Death to Tyrants! (36 page)

A second reason is that the citizens of Ionian poleis could capitalize on the volatility of the times in order to maintain or obtain their freedom and thus govern themselves democratically. The aforementioned inscription from Smyrna (
OGIS
229) provides a very interesting example of that dynamic. The
citizens remained loyal to Seleukos II during the Third Syrian War.
⁷¹
Thus the king strongly supported their democratic regime. The decree of Smyrna—quite interesting—states (line 7) that Seleukos II “knows how to return gratitude to his benefactors” (
ἐπιστάμενος χάριτας ἀποδιδόναι τοῖς ἑαυτὸν εὐεργετοῦσιν
). This is a reversal of what one might expect to find, given the apparent discrepancy in power between a king and a city. The king, that is, should be the benefactor. Note, for example, the aforementioned letter from Eumenes II to the Ionian league (
RC
52). In lines 23–24 of that letter the king writes, “in order that you might show that you always return fitting thanks to your benefactors” (
ὅπως ἀεὶ φαίνησθε τὰς καταξίας τιμὰς τοῖς εὐεργέταις ἀπονέμοντες
).
⁷²

The third and final reason to suspect that the
dēmos
controlled Erythrai is based on the city's (unfortunately meager) epigraphic record. There are possibly nine third-century public inscriptions that do not definitively date to the reign of Antiochos I or earlier.
⁷³
One (
IEryth
McCabe 268 =
I. Erythrai
192) is exceptionally fragmentary and, in any event, is dated roughly to either the fourth or third century; thus it quite possibly dates to the period before the reign of Antiochos II. The eight remaining inscriptions indicate that the
dēmos
controlled the polis. Three are datable only to the third century.
⁷⁴
Two are dated to the mid-third century.
⁷⁵
One (if Erythraian) is dated to the late third century:
I. Erythrai
431—not in
IEryth
McCabe. One (
IEryth
McCabe 117 =
I. Erythrai
87) is very roughly dated to the third or second century. And the date of the final inscription (
IEryth
McCabe 13 =
I. Erythrai
114) is disputed:
IEryth
McCabe dates it to the second century;
I. Erythrai
dates it to the third century. There is no epigraphic evidence for oligarchy in Erythrai in the years circa 246–200.

EARLY SECOND CENTURY

Several points suggest that Erythrai was a democracy during the first couple decades of the second century. Erythrai's epigraphic record is particularly suggestive. There are no extant inscriptions that suggest that Erythrai was not a democracy in those years. But there are at least five (and maybe seven) extant
inscriptions that suggest that the
dēmos
controlled Erythrai during those years.
⁷⁶

Second, Erythrai possibly did not fall to Antiochos III (at least not for any significant period of time); thus the king might not have had the opportunity to meddle in Erythraian domestic affairs. There is no direct evidence that the king took Erythrai during his campaigns of 197–196, although he did make significant gains in Ionia at that time.
⁷⁷
(Indeed, it was the result of that campaign that Antiochos took most of cis-Tauric Asia Minor.) It is possible that Antiochos III held Erythrai during (part of) the Roman-Syrian War (192–188): in 191, his fleet sailed into Kissos, a port of Erythrai (Livy 36.43.10). But Erythrai had at least three ports (Kissos, Korykos [Livy 36.43.13], and Phoinikos [Livy 36.45.7]). And even if Kissos was right next to the
asty
of Erythrai, one need not conclude that Antiochos controlled the city: his fleet soon left and the Romans subsequently came “into the city” (Livy 36.45.7); and Livy—importantly—did not write that the Romans liberated Erythrai.
⁷⁸
Also, Livy clearly indicates that Erythrai subsequently fought with the Romans in the naval action of 190.
⁷⁹

Finally, Erythrai was deemed a “free city” by the Romans after the peace of Apameia (188).
⁸⁰
The Romans treated it very well, even signaling it out, for its
loyalty during the war with Antiochos III (Polyb. 21.45.6).
⁸¹
It subsequently would be left alone (for the time being) to prosper and conduct its own affairs as an official “friend” of Rome.
⁸²

The evidence presented above indicates that two moments were particularly important in the history of Erythrai's early Hellenistic democracy. The first moment was the foundation of democracy in circa 332. The importance there centers on origins: the long-ruling oligarchy was overthrown and the
dēmos
assumed power. The second important moment was the refoundation of the democracy in circa 280. The importance there is that the democracy “stuck,” persisting into the Roman period. Democracy, that is, became the normal regime type for Erythrai after the Erythaians repaired their statue of Philites the tyrant killer.

Conclusion

Although focusing on events in a single Ionian city, this chapter highlights a fundamental dynamic involved in regime preservation for Greek poleis in general: affecting the revolutionary thresholds of the majority of the citizens. For a regime with only minority support to survive, the majority of the population must have relatively high revolutionary thresholds; more specifically, the population must be defined by an “anti-mobilization” threshold sequence. If they were, they would be unable to mobilize against the ruling regime. For a regime with majority support to survive, however, the majority of the population must have relatively low revolutionary thresholds; they must be defined by a “pro-mobilization” threshold sequence. If they were, they would be able to take advantage of their numerical superiority and mobilize in support of their regime. In short, control of a polis came down to affecting thresholds of the majority of the population—a struggle over the population's revolutionary threshold sequence.

That basic insight potentially accounts for many of the different institutions and practices, particularly those involved with managing publicly known information, of various regime types. As noted above, all regimes rely
on the generation of common knowledge to survive. Their survival, that is, depends on what people think others think. The question concerns the content of that common knowledge, and how it is generated and maintained. Nondemocratic regimes will have political institutions and practices that control common knowledge so that people raise their revolutionary thresholds and thus become atomized. Democratic regimes are the opposite.

1
That oligarchs controlled Erythrai from 412 to 394 must be inferred from several sources: (1) Thuc. 8.5.4–8.6; 8.14.2 (the Erythraians revolted from Athens in 412); (2) Xen.
Hell
. 3.4.2 (after the Peloponnesian war [404], the Spartan Lysander established decarchies in the Greek cities of Asia Minor); (3)
RO
8 (the
dēmos
of Erythrai honors Konon in 394 after he defeated the Spartans in a naval battle near Knidos—the
dēmos
, no doubt, subsequently assumed control of the polis); (4) Diod. Sic. 14.84.2–3 (the Erythraians, after the battle of Knidos, expelled their Spartan-supported garrison—cf. Xen.
Hell
. 4.8.1–2).

That oligarchs controlled Erythrai from 386 to circa 334–332 also must be inferred from several sources: (1)
RO
17 (a decree of the Athenian
dēmos
, dated to circa 386, wherein it is made clear [lines 11–14] that the
dēmos
of Erythrai does not want to be “handed over to the barbarians”—i.e., handed to the Persians pursuant to the King's Peace); (2) Xen.
Hell
. 5.1.31 (according to the terms of the King's Peace, the “poleis in Asia” belonged to the king of Persia); (3)
RO
56 (an honorary decree dated to the mid-350s promulgated by the Erythraian
boulē
—
not
the
dēmos
—for Maussollos of Karia for being [lines 3–4] “a good man regarding the
polis
” [i.e., not the
dēmos
]); (4) HD 28 B (an honorary decree, dated 365–355, promulgated by the Erythraian
boulē
—again,
not
the
dēmos
—for Maussollos's brother Idrieos for being [lines 5–6] “a good man regarding the polis”); (5)
RO
68 (an alliance, dated circa 350–342, with Hermias of Atarneus, perhaps in preparation for war against the Persians; the customary oath was to be “taken care of” [lines 18–19] by the generals of Erythrai—perhaps a sign of oligarchy). Alexander subsequently (334–332) established democratic rule, as is noted generally by Arrian (
Anab.
1.18.1–2) and is borne out in Erythrai's epigraphic record:
I. Erythrai
21. Note that the context of
I. Erythrai
7, an Athenian decree concerning Erythrai dated 366/5, is unknown: it need not suggest that Erythrai was governed by a democracy.

2
Text and translation: Heisserer (1979: 282–83). Note, however, that I have retained the Greek word
dēmos
in the translation; Heisserer translated
dēmos
as “the people.” Editio princeps: Kirchhoff (1863: 265–68). The provenance of this inscription has been debated, because its chain of custody is not known for certain: see Heisserer (1979: 289). Some of the earliest editors (e.g., Kirchhoff [1863] and Michel [1900–27: no. 364]) suggested that the decree was promulgated in Chios. Engelmann and Merkelbach, in their edition of the text (
I. Erythrai
503), follow Wilhelm (1915) and suggest that the Philites stele was promulgated in Klazomenai. But Heisserer (1979) has given cogent arguments for Erythraian origin.

3
Gauthier (1982: 216) notes that an
ἀνδριάς
(lines 4, 15, 21 in the Philites stele) is a statue in the form of a man, while an
εἰκών
(lines 2–3 and 20 in the Philites stele) is a statue in the form of a particular man, a portrait.

4
Most notably in the so-called tyrannicide
skolia
(Ath. 15.695a).

5
For the coin from Kyzikos, see Brunnsåker: (1971: 99–100 with plate 23). For evidence of the popularity of the Athenian tyrannicides outside Athens in the post-Classical period, see the texts discussed in Trypanis (1960) and Lebedev (1996). And recall, from the conclusion to
chapter 4
, that Alexander heavily promoted anti-tyranny ideology during his conquest of western Asia Minor.

6
Many scholars have suggested that the statue of Philites echoed the Athenian model: Dittenberger (
Syll
.
³
284); Engelmann and Merkelbach (
I. Erythrai
503); Ober (2005c: 229).

7
A great example is
RO
56. In that inscription (lines 11–14) it states that a statue of Maussollos will be made out of bronze, while a statue of his wife Artemesia will be made out of stone. The Philites stele likely does not refer to the material of the statue because it orders not the creation of a statue but the repairing of an already-existing statue.

8
See Brunnsåker (1971: 143–64). It is to be noted that the Roman copies of the Kritias and Nesiotes statue group of Harmodios and Aristogeiton, because they are made out of heavier stone, might not replicate exactly the bronze originals.

9
See, for example,
I. Erythrai
15, which records a law on the sale of wool. It clearly demonstrates that the
agoramomoi
were in charge of transactions in the agora. Also,
I. Erythrai
104 records the dedication by an
agoranomos
of his scales to Dēmos.

10
For the evidence of the placement of the Kritios and Nesiotes statue of Harmodios and Aristogeiton, see Brunnsåker (1971: 33–41). It is interesting to note here that Xenophon,
Hier.
4.5, wrote that citizens of various poleis placed statues of tyrant killers in holy places. He gives no examples. And no examples are known.

11
Compare Lykourgos's account (
Leok
. 117) of how the Athenian
dēmos
treated the statue of Hipparchos: they melted it down and turned it into a stele upon which they inscribed the names of traitors. Wilhelm (1915: 33) notes an interesting law from Rhodes, apparently quoted by Dio Chrysostom (31.82), against violating a statue—including the taking of a spear out of the statue's hand. Even today, tearing down a statue is an important postrevolution event: consider the Americans (and Iraqis) tearing down the statue of Saddam Hussein after the fall of Bagdad in April 2003.

12
Brunnsåker (1971: 150, 102–6). The earliest, a black-figure
lekythos
, dates to 470–460 and possibly depicts the Antenor statue group: Österreichisches Museum, Vienna, Inv. 5247 = Brunnsåker (1971: 102, plate 23 no. 5). The others all date to around 400: Pelizäus-Museum, Hildesheim, Inv. 1253 and 1254 = Brunnsåker (1971: 104–5, plate 23 nos. 6a and 6b); Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Inv. 98.936 = Brunnsåker (1971: 105–6, plate 24 no. 7). One might also note that according to the
Ath. Pol
. (58.1) the Athenian
polemarchos
made offerings to Harmodios and Aristogeiton. There is no telling if the people of Erythrai had a similar practice, but it is not unlikely: (1) they seem to have treated Philites as quasi-divine figure; (2) there is evidence that the Erythraians worshiped Dēmos starting (most likely) post-280; see below in this chapter's section titled “Repairing the Statue circa 281.”

13
Berve (1967), Heisserer (1979), and Wilhelm (1915) do not offer an explanation for the manipulation of the statue. However, in defense of the latter two scholars, their works focused on the fundamental questions of the inscription's date and provenance. Friedel (1937: 81–82), noting the oligarchs' (supposed) solidarity with tyranny, simply asserts that the oligarchs mutilated a symbol of a powerful
dēmos
.