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How often did the Athenian Assembly Meet?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

Edward M. Harris
Edward M. Harris
Affiliation:
Brooklyn College
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Extract

According to the Aristotelian Constitution of the Athenians (Ath. Pol. 43.4), the Assembly in Athens met four times every prytany. At each one of these meetings certain topics had to be discussed or voted on. For instance, a vote concerning the conduct of magistrates presently in office was to be taken at the κυρ⋯α ⋯κκλησ⋯α. At another meeting anyone who wished to could request a discussion of any matter, be it private or public. Nothing is said in this passage or anywhere else in the Constitution of the Athenians about the possibility of holding additional meetings of the Assembly in times of emergency, but in a few passages in the Attic orators we find the term ⋯κκλησία σύγκλητος used. The scholia to these passages and some entries in the ancient lexica indicate that this term refers to an extra meeting of the Assembly which could be convened at short notice in order to deal with emergencies.

On the basis of this information, scholars have in the past concluded that the Assembly normally met four times each prytany in the Classical period, but that extra meetings, called ⋯κκλησίαɩ σύγκλητοɩ, could also be held if the need arose. Recently, however, M. H. Hansen, whose work on many aspects of the Assembly has greatly increased our understanding of Athenian democracy, has challenged this communis opinio. Hansen argues that the evidence found in the scholia and lexica is unreliable and should be disregarded. In his view, several passages in the speeches of Aeschines and Demosthenes and some fines in IG ii 212 indicate that the Assembly met a fixed number of times each prytany, no more, no less.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 36 , Issue 2 , December 1986 , pp. 363 - 377
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1986

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References

1 E.g. Busolt, G. and Swoboda, H., Griechische Staatskunde i–ii (Munich, 1920–1926), 987–8Google Scholar; Glotz, G., La cité grecque (Paris, 1928), 182–3Google Scholar; Jones, A. H. M., Athenian Democracy (Oxford, 1960), 108–9Google Scholar; Ehrenberg, V., Der Staat der Griechen (Stuttgart, 1965), 67Google Scholar; Staveley, E. S., Greek and Roman Voting and Elections (London, 1972), 79Google Scholar.

2 Hansen, first set forth this idea in his Eisangelia: The Sovereignty of the People's Court in Athens in the Fourth Century B.C. and the Impeachment of Generals and Politicians (Odense, 1975), 51–7Google Scholar. He restated his position with new arguments in ‘How often did the Ecclesia meet?’ GRBS 18 (1977), 43–70Google Scholar and presented further arguments in ‘Εκκλησία Σύγκλητος in Hellenistic Athens’, GRBS 20 (1979), 149–56Google Scholar. Both of these articles were reprinted with addenda in The Athenian Ecclesia: A Collection of Articles (Opuscula Graecolatina 26, Copenhagen, 1983)Google Scholar. References in this article will be made to this volume which will be cited by the author's name only.

3 Hansen, p. 42.

4 Rhodes, P. J., A Commentary on the Aristotelian Athenaion Politeia (Oxford, 1981), 521–2Google Scholar. This work will be cited hereafter as ‘Rhodes, Commentary’.

5 For a useful summary of the reforms of the fourth century b.c., see Rhodes, P. J., ‘Athenian democracy after 403 b.c.’, CJ 75 (1980), 305–23Google Scholar.

6 Hansen, p. 43. Hansen, pursued this idea in his ‘When did the Athenian Ecclesia meet?’, GRBS 23 (1982), 331–50Google Scholar (= Hansen pp. 83–102).

7 Cf. schol. Dem. 19.123.

8 Cf. schol. Aeschin. 1.60; Photius s.v. κυρία ⋯κκλησία Ar. Ach. 19.

9 Cf: Suda and Etym. Magn. s.v. σ⋯κλητoς and Poll. 8.116.

10 For a possible explanation for this phenomenon, see note 17.

11 During the period of the twelve tribes, a prytany was probably concurrent with a month (Hansen, p. 41; Pritchett, W. K. and Neugebauer, O., The Calendars of Athens [Cambridge, Mass. 1947], 68)Google Scholar.

12 [Dem.] 7.26.

13 Dem. 19.150–4.

14 For the location of these fortresses, see Badian, E., Pulpudeva 4 (1980), 64Google Scholar and the references cited there. Demosthenes (18.27) states that at the time of their capture these fortresses were held by Thracians.

15 Aeschin. 2.89–93.

16 Hansen, p. 36 wonders ‘Why should the people resign some of their powers if an extraordinary assembly could be summoned at any moment?’ This misrepresents the situation. The matter of supervising the departure of the embassy was routine business which could be delegated to the Council without risk and did not necessitate the calling of another meeting of the Assembly. For the delegation of powers to the Council by the Assembly, see Rhodes, P. J., The Athenian Boule (Oxford, 1972), 82–5, 92 n. 4, 161, 182–3, 186–8, 218Google Scholar. Rhodes does not include Dem. 19.154 in his list of instances where the Assembly delegated powers to the Council.

17 Hansen, p. 36 makes much of the fact that ‘Demosthenes says explicitly that not a single ecclesia was left, and his emphatic expression must comprise both regular and extraordinary meetings’. But how would Demosthenes have said ‘there were no more “ordinary meetings” left’, when, as Hansen himself has noted, there was no technical term for an ‘ordinary meeting’? Yet, there was probably no need for a technical term, since the word ⋯κκλησία all by itself without the addition of σ⋯κλητoς could mean’ an ordinary meeting'. In the opposition between the two expressions ⋯κκλησία and ⋯κκλησία σ⋯κλητoς we have an example of ‘semantic marking’, whereby ‘the semantically marked lexeme is one that is more specific in sense than the corresponding semantically unmarked lexeme’ and ‘the unmarked member of the opposition has both a more general and a more specific sense according to context’ (Lyons, J., Semantics i [Cambridge, 1977], 307–8Google Scholar). In this case, the expression ⋯κκλησία is the unmarked member of the opposition and can have a more general sense, i.e. ‘a meeting of the Assembly’, or a more specific sense, i.e. ‘an ordinary meeting of the Assembly’, while the expression ⋯κκλησία σ⋯κλητoς is the marked member of the opposition and carries only the specific meaning, i.e. ‘an additional meeting of the Assembly called for an emergency’.

18 Aeschin. 2.60.

19 Aeschin. 3.68–70.

20 Perhaps it is not inapposite to note that elsewhere Hansen, p. 203 has remarked ‘In Aristotle's Constitution of Athens the nomothetai are passed over in silence. Does this mean that nomothesia had been abolished after 329/8 or stopped being of any importance? Certainly not. Argumenta e silentio of this kind based on the Constitution of Athens are of no value whatsoever’.

21 Rhodes, , Commentary 523Google Scholar.

22 It is curious how Hansen, who is so sceptical about the evidence of the scholia and lexica for the term ⋯κκλησία σ⋯κλητoς, confidently accepts this piece of evidence from Photius for which there is no supporting evidence from the Classical period.

23 Aeschin. 1.22–3 with scholia; scholia to Ar. Ach. 44; Dem. 54.39. Cf. Jacoby on FGrHist 334 F 16. τ⋯ ἱєρά may also have included the prayers and curses pronounced by the herald before each meeting; for these, see Aeschin. 1.22–3; Dem. 19.70. Cf. the parody of a meeting of the Assembly at Ar. Th. 295–371.

24 For the use of the article, see Renehan, R., Studies in Greek Texts (Gottingen, 1976), 69–74Google Scholar.

25 E.g. Ath. Pol. 43.3–4; Aeschin. 2.61.

26 Cf. Aeschin. 2.60, 65, 67; Dem. 19.13.

27 Dinarchus (1.28) repeats the same charge against Demosthenes and, like Aeschines, fails to provide any evidence.

28 The third charge is proved to be false by Aeschin. 2.65–6 where the decree regulating the procedure for the meetings on 18 and 19 Elaphebolion is read out. This decree stipulated that no speeches were to be made about the treaty on 19 Elaphebolion. Neither orator provides any evidence to prove that these orders were rescinded. The fourth charge is refuted by Aeschin. 2.83–6 where evidence is produced to show that Cersebleptes did indeed have a person in Athens who could have acted as his synedros, namely, Critobulus of Lampsacus, and that Aleximachus submitted a proposal to have him admitted to the Athenian Confederacy. This request was apparently turned down and Cersebleptes' representative was unable to swear the oaths to the treaty with Philip ([Dem.] 12.8). I plan to deal with the problems relating to the first charge elsewhere.

29 If this argument is accepted, it would eliminate one of the few exceptions to Mikalson's rule that the Assembly did not generally meet on festival days (The Sacred and Civil Calendar of the Athenian Year [Princeton, 1975], 187Google Scholar). Hansen (p. 84 n. 5) noted that Mikalson incorrectly interpreted Dem. 24.26 as referring to a meeting of the Assembly and has questioned his interpretation of IG ii2 1673 lines 9–10. If we eliminate all these examples, this would reduce the total number of exceptions to Mikalson's rule to a total of eight, five of which, as Mikalson himself has noted, can be explained in a reasonable way and do not pose any serious problem for his general thesis.

If one accepts my analysis of Aeschin. 3.66–7 and the validity of Mikalson's rule, the restoration of IG ii2 359, lines 2–7 to give a meeting of the Assembly on 8 Elaphebolion should be viewed with suspicion. This restoration has been endorsed without question by several scholars, including Dinsmoor, W. B. (The Archons of Athens in the Hellenistic Period [Cambridge, Mass. 1931], 372Google Scholar), W. K. Pritchett and O. Neugebauer (op. cit.( note 11), 54) and Meritt, B. D. (The Athenian Year [Berkeley and Los Angeles 1961], 101–2Google Scholar). This restoration would be almost certain if the inscription were strictly stoichedon, but it is clear that, while most of the lines in the inscription appear to have contained 20 letters, line 6 must have contained 21.

30 It is true that Demosthenes (19.154) states that by the time he passed his decree instructing the ambassadors to depart for Macedon (this was on 3 Munichion — see Aeschin. 2.91–2), there were no more regular meetings of the Assembly left in that prytany, but it is quite possible that another meeting of the Assembly might have been called between 25 Elaphebolion and 2 Munichion, or, that Demosthenes is being less than honest here and tailoring the facts to fit the design of his presentation of events in question.

31 Hansen, M. H. and Mitchel, F. W., ‘The number of ecclesiai in fourth-century Athens’, SymbOslo 59 (1984), 13–19Google Scholar. I am not convinced by the argument of Hansen and Mitchel that in the 350s the Assembly met only three times each prytany. See Rhodes, P. J., CQ 35 (1984), 55 n. 4CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

32 Gomme, A. W., A Historical Commentary on Thucydides ii (Oxford, 1956), 76Google Scholar.

33 Hansen and Mitchel, op. cit. (note 31) 16–7. For the payment of the ekklesiastikon, see Ath. Pol. 41.3 with Rhodes Commentary 490–3. If the average attendance was 6,000 (Hansen, p. 16), then each meeting of the Assembly will have cost the state only half a talent.

One wonders if the ekklesiastikon was also paid at the ⋯κκλησία σ⋯κλητoι. Although there is no evidence on this point, I find it unlikely. We know that the ekklesiastikon was instituted to stimulate attendance. This was probably necessary for the ordinary meetings at which dull routine business was discussed, but not for the ⋯κκλησίαɩ σ⋯γκλητoɩ at which important issues of immediate concern to all were debated.

34 Hansen, p. 77 n. 22. It should be noted that Hansen's only evidence for the Hellenistic rule governing the procedure of the prytaneis is a passage from Demosthenes (23.92).

35 For the role of these friends of the Hellenistic monarchs, see Herman, G., ‘The friends of the early Hellenistic rulers: servants or officials?’, Talanta 12–13 (1980–1981), 103–49Google Scholar.

I would like to thank Professor P. J. Rhodes, Professor J. Mikalson, my colleague Professor R. Dunkle and my wife, Victoria F. Harris, for reading over a draft of this article and offering valuable suggestions. They are not to be held responsible for any errors which remain. The research for this article was aided by a PSC-CUNY grant.