Greek society

One way of re-posing the question 'Was Greek civilisation based on slavery?' is to ask what Greek civilisation would have been like without it...
Looking forward, to the world of semi-realistic Utopia, no matter how hard they tried to view things otherwise, the Greeks could not quite envisage a slaveless future. The only alternative to slave labour that they could imagine was a world of automatic life, in which the necessities were constantly available without human labour, on tap as it were, and craft goods were produced or moved by automation (Arist. Politics, 1253b).
The inescapable inference is that the Greeks could conceive of no practical alternative for slavery. That is especially clear from the work of Aristotle… The proverb he quoted 'No leisure for slaves' (1334a) was at one level a statement of fact; more significantly, leisure (schole) was what distinguished the truly free man (eleutheros) and the truly 'liberal' lifestyle (eleutherios).
Moses Finley, as we have seen, did not give a direct, unequivocal answer to his own question ['Was Greek civilization based on slave labour?' (1959)]. The nearest he came to it, with consciously appropriate imagery, was this: 'If we could emancipate ourselves from the despotism of extraneous moral, intellectual and political pressures, we would conclude, without hesitation, that slavery was a basic element of Greek civilization.' If we could... Granted that we cannot, should we even try?
I would like to end by returning to my starting point, morality, and by quoting some wise words of Keith Bradley which I entirely endorse:
'The kinds of impact on slaves made by the traffic in human merchandise that I have posited are symptomatic of what in contemporary affairs we should now call violation of fundamental human rights. If the current sensitivity to that concept sharpens perception and understanding of the past, then that to my mind marks a true historical advance. It does not follow that what is admirable from the past is any the less admirable; it simply means, that the price of the admirable - an incalculable degree of human misery and suffering - is given its full historical due…'
To put the same point emblematically: 1959 was the year not only of Finley's epoch-making article but also of the death of Billie Holiday. Both, it seems to me, have a place within the study and understanding of ancient Greek slavery. They remind us, rather uncomfortably, just how deeply the whole western tradition of freedom is implicated, at its source and in the ever flowing current, with a history of unfreedom.

Paul Cartledge

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Αndocides in 400 BC was defending himself against accusations of being involved in the mutilation [of the herms, 415 BC] and of thus having turned informer to save his own skin. He had opposed the mutilation, which took place while he was incapacitated by injury. Only one herm in the city escaped mutilation, that near his house, which the conspirators had expected him to mutilate. Apparently, on his return to Athens from exile in 403, he had instituted proceedings for impiety against someone for mutilating a herm belonging to his own family. This ploy to clear his own name disgusted his prosecutor in 400, who argued that it showed contempt for the gods. Andocides' own speech and that of the prosecution concur in their condemnation of the impious nature of the crime.
The profanation of the Eleusinian Mysteries came to light immediately before the Sicilian expedition set off. It was alleged that Alcibiades and others had celebrated the Mysteries in at least five private houses in the presence of non-initiates… The prosecution of 400 stressed that the rite was performed by the wrong person and that in imitation of the rites sacred things were revealed to the uninitiated (Lysias 6.51). This celebration was even more shocking than the mutilation of the herms and challenged one of Athens' central religious rites. So sensitive was the matter that the assembly in 415 to which news of the profanation was brought was cleared of non-initiated before matters could proceed and Andocides' jury in 400 again consisted only of Eleusinian initiates…
Those implicated in the scandal, including Andocides, were the subject of an awesome curse by male and female priests. Andocides himself was excluded by a special decree of 415 from the Athenian Agora and the sanctuaries. He thus wandered the Greek world for thirteen years until his return in 402. At his trial in 400 Andocides denied that he had acted impiously or had turned informer, especially not of his own father. He also argued that the exile decree of 415 was no longer valid because of subsequent constitutional changes. He stressed his performance of religious functions for the state since his return in 402 and argued that his safe passage over the seas in the years of exile demonstrated that the gods did not seek his death. Conversely, the prosecution argued for the continuing validity of the exile decree, expressed horror at the impious nature of his advising the counsel on religious matters and the possibility of his being appointed magistrate in charge of the Mysteries, and claimed that he had been preserved from the sea specifically to stand trial in Athens. But the central event which had brought about the trial was Andocides' alleged participation in the Mysteries while still debarred. The prosecution argued for the absolute necessity pf punishing impiety: the gods were capable of punishing impiety themselves, but the jury should here act as agents of the gods. Andocides evaded the issue of his alleged participation in the Mysteries, obfuscated the events of 415 and appealed successfully for leniency. But he entirely agreed with the prosecution that those actually guilty of impiety deserved death (I.30)

Simon Price

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Paul Cartledge. Greek civilization and slavery. In: T.P Wiseman ed. Classics in Progress. Essays on Ancient Greece and Rome. Oxford UP, 2002-2006.

Simon Price. Religions of the Ancient Greeks. Cambridge UP, 1999-2005.