Wandering Greeks (27 page)

Undoubtedly the majority of metics, however, were considerably less wealthy. In contemporary western society immigrant workers undertake low-paid jobs. Many, too, are in semiskilled or skilled employment. Very likely that was true of Athens as well. The decree dated ca. 401/400, which granted citizen rights to metics who had helped liberate Athens from the rule of the Thirty, lists farmers, a cook, a muleteer, a carpenter,
a sculptor, a builder, and a laborer among their ranks (IG II
²
10 = Harding 3). Women, too, immigrated to Athens, many of them no doubt as the helpless victims of sex trafficking.

Greeks from the eastern Mediterranean migrated to Athens in larger numbers than those from the western Mediterranean, probably because the Piraeus was better situated for trading with the East than with the West. Attic gravestones honoring metics dating mostly to the fourth century indicate that they came chiefly from the Black Sea coast, the Hellespont, the Propontis, Thrace, Thessaly, central Greece, and the Peloponnese (
IG
II
²
7882–10530; Garland 2001, 64–65). But though the overwhelming majority of metics were Greek, many non-Greeks also migrated to Athens. Xenophon claimed that in the first half of the fourth century “Lydians, Phrygians, Syrians, and other barbarians” settled in large numbers (
Vect
. 2.3). Judging from the variety of foreign gods who were worshipped in the Piraeus, many Carians, Egyptians, Phoenicians, and Thracians also resided there.

The size of Athens's metic population doubtless fluctuated in line with the city's changing political and economic fortunes, though we should bear in mind that it would not have been easy in any circumstances to relocate at short notice. When the city was at the height of its power in the years leading up to the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War, there might have been as many metics as citizens (Duncan-Jones 1980, 102). It is likely that there was a reduction in numbers just before hostilities began, particularly if Thucydides is right in claiming that the Greek world expected that Athens would be brought to its knees within three years (7.28.3). This decline in numbers would have accelerated once the evacuation of the Attic countryside got under way and again when conditions in the city deteriorated in consequence of the plague. As metics were not yet permitted to own property, those who were resident in Athens presumably had to vacate their rented homes to make way for citizens. These evacuees, as we might call them, would in consequence have been competing with the rural population for temporary accommodation on previously unoccupied land.

There was probably an influx of foreigners when peace was declared in 421. However, a sizable number of metics left Athens following the
disaster in Sicily and others about a decade later in response to the xenophobic policies of the Thirty Tyrants (see later). When the Macedonians installed a garrison in the Piraeus in 322, following the eclipse of Athenian naval power at the end of the Lamian War, the number of metics again began to decline. Even so, a census conducted by Demetrius of Phaleron probably in 317 BCE revealed that there were almost half as many metics as citizens residing in Attica even at this time, viz 10,000 as compared with 21,000 citizens (Ath.
Deipn
. 6.272c).

Prejudice against Immigrants

It is perhaps inevitable that metics would have had to face prejudice at times, like immigrants the world over, though the degree and extent of prejudice would have depended upon their individual status and identity. Polls conduced in Britain between 1998 and 2002 discovered that “respondents are significantly more likely to be hostile to migrants and minorities if they are older, poorer, and less well educated, and live in northern England” (Saggar 2003, 185). Comparable inequities probably existed in Athens and elsewhere, particularly for those who were either at the lower end of the economic scale or non-Greek.

Though supportive of metics in general, Xenophon was uncomfortable with the large number of non-Greeks who were claiming metic status. He thought it highly inappropriate that citizens were required to serve in the army alongside “all sorts of barbarians” (
Vect
. 2.3). His purpose in recommending that “approved” metics be permitted to own freeholds in Attica was to attract “a larger and better class of persons desirous of living in Athens” (2.6). Metics, in other words, were expected to uphold the law and conform to the social norms. No doubt Xenophon was typical of many of his class. It is highly improbable, however, that there was anything equivalent to the fear which the famous “Polish plumber,” a symbol of cheap labor, struck into the French workforce in 2006, when it was suspected that he and his like would put hardworking native plumbers out of work. That is because metics would rarely have been in competition with Athenians for jobs, though as merchants and manufacturers they might well have been in competition for profits.

Some Athenians, perhaps even the majority, held highly ambivalent views of metics. [Xenophon] objected, on the one hand, to the fact that they, like slaves, were undisciplined and could not be distinguished in appearance from slaves or commoners. On the other hand, he acknowledged their vital contribution to the fleet and thought it appropriate that they should be permitted freedom of speech (
Ath. Pol
. 1.10 and 12). By contrast Dicaeopolis in Aristophanes'
Acharnians
(l. 508) called metics “the useless part of the
astoi
[local population].”

Which takes me to the next point. It is probably safe to say that metics were accepted so long as they kept a low profile and demonstrated loyalty toward their adoptive country. The ideal type is exemplified by Parthenopaeus, originally a native of Arcadia, who, following his death in battle, received this glowing eulogy from the Argive king Adrastus, in whose country he had resided (Eur.
Supp
. 891–900):

Being born and bred in Arcadia, he behaved as resident foreigners should behave. He did not make himself objectionable or troublesome to the city —characteristics that would have rendered him loathsome whether as a citizen or as a foreigner. He stood in the ranks of battle like a native-born Argive and defended his country. He rejoiced when Argos prospered and grieved when misfortune overcame it.

In the following passage the orator Lysias fleshes out the definition of what constitutes model metic behavior, and in so doing reveals much about the constraints that metics were placed under (12.4):

Neither my father nor my brothers nor myself ever appeared as prosecutors or defendants in any lawsuit. On the contrary, we conducted ourselves under the democracy in such a way as neither to cause nor to receive offence.

The loyalty of metics was suspected in wartime, seemingly irrespective of ethnicity. When Nicias sent a report to the
dêmos
instancing reasons for the decline in the strength of his fleet in Sicily, he mentioned that the
xenoi
—presumably a reference to metics—“were at the first opportunity deserting to their respective cities” (Thuc. 7.13.2; cf. 7.63.3). Though this may have been an extreme case—the Sicilian Expedition
was a doomed venture by the time Nicias dispatched his letter to Athens—it is unlikely to be without parallel. In a speech dated 330–24 the orator Hyperides refers to an Athenian law of uncertain date which “forbids metics from emigrating [
exoi
(
kein
)] from Athens in wartime” and warns that any metic who does so will be denounced and arrested if he returns later (
Ath
. 29, 33). Aeneas Tacticus indicates that it was common practice in wartime to limit the freedom of movement of both citizens and foreigners (10.8).

The remaining evidence for hostility toward metics is rather inconclusive. Though personal animosity between citizens and metics surely existed, and though some metics must have been subjected at times to abuse if only for their accent, our sources are virtually silent on this point. So far as we know Aristotle, who was Athens's most celebrated metic, did not experience prejudice in the years preceding Athens's defeat at the Battle of Chaeronea in 338, even though his close connections with the Macedonian court made him an obvious target of anti-Macedonian sentiment (Whitehead 1975, 97f.). After the death of Alexander the Great in 323, however, and in the wake of overt demonstrations of hostility toward Macedon, he thought it prudent to go into voluntary exile. Foreign deities were often the butt of humor, but it would be tendentious to translate this into hostility toward metics.

When the Thirty Tyrants came to power in 404 they arrested ten metics and appropriated their property (Lys. 12.5–7; cf. Xen.
Hell
. 2.3.21 and 40). Two of the ten were the orator Lysias, who managed to escape, and his brother Polemarchus, who was executed. What makes the action of the Thirty all the more egregious is the fact that Lysias's father, Cephalus, who had originally migrated from Syracuse at the invitation of Pericles, had been a law-abiding metic for thirty years (Lys. 12.4). The Thirty probably took this action not because they were hostile to the metic population as such, but because they were seeking to remodel Athens along xenophobic Spartan lines (Krentz 1982, 66–68). In other words, confiscating their property was a way of signaling the direction they would be taking the state. Incidentally, though many metics probably took to their heels when the Thirty came to power, the community did not abandon Athens en masse. On the contrary metics fought valiantly
against the Thirty for the restoration of the democracy—proof indeed that they identified closely with the fortunes of the
dêmos
. Without their contribution in fact Thrasybulus might not have succeeded in overthrowing the Thirty. Such was the esteem in which these foreign freedom fighters were held that in ca. 401/400 a decree was passed granting both them and their descendants citizen rights. In consequence, citizen rights (not quite the same thing as citizenship) were granted to perhaps as many as 1,200 metics.

Emigrant Workers

The reverse phenomenon of Athenians emigrating from Athens for economic reasons is also recorded. Those whom we can track most easily are the potters and painters. The earliest evidence dates to ca. 440, when émigrés established a potters' workshop in Lucania in southern Italy, around the time of the foundation of the Athenian colony at Thurii. A decade or so later an important workshop was established in

Apulia, which almost certainly included Attic-trained craftsmen in its ranks. Other sites where Attic-trained potters and painters are believed to have settled include Olympia, Taras, Corinth, Falerii in Etruria, and Syracuse (MacDonald 1981, 159–68).

It is important to note, however, that we do not know what proportion of these émigrés were citizen craftsmen, what proportion had formerly been Athenian metics who now decided that there were richer pickings to be had elsewhere, and what proportion were slaves. In fact it is entirely conceivable that the majority were slaves. Thucydides reports that the largest number of the slaves who escaped to Decelea following the Spartan occupation of the fort in 413 were
cheirotechnai
(skilled craftsmen), and that designation may well have included potters and painters (7.27.5).

The migration of potters and painters from Athens continued after Athens's defeat in 404, in line with the state's changing political and economic fortunes. Though the numbers involved were small—a few hundred in total over a period of half a century—they are likely to have been representative of a much more general trend involving perhaps thousands of émigrés. It is also probable that a large number of other skilled workers, including the sculptors, masons, and painters who had been working on the Acropolis, emigrated at this time too, since the state could no longer afford to finance large-scale building projects.