Lecture 14 - From Pisistratid to Cleisthenes Flashcards
Factions in Athens - events of 508/7 BCE
Isagoras elected archon; Cleisthenes gains popular support; Isagoras asks for Spartan help; Spartan King, Cleomenes intervenes; Cleisthenes leaves Athens; Isagoras and Cleomenes attempt to seize power; Athenians attack and expel them; Cleisthenes returns.
A popular revolt? Hdt
“These men with their factions fell to contending for power, Cleisthenes was getting the worst of it in this dispute and took the people into his party”.
A popular revolt? Aristotle
“The people having taken control of affairs, Cleisthenes was their leader and was head of the people.
Cleisthenes’ reforms - Solon’s system
4 property groups - wealth determines access to political office, 4 tribes (clans), council of 400 (100 from each tribe), magistrates: especially the 9 archons, areopagus council has say in laws, legal cases…
Cleisthenes’ reforms - his tribes
10 new tribe, 139 demes which are divided geographically (city, coast and inland). Each tribe is assigned demes from each trittyes so that each tribe contains about 1/10th of the population of Attica from at least three different regions of Attica.
Cleisthenes’ reforms - government in Athens
Council of 500 - 50 from each tribe, can only serve twice, can prepare decisions but final say goes to assembly of all citizens.
Ostracisms - most unpopular individual exiled for 10 years.
Aristotle’s say on Cleisthenes’ reforms
“These reforms made the constitution much more democratic than that of Solon”.
Cleisthenes’ reforms - Deme politics
‘Local government’ - introduction of demarchs, deme assemblies and religious ceremonies.
Political identity - membership of a deme the basis for all activity as Athenian citizen.
Aristotle - Cleisthenic political identity
“Cleisthenes made all the inhabitants in each of the demes fellow-demesmen of one another”.
Cleisthenes’ motives - military efficiency
Tribes form the basis of the Athenian army - their military success after 508/07 BCE included victories against Sparta, Boeotia and Chalcis
Hdt support for military motivations for reforms
“…while they were under tyrannical rulers, the Athenians were no better in war than any of their neighbours, yet once they got rid of their tyrants, they were by far the best of all”.
Cleisthenes’ motives - democratic idealism
New democratic language around this time (demokratia, isegoria and isonomia).
Cleisthenes’ motives - self-interest
His personal and family background, Cleisthenes the gerrymanderer? why did he choose these 139 villages, why are some demes left out?
