BRIBERY IN CLASSICAL ATHENS Kellam ... - Historia Antigua

Conover Bribery in Classical Athens Chapter Six
fines for dōrodokia towards the end of the fifth century, bribe-takers could also be
reintegrated into the polity.
As the Athenians began to rethink what to do about the dōrodokos, they also
began to rethink who he was in the first place. Chapter Two surveyed the rise of the so-
called New Politicians in the second half of the fifth century: citizens whose political
authority was based more on their rhetorical abilities than on family wealth or prestige.
Individuals like Cleon and Hyperbolus acquired pre-eminent standing because they could
persuade the masses through their command of rhetoric. Yet this new style of politics
was not without its critics. In the Wasps and Knights Aristophanes decried how
politicians like Cleon were effectively corrupting the political process, whether through
outright persuasion or, more dangerously, through promises and services to the dēmos.
And, indeed, as we saw in Chapter Two, in the second half of the fifth century the
Athenians began to condemn giving as much as taking dōra illicitly.
Aristophanes’ criticisms are emblematic of an acute anxiety attending the rise of
the New Politicians, namely, that political institutions were changing, and not for the
better. Contemporary critics of the democracy blamed the fickleness of the masses for
unjust court decisions, like the execution of the Arginusae generals; poor collective
decisions, like the Sicilian Expedition, which was thought fueled more by the Assembly’s
desires than by any prudent deliberation; and unfair policies that disproportionately
burdened elites, while the masses enjoyed the fruits of their labor. 45 In each case, the
45 For an overview of these concerns, see Chapters Two and Three. Courts: AP 34.1, Diod. 13.102.5.
Assembly: Ober (1998: 104-20, esp. 114-18). The vulnerability of the dēmos to make poor collective
decisions at the end of the fifth century is also borne out by the creation of a procedure for illegal proposals,
or graphē paranomōn, and the distinction between public decrees (psēphismata) and laws (nomoi) which
were forged through the complex process of nomothesia: Hansen (1974) on graphē paranomōn, Harrison
(1955), MacDowell (1975), Rhodes (1985), Hansen (1999: 168-9) on nomothesia. Economy: Recall that,
beginning in the Peloponnesian War, the Athenians began to levy the eisphora, or war-time tax on the elite:
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