Part 3 (1/2)

The greatest beneficiaries of this growing power were the Athenians themselves. From many sources, a richer style of life became available in their city. One, importantly, was treasure captured from the Persians in 480/79. Major Oriental trophies found their way into the Athenian Treasury, including Xerxes' travelling throne. Despite the hostile comments on Persian 'softness' and excessive splendour, well-off Athenians responded to the styles of dress and metalwork, fine textiles and precious armour which they saw in the prizes taken from the Persian invaders. Soft, comfortable shoes even became known at Athens as 'Persian' slippers. The greatest beneficiaries were Greek horses. The invading Persians had brought the rich 'Median gra.s.s', or lucerne, with them into Greece in 490 (it was said) with Darius' army:4seeds, perhaps, came in with their cavalry's fodder. This fine 'blue gra.s.s' from the horse-studs back in Media then became a food-crop for horses on rich Greek soil.

Other new sources of luxury were imports by sea, which were a.s.sisted now by the Athenians' growing naval power abroad. It was not that the Athenians took direct control of overseas sources of supply, like imperial 'colonies': rather, their growing city-population and its centrality became the obvious magnet for traders who were exporting the good things in life. Carpets and cus.h.i.+ons came in from Carthage, fish from the h.e.l.lespont and excellent figs from Rhodes; all sorts of delicacies arrived for sale, including quant.i.ties of slaves for use down the Attic silver-mines, in the citizens' households and even on the smaller farms. The houses of the Athenian rich were magnificent and finely decorated in this era. Sadly, none survive, but we can form some idea of their interior paintings from scenes on Athenian painted pottery. In public, extreme distinctions of dress may have been moderated, at least the distinctions between the dress of the upper cla.s.s and that of others. But from c. c. 460 onwards there was not a general abandonment of stylish living by the upper cla.s.s in an age of enhanced democracy. 460 onwards there was not a general abandonment of stylish living by the upper cla.s.s in an age of enhanced democracy.5 In Syracuse, the introduction and abuse of a form of 'ostracism' in the 450s was said to have caused upper-cla.s.s dignitaries to withdraw into private luxury. In Athens, it did nothing of the sort. Even before democracy began in 508, the rich citizens had been liable to expensive services, or 'liturgies' (leitourgiai), which paid for parts of the state's naval force, for the festival-displays and the training of the choruses for theatrical plays. On these 'voluntary' contributions, much of Athenian cultural splendour depended. As the Athenians' cultural life developed under the democracy, there was ever more prestige and honour to be won by paying up as a liturgist. The rich, therefore, took a deep civic pride in their increasingly pre-eminent city, whatever they thought of its const.i.tution: peer-pressure impelled them to give generously to the liturgies and not to disgrace their families or their own fame by a poor show. Anyone who tried to dodge their turn as a liturgist would be resented by his own cla.s.s. In these cultural displays, the rich enjoyed the glory which 'mob-rule' had diluted in the political a.s.sembly. Even the ostracized Athenians remained keen to return and have another chance to s.h.i.+ne in the city-state which, basically, they loved.

By the 440s alliances existed between the Athenians and more than two hundred other Greek communities and const.i.tuted the most powerful 'empire' yet known in Greek history. In contemporary texts, we hear most about its 'enslavement' of its members and its arrogance, yet arguably it a.s.sured more Greek freedom and justice than it ever removed. Most of its member-states had their own internal conflicts developing between the options of democratic and oligarchic rule. The Athenians never intervened unasked to impose or export a democracy onto a stable allied state. Instead, they and the democrats among their subject-allies knew that Athenian power was the people's most solid support for popular rule. The tribute paid to Athens was low and adjustable and, in an allied democracy, most of it would be voted to be paid by the local rich anyway. Even after the fragile peace of 449 BC BC the threat from Persia and her western satraps was far from dead. Athenian s.h.i.+ps, meanwhile, prevented piracy on the seas and promised anti-Persian defence in a crisis, all for a relatively low yearly payment. Allied supporters of Athens were protected by a right of legal appeal against any major sentences imposed on them at home; they could demand a hearing at Athens, just as Athenians, meanwhile, could transfer cases involving an ally and themselves to their own law courts. The Athenian courts did not always side with Athenian suitors: compared with a small allied city's system of justice, the big popular Athenian juries were incorruptible and increasingly experienced. the threat from Persia and her western satraps was far from dead. Athenian s.h.i.+ps, meanwhile, prevented piracy on the seas and promised anti-Persian defence in a crisis, all for a relatively low yearly payment. Allied supporters of Athens were protected by a right of legal appeal against any major sentences imposed on them at home; they could demand a hearing at Athens, just as Athenians, meanwhile, could transfer cases involving an ally and themselves to their own law courts. The Athenian courts did not always side with Athenian suitors: compared with a small allied city's system of justice, the big popular Athenian juries were incorruptible and increasingly experienced.

Through such 'empire', Athenian power, finance and public splendour were transformed: reserves of tribute piled up in the city and it was because of them that the people could vote to rebuild the ruined temples on their Acropolis with the greatest splendour. From 449 onwards a brand new Parthenon temple was joined by an imposing entrance-gate, yet more temples and some stunningly big and precious statues of the G.o.ddess Athena: they made the hilltop the artistic wonder of the world. They are the defining monuments of 'cla.s.sical art', and even though they were built with allied tribute, there were surely allied visitors who marvelled at what had been made with a bit of their money. There would also, as nowadays, be grumblers and pessimists, but in antiquity even they would remember that the alternatives for the member-states of the Athenian alliance were the likelihood of Persian revenge or a brutal coup by their city's oligarchic fringe. An ally's worst enemy was most often another ally, a local oligarch or a long-hated ally in a city-state nearby. For most people in most places, obedience to Athens was the better alternative available to them. The Athenians themselves had few illusions. They, too, could profit individually, not least by acquiring land in their allied states, an intrusion which was later widely (not always justly) resented. Quite openly, their leading politicians endorsed the view that their Empire was 'like a tyranny'.6 So, in one sense it was, as it tended to curb the allies' most prominent individuals and to favour the people's rule instead. But the 'tyranny' also offered fair trials to its friends, freedom from Persia and freedom, too, from the plottings of oligarchic cliques who had the money and skill to overthrow their fellow citizens' free political rights. So, in one sense it was, as it tended to curb the allies' most prominent individuals and to favour the people's rule instead. But the 'tyranny' also offered fair trials to its friends, freedom from Persia and freedom, too, from the plottings of oligarchic cliques who had the money and skill to overthrow their fellow citizens' free political rights.

12.

A Changing Greek Cultural World Then, there is something which some people find amazing: in every area, the Athenians a.s.sign more to the wicked and the poor and the populists than to the Good. In this way, they are actually preserving the democracy. In every land on earth, the Best are opposed to democracy...

The 'Old Oligarch', 1.4 (probably in 425 BC) The years from the 450stothe 420s are cardinal years in the cultural history of ancient Greece. Tragedy flowered in the theatre at Athens, as we can follow in the dramas of the three great surviving tragedians (Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides). Athenian comedy followed suit, combining music and dance with jokes on political subjects. The Athenian art of this period is the supreme example of 'cla.s.sical art'. In sculpture and vase painting, the human form has an idealized realism; the proportions are finer, the poses more confident. The art in this period does not stand still, but the best of it has a contemplative naturalism which exists only in antiquity in Greek culture, and only elsewhere because of it. 'Cla.s.sical art' is not always 'severe' or 'austere', labels which are suited only to a fraction of the art of the 'cla.s.sical' era and are mostly applied because the surviving sculptures have lost their painted colour.

Since the Persian Wars there was also remarkable intellectual progress in a Greek world free of barbarian invaders. It was not even predominantly at Athens or from Athenian-born thinkers. In the Greek West, philosophy's 'way of truth', with implications for language and reality, was explored by Parmenides in a poem of obscure, but profound, imagery. He raised sceptical problems about reality which were then addressed by two thinkers, Democritus and Leucippus, who postulated indivisible particles ('atoms', the origin of our word); they even argued that these atoms moved in empty s.p.a.ces and by their collisions came together to form bigger objects. More mundanely, the symptoms and progress of diseases were described with careful observation in a book of medical Epidemics Epidemics, composed between c c. 475 and 466 BC BC.1 It contains an exact description of mumps, including its familiar effect on young males, as observed on the island of Thasos (females were not so readily infected, a fact which says much for the absence of close contact between the s.e.xes there at a young age). Mathematics also found their first theoretical exponent, Hippocrates of Chios. In Athens, the architectural plan of the Parthenon temple combined exact ratios between its parts and its whole with subtle adjustments for the visual effects of regularity. In the 440s, perhaps first in 'east Greece', unknown thinkers invented political theory and pursued the abstract avenues which it opened. Above all, a new type of prose-writing began, 'enquiry' ( It contains an exact description of mumps, including its familiar effect on young males, as observed on the island of Thasos (females were not so readily infected, a fact which says much for the absence of close contact between the s.e.xes there at a young age). Mathematics also found their first theoretical exponent, Hippocrates of Chios. In Athens, the architectural plan of the Parthenon temple combined exact ratios between its parts and its whole with subtle adjustments for the visual effects of regularity. In the 440s, perhaps first in 'east Greece', unknown thinkers invented political theory and pursued the abstract avenues which it opened. Above all, a new type of prose-writing began, 'enquiry' (histori) into the past, what we now know as history.

Unlike writers about the past in Near Eastern societies (including the writers of Hebrew scriptures), the first surviving exponent of 'history' wrote overtly in the first person, weighing evidence and expressing his own opinions. Herodotus was born in the 490s and was busy with his great enquiry into the conflicts of Greeks and Persians at least until the early 420s BC BC. He was born not in Athens but in south-west Asia, at Halicarna.s.sus, where Greek and non-Greek cultures coexisted under the wavering control of the Persian Empire. He was well born, with literary relations in his family. He is credited with political action against a tyrant in his home city, followed by exile abroad. Eventually he settled in Thurii in south Italy, a city whose foundation in the late 440s was organized on the former site of luxurious Sybaris by the Athenians. In the Greek world, historians were so often to be exiles, cut off from the daily exercise of politics and power which was so much more interesting than writing a book.

Herodotus set out to explain and to celebrate the great events of the Persian Wars against the Greeks. The enterprise led him on long digressions, both literary and personal. He travelled widely to 'enquire' and, if possible, find the truth. He went to Libya, Egypt, northern and southern Greece and even east into Babylon. He did not know any foreign languages and of course he had no convenient reference books with numbered dates which would place events in different countries side by side. He noted quite a variety of inscribed objects and monuments during his travels, but he did not always describe every detail of them correctly and he did not engage in searches for locally preserved doc.u.ments. Nonetheless, he came across several written sources, including what he took to be a 'list' of Xerxes' great invading army in 480. His main evidence was oral, what people in different places told him when he questioned them. Out of it he devised a story, but he was not simply another raconteur. Here and there, he used existing written sources, particularly the work (now lost to us) of his great predecessor, Hecataeus of Miletus, who was more inclined to 'geographic' detail than to political 'history'. He also seems to have used the poem of Aristeas, the Greek who had travelled into Central Asia c. c. 600 600 BC BC. Herodotus was explicitly critical of many of the oral stories which he himself reported from his oral sources but could not endorse.

Herodotus brought strong, personal interpretations to the complex sources he interrelated. The great themes of freedom, justice and luxury are very prominent in his 'enquiry': he shared the Greek view of the battles of 480/79 between Greeks and Persians as battles for freedom and for a life under the impersonal, just rule of law, and it is his history, above all, which has immortalized them in that light. The final speech in his 'enquiry' dwells on the contrasts between the hardy, impoverished Persians who had embarked on an age of conquest and the 'soft' luxury of peoples who live in the 'soft' plains and become others' subjects. Particular themes were evident to him in human life: that 'pride goes before a fall' and that extreme good fortune leads to a debacle, that truly outrageous behaviour often gets its deserts, or retribution, that human affairs are very unstable, that the customs of different societies differ and that some, but not all, of our cherished behaviour is therefore relative to the society in which we happen to live. These beliefs are still valid in our own world.

However, Herodotus also accepted that the G.o.ds are active in human affairs and that, through oracles, they speak truly to men. Dreams and visions are very important for individuals in his history: he knows that some of his contemporaries refuse to accept the truth of oracles, but he is most indignant at their refusal. He accepts, as oracles did too, that the G.o.ds may punish a descendant for the deeds of an ancestor. This belief in 'hereditary guilt' is most centrally a.s.sociated with the idea of an 'archaic age' ('archaic' otherwise being an art-historical term for the sculptures and paintings before the more 'human' cla.s.sical style of the 490s onwards). 'Retribution', therefore, and 'inevitability' are still independent forces in Herodotus' way of writing and thinking. But they coexist with a dense range of human motives, including spite and covetousness of which he is a connoisseur. Herodotus can also relate a community's development to its physical setting, its laws and customs and its rising population. But he thinks more readily in individual, human terms.

The results are amazing in their range and human variety. Like eastern Greek settlers and travellers in the previous century, Herodotus accepts that Libya, Egypt and the world of the Scythian nomads are the extreme points of contrast with the world of the Greeks. He digresses on all three, while returning, justly, to his main theme of the Persian expansion which touched on these peoples too. He is interested in so much in other cultures, in their marriage-practices, in questions of health and diet, religious rites and styles of burial. In Egypt, especially, he reasons with cogency from his evidence, though he tends to see the Egyptian world as a polar opposite to Greece and thus misunderstands it. As we have lost so much other east Greek debating and writing conducted c. c. 480460, we have to compare him with later writers, thereby making him seem more 'modern' than he probably seemed to his contemporaries. His religious outlook and language would suggest otherwise. So, too, would his politics, for Herodotus sympathized with the pa.s.sing 'Panh.e.l.lenic' world of an international Greek upper cla.s.s, Cimon and his like. To them, the enemies were treachery, spontaneous violence and the lower cla.s.ses: the wars between Greek states since the 460s were a profoundly regrettable outcome. Admiring liberty, Herodotus was not an uncritical democrat: the Spartans are frequently seen in a favourable light in his 'enquiries'. 480460, we have to compare him with later writers, thereby making him seem more 'modern' than he probably seemed to his contemporaries. His religious outlook and language would suggest otherwise. So, too, would his politics, for Herodotus sympathized with the pa.s.sing 'Panh.e.l.lenic' world of an international Greek upper cla.s.s, Cimon and his like. To them, the enemies were treachery, spontaneous violence and the lower cla.s.ses: the wars between Greek states since the 460s were a profoundly regrettable outcome. Admiring liberty, Herodotus was not an uncritical democrat: the Spartans are frequently seen in a favourable light in his 'enquiries'.

Naturally, Herodotus visited Athens, probably in or just before 438/7 (to judge from a comment about the entrance-way to their Acropolis). He is even said to have received an enormous cash prize for his Histories Histories, as voted by the a.s.sembly. He talked with important Athenians, but he was already in his mid-fifties. By the early 430s abstract theorizing about power and inter-state relations was current in the city among members of the younger generation, but it was not Herodotus' way of looking on the world. Nor was the new subject of political theory, although Herodotus had picked up one example of it, a clever 'debate' among Persians about the merits of alternative const.i.tutions, including democracy, set in 522 BC BC; it was a witty fake, but old Herodotus believed it.2 This new, hard cleverness underlies an accelerating change in the intellectual and cultural outlook of the big names in Athens. This new, hard cleverness underlies an accelerating change in the intellectual and cultural outlook of the big names in Athens.

The victories over the Persians, then the years of expanding empire had helped to root Athenians' self-confidence and trust in their democracy. How far, then, was the culture of the Athens which Herodotus visited a democratic culture, shaped by the equalities of a political system based on equal popular voting? It was certainly not a level, egalitarian society. Culturally, it was still a place where the upper cla.s.s enjoyed their hunting and cultivated their s.e.xual advances with gifts and protestations to the ever-fickle young boys. Hunting scenes and hunters' 'love gifts' happen to disappear from Athenian painted pottery after c. c. 470, but this change is only a fact about a taste in pottery decoration; it is not evidence for a new caution and a lack of openness about these old aristocratic pursuits. In the evenings socially select groups of males still dined and drank luxuriously in their 'men's rooms' and sang the aristocratic anti-populist songs of the past. Were these old-style 470, but this change is only a fact about a taste in pottery decoration; it is not evidence for a new caution and a lack of openness about these old aristocratic pursuits. In the evenings socially select groups of males still dined and drank luxuriously in their 'men's rooms' and sang the aristocratic anti-populist songs of the past. Were these old-style symposia symposia, though, on the defensive in the new age of 'mob-rule'? A much-discussed group of Attic drinking-cups, dated to the early fifth century, shows paintings of men wearing effeminate dress, apparently as cross-dressers. They have been interpreted as a reflection of an upper-cla.s.s social life which had adopted this transvest.i.te style as a symptom of 'anxiety', now that its own supremacy was under stress. But 'anxiety' was not obviously the mood of Athenian aristocrats at the time. Taking the long view, they believed they needed only to wait until their political hour dawned again. Militarily, meanwhile, they were indispensable members of the cavalry which even the most committed democrats were about to increase sixfold and honour with provisions for a public 'insurance-repayment' on any registered horse which an upper-cla.s.s warrior lost in battle. Probably, the cross-dressing simply portrays revels in honour of Dionysus.

On other cups, we see the young differently, as owners of exotic cheetahs and hunting leopards. These superior young shockers were not 'anxious': even in the democratic age, the cultural life of the theatre and the festivals still depended on the spending of their male upper cla.s.s. In Attica's social infrastructure, too, not so much had changed since the aristocrats of the sixth century BC BC. If Herodotus had asked a male Athenian who he was, he would have named his father and his deme, as Cleisthenes' reforms had emphasized. But he would also have named his 'phratry', or 'brotherhood', as in the older times, and only then, if at all, his members.h.i.+p of one of the democracy's new ten tribes. Even under the democracy, aristocratic families retained a significant power of veto on candidates for inclusion in 'brotherhoods'.

In the early 430s Herodotus would have talked to young Athenians of n.o.ble birth, people who still styled themselves the 'good' as opposed to the vulgar 'bad'. Not so very far below the surface, these people hoped that one day democracy would simply go away, but from the 470s to the 430s conquest abroad and the huge increase in the numbers and tribute of Athens' allies helped meanwhile to compensate for their discontent. The gains of Empire blurred cla.s.s-tension for both the rich and the poor. Empire brought new land-holdings and revenues abroad for both cla.s.ses of Athenian, and, as the rich well knew, it was on the poor and their hard days as oarsmen that this Empire's safety rested meanwhile. Vital though the cavalry might be against the Theban 'pigs' and their hors.e.m.e.n or scattered Spartan ravagers of the land, horses, as Homer's Odyssey Odyssey remarked, were no use on islands overseas. For the 'island empire', what mattered was the trireme. Fleets of a hundred s.h.i.+ps or more were now a commonplace in most years. Although some of the rowers were hired foreigners, the bulk were lower-cla.s.s Athenians who had ama.s.sed years of practice beyond any possible enemy's. On midsummer expeditions these rowers were far tougher than anyone nowadays. Their modern re-creators had to drink about two pints of water for each hour of rowing (the modern oarsmen of a trireme would thus need nearly two tons of water in a ten-hour day, and yet an ancient trireme could not carry a big water supply). 'Almost all the water consumed', writes the modern trireme's mastermind, 'was sweated off, with the rowers feeling relatively little need to urinate. Much of this sweat dripped onto the lowest row, making life particularly unpleasant for them. The smell in the hold became so unpleasant that it had to be washed out with sea water at least once every four days (but ancient Athenians may have been more tolerant).' The body must evaporate fluid to stay cool and so 'ventilation is an absolute necessity, but it is barely adequate for the lower of the three rows'. remarked, were no use on islands overseas. For the 'island empire', what mattered was the trireme. Fleets of a hundred s.h.i.+ps or more were now a commonplace in most years. Although some of the rowers were hired foreigners, the bulk were lower-cla.s.s Athenians who had ama.s.sed years of practice beyond any possible enemy's. On midsummer expeditions these rowers were far tougher than anyone nowadays. Their modern re-creators had to drink about two pints of water for each hour of rowing (the modern oarsmen of a trireme would thus need nearly two tons of water in a ten-hour day, and yet an ancient trireme could not carry a big water supply). 'Almost all the water consumed', writes the modern trireme's mastermind, 'was sweated off, with the rowers feeling relatively little need to urinate. Much of this sweat dripped onto the lowest row, making life particularly unpleasant for them. The smell in the hold became so unpleasant that it had to be washed out with sea water at least once every four days (but ancient Athenians may have been more tolerant).' The body must evaporate fluid to stay cool and so 'ventilation is an absolute necessity, but it is barely adequate for the lower of the three rows'.3 None of the n.o.ble 'fine and fair' would have lasted in this heat for long. Those who did were the Empire's ultimate sanction, and it was no use calling them a 'naval mob' and expecting them not to vote when they came home. None of the n.o.ble 'fine and fair' would have lasted in this heat for long. Those who did were the Empire's ultimate sanction, and it was no use calling them a 'naval mob' and expecting them not to vote when they came home.

For us, the most distinctive fact about the Athenian culture Herodotus visited is that it was a slave-society. Some 55,000 adult male citizens owned some 80,000120,000 other human beings, 'objects' whom they could buy and sell. These slaves (almost all non-Greeks) were central to the Athenians' economy, working in the silver-mines (often down appallingly narrow tunnels) and also in agriculture where contemporary comedies present them to us as a normal part of quite modest Athenian families' property. The prices of untrained slaves appear to have been low, because supply was abundant, from war or raids on barbarian Thrace or inland Asia Minor. Cheap slavery was a major support to the cla.s.s-distinctions and the purchasing-power for luxuries among the better-off Athenians. However, Herodotus would not have remarked unduly on this fact of life. Slaves were andrapoda andrapoda, 'man-footed beasts'; they were ubiquitous in the Greek communities into whom Herodotus enquired. He never queried the justice of this fact.

To many of us, the absence of political partic.i.p.ation for citizen-women would also be striking. The Athenians were typical among Greeks in ensuring that women could not vote; women could not even give evidence in a law court in their own person. Among the Athenians, their capacity to buy or sell was exceptionally limited; their choice in marriage was not entirely free and, essentially, they were in the power of their male 'guardian', or kyrios kyrios. These rules were for women's 'protection' (although modern women look on them from a different perspective). On a longer view, it is a real question how far an everyday Athenian woman's status differed from a slave's. Unlike a slave, she could never escape her condition. She did, however, bring a returnable dowry with her, whereas slaves were bought for a non-returnable price. A woman's relative degree of 'freedom' depended greatly on her social cla.s.s by birth or marriage. Humble women did work visibly in the fields (they had their own harvesting-songs and there were women called poastriai poastriai, who were gra.s.s-cutters and perhaps weeders),4 but, as in many modern societies, the visibility of women outdoors was not at all a sign of social equality. They did not sit outdoors at leisure, drink in a shop or hang around in public s.p.a.ces, any more than the hard-working Berber women in modern Morocco who work in the fields, return home through the village and cook, weave and cope with children indoors. In Attica, respectable households in any case kept their women indoors, to dreary tasks like weaving and spinning. 'Shopping' was left to slaves, although a free woman might go out to fetch water from a public spring: we hear of a 'women's but, as in many modern societies, the visibility of women outdoors was not at all a sign of social equality. They did not sit outdoors at leisure, drink in a shop or hang around in public s.p.a.ces, any more than the hard-working Berber women in modern Morocco who work in the fields, return home through the village and cook, weave and cope with children indoors. In Attica, respectable households in any case kept their women indoors, to dreary tasks like weaving and spinning. 'Shopping' was left to slaves, although a free woman might go out to fetch water from a public spring: we hear of a 'women's agora agora', or market-area, but it was a market where a man could buy a woman, as a slave and s.e.x-object. When Pericles told Athenian war-widows in his great Funeral Speech 'not to prove inferior to their nature' and to be talked about as little as possible, he was not being idiosyncratic. Respectable Athenian women did have important roles as priestesses in some of the Athenian cults of the G.o.ds. But the political limits were absolute. They did not belong to a phratry, although their fathers did want them to be married off to an Athenian citizen-husband. Since 451, therefore, a man's Athenian citizens.h.i.+p depended on having both a citizen-father and a mother of citizen-birth too. But this new requirement did not bring women a new freedom of action. It simply ensured that Athenians' daughters were seldom 'married out' to foreigners or left as spinsters, a burden on their brothers and fathers. In public, a married Athenian woman was still only called 'the wife of...'; to use her own name would imply she was a prost.i.tute.

In the late 340s we find an Athenian orator reminding a citizen-jury that 'we have ”courtesans” [hetairai] for pleasure, prost.i.tutes for everyday attention to our bodies and wives for the production of children legitimately and for being a trustworthy guardian of the contents of our household'.5 Unlike some of his modern readers (in England, not France), the jurors were expected to take him literally. Some husbands did, of course, love their wives, but the orator Lysias (a foreign resident) loved his Unlike some of his modern readers (in England, not France), the jurors were expected to take him literally. Some husbands did, of course, love their wives, but the orator Lysias (a foreign resident) loved his hetaira hetaira enough to have her initiated into the Eleusinian mystery-cult for her own good beyond the grave (it was, nonetheless, considered a mark of a 'complaining man' to wonder, when a enough to have her initiated into the Eleusinian mystery-cult for her own good beyond the grave (it was, nonetheless, considered a mark of a 'complaining man' to wonder, when a hetaira hetaira kissed him, if she was kissing him sincerely, from the heart). Those Athenian males who could afford all three types of woman would have agreed with the orator in question, while adding that in youth (and, perhaps, still), they had young boys for compet.i.tive pursuit, idealization and quick s.e.xual pleasure without the risk of a baby. They never met an educated Athenian woman, because no women were taught in an Athenian school with the boys. No Athenian women joined in the all-male discussions of philosophers and their pupils. A few women did learn to read and write; kissed him, if she was kissing him sincerely, from the heart). Those Athenian males who could afford all three types of woman would have agreed with the orator in question, while adding that in youth (and, perhaps, still), they had young boys for compet.i.tive pursuit, idealization and quick s.e.xual pleasure without the risk of a baby. They never met an educated Athenian woman, because no women were taught in an Athenian school with the boys. No Athenian women joined in the all-male discussions of philosophers and their pupils. A few women did learn to read and write; hetairai hetairai could pick up more, but only like many Edwardian aristocratic ladies, by listening to male talk at parties. Only the most eccentric philosophers, like Pythagoras in the Greek West, were credited with having female pupils as regular hearers. Like vegetarianism, it was a sign that they were dotty. could pick up more, but only like many Edwardian aristocratic ladies, by listening to male talk at parties. Only the most eccentric philosophers, like Pythagoras in the Greek West, were credited with having female pupils as regular hearers. Like vegetarianism, it was a sign that they were dotty.

Outside Athens, by contrast, Herodotus' Histories Histories are full of stories of active women, wise or vengeful, but their setting is usually in a monarchical (or 'tyrannical') family world. In the different setting of a democratic community, the restrictions on Athenian citizen-women would surely have impressed him, as they were such a contrast with the Spartan women whom, as a visitor, he would have seen dancing naked. Among the male Athenian citizens, Herodotus would have noted the time given freely to democratic business, to a.s.semblies (about four times a month), to the yearly council (up to twice in a lifetime) and to jury-service (for those on the yearly list of 6,000 volunteers). He did not think especially highly of the wisdom of a democratic crowd, but he would have had to respect the citizens' dedication. When he visited, the Athenians' Acropolis was being lavishly rebuilt with the support of the annual tribute received from their allies. Yet publicly elected committees were supervising all these public works and upholding the details of financial accountability on which the democracy insisted. Nothing so thorough and public would have been going on in his own Halicarna.s.sus or in aristocratic Thessaly. are full of stories of active women, wise or vengeful, but their setting is usually in a monarchical (or 'tyrannical') family world. In the different setting of a democratic community, the restrictions on Athenian citizen-women would surely have impressed him, as they were such a contrast with the Spartan women whom, as a visitor, he would have seen dancing naked. Among the male Athenian citizens, Herodotus would have noted the time given freely to democratic business, to a.s.semblies (about four times a month), to the yearly council (up to twice in a lifetime) and to jury-service (for those on the yearly list of 6,000 volunteers). He did not think especially highly of the wisdom of a democratic crowd, but he would have had to respect the citizens' dedication. When he visited, the Athenians' Acropolis was being lavishly rebuilt with the support of the annual tribute received from their allies. Yet publicly elected committees were supervising all these public works and upholding the details of financial accountability on which the democracy insisted. Nothing so thorough and public would have been going on in his own Halicarna.s.sus or in aristocratic Thessaly.

Nonetheless, the architecture and the sculpture were not celebrations of democracy. A strengthened sense of political freedom underpinned their artists' reasoned vision, but it did not provoke 'political sculptors': there were no representations of ma.s.s-meetings or 'crowd solidarity'. Up on the Acropolis, the female supporting figures of the ancient Erechtheion temple are a famous image of cla.s.sical Athens nowadays, but arguably they were sculpted to represent women pouring libations to the dead of Cecrops, the Athenians' legendary king, whose tomb lay below them. The Parthenon's fine sculpted frieze did not celebrate democracy. It showed elements of a festival-procession which had begun long before Cleisthenes: it included the mythical hero, Erichthonius, and, on one modern view, one section showed the heroic sacrifice of the legendary king's mythical daughters who had died to save the city in war.