BRIBERY IN CLASSICAL ATHENS Kellam ... - Historia Antigua

Conover Bribery in Classical Athens Chapter Six
political duties. Taken as a whole, these informal measures reflect a clear anxiety over
the role of the individual in the polity, and they sought to define that role clearly within a
specific political domain.
When Solon instituted his reforms, he made the archons swear an oath to the gods
that they would perform their public duties “according to the laws” (kata\ tou/j no/mouj),
that is, the new laws enacted by the lawgiver; if they did break one of his laws, they
swore to set up a golden statue. 2 The phrase “according to the laws” recurs in a variety of
public oaths that were created over the course of the next century, including the bouleutic
and heliastic oaths for the Council and jurors, respectively. In these latter two cases, at
least, the punishment for counseling or judging contrary to the law was more severe:
destruction to an offender, his family and home. 3 Similarly, the Athenians enacted a
public curse, to be pronounced before every session of the Assembly and Council, which
vowed the same destruction on all traitors and enemies of the state. 4 Although the dating
of these oaths and curses is controversial, the archon’s oath is certainly Solonian, the
2 AP 7.1, 55.5, Plat. Phaedr. 235d8-e1, Plut. Sol. 25.2, Pollux 8.86, Suida s.v. xrush= ei)kw/n on the archons’
oath. There is some discrepancy in our sources as to whether or not this was to be a golden statue in
Athens (AP 7.1, 55.5; Pollux 8.86) or a life-size golden statue in Delphi (Plut. Sol. 25.2), or a statue in each
of Athens, Delphi, and Olympia (Suida). Yet it seems clear enough that Plutarch’s account has been
marred by confusion over Socrates’ comment in the Phaedrus, that he would, like the archons, set up a lifesize
golden statue in Delphi. As Sandys (1912: 25 ad AP 7.1) rightly argues, the account of the Athenaiōn
Politeia is preferable here. It is, after all, highly unlikely that an offender would be granted what was an
exceptional honor of setting up a (life-size!) statue of himself, an honor usually granted only to athletes and
other benefactors: see Doming Gygax (forthcoming, esp. 161-2). Conceivably, the statue would have been
a small representation of an offended deity, like the bronze Zanes of Zeus set up at Olympia by athletes
who had been bribed (cf. Paus. 5.21.3-17); but this interpretation cannot be pressed given the strength of
AP’s testimony that the statue be of a man (a)ndria/nta, AP 7.1, 55.5). Still, assuming an affinity to the
Zanes at Olympia might explain why the Suida remarks that offending archons set up a statue at Olympia
too.
3 Oath of the Council (bouleutic oath): cf. Lys. 31.1, [Dem.] 59.4, with kata\ tou/j no/mouj at Xen. Mem.
1.1.18; Rhodes (2007: 12-13). Oath of the jurors (heliastic oath): see Dem. 24.149-51, with kata\ tou/j
no/mouj explicitly attributed to ‘the lawgiver’ (i.e. Solon) at Aeschin. 3.6; for further discussion, see
especially Fränkel (1878: 453-4). Punishment: Andoc. 1.31, Dem. 24.151, Connor (1985).
4 Andoc. 1.31, Dem. 19.70-71, 20.107, 23.97, Lyc. 1.31; cf. Din. 2.16. Although the text of the curse has
not been preserved, it is thought to have been closely parodied in Aristophanes’ Thesmophoriazousae (331-
51). For a reconstruction of the curse, see Rhodes (1972: 36-7).
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