BRIBERY IN CLASSICAL ATHENS Kellam ... - Historia Antigua

Conover Bribery in Classical Athens Chapter One
the potential danger of these relationships—a point which will prove pivotal in the next
section—but the dēmos was happy to elect magistrates who would use their personal
connections for the public’s interest. 73
A second area in which social relations were regularly leveraged in politics was in
the provision of essentially public services through private initiative. Taxes were farmed
out to enterprising individuals who would collect them on behalf of the polis. 74 Grain,
too, was collected by citizens who bid on public contracts for the responsibility to ensure
that a certain amount of grain made it to the Piraeus port. 75 Elite citizens (and sometimes
resident aliens) spent enormous amounts of money on public liturgies, like hosting and
training a dramatic chorus (chorēgia), fitting out and commanding a naval ship
(triērarchia), or a property tax (eisphora) that was collected, from 378/7 onwards, by
means of share-groups (symmories) of about 15 members who shared the burden of the
tax. 76
73
Badian (1987: 14), Herman (1987: 156-61), Mitchell (1997: 65-71). No Athenian seemed to mind,
for instance, when Pericles gave dōra to the Spartan king Pleistoanax not to invade Attica. On the contrary,
in his description of Pericles’ actions, Plutarch writes that some people, including Theophrastus the
philosopher, thought that this was one among a number of payments that Pericles made to the Spartan
leaders over a ten-year time period (Plut. Per. 23.1). Plutarch’s additional testimony is instructive, for he
says that in this way Pericles ‘paid court to’ the Spartans (qerapeu/wn, Plut. Per. 23.1), meaning the
stratēgos was giving money within the context of an ongoing exchange relationship. When Pericles’
accounts for the year came up for scrutiny at his euthynē, he reportedly said that he ‘lost the ten talents out
of necessity’, and the people did not press the issue further: ei)j to\ de/on a)pw/lesa, as Aristophanes quotes
at Clouds 859 (cf. schol. ad loc.). On Pericles’ dealings with Pleistoanax, see Thuc. 2.21.1, 5.16.3; Eph. 70
FGrH F193; Diod. 13.106.10; Plut. Per. 22-3, Nic. 28; Arist. Nu. 859 with scholia. For further discussion,
see also Rhodes (1981: 313 ad AP 25.i), Dover (1968: 204 ad Nu. 859).
74
Tax farming: de Ste. Croix (1953), Brun (1983), Hansen (1991: 113-14), Liddel (2007: 279-80).
75
Grain provision: See Stroud (1998), Osborne (2000), Moreno (2007), and most recently Ober (2008:
260-3).
76
On the liturgical system: Davies (1981), Sinclair (1988a: 64-5). Chorēgia: Wilson (2000), Liddel
(2007: 264-70). Triērarchia: Sinclair (1998: 61-2), Liddel (2007: 270-4). Eisphora: Sinclair (1988a:
62-3), Liddel (2007: 274-5). In the 340’s the symmory system for the eisphora system was expanded to
create 60 groups of roughly 20 members; at the same time, these groups could also be held collectively
responsible for paying for a trierarchy. On the symmory system, see Ruschenbusch (1978), Rhodes (1984),
Gabrielsen (1985: 36), MacDowell (1986).
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