, 1:08:28.270 --> 1:08:31.820 is you take an armed force up onto the Acropolis, 1:08:31.820 --> 1:08:35.150 seize the Acropolis, make it your fortress, 1:08:35.149 --> 1:08:39.179 and proclaim yourself boss and see if you can make it stick. 1:08:39.180 --> 1:08:43.660 Well, he couldn't, he was resisted by enough of 1:08:43.658 --> 1:08:47.258 his opponents that he was defeated. 1:08:47.260 --> 1:08:53.250 The leader of the resistance was the family known as the 1:08:53.247 --> 1:08:56.957 Alcmaeonidae. We will hear a lot about them 1:08:56.955 --> 1:09:00.395 in this course. But they went up there, 1:09:00.402 --> 1:09:05.512 locked up Cylon and his supporters in the Acropolis, 1:09:05.508 --> 1:09:09.098 in a temple. You couldn't go into the temple 1:09:09.098 --> 1:09:12.398 for the purpose of killing somebody, that would be 1:09:12.399 --> 1:09:15.699 sacrilegious and so they were at a standstill. 1:09:15.699 --> 1:09:19.139 Still if you're inside that temple and trying to avoid being 1:09:19.140 --> 1:09:22.990 killed, you still need food and drink, and most important drink. 1:09:22.990 --> 1:09:27.630 So, how could they manage it? Well, they took a cord, 1:09:27.627 --> 1:09:30.617 tied it to the temple, held onto the cord, 1:09:30.618 --> 1:09:34.848 and went down to the well and got their water claiming that 1:09:34.849 --> 1:09:39.079 they were just as sacrosanct as they had been before, 1:09:39.080 --> 1:09:43.040 and for a while it worked. But the Alcmaeonidae said, 1:09:43.037 --> 1:09:46.317 baloney. They cut the cord and killed 1:09:46.315 --> 1:09:50.435 the Cylonians. That put an end to the 1:09:50.436 --> 1:09:55.286 Cylonian conspiracy but it brought something to 1:09:55.294 --> 1:09:58.784 Alcmaeonidae as well, a curse. 1:09:58.779 --> 1:10:04.439 The Alcmaeonids were declared accursed and driven from the 1:10:04.435 --> 1:10:06.585 city. Well, that's for the time 1:10:06.587 --> 1:10:09.967 being, later on we will hear they're back again and they're 1:10:09.970 --> 1:10:13.060 very important. But the curse continues to be 1:10:13.055 --> 1:10:16.695 attached to the family, and as we get to the last end 1:10:16.704 --> 1:10:20.844 of the last third of the fifth century and the Peloponnesian 1:10:20.844 --> 1:10:25.244 War is about to break out, the enemies of Pericles will 1:10:25.240 --> 1:10:29.920 pull out the curse of the Alcmaeonidae to use against him, 1:10:29.920 --> 1:10:35.360 because his mother was of Alcmaeonids family. 1:10:35.359 --> 1:10:38.519 For the moment, what we're talking about here I 1:10:38.522 --> 1:10:41.182 think though, is here's the first sign that 1:10:41.179 --> 1:10:44.599 we see of trouble in paradise. Nice, calm, happy 1:10:44.597 --> 1:10:49.137 synoecisized Athens has got trouble right here in River 1:10:49.143 --> 1:10:50.563 City. I mean in Athens. 1:10:54.430 --> 1:10:57.230 Why? I think we must imagine that 1:10:57.225 --> 1:11:00.595 there are the kinds of discontents that we have been 1:11:00.603 --> 1:11:04.513 talking about which find the leader in the form of a man who 1:11:04.512 --> 1:11:07.562 is an outstanding figure for some reason, 1:11:07.560 --> 1:11:11.300 who is willing to try to establish a tyranny, 1:11:11.295 --> 1:11:15.705 and use armed force to try to achieve their goals. 1:11:15.710 --> 1:11:19.480 That it fails, I think, is an indication that 1:11:19.483 --> 1:11:24.633 the same forces haven't reached the power in Athens that they 1:11:24.630 --> 1:11:28.320 had reached in Megara, Corinth, Sicyon, 1:11:28.320 --> 1:11:32.430 and places like that, but it's a warning about 1:11:32.427 --> 1:11:37.627 troubles ahead and I'll turn to those troubles in the next 1:11:37.630 --> 1:11:39.000 hour.