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The Athenian Treaty with Samos, ML 56

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 October 2013

Andrew Phillip Bridges
Andrew Phillip Bridges
Affiliation:
Merton College, Oxford
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Extract

There have been several recent discussions concerning the text of the Athenian Treaty with Samos (IG i2 50+ 102, ML 56, IG i3 48) and the reconstruction of its fragments. The discussions have dealt largely with inadequacies of the restoration offered ‘exempli gratia’ by Wade-Gery in 1931, but too little attention has been paid to the stones and the evidence they offer the historian. Three of the four stones associated with the Treaty were edited in IG i2 50+102; the fourth was there mentioned but not identified until Wade-Gcry’s article. Wade-Gery’s transcription of the stones has become the foundation of all recent discussion and only Bradeen and McGregor have contributed observations on the stones themselves.

An examination of the fragments conducted in June 1978 and in April 1979 uncovered in Wade-Gery’s transcription an error which served as the basis for his reconstruction of a list of generals attributed to the year 439/8 B.C. The incorrect reading is the next-to-last letter of the word presumed to be Κεκροπίδ]ος in line 31 of the ML text. Wade-Gery presented in his article first a dotted omicron in that space and later an undotted one; in his commentary he stated ‘The first letter in line 2 [line 31 of fragment d in the ML text] is almost certainly 0’. He did not mention that this contradicted the readings of both editions of IG, nor did he state any grounds for deciding the letter to be omicron. Bradeen and McGregor placed the omicron in brackets, thus disagreeing over whether the letter had ever been readable on the stone, but they retained Wade-Gery’s restoration, presumably to declare their approval.

Type
Notes
Information
The Journal of Hellenic Studies , Volume 100 , 1980 , pp. 185 - 188
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1980

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References

1 Fornara, C. W.. ‘On the chronology of the Samian War’, JHS xcix (1979) 14–18Google Scholar; Henry, A. S., ‘Negative coordination in Attic decrees’, JHS xcvii (1977) 156Google Scholar; Wankel, H., ‘Zu Eidesformeln in athenischen Urkunden des 5. Jh.’, ZPE xv (1974) 250–4Google Scholar.

2 Wade-Gery, H. T., ‘Strategoi in the Samian War’, CPh xxvi (1931) 309–13Google Scholar.

3 IG i2 50: ‘d noti vidi’; cf. Wade-Gery (n. 2) 309.

4 Studies in fifth-century Attic epigraphy (Norman, Okla. 1974) 120–1.

5 My sincere thanks go to Mrs D. Peppa-Delmouzou and to Mrs Ch. Karapa-Molizani for their assistance and hospitality in the Epigraphical Museum in Athens, as well as to the capable technicians Panayiotis Diakoumis and Takis Diakoumis; I am grateful to Prof. E. Vanderpool. Prof. C. N. Edmonson, J. S. Traill, and J. McK. Camp for examining the stones with me and offering their opinions. They bear no responsibility for the views expressed in this paper.

6 Op. cit. (n. 2) 3 10.

7 IG i suppl. p. 125 no. 557 line 2; IG i250 fr. a line 2.

8 Letters once certainly read, such as the last three in line 33 of the ML text, but now disappeared through subsequent damage stay unbracketed; Bradeen and McGregor did not see fit to bracket them.

9 IG i suppl. loc. cit. (n. 7).

10 Henry (n. 1); Wankel (n. 1).

11 ML 56, p. 151.

12 Fornara (n. 1).

13 Ibid. 15.

14 Wade-Gery referred (311) to the ‘distinctive and identical’ appearance of workmanship on the backs of b–d which he considered, with the identity of letter-spacing, as conclusive evidence for the association of the stones (312 n. 1). Though he erred in thinking the backs original (a conclusion absolutely ruled out by Epigraphical Museum technicians; cf. ML p. 152), he correctly inferred from the markings on the backs that the stones belonged with each other.

15 ATL ii D18 p. 73, following Meritt, (and Thompson, ) in AFD 54Google Scholar, proposed a fourteen-line lacuna calculated on the measurement of a supposed taper in the fragments; since the backs are not original a conclusion based on taper is groundless.

16 Photographs of all four fragments are in ATL ii. n pl. xi; in AFD frag, a (numbering as in ML) is in fig. 8 while b, c, and d are in figs 9, 5, and 6 respectively.

17 Compare, for example, IG i2 1, 44, 108, 110, 186/7, 188.

18 Frag, c: στ]ρατεγọ[ί with names Περικλ]ε̑ς, Γλαύκον, and (?) Χ̣σ̣[ενοϕο̑ν (this in line 5); frag, b: Σο]κράτε[ς; frag. d: Τλεμπ̣[όλεμος. For refs see below.

19 Cf. n. 16 above.

20 Androtion, (FGrH 324Google Scholar F 38, Schol. Aristid. xliv, iii, p. 485) records among generals at Samos Perikies, Glaukon, and Xenophon; Thucydides (i 117.2) adds Tle(m)polemos.

21 Lemnos as site of Samian hostages: Thuc. i 115.3; the Peloponnesians voting on intervention in aid of Samos: Thuc. i 40.5.

22 Cited in n. 20 above.

23 ML, following Wade-Gery, restore at line 27 what is on the stone (and unrestored) in 25.

24 Lewis, , JHS lxxxi (1961) 118CrossRefGoogle Scholar, suggested Kallias as belonging to the list; his name could fit but there is no evidence linking him with the command against Samos nor any direct indication that he belonged to Pandionis.

25 JHS xcix (1979) 18–19.

26 The text of the decree is given in the IG i3 entry reproduced in the appendix cited in n. 25; its two pieces were originally published as IG i2 141/2 d and Hesp. xiv (1945) 94–7 no. 8 (SEC x 51).

27 JHS xcix (1979) 17 n. 53.

28 I should like to thank the Rotary Foundation, the Lancelyn Green Fund (Merton College), and the Charles Oldham Classical Scholarships Fund (University of Oxford) for financial assistance enabling me to study the inscriptions in Greece; I am grateful also to the American School of Classical Studies at Athens and to the British School at Athens for sponsoring my work in the Epigraphical Museum. I am indebted to C. W. Fornara for graciously providing me with a copy of his article before publication and to D. M. Lewis for discussion regarding issues raised by the stones.