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Paul at Athens: A Topographical Note

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 February 2009

C. J. Hemer
Affiliation:
(Cambridge, England)

Abstract

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Type
Short Studies
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1974

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References

page 341 note 1 Barnes, T. D., ‘An Apostle on Trial’, J.T.S., N.S. xx (1969), 407–19.Google Scholar

page 341 note 2 Fraser, P. M., ‘Archaology in Greece, 1969–70’, J.H.S. xc (1970), Archaeological Reports, pp. 34.Google Scholar

page 341 note 3 Barnes, p. 407 n., cites Harnack, Norden, Meyer and Dibelius.

page 341 note 4 Thus with variations in many British and American works, often following Ramsay, W. M., St Paul the Traveller and the Roman Citizen, pp. 245 ff.Google Scholar So Lake, K. and Cadbury, H. J., The Beginnings of Christianity, IV (1933), 212–13;Google ScholarBruce, F. F., The Speeches in the Acts (1942), p. 16Google Scholar and The Acts of the Apostles2 (1952), p. 335;Google ScholarStonehouse, N. B., The Areopagus Address (1949), pp. 1314;Google ScholarMacgregor, G. H. C. in The Interpreter's Bible, IX (1954), 232–3;Google ScholarLampe, G. W. H. in Peake's Commentary on the Bible2 (1962), pp. 912–13.Google Scholar Some of the commentators, notably Lake and Cadbury, pp. 209–10, give a quite erroneous picture of the elements of Athenian topography. I am not concerned to pursue here the question whether the supposed hearing constituted a formal trial.

page 341 note 5 Nock, A. D. in a review article of Dibelius, Aufsätze zur Apostelgeschichte, in Gnomon xxv (1953), 506.Google ScholarOn the point generally we may note that the full and formal title of the court, as attested passim on the epigraphy of Roman Athens, was ή έξ Άρείου πάγου βουλή (cf. earlier Aristotle, Ath. Pol. 60. 2), but that the simpler (ό) Άρειος πάγος was freely used at all periods. Sometimes the shorter term denotes unambiguously a body of persons rather than a location (e.g. τόν έξ Άρείου πάγου ϕευγόντων, of those banished by the council, Ath. Pol. 47. 2). The phrase is often ambiguous, but the ambiguity may be unimportant where and if we may assume reference to the court meeting on the hill (cf. Barnes, pp. 409–10).

page 342 note 1 [Demosthenes] lix. 80–3; Supp. Eping. Grace. xii. 87 (discussed further below); Ath. Pol. 7. 3–4; 60. 2–3.

page 342 note 2 Aristides, , Panathenaicus, ed. Dindorf, I, 170–2;Google Scholar Pausanias i. 28. 5; cf. i. 28. 8; Lucian, , Bis Accusatus 4. 12.Google Scholar

page 342 note 3 [Demosthenes] xxv. 22–3.

page 342 note 4 The observation that the judgement of capital cases would now belong to the Roman proconsul is not necessarily relevant. This ancient court may well have been permitted to retain at least the outward forms and traditions of its older function. And if we press the statements of Pausanias and Lucian as decisive and normative for contemporary practice, it retained capital powers. But the whole topic raises complex and debated legal issues and the evidence needs careful reappraisal (see further Barnes, p. 412).

page 342 note 5 Especially Ath. Pol.. 57. 3, 4.

page 343 note 1 άναβῆναι είς Άρειον πάγον (Ath. Pol. 60. 3); ώς γάρ έγένετο τά ίερά τα⋯τα καί άνέβησαν είς Άρειον πάγον οί έννήα άρkhgrοντες ταīς καθηκούσαις ήμέραις…Demosthenes 59 (In Neaeram). 80; κατέβη έξ Άρείου πάγου Ibid. 83.

page 343 note 2 So undoubtedly είς 'Αρειον πάγον … άνελθεīν in [Demosthenes] 26 (In Aristogitonem II). 5.

page 343 note 3 Meritt, , Hesperia XXI (1952), 358,Google Scholar where he argued from the text that the meeting-place could not have been as remote from the Bouleuterion in the Agora as was Mars's Hill. In later withdrawing his original rendering (‘The Entrance to the Areopagus’, Hesperia XXII (1953), 129Google Scholar), he did not mention a change of view on this point.

page 343 note 4 Supp. Epig. Grace. xii. 87.

page 343 note 5 Lines 24–6; the assimilation of τήμ sic.

page 343 note 6 Meritt, B. D., ‘Greek Inscriptions’, Hesperia XXI (1952), 355–9,Google Scholar and ‘The Entrance to the Areopagus’, Hesperia XXII (1953), 129;Google ScholarThompson, H. A., ‘Excavations in the Athenian Agora 1952’, Hesperia XXII (1953), 51–2;Google ScholarWycherly, R. E., ‘Two Notes on Athenian Topography’, J.H.S. LXXV (1955), 117–21.Google Scholar

page 343 note 7 See Meritt, in Hesperia XXII (1953), 129.CrossRefGoogle Scholar The basic question is ‘whether είς τό βουλευτήριον depends on τῆς alone, or on είσιόντι, or, by a construction άπό κοινο⋯, on them both’. To take είς τό βσυλευτήριον with είσιόντι leaves τῆς unexplained and may appear to imply reference to two separate though related entrances. If however είσιόντι is taken alone, and είς τό βουλευτήριον made dependent on the preceding τῆ¯ς, there is allusion to only one entrance twice defined. είσιόντι may then seem superfluous and it is puzzling why the entrance should be thus doubly described. But these are matters of interpretation rather than translation and lie within the sphere of the following discussion.

page 343 note 8 Meritt, , Hesperia XXI (1952), 358.Google Scholar

page 344 note 1 Meritt, , Hesperia XXII (1953), 129.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

page 344 note 2 Thompson, , Hesperia XXII (1953), 52.Google Scholar He notes that this building was vacated by the Boule of Five Hundred in the late fifth century B.C., and conjectures that it would have been available until the late second century, when displaced by the Metroon.

page 344 note 3 Wycherly, , J.H.S. LXXV (1955), 117 ff.Google Scholar

page 344 note 4 Aesch, Eumenides 570, 684.Google Scholar

page 344 note 5 We shall not pursue the question of the lacation. Vanderpool, E., ‘The Apostle Paul in Athens’, Archaeology III (1950), 34–7,Google Scholar and others have argued for a site on the north slope of the hill.

page 344 note 6 Thompson, p. 52. This might offer the most natural explanation of the apparentiy otiose είσιόντι: it is emphasized that the decree should confront the councillors as they enter.

page 344 note 7 We cannot press the fact that the stone, found at the east side of the Agora, lay so much nearer a location in the same Agora than one either at the approaches to the hill of Areopagus or at the Pnyx, where the ekklesia met.

page 345 note 1 [Demosthenes] xxv. 22–3.

page 345 note 2 On the question of authenticity see further Barnes, pp. 408–9 and notes, with authorities there cited; J. H. Vince in the Loeb edition of Demosthenes, III, 515.

page 345 note 3 Dinarchus, , In Aristogitonem 13.Google Scholar

page 345 note 4 Pausanias, i. 3. 1; cf.Plato, , Euthyphro 2a;Google Scholar Eustathius, ad Hom. Od. i. 395.

page 345 note 5 Ath. Pol. 57. 3–4. For discussion of duties of the Basileus see SirSandys, J. E., Aristotle's Constitution of Athens (London, 1912), p. 229 n.Google Scholar

page 345 note 6 Euthyphro 2a, in the opening words of the traditional arrangement of the whole Platonic corpus.

page 345 note 7 Cf. for instance the charge of Meletus: ϕησί γάρ με ποιητήν είναι θεόν, καί ώς καινούς ποιο⋯ντα θεούς, τούς δ' άρχαίους ού νομίζοντα (Euthyphro 3b) with ξένων δαιμοίων δοκεī καταγγελεύς εīναι (Acts xvii. 8).

page 346 note 1 Barnes, p. 409. See further pp. 411 ff. for his discussion of the scanty but instructive evidence bearing on the powers and functions of the court in the Roman period.

page 346 note 2 Fraser, p. 4.

page 346 note 3 Thus e.g. σπερμολόγος (‘a word of characteristically Athenian slang’, Ramsay, W. M., St Paul the Traveller, p. 242)Google Scholar, used by Demosthenes of Aeschines (xviii (= De Corona). 127); cf. Acts xvii. 21 with Demosthenes, philippics i. 10 and the words of Cleon in Thuc. iii. 38. 5. The list might be extended to include several small and incidental points. This factor is recognized by Lake, and Cadbury, , Beginings, IV, 208,Google Scholar and more sensitively by Bruce, F. F., The Acts of the Apostles2, pp. 334 ff.Google Scholarpassim.

page 346 note 4 ‘Brilliant as is the picture of Athens, it makes on me the impression of being based on literature, which was easy to find, rather than on personal observation’ (Nock, p. 506). This view in fact seems to be open to severe criticism (cf. Barnes, p. 415). The arguments of Haenchen, E. in Journal for Theology and the Church I (1965), 86,Google Scholar and in Die Apostelgeschichte6 (Göttingen, 1968), p. 456,Google Scholar lean heaveily on Nock and assume his evaluation of a supposed confusion between two senses of ‘Areopagus’.

page 347 note 1 πρώτη δέ έστιν έν δεξιᾷ καλουμένη στοά βασίλειος, ένθα καθίζει βασιλεύς ένιαυσίαν άρχων άρχήν καλουμένην βασιλείαν (Paus. i. 3. 1).

page 347 note 2 He refers to the statues πλησίον … τῆς στοᾶς and continues στοά δέ ōπισθεν ώκοδóμηται γραϕάς έχουσα θεούς τούς δώδεκα καλουμένους (i. 3. 3).

page 347 note 3 The ancientevidence has been collected by R. E. Wycherly, The Athenian Agora, III, ‘Literary and Epigraphical Testimonia’, 22. Among these references we may note: (a) mention of a stoa beside the Basileios in Aristophanes, Eccles. 684–6 (of 391 B. C.). This has been variously taken to be the Poikile or Zeus Eleutherios. (b) Harpocration (ist or 2nd century A. D.) speaks of Eleutherios Zeus and Basileios as side by side, and of a third stoa, formerly called Anaktions, the later Poikile. (c). Suidas likewise, but giving the form Peisianakteios. (d) An enumeration of three stoai at Athens: Basileios, the Herms, and Peisianax (= Poikile), in Schol. ad Demosthenes xx (In Leptinem), 112. (e) Hesychius (?5th century) mentions two ‘Royal’ stoai, ή το⋯ λεγομένου βασιλέως Διòς καί το⋯ Έλευθερίου. (f) Eustathius (twelfth century) ad Hom. Od.. i. 395 refers to a stoa called Basileios near that of Zeus Eleutherios. The balance of evidence here, if we except the complicating factors in (d) and (e), points to the Basileios and Stoa of Zeus as being distinct, but adjacent, structures.

page 347 note 4 This known site would also fit the other stipulation in Pausanias (i. 14. 6), that the temple of Hephaestus (the so-called Theseum) was above the Stoa called Basileios.

page 347 note 5 The prevalent view has been that which identified the Stoa of Zeus and the Basileios as the same on the assumption that there was no room to fit in another building. See Thompson, H. A., ‘Buildings on the West Side of the Agora. Stoa of Zeus’, Hesperia VI (1937), 577.Google Scholar For the opposing opinion see Walter, O., ‘Zeus-und Königshalle der Athener Agora’, Johreshefte des österreichischen archäologischen Instituts xxx (19361937),Google Scholar Beiblatt cols. 95–100; Travlos, J., ‘The West Side of the Athenian Agora Restored’, Hesperia Suppl. 8 (1949), 382–93.CrossRefGoogle Scholar The issue is now settled by the new excavations in favour of the latter view. For a fuller bibliography of the earlier discussions of the Stoa Basileios see Martin, R., ‘La Stoa Basileios: portiques à ailes et lieux d'assemblée’, Bulletin de correspondance hellénique LXVI–LXVII (19421943), part 1, 274–98.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

page 348 note 1 Thus Wycherly in Greek and Byzantine Studies II (1959), 24–5,Google Scholar calls attention to Pausanias's omission of any mention of the vast Middle Stoa of the Agora.

page 348 note 2 On both points see further Vanderpool, E., ‘The Route of Pausanias in the Athenian Agora’, Hesperia XVIII (1949), p. 128–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

page 348 note 3 Fraser, pp. 3–4.

page 348 note 4 Fraser reports clear evidence that a bench lined the walls on three sides. There is in any case the option that a larger concourse may have assembled before the building rather than wholly within it. A limited space may contain a surprisingly numerous crowd. The writer has been present in a gathering of several hundreds on the small summit of the Areopagus hill. None of the suggested alternatives need, I think, be rejected on this ground.

page 348 note 5 ίο⋯σι δέ πρòς τήν στοάν, ήν Ποικίλην όνομάζουσιν άπò τόν, γραφόν, έστιν Έρμῆς χαλκο⋯ς Άγοραίος καί πύλη πλησίον (Paus. i. 15. 1).

page 348 note 6 The problem was discussed by Sir Frazer, J. G., Pausanias' Description of Greece (London, 1898–; reprinted New York, 1965) II, 132–3.Google Scholar He argued from a statement preserved in the lexicographer Harpocration on ‘Hermai’. This refers to a grouping of the figures so called between the Basileios and the Poikile. Frazer's suggestion that these Herma stretched in line across the Agora to the east side has long been excluded by progressive discoveries, notably that of the great Sota of Attalus, while the Herms are now known to have been numerous at the north-west corner. The discussions of Pausanias' methods by Wycherly and Vanderpool are apposite to the resolution of the difficulty, which is occasioned by his omissions and vague connections.

page 348 note 7 Fraser, P. M., ‘Archaeology in Greece, 1970–1971’, J.H.S. XCI (1971), Archaeological Reports, p. 3.Google Scholar

page 348 note 8 Diogenes Laertius vii. 1. 5.

page 349 note 1 So e.g. Cic. Acad. (Priora) ii. 24. 75; Hot, Sat. ii. 3. 44;Google ScholarPlutarch, , Absurd. Stoic. 6Google Scholar (= Mor. 1058D); Athenaeus, , Deipn. xiii. 563D.Google Scholar A lengthy list of literary allusions to Stoicism under its various designations is collected by Hobein, , Pauly–Wissowa–Kroll, , Realencyclopädie, II. Reihe, IV. i, cols. 40 ff.Google Scholar

page 349 note 2 Thus Lucian, , Dial. Meretr. 10. 1,Google ScholarIcaromen. 34, Iuppiter Trag. 16, Piscator 13; Athenaeus, , Deipn. iii. 104B.Google Scholar

page 349 note 3 Cf. the classic strory of the mutilation of the Hermae in Athens on the eve of the Sicilian expedition in 415 B. C. (Thuc. vi. 27).

page 349 note 4 The statement in Harpocration has thus been abundantly verified. Fraser notes the discovery of eighteen fragments of Herms in front of the new stoa, several being the inscribed bases, whose dedications show they were set up by King Archons. Two of these, both dedicated by ‘Kings’, stand in situ on the steps of the actual building.

page 349 note 5 Wycherly, R. E., ‘St Paul at Athens’, J.T.S., N.S. XIX (1968), 619–20.Google Scholar

page 349 note 6 The force of the κατα- compounds here is perhaps ‘thick with’, ‘luxuriant with’, particularly of vegetation. See Wycherly for other examples. This usage of κατά in composition is not noticed in LSJ.