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Revolution and Society in Greek Sicily and Southern Italy PDF

132 Pages·1992·3.068 MB·English
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Shlomo Berger Revolution and Society in Greek Sicily and Southern Italy Historia Einzel- schriften 71 Franz steiner Verlag stuttgart SHLOMO BERGER REVOLUTION ANDS OCIETY ING REEK SICILY ANDS OUTHERN ITALY CIP-Titelaufnahme derD eutschen Bibliothek Berger, Selomo: Revolution ands ociety in Greek Sicily andS outhern Italy / Shlomo Berger. –Stuttgart: Steiner, 1992 (Historia: Einzelschriften; H.7 1) Zugl.: Jerusalem, Hebrew Univ., Diss., 1987 ISBN3 –515–05959–8 NE: Historia / Einzelschriften Jede Verwertung des Werkes außerhalb der Grenzen des Urheberrechtsgesetzes ist unzulässig unds trafbar. Dies gilt insbesondere fürÜ bersetzung, Nachdruck, Mikrover- filmung oderv ergleichbare Verfahren sowie fürd ieS peicherung inD atenverarbeitungs- anlagen. © 1992 by Franz Steiner Verlag Wiesbaden GmbH, Sitz Stuttgart. Druck: Druckerei Peter Proff, Eurasburg. Printed in Germany CONTENTS Acknowledgements 7 Introduction 9 Part I: Stasis in Sicily andS outhern Italy: Case Studies 15 1 Acragas 15 2 Catane 18 3 Croton 19 4 Cumae 22 5 Gela 23 6 Leontinoi 25 7 Locri Epizephyrii 27 8 Megara Hyblaea 27 9 Metapontum 28 10 Pithecoussai 28 11 Rhegion 29 12 Selinus 30 13 Sybaris/Thurii 31 14 Syracuse 34 15 Taras 52 16 Zancle/Messana 54 Part II: The Constituents of Stasis: Systematic Analysis 57 1 Causes of Stasis 57 2 Social, Political andE conomic Structures 62 3 Greeks, Natives andF oreigners 74 4 Violence andt he Armed Forces 88 5 The Stasis in Process 93 Conclusion 106 Bibliography 110 6 Contents Tables 116 1 List of Staseis 116 2 Non-Civic Interference 117 3 Mercenaries 119 4 Exile 120 5 “Class Conflict” 121 6 Metabole 121 7 Ethnic Struggle 122 8 Economic Factors 122 ACKNOLEDGEMENTS This book is the revised version of a Ph. D. thesis submitted to the Hebrew University ofJ erusalem in 1987. Prof. David Asheri served asm yt hesis advisor, Prof. Moshe Amita ndt hel ate Prof. Menahem Stern werem ye xaminers. Amita ndA sheri also read thep resent manuscript andm adem any useful suggestions. I would like to express my gratitude to them for all their help and support. Prof. Hans-Joachim Gehrke (Freiburg imB reisgau) readt hem anuscript, commented oni t ando ffered his help in thep rocess of completing the book. Prof. L. deB lois (Nijmegen) read the manuscript and discussed it with me. Dr. H. Cotton (Jerusalem) and Dr. J. Price (Middlebury, Vermont) shared with me their scholarly knowledge and offered a friendly hand when necessary. Dr. D. Niederland and R. Lemm dedicated many hours, helping mei nv arious ways. Prof. K. Raaflaub guided met hrough thel astp hase and suggested useful changes. Dr. Loren J. Samons II assisted in preparing the manuscript for publication, James Kennelly in reading the proofs. All deserve my deepest thanks. I would like to dedicate this book to myp arents. June 1991 Shlomo Berger INTRODUCTION In 415 B. C. Alcibiades tried to persuade the Athenian demos to sail to Sicily. Among hisa rguments inf avor of such ane xpedition, soT hucydides tells us,w ast he following: “The Sicilian cities have swollen populations made up of all sorts of mixtures, andt here arec onstant changes andr earrangements in thec itizen body ... No one has adequate armor for his ownp erson, or a proper establishment on land. Eachm ans pends hist imet rying tog etf romt hep ublic whatever het hinks hec ang et, either byc lever speeches orb yo pens edition ... Thec hances aret hatt heyw ill make separate agreements withu sa s soona s wec ome forward with attractive suggestions, especially if they are, as weu nderstand thec ase, in a state of violent party strife.”1 Alcibiades’words are echoed by modern scholars. M. I. Finley suggests the following asa reason for“ thef ailure of theS icilian Greeks tom akea success of the city-state wayo f life”: “Their behavior wasp rofoundly influenced andd isturbed by the fact that they lived in ana lien environment. The Carthaginians, Etruscans and others wereo utside butt oon ear ath and; theS icels, Sicans andE lymians wereo nt he island itself and,i nt hec aseo f Syracuse atl east, within their ownt erritorial sphere ... Thent here wast hep eculiar heritage oft hef irst tyrants which Alcibiades hads tressed. Toom anyS icilian Greeks wereu prooted, sometimes moret hano nce, andt here were toom anym ercenaries. Tof unction properly asa ni ndependent self-governing body, thec ity-state hadt o have a strong sense of community andh adt o maintain a delicate equilibrium between the“ few”andt he“ many”, between ther icha ndt hep oor. These the Sicilian cities failed to achieve.”2 Two factors prominently influencing the history of the Sicilian and southern Italian city-states emerge from historical evidence as well as from contemporary research. Oned erives fromt heu nique geographical, social ande thnic characteristics of Sicily. The other is the unstable organization of the polis itself, which was manifested in stasis. The analysis andd iscussion of these two factors will be the subject of this book. Revolution andc ivil strife were endemic to theG reek polis. Many historians and philosophers in antiquity, Plato and Aristotle among them, devoted a substantial portion oft heir workt ot hep roblem of stasis which wast heo utcome oft hei deological ands ocial structure of thec ity-state. Thed evelopment of thep olis andi tsp olitics were bound upw ithc ivil strife ande vena ccommodated itt oa d egree, ati rregular intervals, as can be found in the Athenaion Politeia, where the history of the Athenian constitution is periodicized according to stasis. Stasis wass ucha ni ntegral feature of life in the polis that it not only survived the collapse of the “classical”polis, but also resurfaced in the Hellenistic andR oman polis. 1 Thuc. 6.17.2–4. 2 Finley (1979) 48; seea lso Westlake (1958).

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