Patriotism in Ancient Greece

Abstract

The fourth was shared culture, through which the Greeks expressed a common identity, particularly in their manner of dress (they wore tunics, not trousers; cf. Evans & Abrahams 1964), their cuisine (they consumed wine and olive oil not beer and butter; cf. Wilkins & Hill 2006), their political systems (they were citizens not subjects; cf. Mitchell 2007) and their style of warfare (they fought with the spear not with the bow; cf. Hanson 2009). The Greeks then, clearly felt themselves to be a distinct and delimited group, and as their history reveals, their loyalty to this group was strong enough to form the basis for collective action against an outside power, such as Persia (cf. esp. Herodotus, The Histories, 1.1.0). However, while the Greeks formed one people, they lived in many different political communities, and their 'higher patriotism' was undercut by more local loyalties which focused firmly on the polis. 3. Lower Patriotism This quintessentially Greek socio-political system was found both in Greece proper and in the areas the Greeks colonised (for an inventory of which, see Hansen & Nielsen 2004). The term polis (pl. poleis) is often translated as city-state, but as Aristotle (Politics 1.1252b, 3.1276b; cf. Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War 1.10.2) reveals, the polis was neither a city nor a geographical location, it was, instead, a political community. This community was comprised solely of adult male citizens who exercised their political prerogatives within a wider and politically excluded population of women, children, slaves and resident foreigners (for further discussion, see Finley 1983). Of course, the precise nature of these communities varied but, as Murray (2012; cf. Runciman 1990) demonstrates, they had five things in common. Firstly, they were small. Athens, whose citizens numbered in their tens of thousands (Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War 2.13.6-7), was atypical: most Greek poleis were considerably smaller,