Pericles of Athens (30 page)

The
stratēgos
may well also have been compared to those controversial figures on account of the
policies that he pursued. Some aspects of his actions as leader of the city were certainly
reminiscent of certain initiatives of the Athenian tyrants. When he reorganized the
Great Panathenaea so as to secure a greater place for musical competitions, Pericles
was following in the footsteps of Pisistratus, who had, if not created, at least lent
new luster to this great Athenian festival.
¹⁰
Likewise, the construction policies of the
stratēgos
recalled Athens’s tyrannical past. The gigantism of the Parthenon must have been
regarded as an echo of the immense temple of Zeus Olympius, the construction of which,
to the south east of the Acropolis, had been launched around 515 B.C. by the Pisistratids
who, however, did not have time to complete it.
¹¹
In suggesting that the embellishment of the city was, as Plutarch claimed, “manifestly
subjecting it to tyranny” (
Pericles
, 12.2), Pericles’ opponents no doubt hoped to associate the
stratēgos
’s monumental policies with the detested memory of the Pisistratids.

The monumental program launched by Pericles on the Acropolis played a crucial role
in the process that led to Pericles being depicted as an all-powerful monarch. To
some extent, the ancient sources did represent the
stratēgos
’s power as a reflection of the Parthenon, majestic, intimidating, even overwhelming,
thereby transforming the magistrate into an emperor so intent on his building projects
that he eluded all popular control.

The Builder-Emperor

If Plutarch so greatly admired Pericles, despite all his “demagogic” policies, it
was primarily on account of the “great works” with which the biographer associated
him so closely. In his final comparison between Pericles and Fabius Maximus, Plutarch
expresses his boundless admiration for those buildings that, in a way, increased the
prestige of the whole of Greece in comparison with the triumphant Rome of the early
centuries of its empire: “By the side of the great public works, the temples and the
stately edifices with which Pericles adorned Athens, all Rome’s attempts at splendour
down to the times of the Caesars,
taken together, are not worthy to be considered.”
¹²
In this way, Plutarch explicitly compares the action of the
stratēgos
to that of the Caesars. His monumental policies make him a prefiguration of the Roman
emperors—in particular, Hadrian, who was a contemporary of the biographer and who,
out of a sense of philhellenism, restored the edifices of Athens that were built under
Pericles.
¹³

Was this simply a later idea that emerged at the time when Plutarch was composing
his
Lives
, as a result of a kind of contamination from the Roman imperial model? Not at all.
In his own lifetime, the
stratēgos
was already associated with the monuments constructed at the peak of his career.
The comic poets represented him as “carrying the Odeon on his head”;
¹⁴
and one century later the orator Lycurgus of Athens, himself also a great builder
who completed the construction of the theater of Dionysus, redesigned the Pnyx, and
restored the temples of the Acropolis, wrote as follows: “Pericles, who had conquered
Samos, Euboea, Aegina,
and had constructed the Propylaea, the Odeon, the Parthenon
, and had collected ten thousand talents for the Acropolis, was crowned with a simple
crown of olive leaves.”
¹⁵

However, even if this vision of an architect-Pericles frequently recurs in the ancient
sources, for a number of reasons it calls for qualification. In the first place, we
should distinguish between the edifices that are “Periclean” because Pericles himself
proposed them and the monuments that are called “Periclean” only because they were
constructed at the time when the
stratēgos
wielded influence in the city.
¹⁶
If we credit the testimony of the orator Lycurgus, only the Odeon, the Parthenon,
and the Propylaea—the last conceived by Mnesicles and all constructed in the five
years between 437 and 433—should be attributed to the direct initiative of Pericles.
To be sure, he also played a role in the construction of the Long Walls, which constituted
a crucial element in his defense strategy. Nevertheless, he was not alone in taking
part in their construction: Thucydides does not even mention his name in this connection,
¹⁷
and Plato’s Socrates links him with only the construction of the inner wall that
reinforced the northern wall that connected the city with Piraeus.
¹⁸

Next, even Pericles’ supposed control of the work sites in which he was directly involved
needs qualification. So it is, to put it mildly, mistaken to speak of “the labors
of Pericles” as if they were comparable to the “labors of Heracles.” Pericles was
no Hellenistic king, let alone a Roman emperor who, on his own, as an autocrat, decided
upon the constructions to be undertaken. Every one of his projects was submitted to
a vote of the Assembly that also decided how to finance it. Architects produced plans,
models, and estimates, all of which were submitted for the approval of the Council.
Magistrates then proceeded to adjudicate on the proposed works,
¹⁹
which, once started, were subject to the intrusive control of a college of ten
epistatai
elected by the Assembly.

Given this context, when Plutarch, on the subject of the Odeon, declares that Pericles
“supervised” (
epistatountos
) the construction (
Pericles
, 13.9), the biographer was clearly misrepresenting the reality. Only two possibilities
are plausible: either he was referring to the official post of an
epistatēs
, the supervisor of a construction site, elected by the people, in which case he forgets
that the
stratēgos
was obliged to agree with the other nine members of the commission;
²⁰
alternatively, he was assuming that someone held the power of general supervision
over all such works, and that is something that is nowhere attested by the contemporary
sources.

Plutarch’s testimony also needs to be considered cautiously where he writes of the
building sites on the Acropolis where, if we are to believe him, “everything was under
Phidias’s charge and all were under his superintendence, owing to his friendship with
Pericles.” For in the first place, strictly speaking only the construction of the
statue of Athena Parthenos can be attributed to the hand of Phidias; and second because,
in the case of every one of his projects, Pericles had to persuade the Assembly to
vote in favor of them and was obliged then to submit to controlling procedures that
were beyond his own official powers. The ancient authors tend to ascribe to the
stratēgos
monuments that were in fact constructed both by the people and in the name of the
people. This conflicting information is laid bare whenever it is possible to compare
literary sources to the epigraphical documentation. Whereas Plutarch presents Pericles
as the one who dedicated the monumental statue of Athena Hygieia, the foundation stone
discovered on the Acropolis mentions only the Athenian people; the name of the
stratēgos
does not appear at all.
²¹

One thorny question nevertheless remains. How should we treat the claims of Lycurgus
who, one century later, insisted on personalizing the great works produced between
450 and 430? That biased presentation makes sense once it is set in context. Clearly
playing on the idea of a mirror image, by recalling memories of Pericles, Lycurgus
was aiming to enhance his own actions as the builder who restored the Acropolis monuments.
By magnifying the stature of the
stratēgos
, he hoped to increase his own.

So should we deny Pericles any role in the great building projects that, from the
mid-fifth century onward, multiplied in Athens, on the Acropolis, and on Cape Sunium?
To do so would be to go too far, redressing the balance in an excessive manner. Certain
documents allow us to glimpse how, within the framework of this concerted monumental
policy, the collective will and individual initiative interacted. To come to a clearer
understanding, we need to turn away from the domain of great stone monuments and consider
the construction of more modest structures: fountains. A fragment of a decree dating
from 440–430 B.C. mentions the provision of a fountain at
Eleusis and explains how the project was financed: the Assembly decided to honor Pericles,
Paralus, and Xanthippus, and his other sons, but to meet the costs by drawing on the
money paid as tribute.
²²
Although fragmentary (the name of the
stratēgos
has been restored by epigraphists), this inscription does make it possible, with
a certain degree of likelihood, to trace the process that led to the fountain’s construction.
Initially, Pericles and his sons proposed to use their own resources to pay for either
the whole or at least part of the monument. In doing so, they were acting as men keen
to earn the favor of the people, for the provision of water was a matter of crucial
importance in a Mediterranean land blasted by the sun and with insufficient supplies
of water,
²³
not only for physical survival but also for performing numerous rituals both civic
and private, such as lustrations and sacrifices, nuptial baths, and the washing of
corpses. The people thanked them for this proposal but never theless declined the
offer and eventually financed the project using funds received as tribute from the
allies.
²⁴

This interaction between individual initiative and popular control echoes an episode
recorded by Plutarch that likewise involves polemics sparked off by the financing
of major architectural works:

Thucydides and his faction kept denouncing Pericles for playing fast and loose with
the public moneys and annihilating the revenues. Pericles therefore asked the people
in assembly whether they thought he had expended too much, and on their declaring
that it was altogether too much, “Well then,” said he, “let it not have been spent
on your account, but mine, and I will make the inscriptions of dedication in my own
name [
tōn anathēmatōn idian emautou poiēsomai tēn epigraphēn
].” When Pericles had said this, whether it was that they admired his magnanimity
or
vied with his ambition to get the glory of his works
, they cried out with a loud voice and bade him take freely from the public funds
for his outlays and to spare naught whatsoever (
Pericles
, 14.1–2).

As in the case of the Eleusis fountain, the Athenian people were definitely keen to
preserve their own major responsibility for great works; these had to redound to the
glory of the whole community, not distinguish private individuals (
idiōtai
). All the same, Pericles’ influence was by no means minimal in the process of decision-taking,
for he seems to have acted as the spur or even the initiator for the decisions taken
by the community. The great works thus appear to have been the product of close negotiation
between the people and the members of the Athenian elite.

However crucial Pericles’ influence on monumental policy may really have been, his
name rapidly became associated with these grandiose constructions and this helped
to confer upon him exceptional political stature in the eyes of the western world.
And there was another element that supported this impression of Periclean domination:
namely, the introduction, for the first time, of pay for civic services. In the ancient
sources, the creation of the
misthoi
was certainly interpreted as a symbol of the patronage that Pericles exercised over
the Athenian people, reducing it to a passive recipient of the great man’s benefactions.

The Beneficent Patron

In the second half of the fourth century, already, the author of the
Constitution of the Athenians
was defending such an analysis, and Plutarch later concurred with his account:

Pericles first made service in the jury-courts a paid office, as a popular measure
against Cimon’s wealth. For as Cimon had an estate large enough for a tyrant, in the
first place he discharged the general public services in a brilliant manner, and moreover
he supplied maintenance to a number of members of his deme; for anyone of the Laciadae
who liked could come to his house every day and have a moderate supply, and also all
his farms were unfenced, to enable anyone who liked to avail himself of the harvest.
So as Pericles’ means were insufficient for this lavishness, he took the advice of
Damonides of Oea …, since he was getting the worst of it with his private resources,
to give the multitude what was their own; and he instituted payment for the jury-courts;
the result of which according to some critics was their deterioration, because ordinary
persons always took more care than the respectable to cast lots for the duty.
²⁵

Within this framework of Aristotelian analysis, the
misthos
was represented as a means for Pericles to rival the wealth of Cimon and become the
patron of the people, which this collective gift had the effect of infantilizing.
However, that version of the situation needs to be considered with circumspection.
By the late 450s, Cimon no longer held any real political power. He had been ostracized
ten years earlier and, although he was recalled to Athens in 451, his influence must
by then have been limited.
²⁶
It is above all the interpretation given by the
Constitution of the
Athenians
that needs to be reexamined. Its author analyzes the pay given to jurors from a typically
anti-democratic
point of view (later emulated by Plutarch
²⁷
), regarding it simply as a way of buying the people and, for Pericles, a means by
which to turn himself into the patron of the poorest of the Athenians. According to
that author, the introduction of the
misthos
was simply the fruit of a rivalry between aristocrats before which the people were
mere spectators mechanically tending to support whichever side seemed the more generous.