Bellerophon, Il. vi. 194.
Æneas (promised by the Trojan community if he should slay
Achilles), Il. xx. 184.
Meleager, Il. ix. 574.
Sarpedon and Glaucus, Il. xii. 313.
The βασιλεὺς on the Shield, Il. xviii. 550.
Iphition (πολέων ἡγήτωρ λαῶν), Il. xx. 391.
Alcinous, Od. vi. 293.
Ulysses, Od. xi. 184, and xvii. 299.
On the other hand, the merely rich man (Il. xi. 68) has an ἄρουρα, not
a τέμενος; and the farm of Laertes is called ἀγρὸς, not τέμενος. And
why? Because it was a private possession, acquired by him apparently
out of savings (Od. xxiv. 206);
ὅν ῥά ποτ’ αὐτὸς
Λαέρτης κτεάτισσεν, ἐπεὶ μάλα πόλλ’ ἐμόγησεν.
The word τέμενος is probably from τέμνω, or from the same root with
that verb, and signifies land which, having been cut off from the
original common stock, available for the uses of private persons, has
been set apart for one of the two great public purposes, of government
or of religion.
~_Revenues and burdens on them._~
Besides their great estates, the kings appear to have had at least two
other sources of revenue. One of these was not without resemblance
in form to what we now call customs’-duties, and may have contained
their historical germ. In the Book of Genesis, where the sons of Jacob
go down to buy corn in Egypt, they carry with them a present for the
ruler; and doubtless the object of this practice was to conciliate the
protection to which, as foreigners, and perhaps as suspected persons,
avowedly seeking their own gain, they would not otherwise have had a
claim. ‘Take of the best fruits of the land in your vessels, and carry
down the man a present; a little balm, and a little honey, spices, and
myrrh, nuts, and almonds[120].’ In conformity with the practice thus
exemplified, when Euneus in the Seventh Iliad despatches his ships from
Lemnos to sell wine to the Greek army, in return for which they obtain
slaves, hides, and other commodities, he sends a separate supply, χίλια
μέτρα, as a present to the two sons of Atreus[121]. Agamemnon indeed
is, in the Ninth Book, slily twitted by Nestor with the largeness of
the stores of wine, that he had contrived to accumulate.
[120] Gen. xliii. 11.
[121] Il. vii. 467-75.
So likewise we find that certain traders, sailing to Scheria, made a
present to Alcinous, as the sovereign, of the captive Eurymedusa. When
we compare this with the case of Euneus, the gift obviously appears to
have been a consideration for permission to trade[122].
[122] Od. vii. 8-11.
The other source of revenue traceable in the Iliad was one sure to
lead to the extensive corruptions, which must already have prevailed
in the time of Hesiod. It consisted in fees upon the administration of
justice. In the suit described upon the shield, the matter at issue is
a fine for homicide. But quite apart, as it would seem, from this fine,
there lie in the midst, duly ‘paid into court,’ two talents of gold, to
be given at the close to him, of all the judges, who should deliver
the most upright, that is the most approved, judgment[123]:
[123] Il. xviii. 508.
τῷ δόμεν ὃς μετὰ τοῖσι δίκην ἰθύντατα εἴποι.
However righteous the original intention of a payment in this form, it
is easy to estimate its practical tendencies, and curious to remark how
early in the course of time they were realized.
On the other hand, the great possessions of the king were not given
him for his own use alone. Over and above the general obligation of
hospitality to strangers, it was his duty to entertain liberally the
principal persons among his subjects. Doubtless this provided the
excuse, which enabled the Suitors to feast upon the stores of Ulysses,
without the shame, in the very outset, of absolute rapine. And it would
appear from the Odyssey that Alitherses[124] and other friends of the
royal house, frequented the table there as well as its enemies, though
not perhaps so constantly.
[124] Od. xvii. 68.
In the Seventh Iliad, after his fight with Hector, Ajax[125] repairs,
not invited, but as if it were a matter of course, to share the
hospitality of Agamemnon. In the Ninth Book, Nestor urges Agamemnon to
give a feast to the elders, as a duty of his office:
[125] Il. vii. 313.
ἔοικέ τοι, οὔτοι ἀεικές[126],
[126] Il. ix. 70.
adding,
πολέεσσι δ’ ἀνάσσεις[127],
[127] Ibid. 73.
and then to take their counsel. But perhaps the ordinary exercise of
this duty is best exhibited in the case of Alcinous, who is discovered
by Ulysses on his arrival entertaining his brother kings in his
palace[128].
[128] Od. vii. 49, 108.
I have not here taken specific notice of the δώτιναι, or tributes,
which, as Agamemnon promised, Achilles was to receive, from the
seven cities, that it was proposed to place under his dominion. The
expression is[129],
[129] Il. ix. 155.
οἵ κέ ἑ δωτίνῃσι θεὸν ὣς τιμήσουσιν,
καί οἱ ὑπὸ σκήπτρῳ λιπαρὰς τελέουσι θέμιστας.
The connection of the ideas in the two lines respectively would appear
to show, that the δώτιναι may be no more than the fees payable to the
sovereign on the administration of justice.
Thus then the king might draw his ordinary revenues mainly from the
following sources:
First and principally, the public τέμενος, or demesne land.
Next, his own private acquisitions, such as the ἀγρὸς of Laertes.
Thirdly, the fees on the administration of justice.
Fourthly, the presents paid for licenses to trade.
~_The position of Agamemnon._~
The position of Agamemnon, the greatest king of the heroic age,
constitutes in itself too considerable a feature of Greek polity at
that period to be dismissed without especial notice.
He appears to have united in himself almost every advantage which could
tend to raise regal power to its _acmè_. He was of a house moving
onward in its as yet unbroken career of accumulating greatness: he was
the head of that house, supported in Lacedæmon by his affectionate
brother Menelaus; and the double title of the two was fortified
with twin supports, by their marriages with Clytemnestra and Helen
respectively. This family was at the head of the energetic race
which ruled, and deserved to rule, in the Greek peninsula; and which
apparently produced such large and full developments of personal
character, as the world has never seen, either before or since, at
so infantine a stage of civilization. There were various kings in the
army before Troy, but among them all the race of Pelopids was the most
kingly[130]. Agamemnon possessed the courage, strength, and skill of a
warrior, in a degree surpassed only by the very greatest heroes of his
nation; and (according to Homer) evidently exceeding that of Hector,
the chief Trojan warrior opposed to him. He must have been still in
the flower of his age; and though neither gifted with extraordinary
talents, nor with the most popular or attractive turn of character, yet
he possessed in a high degree the political spirit, the sense of public
responsibility, the faculty of identifying himself with the general
mind and will. Avarice and irresolution appear to have been the two
most faulty points in his composition.
[130] Il. x. 239.
His dominions were the largest which, up to that time, had been known
in that portion of the world: including Greece, from Mount Olympus to
the Malean Cape, reaching across to the islands on the coast of Asia
Minor, and even capable of being held to include the island of Cyprus.
Before Troy, his troops were πολὺ πλεῖστοι καὶ ἄριστοι (Il. ii. 577),
which must imply, as his ships were not greatly more numerous than
those of some other contingents, that they were of large size; and
he also supplied the Arcadians, who had none of their own, (v. 612.)
Lastly, he bore upon him the mellow brightness of the patriarchal age,
signified by the title ἄναξ ἀνδρῶν.
Thucydides was not an antiquarian, or he would have left on his history
more marks of his researches in that department. But he seems to have
formed with care the opinions which he expresses on archaic Greece, in
the admirable introduction to his great work. Among them he says that,
as he conceives, the fear of Agamemnon operated more powerfully than
the oath given to Tyndareus[131], or than good will, in the formation
of the confederacy which undertook the war of Troy.
[131] Thuc. i. 9.
It seems clear from Homer, that the name and fame of Agamemnon were
known far beyond the limits of Greece, and that the reputation of
being connected with him was thought to be of value. For Menelaus, on
his return from Pharos to Egypt, erected there a funeral mound in his
honour[132], ἵν’ ἄσβεστον κλέος εἴη; which he would not have done in a
country, to whose inhabitants that monarch was unknown. And again, when
Ulysses is challenged by the Cyclops to declare, to what and to whom he
and his crew belong, he makes the reply, that they are the subjects of
Agamemnon, the son of Atreus[133]:
[132] Od. iv. 584.
[133] Od. ix. 263.
λαοὶ δ’ Ἀτρείδεω Ἀγαμέμνονος εὐχόμεθ’ εἶναι,
τοῦ δὴ νῦν γε μέγιστον ὑπουράνιον κλέος ἐστίν.
Ulysses evidently conceives the fame of the great monarch, thus
enhanced by success, to have been likely to supply any one who belonged
to him with a defence against the formidable monster, before whom he
stood.
~_Governing motives of the War._~
The statements of Homer respecting the position of Agamemnon and the
motives of the war, fall short of, but are not wholly at variance
with, the opinion which has been expressed by Thucydides. Of the
oath to Tyndareus Homer knows nothing: but he tells us of the oath,
by which the Greek chieftains had bound themselves to prosecute the
expedition. Before setting out, they had a solemn ceremonial at Aulis;
they offered sacrifices, they made libations, they swore, they pledged
hands[134], they saw a portent, and had it interpreted by Calchas[135].
But all this only shows that the Atreidæ were conscious how formidable
an enterprise they were about, and how they desired accordingly that
their companion kings should, after having once embarked, be as deeply
pledged as possible to go forward. It does not tell us what was the
original inducement to enter into the undertaking. Again, it does not
appear that the Greeks in general cared much about the abduction or
even the restoration of Helen. The only passage directly touching the
point is the one in which Agamemnon[136] expresses his opinion that, if
Menelaus should die of his wound, the army would probably return home.
It seems as if Agamemnon thought, that without doubt they would then be
in honour released from their engagement, and that they would at once
avail themselves of their freedom. The hope of booty, however, would do
much; and the members of a conquering race unite together with great
facility for purposes of war, through a mixture of old fellow-feeling
and the love of adventure, as well as through anticipation of spoil.
On the other hand, it was evidently no small matter to organize the
expedition: much time was consumed; a friendly embassy to Troy had been
tried without success; the ablest princes, Nestor and Ulysses, were
employed in obtaining cooperation. The general conclusion, I think, is,
that a combination of hope, sympathy, respect, and fear, but certainly
a very strong personal feeling, whatever its precise ingredients may
have been, towards the Pelopid house, must have operated largely in
the matter. And it is in this spirit that we should construe the
various declarations of Homer respecting those who came to the war, as
courting the Atreidæ, and as acting for their honour; namely these,
[134] Il. ii. 303-7. 339-41.
[135] Ibid. 308, 322.
[136] Il. iv. 169-72.
χάριν Ἀτρείδῃσι φέροντες. Od. v. 307.
Ἀγαμέμνονι ἦρα φέροντες. Il. xiv. 132.
τιμὴν ἀρνύμενοι Μενελάῳ σοί τε, κυνῶπα. Il. i. 159.
Before Troy, Agamemnon is always regarded by others as responsible for
the expedition, and it is plain that he so regards himself. The use of
his sceptre by Ulysses in the great effort to stem the torrent of the
retiring multitude, is highly significant of the influence belonging
to his station; and when Ulysses argues with the leaders, he rests his
case on the importance of knowing the whole mind of Agamemnon, while he
strongly dwells on his royal authority, and on the higher authority of
heaven as its foundation.
His position, however, did not place him above the influence of
jealousy and fear: for he was gratified when he saw Achilles and
Ulysses, the first of his chieftains, at variance[137]. And his weight
and authority depended for their efficacy on reason, and on the free
will of the Greeks. Agamemnon takes Briseis from Achilles by an act
of force; but he nowhere seeks to move the army, or the individuals
composing it, upon that principle; nor does the prolongation of
the service appear to have been placed beyond the judgment of the
particular chiefs and of the troops. Achilles not only declares that
he will go, but says he will advise others to go with him[138], and
asks Phœnix to remain in his tent for the purpose. The deference paid
to the Head is a deference according to measure; and the measure is
that of his greater responsibility, his heavier stake in the war[139].
His functions in regard to the host are, to think for and advise it in
council, and to stimulate it by exhortation and example in the field.
If we may rely on Homer, it was essentially, so far as regarded the
relation between the general in chief and the rest of the body, a free
military organization.
[137] Od. vii. 77.
[138] Il. ix. 356-63, 417-20.
[139] Il. iv. 415-8.
~_Personal Character of Agamemnon._~
The Agamemnon of Homer does not appear to be intended by the Poet for
a man of genius. But on this very account, the dominance of political
ideas in his mind is more remarkable. On political grounds he is ready
to give up Chryseis[140]. On political grounds he quells his own
avarice, and slays Trojans instead of taking ransom for them[141]. He
deeply feels the responsibilities of his station, and care banishes
his sleep. The amiable trait in his character is his affection for
Menelaus, and in this, as in many other respects, he recalls the
Jupiter of Homer, whose selfishness is nowhere relieved, except by
paternal affection.
[140] Il. i. 117.
[141] Il. vi. 45-62.
Further, Agamemnon, though without genius, is a practitioner in
finesse. In his love of this art, I fear, he resembles the tribe of
later politicians. He resembles them, too, in outwitting himself by
means of it: he is ‘hoist upon his own petard.’ This seems to be, in
part at least, the explanation of his unhappy device in the Second
Iliad, to prepare the people for an attack on Troy, by counselling them
to go home forthwith. The breakdown of his scheme is, as it were, the
first-fruits of retribution for his ἄτη in the First Book.----
As, upon the whole, there is no idea of selfishness involved in the
prerogatives of the Homeric king, so is it clear that, except as
against mere criminals, there is no general idea of coercion. The
Homeric king reigns with the free assent of his subjects--an assent
indeterminate, but real, and in both points alike resembling his
kingly power. The relation between ruler and ruled is founded in the
laws and condition of our nature. Born in a state of dependence, man,
when he attains to freedom and capacity for action, finds himself the
debtor both of his parents and of society at large; and is justly
liable to discharge his debt by rendering service in return. Of
this we have various indications in Homer, with respect to parents
in particular. Those who die young, like Simoeisius by the hand of
Ajax[142], die before they have repaid to their parents the cost, that
is the care, of their education (θρεπτρά). In a most remarkable and
characteristic passage. Phœnix describes how, when he was young, some
deity restrained his wrath against his father, and shows the infamy
that would attend the taking away of that life, in a country where
voluntary homicide, in general, was regarded more as a misfortune than
a crime[143]:
[142] Il. iv. 473-9.
[143] Il. ix. 459.
ὅς ῥ’ ἐνὶ θυμῷ
δήμου θῆκε φάτιν, καὶ ὀνείδεα πόλλ’ ἀνθρώπων,
ὡς μὴ πατροφόνος μετ’ Ἀχαιοῖσιν καλεοίμην.
The reciprocal obligations of father and son are beautifully shown by
Andromache in her lament over Hector, when she speaks of her child[144]:
[144] Il. xxii. 485. Od. xxiv. 434.
οὔτε σὺ τούτῳ
ἔσσεαι, Ἕκτορ, ὄνειαρ, ἐπεὶ θάνες, οὔτε σοὶ οὗτος.
~_The relation of sovereign and subject free._~
As to the relation between the subject and the sovereign authority,
it seems everywhere to be taken for granted. In the Twenty-fourth
Odyssey, the object of those who march against Ulysses is not to put
down authority, but to avenge the deaths of their sons and brothers.
But there appears nowhere in Homer the idea that in this relation
could be involved a difference of interest, or even of opinion, between
class and class, between governors and governed. The king or chief
was uplifted to set a high example, to lead the common counsels to
common ends, to conduct the public and common intercourse with heaven,
to decide the strifes of individuals, to defend the borders of the
territory from invasion. That the community at home, or any regularly
subsisting class of it, could require repression or restraint from the
government, was an idea happily unknown to the Homeric times.
Those classes, indeed, were few and simple. There was, first of all,
the king; and round him his family and his κήρυκες, the serjeants or
heralds, who were his immediate, and apparently his only immediate,
agents. They conveyed his orders; they assisted him in the Assembly,
in sacrifice, and in banquets. They appear to be the only executive
officers that are found in Homer. With these was the Bard, apparently
also an indispensable member of royal households. Both were recognised
among the established professions.
Next to the kings and other sovereigns, we must place the chief
proprietors of the country. In the Odyssey, we find the members of the
aristocracy having their own estates and functions, and sustaining the
part of γέροντες, or leaders in the Assembly. The judicial office,
as we have seen from the Shield and otherwise, was in their hands,
probably by delegation. But it would appear, that the distinction
between them and the sovereign family was rather a broad one; since,
in almost every case, we seem to find the prince contracting a
marriage beyond his own borders. Laertes brings Anticlea[145] from
the neighbourhood of Parnassus; Theseus marries Ariadne from Crete;
Agamemnon and Menelaus, belonging to Mycenæ, are united to the
daughters of the king of Sparta; of the two daughters of Icarius,
Ulysses in Ithaca married Penelope, and Eumelus in Pheræ married
Iphthime (Od. iv. 797); one of the two, at least, and perhaps both,
must have married from a considerable distance; Menelaus sends his
beautiful daughter Hermione to be the wife of Neoptolemus in Thessaly:
and the only instance, even apparently in the opposite sense, seems
to be that of his son Megapenthes, who married a Spartan damsel, the
daughter of Alector. But then Megapenthes was not legitimate; he was
born of a slave-mother, and therefore he was not a prince[146]. All
these facts seem to show us that the royal houses formed a network
among themselves, spread over Greece, and keeping pretty distinct from
the aristocracy: a circumstance which may, in some degree, help to
explain the wonderful patience and constancy of Penelope.
[145] Od. xi. 85.
[146] Od. iv. 10-12.
~_Other classes of the community._~
Next to the nobles, and in the third place, we may class what we should
now call trades and professions: observing, however, that, in Homer’s
time, both the useful arts and the fine arts had a social dignity, as
compared with that of wealth and station, which the former have long
ago lost, and which the later have not retained in as full manner as
perhaps might be desired, not for their own advantage merely, but to
secure due honour for labour, and the humanizing effect of this kind of
labour in particular for society at large. I draw the proof of their
estimation in the heroic age, first, from the manner in which they are
combined under the common designation of δημιοεργοὶ, and arranged
in a mixed order, the preference being only given by a more emphatic
description to the bard[147]:
[147] Od. xvii. 383.
τῶν, οἳ δημιοεργοὶ ἔασιν,
μάντιν, ἢ ἰητῆρα κακῶν, ἢ τέκτονα δούρων,
ἢ καὶ θέσπιν ἀοιδὸν, ὅ κεν τέρπῃσιν ἀείδων;
Here I take τέκτονα δούρων to represent the entire class of artificers,
of whom many are named in Homer; in a poor country like Ithaca,
depending very much on the use of boats for fishing and for its
communications, the carpenters might naturally represent the whole.
And next, from the manner in which these arts were practised by
princes, it seems plain that there was nothing in the pursuit of them
inconsistent with high rank. The physicians, or surgeons rather, of
the Greek army, Podaleirius and Machaon, were themselves princes and
commanders of a contingent: and even Paris, who was not the man to
demean himself by employments beneath his station, seems to have taken
the chief share in the erection of his own palace[148]:
[148] Il. vi. 314.
τά ῥ’ αὐτὸς ἔτευξε σὺν ἀνδράσιν, οἳ τότ’ ἄριστοι
ἦσαν ἐνὶ Τροίῃ ἐριβώλακι τέκτονες ἄνδρες.
Again, the bard of Agamemnon was appointed quasi-guardian[149] to
Clytemnestra in her husband’s absence: and Phemius, the bard of
Ulysses[150], proceeded to the Assembly of the Twenty-fourth Odyssey
in order to prevent any tumult, together with Medon the herald, who
addressed the people accordingly. The heralds, or serjeants, are also
recognised as δημιοεργοί[151]. Again, Alitherses, being the μάντις or
seer of the island, and apparently the only one, takes part in the
debates both of the Second and of the Twenty-fourth Books.
[149] Od. iii. 267.
[150] Od. xvii. 263. xxiv. 439.
[151] Od. xix. 135.
The professions, then, thus far are five:
1. Seers.
2. Surgeons.
3. Artificers.
4. Bards.
5. Heralds.
We may remark the absence of priests and merchants. Not that merchants
were unknown: we find them mentioned by Euryalus the Phæacian, as
πρηκτῆρες, but their business was esteemed sordid; it too much
resembled that of the kidnapper or swindler, and it is the reproach of
seeming to belong to this class that smartly stings Ulysses[152]. And
even the merchant Mentes, whose form was assumed by Pallas, belonged
to the Taphians, a tribe of pirates[153]. As yet, neither the order
of priests would seem to have been completely taken over from the
Pelasgians, nor the class of merchants formed in imitation of the
Phœnicians.
[152] Od. viii. 161.
[153] Od. i. 183.
~_Slaves in the Homeric age._~
After the classes we have named, come the great mass of the population,
who till the ground and tend the live stock for themselves or their
employers, if free, and for their lords if slaves. The fisherman, too,
is distinctly noticed[154] in Ithaca. Mr. Grote classes with the free
husbandmen the artisans[155], and separates both of them from the
θῆτες, or hired labourers, and the slaves. It appears to me, however,
that we ought to distinguish the artisans from the mere husbandmen, as
having been in a higher station. On the other hand, I see no passage
in Homer which clearly gives to the husbandmen as a class a condition
superior to that of the hired servants, or even, perhaps, the slaves.
The evidence of the poems is not clear as to the existence or extent of
a peasant proprietary. We must beware of confounding those conceptions
of a slavery maintained wholesale for the purposes of commerce, which
our experience supplies, with its earliest form, in which the number
of slaves would seem to have been small, and their ranks to have
been recruited principally by war, with slight and casual aid from
kidnapping. In those times, the liability to captivity would seem to
have affected all men alike, independently of all distinctions whether
in rank or in blood. The sons of Priam were sold into slavery like any
one else: the only difference was, that, in proportion to the wealth of
the parents, there was a better chance of ransom. It would appear that
the slaves of Homer were properly, even when not indoor, yet domestic.
The women discharged the indoor and household offices: except that a
few men performed strictly personal services about their masters, as
δρηστῆρες and as carvers[156] (θεράποντε δαήμονε δαιτροσυνάων). But
the men-slaves were more largely employed out of doors in the care
of flocks and herds, fields and vineyards. Thus, the slaves were in
a different position apparently from the freemen, for they seem to
have been gathered as servants and attendants round the rich. It would
appear, however, from the case of Eumæus, who had a slave of his own,
Mesaulios[157], that they might hold property for themselves. Again,
not Eumæus only, but in the Twenty-fourth Odyssey Dolius and his six
sons, sit down to table together with Ulysses, and fondly clasp his
hands. They bear arms too; and this could not have been very strange,
for Homer describes the arming of the sons without remark, while he
calls both the father and Laertes, on account of their old age[158],
ἀναγκαῖοι πολεμισταί. The moral deterioration of slaves is noticed very
strongly by Eumæus himself[159], though not with reference to himself.
We have, however, no reason to suppose that their outward condition was
inferior to that of the free labouring population in any thing, except
that we must presume they did not take part in the assemblies or in
war. When Achilles[160] in the infernal regions compares the highest
condition there with the lowest on earth, he does not choose the slave,
but the labourer for hire (θητεύεμεν is his expression), as the type
of a depressed condition upon earth. The state of the hired servant
probably resembled that of the slave in being dependent upon others,
and fell beneath it in the point of security. This is the more likely,
because the point of the passage turns on the poverty of the employer,
[154] Od. xxiv.
[155] Hist. Greece ii. p. 84.
[156] Od. xvi. 248, 253, also δαιτρὸς, Od. i. 141. There were likewise
in Scheria nine αἰσυμνῆται, who made arrangements for the dance. These
were public officers (δήμιοι) and may fairly be rendered ‘masters of
the ceremonies.’ (Od. viii. 258.)
[157] Od. xiv. 449-52.
[158] Od. xxiv. 498.
[159] Od. xvii. 320-3.
[160] Od. xi. 489-91.
ἀνδρὶ παρ’ ἀκλήρῳ, ᾧ μὴ βιοτὸς πολὺς εἴη,
as constituting the misery of the servant.
Indeed, if we consider the matter a little further, we shall perhaps
see the greater reason to think, that the expression θητεύεμεν has been
chosen otherwise than at random. What do we mean by a hired servant, at
a period in the movement of society when money did not exist? We can
only mean one who was paid by food, clothes, and lodging, like a slave,
but who was not, like a slave, permanently attached to his master or
his master’s estate. The difference between the two would thus lie in
the absence of the permanent tie: a difference much more against the
θὴς, than in his favour.
The position, then, of the slaves was probably analogous to that of
domestic servants among ourselves, who practically forfeit the active
exercise of political privileges, but are in many respects better off
than the mass of those who depend on bodily labour. It doubtless grew
out of the state of things in which slaves were practically servants,
and servants of the rich, that masters, or ἄνακτες[161], were regarded
as constituting the wealthy class of the community.
[161] Od. xiii. 223.
~_Supply of military service._~
I stop for a moment to observe, that the view here taken of the
comparatively restricted numbers and sphere of the slaves in heroic
Greece may serve in some degree to answer the question, why do we not
hear of them in the army of the Iliad? As men of equal blood with the
Greeks themselves, they would perhaps be dangerous comrades in arms.
As persons established in charge of the property of the lord, there
would be a strong motive to leave them behind for its care. It is
very difficult to judge how far the state of heroic Greece bore any
resemblance to the feudal system of the later middle ages, and whether
it did not present a more substantial correspondence with the allodial
system of the earlier. We have before us a large number of independent
proprietors, each bound by usage probably to render personal service,
but we have nothing that resembles the obligation to bring so many
retainers into the field with reference to the size of the estate.
And accordingly, in the Iliad we do not find many merely personal
retainers. The menial services in the tent of Achilles are performed
by the women-captives, or by Patroclus in person. After Patroclus was
dead, his tent was attended only by Automedon, his charioteer, and by
one other warrior. Agamemnon had no other male attendants that we hear
of, except his two herald-serjeants, Talthybius and Eurybates, who
discharged a double function[162]:
[162] Il. i. 321.
τώ οἱ ἔσαν κήρυκε καὶ ὀτρηρὼ θεράποντε.
We may infer from the poems, that each independent family
furnished one or more of its members, drawn by lot, to serve in the
expedition[163]. Such is the declaration of the pseudo-Myrmidon to
Priam: and again, in the Odyssey we find Ægyptius[164] of Ithaca had
sent one son to Troy, while he kept three at home. The inference
is strengthened[165] by the negative evidence of the Twenty-fourth
Odyssey. There[166] Dolius the slave appears with no less than six
sons: but no mention is made of any member of his family as having
attended Ulysses to Troy, although, if there had been such a person,
some reference to him here, in the presence of Ulysses just returned,
would have been most appropriate. Indeed, the six are introduced as
‘the sons’ of Dolius, which of itself almost excludes the idea of his
having sent any son to the war.
[163] Il. xxiv. 396-400.
[164] Od. ii. 17.
[165] Ibid. 474.
[166] Od. xxiv. 387. 497.
Again, we see that the whole mass of the soldiery attended the
assemblies, and were there addressed by kings and chiefs in terms
which seemed to imply a brotherhood. They are ‘friends, Danaan heroes,
satellites of Mars[167],’ and it is hard to suppose such words could
be addressed to persons held in slavery, however mild, familiar, or
favourable. The employment of these terms may suggest a comparison
with our own modes of public address, according to which the word
‘Gentlemen’ would be commonly used, though the audience should be
composed in great part of the humbler class. But all these words are so
many proofs of that political freedom, pervading the community and the
spirit of its institutions as a whole, which exacts this kind of homage
from the great and wealthy on public occasions.
[167] Il. ii. 110.
It was a natural and healthful sign of the state of political society,
that slavery was held to be odious. But it was odious on account
of its effects on the mind, and not because it entailed cruelty or
oppression. There is not, I think, a single passage in the poems which
in any degree conveys the impression either of hardship endured, or of
resentment felt, by any slave of the period.
~_As to a peasant proprietary._~
Neither, as has been said, is there any thing in Homer, which clearly
exhibits to us a peasant-proprietary; or entitles us positively
to assert that the land was cultivated to a great extent by small
proprietors, each acting independently for himself. On the one hand, as
has been remarked, we do not find large numbers of personal retainers
and servants about the great men: but, on the other hand, Homer does
not paint for us a single picture of the independent peasant. In the
similes, in the legends, on the Shield of Achilles, in Ithaca, we
hear much of large flocks and herds, of great proprietors, of their
harvest-fields and their vineyards, but nothing of the small freeman,
with property in land sufficient for his family, and no more. The rural
labour, which he shows us in action, is organized on a large scale.
The question, what after all was the actual condition of the Greek
people in the age of the _Troica_, is thus left in great obscurity.
It is indeed at once the capital point, and the one of which history,
chronicle, and poem commonly take the least notice. Upon the whole
it would appear most reasonable, while abstaining from too confident
assertion, to suppose,
1. That, as respected primogeniture and the disposition of landed
property, society was aristocratically organized.
2. That this aristocratic organization, being founded on military
occupation, embraced a rather wide range of greater and of smaller
proprietors.
3. That these proprietors, by superior wealth, energy, and influence,
led the remainder of the population.
4. That there may have existed a peasant-proprietary class in
considerable numbers, neither excluded from political privilege nor
exempt from military service, but yet not combined, under ordinary
circumstances, by any community of interest or of hardship; led, not
unwillingly, by the dominant Achæan race; and by no means forming a
social element of such interest or attractiveness, in the view of
the Poet, as to claim a marked place or vivid delineation, which it
certainly has not received, on his canvass.
5. That the cultivation of the greater estates was carried on by hired
labourers and by slaves, between which two classes, for that period, no
very broad line of distinction can be drawn.
It is not within the scope of this work to enter largely upon the
‘political economy’ of the Homeric age. But, as being itself an
important feature of polity, it cannot be altogether overlooked; and
this appears to be the place for referring to it.
~_Political Economy of the Homeric age._~
There has been, of late years, debate and research respecting the
name given to the important science, which treats of the creation and
distribution of wealth. The phrase ‘political economy,’ which has been
established by long usage, cannot be defended on its merits. The name
Chrematistic has been devised in its stead; an accurate, but perhaps
rather dry definition, which does not, like the names Πολιτικὴ and
Ἠθικὴ, and like the exceptionable title it is meant to displace, take
the human being, who is the real subject of the science, into view.
Homer has provided us beforehand with a word which, as it appears
to me, retrenches the phrase ‘economy’ precisely in the point where
retrenchment is required. The Ulysses of the Fourteenth Odyssey, in one
of his fabulous accounts of himself as a Cretan, states[168],
[168] Od. xiv. 222.
ἔργον δέ μοι οὐ φίλον ἔσκεν
οὐδ’ οἰκωφελίη, ἥτε τρέφει ἀγλαὰ τέκνα.
And I believe that, were it not too late to change a name, ‘political
œcophely’ precisely expresses the idea of the science, which, having
its fountain-head in good housekeeping, treats, when it has reached its
expansion and maturity, of the ‘Wealth of Nations.’
It was not surprising, that the Greeks of the heroic age should have
a name for the business of growing wealthy; for it was one to which
Hellenes, as well as Pelasgians, appear to have taken kindly. Of this
we find various tokens. Though the spirit of acquisition had not
yet reached the point, at which it becomes injurious to the general
development of man, we appear to have in the distinguished house of
the Pelopids at least one isolated example of its excess. We have
the friendly testimony of Nestor, as well as the fierce invective of
Achilles[169], to show that in Agamemnon it constituted a weakness: and
he is distinguished in war from the other great chieftains[170], by
his habit of forthwith stripping those whom he had slain. But Ulysses
also, to whom we may be certain that Homer did not mean in this matter
to impute a fault, was, according to Eumæus[171], richer than any
twenty; and after making every allowance for friendly exaggeration, we
cannot doubt that Homer meant us to understand that, in the wealth of
those days, he was very opulent. The settlement from time to time of
Phœnicians in Greece, and the ready docility of the Hellenes in the
art of navigation, are signs to the same effect. The idea of wealth
again is deeply involved in the name of ὄλβος, which appears to mean
a god-given felicity: and μάκαρ is the epithet in common of the gods,
the rich man, and the happy man[172]. Not that the Greeks of those
times were, in a greater degree than ourselves, the slaves of wealth,
but that they spoke out in their simplicity, here, as also with other
matters, what we keep in the shade; and thus they made a greater show
of particular propensities, even while they had less of them in reality.
[169] Il. ix. 70-73, 330-3. i. 121.
[170] Il. xi. 100, 110.
[171] Od. xiv. 96-104.
[172] The gods, Il. i. 599 _et alibi_. The rich man, Il. xi. 68. Od. i.
217. The happy man, Od. vi. 158. xi. 482. Il. iii. 182. xxiv. 377.
But, even more than from particular signs, I estimate the capacity
of the Homeric Greeks for acquisition from the state of facts in the
poems. Here we observe a remarkable temperance, and even a detestation
of excess, in all the enjoyments of the senses, combined with the
possession, not only of a rude abundance in meat, corn, and wine,
but with the principle of ornament, largely, though inartificially,
established in their greater houses and gardens; with considerable
stores of the precious as well as the useful metals, and of fine
raiment; and with the possession of somewhat rich works of art, both in
metal and embroidery. This picture seems to belong to a stage, although
a very early one, in a process of rapid advance to material wealth and
prosperity. The wealth and the simplicity of manners, taken together,
would seem to imply that they had not yet had time to be corrupted
by it, and consequently that, by their energy and prudence, they had
gathered it promptly and with ease.
~_The precious metals not a measure of value._~
The commercial intercourse of the age, however, was still an
intercourse of barter. There can hardly be a stronger sign of the
rudeness of trading relations, than the Homeric use of the word χρεῖος.
It signifies both the obligation to pay a debt regularly contracted for
value received (Od. iii. 367), and the liability to sustain retaliation
after an act of rapine (Il. xi. 686, 8). The possession of the precious
metals was probably confined to a very few. Both these, and iron, which
apparently stood next to them in value, formed prizes at the Games; in
which, speaking generally, only kings and chiefs took part. A certain
approximation had been made towards the use of them as money, that
is, as the measure of value for other commodities. For, as they were
divided into fixed quantities, those quantities were in all likelihood
certified by some mark or stamp upon them. Nor do we ever find mere
unwrought gold and silver estimated or priced in any other commodity.
The arms of Glaucus are indeed ἑκατομβοῖα[173], and they are χρύσεα.
But this means gilded or adorned with gold; an object made of gold
would with Homer be παγχρύσεος. Such are the θύσανοι, the gold drops
or tassels of Minerva’s Ægis; each of which is worth an hundred oxen.
Thus gold, when manufactured, even if not when in mass, had its value
expressed in oxen[174].
[173] Il. vi. 236.
[174] Il. ii. 448, 9.
It is possible that gold and silver may, to a limited extent, have
been used as a standard, or as a medium of exchange. The payment of
the judge’s fee in the Eighteenth Iliad suggests, though it does not
absolutely require, this supposition. Like writing in the Homeric age,
like printing when it was executed from a mould among the Ancients, the
practice may have existed essentially, but in a form and on a scale
that deprived it of importance, by limiting its extent.
~_Oxen in some degree a measure of value._~
The arms of Glaucus and Diomed, and the drops of Minerva’s Ægis, are,
as we have seen, valued or priced in oxen. The tripod, which was the
first prize for the wrestlers of the Twenty-third Book, was valued at
twelve oxen: the captive woman, who was the second, accomplished in
works of industry, was worth four[175].
[175] Il. xxiii. 702-5.
But Laertes gave for Euryclea no less than twenty oxen, or rather the
value of twenty oxen (ἐεικοσάβοια δ’ ἔδωκεν, Od. i. 431). We need not
ascribe the difference in costliness to the superior merit of Euryclea;
but we may presume the explanation to be, that Laertes, in time of
peace, paid for Euryclea the high price of an importing market; whereas
the Greeks, in a state of war before Troy, had probably more captives
than they knew how to feed. They were, at any rate, in the country of
production: and the price was low accordingly.
When we find it said that a woman slave was estimated at four oxen, we
are not enabled at once to judge from such a statement whether oxen
were a measure of value, or whether the meaning simply was, that a man,
who wanted such a slave, would give four oxen for her. But the case of
Euryclea clears up this point. For what Laertes gave was not the twenty
oxen, but something equal to them, something in return for which they
could ordinarily be had. Again, Lycaon brought Achilles the value of a
hundred oxen, a hundred oxen’s worth[176]. In this case, then, oxen are
used as a medium for the expression of value.
[176] Il. xxi. 79.
In a passage of the Odyssey, we find that the Suitors, when they try
to make terms with Ulysses in his wrath, promise as follows by the
mouth of Eurymachus[177];
[177] Od. xxii. 57-9.
τιμὴν ἀμφὶς ἄγοντες ἐεικοσάβοιον ἕκαστος,
χαλκόν τε χρυσόν τ’ ἀποδώσομεν, εἰσόκε σὸν κῆρ
ἰανθῇ.
This has been rendered as a double engagement to pay the oxen and the
metals. It seems to me, from the construction of the passage, as if it
would be more properly understood to be a declaration, that they would
each of them bring him a compensation of the value of twenty oxen in
gold, and in copper. If Eurymachus had meant to express the restoration
of the live stock of Ulysses, it is not likely that he would have
spoken of oxen only, especially in the goat-feeding and swine-feeding
Ithaca.
There is another passage in the poems, which seems to carry a similar
testimony one point further. When Euneus sends ships with wine to the
Greek camp, the Greeks pay him for his wine, some with copper, some
with iron, some with hides, some with slaves, and some with oxen.
Slaves, as we have seen, would probably be redundant in the camp. The
same would be eminently the case with respect to hides; since they
would be redundantly supplied by the animals continually slaughtered
for the subsistence of the army. Even as to the metals, we need not
feel surprise at the passage; for they were acquired largely by spoil,
and not greatly needed by the force, since wear and tear scarcely
constitute an element in the question of supply for those times. But
it is certainly more startling that any of the Greeks should have sold
oxen to the crews of Euneus. Neither in that age nor in this would any
merchants carry away oxen from a vast and crowded camp, where they
would be certain to be in the highest demand. I therefore presume the
meaning to be as follows; that those particular Greeks, who happened to
have more oxen than they wanted at the moment, sold them to the people
of the ships; and that the people of the ships took these oxen, in
exchange for wine, not intending to carry them away, but to sell them
again, perhaps against hides or slaves on the spot, as the live cattle
would be certain to find a ready and advantageous market among other
Greeks of the army.
Oxen therefore, in that age, seem to have come nearer, than any other
commodity, to the discharge of the functions now performed by the
precious metals: for they were both used to express value, and probably
purchased not for use only, but also with a view to re-sale. Thus the
Homeric evidence, with respect to them, is in conformity with the
testimony of Æschylus in the Agamemnon, who seems to represent the ox
as the first sign imprinted upon money[178].
[178] Agam. 37.
The precious metals themselves were much employed for both personal
ornament and for art. This was, no doubt, their proper and established
application; and when they are stored, they are stored in common with
other metals not of the same class, and with a view, in all likelihood,
to manufacture.
~_Relative scarcity of metals._~
It appears clear, from the Homeric poems, that silver was more rare
than gold. It is used, when used at all, in smaller quantities: and
it much more rarely appears in the accounts of stored-up wealth. A
like inference may be drawn, perhaps, from the books of Moses; and
it corresponds with the anticipations we should reasonably form from
the fact that gold is found in a native state, and, even when mixed
with other material, is more readily fitted for use. The extensive
employment of silver only arrives, when society is more advanced, and
when the use of money is more familiar and minute. Payments in the
precious metals on a somewhat large scale precede those for smaller
transactions. We are not however to infer, from the greater rarity of
silver, that it was more valuable than gold: the value depending, not
on the comparative quantities only, but upon the compound ratio of the
quantities as compared with the demand. It would however appear from a
passage in the account of the funeral games, that gold, if not silver,
was then much less esteemed than it now is. For, while a silver bowl
was the first prize of the foot-race, a large and fat ox (perhaps worth
three ordinary ones) was the second, and a half talent of gold was only
the third[179].
[179] Il. xxiii. 740-51.
The position of iron, however, relatively to the other metals, was very
different in the heroic age from what it now is: and probably its great
rarity was due, like that of silver, to the difficulty of bringing the
metal into a state fit for use; which could more readily be effected
with copper, with tin, or with κύανος, in whatever sense it is to be
interpreted. Iron, however, would appear to have been more valuable
than these metals; greatly more valuable, in particular, than copper,
which is now worth from fifteen to twenty times as much as iron. A
mass of crude iron is produced at the funeral games as a prize; and
iron made into axe-heads forms another. No other metal, below the rank
of gold and silver, is ever similarly employed in an unmanufactured
state.--
Let us now turn to a brief view of the polity and organization of the
army.
We perceive the organization of the Greek communities in a double form:
both as a community, properly so called, in time of peace, a picture
supplied by the Odyssey; and likewise as an army, according to the
delineations of the Iliad.
~_Mode of government of the army._~
The differences are worth noting: but they do not seem to touch
fundamental principles. Agamemnon governed the army by the ordinary
political instruments, not by the rules of military discipline.
Aristotle[180] quotes from the Iliad of his own day and place, and as
proceeding from the mouth of Agamemnon, the words,
[180] Pol. iii. 14. 5.
πὰρ γὰρ ἐμοὶ θάνατος·
and Grote founds upon this citation the remark, that ‘the Alexandrian
critics effaced many traces of the old manners.’ But was this really a
trace of the old manners? Is there a single passage now remaining of
the Iliad, a single thought, a single word, which at all corresponds
with the idea that Agamemnon had in his own hands, in the shape of
a defined prerogative, the power of capital punishment? Aristotle
certainly accepts the passage, and contrasts this military power of
Agamemnon with the restraints upon him in the peaceful sphere of the
ἀγορή; but I am by no means sure that English institutions do not
afford us the aid of far more powerful analogies for appreciating
the real political spirit of the Homeric poems, than any that even
Aristotle could draw in his own day from the orientalizing government
of Alexander. I do not, however, so much question the passage, as
the construction put upon it. The prerogatives of the Greek kings
were founded in general duty and feeling, not in law. When Ulysses
belaboured Thersites, it was not in the exercise of a determinate
right, but in obedience to the dictates of general prudence, which,
upon a high emergency, the general sense approved. Doubtless, if
Agamemnon had caught a runaway from the ranks, he might have slain him;
but is it supposed that Ulysses might not? What was the meaning of the
advice of Nestor, to put the poltroons in the middle of the ranks,
but that their comrades about them should spear them if they should
try to run? There is no criminal justice, in the proper sense of the
term, though there is civil justice, in either of the Homeric poems;
the wrongs of man to man are adjusted or requited by the latter form
of remedy, but the ideas on which the former rests were unknown: there
is no king’s peace, more than there is a king’s highway: the sanctions
of force are added upon occasion to the general authority of office by
those who bear it, according to the suggestions of their common sense.
Had it been otherwise, Ulysses would never have put the wretched women
in his household, who could not, like the Suitors their paramours, be
politically formidable, to a death, which fully entitled him to say
with the Agamemnon of the citation, πὰρ γὰρ ἐμοὶ θάνατος. The general
reverence for rank and station, the safeguard of publicity, and the
influence of persuasion, are the usual and sufficient instruments
for governing the army, even as they governed the civil societies of
Greece. In the Assembly of the army, the quarrel with Achilles takes
place: in the Assembly arises the tumultuary impulse to return home:
in the Assembly, that impulse having been checked, it is deliberately
resolved to see what they can do by fighting: in the Assembly it is
determined to ask a truce for burials, and to erect the rampart: in the
nocturnal Assembly that Council is appointed to sit, which sends the
abortive mission to Achilles. Every great measure affecting the whole
body is, as we shall find, adopted in the Assembly: and, finally, it
is here that Agamemnon explicitly confesses and laments his fault, and
that the reconciliation with Achilles is ratified.
We may therefore take the polity, so to speak, of the Greek army into a
common view with that of the Ithacan ἀγορή; but first it will be well
to sketch its military organization.
~_Its military composition._~
Next to the βασιλῆες came the ἔξοχοι ἄνδρες (Il. ii. 188), or ἀριστῆες,
of the Greek army. They are pretty clearly distinguished from the
kings in the speech of Achilles (ix. 334); when, after describing the
niggardliness of Agamemnon with respect to booty, he goes on to say,
ἄλλα δ’ ἀριστήεσσι δίδου γέρα καὶ βασιλεῦσιν·
which I understand to mean, he gave to these two classes prizes
different, i. e. proportioned to their respective stations.
The language of the Catalogue pointedly marks the same distinction in
other words. At the beginning, the Poet invites the Muses to tell him
(ver. 487),
οἵτινες ἡγεμόνες Δαναῶν καὶ κοίρανοι ἦσαν,
and at the close he says (ver. 760),
οὗτοι ἄρ’ ἡγεμόνες Δαναῶν καὶ κοίρανοι ἦσαν.
These two verses appear to be in evident correspondence with each
other: and if so, we may the more confidently rely on the language
as carefully chosen to describe the two classes, first the kings
as κοίρανοι (cf. Il. ii. 204, 207), and, secondly, the ἀριστῆες as
ἡγεμόνες.
This class, it is probable, consisted,
First, of the leaders of the minor and less significant contingents.
Secondly, of lieutenants, or those who are named in the Catalogue as
holding inferior commands under the great leaders (such as Meriones,
Sthenelus, and Euryalus).
But, below the ἡγεμόνες of the Catalogue, there would appear to
have been several grades of minor officers, in command of smaller
subdivisions of the army. These would seem to have been described by a
general name, ἡγεμόνες. When Nestor (ii. 362) advises the distribution
of the army according to φῦλα and φρήτραι, it will, he says, have the
advantage of showing not only which of the soldiers, but which of
the officers were good, and which bad. Probably therefore there were
officers of each φῦλον, if not even, under these, of each φρήτρη.
Of the Greeks nine are named in Il. xi. 301-3, who were slain by Hector
at once, before he went among the privates (πληθύς). Of these nine no
one is mentioned in any other part of the poem; and since at the same
time they are expressly declared to be ἡγεμόνες, we may safely look
upon them as examples of the class of minor or secondary officers. From
their names, which have a strong Hellenic colour[181], we may venture
at least to conjecture, that this class was chiefly Achæan, or of
Achæan rank, and that the Pelasgian blood of the army was principally
among the common soldiers.
[181] Vid. Achæis or Ethnology, p. 574.
The maritime order of the armament, which required a commander for each
vessel, necessarily involved the existence of a class of what we may
call subaltern officers.
When Helen describes the chieftains to Priam from the tower, of whom
Idomeneus is one, she proceeds (Il. iii. 231);
ἀμφὶ δέ μιν Κρητῶν ἀγοὶ ἠγερέθονται.
Again, when Achilles went with fifty ships to Troy, he divided his 2500
men under five ἡγεμόνες, whom he appointed to give the word of command
(σημαίνειν) under him. The force thus arranged formed five στίχες or
ranks, Il. xvi. 168-72: and here the private persons are expressly
called ἑταῖροι (ver. 170). Most probably these ἀγοὶ of the Cretans,
and these five Myrmidon leaders, are to be considered as belonging to
a class below the ἀριστῆες, yet above the subalterns.
Lastly, we have to notice the privates, so to speak, of the Greek army,
who are called by the several names of λαὸς (Il. ii. 191. i. 54), δῆμος
(ii. 198), and πληθὺς (ii. 278).
In their military character they are indeed a mass of atoms,
undistinguishable from one another, but yet distinguished by their
silence and order, which was founded probably on confidence in their
leaders.
~_The descriptions of fighting men._~
No private or nameless[182] person of the Greek army, however, on any
occasion performs any feat, either great or small: these are always
achieved by the men of birth and station: and the three designations
we have mentioned, the only ones which are used to designate the whole
mass of the soldiery, represent them to us as a community bearing arms,
rather than as an army in any sense that is technical or professional.
[182] Even the instance, in Il. xiii. 211, of a nameless person who had
simply been wounded is a rare, if not indeed the single, exception.
All these were entitled to attend the ἀγορὴ, or Assembly, if they
pleased. And accordingly, on the first Assembly that Achilles attended
after renouncing his wrath, we find that, from the great interest
of the occasion, even those persons were present who did not usually
appear: namely, the pilots of the ships, and others who probably
had charge of them while ashore, together with those who managed
the provisioning of the force (ταμίαι), or, in our language, the
commissariat (Il. xix. 42-5).