The Associations of Classical Athens: The Response to Democracy

364 Pages·1999·23.95 MB·English

by  Nicholas F. Jones

The Associations of Classical Athens
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The Associations of Classical Athens
The Response to Democracy
Nicholas F. Jones
New York Oxford
Oxford University Press
1999
Oxford University Press
Oxford New York
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Copyright © 1999 by Oxford University Press, Inc.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Jones, Nicholas F.
The associations of Classical Athens : the response to democracy /
Nicholas F. Jones.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-19-512175-9
1. Associations, institutions, etc.—Greece—Athens—Political
aspects. 2. Athens (Greece)—Social life and customs. 3. Political
participation—Greece—Athens—Societies, etc. 4. Greece—
Civilization—To 146 B.C. 5. Democracy—Greece—Athens.
I. Title.
DF277.J66 1998
938—dc21 97-46502
9 8 7 6 5 4 3 21
Printed in the United States of America
on acid-free paper
To Marilyn
and our children
Nathaniel, Emily, Deborah, and Alice
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Preface
Comprehensive study of the association in ancient Greece has lagged well behind
the stupendous progress made in recent decades in our understanding of Greek
public life and especially, where the present study is concerned, the institutions of
Classical Athens. The reasons are not hard to discover. For one thing, the "associa-
tion" in its ancient Greek context is an intractable phenomenon, difficult to define
and, once defined, difficult to study owing to the scarcity and peculiar character-
istics of the primary evidence. Those groups, furthermore, that we can satisfy our-
selves are adequately labeled "associations" bear little resemblance to the groups
that go by that name in more recent historical or living societies. Some, indeed the
most important by far, are not, as one might expect, freestanding, independent pri-
vate organizations but rather the internally organized segments of the state itself, as
in the case of the deme association, the "constitutionalized" village of Kleisthenic
Athens. Others bear signs of a strong kinship orientation, with membership some-
times confined to a few closely related families, new members added not by recruit-
ment but by descent in the male line. Thus the expectations awakened by the mod-
ern notion of "voluntary association" have very little application to the ancient
Greek, and certainly to the ancient Athenian, case. So, difficulty in coming to grips
with this slippery subject may, I suggest, help explain why the only two existing in-
clusive studies of Greek associations date to around the turn of the twentieth cen-
tury and, more pertinently for the present case, account for the total absence of a
comprehensive examination of the subject matter of this book—the associations of
classical Athens.
The time is ripe for a work of this kind. The last twenty years have witnessed
viii Preface
the appearance of several exemplary publications devoted to some of the individual
"associations" comprehended within the scope of this study. While the authors and
titles of these (and other) studies all appear among the overview of the secondary
literature at the close of the Introduction, it is appropriate that I acknowledge here
my particularly great debt to the two monographs (1975 and 1986) of John S. Traill
dealing systematically with the organization of Attica, to the comprehensive politi-
cal and social study of the demes by David Whitehead (1986), and to the even more
recent general treatment of the phratry by S. D. Lambert (1993). Were it not for the
existence of these fundamental works, any attempt to grasp the "big picture" would
not have been possible. At the same time, furthermore, since, as the subtitle of my
book indicates, my goal is to examine for the first time the Athenian associations
with respect to their "response to democracy," it is most fortunate that we now pos-
sess so much better an understanding of that democracy, particularly in respect to
those features of the government with which, I will argue, the associations stood in a
responsive or sort of dovetailing relationship. Here, too, I must acknowledge a spe-
cific debt by name—to both the more specialized and the more exoteric writings on
the Athenian government by Mogens Herman Hansen.
The project was launched at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton,
New Jersey, where, with the status of visitor, I spent the 1984—1985 academic year
on leave from my post at the University of Pittsburgh. It was at the Institute that I
commenced the usual spadework required by a project of this kind and, more cru-
cially, conceived in embryonic form the ideas that were eventually to underlie the
design and ultimate purpose of my investigations. That the thesis of the study should
have begun to emerge at so early a stage was in part due to a lucky coincidence.
Some of my time was devoted, in the hope of gaining a wider context for my study,
to reading some of the more recent secondary literature dealing with the associa-
tions of nonclassical historical and living societies. Among other revelations, it be-
came increasingly clear that in advanced societies associations, voluntary and oth-
erwise, often bear a significant, indeed an organic, complementary relationship with
the central government and its functioning. Concurrently, in the course of an effort
to catch up with the most recent scholarship on the Athenian democracy, my read-
ings of Hansen's groundbreaking articles on the Athenian democratic government
— especially those concerning aspects of participation—made clear the low level
of involvement by the citizen body in this nominally inclusive and egalitarian
regime. At once, I began to explore the hunch, prompted by the nonclassical evi-
dence, that low participation in the democracy was somehow counterbalanced by
the engagement of the de facto disfranchised in their associations. Methodologi-
cally, the investigation was put on a sounder footing when I realized that the phe-
nomenon of association could be defined by the usage of the ancient Athenians
themselves, exemplified in a law of Solon and in certain key passages in Aristotle's
writings. Over time, too, the simple fact of nonparticipation expanded to include
other modes of estrangement or dissatisfaction originating in the distinctive fea-
tures of the democracy—its egalitarianism, direct rule, and, beyond the citizen
class, total exclusion of all but the adult male lineal descendants of the citizen caste.
Eventually, the associations taken as a whole, despite their variations in origin,
structure, and composition, all seemed to share in common a feature or features
Preface ix
shaped by some perceived deficit of the demokratia. Now, a decade later, the book
bears the subtitle "The Response to Democracy."
Debts of gratitude have been incurred in the course of my work, not the least of
which is an institutional one. To the National Endowment for the Humanities, and
ultimately to the taxpayers of the United States of America, I am thankful for the
award of the senior fellowship that made possible my full year of study at the Insti-
tute. Since this book—the end—product of the research supported by the fellowship
—aims to shed new light on the democracy from which our own form of govern-
ment descends, I sincerely hope that my fellow Americans will think that they have
received not only a good but an appropriate return as well on their investment.
At the Institute, Christian Habicht sponsored my year in residence at the
School of Historical Studies (and, again, a brief return visit in the summer of 1994)
and generously shared his knowledge on a number of topics as well as offering
helpful advice and extending cordial hospitality. To Homer Thompson I am grate-
ful for searching explorations of several subjects relating to the Athenian Agora,
for friendly comraderie and encouragement, and for giving up some of his leisure
time to introduce my wife and me to the historical sites and monuments of the
Princeton area. Special thanks to a visiting member, Malcolm Errington, of Philipps—
Universitat in Marburg, Germany, for productive conversations in the epigraphic li-
brary, for interest in my project, and for making possible happy gatherings of our
two families. During the year, I also profited from contact with the School of Social
Science through exchanges with faculty and visiting members and attendance at
various presentations. I am particularly grateful to the School and to the facilitator
of its luncheon seminar at that time, Clifford Geertz, for the opportunity to present a
paper entitled "The Role of Associations in the Athenian Democracy" in the spring
of 1985.
Since my stay at the Institute, I have delivered presentations on various aspects
of the topic to the general meeting of the American Philological Association and,
back at the University of Pittsburgh, to the Department of History, the local chapter
of the Archaeological Institute of America, and the Department of Classics. Audi-
ences on each of those occasions are here thanked for any productive questioning or
helpful comments offered in response to my presentation. Anonymous readers pro-
vided valuable corrections (notably concerning the chronology of certain documents
of the orgeones), references to recent or forthcoming publications of relevance, and,
no less valuably, an advance inkling of the reception my ideas may receive. With re-
gard to the last point, while it is clear that others might have approached my subject
differently, if the ultimate outcome of the publication of my book, even if that out-
come includes controversy, proves to be a significant advance in our understanding
of ancient Greece's first city, I will have achieved my purpose.
To mention a far more remote, but no less important, debt, I would be remiss if
I failed to acknowledge the formative impact on this book of my two academic
years' study in Greece under the auspices of the American School of Classical Stud-
ies during the 1970s. Were it not for my travels throughout Greece, my extended
stay in Athens, and my residence in the village of Herakleion in the Argolid as a
field excavator with the University of California, Berkeley, expedition to Nemea,
this project could not have been conceived, much less brought to completion. While