Peace (8 page)

Ancient Greece, Cradle of Western Peace and Peacemaking?

Peace and peacemaking in Ancient Greece continued to be strategies of survival and subsistence, as in prehistoric times, as well as basic components of prosperous and unified cities, states and civilization, as in Mesopotamia and Ancient Egypt. In previous eras, however, the means and ends of pacific enterprises were dictated almost exclusively by necessity, tradition and from the top-down. Ancient Greek mythology, politics, literature and philosophy challenged such peace praxes by positing ideas and individuals as sources of peace as well, and the city-states (
polis
) of Sparta and Athens and leagues they supported continue to provide competing, contrasting peace paradigms. Mythology provided contemporaries with a common cultural framework that reflected and influenced how peace was or could be made and maintained. Tracing mythological developments brings the evolution of Ancient Greek peace practices into relief by assisting in placing them in their changing historical contexts. In this respect, divine genealogies are particularly revealing because of the conceptual webs the gods personified, indicating how they and the relations between them changed over time.

Of all mythological families, none illustrates the evolution of peace in Ancient Greece better than that of Themis, whose name evoked the “regularity of nature, the peaceful law shared by all its creatures.”
¹⁷
She had triplets with Zeus, god of thunder and king of them all, called the Horae, meaning “rhythmic periods of the world's unfolding,” root of the word hour. They initially controlled time spans related to rural peace and prosperity: Thallo, “blossom-bringer,” was the goddess of spring; Auxo, the “increaser,” of summer plant growth; and Xarpo, “food-bringer,” of ripening and the autumn harvest. However, the Horae took on new names and profiles over time. The second generation of Horae, chronologically not genealogically, was: Dike, who presided over social justice, just as Themis did natural justice; Eunomia, who oversaw human laws and legislative processes; and Irene, goddess of peace and basis for the Greek word for it, also strongly associated with wealth. As seasonal goddesses,
the first generation reflects the peace-related concerns of an agricultural society, which early Ancient Greece exclusively was. As socio-political/ economic goddesses, the second generation of Horae reflects the peace-related concerns of a more urban society. Whereas the first generation controlled peace by the natural order of crops, Themis' ecological bequest, the second did by the human order of society, Themis' lawmaking legacy. One reflects bio-genetic imperatives, the other cultural imperatives, but both generations were entrusted with the guardianship of heavens' gates. Thus, as conditions of peace and peacemaking evolved, so did what Ancient Greek mythology reflected.

The literature of the Ancient Greeks exemplified the pragmatics of peace reflected in their mythology. In effect, Ancient Greek literature presents the first comprehensive corpus of anti-war and pro-peace literature in the West, of which preeminent instances are the Homeric and Hesiodic epics. Passed orally by peripatetic bards for centuries, Homer's
Iliad
and the
Odyssey
were already keystones of literary culture by the time they were inscribed
c
. the eighth century BCE. The
Iliad
revolves around the Greek armies' greatest soldier, Achilles, in the last of a ten-year war against Troy. After his commander breaches the boundaries of his authority in his eyes, Achilles defects in an early literary instance of civil disobedience. Only when his best friend is killed does he rejoin the war, dying bravely in the process of securing a triumphal Greek return – except for the cunning Odysseus, who faced ten more years of unearthly misadventures narrated in the
Odyssey
before reaching home. Graphic depictions of battles everywhere temper their glorification in these two sidelong parables. “A surgeon who can cut out an arrow and heal wounds. . . is worth a regiment,” we are told in the
Iliad
, which ends with a truce between the two armies.
¹⁸
At one point in the
Odyssey
, the warriors agree to ban poison arrows. The devastating domestic impact of drawn-out foreign wars like that of the
Iliad
is the
Odyssey'
s starting point, as its hero returns home only to find his kingdom in disarray. Ares, god of war, is described as being without
themis
and even Zeus denounces him, saying “Most hateful to me art thou of all gods. . . for ever is strife dear to thee, and wars and fighting.”
¹⁹
Achilles and Odysseus stand out as champions of what scholars call
heroic peace
by their bravery and cunning in hastening war's end and soldiers' homecoming.
²⁰
Achilles' resistance to war and Odysseus' cautionary struggle with its aftermath make them paramount though unlikely anti-war heroes.

The moral of Homer's stories, in the
Odyssey'
s last words, is to “let the mutual goodwill of the days of old be restored, and let peace and plenty prevail.”
²¹
Which days of old are being referenced? According to Hesiod's didactic epic,
Works and Days
(
c
. 700 BCE), humanity has passed through five Ages including the present. During the Golden Age, humans
were at peace, living in harmony with worldly and cosmic spirits. In the subsequent Silver Age mythological deities arose, humans lived as children for a century, then aged rapidly and died. A great flood inaugurated the Bronze Age, when humans were fierce warriors consuming themselves in war. Achilles and Odysseus lived in the Heroic Age, in which demigods and heroes, often one and the same, roamed and ruled the earth. The current Iron Age is one in which gods no longer interact with humans and it seems our only escape from war and suffering is death. However, Hesiod does not leave humanity without hope. His foresighted formula placed a premium on strong work ethics and justice, leading from inner to social peace: those who “go not aside from what is just, their city flourishes. . . Peace, the nurse of children, is abroad in their land.”
²²
Foreshadowing modern economic theories of peace, he stressed two kinds of strife: one military and destructive, the other commercial and productive, advising that the latter replace the former. Thus peace belongs to a distant past which can only be secured for the future by immediate action in the present. For Homer's heroes, such actions involve incredible feats of mind and body exhibited in heroic peace. Humans can seek to emulate heroes, but in Hesiodic terms heroic peace can never be replicated because its Age has forever passed. The less illustrious though equally powerful definition of peaceful action in our times is, as individuals, to fulfill our duties as we understand them diligently and, as societies and collectives, to treat each other justly.

In historical terms, there was in fact a proto-Greek culture located on the island of Crete that, if not fitted, then at least shows striking signs of being a possible wellspring of inspiration for these literary depictions of peace in the distant past. Archaeologists refer to this period as the Minoan Peace because they have found little (some argue, no) remains of warfare. Politically autonomous Minoan towns cooperated nonviolently and as peers on an economic basis and on a scale unamtched in Europe until then. But no data suggests Minoa came close to the complex networks of Greek city-states a thousand years later. Although the Oracle of Delphi dates back to prehistoric times, first as a centre for the worship of the earth goddess Gaia, then her daughter Themis, in time it was housed in the temple of Apollo, god of healing, truth and defender of sheep flocks. Apollo's brother Dionysus, god of wine, took his place in winter, as both were also known as promoters of peace. Knowledge priests gathered in consultations probably informed the chief priestesses' prophecies, which guided the fate of Ancient Greece. The range of topics upon which they gave predictions, from individual pursuits to the fate of cities, and the gravity with which they were considered, gave Delphi its clout. Inscriptions at the Oracle's entrance – “know thyself,” “nothing in excess” and “give a pledge and trouble is at hand” –
mirror the notoriously enigmatic predictions pilgrims received.
²³
This equivocalness makes it difficult to discern whether actions stemming from the Oracle visits should be attributed to its predictions or their interpretation, though in two cases peace was a direct result of both.

By around 1100 BCE, Delphi had become the centre of a religious league of all major Greek cities. Known as the Amphictyonic or simply Delphic League, its aims were to ensure that sacred sites and personnel were protected, that no city was wiped out in war and that water supplies were never cut. Offenders, whether members of the League or not, faced joint attacks if they broke its code. The League's council of heads of states or their representatives had the power to pass binding internal legislation and direct common foreign policy. This League outlived many of the later Greek ones modeled upon it, and lasted in varying forms until Roman times. By the sixth century BCE it had considerable political influence, and the more powerful cities could control policy by pressuring the lesser. Legend has it that late in the ninth century BCE, a League member, King Iphitos of Elis, visited the Oracle with the aim of ending altogether hostilities between his compatriots. The priestesses advised him to establish a special truce between local rulers like himself, a bold and unparalleled venture in which Iphitos was ultimately successful. The terms of the truce provided that, every four years, all fighting between Greeks would cease from twelve days before until twelve days after a sporting competition celebrating the gods, in which all Greeks could participate and travel safely to and from. On this premise, the first Olympic Games were held in 776 BCE at Olympia, a central city named after the gods' dwelling.

In time, the Games included literary competitions, diplomatic meetings and trade summits. Winners in each event were revered as heroes in their homelands and received an olive-branch crown, ever since a prominent symbol of peace. According to myths, Athena, goddess of wisdom, and Poseidon, god of the sea, competed to see who could give humanity the most useful gift. Poseidon presented the horse and Athena the olive tree. Athena was judged the winner because her gift provided a stable source of nourishment in mountainous regions such as Greece and a shelter from their harsh sun and wind. Embodying the third staple of Ancient Greek agriculture aside from flocks and wine, the olive-branch crown was “uniquely suited to represent peace and social concord” because olive trees required one or two generations to bear fruit, which assumes a stable state able to withstand external and internal threats.
²⁴
The Games became such an important element of Greek culture that the four-year cycle of prescribed periods of peace, an Olympiad, became a basis of classical chronology. The ancient Olympic tradition continued unbroken for nearly a thousand years, until suppressed during the imposition of Christianity throughout the Roman
Empire, by then including Greece. The Olympic peace tradition was renewed in 2006 with the UN's Olympic Resolution, by which 179 nations agreed to halt hostilities during the Winter Games in Turin, Italy, that year.

By 800 BCE, Ancient Greece was a network of prosperous agricultural and maritime trading communities, when they were not fighting over rights to land, sea and trade. Two of the largest, Sparta and Athens, began annexing proximate towns by force and diplomacy, a process they called
synoikismos
(“bringing together in one home”) while founding others of their own. Before long, the conflicting paradigms of peace these two city-states developed and had to offer brought all of Ancient Greece to war. For both Sparta and Athens,
synoikismos
was limited to Greek-speakers, the rest of the world were barbarians (“those who say ba-ba”), who could feel the wrath of their warfare but could never enjoy their peace. The reason for Sparta's awkward appearance in a history of peace is that the militarism by which the city-state came to rule most of continental Greece also adeptly obviated domestic conflicts. After a series of skilful reforms by the legendary lawgiver Lycurgus (seventh century BCE), Sparta soon controlled two-fifth of the Peloponnese as its foremost polis. The central document of these reforms, the
Great Rhetra
, set a societal structure that for eight centuries sustained external warfare and, paradoxically, internal albeit oppressive peace. At the apex were hereditary double monarchs who could check each other's actions and declare war, a power later transferred to the popular assembly, in which all citizens could vote directly on proposals and elect members of the elder and executive councils, an innovative form of mixed government Plato would later laud. The
agoge
system, among the most rigorous, military-oriented mandatory education system ever instituted, was so effective in producing able, cooperative and obedient soldier-citizens of both sexes that Sparta was the only polis which did not find defensive walls necessary. The general Xenophon (
c
. 431–355) explains Sparta's social cohesion in saying that “good order seems to provide safety while disorder has already destroyed many.”
²⁵
Until they broke down in 4 CE, Sparta's mixed government and the
agoge
system fostered an authoritarian society that was as internally peaceful as it was warlike to outsiders – especially as compared to its internally tumultuous rival.

Athens is generally considered the cradle of Western civilization. But whether or not it is the birthplace of Western peace and peacemaking is questionable at best. Originally limited to the fortified tip of the Acropolis,
synoikismos
soon made Athens a maritime superpower second only to land-backed Sparta. Noble-born hereditary rulers of four prominent local clans once met atop the indicatively named Mount Ares in a council known as the Areopagus to deliberate upon war, peace and affairs
of state. As Athens' fleets and economy grew, so did the power of the merchants and tradesmen, threatening the nobility. The exclusivity of the Areopagus caused internal strife in the seventh century BCE, only temporarily quelled by Draco's harsh laws. So serious was this strife that the historian Thucydides describes it as a danger to day-to-day polis life. The severity of Draconian policies precluded even oppressive peace, so were followed early in the sixth century by Solon's reforms. These reforms changed the Areopagus' hereditary membership to land ownership requirements; bolstered the Boule's power, a lottery-based legislative assembly initiated by Draco; developed a popular assembly similar to Sparta's; and divided the population into classes upon which punishments and levels of political participation were decided. However, the more direct democracy instituted by Solon's reforms only inflamed Athens' class conflicts, which reached epidemic proportions again in the late sixth century. Once more, exclusivity was the cause of strife, since citizenship was still the privilege of a narrow minority of Athenians, landed males over the age of eighteen. The women, foreigners, landless and slaves who constituted the crestfallen majority were never citizens and so could not participate in political processes, notwithstanding that Athens could not have existed as it did without them.