Philosophy of archaic Greece. Culture of Archaic Greece

The economic recovery, the preconditions for which were laid in the previous “dark ages,” served as the foundation for major changes in all spheres of society. During the archaic period of Greek history, the final separation of crafts from agriculture took place, pottery and shipbuilding were improved, iron was mined and widely used, and real money appeared.

Two new industries are emerging in agriculture: olive growing and viticulture. Their leadership was due to geographical reasons, namely mountainous terrain, which was not the best basis for widespread sowing of cereal crops. Peasants, using iron tools, were able to produce more than enough food to provide for their community, so the resulting surplus steel was exported for sale. It was this goal (selling surplus and making a profit) that stimulated the growth of agricultural production, and also contributed to the development of crafts, the products of which could be purchased with the proceeds.

Development of crafts in the archaic period

The more crafts distanced themselves from agriculture, the more the skills of their craftsmen increased, as they had free time to improve their skills. Metallurgists were especially successful. They learned not only to process iron, but also developed various methods of soldering and welding it. Iron tools were much more effective than bronze ones, and iron weapons contributed to the emergence of the so-called hoplites (heavily armed infantry). The role of cavalry, recruited from aristocrats, gradually acquired secondary importance in military affairs. Pottery production also did not stand still. With the improvement of firing technologies, the Greeks learned more “rich” in content decoration their products. As a result, the products of potters from Athens and Corinth had great success throughout the Mediterranean. And, of course, shipbuilding, as a kind of indicator of the success of the development of all crafts, reached its highest peak in comparison with other periods in the history of Greece. After all, the construction of any ship required the coordinated work of many narrow specialists (often living in remote cities), and therefore a fairly developed sector of the economy in the field of various crafts.

The appearance of money

The result of all these economic transformations and the strengthening ties between policies was the emergence of money, which further stimulated further commodity production. The polis is now becoming not only an administrative and religious center, but also a trade and craft center, where in every city there is active trade in the central markets (agoras) and foreign ships that arrived in Greece for commercial purposes stand at the harbors. In all cities of Greece, the number of living artisans, sailors, rowers, merchants and workshop owners is significantly increasing. Peasants - farmers also tried to maintain close ties with large cities; there they gathered for public meetings, sold their surplus products, took part in public holidays, and also purchased handicrafts. Thus, Greek cities turn into the center of everything economic, cultural and political development society.

Social sector

The rapid pace of economic development and the stratification of society (the result of the development of crafts) led to the emergence of classes and various social groups. The faster industrial production and trade developed in a particular policy, the faster and more intense these processes proceeded. Where trade and industry developed faster, the process of dividing society into classes and eliminating the vestiges of tribal relations proceeded faster. At the same time, in agricultural zones, where there was no talk of commodity relations at that time, it proceeded very sluggishly, due to the fact that tribal remnants did not disappear from the life of society for a long time.

The emergence of a class of artisans and merchants

One of the first to emerge was the class of artisans and traders. Over time, he became quite a significant force, capable of even interfering in politics and able to defend his rights. It was the craft and trade stratum that gave birth to the phenomenon that was later called tyranny. Tyrants were people's leaders who came to power using violent methods. They persecuted the old family aristocracy - they confiscated property, expelled them, etc. That's why in modern society the term "tyrant" has a negative connotation. In fact, there were many active, capable and intelligent “tyrants” who actively supported such industries as trade, crafts, agriculture, and shipbuilding; they minted coins and provided protection for trade routes.

However, the phenomenon of tyranny did not stay long in Greece. Despite the fact that the tyrants fought against centuries-old ways of life, carried out reforms in favor of the people, and developed the economy, their rule soon acquired a truly despotic character. Both the leaders themselves and their associates began to actively use violent methods to exercise their power and abused their position. Eventually, the people stopped supporting the tyrants, and they were expelled or died in the class struggle. By the end of the 6th century. BC e. tyranny was completely eliminated in almost all of Greece.

In general, the consequences of this regime were not bad - the clan nobility no longer had such a high and inviolable position as before, the prerequisites for the establishment of a polis system appeared, the craft and trade stratum strengthened its position in society and in its management. The handicraft and trade sector developed very quickly, which contributed to the rapid overpopulation of policies and the “crisis of overproduction.” There was a need to expand the market, and the only way out at that time seemed to be the colonization of foreign lands.

Great Greek Colonization

Modern historians see several reasons that contributed to the great Greek colonization. First of all, the already mentioned economic reasons. The next reason is the rapid process of stratification of society. The poor, who did not have their own land, tired of debt dependence, losing in the social struggle of various opposing sides, hoped to find luck, a good life in a foreign land, in the newly founded colonies. This state of affairs was only to the advantage of the aristocracy, because dissatisfied people and political opponents who were dangerous for the nobility were sent to the colonies. And it was beneficial for the governments of large cities to have their own colonies, with the help of which they would expand their economic and political influence.

Scientists distinguish two stages of the colonization process:

8th century BC. - first half of the 7th century. BC e. The colonies at this time were purely agrarian in nature. Their goal was only to provide the colonists with land.

From the end of the 7th century. BC. until the end of the 6th century. BC. More attention is paid to communication and establishing contacts with the local population, which contributed to the development of the trade and craft sector.

As for the geographical directions of colonization, at that time there were three of them: western, southern and north-eastern. The most intensive development was in the western direction. Part of the east of Sicily and part of Italy were colonized. Subsequently they received the name “great Greece”. In addition, the islands of Sardinia and Corsica, the south of France and the eastern coast of Spain became colonies. The next direction is south and southeast. It includes the appearance of colonies in the following territories: the coast of Palestine, Phenicia and northern Africa. As for the northeastern direction, here you can observe movement to the Propontis (Sea of ​​Marmara) and to the Black Sea. Two towns appear in the Propontis: Byzantium, the ancestor of the great Constantinople, from which the history of Byzantium will begin, and Chalcedon, where the fourth Ecumenical Council will take place later, already in the times of Christianity.

In the colonies, people were not burdened by the burden of tribal relations and, therefore, everything developed faster - be it the economy, culture or government. Many initially small, poor towns are turning into huge, rich, economically developed cities with a large population and a rich social and cultural life. The fact of such rapid development Greek colonies has a positive effect on the development of Greece as a whole, on the establishment of more mature forms of the polis system. Great Greek colonization 8th-6th centuries. BC e. contributed to the rapid and effective development of the entire Greek world. The Greeks learned about new countries, peoples, traditions, and customs, which greatly expanded their horizons. The need for housing, ships, and the development of new territories gave a powerful impetus to the development of construction, architecture, and shipbuilding. Communication with other countries enriched the culture of Greece with new knowledge and ideas, which had a positive impact on the formation and development of Greek literature and philosophy.

Culture

The prosperity of Greece due to the development of trade, agriculture, production, and the emergence of new territories in the process of colonization led to renewal Greek culture. The free human personality now stood at the center of the new value system. The Minoan and Achaean heritage of their ancestors was rethought. At this time, the “Homeric” sphere - poetry - continues to develop. New literary genres are emerging. Epic is replaced by lyrical poetry, which describes a person’s feelings, his joys and sorrows.

Another science is also emerging - philosophy. It is close to natural philosophy (“philosophy of nature” of the East). It reflects the first steps of Greek thinkers seeking to understand what the world is and what place man occupies in it.

Greek architecture is also developing very rapidly. The focus of the architects of that time were public buildings and temples of the gods. Each city had its own patron god, who was the personification of the strength and beauty of the city, so the authorities spared no expense in decorating such buildings. It was in the construction of temples that the famous order system of architecture was created, which later became the source of the development of Greek and subsequently Roman architecture. New features are also appearing in the visual arts. The geometric style is being replaced by black- and red-figure painting of ceramic products, which appeared not without the influence of the East.

The “golden age” of antiquity began - the state entered a new era of its development - the classical one.

Archaic- early development of art. Translated from Greek “archaikуs” means ancient, ancient. Art can be called any ancient art, starting with cave paintings, but most often this term refers to the art of ancient Greece.

Archaic period of Greece from 650 to 480 BC e. is an unusual flowering of science, culture and art, which became the basis of all world art. Many, however, criticize the name of Greek culture as “archaic,” since this term hides precisely a certain primitiveness, while the “archaic period” of Greece represents high art and a mature culture, which is quite comparable to modern one.

The archaic period of Greece contributed to the emergence of many types of graceful and applied arts. The cultural surge of this time is comparable to the Renaissance in Europe, which also contributed to the emergence of many genres and trends, revolutionized ideas about the world and made life much more interesting and richer. Archaic is a period of formation, a period of birth and the beginning of prosperity. There was a noticeable shift in the visual arts, ceramics, sculpture and architecture. Doric and Ionic architectural styles appeared. To decorate houses, palaces, temples, and tombstones, sculptures are being created from various materials, which today are considered true masterpieces of archaic art. In addition, Ancient Greece became famous for its writers, poets, philosophers, whose work is also considered literary archaic, that is, the period of the birth of foundations.

Archaic, how early stage development of culture and art plays the most important role in the history of mankind. It is thanks to those figures who laid the foundations and proved their necessity to all people that today we have our world heritage - hundreds of styles and genres of painting, graphics, literature, sculpture, architecture, music, philosophy, creative activities and much, much more.

Examples of archaic art

The Greek Archaic Period (ca. 800-479 BC) began with what can be called uncertainty and ended with the Persians being driven out of Greece forever after the battles of Plataea and Mycale in 479 BC.

The Archaic Period is preceded by the Greek Dark Age (c.1200-800 BCE), a period about which little is known, and then the Classical Period (c.510-332 BCE), which is one from the best documented periods Greek history, with tragedies, comedies, histories, court cases and more surviving in the form of literary and epigraphic sources. Each of these periods had its own cultural identity, but despite this, there is a certain degree of flexibility with the dates given to the periods. These are modern terms that attempt to define various aspects of changes in Greek culture that in no way occurred during one particular year or all together in the same year.

The Archaic period saw enormous changes in Greek language, society, art, architecture and politics. These changes occurred due to Greece's growing population and its increasing volume of trade, which in turn led to colonization and a new era of intellectual ideas, the most important of which (at least for the modern Western world) was Democracy. Then it will spread cultural change more coolly.

POLITICS AND LAW
The politics of Athens underwent a number of major changes during the Archaic period, and the first change was, perhaps at its worst, with the Draco laws, around 622/621 BC. E. (The semi-legendary character of these laws and its namesake should be noted, and secondly, the semi-legendary nature of most cases during the first two hundred years of the period). As Aristotle says of Draco, “there is nothing special in his laws worthy of mention except their severity in inflicting heavy punishments” (Politics 2.1274b).

Legacy of their shame (loans can be made to defend own person), still exists in modern word"dragons". However, the most cruel were death sentences; Plutarch says that “it is said that Draco himself, when asked why he instituted the punishment for death penalty for most offences, replied that he considered these lesser crimes to be worthy of it, and he had no further punishment for the more important ones.” Although Aristotle comments that there was nothing special about the laws, what is important is that the laws, for the first time in Athens, were written down for everyone to see and read (for those who were literate).

The next major changes that occurred were caused by Solon (c. 594 BC), whose historical accuracy is more certain than that of Draco due to fragments of his poetry, which Plutarch considers to still exist in his time. His changes to Athenian law were the first to give the lower classes a fairer chance, but positions of power were still only available to wealth. It was the consequences of class inequality that Solon addressed, not the causes of them. The most notable change made by Solon was seisachtheia, "shaking of the burden." This decree canceled debts, prohibited the use of one's face as security for a loan, and recalled all those who were sold as slaves and those who fled to avoid such a fate.

There were also Solanus' reforms regarding weights and measures, including the introduction of the right to treat third parties in other developments. To avoid being pressured to change these laws, Solon left Athens for ten years (according to Herodotus) and went to Egypt, where he wrote political poetry.

It was only after Solon that a sense of self-conscious democracy arose in Athens; development, which can be seen as social phenomenon or a political and institutional phenomenon. Then the changes came thick and fast. The era of tyrants that began with Draco would soon end soon, but not if the Paisistratids had anything to do with it.

The Peisistratids were a short line of Athenian tyrants that began with the Peisistratos, and it should be noted that the term "tyrant" during this period did not have the negative connotations that it has today. In fact, Pesestratos was not a draconian ruler, but one who felt a certain sympathy for the poorest classes Athens. Aristotle gives a good account of subsequent events. After the death of Peshistratos, his sons Hippias and Hipparchus maintained tyranny until Harmodias and Aristogenes began to plot against them.

Cleisthenes came to power in the political rift left by the tyrannicides and is famous for teaching isonomy in Athens ( equal laws). He achieved this through various reforms, which meant that less importance was placed on aristocratic experience. The biggest reform that Clisthen made was in the tribal system of Athens. Before his reform there were four tribes (based on family connections), Kleisthens changed this to ten tribes, each formed by a slightly complex subsystem.

The tribes were formed by a collection of dems (like an English parish, small local people) who were themselves placed into one of thirty tritium, "thirds" (three per tribe); dem will be in any of three regions depending on its location: coast, city or inland. The Tritti were thus a union of ten desmenes from each of the three regions; so each tribe had three tritti, one of which consisted of demons from the city, one of the des from the coast, and one of the demons from within. In addition to this, Athenians will no longer take their "surname" from their father, but from their dem. All this meant that the family ties, traditions and allegiances that had previously caused political friction (and in some way connected with the tyrants of the Peixistrids) were broken. Moreover, during the time of Clystenes, many Athenian official positions began to be chosen by lot. Aristotle and Herodotus tell quite good stories about these events.

ART AND ARCHITECTURE
The art and architecture of the Archaic period also underwent various changes; the earlier geometric style was replaced by an orientalizing style, which in turn was replaced by black figured pottery. Black figured pottery first began to be used in Corinth c. 700s BCE, but the first signed example dates from c. 570 BC E., when attic black figured pottery was in its heyday (around 630-480 BC) and sophilos. As this method was further developed and studied, it gave way to red pattern pottery, which began to develop. C. 530 BC

In addition, many changes and modifications were made to the construction of the temple during this period. The first phase of Gereon on Samos was built in the middle. 8th C. BC E., but his final, unfinished, reincarnation was not begun until c. 530 BC By this time many changes had occurred. The Heraion at Olympia, built c. 600 BC CE, was the first temple to have a stone stylobate and a lower wall path, but was still built with wooden columns, one of which still survives to the day of Pausanias. Today, remnants of this development can be seen in the different sizes and styles of Doric stone temple columns, as they were created by different hands at different times to replace the wooden pillars as needed.

Archeology of Corcyra (ca. 580/70 BC) was the first Greek temple to have a stone entablature, and the Temple of Apollo (ca. 580-550 BC) in Syracuse is now known as the Cathedral of Syracuse, being the most the lasting constant is the only building to remain consecrated ground, in this case, with its archaic origins. The era of tyrants can also be attested in one particular temple, in this case not referring to the tyrants of Athens, but to Samos, namely the Polycrates (c.540-520 BC), who commissioned the fourth stage of Gerian to Samos. This is also evidenced by evidence showing the development of Greece in international relations, with King Croy dedicated to the column of the Temple of Artemis and Ephesus; and to this day it still has its mark.

PANEL GAMES
It was during the Archaic period that the four major panlenetic games of Greece were founded. In 776 BC. Olympic Games traditionally began by Hercules and Pelops (and their influence can be seen in the sculptural decoration of the classical Temple of Zeus), while sporting events were held at Delphi c. 586 BC, the home of the Pythian Games and the Panhelian Isthmian Games were founded in Corinth c. 581 BC The last of the Big Four was founded c. 573 BC, and these were the games of Nemea.

However, in the usual archaic tradition, each of these games was surrounded by its own foundation myth, not just the Olympic Games. The Pythian Games, which were originally exclusively games of music and dance, were supposedly founded by Apollo himself (according to Pindar), the Ishmian Games (according to Pausanias) by the legendary king of Corinth, Sisyphus and the Nemean Games after Hercules killed the ice lion. But when we think of winning games, there is one name that jumps out, and it is not the winner, but the poet, Pindar, who composed between c. 500-466 BC E., writing his Pythian odes and others in honor of various winners in the games.

ALPHABET AND LITERATURE
From Homer and Hesiod to Pindar and Aeschylus, the Archaic period underwent extensive development in the field of Greek literature as well as language, with the development of the first Greek alphabet. The Greek alphabet, developed from the telephone alphabet, is itself a tribute to the increase in trade and exploration during the period that made this cultural exchange possible: the earliest Greek writing, dated c. 750 BCE. However, despite the development of the Greek alphabet, the oral tradition of poetic composition and transmission was still the method used by Hesiod and Homer; it was only until c. 670 BC and the rule of Peisistratus that a definitive version of the Iliad and Odyssey was attempted.

The end of the Archaic period also had a literature equally influential, less well known perhaps, but it set the stage for the later classical tragedians and comedians. 535 BCE was the year of the first drama festival in Athens and in 485 BC. comedy was added, and a year later Aeschylus won his first dramatic competition in Athens, but not until 472 BC. The Persians of Aeschylus were compiled.

PERSIAN WARS
The Persian Wars, perhaps the most influential set of events in the Archaic period that could not be brought to justice here, began with the Ionian revolt of the Greek colonies and settlements in Asia Minor from the Persian Empire, which prompted Darius I's response to invade Greece, which failed in battle at Marathon in 490 BC. This was later avenged by a second invasion of Greece by Xerxes, who was finally eliminated with combined victories at Plataea and Mycale, although only after the equally famous battles of Thermopylae and Salamis. Salamis was won by a fleet that Themistocles convinced the Athenians to build from the silver mines at Laurium, and this silver would remain vital into the classical period.

However, in these wars there were losses; the sacking of the Athenian acropolis and Agora, the death of Leonidas, and eventually the freedom of the Ionic tributaries in Athens as the League of Delia soon became the Athenian League. The change was that in the archaic period in the Persian War, in the classical period, there was diplomacy.

Therefore, the Archaic period is a very important time period, but also very important in preventing events Classical Period into context. However, this definition covers only a few of the many events and developments, and covers some of them only briefly: the Archaic period is perhaps the richest and most complex in Greek history.

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION OF THE MOSCOW REGION

MOSCOW STATE REGIONAL UNIVERSITY

Historical and Philological Institute

FACULTY OF HISTORY, POLITICAL SCIENCE AND LAW

Department of History ancient world and the Middle Ages

Coursework on the topic:

Greece in the archaic era and its influence on the world.

Completed by: Klimenko I.E.

2nd year student d/o

Scientific adviser:

Ph.D., Associate Professor A.S. Klemeshov

Moscow 2014

Introduction……………………………………………………………... 3

Writing………………………………………………………….. 7

Poetry……………………………………………………………………………… 7

Religion and philosophy……………………………………………………………. 10

Architecture and Sculpture……………………………………………………………13

Vase painting………………………………………………………15

Greek alphabet……………………………………………………..15

Olympic Games………………………………………………………18

Historiography…………………………………………………………. 21

Mathematics…………………………………………………………….. 23

Theater………………………………………………………………………………………23

Coins…………………………………………………………………………………..24

Conclusion

List of references

Introduction

Archaic period in Greek history(8-5. BC) - a term adopted among historians since the 18th century. Appeared during the study of Greek art and originally belonged only to the times of the Dark Ages and classical Greece. Later, the term “archaic period” was extended not only to the history of art, but also to the social life of Greece, since during this period, following the “dark ages,” a significant expansion of political theory began, the rise of democracy, philosophy, theater, poetry, and the revival of written language. language (the emergence of the Greek alphabet to replace that forgotten during the “Dark Ages” Linear B).

This era became a time of rapid and active development of Ancient Greece, during which all the necessary conditions and prerequisites were made for the future amazing takeoff and prosperity. Profound changes are taking place in almost every area of ​​life. Over the course of three centuries, ancient society made a transition from village to city, from tribal and patriarchal relations to relations of classical slavery.

The city-state, the Greek polis, became the main form of socio-political organization of public life. Society, as it were, tries all possible forms of government and government (i.e., such a search for a political institution) - monarchy, tyranny, oligarchy, aristocratic and democratic republics.

The rapid development of agriculture leads to the release of people, which activates the growth of handicrafts in the country. Since this does not solve the “employment problem,” the colonization of neighboring and distant lands, which began in the Achaean period, is intensifying, as a result of which Greece is expanding territorially to enormous proportions. The economic surge contributes to an increase in the market and trade operations, whose main support is monetary circulation system. Appeared coinage, which accelerated these processes.

There have been great achievements and victories in the formation of spiritual culture. An absolute role in its development was played by the emergence alphabetic letter, which became the main achievement of the culture of archaic Greece. It was made on the basis of Phoenician writing and is surprisingly simple and accessible, which made it possible to create an extremely effective education system, thanks to which there were no illiterates in ancient Greece, which was also a huge success.

During the archaic period, the main ethical standards and values ancient society, in which the main thing is a sense of collectivism, combined with an agonistic (competitive) principle, with the formation of individual and personal rights, and the spirit of freedom. Patriotism and citizenship play a special role. Protecting one's policy began to be considered the highest honor of a citizen. At the same time, the symbol of a person in whom spirit and body are in harmony is also born.

The incarnation of this image was influenced by those that arose in 776 BC. Olympic Games. They took place every four years in the city of Olympia and lasted for five days, during which a “sacred peace” was observed, stopping all military actions. Those who took 1st place at the games enjoyed great success and received significant social guarantees (tax exemption, lifelong pension, permanent seats in the theater and at holidays). The winner of the games three times ordered his statue from a famous sculptor and placed it in the sacred grove surrounding the main shrine of the city of Olympia and all of Greece - the Temple of Zeus.

In the archaic era, such symbols of ancient culture arose as philosophy And spider. Their father was Thales, for whom they are not yet strictly separated from each other and are within the framework of a single natural philosophy. One of the founders of ancient philosophy and philosophy in general as a science is also the legendary Pythagoras, whose science takes the form mathematics, already has a completely independent meaning.

The real flourishing in this era occurs in poetry. The greatest monuments of ancient literature were epic poems Homer's Iliad and Odyssey. A little later, Homer was created by another famous Greek poet, Hesiod. His poems "Theogony", i.e. the genealogy of the gods, and the “Catalog of Women” complemented the work of Homer, and ancient poetry acquired its classic, ideal image.

Among other poets, the works of Archilochus, the founder of lyric poetry, deserve special mention; his poems are filled with personal suffering and experiences, combining the difficulties and hardships of life. This also includes the work of the lyricist Sappho, the great ancient poetess from the island of Lesbos, who experienced the feelings of a loving, jealous and suffering woman. The work of Anacreon, who glorified everything beautiful: beauty, feelings, joy, passion and fun of life, had a great influence on European and Russian poetry, in particular on A.S. Pushkin.

Artistic culture reaches a high level in the archaic era. At this time it develops architecture, standing on two types of order - Doric and Ionic. The leading type of construction is the sacred temple as the abode of God. The temple of Apollo in Delphi becomes the most famous and revered. There is also monumental sculpture - first wooden and then stone. Two types are most popular: a naked male statue, known as a kouros (the figure of a young athlete), and a draped female statue, an example of which was the kora (an upright girl).

The main elements of the urban structure of the Archaic period were the acropolis (sanctuary) and agora (shopping center), surrounded by residential areas of houses. The main place in the development of cities was occupied by temples, which were first built from mud brick and wood, then from limestone, and from the end of the 6th century. BC. - made of marble. An architectural order was created in its Doric and Ionic variants. The harsh, somewhat ponderous Doric style is characterized by a strict, geometrically correct capital columns. In the Ionic, more magnificent style, the column acts not only as a support, but also as a decorative element; it is characterized by a capital with curls - volutes, a more complex base, and is much more elegant than a Doric column. Among the buildings of the Doric order, the most famous were the Temple of Hera in Olympia, and the Ionic order - the Temple of Artemis in Ephesus.

During the archaic period, a synthesis of architecture and sculpture occurs - the outside of the temples is decorated with reliefs, and statues of the deity to whom the temple is dedicated are placed inside. The figures depict not only gods, but also mythical heroes (Hercules, Perseus, etc.). Greek ceramics from the Archaic era amazes with its richness and variety of forms, and the beauty of its style. Particularly notable are the Corinthian vases painted in the so-called orientalizing style, i.e. oriental style, which is distinguished by the beauty and whimsy of pictorial decoration, and Attic black-figure and later red-figure vases depicting the everyday life of people. A peculiar archaic culture laid the foundation for the flourishing of classical culture, which played such a significant role in the development of world civilization. Typical examples created by sculptors of that time were sculptures of naked young men - kouros and chastely draped girls - kora. The faces of the sculptures have individuality (“Cleobis and Biton” by Polymedes), the poses were given staticity, intense restraint, nobility and majesty. In the VI century. BC. temple decorations appeared. The motives for the created compositions were traditional, artistically modified myths, historical events described by Homer and their participants. Shade played a big role in sculpture. Individual parts of the kouros' body and clothing were painted. Sometimes precious stones were inserted into the eye sockets. In vase paintings in the 6th century. BC. the black-figure style (founder Exekius) is known - black varnish was applied to red clay, as well as the red-figure style (founder Epictetus) - painted ceramics, in which the images remained in the color of baked clay, and the background of the vessel was covered with black varnish. The approach to the second style had artists turning to dissimilar everyday subjects (“The Girl Heading to the Bath” from the masterful work of Euphronius

Religion. The Greek religion still played a connecting role in society. The image of Apollo in Delphi played an important meaning. This cult of the Delphic sacred college in the Greek state was very large, but had a purely cultic character, since the priests did not participate in government administration. In the policies, elected priests were in charge of sacraments and rituals, while at the same time providing religious education to citizens. The cults of Dionysus and Demeter played an important role in Greek religion.

The purpose of the course work is to show how the world has changed with the archaic, how the archaic has contributed to the development of art and how the whole world has changed with it, having gone through the path of experiments both in mathematics and in philosophy and in art too.

The so-called archaic period, covering the VIII-VI centuries. BC e., is the beginning of a new important stage in the history of ancient Greece. Over these three centuries, t.s. in a relatively short historical period, Greece has far surpassed its neighboring countries in its development, including the countries ancient East, which until that time were at the forefront of the cultural progress of mankind.

The Archaic period was a time of awakening of the spiritual forces of the Greek people after almost four centuries of stagnation. This is evidenced by an unprecedented explosion of creative activity.

Once again, after a long break, seemingly forever forgotten forms of art are being revived: architecture, monumental sculpture, painting. The colonnades of the first Greek temples were erected from marble and limestone. Statues are carved from stone and cast in bronze. The poems of Homer and Hesiod, the lyrical poems of Archilochus and Saffo, amazing in their depth and sincerity of feeling, appear. Alcaeus and many other poets. The first philosophers - Thales. Anaximenes. Anaximander - intensely pondering the question of the origin of the universe and the fundamental principle of all things.

The rapid growth of Greek culture during the 8th - 6th centuries. BC e. was directly connected with the Great Colonization taking place at that time. Earlier (see "Early Antiquity", lecture 17) it was shown that colonization brought the Greek world out of the state of isolation in which it found itself after the collapse of the Mycenaean culture. The Greeks were able to learn a lot from their neighbors, especially from the peoples of the East. Thus, an alphabetic letter was borrowed from the Phoenicians, which the Greeks improved by introducing the designation of not only consonants, but also vowels; Modern alphabets, including Russian, also originate from here. From Phenicia or Syria, the secret of making glass from sand came to Greece, as well as the method of extracting purple dye from the shells of sea mollusks. The Egyptians and Babylonians became teachers of the Greeks in astronomy and geometry. Egyptian architecture and monumental sculpture had a strong influence on the emerging Greek art. From the Lydians, the Greeks adopted such an important invention as money coinage.

All these elements of foreign cultures were creatively processed, adapted to the urgent needs of life and entered Greek culture as organic components.

Colonization made Greek society more mobile, more receptive. It opened up wide scope for the personal initiative and creative abilities of each person, which contributed to the liberation of the individual from the control of the clan and accelerated the transition of the entire society to a higher level of economic and cultural development. In the life of Greek city-states, navigation and maritime trade now come to the fore. Initially, many of the colonies located on the distant periphery of the Hellenic world found themselves economically dependent on their mother countries.

The colonists were in dire need of the basic necessities. They lacked products such as wine and olive oil, without which the Greeks could not imagine normal human life. Both had to be delivered from Greece by ship. Pottery and other household utensils, then fabrics, weapons, jewelry, etc. were also exported from the metropolis to the colonies. These things attract attention local residents, and they offer grain and livestock, metals and slaves in exchange for them. The simple products of Greek artisans initially could not, of course, compete with the high-quality oriental goods that Phoenician merchants transported throughout the Mediterranean. Nevertheless, they were in great demand in the markets of the Black Sea region, Thrace, and the Adriatic, remote from the main sea routes, where Phoenician ships appeared relatively rarely. Subsequently, cheaper, but also more mass-produced products of Greek crafts began to penetrate into the “reserved zone” of Phoenician trade - Sicily.

Southern and Central Italy, even Syria and Egypt - and gradually conquers these countries. Colonies little by little turned into important centers of intermediary trade between the countries of the ancient world. In Greece itself, the main centers of economic activity are the policies that are at the head of the colonization movement. Among them are the cities of the islands of Euboea, Corinth and Megara in the Northern Peloponnese, Aegina, Samos and Rhodes in the Aegean archipelago, Miletus and Ephesus on the western coast of Asia Minor.

The opening of markets on the colonial periphery gave a powerful impetus to the improvement of handicraft and agricultural production in Greece itself. Greek artisans are persistently improving the technical equipment of their workshops. In the entire subsequent history of the ancient world, never again have so many discoveries and inventions been made as during the three centuries that made up the archaic period. It is enough to point out such important innovations as the discovery of a method for soldering iron or bronze casting. Greek vases of the 7th - 6th centuries. BC e. They amaze with their richness and variety of forms and the beauty of their picturesque design. Among them are vessels made by Corinthian masters, painted in the so-called orientalizing, i.e., “oriental” style (it is distinguished by the colorfulness and fantastic whimsicality of the pictorial decor, reminiscent of drawings on oriental carpets), and later vases of the black-figure style, mainly Athenian and Peloponnesian production. The products of Greek ceramicists and bronze casters testify to high professionalism and a far advanced division of labor not only between industries, but also within individual branches of handicraft production. The bulk of ceramics exported from Greece to foreign markets was produced in special workshops by qualified potters and vase painters. Specialist craftsmen were no longer, as they once were, powerless loners who stood outside the community and its laws and often did not even have permanent place residence. Now they form a very numerous and quite influential social stratum. This is indicated not only by the quantitative and qualitative growth of handicraft products, but also by the emergence in the most economically developed policies of special craft districts, where artisans of one specific profession settled. So, in Corinth, starting from the 7th century. BC e. there was a quarter of potters - Keramik. In Athens, a similar quarter, which occupied a significant part of the old city, arose in the 6th century. BC e. All these facts indicate that during the archaic period in Greece a historical shift of enormous importance occurred: crafts were finally separated from agriculture as a special, completely independent branch of commodity production. Agriculture is also being restructured accordingly, which can now focus not only on the internal needs of the family community, but also on market demand. Communication with the market becomes of paramount importance. Many Greek peasants in those days had boats or even entire ships, on which they delivered the products of their farms to the markets of nearby cities (overland roads in mountainous Greece were extremely inconvenient and unsafe due to robbers). In a number of areas of Greece, peasants are switching from growing cereal crops that did not work well here to more profitable perennial crops - grapes and oilseeds: excellent Greek wines and olive oil were in great demand in foreign markets in the colonies. In the end, many Greek states abandoned the production of their own bread altogether and began to live off cheaper imported grain.

So, the main result of the Great Colonization was the transition of Greek society from the stage of a primitive natural economy to a higher stage of a commodity-money economy, which required a universal equivalent of commodity transactions. IN greek cities Asia Minor, and then the most significant policies of European Greece, appeared their own monetary standards, imitating the Lydian. Even before this, in many areas of Greece, small metal (sometimes copper, sometimes iron) bars called obols (lit., “spokes,” “skewers”) were used as the main unit of exchange. Six obols made up a drachma (lit., “handful”), since that many of them could be grabbed with one hand. Now these ancient names were transferred to new monetary units, which also became known as obols and drachmas. Already in the 7th century. In Greece, two main monetary standards were in use - Aeginian and Euboean. In addition to the island of Euboea, the Euboean standard was also adopted in Corinth, Athens (from the beginning of the 6th century) and in many Western Greek colonies; in other places the Aeginetan standard was used. Both systems of monetary coinage were based on a weight unit called talent (Tal ant as a weight unit was borrowed from Western Asia; the Babylonian talent (biltu, about 30 kg) of 60 mina, or 360 shekels, and the Phoenician talent (kikkar) were common here , about 26 kg, which is equal to the Euboean talent) from 60 mina, or 360 shekels. The Aegypian talent weighed 37 kg - Ed.), which in both cases was divided into 6000 drachmas (drachmas were usually minted from silver, obol - from copper or bronze). “Money makes a man” - this saying, attributed to a certain Spartan Aristodemus, has become a kind of motto of the new era. Money many times accelerated the process of property stratification of the community, which began even before its appearance, and brought even closer the complete and final triumph of private property.

Purchase and sale transactions now apply to all types of material assets. Not only movable property: livestock, clothing, utensils, etc., but also lands, which until now were considered the property not of individuals, but of the clan or the entire community, freely pass from hand to hand: sold, mortgaged, transferred by will or as a dowry. The already mentioned Hesiod advises his reader to achieve the favor of the gods with regular sacrifices, “so that,” he ends his instructions, “you buy the plots of others, and not yours, others.”

Money itself is bought and sold. A rich person could lend them to a poor person at an interest rate that, according to our standards, was very high (18% per annum in those days was not considered too high a norm) (As we saw above, in ancient Western Asia of the previous period the percentage was much higher. A decrease in interest rate is an indicator increasing the marketability of farms and, consequently, some reducing their dependence on usurious credit, the dominance of which in Greece turned out to be short-lived - Ed.). Along with usury came debt slavery. Self-mortgage transactions are becoming commonplace. Unable to pay his creditor on time, the debtor pledges his children, his wife, and then himself. If the debt and the accumulated interest on it were not paid even after that, the debtor with his entire family and the rest of his property fell into bondage to the usurer and turned into a slave, whose position was no different from the position of slaves taken captive or bought on the market. Debt slavery contained a terrible danger for the young and not yet strong Greek states. It was draining internal forces polis community, undermined its combat effectiveness in the fight against external enemies. Many states adopted special laws that prohibited or limited the enslavement of citizens. An example is the famous Solonian seisakhteia (“shaking off the burden”) in Athens (see about it below). However, purely legislative measures would hardly have been able to eradicate this terrible social evil if a replacement for fellow slaves had not been found in the person of foreign slaves. The widespread spread of this new and, for that time, certainly more progressive form of slavery was directly related to colonization. At that time the Greeks had not yet led big wars with neighboring peoples. The bulk of slaves came to Greek markets from the colonies, where they could be purchased in large quantities and at affordable prices from local kings. Slaves constituted one of the main articles of Scythian and Thracian export to Greece; they were exported en masse from Asia Minor, Italy, Sicily and other areas of the colonial periphery.

The abundance of cheap labor in the markets of Greek cities made possible for the first time the widespread use of slave labor in all major branches of production. Purchased slaves now appear not only in the houses of the nobility, but also in the farms of wealthy peasants.

Slaves could be seen in craft workshops and merchant shops, in markets, in the port, in the construction of fortifications and temples, and in mining. Everywhere they performed the most difficult and humiliating work, which did not require special training. Thanks to this, their owners - citizens of the polis - created an excess of free time, which they could devote to politics, sports, art, philosophy, etc. This is how the foundations of a new slave society were laid in Greece and at the same time a new polis civilization, sharply different from the previous one her palace civilization of the Cretan-Mycenaean era. The first and most important sign indicating the transition of Greek society from barbarism to civilization was the formation of cities. It was during the archaic era that the city first truly separated from the village and politically, as well as economically, subjugated it. This event was associated with the separation of crafts from agriculture and the development of trade relations (However, the Greeks themselves saw the main feature of the city not with trade and craft activities, but in the political independence of the settlement, its independence from other communities. In their understanding, cities (policies ) could also be considered unfortified villages that had independence for reasons of a military-political nature.).

Almost all Greek cities, with the exception of the colonies, grew out of fortified settlements of the Homeric era - poleis, retaining this ancient name. There was, however, one very significant difference between the Homeric polis and the archaic polis that replaced it. Homer's polis was at the same time both a city and a village, since no other settlements competing with it existed in the territory under his control. The archaic polis, on the contrary, was the capital of a dwarf state, which, in addition to itself, also included villages (comas in Greek), located on the outskirts of the territory of the polis and politically dependent on it.

It should also be taken into account that in comparison with Homeric times, the Greek city-states of the Archaic period became larger. This consolidation occurred both due to natural population growth and due to the artificial merger of several village-type settlements into one new town. To this measure, called synoicism in Greek, i.e. “joint settlement” was resorted to by many communities in order to strengthen their defenses in the face of hostile neighbors. But there were no large cities in the modern sense of the word in Greece. Polis with a population of several thousand people were an exception: in most cities the number of inhabitants apparently did not exceed a thousand people. An example of an archaic polis is ancient Smyrna, excavated by archaeologists; part of it was located on a peninsula that closed the entrance to a deep bay - a convenient ship anchorage. The city center was surrounded by a defensive wall made of bricks on a stone dock. There were several gates with towers and observation platforms in the wall. The city had a regular layout: rows of houses ran strictly parallel to each other. There were several temples in the city. The houses were quite roomy and comfortable; some of them even had terracotta baths.

The main vital center of the early Greek city was the so-called agora, which served as a place for public meetings of citizens and at the same time was used as a market square. The free Greek spent most of his time here. Here he sold and bought, and here, in the community of other citizens of the policy, he was involved in politics - he decided on state affairs; here, in the agora, he could find out all the important city news. Originally the agora was simply open area devoid of any buildings. Later, they began to install wooden or stone seats, rising above each other in steps. People sat on these benches during meetings. At an even later time (already at the end of the archaic period), special canopies - porticos - were erected on the sides of the square, protecting people from the rays of the sun. The porticoes turned into a favorite refuge of petty traders, philosophers and all sorts of loitering public. Right on the agora or not far from it, the government buildings of the policy were located: bouleuterium - the building of the city council (bule), prytaneum - a place for meetings of the ruling board of prytans, dicastery - a court building, etc. On the agora, new laws and orders were exhibited for public viewing government.

Among the buildings of the archaic city, the temples of the main Olympian gods and famous heroes stood out noticeably for their size and splendor of decoration. Individual parts of external walls Greek temple were painted in bright colors and richly decorated with sculpture (also painted). The temple was considered the home of the deity, and he was present in it in the form of his image.

Initially it was just a rough wooden idol that bore a very distant resemblance to a human figure.

However, by the end of the archaic era, the Greeks had already improved so much in plastic art that the statues of gods carved from marble or cast in bronze could easily pass for living people (the Greeks imagined their gods as humanoid creatures endowed with the gift of immortality and superhuman power). On holidays, the god, dressed in his best clothes (for such occasions, each temple had a special wardrobe), crowned with a golden wreath, graciously accepted gifts and sacrifices from the citizens of the polis, who came to the temple in a solemn procession. Before approaching the shrine, the procession passed through the city to the sound of flutes, garlands of fresh flowers and lighted torches, accompanied by an armed escort. Celebrations in honor of the deity of this polis were celebrated with special splendor.

Each policy had its own special patron or patroness. So, in Athens it was Pallas Athena. in Argos - Hera, in Corinth - Aphrodite, in Delphi - Apollo. The temple of the “city ruler” god was usually located in the city citadel, which the Greeks called the acropolis, that is, the “upper city.” The state porridge of the policy was kept here. Fines levied for various crimes and all other types of state income were received here). In Athens already in the 6th century. The top of the impregnable rock of the acropolis was crowned with a monumental temple of Athena, the main goddess of the city.

It is known how much of a place athletic competitions occupied in the life of the ancient Greeks. Since ancient times, special areas for youth exercise were set up in Greek cities - they were called gymnasiums. and palaestrums. Young men and teenagers spent entire days there, regardless of the time of year, diligently practicing god, wrestling, fist fights, jumping, throwing javelin and discus. Not a single major holiday was complete without a mass athletic competition - an agon, in which all free-born citizens of the polis, as well as specially invited foreigners, could take part.

Some agons, which were especially popular, turned into intercity pan-Greek festivals. These are the famous Olympic Games, which attracted athletes and “fans” from all over the Greek world, including even the most distant colonies, every four years. The participating states prepared for them no less seriously than for the upcoming military campaign. Victory or defeat at Olympia was a matter of prestige for each polis. Grateful fellow citizens showered the Olympic winner with truly royal honors (sometimes they even dismantled the city wall to clear the way for the triumphal chariot of the winner: it was believed that a person of such rank could not pass through an ordinary gate).

These are the basic elements that made up the daily life of a citizen of the Greek polis in the archaic era, as well as in later times: commercial transactions in the agora, debates in the people's assembly, participation in the most important religious ceremonies, athletic exercises and competitions.

And since all these types of spiritual and physical activities could only be done in the city, the Greeks did not imagine normal human life outside the city walls. Only this way of life they considered worthy of a free man - a true Hellene, and in this in a special way In life, they saw their main thing differently from all the surrounding “barbarian” peoples.

Generated by the powerful surge of economic activity that accompanied the Great Colonization, the early Greek city in turn became an important factor in further economic and social progress. The urban way of life, with its characteristic intensive exchange of goods and other types of economic activity, in which masses of people of various origins took part, from the very beginning came into conflict with the then structure of Greek society, based on two main principles: the principle of class hierarchy, separating all people on the “best” or “noble” and the “worst” or “low-born”, and the principle of strict isolation of individual clan unions both from each other and from the entire outside world. In the cities, which had already begun earlier, in connection with the resettlement to the colonies, the process of breaking down inter-clan barriers proceeded at a particularly rapid pace. People who belonged to different clans, phyla and phratries now not only live side by side, in the same quarters, but also enter into business and simply friendly contacts, and enter into marriage alliances. Gradually, the line separating the ancient family nobility from wealthy merchants and landowners who came from the common people begins to blur. These two layers are merging into a single ruling class of slave owners. The main role in this process was played by money - the most accessible and most mobile type of property. This was well understood by contemporaries of the events described. “Money is held in high esteem by everyone. Wealth mixed the breeds,” exclaims the Megarian poet of the 6th century. Theognis.

The growth of cities is associated with progress in the field of internal and international law. Need for further development commodity-money relations, uniting the entire population of the polis into a single civil collective was difficult to reconcile with the traditional principles of tribal law and morality, according to which every stranger - coming from another clan or phratry - was perceived as a potential enemy, subject to destruction or transformation into a slave. In the archaic era, these views gradually begin to give way to broader and more humane views, according to which there is a kind of divine justice that applies equally to all people, regardless of their clan or tribal affiliation. We encounter such an idea already in the “Works and Days” of Hesiod, the Boeotian poet of the 8th century. BC e., although it is completely alien to his closest predecessor, Homer. The gods, in Hesiod's understanding, closely monitor the right and wrong deeds of people. For this purpose, “three myriads of immortal guards were sent to earth... spies of the right and evil of human affairs, they roam the world everywhere, clothed in a foggy darkness” (Hereinafter, translations by V.V. Veresaev.).

The main guardian of the law is the daughter of Zeus - the goddess Dike (“Justice”). The real progress of social legal consciousness is evidenced by the most ancient collections of laws attributed to famous legislators: Dracon, Zalevko, Charond, etc. Judging by the surviving passages, these codes were still very imperfect and contained many archaic legal norms and customs: basically the laws of Draco and their kind were a record of pre-existing customary law. Many of these laws have their roots in the depths of the primitive era, such as the exotic custom of bringing to justice the "murderers" of animals and inanimate objects, which we encounter in one of the fragments that have come down to us from the laws of Draco. At the same time, the very fact of recording the law cannot but be assessed as a positive shift, since it testifies to the desire to put a limit to the arbitrariness of influential families and clans and to achieve the subordination of the clan to the judicial authority of the polis. The recording of laws and the introduction of correct legal proceedings contributed to the eradication of such ancient customs as blood feud or bribes for murder. Now murder is no longer considered a private matter between two families: the family of the killer and the family of his victim. The entire community, represented by its judicial authorities, participates in resolving the dispute.

Advanced standards of morality and law apply in this era not only to compatriots, but also to foreigners, citizens of other policies. The corpse of a killed enemy was no longer subjected to abuse (cf., for example, the Iliad, where Achilles violated the body of the deceased Hector), but was given to relatives to be buried. Free Hellenes captured in war, as a rule, are not killed or turned into slaves, but are returned to their homeland for a ransom. Measures are being taken to eradicate maritime piracy and robbery on land. Individual policies enter into agreements with each other, guaranteeing the personal safety and inviolability of citizens’ property if they find themselves on foreign territory. These steps towards rapprochement were caused by a real need for closer economic and cultural contacts. To a certain extent, this led to the overcoming of the former isolation of individual policies and the gradual development of pan-Greek, or, as they said then, panhellenic, patriotism. However, things did not go beyond these first attempts. The Greeks still did not become a single people.

It was cities that in the archaic period were the main centers of achievements of advanced culture. A new writing system, the alphabet, became widespread here.

It was much more convenient than the syllabary of the Mycenaean era: it consisted of only 24 characters, each of which had a firmly established phonetic meaning. If in Mycenaean society literacy was available only to a few initiates who were part of a closed group of professional scribes, now it becomes the common property of all citizens of the polis (everyone could master basic writing and reading skills in primary school). New system For the first time, writing became a truly universal means of transmitting information, which could be used with equal success in business correspondence and for recording lyrical poetry or philosophical aphorisms. All this led to a rapid increase in literacy among the population of Greek city-states and, undoubtedly, contributed to the further progress of culture in all its main areas.

However, all this progress, as usually happens in history, also had its dark side. The rapid development of commodity-money relations, which brought to life the first cities with their advanced, life-affirming culture, had a negative impact on the position of the Greek peasantry. The agrarian crisis, which was the main cause of the Great Colonization, not only did not subside, but, on the contrary, began to rage even more greater strength. Almost everywhere in Greece we observe the same bleak picture: the peasants are going bankrupt en masse, losing their “father's allotments” and joining the ranks of farm laborers - fetes. Characterizing the situation in Athens at the turn of the 7th-6th centuries. BC e., before Solon’s reforms, Aristotle wrote: “We must keep in mind that in general the political system was oligarchic, but the main thing was that the poor were enslaved not only themselves, but also their children and wives. They were called pelates and shestidolniks, because on such lease terms they cultivated the fields of the rich (It’s not clear what Aristotle wanted to say with this phrase. Hexadolniks could give the landowner either 5/6 or 1/6 of the harvest. The latter seems more likely, since With the existing agricultural technology, it is unlikely that a peasant could feed his family with one sixth of the harvest from a plot of such size that he could cultivate together with his wife and children.). All the land was in the hands of a few. Moreover, if these poor people did not pay rent, they and their children could be taken into bondage. And everyone’s loans were secured by personal bondage until the time of Solon.” To one degree or another, this characteristic applies to all other regions of what was then Greece.

The radical disruption of the usual way of life had a very painful effect on the consciousness of the people of the archaic era. In Hesiod's poem "Works and Days" the entire history of mankind is presented as a continuous decline and movement back from better to worse. On earth, according to the poet, four human generations have already changed: the golden, silver, copper and generation of heroes. Each of them lived worse than the previous one, but the most difficult lot went to the fifth, iron generation of people, to which Hesiod himself counts himself. “If only I could avoid living with the generation of the fifth century! - the poet exclaims sadly. “I would like to die before him or be born later.”

The consciousness of his helplessness in the face of the “gift-eating kings” (“Kings” (basilei) in the Lord, as in Homer, are representatives of the local clan nobility standing at the head of the community.), apparently, especially oppressed the poet-peasants and on the. This is reflected in Hesiod’s poem “The Fable of the Nightingale and the Hawk”:

Now I will tell the kings a fable about how foolish they are. This is what a hawk once said to a quiet nightingale. The claws sank into him and carried him in the high clouds. The nightingale squealed pitifully, pierced by its crooked claws. The same one imperiously addressed him with the following speech: “Why are you, unfortunate one, squealing? After all, I am much stronger than you! No matter how you sing, I will take you wherever I want, And I can dine on you and set you free. He who wants to compare himself with the strongest has no reason; No matter if he defeats him, he will only add grief to his misfortune!” That's what the swift hawk said, the long-winged bird.

At the time when Hesiod created his Works and Days, the power of the clan nobility in most Greek city-states remained unshakable.

After some hundred years, the picture changes radically.

We learn about this from the poems of another poet, a native of Megara, Theognis. Theognis, although by birth he belonged to the highest nobility, feels very insecure in this changing world before his eyes and, like Hesiod, is inclined to be very pessimistic about his era. He is tormented by the awareness of the irreversibility of the social changes taking place around him:

Our city is still a city, O Kirn, but the people are different,

Who hitherto knew neither the laws nor justice, Who dressed his body with worn-out goat fur

And behind the city wall he grazed like a wild deer.

From now on he became noble.

And the people who were noble

They became low. Well, who could endure all this?

Theognis's poems show that the process of property stratification of the community affected not only the peasantry, but also the nobility. Many aristocrats, overwhelmed by the thirst for profit, invested their fortunes in various commercial enterprises and speculations, but, lacking sufficient practical insight, went bankrupt, giving way to more tenacious and resourceful people from the lower classes, who, thanks to their wealth, are now rising to the very top of the social ladder. These “upstarts” evoke wild anger and hatred in the soul of the aristocratic poet. In his dreams, he sees the people returned to their former, semi-slave state:

Step on the chest of the vain-minded rabble with a firm foot, Beat it with a copper butt, bend its neck under the yoke!.. There is no people under the all-seeing sun, there is no people in the wide world, To voluntarily endure the strong reins of the masters... (Translation by L. Piotrovsky.)

Reality, however, shatters these illusions of the herald of aristocratic reaction. Going back is no longer possible, and the poet is aware of this.

Theognis's poems captured the height of the class struggle, the moment when mutual enmity and hatred of the fighting parties reached their highest point. A powerful democratic movement at this time swept the cities of the Northern Peloponnese, including the hometown of Theognis Megara, also Attica, the island cities of the Aegean Sea, the Ionian cities of Asia Minor and even the remote western colonies of Italy and Sicily.

Everywhere, democrats put forward the same slogans: “Redistribution of land and cancellation of debts”, “Equality of all citizens of the polis before the law”) (isonomia), “Transfer of power to the people” (democracy). This democratic movement was heterogeneous in its social composition. Rich merchants from the common people, wealthy peasants, artisans, and the dispossessed masses of the rural and urban poor took part in it. If the former sought, first of all, political equality with the ancient nobility, the latter were much more attracted to the idea of ​​universal property equality, which in those conditions meant a return back to the traditions of the communal clan system, to regular redistribution of land. In many places, desperate peasants tried to put Hesiod's patriarchal utopia into practice and bring humanity back to a "golden age." Inspired by this idea, they seized the property of the rich and nobles and divided it among themselves, throwing off the hated mortgage pillars from their fields (These pillars were erected by the creditor on the debtor’s field as a sign that the field was a guarantee of payment of the debt and could be taken away in case of non-payment. ), burned the debt books of moneylenders. In defending their property, the rich increasingly resort to terror and violence, and thus the class enmity that has accumulated over centuries develops into a real civil war. Uprisings and coups d'etat, accompanied by brutal murders, mass expulsions and confiscations of the property of the vanquished, became commonplace at this time in the life of the Greek city-states. Theognis, in one of his elegies, addresses the reader with a warning:

Let our city still rest in complete silence, - Believe me, she may not reign in the city for long. Where bad people begin to strive for this, so that they can benefit from the people's passions. For from here - uprisings, civil wars, murders, Also monarchs - protect us from them, fate!

The mention of monarchs in the last line is very symptomatic:

in many Greek states, a socio-political crisis that sometimes lasted for decades was resolved by the establishment of a regime of personal power.

Exhausted by endless internal unrest and strife, the city community could no longer resist the claims of influential persons to individual power, and the dictatorship of a “strong man” was established in the city, who ruled without regard for the law and traditional institutions: the council, the people’s assembly, etc. The Greeks called such usurpers tyrants (This word itself was borrowed by the Greeks from the Lydian language and initially did not have an abusive meaning.), contrasting them with the ancient kings - basilei, who ruled on the basis of hereditary law or popular election. Having seized power, the tyrant began reprisals against his political opponents. They were executed without trial or investigation. Entire families and even clans were sent into exile, and their property went into the treasury of the tyrant. In the later historical tradition, mostly hostile to tyranny, the word “tyranny” itself became synonymous in Greek with merciless, bloody tyranny. Most often, the victims of repression were people from ancient aristocratic families. The spearhead of the tyrants' terrorist policy was directed against the family nobility. Not content with the physical extermination of the most prominent representatives of this social group, the tyrants infringed on her interests in every possible way, forbidding aristocrats to do gymnastics, gather for joint meals and drinking bouts, and purchase slaves and luxury goods. The nobility, which was the most organized and at the same time the most influential and wealthy part of the community, posed the greatest danger to the sole power of the tyrant. From this side he constantly had to expect conspiracies, assassinations, and rebellions.

The relationship between the tyrant and the people was different. Many tyrants of the archaic era began their political careers as prostates, that is, leaders and defenders of the demos. The famous Pisistratus, who seized power over Athens in 562 BC. e., relied on the support of the poorest part of the Athenian peasantry, which lived mainly in the interior mountainous regions of Attica. The tyrant's "guard", provided to Peisistratus at his request by the Athenian people, consisted of a detachment of three hundred people armed with clubs - the usual weapon of the Greek peasantry at that time of troubles. With the help of these “club bearers,” Pisistratus captured the Athenian acropolis and thus became master of the situation in the city. While in power, the tyrant appeased the demos with gifts, free treats and entertainment during the holidays. Thus, Peisistratus introduced cheap agricultural credit in Athens, lending equipment, seeds, and livestock to needy peasants. He established two new national festivals; Great Panathenaea and City Dionysia and celebrated them with extraordinary pomp (The program of the City Dionysia included theatrical performances. According to legend, in 536 BC. uh, under Pisistratus, the first tragedy production in the history of Greek theater was carried out.). The desire to achieve popularity among the people also dictated the city improvement measures attributed to many tyrants: the construction of water pipelines and fountains, the construction of new magnificent temples, porticos on the agora, port buildings, etc. All this, however, does not yet give us the right to consider the tyrants themselves "fighters" for the people's cause. The main goal of the tyrants was to fully strengthen their rule over the polis and, in the future, to create a hereditary dynasty. The tyrant could carry out these plans only by breaking the resistance of the nobility. For this, he needed the support of the demos, or at least benevolent neutrality on its part. In their “love of the people,” tyrants usually did not go beyond minor handouts and demagogic promises to the crowd. None of the tyrants we know tried to put into practice the main slogans of the democratic movement: “Redistribution of land” and “Cancellation of debts.” None of them did anything to democratize the political system of the polis. On the contrary, constantly in need of money to pay salaries to mercenaries, for their construction enterprises and other needs, the tyrants imposed previously unknown taxes on their subjects. Thus, under Pisistratus, the Athenians annually contributed 1/10 of their income to the tyrant’s treasury. In general, tyranny not only did not contribute further development slave state, but, on the contrary, slowed it down.

The tactics used by the tyrants against the masses can be defined as “carrot and stick policies.”

While flirting with the demos and trying to win him over to their side as a possible ally in the fight against the nobility, the tyrants at the same time feared the people. To protect themselves from this side, they often resorted to disarming the citizens of the policy and at the same time surrounded themselves with hired bodyguards from among foreigners or freed slaves. Any gathering of people on a city street or square aroused suspicion in the tyrant; it seemed to him that the citizens were up to something, preparing a rebellion or an assassination attempt; The tyrant's home was usually located in the city citadel - on the acropolis. Only here, in his fortified nest, could he feel at least relatively safe.

Naturally, in such conditions there was and could not be a truly strong alliance between the tyrant and the demos. The only real support for the regime of personal power in the Greek city-states, in essence, was the hired guard of tyrants. Tyranny left a noticeable mark on the history of early Greece. The colorful figures of the first tyrants - Periander, Pisistratus, Polycrates and others - invariably attracted the attention of later Greek historians. Legends about their extraordinary power and wealth, about their superhuman luck, which aroused the envy of even the gods themselves, were passed down from generation to generation - such is the well-known legend about the ring of Polycrates, preserved by Herodotus (The legend says that who was visiting Polycrates, the tyrant of the island of Samos, The Egyptian king advised him to sacrifice the most precious thing he had, so that the gods would not envy his happiness. Polycrates threw his ring into the sea, but the next day the fisherman brought him a large fish as a gift, and the abandoned ring was found in its belly. The Egyptian king left Polycrates, considering him doomed, and soon he actually died.). In an effort to add more shine to their rule and perpetuate their name, many tyrants attracted outstanding musicians, poets, and artists to their courts. Such Greek city-states as Corinth, Sikyon, Athens, Samos, Miletus, under the rule of tyrants became rich, prosperous cities, decorated with new magnificent buildings. Some of the tyrants pursued quite successful foreign policies.

Periander, who ruled Corinth from 627 to 585 BC. e., managed to create a large colonial power, stretching from the islands of the Ionian Sea to the shores of the Adriatic. The famous tyrant of the island

Samos Polycrates in a short time brought under his rule most of the island states of the Aegean Sea. Peisistratus successfully fought for the mastery of an important sea route that connected Greece through the corridor of the straits and the Sea of ​​Marmara with the Black Sea region. Nevertheless, the contribution of tyrants to the socio-economic and cultural development of archaic Greece cannot be exaggerated. In this matter we can fully rely on the sober and impartial assessment of tyranny that was given by the greatest of the Greek historians, Thucydides. “All the tyrants who were in the Hellenic states,” he wrote, “directed their concerns exclusively to their interests, to the security of their personality and to the exaltation of their home. Therefore, when governing the state, they were primarily, as far as possible, concerned with taking measures for their own safety; They have not accomplished a single remarkable deed, except perhaps the wars of individual tyrants with border residents.” But having a strong social support among the masses, tyranny could not become a stable form of government in the Greek polis. Later Greek historians and philosophers, for example Herodotus, Plato, Aristotle, saw in tyranny an abnormal, unnatural state of the state, a kind of disease of the polis caused by political unrest and social upheaval, and were sure that this state could not last long.

Indeed, only a few of the Greek tyrants of the archaic period managed not only to retain the throne they had seized, but also to pass it on as an inheritance to their children (The longest reign was the Orphagorid dynasty in Sikyon (670-510 BC). On The Corinthian Cypselids (657-583 BC) are in second place, and the Peisistratids (560-510 BC) are in third place.

Tyranny only weakened the clan nobility, but could not completely break its power, and, probably, did not strive to do so. In many cities, after the overthrow of the tirapia, outbreaks of intense struggle were again observed. But in a whirlwind civil wars A new type of state is gradually emerging - the slave policy.

The formation of the polis was the result of the persistent transformative activity of many generations of Greek legislators. We know almost nothing about most of them. ( Antique tradition brought to us only a few names, among which the names of two outstanding Athenian reformers - Solon and Cleisthenes and the great Spartan legislator Lycurgus - occupy a particularly prominent place. As a rule, the most significant transformations were carried out in an acute situation political crisis. There are a number of cases where citizens of a particular state, driven to despair by endless strife and unrest and seeing no other way out of the situation, elected one of their midst as a mediator and conciliator.

One of these conciliators was Solon. Elected in 594 BC. e. to the post of first archon (Archons (literally, “in charge”) - a ruling board of officials, consisting of nine people. The first archon was considered the chairman of the board. The year was designated by his name in Athens.) with the rights of a legislator, he developed and implemented a broad program socio-economic and political transformations, the ultimate goal of which was to restore the unity of the city community, split by civil strife into warring political factions. The most important among Solon's reforms was a radical reform of the law of debt, which went down in history under the figurative name of “shaking off the burden” (seisakhteya). Solon actually threw off the hated burden of debt bondage from the shoulders of the Athenian people, declaring all debts and the interest accrued on them invalid and prohibiting self-mortgage transactions in the future. Seisachtheia saved the peasantry of Attica from enslavement and thereby made possible the further development of democracy in Athens. Subsequently, the legislator himself proudly wrote about this service of his to the Athenian people: What kind of person am I?

Mother Black Earth, the pillars erected, could have said it better than anyone else.

Slave before

(Translation by S.I. Radzig.)

didn’t complete those tasks, then he rallied the people,

before Time, the highest court of the Olympians - from which I then removed many debts,

now free. Having freed the Athenian demos from the debt that weighed on him, Solon, however, refused to fulfill his other demand - to redistribute the land. According to Solon himself, it was not his intention to “give the poor and the noble an equal share in the wealth of his relatives,” that is, to completely equalize the nobility and the common people in property and social terms. Solon only tried to stop the further growth of large landownership and thereby put a limit to the dominance of the nobility in the economy of Athens. Solon's law is known, which prohibited the acquisition of land above a certain norm. Obviously, these measures were successful, since later, throughout the 6th and 5th centuries. BC e., Attica remained predominantly a country of medium and small land ownership, in which even the largest slaveholding farms exceeded the area of ​​several tens of hectares.

Another important step towards the democratization of the Athenian state and strengthening of its internal unity was taken at the end of the 6th century. (between 509 and 507) Cleisthenes (Between Solon and

Cleisthenes was ruled in Athens by the tyrant Peisistratus, and then by his sons. Tyranny was abolished in 510 BC. e.). If Solop's reforms undermined the economic power of the nobility, then Cleisthenes, although he himself came from a noble family, went even further. The main support of the aristocratic regime in Athens, as well as in all other Greek states, were clan associations - the so-called phyles and phratries. Since ancient times, the entire Athenian demos was divided into four phylas, each of which included three phratries. At the head of each phratry was a noble family in charge of its religious affairs. Ordinary members of the phratry were obliged to submit to the religious and political authority of their "leaders", providing them with support in all their undertakings.

Occupying a dominant position in clan alliances, the aristocracy kept the entire mass of the demos under its control. It was against this political organization that Clisthep directed his main blow. He introduced a new, purely territorial system of administrative division, distributing all citizens into ten phylas and one hundred smaller units - demes. The phyla established by Cleisthenes had nothing to do with the old generic phyla.

Moreover, they were drawn up in such a way that persons belonging to the same clans and phratries would henceforth be politically separated, living in different territorial and administrative districts. Cleisthenes, as Aristotle put it, “mixed together the entire population of Attica,” regardless of its traditional political and religious ties. In this way, he managed to solve three important problems simultaneously: 1) the Athenian demos, and first of all the peasantry, which constituted a very significant and at the same time the most conservative part of it, was freed from the ancient clan traditions on which the political influence of the nobility was based; 2) the often arising feuds between individual clan unions, which threatened the internal unity of the Athenian state, were stopped; 3) those who had previously stood outside the phratries and philes and, as a result, did not enjoy civil rights, were attracted to participate in political life. Cleisthenes' reforms completed the first stage of the struggle for democracy in Athens. During this struggle, the Athenian demos achieved great success, grew politically and became stronger. The will of the demos, expressed through a general vote in the people's assembly (ekklesia), acquires the force of a law binding on all. All officials, not excluding the highest ones - archons and strategists (Strategos in Athens were the military leaders who commanded the army and navy. A board of ten strategists was established by Cleisthenes.), are elected and are obliged to report to the people in their actions, and in that case, if any offense is committed on their part, they may be subjected to severe punishment.

The council of five hundred (bule) created by Cleisthenes and the jury (helium) established by Solon worked hand in hand with the popular assembly. The Council of Five Hundred performed the functions of a kind of presidium at the national assembly, engaging in preliminary discussion and processing of all proposals and bills, which were then submitted for final approval to the ecclesia. Therefore, the decrees of the national assembly in Athens usually began with the formula: “The council and the people decided.” As for helia, it was the highest court in Athens, to which all citizens could file complaints about unfair decisions of officials. Both the council and the jury were chosen by lot among the ten phyla established by Cleisthenes. Thanks to this, ordinary citizens could also join them on an equal basis with representatives of the nobility. In this they were fundamentally different from the old aristocratic council and court - the Areopagus.

However, the complete triumph of democratic ideals was still far away. The system that emerged as a result of the reforms of Solon and Cleisthenes government controlled was assessed by the ancients as a moderate form of democracy. The stratum of the wealthy peasantry enjoyed the greatest importance in the political life of Athens, pushing into the background both the old landed nobility and the trade and craft layers of the urban population. Wealthy peasants - zevgits (3evgit - from the Greek zevgos - “yoke”, “team”. A team of two oxen was the main labor force in the farm of the peasant (perhaps this word comes from the place that the warrior hired in the ranks - Ed.) constituted the politically active core of the people's assembly. From them a heavily armed hoplite was formed (A hoplite is a foot warrior with full set heavy defensive weapons: ttopoash. armor, helmet and shield. Unlike the warriors of the Homeric era, hoplites fought in close formation, the so-called phalanx.) militia, which now becomes the decisive force on the battlefields, almost completely displacing the aristocratic cavalry from them. Peasants with little land, as well as the urban poor, did not yet take an active part in governing the state at that time, although formally both of them were considered Athenian citizens. It should be borne in mind that since the time of Solon, access to many of the government institutions was limited in Athens by a high property qualification. Thus, only a person who belonged to the category of Zevgits, that is, one who received at least two hundred measures of annual income from his land, could become a member of the council. The highest qualification was established for the position of archon - no less than five hundred measures of annual income. Representatives of the last, fourth category of fet (Fet - literally, “day laborers”, “farmers”. This category included citizens who received less than two hundred measures of annual income from land, as well as those who had no land at all) were admitted only to the people's assembly and to the jury. It took decades of persistent political struggle for the principle of civil equality to be consistently implemented in Athens.

Athenian democracy gives an idea of ​​only one of the possible ways of development of the early Greek polis. During the Archaic period, many very diverse types and forms of polis organization arose in Greece. One of the most unique variants of the polis system developed in Sparta, the largest of the Dorian states of the Peloponnese. Since ancient times, the socio-economic development of Spartan society has not taken the usual direction. The Dorians who founded Sparta came to Laconia as conquerors and enslavers of the local Achaean population. From about the middle of the 8th century. In Sparta, as in many other Greek states, acute land hunger began to be felt. The problem of excess population that arose in connection with this required an immediate solution, and the Spartans solved it in their own way: they found a way out by expanding their territory at the expense of their closest neighbors. The main target of Spartan aggression was Messenia, a rich and vast region in the southwestern part of the Peloponnese. The struggle for Messinia, which took place in the 8th-7th centuries. BC e., ultimately ended with the complete conquest and enslavement of its population. The seizure of fertile Messenian lands allowed the Spartan government to halt the impending agrarian crisis. In Sparta, a wide redistribution of land was carried out and a stable land tenure system was created, based on a strict correspondence between the number of plots and the number of full citizens. The entire land was divided into 9,000 plots of approximately equal profitability, which were distributed to the corresponding number of Spartiates (Spartiates are the usual name for full citizens of Sparta in the sources.). Subsequently, the government of Sparta carefully ensured that the size of individual plots remained unchanged all the time (they could not, for example, be divided when transferred by inheritance), and they themselves could not change hands through donations, wills, sales, etc. d. State slaves-helots from among the conquered inhabitants of Laconia and Messenia, attached to the land, were also divided. This was done in such a way that for each Spartan clere (land plot) there would be several carnal families, who with their labor provided the owner of the clere and his entire family with everything necessary.

As a result of this reform, the Spartan demos turned into a closed class of professional hoplite warriors, who exercised their dominance over the many thousands of helots by force of arms.

The forced labor of the helots relieved the Spartiates of the need to earn their own food and left them maximum free time to engage in government affairs and improve their art of war. The latter was all the more necessary because after the conquest of Messenia, an extremely tense situation was created in Sparta: the main commandment of the slave economy, later formulated by Aristotle, was violated here: to avoid the accumulation of large masses of slaves of the same ethnic origin. The helots, who made up the majority among the working population of Sparta, spoke the same language and dreamed only of throwing off the hated yoke of the Spartan conquerors (According to Herodotus, in the Spartan army that fought against the Persians at Plataea (479 BC). BC), for each full-fledged Spartiate there were seven helots.). It was possible to keep them in obedience only through systematic, merciless terror.

The constant threat of carnal rebellion required maximum unity and organization of the Spartiates. Therefore, simultaneously with the redistribution of land in Sparta, a whole series of reforms were carried out, which went down in history under the name of the “laws of /1icurgus” (no reliable evidence of the life and work of Lycurgus has survived. It was not possible to establish with sufficient accuracy the time of his reforms. Many modern historians believe his fictitious personality. It is most likely that the “Lycurgian system” took shape in its final form no earlier than the end of the 7th - beginning of the 6th century BC - Ed. note). These reforms in a short time changed the appearance of the Spartan state beyond recognition, turning it into a military camp, all the inhabitants of which were subject to barracks discipline. From the moment of birth to death, the Spartiate was under the constant supervision of special officials (they were called zfori, i.e. “overseers”), who were obliged to monitor the strict observance of the laws of Lycurgus by all citizens.

These laws provided for everything down to the smallest details, such as the cut of clothing and the shape of the beard and mustache that the citizens of Sparta were allowed to wear. The law strictly obliged each Spartiate to send his sons, as soon as they turned seven years old, to special camps - agels (lit., “herd”), where they were subjected to brutal drill, cultivating in the younger generation endurance, cunning, cruelty, the ability to command and obey and other qualities necessary for a “real Spartan”. Adult Spartiates compulsorily attended joint meals - sissitia, allocating a certain amount of food monthly for their organization. In the hands of the ruling elite of the Spartan state, sissitii and angels were a convenient means of controlling the behavior and sentiments of ordinary citizens. The state in Sparta actively intervened in the personal lives of citizens, regulating childbirth and marital relations.

In accordance with the principle of the “Lycurgian system,” all full-fledged citizens of Sparta were officially called “equals,” and these were not empty words. In Sparta, a whole system of measures was in effect for almost two centuries aimed at minimizing any opportunities for personal enrichment and thereby stopping the growth of property inequality among the Spartans. For this purpose, gold and silver coins were withdrawn from circulation. According to legend, Lycurgus replaced it with heavy and uncomfortable iron obols, which had long since fallen into disuse outside Laconia. Trade and craft were considered in Sparta to be occupations that dishonored a citizen. They could only be dealt with by the perieki, (literally, “living around”) - the disadvantaged population of small towns scattered throughout the territory of Laconia and Messenia at some distance from Sparta itself. Almost all paths to the accumulation of wealth were closed to the citizens of this extraordinary state. However, even if one of them managed to make a fortune, he still would not be able to use it under the watchful supervision of the Spartan morality police. All Spartiates, regardless of their origin and social status - no exceptions were made even for the “kings” who stood at the head of the state (Starting from ancient times, Sparta was ruled by two “kings” belonging to two different dynasties. The power of the “kings” was lifelong, in its opinion limited constant supervision by the ephors. The “kings” enjoyed full power only during war as the supreme commanders of the Spartan army.) - they lived in exactly the same conditions, like soldiers in a barracks, wore the same simple and rough clothes, ate the same food in common table in sissitia, they used the same household utensils. A strict ban was imposed on the production and consumption of the most insignificant luxury goods in Sparta. Periek artisans made only the simplest and most necessary utensils, tools and weapons to equip the Spartan army. The import of foreign products into Sparta was strictly prohibited by law. The Spartan government managed to unite the citizens in the face of the enslaved helots, who were constantly ready for indignation. Possessing a large reserve of internal strength, the “community of equals” was subsequently able to withstand such serious tests as, for example, the great uprising of the helots of 464 (the so-called III Messenian War) or the Peloponnesian War of 431 - 404. BC e. The persistent military training, which the Spartans indulged in throughout their lives with unremitting zeal, also bore fruit. The famous Spartan phalanx (heavily armed infantry kept in close formation) for a long time she had no equal on the battlefields and deservedly enjoyed the glory of invincibility. Sparta managed even before the beginning of the 5th century. BC e. establish its hegemony over most of the Peloponnese, and subsequently tried to extend it to the rest of Greece. However, the great power claims of Sparta were based only on its military force. Economically and culturally, it lagged far behind other Greek states. The establishment of the “Lycurgian system” sharply slowed down the development of the Spartan economy, returning it back almost to the stage of the subsistence economy of the Homeric era. In the atmosphere of a harsh military-police regime with its cult of equality brought to the point of absurdity, the bright and unique culture of archaic Sparta gradually withered away and then completely disappeared (Archaeological excavations on the territory of Sparta showed that in the 7th - first half of the 6th century there was one of the most significant centers of artistic craft throughout Greece.The products of footman artisans of this time are not inferior to the best products of Athenian, Corinthian and Euboean craftsmen.). After Tyrtaeus, who glorified the feats accomplished by Spartan warriors during the Messenian Wars, Sparta did not produce a single significant poet, not a single philosopher, orator, or scientist. Complete stagnation in socio-economic and political life and extreme spiritual impoverishment - this was the price the Spartans had to pay for their dominance over the helots. Closed in on itself, fenced off from the outside world with a blank wall of hostility and mistrust, Sparta is gradually becoming the main center of political reaction in Greece, the hope and support of all enemies of democracy.

So, we have become acquainted with the two extreme, most different forms of the early Greek polis. The first of these two forms, which emerged in Athens as a result of the reforms of Solon and Cleisthenes, provided citizens with harmonious personal development and turned out to be more capable of development and, therefore, historically more promising in comparison with the second - the barracks Spartan form of the polis. Athens did not know the complete political discrimination typical of Sparta against all people working manually. It was Athens that was destined to become in the future the main stronghold of Greek democracy and at the same time the largest cultural center of Greece, the “school of Hellas,” as Thucydides would later say.

Speaking about the significant differences in the social and state structure of Athens and Sparta, we should not lose sight of what they have in common, which allows us to consider them two varieties of the same type of state, namely the polis. Any policy is a self-governing, or, as the Greeks said, an autonomous community, most often not extending beyond one, usually small town and its immediate surroundings (hence the generally accepted translation of the term polis in modern scientific literature - “city-state”). States that exceed in size this norm, which is usual for a polis, are found in Greece only as an exception (examples include Athens and Sparta, on the territory of which, in addition to the main city that gave its name to its state, there were also other cities). The main feature of the polis organization, which distinguishes it from all other types of slave-owning state, is that here all members of a given community, and not just a select part of them, participate in the management of the state to some extent, although, of course, far from equally. , part of an extremely narrow circle of court nobility, as we most often see in the monarchies of the ancient East, the civil community (demos) practically merges here with the state (Of course, it should be borne in mind that the size and number of the polis communities themselves could fluctuate very widely within the limits depending on the criteria of civil rights that were used in various Greek states.If in Athens: during the heyday of democracy in the second half of the 5th century there were about 45 thousand full citizens, then in Sparta their number even in the years of its highest rise power did not exceed 9-10 thousand people. However, in Greece there were also policies in which the entire civil collective consisted of several hundred or even several dozen people.).

Even in the most conservative and politically backward Greek city-states like Sparta, all full-fledged citizens had access to the people's assembly, which was considered the bearer of the highest sovereign power in the state (This principle was already formulated in the oldest of all political documents that have come down to us - the so-called “Retro Lycurgus" (around the 8th century BC). Its final phrase read: "Let power and authority belong to the people."). Being an expression of the collective will of the citizens of the polis, the decisions of the people's assembly had the force of a generally binding law. This reveals the most important political principle underlying the polis organization - the principle of subordination of the minority to the majority, of the individual to the collective. We have already seen above, using the example of Sparta, what paradoxical forms this omnipotence of law sometimes took. And in other Greek states, the power of the collective, formalized as law, over the personality and property of an individual citizen often extended very far. In Athens, for example, any person, no matter how high a position in society he occupied, could be expelled from the state without any fault on his part only on the grounds that the majority of his fellow citizens wanted it (In such cases, a general vote was held, in in which clay shards served as ballots. Hence the name of this procedure - ostracism, literally, “cutting.” Each of the voting participants wrote on his shard the name of the person who, in his opinion, represented the greatest danger to the state at the moment. The one who collected such a bunch greatest number votes, was expelled from Athens for a period of ten years. The invention of ostracism was attributed to Cleisthenes in antiquity. Note that the institution of ostracism presupposes universal literacy of citizens.). Using its right of supreme control over the lives and behavior of individual citizens, the polis actively intervened in the economy, restraining the growth of private property and thus smoothing out property inequality within the civil community.

Examples of such interference include the Solopovian seisakhteia in Athens, already known to us, the land redistribution attributed to Lycurgus in Sparta and similar economic reforms in other policies (In many policies, state control over the private property of citizens was systematic. Its most typical manifestations can be considered various prohibitions and restrictions , imposed on the purchase and sale of land, the so-called liturgy - duties in favor of the state, performed by the most prosperous citizens; laws against luxury, etc.).

For its time, the polis can be considered the most perfect form of political organization of the ruling class. Its main advantage over other forms and types of slave-owning states, for example, over Eastern despotism, lies in the comparative breadth and stability of its social base and in the broad opportunities it provided for the development of private slave-owning economies. The polis community united both large and small owners, rich in land and slave owners and simply free peasants and artisans, guaranteeing each of them the inviolability of personality and property and at the same time a certain minimum of rights, and above all the ownership of land within the polis . The Greeks saw legal capacity as the main feature distinguishing a citizen from a non-citizen. At the same time, the polis was a military-political union of free owners, directed against all enslaved and exploited and pursuing two main goals: 1) to keep existing slaves in service; 2) organize military aggression against the countries of the “barbarian” world, thereby ensuring the replenishment of slave farms with the labor force they need.

§29 The Greek polis and its inhabitants