BRIBERY IN CLASSICAL ATHENS Kellam ... - Historia Antigua

Conover Bribery in Classical Athens Introduction
pressed to answer how Timagoras could have been so wrong or why he would have
risked the decision that he did, particularly when the stakes for being wrong were so
incredibly high. Framed this way, we have fundamental problems in understanding
Timagoras’ intent in taking the King’s dōra.
And this leads us to the second apparent incongruity in the story: why were the
stakes so high? Given the ascendancy of Thebes, Athens had effectively little bargaining
power when Timagoras’ embassy went to Susa; she realistically could have hoped for
little more than the negotiations gained her. As a result, any bribes from the Persian King
had probably little effect on the resultant terms of the alliance, so it is difficult to see how
Timagoras was solely to blame for the treaty. It is hard to understand, moreover, how his
offense could have been considered egregious enough to warrant capital punishment. On
both counts, we fail to understand the Athenians’ intent in killing Timagoras.
Addressing both of these ‘incongruities’ entails placing ancient Athens into
critical dialogue with the present: confronting differences between ‘then’ and ‘now’, but
also—I would argue ‘especially’—using the past to refocus how we think about the
present. Certainly there were considerable differences between Athenian-style
democracy and the democracy we are used to: notably the exclusion of women, slaves,
and resident aliens from the political franchise; direct participation as opposed to
representation and delegation; in the second-half of the fifth century the largest Greek
empire over other Greeks; and no robust conception of ‘rights’ as we might think of
them. 12 Still, there were striking similarities as well, particularly in terms of the
12 See generally Finley (1973), Ober and Hedrick (1996). On Athens’ treatment of slaves, metics, and
women, see variously Whitehead (1977), Cohen (2002), and the essays collected in Hunter and Edmondson
(2001). Empire: e.g. AE (passim), Finley (1973: esp. 95-6), Raaflaub (1994). Increased participation:
Sinclair (1988a). Rights: Finley (1976), cf. Wallace (2006).
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