Read Aristophanes, Lysistrata, lines 167-83, ‘CALONICE: Well, if that’s what you both think ... LAMPITO: ... we are ready to swear.’ Consider the above passage in no more than 500 words:
(i) Briefly provide its context;
(ii) Consider how far this passage, while at first sight appearing to be written for comic effect, nevertheless has serious issues underlying it.
This passage is taken from the prologue of Lysistrata by Aristophanes. It occurs before the parodos, the entrance of the chorus on stage. Lysistrata has outlined her plan to the Greek women gathered around her¬ – ¬“we must abstain from – cock and balls” (124). It is an important exchange between Lysistrata, the Athenian, and Lampito, the Spartan. The passage ends with the all-important pledging of the oath to enforce the plan. The two leading women also encourage each other, in a kind of friendly rivalry, to demonstrate their power over their respective menfolk. Further, challenged by Lampito, Lysistrata pledges herself to a practical political act – the seizure of the Acropolis, i.e. physically to block access to the temple that houses the state treasury.
The comic effect of the passage stems from the absurdity of the exchange. That women should be able, through sexual abstinence, to provoke peace is clearly a fantasy. The humour thus stems from the apparent seriousness of what is said, including the pledging of an oath, with the very shaky premise of the play. As is clear from the exchange, the immediate issue at stake is the apparently never ending conflict with Sparta. The war has exhausted both human and material resources on both sides. Furthermore, the structure of Athenian democracy itself has become increasingly under threat, following the disastrous Sicilian expedition (BHAG, p.213-17). The return of the tyranny of Hippias is often trailed as a threat (Aristophanes, Lysistrata, 619). The second and more central issue, from the point of view of the comedy, is the unprecedented political role played by the women of Athens and Sparta. The comedy may seem to the males of the audience as a pure fantasy given the traditionally subservient role of women during that period (OCCC p.777, BHAG pp. 157-161). He cleverly chooses the one instance of communal power the women did have in 5th century Athens, viz their specific role in all-women religious ceremonies (such as the Greek festivals of Aphrodite and Demeter that involved sexual humour, OCCC p.779) to drive the point home and this is confirmed by the fact that “the over-age women have instructions [...] to seize the Acropolis under pretence of making a sacrifice” (176-9). Lysistrata herself reminds her audience of such gatherings in the opening lines of the play (Aristophanes, Lysistrata, 1-2). Aristophanes does this specifically to counter the otherwise preposterous premise of the play. At this point, to see the play as in any way a proto-feminist tract would be a serious misreading because the real power the women wield in it is entirely based on their sexuality such as in the scene between Cinesias and Myrrhine (Aristophanes, Lysistrata, 829-1013). A third issue lies in the deprecation of Athens in the mouth of Lampito: “how is one going to persuade that riffraff not to act barmy?” (170-1). On a superficial level, of course, this statement illustrates what the Spartans typically think of the democratic Athenians. But that Aristophanes should make such a side-comment in his play is revealing of a certain loss of Athenian self-esteem following the set-back of the war and of the Sicilian expedition. While the play as a whole portrays Sparta in a favourable light, this barely implicit jibe at Athens’ reputation is revealing of Aristophanes’ trenchant humour and satirical power.
549 words
Bibliography
Ancient sources
Aristophanes, Lysistrata, 167-83, in Sommerstein, A.H. (trans.), Oxford: Oxbow Books, pp.15-53
Modern scholarship
Budelmann, F., Hardwick, L. and Robson, J. (2006) A219: Block 2: Classical Athens, Milton Keynes: The Open University
Pomeroy, S.B., Burnstein, S.M., Donlan, W. And Roberts, J.T. (2004) A Brief History of Ancient Greece: Politics, Society and Culture, Oxford: Oxford University Press
Hornblower, S. And Spawforth, A. (eds) (1998) The Oxford Companion to Classical Civilization, Oxford: Oxford University Press
mardi 26 mai 2009
The Acropolis
Answer the following question in no more than 1,500 words:
‘A conscious programme of display.’ Making close reference to the art and architecture of the Acropolis, explain and illustrate what is meant by this phrase. Then take any one of the other sources you have studied in Block 2, and briefly analyse the comparisons and contrasts that may be made between this source and the Acropolis in this matter of display.
If the Acropolis in Athens is to be treated as ‘a conscious programme of display’ (Block 2, p.76) we must briefly look at the historical and political context in which it was built so as to understand the purpose and nature of the undertaking. We can then seek to interpret the remaining material evidence of the Acropolis in the light of that building programme. As we shall see, the material evidence carries with it a metaphysical dimension as well as an obvious physical one. We shall then briefly draw an analogy between the intended effect of the Acropolis and Thucydides’s rendering of Pericles’s speech dedicated to those who fought and died in the first year of the Great Peloponnesian War in 431 BCE.
By the time the Athenians, and Pericles first among them, turned their attention to re-building the site of the Acropolis in the middle of the fifth century BCE ¬-- a site which had been sacked by the Persians in 480 BCE and left largely untouched since then -- the Athenian empire was very much alive, although weakened by a revolt in Euboea and the defection of Megara to the Peloponnesian league. A connection was made in the mind of ordinary Athenian citizens between the radical democratic constitution in Athens and the possession of the empire bringing wealth and success to the polis (Joint Association of Classical Teachers, 2008, p.26). Indeed, after Xerxes’s defeat, Athens became a major cultural centre (BHAG, p.138) and some of the money received from the league against Persia led by Athens was used to celebrate religious festivals and to build magnificent buildings, such as the Parthenon in 447 BCE (ibid).
As “the guiding spirit of Athenian imperialism” (BHAG, p.145) Pericles instigated the building of this temple and others, all adorned with sculptures, on the Acropolis meaning ‘city-top’ or ‘citadel’ (JACT, 2008, p.74). According to the same source (2008, p.26) “there is little doubt that, from the first, these buildings made a statement about Athenian power and superiority. Through them, Athens presented herself as a city fit to be the leader of an empire.” Pericles justified this display of power in the following terms, according to Plutarch (Life of Pericles, 12.4): “It is fair that the city, once she has been equipped with what is necessary for war, should turn the surplus over to works which, when completed, will bring her everlasting glory.” Democratically, the public building would, appropriately, “stir every hand until almost the whole city will be under contract” (Plutarch, Life of Pericles, 12.4). In what way then does the Acropolis symbolise an imperial, yet democratic, programme?
The first point to note is that of location (Illustrations Book, Plate 3). The Acropolis is situated on a rocky hillside that rises 120 m from the surrounding plain (JACT, 2008, p.74). This made it “a natural place of refuge in time of trouble” (ibid). Secondly, on top of being “the central fortress,” the Acropolis is “the principal sanctuary of Athena, patron goddess of the city” (OCCC, p.93). One of the first monuments to be erected after the sack by the Persians was a bronze statue of Athena Promachos “set up to celebrate victory over the Persians” (ibid). This statue was visible from what was to later be the Propylaea, the gateway building to the Acropolis (Illustrations Book, Plate 10). Towards the end of the fifth century, the statue was housed in the most sacred of the temples of the Acropolis, the Erechtheion. Thus, the imperial implications of the Acropolis are evident from the outset, chronologically and geographically; at its entrance lay a statue celebrating that victory which was instrumental in the formation of the Athenian empire.
Next came the Parthenon, undoubtedly the most known and celebrated monument of the Acropolis. Temple to Athena, housing an unprecedented gold and ivory statue of the goddess, the Parthenon also served as the state treasury (Block 2, p.74) confirming its status as “a monument to Athens’ imperial position” (JACT, 2008, p.80). Indeed, the move of the treasury of the Delian league from Delos to Athens in 454 BCE (Block 2, p.74) marks the beginning of what is now called the Athenian empire. This was no ordinary treasury however. The Parthenon was “the largest temple of its day” (ibid), positioned in the centre of the Acropolis and visible from afar, to friends and foe alike (Experiencing the Classical World, p.98). Especially of interest are the temple’s sculptures, i.e. the pediments, the metopes and the endlessly controversial frieze. Together these can be viewed “as celebrating Athens’ spiritual life, military prowess and cultural pre-eminence” (ECW, p.99).
The pediments, for example, depict, on the east end, the birth of Athena, and on the west end, the contest between her and Poseidon for the possession of the land (Readings Book 1, Reading 2.6., Pausanias 1.24.5). These pediments portray the power of the polis as having divine origin (birth of Athena) on the one hand and divine sanction (reign of Athena) on the other. The metopes “depict various battles between the powers of civilisation and groups that are somehow uncivilised – the gods battle against the giants, the Greeks against the Amazons” (ECW, p.99). The message thus conveyed is unequivocal: Athens is the bastion of civilisation, Hellenism, and has to assert herself in the struggle against un-Greek barbarians on the one hand, and possibly undemocratic Greek poleis on the other, i.e. poleis not forming part of her empire, the chief among them being Sparta.
The frieze itself is said to depict the festival of the Panathenaia, dedicated to the patron goddess Athena, and certainly suggests as much in terms of the procession it depicts although its actual constitution is somewhat mythical, if not aristocratic, with a predominance of cavalry and charioteers (Robin Osbourne, 1987, pp.103-104). Nevertheless, the fact that the procession (which was all-inclusive in that all members of the polis, citizens and denizens alike, took part in it) made its way to the Parthenon frieze shows that the building programme was open to influences which were not solely those of the powerful. The frieze is a loose but undeniable representation of unity and not of struggle, like the metopes.
In his essay on Classical Athens (ECW, pp.99-100), James Robson points out the thematic unity of the Acropolis as a whole. Thus the already mentioned statue of Athena Parthenos included “a shield sculpted with scenes of the battles between both gods and giants and Greeks and Amazons [and] sandals whose decoration included the battle between Lapiths and centaurs (all motifs found on the temple’s metopes).” In addition, the Parthenos statue could be seen as complementing the already mentioned Promachos statue, while the temple of Athena Nike that sits just outside of the Acropolis boasts a frieze representing the battle of Marathon which was a major Greek victory against the first Persian invasion by Darius. Rather like the Parthenon frieze, an actual event, in this case a battle, had entered the world of myth and was thus fit to be the object of a temple’s decoration.
A similar glorification of past deeds is to be found in Pericles’ Funeral Speech dedicated to those who died in the first year of the Great Peloponnesian War in 431 BCE (Readings Book 1, Reading 2.8 Thucydides 2.34-46). In 2.36 Pericles glorifies, alongside “our ancestors,” “our own fathers, who added to their inheritance the empire which we now possess.” The not- too-distant past, symbolised by the battle of Marathon on the temple of Athena Nike, features in the opening words of the statesman’s speech. In 2.43 he notes that “heroes have the whole earth for their tomb.” The following sentence in 2.41 sums up the building programme on the Acropolis: “the admiration of the present and succeeding ages will be ours, since we have not left our power without witness, but have shown it by mighty proofs.”
As with the Parthenon frieze, there is no reference in the speech to named individuals or fighting units, although the war dead were mainly cavalry, i.e. from the upper-classes. Athens being a democracy of sorts, Pericles was careful not to single out any individuals or groups of individuals which would undermine the unity of the state. The emphasis is on participation, and there is no doubt that the construction of the Acropolis entailed a wide participation from the citizen and non-citizen body alike, as noted above. Intriguingly, Thucydides puts the following words in Pericles’ mouth: “For Athens alone of her contemporaries is found when tested to be greater than her reputation.” This sits oddly with Thucydides’ own statement (Thucydides 1.10) that were Athens to be found in ruins, “one would conjecture from what met the eye that the city had been twice as powerful as in fact it is.” This, if anything, points to the success of the Acropolis in conveying the power of Athens and her empire, making her, to quote Pericles, “the school of Hellas.” Pericles’s observation in 2.45 that the most ‘glorious’ women keep themselves discreet is mirrored in the aforementioned frieze in which a tiny minority of women figure.
1,510 words
Bibliography
Ancient sources
Plutarch, Life of Pericles
Pausanias, Guide to Greece, vol.1, in Levi, P. (trans.) (1979 [1971]), Hammondsworth: Penguin, pp.69-70)
Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War, 2.34-46, in Crawley, R. (trans.) (1997), Ware: Wordsworth Editions, pp.93-100
Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War, 1.10, in Crawley, R. (trans.) (1997), Ware: Wordsworth Editions
Modern scholarship
Budelmann, F., Hardwick, L. and Robson, J. (2006) A219: Block 2: Classical Athens, Milton Keynes: The Open University
Joint Association of Classical Teachers (2008) The World of Athens, Cambridge and NY: Cambridge University Press
Pomeroy, S.B., Burnstein, S.M., Donlan, W. And Roberts, J.T. (2004) A Brief History of Ancient Greece: Politics, Society and Culture, Oxford: Oxford University Press
Robson, J. (2006) ‘Self and Society in Classical Athens’ in Perkins, P. (ed.), Experiencing the Classical World, Milton Keynes: The Open University
A219 Illustrations Book
‘A conscious programme of display.’ Making close reference to the art and architecture of the Acropolis, explain and illustrate what is meant by this phrase. Then take any one of the other sources you have studied in Block 2, and briefly analyse the comparisons and contrasts that may be made between this source and the Acropolis in this matter of display.
If the Acropolis in Athens is to be treated as ‘a conscious programme of display’ (Block 2, p.76) we must briefly look at the historical and political context in which it was built so as to understand the purpose and nature of the undertaking. We can then seek to interpret the remaining material evidence of the Acropolis in the light of that building programme. As we shall see, the material evidence carries with it a metaphysical dimension as well as an obvious physical one. We shall then briefly draw an analogy between the intended effect of the Acropolis and Thucydides’s rendering of Pericles’s speech dedicated to those who fought and died in the first year of the Great Peloponnesian War in 431 BCE.
By the time the Athenians, and Pericles first among them, turned their attention to re-building the site of the Acropolis in the middle of the fifth century BCE ¬-- a site which had been sacked by the Persians in 480 BCE and left largely untouched since then -- the Athenian empire was very much alive, although weakened by a revolt in Euboea and the defection of Megara to the Peloponnesian league. A connection was made in the mind of ordinary Athenian citizens between the radical democratic constitution in Athens and the possession of the empire bringing wealth and success to the polis (Joint Association of Classical Teachers, 2008, p.26). Indeed, after Xerxes’s defeat, Athens became a major cultural centre (BHAG, p.138) and some of the money received from the league against Persia led by Athens was used to celebrate religious festivals and to build magnificent buildings, such as the Parthenon in 447 BCE (ibid).
As “the guiding spirit of Athenian imperialism” (BHAG, p.145) Pericles instigated the building of this temple and others, all adorned with sculptures, on the Acropolis meaning ‘city-top’ or ‘citadel’ (JACT, 2008, p.74). According to the same source (2008, p.26) “there is little doubt that, from the first, these buildings made a statement about Athenian power and superiority. Through them, Athens presented herself as a city fit to be the leader of an empire.” Pericles justified this display of power in the following terms, according to Plutarch (Life of Pericles, 12.4): “It is fair that the city, once she has been equipped with what is necessary for war, should turn the surplus over to works which, when completed, will bring her everlasting glory.” Democratically, the public building would, appropriately, “stir every hand until almost the whole city will be under contract” (Plutarch, Life of Pericles, 12.4). In what way then does the Acropolis symbolise an imperial, yet democratic, programme?
The first point to note is that of location (Illustrations Book, Plate 3). The Acropolis is situated on a rocky hillside that rises 120 m from the surrounding plain (JACT, 2008, p.74). This made it “a natural place of refuge in time of trouble” (ibid). Secondly, on top of being “the central fortress,” the Acropolis is “the principal sanctuary of Athena, patron goddess of the city” (OCCC, p.93). One of the first monuments to be erected after the sack by the Persians was a bronze statue of Athena Promachos “set up to celebrate victory over the Persians” (ibid). This statue was visible from what was to later be the Propylaea, the gateway building to the Acropolis (Illustrations Book, Plate 10). Towards the end of the fifth century, the statue was housed in the most sacred of the temples of the Acropolis, the Erechtheion. Thus, the imperial implications of the Acropolis are evident from the outset, chronologically and geographically; at its entrance lay a statue celebrating that victory which was instrumental in the formation of the Athenian empire.
Next came the Parthenon, undoubtedly the most known and celebrated monument of the Acropolis. Temple to Athena, housing an unprecedented gold and ivory statue of the goddess, the Parthenon also served as the state treasury (Block 2, p.74) confirming its status as “a monument to Athens’ imperial position” (JACT, 2008, p.80). Indeed, the move of the treasury of the Delian league from Delos to Athens in 454 BCE (Block 2, p.74) marks the beginning of what is now called the Athenian empire. This was no ordinary treasury however. The Parthenon was “the largest temple of its day” (ibid), positioned in the centre of the Acropolis and visible from afar, to friends and foe alike (Experiencing the Classical World, p.98). Especially of interest are the temple’s sculptures, i.e. the pediments, the metopes and the endlessly controversial frieze. Together these can be viewed “as celebrating Athens’ spiritual life, military prowess and cultural pre-eminence” (ECW, p.99).
The pediments, for example, depict, on the east end, the birth of Athena, and on the west end, the contest between her and Poseidon for the possession of the land (Readings Book 1, Reading 2.6., Pausanias 1.24.5). These pediments portray the power of the polis as having divine origin (birth of Athena) on the one hand and divine sanction (reign of Athena) on the other. The metopes “depict various battles between the powers of civilisation and groups that are somehow uncivilised – the gods battle against the giants, the Greeks against the Amazons” (ECW, p.99). The message thus conveyed is unequivocal: Athens is the bastion of civilisation, Hellenism, and has to assert herself in the struggle against un-Greek barbarians on the one hand, and possibly undemocratic Greek poleis on the other, i.e. poleis not forming part of her empire, the chief among them being Sparta.
The frieze itself is said to depict the festival of the Panathenaia, dedicated to the patron goddess Athena, and certainly suggests as much in terms of the procession it depicts although its actual constitution is somewhat mythical, if not aristocratic, with a predominance of cavalry and charioteers (Robin Osbourne, 1987, pp.103-104). Nevertheless, the fact that the procession (which was all-inclusive in that all members of the polis, citizens and denizens alike, took part in it) made its way to the Parthenon frieze shows that the building programme was open to influences which were not solely those of the powerful. The frieze is a loose but undeniable representation of unity and not of struggle, like the metopes.
In his essay on Classical Athens (ECW, pp.99-100), James Robson points out the thematic unity of the Acropolis as a whole. Thus the already mentioned statue of Athena Parthenos included “a shield sculpted with scenes of the battles between both gods and giants and Greeks and Amazons [and] sandals whose decoration included the battle between Lapiths and centaurs (all motifs found on the temple’s metopes).” In addition, the Parthenos statue could be seen as complementing the already mentioned Promachos statue, while the temple of Athena Nike that sits just outside of the Acropolis boasts a frieze representing the battle of Marathon which was a major Greek victory against the first Persian invasion by Darius. Rather like the Parthenon frieze, an actual event, in this case a battle, had entered the world of myth and was thus fit to be the object of a temple’s decoration.
A similar glorification of past deeds is to be found in Pericles’ Funeral Speech dedicated to those who died in the first year of the Great Peloponnesian War in 431 BCE (Readings Book 1, Reading 2.8 Thucydides 2.34-46). In 2.36 Pericles glorifies, alongside “our ancestors,” “our own fathers, who added to their inheritance the empire which we now possess.” The not- too-distant past, symbolised by the battle of Marathon on the temple of Athena Nike, features in the opening words of the statesman’s speech. In 2.43 he notes that “heroes have the whole earth for their tomb.” The following sentence in 2.41 sums up the building programme on the Acropolis: “the admiration of the present and succeeding ages will be ours, since we have not left our power without witness, but have shown it by mighty proofs.”
As with the Parthenon frieze, there is no reference in the speech to named individuals or fighting units, although the war dead were mainly cavalry, i.e. from the upper-classes. Athens being a democracy of sorts, Pericles was careful not to single out any individuals or groups of individuals which would undermine the unity of the state. The emphasis is on participation, and there is no doubt that the construction of the Acropolis entailed a wide participation from the citizen and non-citizen body alike, as noted above. Intriguingly, Thucydides puts the following words in Pericles’ mouth: “For Athens alone of her contemporaries is found when tested to be greater than her reputation.” This sits oddly with Thucydides’ own statement (Thucydides 1.10) that were Athens to be found in ruins, “one would conjecture from what met the eye that the city had been twice as powerful as in fact it is.” This, if anything, points to the success of the Acropolis in conveying the power of Athens and her empire, making her, to quote Pericles, “the school of Hellas.” Pericles’s observation in 2.45 that the most ‘glorious’ women keep themselves discreet is mirrored in the aforementioned frieze in which a tiny minority of women figure.
1,510 words
Bibliography
Ancient sources
Plutarch, Life of Pericles
Pausanias, Guide to Greece, vol.1, in Levi, P. (trans.) (1979 [1971]), Hammondsworth: Penguin, pp.69-70)
Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War, 2.34-46, in Crawley, R. (trans.) (1997), Ware: Wordsworth Editions, pp.93-100
Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War, 1.10, in Crawley, R. (trans.) (1997), Ware: Wordsworth Editions
Modern scholarship
Budelmann, F., Hardwick, L. and Robson, J. (2006) A219: Block 2: Classical Athens, Milton Keynes: The Open University
Joint Association of Classical Teachers (2008) The World of Athens, Cambridge and NY: Cambridge University Press
Pomeroy, S.B., Burnstein, S.M., Donlan, W. And Roberts, J.T. (2004) A Brief History of Ancient Greece: Politics, Society and Culture, Oxford: Oxford University Press
Robson, J. (2006) ‘Self and Society in Classical Athens’ in Perkins, P. (ed.), Experiencing the Classical World, Milton Keynes: The Open University
A219 Illustrations Book
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