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Isocrates, IG ii2 43, Greek Propaganda and Imperialism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 July 2016

Charles D. Hamilton
Charles D. Hamilton*
Affiliation:
San Diego State University
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Extract

In the late winter of 378–7, the Athenian assembly passed a decree on the motion of Aristoteles which formalized the results of much earlier diplomatic activity and invited those states concerned with their freedom and autonomy to join Athens and her allies in a novel and permanent alliance. This Decree is often called the ‘Charter of the Second Athenian Confederacy,’ and it is rightly regarded as ‘the Queen of Fourth Century Inscriptions’ for the crucial information which it provides on one of the most important political and diplomatic developments of that epoch, a development that soon led to a resurgence of Athenian imperialism. The detailed provisions of the Decree are of inestimable value, particularly as the only extant contemporary history of this period, the Hellenica of Xenophon, contains not so much as a passing reference to the Decree itself or to most of the significant steps which led up to it. This glaring omission in Xenophon's account has attracted both the curious attention and often the unfavorable criticism of virtually every modern scholar who has investigated fourth century Greek history. The only other major extant account of the establishment of the confederacy, that of Diodorus, provides some details, but it contains inaccuracies, especially errors of chronology. The modern historian therefore must seek to recover the origins and background of the confederacy from a variety of sources which are often incomplete and sometimes biased. A century of scholarship has elucidated many problematical aspects of this Decree, but several questions connected with it still demand discussion. It is my purpose in this article to examine some of these questions with reference to Greek diplomacy, propaganda, and imperialism in the early fourth century.

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Articles
Information
Traditio , Volume 36 , 1980 , pp. 83 - 109
Copyright
Copyright © Fordham University Press 

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References

1 The date, February or March 377, is known from the formula which begins the Decree, stating that it was passed in the seventh prytany of the archonship of Nausinikos. See Tod, M. N., Greek Historical Inscriptions (Oxford 1950) II 63 and the copy of his text, reproduced at the end of this paper, Il. 1, 4–5. An early version of this paper was read on December 28, 1976, at the American Philological Association in New York City at a meeting of the Friends of Ancient History. Note also Jack Cargill, The Second Athenian League (Berkeley |forthcoming]). I am grateful to Professor Cargill for reading this article and for much helpful advice, which I have considered carefully but not always followed (we differ, e.g., on the question of Athenian imperialism after 377).Google Scholar

2 See Marshall, F. H., The Second Athenian Confederacy (Cambridge 1905); Accame, S., La Lega ateniese del secolo IV a.C. (Rome 1941); Burnett, A. P., ‘Thebes and the Expansion of the Second Athenian Confederacy,’ Historia 11 (1962) 1–17; and Cawkwell, G. L., ‘The Foundation of the Second Athenian Confederacy,’ Classical Quarterly 23 (1973) 47–60 for important discussion of this Decree.Google Scholar

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65 See 17–18 of the Decree.Google Scholar

66 Diod. 15.29.3.Google Scholar

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