BRIBERY IN CLASSICAL ATHENS Kellam ... - Historia Antigua

Conover Bribery in Classical Athens Chapter One
238); “stuffing” someone’s mouth with money (xrusi/w|…e)bu/noun to\ sto/ma, Aristoph.
Pax, 645; to\ sto/m’ e)pibu/saj ke/rmasin, Aristoph. Pl. 379); and vomiting up bribe
monies received (Aristoph. Eq. 1149). In fact, in a different version of the scene at
Artemisium, the Athenian leader Architeles reportedly wanted to leave because he did
not have enough money to pay his men. Themistocles hid a talent of silver beneath
Architeles’ dinner and bid him to dine on it and feed his men in the morning (Plut. Them.
7.6-7=Phanias fr. 24 Wehrli). Consuming the food became a metaphor for taking the
talent of silver. 54
Likewise, the verb diaphtheirō (“corrupt”=“bribe”), itself the most negative
Greek word for bribery, indicated a bad outcome; frequently, it also indicated a causal
link between the means of corruption and the outcome itself. The verb phtheirō, at the
root of diaphtheirō, meant “to destroy,” and diaphtheirō consequently had a range of
meanings, including “to destroy,” “to seduce,” and finally “to corrupt.” 55 The semantic
range of diaphtheirō is not easily explained, but by the end of the fifth century we find it
repeatedly denoting a deterioration—one might say a ‘destroying’—of the nature or
54 In the same vein, the Rhodian poet Timocreon censures Themistocles for serving “cold meats” (yuxra_
krei=a) or “leftovers” to others (PMG 727.10). Timocreon seems to suggest that these leftovers were
monetary in nature when he insinuates that Themistocles was “full of silver” at the Isthmus (a)rguri/wn d'
u(po&plewj, following Bergk at 727 PMG 9). This appellation works nicely on two levels: first as a
straightforward indication of how Themistocles had the means to serve cold meats to everyone (he had a lot
of money after receiving so many bribes); and, second, as a euphemistic signal of the food imagery to come
(though himself ‘full on silver’, he served but leftovers to everyone else).
55 Accordingly, the development of this semantic field, specifically its extension to the realm of bribery, has
troubled scholars. Wankel (1976: 315) has suggested that the ‘corruption’ at the root of bribery is a kind
of ‘seduction’, while Harvey (1985: 86-7) has posited that diaphtheirein represents a surrendering of free
will, an idea extended to bribery more generally by Ober (1989: 236-8), von Reden (1995a: 95), Euben
(1997: 103). Yet Harvey’s interpretation gives too much weight to select evidence (e.g. Dem. 19.118, his
only cited example) and I disagree with his interpretation of Lys. 1.33 (tou\j de\ pei/santaj ou#twj au)tw=n
ta\j yuxa\j diafqei/rein). There the point is not that a seduced woman surrenders her free will, but that
she no longer belongs exclusively to her husband—a morally unacceptable outcome. In other words, her
subordinate role in the household is destroyed and changed for the worse. Note how nearly identical syntax
is used at Xen. Symp. 8.21—cf. o( de\ pei/qwn th\n tou= a)napeiqome/nou yuxh\n diafqei/rei—where the
concern is not about the surrendering of free will, but about changing the character of a lover.
53