Introduction
Athensâ naval hegemony in the Classical period (480â323)1 is a stock narrative of historical textbooks and hardly needs recounting. By 483, the Athenians had acquired a great new source of wealth with the discovery of a large silver vein in the Laurion area of southern Attica.2 When it was proposed that the money be used to pay each adult citizen a sum of ten drachmas, the Athenian statesman Themistokles intervened, proposing that the money be spent on a naval program, the scope of which the Ancient world had seldom seen.3 This program resulted in the construction of a fleet that at the outbreak of the second Greco-Persian war would number two hundred triremes, the most advanced warships of the day, and a huge new harbor at Piraeus.4 Although these ships were initially intended to combat Athensâ archenemy Aegina, the Athenians ended up using them to destroy the Persian navy that accompanied Xerxes at Salamis during his invasion of Greece in 480.5 Cut off from their important maritime forage routes, the Persian army was routed the next year at the Battle of Plataia, leaving to the Athenians the control of the entire Aegean Sea and a dominant position in the Eastern Mediterranean. This naval dominance was largely centered on the Aegean and formed the basis of the Athenian Empire, ended by the Spartans in 404, but reconstituted not much later during the Second Athenian Empire (378â355).
Thucydides emphasizes that the Athenians did not âbecome sailors until they were forced by the Medesâ, thus suggesting that they, ironically, owed their empire to the Persian invasions, as well as to Themistoklesâ great act of foresight.6 This view is generally accepted, for example in two influential works on the Athenian Empire, the monumental monograph by Russel Meiggs and a shorter treatise by Peter Rhodes.7 Both works take the Greek-Persian conflict and the adoption of Themistoklesâ proposal as the starting point for their historical narrative and indeed this is the way in which the Empire is generally treated in Greek history handbooks. But presenting Athenian naval hegemony as having sprung ex novo from Themistoklesâ head, so to speak, does too little justice to the extensive maritime interests that existed before the Greco-Persian conflict and upon which the Classical Empire was built.
The Athenian economy of the Archaic period (ca. 700â480) is largely understood to have revolved around agricultural production, an enterprise controlled by a small but wealthy aristocratic clique.8 This view is closely related to the observation that, in the Archaic period, the Athenians did not take part in the colonizing movement that brought Greeks to the shores of Spain, France, Italy, Sicily, Africa, and the Black Sea littoral, because they had ample agricultural land of their own to sustain a growing population.9 The non-colonization argument, however, does too little justice to the possibility that the principal impetus for migration may not always have been a desire for land as much as the trading opportunities offered by opening up new markets and channeling previously untapped resources into the larger Mediterranean trading networks.10 A more pressing problem with this understanding of an inward-looking society, not committing itself to overseas enterprises, is the evidence derived both from literary sources (Herodotus most of all), and archaeology, epigraphy and numismatics, which suggest a surge in Athenian military and economic activities in the northern Aegean from the end of the seventh century and throughout the Archaic period down to the Greco-Persian conflict. Notably, these activities were to form the core of the classical Delian-Attic League.
Therefore, rather than discussing the unrivalled Athenian maritime power of the fifth century that brought the city to the forefront of the Greek oikoumene, I will focus on the century and a half preceding Themistoklesâ proposal to build a standing, polis-controlled navy. I do not intend to make a case for Athenian maritime hegemony in the Archaic period, but to show how some of its core (strategic and economic) interests abroad where already in play well before the outbreak of the Greco-Persian conflict. In particular, I will show that aristocratic rivalry in the sixth century propelled the Athenians to the Thracian coast and the Hellespont in a bid to control the Macedonian timber trade, Thracian silver production and the lucrative grain imports from the Euxine region. Beginning with an overview of Athenian naval capacity in the Archaic period (ca. 750â480), I will follow up with an investigation of the overseas exploits of the main aristocratic factions, the Peisistratids, the Philaidai and the Alkmeonidai, showing how systematically and seemingly independent from each other these families conducted their own foreign policy to secure the resources flowing through the Aegean.
Athenian Naval Power before Peisistratos
What would something like a ânavyâ have looked like in Archaic Athens? The first part of an answer to this question is intimately connected with the way the polis was organized. In the Greek city-states of the Archaic period, poleis were generally governed by several aristocratic families sharing in the responsibilities and benefits of the polis. In some cases, one such family might come to dominate the polisâ affairs, resulting in the establishment of tyrannical rule, as indeed happened in Athens with the dominion of Peisistratos and, after him, his sons.11 Accordingly, constitutions of Archaic poleis were first and foremost concerned with keeping factional strive within bounds by devising ways for the propertied classes to share power at home.12 Foreign affairs comprised a domain left to the families, whose leaders used both soft power, in the form of xenia, personal alliances in the form of mutual guest-friendship,13 or hard power, in the form of military enterprises to promote their own private interests, which did not always align with the interests of the commonwealth. For this reason, it is problematic to speak of a ânavyâ proper, as it implies more cohesion than was actually the case. Ships and their crews were outfitted and recruited by the aristocrats who paid all expenses and could therefore count on âtheirâ part of the fleet.14 For this reason, I agree with Christopher Haas in preferring to speak of a polisâ naval power instead of using the word navy with its implications of a cohesive âstateâ in control of a unified fleet.15
The second aspect to consider is the type of ship implicated by such ânaval powerâ. In other words, what did a warship look like? With the invention of the battering ram in the Early Iron Age, naval warfare was transformed in the sense that, for the first time in history, ships came to be used as weapons.16 The invention of the ram also meant that warships had to be propelled mainly by human force, aided by sail when winds were favorable. It has been debated whether a purely wind-driven, commercial vesselâknown to have existed in the Bronze Ageâexisted as early as the Archaic period, a notion effectively dispelled by Wallinga, who argued from the iconographic evidence that all ships during this time were galleys and served both a military and a commercial purpose.17
The basic type of all-purpose ship in the Mediterranean during the Archaic period was the pentekonter, a fifty-oared ship. âPentekonterâ is a conventional name to describe a type of long and narrow ship (ratio ca. 10:1) with a long-curving stern and prow, that was in use throughout the first half of the first millennium. These ships figure in the Homeric epics as âhollowâ, i.e. without deck, although they probably did have minor raised platforms, both in front and in the back, that could be used for the purpose of navigation.18 In practice, such ships could be outfitted with as little as 20 or as much as 100 rowers.19 A famous Geometric louterion (ca. 735) from the British Museum shows a pentekonter outfitted with a battering ram and a double steering-oar, presumably reflecting the standard design of the day (Figure. 3.1).20
This versatile ship could be used both for long-distance trade and piracy/warfare, occupations that often went hand in hand in the Early Iron Age as well as in the Archaic period.21 Herodotus mentions that the Phocaeans, inhabitants of the Aeolic coast of Asia Minor, ventured out into the western Mediterranean in pentekonters, which they used both to conduct trade with the metropolis andâafter their forced removal from their homeland by the Persiansâto transport their population westwards and engage in a large-scale naval battle with a combined Etruscan and Carthaginian force.22 This episode is illuminating because it shows the violent nature of long distant trade, where commercial enterprises could be compromised by competitors and, no doubt, by hostile native populations. It also shows that trade and migration were part of a single continuum: once a long-distance network was established, both people and commodities could flow freely. The pentekonter was the perfect vessel for this, combining military capabilities with sufficient cargo-space.
As early as the eighth century, experiments adding to the propulsive force led to the creation of a full deck, stretching from stern to prow, which allowed for an additional level of rowers.23 A battle scene on a Geometric vase indicates that the deck could also be used for hand-to-hand combat once a ship had been entered.24 The name usually attached to such a vessel is âbiremeâ, a modern term that has been coined on analogy of âtriremeâ and one that was not used in antiquity.25 The âdouble-deckerâ was probably a Phoenician innovation, although several Geometric vases made in Athensâincluding the one in Figure 3.1âalready hint at this feature as early as the late eighth century.26 Experiments with an additional third deck appear to have been conducted in the seventh century, when Necho, pharaoh of Egypt, is credited with building a number of trieres, or âtriremesâ, a new type of ship specifically designed for military purposes.27 In Greece, the trireme was slow to be adopted, perhaps not until the second half of the sixth century when it was introduced there by the Corinthians.28 Still, even at the outbreak of the Greco-Persian conflict, most of the Greek ships were said to have been pentekonters.29
In this light, Themistoklesâ proposal to build a huge fleet of triremes would seem to represent not only a revolution in terms of quantity, but no doubt also in quality. It has been shown, however, that Themistoklesâ naval bill was part of a larger naval arms race that transformed the Athenian fleet in a mere two decades from the 20 ships, presumably already triremes, sent to Ionia in 498 to the 200 galleys deployed at Salamis.30 The adoption of the trireme, on that view, seems to have occurred in the early years of the democracy.
Athenian maritime exploits may have experienced a golden age in the later ninth and first half of the eighth century. Coldstream interpreted the prolific nautical imagery on Late Geometric Ia vases (ca. 750) as a way to commemorate a generation of Athenian maritime entrepreneurs who traded Athenian pottery throughout the Aegean, as is evidenced by the wide distribution of Athenian product in the period immediately preceding these scenes.31 When this generation was beginning to die off around the middle of the century and boat-scenes first appear in vase painting, Attic exports went into apparent decline. Coldstream connected this with a naval conflict with Aegina recorded by Herodotus, which ended disastrously for Athens with an embargo imposed on its goods.32 This would accord well with a sudden lapse of Attic imports found on Aegina from the third quarter of the eighth century.33 We have to keep in mind, however, that exports are not necessarily indicative of the mobility of the exporters and may be the result of trade by a third party. Moreover, the connection with an event that Herodotus expressly places in the remote distance must, for obvious reasons, remain tenuous.
In any case, by the end of the eighth century, Attic ceramic exports in the Aegean were eclipsed by vases of Corinthian manufacture. Strategically placed to control the Isthmus, which connects the Peloponnese to the mainland, and the hub of a trading network that comprised a host of colonies extending through the Corinthian Gulf, the Adriatic and as far out as Sicily, Corinth dominated Greek trade with the Central Mediterranean down to the middle of the sixth century and was even in a position to supply both allies and competitors with shipping technology, including the new state of the art trireme.34 Samos likewise dominated the pottery trade in the Aegean and as far out as Egypt and North Africa. In the sixth century, the Samian tyrant Polykrates, having adopted the trireme at an early stage, is reported to have commanded as much as one hundred pentekonters to boot, creating a great new harbor through the construction of a vast mole to protect the Samian fleet.35 Finally, nearby Aegina too appears to have overshadowed Athens as a dynamic center of trade (and piracy) throughout much of the Archaic period, its currency, the âAeginetan Turtleâ, finding wide acceptance throughout the Aegean.36
In many respects, the traditional account of an inward-looking society holds true for Athens at least down to the end of the seventh century.37 In the words of Christopher Haas âAthens was late in acquiring naval force, and such naval power as she had was second-class in comparison with other Greek states in the Late Archaic period.â38 And indeed, it is not until the second half of the sixth century that Athens began to make up to its competitors by cornering the market for Black-Figure potteryâthough we must again be cautious not to overemphasize the connection between exports and active trade.39
By the end of the seventh century, however, we find the Athenians actively looking to pick up the crumbs left them by the principal naval powers. Athensâ first recorded foreign venture led them to the Troad. In the eighth or seventh century a settlement, Sigeion, had been founded there by Mytilenaeans from Lesbos, who also held a stronghold at Achilleion, ca. 7 km to the south.40 According to Herodotus, an Athenian named Phrynon, who had been Olympic victor in 636, took Sigeion by force. This gave rise to a prolonged period of warfare with the remaining Mytilenaeans at Achilleion, in the course of which the poet Alcaeus famously saved his life but lost his shieldâwhich the Athenians duly dedicated in the sanctuary of Athena at Sigeion.41 Phrynon was eventually defeated in single combat by Pittacus of Mytilene and when the Athenians appealed to Periander to arbitrate the dispute, the Corinthian tyrant decided in favor of the Athenians on the grounds that they had taken part in the Trojan War and could claim to have had an active hand in the destruction of nearby Ilion (Troy). The Mytilenaeans, on the other hand, who had dwelled in the Troad for centuries, were considered Aeolian late-comers and were judged unable to lay a proper claim to the land.42
Athenian interest in this area is highly significant and indicative of its aims and interests abroad. Sigeion held great strategic importance, controlling the passage through the Hellespont and onward to the grain-rich coasts of the Black Sea.43 âControlâ presumably did not entail a potential blockade of the straits; rather, the settlement at Sigeion allowed the Athenians a share in the economic benefits of the Euxine trade by effectively creating a last place of anchorage for tradesmen before embarking on the hazardous journey through the treacherous currents of the Hellespont.44 The fact that the Athenians fought so hard for the control of Sigeion is indicative of their aspirations to become a dominant player in the Northern Aegean.45
Such is the state of our knowledge about Athenian foreign affairs before the middle of the sixth century, a time when Athens itself suffered from internal strife between three aristocratic factionsâthe Peisistratids, the Philaidai and the Alkmeonidaiâculminating in Peisistratosâ rise to tyranny. Owing to Herodotusâ interest in relaying the historical events leading up to the Greco-Persian conflictâwhich necessarily included Peisistratid dominionâwe are much better informed about the second half of the sixth century than the period that came before. Herodotusâ account contains several brief references to the overseas enterprises of each of the three factions, presenting us with a precious insight into the way the Athenians exerted their influence abroad, before the hostilities with the Persians.
The Peisistratids
The strategically placed settlement at Sigeion in the northwestern Troadâwhere we have seen Athenians maintaining a presence as early as the late seventh centuryâremained an important foreign stronghold throughout the sixth century.46 At some point, however, Sigeion appears to have been lost to the Athenians. Herodotus mentions that Peisistratus reconquered the city âat spearâs pointâ, establishing his bastard son, Hegesistratos, as tyrantâan event that appears to have taken place in the years around 550.47 After Peisistratosâ death in 527, his legitimate son, the Athenian tyrant Hippias, ruled the town.48 With the end of Peisistratid tyranny at Athens in 510/9, Hippias was banished from the city and retired to Sigeion. The picture that emerges mostly from Herodotusâ account suggests that the Peisistratids ruled Sigeion as a personal fief from the middle of the sixth century down to the Second Persian War, when it was absorbed into the Delian League.
This account is corroborated by archaeological, epigraphic and numismatic sources. Archaeology in particular reinforces the notion of an Athenian colony surrounded by Aeolic settlements. Excavations conducted by Manfred Korfmann indicate that the settlement at Achilleion represented an important Mytilenaean stronghold on the mainland throughout the sixth century.49 At Sigeion, on the other hand, no evidence of an Aeolic presence at this time has come to light. Instead, a graffito in Attic lettering on a Middle Corinthian aryballos, dated to the first half of the sixth century, reinforces the notion of an Athenian presence at Sigeion.50 A second inscription was certainly set up in Sigeion, by the Athenian colonists Haisopos and his brothers.51 Jeffery tentatively dated the inscription to the second quarter of the sixth century, although a later date of inscription in the Peisitratid era has been suggested as well.52 While not implicating the Peisistratids directly, both inscriptions reinforce the notion of early Athenian control at Sigeion. A direct reference to the Peisistratids can, however, be found on a coin, minted at Sigeion, bearing the head of Athena on the obverse and the name of Hippias and the Athenian owl on the reverse (Figure. 3.2).53 The coin neatly expresses the dual nature of the settlement in the later Archaic period; apparently, the colony was considered at once a part of the Athenian commonwealth and a personal fiefdom of the Peisistratids.
But the long arm of the Peisistratids was not felt by the Troad Aeolians alone. During his second exile (556â546), Peisistratos set out to build a powerful network of alliances in the northern Aegean. Building on his friendship with the Eretrian nobility, he began âcollecting contributions from all the cities that owed them anything. Many of these gave great amounts, the Thebans more than any â¦â54 With the help of citizens from Eretria, Peisistratos established a settlement in Macedonia.55 According to the pseudo-Aristotelian Athenaion Politeia, âhe first founded a settlement near the Thermaic Gulf called Rhaikelos, and from there he moved into the area around [Mt.] Pangaios, from where he got money and hired soldiers. â¦â56 Rhaikelos appears to have served as an excellent base for Peisistratos to acquire the wealth needed to return from exile to Athens, thus, according to Herodotus, ârooting his tyranny in the great muscle and revenue derived both from Athens and from the area near the river Strymonâ.57
Neither Athenaion Politeia nor Herodotus specifies the source from which Peisistratos derived this wealth. In the classical period, the Athenians were actively involved in the timber trade with Macedonia and it seems probable that it was this commodity that attracted Peisistratos.58 Furthermore, both accounts have him venturing east towards Thraceâthe area around Mt. Pangaios and the river Strymon, where the Athenians had interests in the precious metal industry during the fifth century.59 Indeed, it has been suggested that âPeisistratos became rich as a middle-man by doing business with Thracian miners.â60 And finally, it has been suggested that the Athenian and Eretrian soldier-colonists in Peisistratosâ retinue represented a mercenary force-for-hire, available to intercede on behalf of local rulers ready to pay for their service.61 Combining the trade in raw materials with his meddling in local politics seems to have landed Peisistratos a strong regional network that served as a powerbase from which he was able to launch his successful return from exile in 546, when he defeated his Athenian rivals at the battle of Pallene.
It is less clear how the Peisistratids maintained control of this foothold in the northern Aegean during the remainder of their tyranny. While we are less well-informed about their possession in Macedonia-Thrace than at SigeionâHerodotus declines to say whether or how the Peisistratids continued their control over the regionâthere is no reason to think that they voluntarily parted with such a formidable power-base. In fact, some circumstantial evidence suggests that they remained an important political factor down to the end of the Archaic period. This may be derived from another passage, which has the Macedonian king Amyntas offering Hippiasâfreshly ousted from Athens in 510âthe settlement of Anthemous, about a dayâs march inlands of Rhaikelos, while the Thessalians offered him Iolkos.62 While it is not clear why Hippias chose to decline both offers, choosing to retire to Sigeion instead, it is clear that the Peisitratids could still count on a strong network of allies in the northern Aegean by the end of the sixth century, which may suggest that they were still in possession of Rhaikelos.
Having firmly re-established his rule at Athens after the battle of Pallene in 546, Peisistratos set his eyes on the Ionian Aegean. A Naxian by the name of Lygdamis, who had been a supporter of Peisistratos when he was still endeavoring to return to Athens, provided an opportunity to expand his power to the southern Aegean. First, he conquered Naxos and established Lygdamis as its tyrant, using it as a place to keep the sons of influential Athenians as hostages.63 With the largest of the Cycladic islands in his grasp, he then sought to extend his authority over the Cyclades and the Ionian cities to the east by assuming control over the sanctuary of Apollo on Delos. The manner in which he chose to do so is indicative of the integral role of religion in interstate politics, which is sometimes filtered out of the historical record. Herodotus states that Peisistratos âpurified the island of Delos as a result of oraclesâ, removing âall the dead buried in the ground that was within sight of the sanctuary and brought them to another part of Delos.â64 The sanctuary of Apollo on Delos was considered sacred to all Ionian communities in the Aegean. While Peisistratosâ influence within the Ionian world was informal, his role in the purification of Delos was clearly designed to build his authority and represents a first Athenian claim to pre-eminence among the Ionian communities; this was reinforced by the claim that Athens was the metropolis from which all Ionians descended.65 This claim would provide legitimacy to Athenian dominion in the fifth century and is closely related to the choice for Delos as spiritual core of the Delian League and as home to the communal treasury (478â454).
The Philaidai
The tyranny of the Peisistratids may be expected to have curtailed the power of the other two factions, the Philaidai and the Alkmeonidai. At Athens, this must have been the caseâalthough the fact that the Alkmeonid Kleisthenes and the Philaid Miltiades66 appear to have served under the Peisistratids as archonsâin 525/4 and 524/3 respectivelyâshows that the situation was more complex than is sometimes thought. On the other hand, the tyranny seems, if anything, to have strengthened the international ambitions of both the Philaidai and the Alkmeonidai. Rather than limiting the room to maneuver for the other factions, Peisistratos and his sons seem to have actively encouraged these factions to strike out into the Aegean on their own. No doubt this kept them out of harmâs way at home, but at the cost of providing them with an alternative powerbase abroad, just as Peisistratos himself had set up a foreign powerbase from which he launched his return from exile.
Around the same time that Peisistratos captured Sigeion âat spearâs pointâ (ca. 550), the Philaidai ventured out in the same direction, to the Thracian Chersonese on the other side of the Hellespont.67 This thin, long peninsula upon which modern-day Gallipoli is located, was inhabited by a local tribe called the Dolonkoi.68 According to Herodotus, when they were getting worsted by another tribe, the Apsinthians, âthey sent their kings to Delphi to ask for an oracle pertaining to the war.â69 The oracle bade them to set up as their king the first to show them hospitality, which in the event turned out to be Miltiades, son of Kypselos (archon in 597â596), who was a prominent member of the Philaid genos and Olympic victor in 560. Miltiades accepted their request, desiring to leave Peisistratosâ (second) tyranny in Athensâwhich, if trustworthy, would date the beginning of Philaid rule over the Thracian Chersonese to 556 or 555.70 This date would also suggest that the conquest of the Chersonese precededâand possibly inspiredâthat of Sigeion. Having built a wall at the isthmus of the peninsula, he battled both the Apsinthians and the inhabitants of Lampsakos before dying childless and leaving his possession to his (grand-?) nephew Stesigoros, son of Kimon.71 Herodotus mentions that Miltiades was revered as oikistes of the Athenian settlement in the Chersonese.72
Herodotus informs us that when this Stesigoros died in battle âthe sons of Peisistratos sent Miltiades, the son of Kimon and brother of the recently deceased Stesigoros, in a trireme to the Chersonese to take control of its affairsâ possibly using as a pretext the need to secure the grain-trade from the Black Sea.73 It is remarkable that this younger Miltiades, who was to be the famous general at the battle of Marathon, would lend himself to the cause of the Peisistratids, since they were credited with having had a hand in his fatherâs death.74 No doubt, Peisistratosâ sons were happy to have this Philaid scion removed from Athens and he may himself have found it safest to accede to their request. In any case, Miltiades re-established order in the Chersonese and appears to have ruled the territory as a personal fiefâmuch in the way his Peisistratid rivals did on the opposite shores of the Hellespontâalthough Miltiadesâ rule appears to have been broken temporarily after a Skythian invasion drove him from the peninsula in 511/10.75
Athenian presence on the Chersonese is reinforced by numismatic evidence. It is certain that coins were struck on the Chersonese during the rule of the younger Miltiades (Figure. 3.3).76 These coins are Attic tetradrachms with a head of Athena on the reverse in imitation of Athenian models, though the Lion on the obverse may be modelled on early coins from Miletos in possible support of the anti-Persian cause of that city. Some of these coins have the lettering ΧÎΡâin credible Attic script (to the degree that the letters lend itself to such a distinction)âinscribed in front of Athena. All are dated to the 490âs. The fact that the Chersonese Athenians would strike their own coinage may be taken as evidence of their confidence as an independent community and certainly attests to their economic strength.77 Conversely, the coinage shows a clear link with Athens in the head of Athena and the manner in which it was struck. This duality is reminiscent of the overlapping identity encountered on the Hippias coin, discussed earlier, in claiming adherence to the Athenian commonwealth as well as to the aristocratic faction in control of this specific dominion.
Philaid interests in the northern Aegean were not confined to the Thracian Chersonese alone. Herodotus and other sources attest that Miltiades the Younger conquered Lemnos, one of the Thracian Sporades (fig. 3.5), an event that has been dated as broadly as 515â495, although a more preciseâand perhaps more credibleâdate of 496â495 has been proposed by Evans.78 The neighboring island of Imbros apparently befell the same fate, though much less is known about the circumstances of its conquest.79 The ethnicity of the previous inhabitants of Lemnos is disputed by the ancient sources. According to Nepos they were Carians, while Herodotus calls them Pelasgians, a generic term used in antiquity to denote the pre-Hellenic population of Greece.80 According to the latter, the Pelasgians harbored an age-old and deep-rooted enmity with the Athenians because they had expelled them from Attica, causing them to retire to Lemnos. The label âPelasgianâ is likely to be a late invention and may well have been attached to the Lemnians at the time of the Athenian take-over by Miltiades, since it tied them to the Atheniansâ own mythological-historical narrative while at the same time pinning the blame of the conflict on the Lemnians.81
This reading is supported by the fact that a third author, Diodorus Siculus, calls the inhabitants âTyrrheniansâ.82 In modern linguistics, this ethnonym is applied to an eastern group of isoglot peoples in the northeastern Aegean, who were most likely related to a western group, better known as the Etruscans, who may have split off at some point during the Early Iron Age.83 The first Attic inscriptions from Lemnos, on the other hand, all date from 500 onward, and include a boundary stone from an Artemis sanctuary as well as a well-known casualty list (Figure. 3.4), which is generally dated to the first years of the fifth century.84 Epigraphic evidence thus supports a date for the Lemnian and Imbrian acquisitions in the early years of the fifth century.
The listing of the fallen according to their Kleisthenic tribal allegiance is noteworthy, as is the distinct possibility that these men lost their lives during Miltiadesâ conquest. The Athenian tribal names show that these men identified themselves as Athenians first and foremost, suggesting that the acquisition of the island in the early years of the democracy may have been more of a polis affair than the earlier Hellespontine acquisitions, which seem to have been tied more closely to their individual aristocratic rulers. Perhaps the ethnic cleansing, alluded to by Herodotus,85 that took place after the conquest, opened the way for Lemnos to become a true Athenian settlement away from home, a klerouchia, which was tied more closely to the polis in an administrative sense.86 It also ties in with the fact that the Athenians are said to have honored Miltiades for delivering Lemnos into their possession.87 Lemnos was unique among Athensâ northern possessions in that it remained in Athenian hands throughout much of Antiquity, as is attested by the issue of coins struck on the island with the head of Athena.88
We thus notice a remarkable transformation taking place in the years before Marathon, at a time when the Persian threat already loomed large. As Hippias remained in exile at Sigeion, we observe Miltiades now operating under the guise of the Athenian polis, but in effect still pursuing the same Philaid territorial aims as under the tyranny. Personal interests and those of the demos clearly went hand in hand at this time, but also in the years immediately following the Persian invasion of Greece. In the 470âs Miltiadesâ son conquered Skyros, wiping out its original inhabitants and settling the island with Athenian klerouchoi, thus following a pattern set by his father two decades earlier with Lemnos and Imbros.89 At the same time, the Athenians settled Amphipolis near the estuary of the Strymon in Thrace in an apparent move into what had been a Peisistratid area of influence.90 It is interesting to note that Skyros lies on the route from Athens to the Propontic Aegean, marking the place where ships would have to abandon the relative safety of the mainlandâs coast for a journey across the Aegean toward, indeed, Lemnos, Imbros and the Thracian Chersonese.91 Thus, Kimon completed what appears to have been a longstanding Philaid project of controlling and profiting from the entire Aegean corn-route.92
Following the example of the Peisistratids, the Philaidai, in the person of Miltiades, sought to expand their influence to the Cyclades in an attempt, it would seem, to increase Athenian standing within the Ionian world. In 489, a year after the battle of Marathon, with his personal prestige at its zenith, Miltiades convinced the Athenians to give him 70 galleys, with which he proposed to conquer an undisclosed country, bringing them bountiful spoils.93 Willing to obey their successful general, the Athenians granted Miltiades his request. The secret object of his plan, however, the Cycladic island of Paros, proved less amenable to conquest than Miltiades had promised.94 Having sustained a lethal wound to his leg, he was forced to return home, where he was fined a sum of 50 talentsâeventually paid by his son Kimonâbefore succumbing to the effects of gangrene.95 Herodotus ascribes the motive to a personal grudge against a Parian called Lysagoras son of Tisias.96 It would, however, have been apparent from the outset that a strike against the second largest Cycladic island would bring the Athenians a considerable strategic advantage in the southern Aegean97 and, like Peisistratosâ activities on Naxos and Delos, shows that Athenian aspirations of dominion over the whole of the Aegean preceded the formation of the Delian League. Even in its failure, the attempt at gaining control of Paros reinforces the notion, moreover, that the Philaids were successful in aligning the objectives of the democratic polis with their own, something Miltiades had already shown on Lemnos and his son was about to in Thrace and on Skyros.98
The Alkmeonids
Much less is known about the foreign exploits of the third Athenian faction, the Alkmeonids.99 It is nevertheless instructive to attempt to weave what little we know into the narrative as outlined for the other factions. From what we do know, the Alkmeonids did not engage in the acquisition of foreign territorial possessions, perhaps because they were more solidly entrenched in Athens during much of the sixth century.100 The Alkmeonids were involved in the suppression of Kylonâs attempt at a coup dâetat in 632, killing his followers after they had taken refuge at the sanctuary of Athena on the Acropolis.101 This resulted in a period of exile which lasted until they were allowed back in the city under the archonship of Solon in 594.102 According to several sources, the Alkmeonids amassed great wealth during their period in exile.103 While these sources do not state how this wealth was accumulatedâit was apparently enough for Alkmaion to field a winning chariot team at Olympia in 592, a clear testament of his impressive personal wealthâwe detect here a pattern similar to the foreign enterprises of the Peisistratids and Philaidai during their time in exile. Exclusion from a share in Athenian politics apparently did not necessarily mean a deprecation of their international influence and standing.
Soon after their return, Alkmaion scored a resounding international success by marrying his son Megakles to Agarista, daughter of the powerful tyrant of Sikyon.104 After this, the record is more silent about the international exploits of the Almeonidai, perhaps because at the time they were too deeply involved in the politics of Athens itself. Indeed, they appear to have played a rather duplicitous role throughout the tyranny and were probably early backers of Peisistratosâ bid for power.105 This accords well with the fact that Kleisthenes, Megaklesâs son, was archon at Athens in 525/4, when Hippias was tyrant. Nevertheless, there appears to have been a falling out between the two factions and the Alkmeonidai are said to have gone into exile. Once out of Athens, they bribed the Delphic oracle by rebuilding the temple of Apollo in order to lure the Spartans into âliberatingâ Athens from the Peisistratids in 510.106 Perhaps the Alkmeonidai lacked such foreign territorial holdings as their competitors possessed because they were too deeply entrenched in Athens for most of the sixth century. And indeed, it has been suggested that their final exile was played-up post factum to cover up their continuing support of the tyranny.107 But no matter how we choose to valuate this episode, their involvement in the rebuilding of the temple of the Pythia remains beyond doubt and shows that they ranked not just among the most prominent families in Athens, but indeed in all of Greece.
Factionalism and the Greco-Persian Conflict
Both the Philaids and the Peisistratids ruled their possessions as personal fiefs. Nevertheless, the northern inhabitants of the settlements retained a strong Athenian identity, as is evidenced by the âAthenianâ owl and head of Athena impressed on them. Ties with the metropolis were common in Greek colonies throughout the Mediterranean, but seem especially strong in Sigeion and on the Thracian Chersonese. This duality brings to mind the âconcessionsâ of foreign territories given out by the Genoese government to leading families in order to secure strategic aims abroad.108 This practice, incidentally, planted the seeds for potential conflict with the mother city as local allegiance was predicated on the factional leaders in control of these possessions, a conflict of interests also at play in Sigeion during Hippiasâ rule in exile. The problematic double allegiance to both the mother city and to local aristocratic rule became especially apparent during the first years of the democracy, when the Philaids sought to play the game both abroad and at home. When Miltiades returned to Athens in flight before the Persian advance to the Chersonese, he was (unsuccessfully) tried for his tyrannical rule there.109 Some years earlier, Miltiades seems to have secured Athenian consent for his conquest of Lemnos, âdelivering it to the Athenians,â which confirms the ambivalent relationship between the young democracy and its champions abroad.110 Kimonâs exploits in the northern Aegean during the 470âs can at once be seen as a continuation of the policy of his father, but it also brings to light the unease it inspired at home, his actions winning him acclaim as well as litigation for allegedly accepting bribes from the Macedonian king.111
As Miltiadesâ trial at Athens shows, the ambivalence of this relationship did not fully emerge until the Persian advance brought to light the inherent vulnerability of the overseas possessions. Of the two possible responses, resistance or submission, the ârenegadeâ Hippias, who was firmly entrenched in Sigeion, chose the latter, calculating that the Persians would be able to restore him to power in Athens. While this may well have played into his plans, it fails to factor in the basic premise of the Ionic revolt, aversion of the tyrantsâ rule, and the Persian reaction, which was to protect the tyrants. Hippiasâ choice, it appears, was made for him.
Athensâ role in burning the Persian capital of Asia Minor, Sardis, in 498, placed it firmly in the camp of the rebels,112 a policy that has a strong Alkmeonid flavor to it. With the Peisistratid Hippias and the Philaid Miltiades out of the way, democratic rule at Athens was effectively dominated by the Alkmeonids and it is easy to understand why the party of Kleisthenes, founder of the democratic constitution in 508/7, favored the Ionian cause, directed as it was against its Persian-backed tyrants. Having played an important role in the removal of tyranny from Athens, the Alkmeonids now found natural allies in the Ionian reformist camp.
In this light, the Athenian involvement in the Greco-Persian conflict is not merely a matter of democracy opposing tyranny, but also of rivalling faction leaders choosing sides based on their primary interests. This naturally pitted Alkmeonids against Peisistratids. The position of the Philaid party was more ambivalent, however. As tyrant of the Chersonese, Miltiades faced a similar choice as his rival on the opposite shore of the Hellespont and may have frowned upon the anti-tyrannical element within the rebel cause. But unlike Hippias, Miltiades remained a part of the Athenian franchise and, as such, had the option to return home. He apparently wavered for a long time, waiting until the very last moment before laying out his cards and fleeing to Athens.113 Sailing from the Chersonese, he was overtaken by the Persian fleet, and, losing his son to Persian captivity, only barely managed to make his own escape.114
That Miltiades chose to flee may be taken as a powerful testament to the appeal the Athenian franchise held from him, a franchise he would have to give up if he were to side with the Persians. His choice should not, however, be taken as a wholehearted yea to the democratic cause of his mother-city. And indeed, the fact that he was tried for tyranny upon his arrival there, shows how deeply he was mistrusted by some in the democratic party and suggests suspicion of collusion with the âotherâ tyrants in the opposing camp.115 Miltiades, in the end, may well have been swayed by a deeply-felt animosity towards the Peisistratids, which dated at least to Peisistratosâ first tyranny and the choice of the elder Miltiades to try his fortunes on the Thracian Chersonese. The rivalry implicit in that choice presumably deepened to enmity with the hand the Peisistratids were supposed to have had in the murder of Miltiadesâ father. With the fate of Hippias firmly tied to the Persian cause, Miltiades may well have been rooting secretly for the Ionians in the hope of effectuating his rivalâs destruction. It would explain the rebelsâ apparent free access to the Propontis116 and would tie in well with the sentiment expressed on the Chersonese coins that were struck in the 490âs, bearing the head of Athena on one side and the Milesian lion on the other (Figure. 3.3), which appears to imply support for the anti-Persian cause of that city.
Concluding Remarks: the Roots of Empire
Athenian overseas ambitions in the Archaic period were limited in scope, a far cry yet from the Classical Empire. They also lacked the support of an overwhelmingly dominant navy. For much of the earlier period, Athens could not compete with contemporary naval powers like Corinth, Samos or even neighboring Aegina. Only by the end of the sixth century did Athenian naval force begin to count, as it entered into an arms race at sea with Aegina. From the late seventh century onwards, however, Athenians began to take an active interest in the northern Aegean seaboards, setting up strongholds in Macedonia, Thrace and on either side of the entrance to the Hellespont and conquering the strategically important islands of Lemnos and Imbros. This shows that influence abroad was not merely a question of naval power alone, but relied on an individual kind of entrepreneurship that suggests a stunning lack of coordinated state policy.117 As the case of Kimon shows, foreign policy remained in the hands of strong aristocratic leaders even in the early democracy.
Peisistratos, in particular, has been credited with taking âthe first steps on the path which led Athens to empireâ, on account of his aggressive overseas exploits.118 But Peisistratos could not rely on a naval force strong enough to consistently enforce Athenian dominion over a range of Greek poleis. Naxos remained an exception. More importantly, Peisistratosâ foreign ventures should be seen in light of other Athenianâand indeed Greekâaristocratic leaders actively promoting their interests abroad. The exploits of the Athenian faction leaders were made possible through a combination of alliances with other Greek poleis and aristocratsâas in the case of the Peisistratid bid for power in Macedonia/Thraceâas well as with local populationsâsuch as the Philaid connection with the Dolonkoi. If anything, these exploits show a willingness on the part of these leaders to engage their foes, Greek or native, when- and wherever necessary on land.
The core strategic aims of the Classical Empire were, however, deeply rooted in the Archaic period. First, the assumption of a leading role among the Ionian states of the Southern Aegean appears to have been definedâalbeit in an embryonic formâas early as Peisistratosâ tyranny. So was an important method of accomplishing that aim: the purification of the sanctuary of Delos, an act designed to establish Athenian control over the Cyclades, assert authority over the Ionians of the Cyclades and Asia Minor, and reinforce the Athenian claim as the metropolis from which all Ionians descended. The same process was repeated, more thoroughly, in the fifth century.119 The choice for Delos as the nominal headquarters of the Delian League in the fifth century was based on a stratagem that had been conceived a century before. A similar case of meddling in international affairs through direct intervention at a supra-regional sanctuary is provided by the Alkmeonid involvement in the rebuilding of the temple of the Pythia. With regard to Delphi, too, Athenian policy remained consistent.120
A second crucial strategic interest of the Classical Empire, securing the âcorn-routeâ through the northern Aegean likewise had its roots deep in the Archaic period.121 During that time, Athenian aims in the region were effectuated through a variety of means, ranging from the creation of trade entrepots, such as at Rhaikelos in Macedonia, to the strategic control of anchorage posts on either side of the Hellespont and the establishment of a klerouchia on Lemnos. In the case of the Hellespontine settlements, economic benefits were derived not so much from direct trade with the Euxine hinterlandâwhich seems to have been dominated by the Milesians and Megariansâor from a potential blockade of the Propontic straits. Rather, the Athenian settlement at Sigeion afforded outside traders with a last port of call before entering the treacherous currents. Once inside the straits the Philaid controlled settlements on the southern shores of the Chersonese (Elaios, Madytos, Sestos, Kallipolis and Paktya) provided reliable anchorages where traders could take in food and water. But most importantly, the firm grasp on the Hellespont secured the free flow of vital grain imports that might otherwise be redirected elsewhereâa familiar concern in the Classical Empire.122
But grain was not all there was to be had in the northern Aegean. In the Classical period, Athens relied heavily on the empire to provide its citizens with a range and quantity of commodities not found at homeâleading Pericles to remark that to an Athenian âthe fruits of other countries are as familiar a luxury as those of his own.â123 While the commercial interests of the Athenian Empire extended far beyond the northern Aegean and the (pro-)Pontic region, it is clear that trade with these areas was vital to the Athenian economy throughout much of the fifth and fourth centuries. The Pontic region supplied the city with foodstuffs (grain, wine, fish), slaves and mineral resources (gold, copper, iron, zinc, lead); Macedonia was vital for supplying the timber needed for the maintenance of the fleet; and Thrace offered more mineral riches (gold, silver) and slaves. These same commodities were already available to the Athenians in the Archaic period as a result of their overseas possessions. What sets Athenian strategic aims in the Archaic period apart from the those prevalent in the Classical era is thus not so much the definition of the aims themselves as the scope within which they were pursued.
Late Geometric I spouted crater (louterion) from Athens. Cat. No. 1899.2-19.1
photo courtesy of the british museum
Coin from Sigeion, ca. 500, with Athena on the obverse and an owl with the lettering ÎÎÎ (Hippias) on the reverse (Babelon 1906, 8)
Coin from the Thracian Chersonese, ca. 595â594, with Milesian lion on the obverse and the head of Athena on the reverse
photo courtesy of classical numismatics group
Map of the Aegean. Peisistratid holdings indicated in bold. Philaid holdings indicated in italics
All dates before common era.
Hdt. 7.144.
Wallinga 1992, 148â54, following Ath.Pol. 22.7, believes the number of ships proposed by Themistokles to have been 100, which van Wees 2010, 223 believes were additional to an existing fleet of 100, bringing the total number of ships at Salamis to 200, the number Herodotus erroneously assigned to Themistoklesâ naval bill.
Hdt. 7.144.2; Plut., Them. 4.
Thuc. 7.21.3. Herodotusâ account (7.144.2) differs slightly in identifying the pending war with Aegina as the true impetus for building a navy, although, here too, the net outcome was that the decision âsaved Hellas by compelling the Athenians to become seamenâ, establishing Athenian Naval hegemony. For the imperial implications of Themistoklesâ proposal and his tactical inclusion of a looming war with Aegina, see Kallet-Marx 2008, 202â204, and n. 56.
Meiggs 1972; Rhodes 1985. Characteristically, Hornblower 20023, 9 speaks of Themistoklesâ hardline approach toward the Spartans in 479/8 as âthe first hint of imperial pretensionsâ. See also de Romilly 1963, 13; Haas 1985, 29. For a dissenting view, see Bloedow 1975.
The most comprehensive and, in my view, most successful treatment of aristocratic land tenure (and its political implications) is still Foxhall 1997. For a general account of the Athenian economy in the Archaic period, see van Wees 2013.
E.g. Coldstream 1977, 135; Osborne 1989, 313, 321. For the movement of âinternal colonizationâ in general, see Snodgrass 1980, 22â23; Lauter 1985, 87â88; Mersch 1997, 46; Hall 2006, 220; van den Eijnde 2010, 335, 367.
Recent scholarship shows how Greek colonial enterprises were channeled into pre-existing trade networks, e.g. Malkin 2011, 22, 154. The Phokaian colonization of the Rhone estuary is illustrative, cf. Dietler 2010.
Haas 1985, 30; compare the use of âship powerâ in the title of Wallinga 1992. See van Wees 2013, 64â68 for the measure of state control over Athenian naval power.
Casson 1971, 49 dates the invention of the ram to the Early Iron Age, or ca. 1000, Strauss 2008, 224 to the eighth century.
Wallinga 1992, 33â41. Purely commercial vesselsâknown in later antiquity as strongylaiâhad a strongly pronounced, rounded hull, to accommodate as much cargo as possible and was predominantly propelled by wind, aided only by manpower (oars) when wind was lacking or when entering or leaving port. No such vessels have been positively attested for the Archaic period.
ii. 1.476; Od. 9.150â51; 168â69. For the decks: Od. 12.229â230, cf. Casson 1971, 44, 51â53.
British Museum 1899.2-19.1.
Casson 1971, 53â60. For a collection of ship-scenes on Late Geometric vases, see Ahlberg-Cornell 1971, 25â38.
Thuc. 1.14.
Hdt. 6.89.
Hdt. 3.39.4. For the prominent role played by Samos in sixth century maritime developments, see Wallinga 1992, 84â101.
Hdt. 5.94.1, Str. 13.1.38.
Str. 13.1.38, Val. Max. 6.5 ext. 1, Polyaen., Strategemata 1.25.1, Schol. (vetus) in A. Eum. 398c, Suda s.v. ΠιÏÏάκοÏ. The Alcaeus episode: Alc. fr. 428a Lobel-Page (= Str. 13.1.38); Hdt 5.95.1. For further references see Figueira 1991, 132-131; 2008, 429â430.
Hdt. 5.94.2.
For a comprehensive account of Athenian activity here, see Isaac 1986, 162â166, in addition to the historical treatment by Berve 1937, 26â36.
Hdt. 5.94.1. Graham 1982, 121 dates the seizure of Sigeion to Peisistratosâ third tyranny (546), though he mistakenly attributes Hegesistratos with the conquest. On the other hand, the fact that Peisistratos had his hands free to conquer Sigeion suggests the possibility of a slightly earlier date in between the second and third tyrannies. The establishment of Hegesistratos as tyrant could then be attributed to his fatherâs third seizure of power at Athens.
Hdt. 5.65.3, 5.91.1, 5.94.1 Th. 6.59.4, Plu. De Herod. 854e.
Hdt 1.64.1; AthPol 15.2. The Peisistratean venture in Macedonia and Thrace has been elaborately discussed by Lavelle 2005, 116â34. There is some confusion as to the precise location of the settlement, since the Herodotus passage refers to the river Strymon, which runs east of the Chalkidiki, while AthPol places it on the Thermaic Gulf. A general consensus places it in the northwestern Chalkidiki, on the promontory of Megalo Karabournou, about twenty-five kilometers southwest of Thessalonike on the eastern side of the Thermaic Gulf, Edson 1947, 88â91; Cole 1975, 42â43; Rhodes 1993, 207; Lavelle 2005, 331.
AthPol 15.2.
Hdt 1.64.1.
Thuc. 4.108.1.
Hdt. 5.94.
Hdt. 1.64.2; cf. AthPol 15.3.
Hdt. 1.64.2; cf. Thuc. 3.104.
Hdt. 1.147.
For the region and its history, see Loukoupoulou 2004, 900â901. Athenian colonization, Figueira 2008, 431.
Hdt. 6.34. The history of Philaid rule is related in 6.34â41.
Hdt. 6.38.
Hdt. 6.39.
Hdt. 6.103. The complicity of the Peisistratids has, however, been called into question as a case of âpost-tyranny adjustmentâ, Kallett-Marx 2013, 53, n. 65.
Hdt. 6.40. Seltman 1924, 141â144 and pl. xxiv; Head et al. 19112, 257â258; Jeffery 19902, 371, no. 34.
Hdt. 6.136 and 6.140; Nep., Milt. 1â3; Diod. 10.19.6. See Berve 1937, 44â57; Evans 1963, 168 for a treatment of the conquest of Lemnos by Miltiades with a summary of the various datings, favoring for himself the lower date. Ficuciello 2013, 198 favors a date between 499-494/3. Cf. Figueira 2008, 431â432.
When Dariusâ fleet advanced in 495, Miltiades fled with five of his ships to Imbros, losing one with his son in command, Hdt. 6.41. Athenian troops from Imbros are mentioned several times in Thucydidesâ account of the Peloponnesian War, Thuc. 3.5.1; 4.28.4; 5.8.2; 7.57.2. See also Graham 1982, 122. Imbros as an apanage of Philaid Chersonese, Figueira 2008, 431.
Nep., Milt. 2.5; Hdt. 6.136â139.
Diod. 10.19.6.
Beekes 2003. That the language of the Lemnian âTyrrheniansâ was related to Etruscan is today disputed by few and borne out by the lettering on the famous âLemnos Steleâ, which dates to the late sixth century, Cousin and Durrbach 1886. Cf. Ficuciello 2013, 192â193.
Hdt. 6.140.
Hdt. 6.136.
Cf. Kallett-Marx 2013, 53, with regard to Thrace: âCimon accomplished what his father had intended but failed to doâ.
Hdt. 6.132.
Hdt. 6.136.
Hdt. 6.133.1.
Kimon in Thrace: Hdt. 7.107; Thuc. 1.98.1; Plut., Cim. 7â8.2; Isaac 1986, 19â21; on Skyros: Thuc. 1.98.2.
They were, by all means a very large faction. According to Herodotus (5.72.1) they numbered seven hundred households before Cleomenes drove them out of Attica (see also Ath.Pol. 20.3).
Hdt. 5.71; Thuc 1.126. Plut., Sol. 12.
Plut., Sol. 11.2.
Hdt. 6.126â131.
Lavelle 2005, 87â89. Jeffery 1976, 78 argued for an Alkmeonid exile during Peisistratusâ earlier tyranny, based on a dedication set up by Alkmeonides at the sanctary of Apollo at Ptoion (ceg 302/IG i3 1469), but it is not at all evident that the inscription supports such a conclusion, cf. Schachter 2016, 154â160.
Hdt. 5.62â63. This passage should be treated with some caution as it puts the Alkmeonidai âon the right side of historyâ just before the end of the tyranny. As Lavelle 2005, 87â89 argues, Herodotusâ account of the family under the tyranny shows evidence of being biased, perhaps because the Alkmeonidai themselves were his primary informants.
See the contribution by Kirk in this volume.
Hdt. 6.136.
Hdt. 5.99.
But see Isaac 1986, 175, who argues that Miltiades had pursued an anti-Persian policy all along. This is based on Miltiadesâ supposed two-faced approach during Dariusâ Skythian campaign in 513/2, Hdt. 4.136â137.
Hdt. 6.41.
In 513/2, during his Skythian campaign, Darius had charged Miltiades with guarding a bridge across the Danube, although he seems to have played both sides of the fence here, Hdt. 4.136â7 and Isaac 1986, 173â174.
Figueira 1991, 132â142 called Archaic Athenian colonization âpatronalâ, stressing the individual/familial nature of these initiatives, cf. also Figueira 2008, 429â434. Recently, Kallett-Marx 2013, 53 has argued for a more âcollectiveâ or âimperialâ nature, pointing to a passage in Herodotus (6.140), discussed above, which has Miltiades acting on behalf of the Athenians in the conquest of Lemnos. As the discussion here makes clear, Lemnos stands out from the other Athenian possessions in the northern Aegean: Herodotus specifically refers to Peisistratid rule at Sigeion and Philaid hegemony in the Thracian Chersonese as tyrannical (see discussion above); Lemnos, on the other hand, was an Athenian klerouchia, established very late in the Archaic period and was acquired for the Athenian democracy by Miltiades.
Thuc. 3.104.
Especially evident during the second Sacred War, Thuc. 1.112; Plut., Vit. Per., 21.
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