of conquered land (κληρουχίαι), in the islands or on the seaboard has
been fully treated[204] by Dr Grundy. He shews that this movement had
two aims, the occupation of strategic points as an imperial measure
of security, and the provision of land-lots for poorer citizens as a
measure of economic relief. The latter purpose is part of a general plan
for reducing the financial liabilities of the state with respect to its
citizen population, the necessity for which Dr Grundy explains. By these
settlements abroad some surplus population was removed and provided with
means of livelihood. If the assumption of a surplus citizen population
be sound (and I am not in a position to challenge it), we must also
assume a certain degree of genuine land-hunger, at least more than the
Attic territory could satisfy. If there was such land-hunger, it is
perhaps not unreasonable to connect it with the survival of old Attic
traditions of country life. And it would seem that the settlers, cleruchs
or colonists, did as a rule[205] stay and live in their settlements.
They would probably work their lands on much the same general plan as
their brethren in Attica, and their labour-arrangements would be much
the same. But in 427 BC, when Pericles was dead and there was surely no
surplus population, at least of able-bodied men, owing to the war, we
find a curious record. Reconquered Lesbos[206] had to be dealt with. It
was not subjected to an assessed tribute (φόρος), but parcelled into
3000 allotments, 2700 of which were reserved for 2700 Athenian citizens,
those who drew the lucky lots (τοὺς λαχόντας), and these 2700 were sent
out. But they did not stay[207] there. They let their shares to the old
inhabitants as cultivating tenants, at a rent of two minae per share
per annum, and evidently returned to Athens. By this arrangement a sum
of about £21000 a year would come in to the shareholders in Athens,
who would have a personal interest in seeing that it was punctually
paid. Whether these non-resident landlords were chosen by lot from all
citizens, rich or poor, is not stated. We know that in some cases[208]
at least the choice of settlers was confined to members of the two
lowest property-classes; and it may well be that on this occasion the
opportunity[209] was taken to compensate to some extent members of rural
families, who had suffered loss from the invasions of Attica, but did not
wish to go abroad. In any case their tenants would farm as they had done
before, employing or not employing slave labour according to their means
and the circumstances of the several farms. So too in cases of lands let
on lease, and in the confiscations and redistributions of lands, proposed
or carried out, it was simply their own profit and comfort that attracted
the lessees or beneficiaries. We are entitled to assume that if it paid
to employ slaves, and slaves were to be had, then slaves were employed.
In short, the scraps of evidence furnished by Thucydides leave us pretty
much where we were.
XII. XENOPHON.
=Xenophon=, who lived somewhere between 440 and 350 BC, introduces us
to a great change in the conditions of the Greek world. The uneasiness
and sufferings of the Greek states from the fall of Athens in 404 to the
time of exhaustion resulting from the battle of Mantinea in 362 do not
concern us here. Of such matters we hear much, but very little directly
of the economic changes that were undoubtedly going on. Poverty was as
before a standing trouble in Greece. In the more backward parts[210]
able-bodied men left their homes to serve as hired soldiers. The age of
professional mercenaries was in full swing. Arcadians Achaeans Aetolians
Acarnanians Thessalians and other seekers after fortune became more
and more the staple material of armies. Athens could no longer support
imperial ambitions on imperial tributes, and had to depend on the sale
of her products to procure her supplies of food. These products were
chiefly oil and wine and urban manufactures, and there is reason to think
that in general the most economical method of production was by slave
labour under close and skilful superintendence. Slaves were supplied
by kidnappers from the Euxine and elsewhere, but prisoners captured
by armies were another source of supply. This living loot was one of
the perquisites that made military life attractive, and the captives
found their way to such markets as the industrial centres of Athens and
Corinth. What happened in the rural districts of Attica, how far there
was a revival of the small farmer class, is a point on which we are very
much in the dark. The indirect evidence of Xenophon is interesting but
not wholly conclusive.
It is perhaps important to consider what significance should be attached
to the mention of agricultural work done by men of military forces on
land or sea. In 406 BC we hear of hardships[211] endured by the force
under the Spartan Eteonicus who were cut off in Chios after the defeat
of Arginusae. During the summer months they ‘supported themselves on
the fruits of the season and by working for hire in the country.’ This
is meant to shew that they were in sad straits, as the sequel clearly
proves. Again, in 372 BC Iphicrates was with a force in Corcyra, and
naval operations were for the time over. So he ‘managed[212] to provide
for his oarsmen (νάυτας) chiefly by employing them in farm-work for the
Corcyraeans,’ while he undertook an expedition on the mainland with his
soldiers. In both these cases want of pay was no doubt one reason for
emergency-labour. In the earlier case the destitution of the men led
them to look for any paid work: in the second the general had to do his
best in spite of irregular and insufficient supplies from home. In both
cases it is the exceptional nature of the arrangement that makes it worth
mentioning. It can hardly be viewed as having any economic significance.
But it is of some interest in connexion with a passage of Aristotle[213]
that will require notice below.
In the _Anabasis_ Xenophon reports his own arguments, urging the Greek
army to fight their way out of the Persian empire. He feared that,
now Cyrus was dead, and they were cut off far from home in an enemy’s
country, they might in despair surrender to the King and take service
under him. At best this meant giving up Greece and settling in Persia on
the King’s terms. This he begged them not to do: that they could under
Greek discipline cut their way out was evident from the independence
of many peoples of Asia Minor, who lived and raided as they chose in
defiance of the Persian power. He added ‘Therefore I hold[214] that our
right and proper course is first to make a push to reach Hellas and our
own kinsmen, and to demonstrate to the Greeks that their poverty is
their own fault: for, if they would only convey to these parts those of
their citizens who are now living in want at home, they could see them
in plenty (πλουσίους).’ But he reminds them that the good things of Asia
are only to be had as the reward of victory. For my present purpose
the one important point is that a mixed host of Greek mercenaries are
said to have been appealed to by a reference to the fact of poverty and
land-hunger among their folks at home, and that this reference is said
to have been made by an Athenian. Writing this in later life, Xenophon
would hardly have set down such an argument had it not then, as on the
occasion recorded, had considerable force. In another passage[215] he
gives an interesting account of the motives that had induced most of the
men to join the expedition. He is explaining why they were irritated at
a rumour that they were to be pressed to settle down at a spot on the
Euxine coast. ‘It was not lack of subsistence that had led most of the
soldiers to go abroad on this paid service: they had been told of the
generosity of Cyrus. Some had other men following them, some had even
spent money for the cause: others had run away from their parents, or
left children behind, meaning to win money and return to them, on the
faith of the reported prosperity of those already in the service of
Cyrus. Such was the character of the men, and they were longing to get
safe home to Greece.’ In short, full-blooded men were not content to
drag on poor ill-found stagnant lives in corners of Greece. And we may
add that nothing stimulated the enterprises of Greek adventurers in the
East, and led up to the conquests of Alexander, more effectually than the
experiences of the Ten Thousand.
Among these experiences was of course the capture of booty, more
particularly[216] in the form of marketable prisoners. So many of these
were sometimes in hand that they were a drag on the march: in a moment
of peril[217] they had to be abandoned. Even so, a considerable sum had
been raised by sales[218] and was shared out at Cerasus. The Greek cities
on the Pontic seaboard would all no doubt be resorts of slave-dealers.
One of the Ten Thousand himself, formerly a slave[219] at Athens,
recognized as kinsmen by their speech the people of a mountain tribe in
Armenia. In Thrace too we hear of the chieftain Seuthes, when short of
cash, offering[220] to make a payment partly in slaves. Nor was selling
into slavery a fate reserved for barbarians alone. Greeks[221] had been
treated thus in the great war lately ended; and now the Spartan harmost,
anxious to clear the remainder of the Ten Thousand[222] out of Byzantium
safely, made them an offer of facilities for a raid in Thrace: any that
stayed behind in the town were to be sold as slaves. And more than 400
were accordingly sold. It seems reasonable to infer that at this time the
slave-markets were as busy as ever, perhaps more so than had been the
case during the great war. It may be going too far to say that in some
parts of Greece people were now trying to restore a broken prosperity by
industrial exploitation of slave-labour, while from other parts soldiers
of fortune and kidnappers went forth to enlarge the supply of slaves.
But that there is some truth in such a statement I do not doubt. It was
evidently no easy matter for persons of small means to live in any sort
of comfort at Athens. We hear of Socrates[223] discussing with a friend
the embarrassments of a genteel household. The late civil disorders have
driven a number of this man’s sisters cousins and aunts to take refuge in
his house. In the present state of things neither land nor house property
are bringing in anything, and nobody will lend. How is he to maintain
a party of 14 free persons in all? Socrates points to the case of a
neighbour who provides for a still larger household without difficulty.
Questions elicit the fact that this household consists of slave-artisans
trained to useful trades. The distressed party have been brought up as
ladies, to do nothing. Socrates suggests that they had better work for
bread than starve. The adoption of this suggestion produced the happiest
results in every way. Such was the way in which Socrates led his friend.
He drew from him the assertion that free people are superior to slaves,
and so brought him round to the conviction that superiority could not be
shewn by mere incapacity for work.
In this conversation of Socrates may be detected the germ of a complete
revolution in thought on labour-subjects. It avoids the topic of
common humanity. That the slave is a man and brother, only the victim
of misfortune, had been hinted by Euripides and was to become a theme
of comic poets. But Socrates lets this point alone, and argues from
natural economic necessity. Elsewhere he denounces[224] idleness and
proclaims that useful labour is good for the labourer, taking a moral
point of view. Again, he suggests[225] that the shortcomings of slaves
are largely due to their masters’ slackness or mismanagement. But he
accepts slavery as a social and economic fact. All the same he makes
play at times with the notion of moral worthlessness, which many people
regarded as characteristic of slaves in general. It is the knowledge of
the true qualities[226] of conduct, in short of the moral and political
virtues, that makes men honourable gentlemen (καλοὺς κἀγαθούς), and the
lack of this knowledge that makes them slavish (ἀνδραποδώδεις). But, if
the difference between a liberal and an illiberal training, expressed
in resulting habits of mind, is thus great, the slavish must surely
include many of those legally free. Hence he even goes so far as to
say ‘Therefore we ought to spare no exertions to escape being slaves
(ἀνδράποδα).’ And he lays stress on the need of moral qualities[227]
in slaves as well as freemen: we should never be willing to entrust
our cattle or our store-houses or the direction of our works to a
slave devoid of self-control. His position suggests two things: first,
that the importance of the slave in the economic and social system was
a striking fact now recognized: second, that the unavoidable moral
degradation generally assumed to accompany the condition of slavery
was either wrongfully assumed or largely due to the shortcomings of
masters. The conception of the slave as a mere chattel, injury to which
is simply a damage to its owner, was proving defective in practice,
and the philosopher was inclined to doubt its soundness in principle.
Xenophon had been brought into touch with such questionings by his
intercourse with Socrates. It remains to see how far he shews traces of
their influence when he comes to treat labour-problems in connexion with
agriculture.
References to agriculture[228] are few and unimportant in the
_Memorabilia_. The _Economicus_ deals directly with the subject. A
significant passage throws light on the condition of rural Attica at
the end of the fifth century BC. The speaker Ischomachus tells[229]
how his father made money by judicious enterprise. He bought up farms
that were let down or derelict, got them into good order, and sold
them at a profit when improved. Clearly he was a citizen, able to deal
in real estate, and a capitalist. There can hardly be a doubt that
he operated by the use of slave-labour on a considerable scale. All
through the _Economicus_ slavery is presupposed, but the attitude of
Xenophon is characteristically genial and humane. The existence of a
slave-market[230], where you may buy likely men, even skilled craftsmen,
is assumed. But the most notable feature of the book is the seriousness
with which the responsibility of the master[231] is asserted. There is
no querulous evasion of the issue by laying the blame of failure on the
incorrigible vices of slaves. Prosperity will depend on securing good
service: good service cannot be secured by any amount of chains and
punishments, if the master be slack and fitful: both in the house and
on the farm, good sympathetic discipline, fairly and steadily enforced,
is the secret of success. Carelessness malingering and desertion must
be prevented or checked. And to achieve this is the function of the
economic art, operating through the influence of hope rather than
fear. The training of slaves[232] is a matter needing infinite pains
on the part of the master and mistress. She must train her housekeeper
(ταμία) as he trains his steward (ἐπίτροπος), and both are to act in a
humane and kindly spirit. Yet the strictly animal view of slaves[233]
appears clearly in a passage where the training of slaves is compared
with that of horses or performing dogs. ‘But it is possible to make
men more obedient by mere instruction (καὶ λόγῳ), pointing out that it
is to their interest to obey: in dealing with slaves the system which
is thought suitable for training beasts has much to recommend it as a
way of teaching obedience. For by meeting their appetites with special
indulgence to their bellies you may contrive to get much out of them.’
We gather that the better and more refined type of Athenian gentleman
with a landed estate, while averse to inhumanity, and aware that slaves
were human, still regarded his slaves as mere chattels. His humanity is
prompted mainly by self-interest. As for rights, they have none.
The system of rewards and punishments on the estate of course rests
wholly on the masters will. The whole success of the working depends on
the efficiency of the steward or stewards. Accordingly the passage in
which Ischomachus explains how he deals with these trusted slaves is
of particular interest. Having carefully trained a man, he must judge
him[234] according to a definite standard—does he or does he not honestly
and zealously discharge his trust? ‘When I find that in spite of good
treatment they still try to cheat me, I conclude that their greediness
is past curing, and degrade them[235] from their charge.’ This seems to
mean that they are reduced to the position of the ordinary hands. ‘But
when I observe any induced to be honest[236] not merely because honesty
pays best, but because they want to get a word of praise from me, these I
treat as no longer slaves (ὥσπερ ἐλευθέροις ἤδη). I not only enrich them,
but shew them respect as men of honour.’ One is tempted to interpret
these last words as implying that actual manumission takes place, the
services of the men being retained as freedmen. But the words do not say
so plainly, and it is safer to read into them no technical sense. That
the men are trusted and allowed to earn for themselves, is enough. The
agriculture depicted in the _Economicus_ is that of a landowner with
plenty of capital, not that of the peasant farmer. The note of it is
superintendence[237] (ἐπιμέλεια), not bodily labour (αὐτουργία). In one
place αὐτουργία is mentioned, when agriculture is praised, one of its
merits being the bodily strength that those gain who work with their own
hands. It is as well to repeat here that the fact of a farmer labouring
himself does not prove that he employs no other labour. On the other
hand there is good reason to infer that the other class, those who ‘do
their farming by superintendence,’ are not manual labourers at all. The
benefit to them is that agriculture ‘makes them early risers and smart in
their movements.’ The master keeps a horse, and is thus enabled to ride
out[238] early to the farm and stay there till late.
It is remarkable that in this book we hear nothing of hired labourers.
There are two references[239] to the earning of pay, neither of them in
connexion with agricultural labour. Yet the existence of a class of poor
people who have to earn their daily bread[240] is not ignored. Socrates
admires the economic skill[241] of Ischomachus. It has enabled him to be
of service to his friends and to the state. This is a fine thing, and
shews the man of substance. In contrast, ‘there are numbers of men who
cannot live without depending on others: numbers too who are content
if they can procure themselves the necessaries of life.’ The solid
and strong men are those who contrive to make a surplus and use it as
benefactors. I read this passage as indirect evidence of the depression
of small-scale free industry and the increase of slaveowning capitalism
in the Athens of Xenophon’s time. And I find another indication[242]
of this in connexion with agriculture. In the course of the dialogue
it appears that the chief points of agricultural knowledge are simple
enough: Socrates knew them all along. Why then do some farmers succeed
and others fail? The truth of the matter is, replies Ischomachus, that
the cause of failure is not want of knowledge but want of careful
superintendence. This criticism is in general terms, but it is surely
inapplicable to the case of the working peasant farmer: he who puts
his own labour into the land will not overlook the shortcomings of a
hired man or a slave. In the agriculture of which this book treats it
is the practical and intelligent self-interest of the master that rules
everything. His appearance on the field[243] should cause all the slaves
to brighten up and work with a will: but rather to win his favour than to
escape his wrath. For in agriculture, as in other pursuits, the ultimate
secret of success[244] is a divine gift, the power of inspiring a willing
obedience.
I have kept back one passage which needs to be considered with reference
to the steward[245]. Can we safely assume that an ἐπίτροπος was always,
or at least normally, a slave? Of those who direct the labourers, the
real treasure is the man who gets zealous and steady work out of the
hands, whether he be steward or director (ἐπίτροπος or ἐπιστάτης).
What difference is connoted by these terms? In the _Memorabilia_[246],
Socrates meets an old friend who is impoverished by the results of the
great war, and driven to earn his living by bodily labour. Socrates
points out to him that this resource will fail with advancing age: he had
better find some employment less dependent on bodily vigour. ‘Why not
look out for some wealthy man who needs an assistant in superintendence
of his property? Such a man would find it worth his while to employ you
as director (or foreman, ἔργων ἐπιστατοῦντα), to help in getting in his
crops and looking after his estate.’ He answers ‘it would gall me to put
up with a servile position (δουλείαν).’ Clearly the position of ἐπιστάτης
appears to him a meaner occupation than free wage-earning by manual
labour. In another place[247] we hear of an ἐπιστάτης for a mine-gang
being bought for a talent (£235). That superintendents, whatever their
title, were at least normally slaves, seems certain. As to the difference
between ‘steward’ and ‘director’ I can only guess that the former might
be a slave promoted from the ranks, but might also be what the ‘director’
always was, a new importation. It seems a fair assumption that, as a
free superintendent must have been a new importation, a specially bought
slave ‘director’ would rank somewhat higher than an ordinary ‘steward,’
whose title ἐπίτροπος at once marked him as a slave. In relation to the
general employment of slave-labour there is practically no difference:
both are slave-driving ‘overseers.’ As the pamphlet on the Revenues has
been thought by some critics not to be the work of Xenophon, I pass
it by, only noting that it surely belongs to the same generation. It
fully attests the tendency to rely[248] on slave-labour, but it is not
concerned with agriculture.
The romance known as _Cyropaedia_ wanders far from fact. Its purpose is
to expound or suggest Xenophon’s own views on the government of men:
accordingly opportunities for drawing a moral are sought at the expense
of historical truth. But from my present point of view the chief point
to note is that it does not touch the labour-question with which we
are concerned. True, we hear[249] of αὐτουργοί, and of the hardship
and poverty of such cultivators, gaining a painful livelihood from an
unkind soil. That the value of a territory depends on the presence of
a population[250] able and willing to develop its resources, is fully
insisted on by Cyrus. But this is in connexion with conquest. The
inhabitants of a conquered district remain as tributary cultivators,
merely changing their rulers. That the labour of the conquered is
to provide the sustenance of the conquering race, is accepted as a
fundamental principle. It is simply the right of the stronger: if he
leaves anything to his subject, that is a voluntary act of grace. The
reason why we hear little of slavery is that all are virtually slaves
save the one autocrat. The fabric of Xenophon’s model government is
a very simple one: first, an oriental Great King, possessed of all
the virtues: second, a class of warrior nobles, specially trained and
dependent on the King’s favour: third, a numerous subject population,
whose labour supports the whole, and who are practically serfs. A cynical
passage[251] describes the policy of Cyrus, meant to perpetuate the
difference of the classes. After detailing minutely the liberal training
enjoined on those whom he intended to employ in governing (οὓς ... ἄρχειν
ᾤετο χρῆναι), Xenophon proceeds to those whom he intended to qualify
for servitude (οὓς ... κατεσκεύαζεν εἰς τὸ δουλεύειν). These it was his
practice not to urge to any of the liberal exercises, nor to allow them
to possess arms. He took great care to spare them any privations: for
instance at a hunt: the hunters had to take their chance of hunger and
thirst, being freemen, but the beaters had ample supplies and halted
for meals. They were delighted with this consideration, the design of
which was to prevent their ever ceasing to be slaves (ἀνδράποδα). The
whole scheme is frankly imperial. All initiative and power rests with
the autocrat, and all depends on his virtues. That a succession of
such faultless despots could not be ensured, and that the scheme was
consequently utopian, did not trouble the simple Xenophon. Like many
other thoughtful men of the time, he was impressed by the apparent
efficiency of the rigid Spartan system, and distrusted the individual
liberty enjoyed in democratic states, above all in Athens. In Persia,
though he thought the Persians were no longer what Cyrus the Great had
made them, he had seen how great was still the power arising from the
control of all resources by a single will. These two impressions combined
seem to account for the tone of the _Cyropaedia_, and the servile
position of the cultivators explains why it has so very little bearing on
the labour-question in agriculture.
XIII. THE COMIC FRAGMENTS.