Pericles of Athens (51 page)
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Authors: Janet Lloyd and Paul Cartledge Vincent Azoulay
23.
See Azoulay 2004, 375 f.
24.
Schwarze 1971, 111–112.
25.
Plutarch,
Pericles
, 13.9. See earlier,
chapter 6
.
26.
Schmitt Pantel 2007, 205.
27.
Lysias,
On the Murder of Eratosthenes
(1), 33, with the commentary of Patterson 1998, 166–174. In the Athenian attempt
at suppressing adultery, the question of the child’s legitimacy is central. That is
why a rape is less grave than adultery: better a one-off criminal act than a slow
process of corruption that may cast doubt on the legitimacy of the marriage’s already
existing children. On this subject, see Harris 1990.
28.
At the end of the fifth century, the comic poet Strattis (fr. 28 K.-A. = Athenaeus,
14.654F) was linking the breeding of peacocks with frivolity and luxury.
29.
Cartledge 1990, 52–54; Miller 1997, 189–192.
30.
Plato,
Charmides
, 158a. Pyrilampes, a friend of Pericles and married to Plato’s mother, was wounded
and captured at Delion in 424 (Plutarch,
The Genius of Socrates
, 581D). Although extremely wealthy, he had named his son Demos, which shows his desire
to conform with the democratic ideology (see Plato,
Gorgias,
481d, for a pun on his name). See the family tree in Cartledge 1990, 45–46.
31.
Antiphon, fr. 58 Thalheim. See Cartledge 1990, 53 n. 52; and Miller 1997, 191.
Ornithotrophia
, the breeding of birds, was an activity even more distinctive than the breeding of
horses,
hippotrophia
, which itself also aroused suspicions among the people. A number of discovered
ostraka
testify to how people reacted to this in the way they voted: horse breeding suggested
that one was too wealthy to be honest.
32.
Héritier, Cyrulnik, and Naouri 1994. However, see Bonnard 2002.
33.
Pericles
, 13.11. See also 36.3.
34.
Hermippus,
Moirai
, fr. 47 K.-A. (=
Pericles
, 33.7); and Cratinus,
Dionysalexandros
(K.-A., p. 140).
36.
On satyrs as highly sexed creatures, see Lissarrague 1990.
37.
Heraclides Ponticus, fr. 59 Wehrli (= Athenaeus, 12.533C). Heraclides Ponticus (or
Athenaeus, who cites him) here confuses Miletus and Megara. The confusion is probably
linked to a faulty reading of Aristophanes’
Acharnians,
524–531, where the comic poet mentions the Megarians’ seizure of two courtesans trained
by Aspasia.
38.
Athenaeus, 13.589E.
39.
Antisthenes,
SSR
Va 143 (= Plutarch,
Pericles
, 24.6). Antisthenes is probably Plutarch’s source, for Athenaeus attributes exactly
the same story to him in his
Deipnosophistae
(13.589E).
40.
Brulé 2003, 196. See Loraux 2003, 161–162.
41.
Pericles
, 32.1. Loraux 2003, 159.
42.
Loraux 2003, 140.
43.
Callias,
Pedetai
, fr. 21 K.-A.: in this play, dated, according to the authors, either to the late
430s or else to soon after the peace of 421 B.C., Pericles learns from Aspasia how
to speak in public.
44.
Schmitt Pantel 2007, 213: “But, in any case, the two statuses—whore and teacher of
rhetoric—are perhaps not really all that opposed: both refer to the register of seduction;
among the Greeks,
peithō
was as much a matter of rhetoric as of sexual attraction.” Rhetoric, like love, can
establish one’s control over others.
45.
See Lenfant 2003a, 402.
46.
Alexis of Samos,
FGrHist
539 F 1 = Athenaeus, 13.572F.
47.
See D’Hautcourt 2006, according to whom the sanctuary was founded after a naval victory,
as thanks to Aphrodite, the goddess of sea navigation—not by prostitutes.
48.
Text: Kassel and Austin 1983, 140, col. I (1–25) and II (26–48); text and translation,
Edmonds 1957, 32–33; and now also Bakola 2010, 320–321 (appendix 4).
49.
See Tatti 1986; and McGlew 2002, 46–56. The three gifts offered to Paris are supposed
to symbolize the main resources of the Periclean government: Aphrodite offers him
beauty and love, Athena courage in warfare, and Hera tyranny. Bakola 2010, 180–208,
nevertheless refuses to analyze the play purely as an allegory and insists upon what
she calls “the multi-layered composition of the play”; in the play, “Dionysus acts
sometimes as the god familiar from satyr plays and comedies, sometimes as the Paris/Alexandros
of the
Iliad
, sometimes as ‘Pericles’, and sometimes as an initiand” (p. 207).
50.
Mattingly 1977, 231–245, nevertheless emphasizes that the
Dionysalexandros
could just as well date from the early 430s and refer to the campaign against Samos—which
involved Miletus, Aspasia’s birthplace. The poet doubtless presented Pericles in the
guise of Dionysus-Paris, carrying a
thyrsus
and a drinking vessel and surrounded by a chorus of satyrs.
51.
Aristophanes,
Acharnians
, 524–531.
52.
Aeschines Socraticus,
SSR
, VIa III, 61 (in which the philosopher, bent on his task of rehabilitation, tries
to dissociate Aspasia from the detestable image of her Ionian sisters).
53.
Montuori 1981, 87–109; the argument is based on a passage in which Plutarch describes
the beautiful Thargelia, who “stealthily sowed the seeds of Persian sympathy” and
who, it is suggested, Aspasia took as her model (
Pericles
, 24.2).
54.
On Aspasia as a
hetaira
, see for example Keuls 1993, 198 (“the best known hetaira of the Classical age”).
On Aspasia as an intellectual, see Stadter 1991, 123.
55.
See Henry 1995.
56.
Cratinus, fr. 241 K.-A. (= Plutarch,
Pericles
, 24.6).
57.
Eupolis,
Demes
, fr. 110 K.-A.
58.
On all these names, see Halperin 1990, 111.
59.
FGrHist
372 F 40 (fourth century B.C.). There was no reason why Pericles and Aspasia should
not have been married: the law of 451 affected only the status
of any children they might have and did not imply any illegality of the marriage itself.
Marriage was a private affair that was none of the city’s business.
60.
Bicknell 1982.
C
HAPTER
8. P
ERICLES AND THE
C
ITY
G
ODS
1.
Sourvinou-Inwood 1990, 295–322.
2.
Xenophon,
Hellenica
, 2.4.20–21.
3.
Ps.-Aristotle,
Constitution of the Athenians
, 47.1 (Treasurers of Athena) and 54.6–7 (
hieropoioi
).
4.
IG
I
3
363 = ML 55 = Fornara 113. See Boedeker 2007, 57–58.
5.
Thucydides 2.13.4.
6.
See
IG
II
2
134 (around 335 B.C.).
7.
Thucydides, 2.38.1.
8.
Constitution of the Athenians
, 3.1–2 (author’s italics).
9.
Ibid., 2.9.
10.
Plutarch,
Pericles
, 11.4 (trans. Perrin, modified).
11.
See the discussion in Planeaux (2000–2001).
12.
Pericles
, 13.6. In the early fourth century, the first day of the Panathenaea—which lasted
for over a week—was devoted to musical and rhapsodic competitions: See
IG
II
2
2311.
13.
Many vases dating from the late Archaic period already carry scenes of musical performances
in a Panathenaic framework, so such competitions must already have taken place before
the time of Pericles. See Neils 1992, 57.
14.
See also Etienne 2004, 67, which mentions that in Phocis, at Kalapodi, a memorial
was erected in the sanctuary ruined in the Persian wars.
15.
This hall, which was begun in 450, was not completed until the 420s.
16.
Parker 1996, 154.
18.
Pericles
, 13.4–7. But even this statement needs to be qualified: see later,
chapter 10
.
19.
Cimon had even begun work on the Acropolis, constructing a surrounding wall; this
contained the sacred space where the remains of the old temple of Athena that the
Persians had destroyed stood on the northern side that faced the Agora, so that “it
showed to all who saw it that the divinity of the Acropolis was not neglected even
if the ban on reconstructing the sanctuary was respected”; see Etienne 2004, 69.
20.
IG
I
3
34 = ML 46 = Brun 9.
21.
See Shapiro 1996.
22.
See Blok 2009 (which clarifies the chronology adopted by Loraux 1993b, 37–71, esp.
41, which mentioned only “a myth of the fifth century”).
23.
See, for example, Plato,
Menexenus
, 237B (in an ironic mode); Lycurgus,
Against Leocrates
, 100; Demosthenes,
Funeral Oration
, 4; Hyperides,
Funeral Oration
, 4.
24.
Rosivach 1987.
25.
See Herodotus, 8.73 (Arcadians), 1.171 (Carians), 4.197 (Libyans and Ethiopians).
26.
Iliad
, 2.546–549.
27.
Gantz 1993, 235–236. Before the date of the testimony of Euripides, Athenian painters
of images were already representing the birth of Erechtheus (from 490 B.C. onward).
The scene chosen is nearly always the same: Gaia, half-buried in the earth that she
symbolizes, entrusts Erechtheus to Athena, who picks him up and clasps him in her
arms, copying the gesture made by a father to his son in the Amphidromia ritual.
28.
Blok 2009, 153.
29.
Euripides,
Erechtheus
, fr. 14, lines 8–10, Jouan-Van Looy.
30.
On the question of dates, see Camp 1986, 87, who suggests a range of possible dates,
between 460–450/448, for the start of the project.
31.
Brun 2005a, 249.
32.
IG
I
3
82 = Brun 129.
33.
Rolley 1999, 144–145. This makes it easier to understand why the exploits of Theseus
were represented on the metopes surrounding the temple, causing interpreters for a
long time to believe that the edifice was dedicated to him. In fact, though, the Athenians
were representing the exploits of the founder of the Athenian political community,
who in this way mirrored the figure of Erechtheus, who was himself placed in the position
of founding father.
34.
Thucydides, 2.36.1.
36.
Etienne 2004, 88–89.
37.
Pericles
, 13.8.
38.
See Bruit 2005, 85–103. At the supposed time of the dream, there did not yet exist
any sanctuary of Asclepius in Athens; it was only after the great plague of 432–427
that Asclepius was introduced into the city, probably in 420/419, and it was not until
the fourth century that a civic priest was attached to his cult.
39.
Schmitt Pantel 2009, 96.
40.
Herodotus, 1.60 (see Ps.-Aristotle,
Constitution of the Athenians
, 14.4; and Cleidemus,
FGrHist
323 F 15). See Sinos 1993, 73–91.
42.
Pericles
, 39.2.
43.
Cratinus,
Chirons
, fr. 258 K.-A. (= Plutarch,
Pericles
, 3.3). The poet was playing on a comic association with one of the traditional epithets
for Zeus used by Homer, who calls him “The Assembler of Clouds.” According to Plutarch,
it was Pericles’ squill-shaped head that explained the variation chosen by Cratinus
(“The Assembler of Heads”).
44.
Pack
2
253 = K.-A. On the dating and themes of the play, see Ceccarelli 1996, 112.
45.
Hesiod,
Works and Days
, 111 ff. See Cratinus,
The Spirits of Wealth
[
Ploutoi
], fr. 176 K.-A. (= Athenaeus, 6.267E).
46.
Cimon,
10.6. According to Ceccarelli 1996, 142, Plutarch may have been inspired by a passage
in Cratinus,
The Spirits of Wealth
(fr. 175 K.-A.), in which foreigners partake of a Laconian banquet (Cimon is well
known for his philolaconianism), grabbing sausages from doorways where they were hanging.
47.
Cratinus, fr. 241 K.-A. (= Plutarch,
Pericles
, 24.6). See earlier,
chapter 7
.
48.
Schachermeyr 1968.
49.
See, among others, Beloch 1914, 295; and Chêtelet 1982, 137–138.
50.
Plutarch,
Pericles
, 35.1–2.
51.
See Parker 1996, 214.
52.
Plutarch,
Nicias
, 24.1.
53.
Pericles
, 36.3.
54.
Diogenes Laertius, 9.51 (third century A.D.); and Eusebius of Caesarea,
Preparation for the Gospel
, 14.3.7 (fourth century A.D.). See Plato,
Cratylus
, 385e–386a: “man is the measure of all things [
khrēmata
], of the existence of those that exist, and of the nonexistence of those that do
not.” According to Diogenes Laertius (9.51), he was forced to leave Athens on account
of his impiety, while his books were publicly burned. But Plato’s testimony refutes
this (
Meno
, 91e).
