BRIBERY IN CLASSICAL ATHENS Kellam ... - Historia Antigua

Conover Bribery in Classical Athens Chapter Five
fits better in the context of a series of large-scale reforms that essentially mapped out the
entire terrain of licit and illicit actions within the community. Indeed, precisely this kind
of legislation was common in the archaic period, when poleis frequently defined in law
under what conditions an otherwise regular action became illicit. Solon’s regulations on
who could or could not marry (F47, F48) or adopt (F49, F58) are typical in this regard.
Similarly, archaic prohibitions on enslaving or hitting citizens, on killing—licit in war,
illicit otherwise—as well as regulations on various kinds of property transfers, including
sale, inheritance, and theft all divided basic social interactions into licit and illicit
classes. 67 In Athens, at least, many of these laws date back to Solon’s extensive reforms
and cohere with each other as a broad-based reorganization of social and political space
within the law.
The graphē dōrōn seems likely an innovation of the archaic period also because it
established mere accountability, not accountability to the people, specifically. Were we
to posit that the process was first implemented in the early decades of the fifth century, in
those cases where it would have been applied the suit would have been heard by the elite
Areopagus Council, not by the Assembly or a popular jury. 68 In this respect, the graphē
dōrōn would have stood counter the trend in the early democracy of establishing the
dēmos’ control over magistrates and citizens, alike. By contrast, if we look to when
accountability, not public accountability, was first established, tradition holds that it was
first institutionalized by the lawgiver Solon (Arist. Pol. 2.1274a15-18, 3.1281b31-4; AP
9.1).
67
On the range of archaic Greek law, see especially Gagarin (1986: 63-77) and Papakonstantinou (2008:
51-63).
68
Assembly and treason trials: Carawan (1987: 168-91). Properly, the Areopagus Council was a standing
body of all previous archons. Prior to 487, and perhaps prior to 457, however, the only citizens eligible for
the archonship were those from the highest census classes.
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