Greece & Rome, Vol. 58, No. 2, The Classical Association, 2011.

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doi:10.1017/S0017383511000039

NATURALIZED CITIZENS AND SOCIAL MOBILITY IN ATHENS

NATURALIZED CITIZENS AND SOCIAL MOBILITY IN

CLASSICAL ATHENS: THE CASE OF APOLLODORUS*

Introduction

Around 340 bc, Theomnestus, son of Deinias, from the deme

Athmonon, prosecuted the alleged hetaira Neaira for living in
marriage with Stephanus, from the deme Eroeadae, breaching the law
that prohibited xenoi from feigning lawful marriage with Athenian
citizens ([Dem.] 59).1 Under this law (59.16), foreigners who married
an Athenian citizen were liable to enslavement and conscation of
property the penalty for conviction for illegal exercise of citizen
rights.2 Although Theomnestus is the formal prosecutor, most of the
case is presented by his kinsman and supporting speaker Apollodorus,
elder son of the well-known wealthy Athenian banker and former slave
Pasion. It might seem incongruous that he, the son of a newly made
citizen with foreign and servile origins, invoking the most sacred of
Athenian laws, appeals to the Athenians to guard the purity of their
citizen body.3 However, while Apollodorus undeniably had a hidden
agenda in bringing a prosecution against Neaira,4 it is not surprising

*
I would like to thank Dr. Paul Millett, Prof. Arjan Zuiderhoek, and an anonymous reviewer
for commenting on earlier versions of this article.
1
Although Neaira is called a xene throughout, she appears to have been a metic, with a
prostates ([Dem.] 59.37). See D. Whitehead, The Ideology of the Athenian Metic (Cambridge,
1977), 50, for discussion.
2
According to some older scholars, the law mentioned at [Dem.] 59.16 is preserved within
a record inserted perhaps at a later date by a Hellenistic editor, and is therefore spurious (see
the debate in E. Drerup, ber die bei den attischen Rednern eingelegten Urkunden, Jahrbcher
fr Classische Philologie suppl. 24 [1898], 221366). This opinion, however, has been disputed
by later scholars, and it is now commonly believed that the document is authentic. See K. A.
Kapparis, Apollodoros Against Neaira [D. 59]. Edited with Introduction, Translation and Commentary
(Berlin, 1999), 198206, for discussion.
3
C. Patterson, The Case Against Neaira and the Public Ideology of the Athenian Family,
in A. Boegehold and A. Scafuro (eds.), Athenian Identity and Civic Ideology (Baltimore, MD,
1994), 199.
4
Just as it is not Theomnestus but Apollodorus who is the de facto prosecutor in this case,
it is clear that the real target is not the aged Neaira but her companion, Stephanus. The enmity
between Apollodorus and Stephanus, apparently founded upon political differences, was of long
standing, reaching back to c.348 ([Dem.] 59.38). For the background political dimension of this
enmity, see G. H. Macurdy, Apollodorus and the Speech Against Neaera (Pseudo-Dem. LIX),
AJPh 63 (1942), 25771; C. Carey, Apollodoros. Against Neaira [Demosthenes] 59 (Warminster,
160 NATURALIZED CITIZENS AND SOCIAL MOBILITY IN ATHENS

that false claim to and debasement of citizen status should be a source

of resentment for new citizens such as he, who were anxious to protect
their hard-earned privilege.5
Compared to the Romans, the Athenians were remarkably
restrictive about citizenship,6 dening by law the membership of their
citizen body in terms of descent. Since the Periclean citizenship law
of 451/450, citizenship had depended not only on having a citizen
father but also on having a mother who was the child of Athenian
citizens. Moreover, being a citizen depended upon being over the
age of eighteen and on being publicly accepted as such by the deme
of origin. Apart from exceptional crises, this system remained fairly
stable throughout the fth and fourth centuries, despite the violent
ebbs and ows in Athenian political affairs. Nevertheless, it was at
times supplemented by naturalization,7 a means to enlarge the citizen
body during exceptional circumstances or to bestow an honour upon
worthy benefactors of the Athenians,8 such as Apollodorus father,
Pasion.
By acquiring full citizenship, newly made citizens, described in the
sources as , or

1992), 48; J. Trevett, Apollodoros, the Son of Pasion (Oxford, 1992), 14950; Kapparis (n. 2),
2931.
5
The Demosthenic speech Against Neaira ([Dem.] 59) has a high prole in recent scholarship
because of the information that it contains concerning Athenian law, religion, and society. For
a discussion of the social and ideological matters at issue in the speech, see especially Carey
(n. 4); Patterson (n. 3), 199216; Kapparis (n. 2); J. Miner, Courtesan, Concubine, Whore:
Apollodorus Deliberate Use of Terms for Prostitutes, AJPh 124 (2003), 1937; A. Glazebrook,
The Making of a Prostitute: Apollodoros Portrait of Neaira, Arethusa 38 (2005), 16187;
eadem, The Bad Girls of Athens: The Image and Function of Hetairai in Judicial Oratory, in
C. A. Faraone and L. K. Mcclure (eds.), Prostitutes and Courtesans in the Ancient World (Madison,
WI, 2006), 12538; D. Hamel, Trying Neaira: The True Story of a Courtesans Scandalous Life in
Ancient Greece (New Haven, CT, 2005); K. Gilhuly, Collapsing Order: Typologies of Women
in the Speech Against Neaira, in K. Gilhuly (ed.), The Feminine Matrix of Sex and Gender
in Classical Athens (Cambridge, 2009), 2957; D. MacDowell, Demosthenes the Orator (Oxford,
2009), 1216; S. Lape, Race and Citizen Identity in the Classical Athenian Democracy (Cambridge,
2010), 21639.
6
Cf. P. Gauthier, Generosit romaine et avarice grecque, in J. Trheux (ed.), Mlanges
d'histoire ancienne offerts William Seston (Paris, 1974), 20715; R. K. Sinclair, Democracy and
Participation in Athens (Cambridge, 1988), 247.
7
Osborne prefers not to speak in terms of naturalized citizens prior to Cleisthenes reforms,
which stipulated that naturalization could only be achieved by the passing of a decree in the
Assembly. His catalogue of naturalized citizens therefore begins with Alexander of Macedon, to
whom citizenship was granted in 479 (M. J. Osborne, Naturalization in Athens, 4 vols. [Brussel,
19813], iv.13942). Whereas in the fth century merely one favourable vote in the Assembly
was required for granting citizenship, the procedure was made more complex at the beginning of
the fourth century, by the adding of a statutory second vote on the proposed grant in the next
meeting of the Assembly. For the procedure for naturalization, see ibid., iv.15570.
8
See ibid., iv.14550 for the practice of granting citizenship and naturalization as an honour.
 NATURALIZED CITIZENS AND SOCIAL MOBILITY IN ATHENS 161

([Dem.] 45.78, 53.18; Arist. Pol. 1275a6; Plut. Vit. Sol. 24.4) and
commonly their descendants9 were permitted to share in nearly all
the privileges and sanctions in which the Athenians shared, both civil
and religious, except for the tenure of archonship and priesthoods
during the rst generation ([Dem.] 59.92).10 However, in order for
their social status to match their new and privileged legal status, their
social mobility had to be seen and recognized publicly, in order to
be meaningful. The aim of this article is to argue that the principal
problem that newly made citizens hereby encountered was caused
by the so-called blurring of identities in Athenian society, which
hampered a clear differentiation from the metic or foreign community
to which they had previously belonged.

Naturalization in Athens

Legislation

From the early stages of Athenian history, residents and xenoi were
being admitted into the Athenian citizen body. As early as the sixth
century, Solon had allegedly welcomed as citizens not only foreign
exiles and refugees but also people who had come to Athens with their
families to practice a trade (Plut. Vit. Sol. 24.4). According to pseudo-
Aristotle, Peisistratus even accepted new citizens of dubious origin
and/or diminished circumstance (Ath. Pol. 13.5).11 After the expulsion
of the tyrants, Cleisthenes apparently expanded the total number of
citizens, by enrolling in his tribes many resident aliens who had been
foreigners or slaves ( ) (Arist.
Pol. 1275b3637).

9
Although the reference to ekgonoi had occasionally been made in the decrees before the
380s, the explicit extension to the honorands descendants is regularly specied from c.385/384
onwards. See ibid., iv.1504, for discussion.
10
It is possible that this restriction was not yet in use in the 470s, since Menon of Pharsalus
(ibid., T1) appears to have held the epynonymous archonship of 473/472 after his naturalization.
Osborne suggests that the ban on the holdings of archonships and priesthoods, mentioned by
Apollodorus, goes back to the Periclean citizenship law of 451/450 (ibid., iv.1736).
11
For the impact of these new citizens on the total Athenian population, see P. Manville,
The Origins of Citizenship in Ancient Athens (Princeton, NJ, 1990), 17685. Sometime afterwards,
in 510/509, many of them were expelled in the rst of the numerous Athenian expulsion votes
(diapsephismoi) which took place in the course of the fth and fourth centuries. However, they
were in turn reinstated by Cleisthenes (Ath. Pol. 20.1): E. E. Cohen, The Athenian Nation
(Princeton, NJ, 2000), 634.
162 NATURALIZED CITIZENS AND SOCIAL MOBILITY IN ATHENS

Until the Periclean citizenship law of 451/450,12 no polis legislation

dened or controlled membership of the demes and phratries, as a
consequence of which no restrictions limited a demes acceptance of
new members, and hence the creations of new citizens.13 Osborne
supposes that the rst law dening the eligibility for naturalization
might have formed part of this Periclean citizenship law.14 However,
there is no evidence to support this presupposition. According to
Apollodorus, who quotes a possibly contemporary version of the law
dening the eligibility for naturalization in his vilication of Neaira
([Dem.] 59.89), this law essentially prohibited the Athenians from
granting citizenship to any man who did not deserve it because of
distinguished services (andragathia) to the Athenian people. Grants of
citizenship in return for andragathia are attested as early as the 470s,
such as in the case of Menon of Pharsalus, who received citizenship
because of his nancial and military aid to Athens.15 This suggests that
the law outlined by Apollodorus, might have been in force even before
451, or that it was merely a ratication of earlier common practice.16
In any case, whether this legislation had the restrictive effect that
was probably originally intended is doubtful. After all, not very long
after the implementation of the Periclean citizenship law, the Athenians
were again admitting various groups of new citizens.

Classification

In addition to the collective grants of citizenship,17 which mainly occur-

red during and immediately after the Peloponnesian War and thus were
12
For an account of Pericles citizenship law, see the Aristotelian Ath. Pol. 26.
13
C. Patterson, Pericles Citizenship Law of 451450 B.C. (New York, 1981), 3.
14
Osborne (n. 7), iv.1434.
15
Ibid., T1.
16
See Kapparis (n. 2), 362, for discussion.
17
Collective grants had, for instance, been awarded to the Plataeans some time before 429, to
those who would take part in the battle of Arginusae in 406/405, to the Samians in 405, and in
401/400 to the heroes of Phyle, for what in each of these instances was considered as exceptional
courage and exemplary loyalty to Athens interests. The same motivation presumably lay behind
the attested collective grants of citizenship in the fourth century, such as those to the Elaiousans
in 341/340, and to the Troezenians who were expelled from their city by a pro-Macedon ruler
c.335. For the grant of citizenship to the Plataeans, see M. Amit, Great and Small Poleis. A Study
in the Relations Between the Great Powers and the Small Cities in Ancient Greece (Brussels, 1973),
758; W. Gawantka, Isopolitie. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der zwischenstaatlichen Beziehungen in der
griechischen Antike (Munich, 1975), 1748; Osborne (n. 7), D1; K. A. Kapparis, The Athenian
Decree for the Naturalisation of the Plataeans, GRBS 36 (1995), 35978. For the grant of
citizenship to the Samians, see Gawantka (this note), 17897; Osborne (n. 7), D45; C. Koch,
Integration unter Vorbehalt: Der athenische Volksbeschluss ber die Samier von 405/4 v. Chr.,
Tyche 8 (1993), 6375. For a reconstruction of the decree granting citizenship to the heroes
 NATURALIZED CITIZENS AND SOCIAL MOBILITY IN ATHENS 163

presumably considered as being justied by unusual circumstances,18

numerous individual grants were presented to those considered
worthy of it. Many were presented as a political tactic by the Athenian
diplomats (cf. Thuc. 2.29.67 and Ar. Ach. 1457).19 As these men,
both high-level benefactors and somewhat less prominent individuals
who promoted Athenian interests in their own polis, normally lived
abroad and were likely to continue to do so, their citizenship would, as
recognized by Demosthenes (23.126), have been primarily honoric
and not intended to be implemented.20 Other honorands were men
who came to live in Athens at the moment that their friendship to the
Athenians caused them to be exiled from their own poleis.21
Most important for our topic are the men who obtained their
citizenship as outstanding renderers of military or political service
to the polis or as extraordinary nancial benefactors of the demos,
after what has been called by Osborne a competitive struggle.22
To these men, for the most part metics, xenoi, and even freedmen
who permanently lived in Athens, naturalization was both an honour
and a gift of practical importance and value. After all, many if not
most of them denitely strove with their services and benefactions

of Phyle, see Osborne (n. 7), ii.2643 (also D6). For the collective grants of citizenship to the
Elaiousans and the Troezenians, see ibid., iv.21011, D12, and T72.
18
The threatening deciency of manpower in those critical circumstances, and the fact that
the newly made citizens were expected to perform exceptional military benefactions in the very
near future, presumably justied this grant, despite the fact that it admitted people as citizens
who had not yet performed benefactions to Athens, (Osborne [n. 7], T10 and iv.145). The
collective grants are at times considered as having been merely honoric (ibid., iii.72). Davies
even argued that the Plataeans and the Samians merely acquired some kind of favoured metic
status (isoteleia) rather than full citizenship, and that a true integration was improbable (J. K.
Davies, Athenian Citizenship: The Descent Group and the Alternatives, CJ 73 (19778), 107;
idem, The Concept of The Citizen, in S. Cataldi (ed.), Polis e politeiai. Atti del Convegno
internazionale di storia greca, Torino, 2931 Maggio 2002 [Alexandria, 2004], 19). As observed by
Cohen (n. 11), 667, however, many of these newly made citizens functioned fully as such and
were fully recognized as citizens.
19
This was, for instance, the case with Sadokos, son of the king of Thrace, in 431; with
Evagoras I of Salamis around 407; with the Bosporian royal family from the late fth century
onwards; with Hipparchus and Archippus of Thasos around 388; and with Dionysius I, tyrant of
Syracuse, and his two sons in 369/368. See respectively Osborne (n. 7), T4, D3, T21, D9, and
D10, for discussion.
20
Some, however, did implement their citizenship, but only temporarily (as, for example,
Sadocus and Tharyps), or because they were compelled to utilize the grant because of a
misfortune (such as Arybbas of Molossia). See in Osborne (n. 7), T4, T6, and D14 respectively,
for discussion.
21
E.g. Astycrates of Delphi, leader of the pro-Phocaean grouping at Delphi who obtained
Athenian citizenship in 363/362 when he ed to Athens after the Thebans took over the sanctuary;
Peisitheides of Delos, who was after defending Athenian interests on the island forced to ee
to Athens; and Phormio and Carphinas of Acharnia, who fought with the Athenians at the battle
of Chaeronea. See respectively Osborne (n. 7), D11, D22, and D16.
22
Ibid., iv.195.
164 NATURALIZED CITIZENS AND SOCIAL MOBILITY IN ATHENS

to acquire Athenian citizenship, and thus certainly intended to utilize

this impending grant. There is an illustrative comment made by
Theomnestus in the Demosthenic speech Against Neaira. After accusing
Stephanus of illegitimately admitting someone to Athenian citizenship
by living with an alien woman contrary to the law, introducing her
children to his fellow-clansmen and demesmen, and giving in marriage
her daughter as though she were his own, Theomnestus exclaims
([Dem.] 59.13):

,
, ,

because who would still seek to receive this reward from the Athenian people, and to
undergo much expense and trouble so as to become a citizen, if it is possible to get
exactly the same reward from Stephanus at less expense?

The practice of striving for citizenship is further exemplied by the

case of Apollodorus father, Pasion. Possibly of Phoenician origin,
Pasion had been the slave of two Athenian bankers, Archestratus and
Antisthenes (Dem. 36.43). After having been manumitted (Dem.
36.48), he had taken over the running of the bank (Isoc. 17 passim),
which probably happened through an outright gift of goodwill and,
according to Apollodorus, because of his professional competence
and reputation for honesty and reliability (36.434).23 A bankers
xed costs were restricted (Dem. 45.33), interest rates were high, and
interest was probably paid on very few if any deposits. This meant that
banking, which included money-changing, was a risky but protable
business, offering scope for the relatively rapid accumulation of wealth
(Dem. 36.502).24 Pasion was a very successful banker. His bank
prospered to the extent that, by the time of his death in 370/369, he
had assembled a fortune estimated at around 70 talents.25 With this
money, he made a number of generous benefactions to the Athenians,
which, according to Theomnestus, was the specic reason why they
passed a decree granting the right of citizenship to him and to his
23
J. K. Davies, Athenian Propertied Families, 600300 B.C. (Oxford, 1971), 4289; Trevett
(n.4), 12.
24
J. K. Davies, Wealth and the Power of Wealth in Classical Athens (New York, 1981), 606;
P. Millett, Lending and Borrowing in Ancient Athens (Cambridge, 1991), 91108, 203, 21617,
23841; Trevett (n. 4), 45.
25
Davies (n. 23), 4315. For the problems concerning this estimation, see R. Bogaert, La
Banque Athnes au IVe sicle avant J.-C.: tat de la question, Museum Helveticum 43 (1986),
3542; Trevett (n. 4), 2731.
 NATURALIZED CITIZENS AND SOCIAL MOBILITY IN ATHENS 165

descendants ([Dem.] 59.2).26 Pasions social promotion from a foreign

slave to a wealthy Athenian citizen is remarkable, but certainly not
unique especially not within the banking world.27 As Davies remarks,
banking seems not to have been a way by which citizens became rich,
but rather by which slaves and metics were able to buy themselves
citizenship.28
Considering the costs and troubles that these men had to endure
in order to acquire Athenian citizenship,29 it is feasible to conclude
that they truly wanted above all to be recognized as Athenian citizens,
and thus most of all sought to display their social mobility publicly.
This article will therefore focus mainly on this relatively small group
of naturalized citizens.

The public display of legal status

Absence of visible markers and other problems of identification

In accordance with the principles of social status determination, status

and position had to be observed and to be publicly recognized in order
to be meaningful. As a result, the public display of the newly obtained
asset that principally caused a naturalized citizen to rise in status,

26
Osborne (n. 7), ii.479; For dissimilar views on the date of Pasions naturalization, see
Kapparis (n. 2), 169.
27
Davies has observed that, although bankers were not the only men who successfully used
their gains in order to obtain citizenship (cf. the salt-sh seller Chaerephilus (Davies [n. 23],
no. 15128), it was mainly bankers, rather than other metics, who appear to have become rich
enough to inuence not only their social position in society but also their legal status: Davies
(n. 24), 656. See also Osborne (n. 7), iv.196; E. E. Cohen, Athenian Economy and Society: A
Banking Perspective (Princeton, NJ, 1992), 889.
28
Davies (n. 24), 65. See also the lives of Pasions ex-slave Phormion (Davies [n. 23], no.
11675.IX; Osborne [n. 7], T48), of Konon (Osborne [n. 7], T81), and of Epigenes (ibid., T80).
It has also been presumed that the trierarch Aristolochus of Erchia was the same man as the
banker Aristolochus of Dem. 45.63 (Davies [n. 23], no. 1946), and that the victorious choregos
Timodemus is to be identied with the banker Timodemus of Dem. 36.29, 50 (ibid., no. 13674).
29
It was not only ostentatious generosity and voluntary liturgies that appear to have been
employed when striving for citizenship. It was a common allegation that inuential politicians
accepted bribes to obtain citizenship for certain persons, which was notoriously a charge against
Demosthenes (Din. 1.43; Hyp. 5 col. 20, 25). Of course, expenditure was certainly not a
guarantee of obtaining citizenship, as is demonstrated by the case of Lysias. He and his brother
Polemarchus performed all the choregiai by 404, paid ransoms and eisphora (Lys. 12.20), donated
2000 drachmae and 200 shields on behalf of the democratic cause in 403, and paid for the
maintenance of 300 mercenaries (Davies [n. 23], 589). However, although Lysias at some time
apparently gained isoteleia (see S. C. Todd, A Commentary on Lysias, Speeches 111 (Oxford,
2007), 1516, for discussion), citizenship was, despite his numerous benefactions, beyond his
reach.
166 NATURALIZED CITIZENS AND SOCIAL MOBILITY IN ATHENS

namely his citizenship, was indispensible. For that reason, it was of

the utmost importance for newly made citizens in classical Athens to
differentiate themselves as clearly as possible from the metic or foreign
community to which they had previously belonged. This, however,
appears to have been made difficult by what has recently been called
the blurring of identities in classical Athens.30
As many and different types of sources assert, the legal distinction
between citizens, metics, and even slaves was often difficult to
determine. Not least of the reasons for this was the absence of
apparent visible markers. The satiric Constitution of the Athenians,
attributed to Xenophon but generally dated to late in the fth century
and sometimes even earlier,31 not only asserts that distinguishing
slaves at Athens was difficult but also emphasizes the impossibility
of differentiating Athenians from xenoi (the Old Oligarch, Constitution
of the Athenians 1.10).32 The same can be said about the portrayal
of individuals on Attic pottery, where Athenians and other Greeks
are regularly indistinguishable,33 and where slaves in some cases are
identiable neither by size, nor by posture, nor by appearance.34
Moreover, contrary to the views of Morris that formal burial was a
privilege indicating and dependent upon citizenship, and that classical
Athenians put great emphasis on formal, bounded cemeteries as

30
For the idea of the blurring of identities in Athenian free space, which lies at the background
of this article, see K. Vlassopoulos, Free Spaces: Identity, Experience and Democracy in
Classical Athens, CQ 57 (2007), 345. See also R. Osborne, The History Written on the Classical
Greek Body (Cambridge, forthcoming), for a survey of the major political, social, and theological
repercussions of the frequent impossibility of seeing who belonged to which (legal) category in
classical Athens.
31
Cf. D. Stockton, The Classical Athenian Democracy (Oxford, 1990), 168; A. W. Gomme,
The Old Oligarch, in A. W. Gomme (ed.), More Essays in Greek History and Literature (Oxford,
1962), 68; N. Fisher, Slavery in Classical Greece (London, 1993), 53. For the Constitution of the
Athenians as an early fourth-century text, see S. Hornblower, The Old Oligarch and Thucydides:
A Fourth-century Date for the Old Oligarch?, in P. Flensted-Jensen, T. H. Nielsen, and L.
Rubinstein (eds.), Polis and Politics: Studies in Ancient Greek History: Presented to Mogens Herman
Hansen on His Sixtieth Birthday, August 20, 2000 (Copenhagen, 2000), 36384.
32
In fact, he describes the Athenians as being exceptional among the Greeks for adopting
foreign dialects, ways of life, and types of dress (2.8). Of course, this fondness of foreign manners
and style may have been mostly an elite phenomenon. See Lape (n. 5), 187, n. 4, for references.
33
For the overly optimistic belief that Athenian citizens on pottery can typically be made out
by means of their clothing or special attributes, see H.-G. Hollein, Brgerbild und Bildwelt der
attischen Demokratie auf den rotgurigen Vasen des 6.4. Jahrhunderts v. Chr. (Frankfurt-am-Main,
1988). For clothing allegedly distinguishing people with different functions in Athenian society
rather than signalling a legal status, see M. Pipili, Wearing an Other Hat: Workmen in Town and
Country, in B. Cohen (ed.), Not the Classical Ideal. Athens and the Construction of the Other in
Greek Art (Leiden, 2000), 15479.
34
See J. H. Oakley, Some Other Members of the Athenian Household: Maids and Their
Mistresses in Fifth-century Athenian Art, in Cohen (n. 33), 22747; S. Lewis, The Athenian
Woman. An Iconographic Handbook (London, 2002), 13840.
 NATURALIZED CITIZENS AND SOCIAL MOBILITY IN ATHENS 167

symbols of membership of the citizen body as a whole,35 voices have

been raised to deny both the reality of burial as a citizen privilege and
the existence of exclusive citizen cemeteries at Athens.36 All the more
notable is the fact that on funerary reliefs the same visual standards
were used for temporary Greek residents in Athens as for Athenians
themselves.37
The situation was even more problematic because of the actuality
especially in business functions of the interchangeability of roles
among free persons and slaves, Athenians and foreigners that was
characteristic of Athenian society.38 Although the Athenians became
acquainted with a large number of fellow citizens by interacting
closely with one another in public and political life, bearing in mind
the size of the Athenian population, it is hard to believe that they
were ever in the position to be in no doubt as to who was a citizen
and who was not.39 As a result of all this, it seems to have been quite
difficult to determine an individuals legal status, even in the case of
a person of high prole and even after extensive scrutiny, which is
shown clearly by Lysias 23, Demosthenes 57, and Isaeus 12, the only
surviving forensic speeches focusing on personal status (see also Dem.
47.61, 53.16; Aeschin. 1.5464).

Implications

This blurring of identities had signicant implications for different

types of group in Athenian society. In the rst instance, it offered
some scope for litigants willing to cast doubt on Athenians citizen

35
I. Morris, Burial and Ancient Society. The Rise of the Greek City-state (Cambridge, 1987),
54; idem, The Archaeology of Ancestors: The Saxe-Goldstein Hypothesis Revisited, Cambridge
Archaeological Journal 1 (1991), 1578.
36
C. Patterson, Citizen Cemeteries in Classical Athens?, CQ 56 (2006), 4856.
37
J. Bergemann, Demos und Thanatos. Untersuchungen zum Wertsystem der Polis im Spiegel
der attischen Grabreliefs des 4. Jahrhunderts v. Chr. und zur Funktion der gleichzeitigen Grabbauten
(Munich, 1997), 13150, esp. 146.
38
See W. R. Connor, The Problem of Athenian Civic Identity, in Boegehold and Scafuro
(n. 3), 367, as well as the detailed discussion of this chapter by D. Rosenbloom, [Review of] A.
Boegehold and A. Scafuro (eds.), Athenian Identity and Civic Ideology (Baltimore, 1994), BMCR
94.09.06b; Cohen (n. 11), 13054.
39
For Finleys characterization of Athens as the model of a face-to-face society, see M. I.
Finley, Democracy Ancient and Modern (New Brunswick, NJ, 1973); 1718; idem, The Freedom
of the Citizen in the Greek World, Talanta 7 (1976), 23; idem, Politics in the Ancient World
(Cambridge, 1983), 289, 823. For the contrary concept of the imagined community, see B.
Anderson, Imagined Communities. Reections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London,
1991); Cohen (n. 11), 10429; G. Anderson, The Athenian Experiment. Building an Imagined
Political Community in Ancient Attica, 508490 B.C. (Ann Arbor, MI, 2003).
168 NATURALIZED CITIZENS AND SOCIAL MOBILITY IN ATHENS

status.40 Even those whose entitlements to Athenian citizenship were

beyond doubt in the paternal line might nd themselves defenceless
against accusations about the maternal line.41 Their best course was
to look and act like an Athenian in every possible way is the solution
provided by Connor.42 But how might the former have been possible,
considering the absence of apparent visible markers?
On the other hand, this phenomenon also appears to have provided
opportunities for non-citizens informally to cross boundaries, as is
clearly exemplied in Attic oratory, where children of slaves, foreigners,
those with illegitimate unions, and so forth, are said to have managed
to pass as citizens (Lys. 30.2, 5, 27; Aeschin. 2.76; Dem. 21.149;
[Dem.] 59).43 What is more, it even provided opportunities for non-
citizens illegitimately to attempt to become Athenian citizens in formal
ways, the success of which depended entirely on the efficiency of the
deme or the determination of a citizen to take legal actions against
individuals whom he believed to have been guilty of this sort of
practice.44 Some demesmen or demarchs were without doubt corrupt
in admitting citizens improperly (Dem. 57.60; FGrH 324 F 52, n. 9),45

40
As might be expected, especially important Athenian politicians were the target of these
accusations, which can be seen not only in the recurring juridical charges against prominent
politicians (such as Demosthenes, Aeschines, Hyperbolus, and Meidias), concerning their
supposed foreign and/or servile origin but also in the frequent sneers by Aristophanes imputing
foreign or slave origins to political leaders such as Cleon and Cleophon: see V. Ehrenberg, The
People of Aristophanes. A Sociology of Old Attic Comedy (Oxford, 1943), 11920; P. Harding,
Rhetoric and Politics in Fourth-century Athens, Phoenix 41 (1987), 2539; J. Ober, Mass and
Elite in Democratic Athens. Rhetoric, Ideology, and the Power of the People (Princeton, NJ, 1989),
2709; Cohen (n. 11), 112.
41
Ober (n. 40), 267; A. C. Scafuro, Witnessing and False Witnessing: Proving Citizenship
and Kin Identity in Fourth-century Athens, in Boegehold and Scafuro (n. 3), 15698.
42
Connor (n. 38), 41.
43
K. Vlassopoulos, Slavery, Freedom and Citizenship in Classical Athens: Beyond a Legalistic
Approach, European Review of History 16.3 (2009), 34763; See also Ober (n. 40), 271. That
even slaves are plausibly said to have managed to pass as citizens, can in part be explained by
the fact that manumission of a slave in Athens was thought to be a solely private event, so that
no action was carried out in a formal manner in front of witnesses, nor was the freeing publicly
recorded (cf. S.C. Todd, The Shape of Athenian Law (Oxford, 1993), 1259).
44
Connor (n. 38), 38.
45
Citizenship was essentially monitored by demesmen ([Arist.] Ath. Pol. 42) and in the
phratry (S. D. Lambert, The Phratries of Attica (Ann Arbor, MI, 1993), 259), and the Athenian
polis apparently failed to oversee the situation by not keeping a central archive for the purpose of
proving citizenship, although this would have been a useful instrument in combating corruption
at deme level (Scafuro [n. 41], 15682). The only citizen records were kept in the lexiarchikon
grammateion, held separately in each deme. Although a central archive was maintained in the
metroon (R. Thomas, Oral Tradition and Written Record in Classical Athens [Cambridge, 1989], 68
83; J. P. Sickinger, Public Records and Archives in Classical Athens [Chapel Hill, NC, 1999], 93
113), no master list of citizens and/or metics was ever kept (P. J. Rhodes, A Commentary on the
Aristotelian Athenaion Politeia [Oxford, 1981], 497; M. H. Hansen, Demography and Democracy.
The Number of Athenian Citizens in the Fourth Century B.C. [Herning, 1985], 14; Scafuro [this
 NATURALIZED CITIZENS AND SOCIAL MOBILITY IN ATHENS 169

which may have been one of the reasons behind the decree of a certain
Demophilus that in 346/345 ordered all the demes to scrutinize their
membership lists in a diapsephismos.46
For naturalized citizens, all this hampered clear distinction from the
metic or foreign community to which they previously belonged, and
thus complicated the public display of their social mobility. In spite of
everything, however, they appear to have been able to bring into play
a limited number of strategies in order to put their citizenship status
on view. The nature of these available strategies can best be illustrated
by using the conduct of Apollodorus as a case study, since, although
a fair amount of information about newly made citizens or demopoietoi
exists, most of the detailed information relates to Pasion and his son
Apollodorus, mainly through the latters philodikia or litigiousness.47

The case of Apollodorus

Exercising citizen privileges

Apollodorus, a man of foreign and servile origins who owed his

privileged legal status to his wealthy father Pasions benefactions
towards the Athenians, clearly sought to differentiate himself as a
demopoietos from the metic community of his origins48 by exercising
as soon and as fervently as possible the rights and privileges that
had precisely the function of distinguishing citizens from socially
and economically equal or even superior non-citizens. He eagerly
made use of his political rights labelled by Hansen as the essence
of Athenian citizenship49 and embarked on an dynamic political
career, for which he had great ambition.50 Apollodorus was favoured

note], 164; J. Davidson, Courtesans and Fishcakes. Consuming Passions of Classical Athens [London,
1997], 215; Cohen [n. 11], 109).
46
Davies (n. 18), 112.
47
For Apollodorus speeches, see Trevett (n. 4), 50123.
48
As observed by Osborne, Apollodorus was already born at the time of his fathers
naturalization, so that in strict terms he too was naturalized: Osborne (n. 7), iii.49.
49
M. H. Hansen, The Athenian Democracy in the Age of Demosthenes. Structure, Principles, and
Ideology, trans. J. A. Crook (Oxford, 1991), 97.
50
For Apollodorus political career, see Trevett (n. 4), 12454. It appears to have been a
common tactic for aspiring politicians to launch their career by prosecuting a public gure.
However, prosecuting ve men all at once for this purpose, as Apollodorus did, appears to have
been extraordinary and can, as Trevett observed, be considered as indicative of his ambition on
this score (ibid., 152). See especially p. 174 for Apollodorus taking part in Athenian politics as
an affirmation of his citizen status.
170 NATURALIZED CITIZENS AND SOCIAL MOBILITY IN ATHENS

with a number of important politicians as friends of the family. Pasion

was probably never actively involved in politics but is known to have
been a close friend of several members of the political elite, such as
Agyrrhius of Collyte (Isoc. 17.31) and Callistratus of Aphnida (Dem.
49.47). Moreover, he had dealings with important public gures
such as Timotheus, son of Conon (Dem. 49 passim).51 These existing
connections were presumably valuable at the start of Apollodorus
political career, since they could provide him with a ready-made
entre into the political arena.52 Moreover, the fact that only citizens
had the full and unrestricted legal capacity to initiate court actions
makes it plausible to interpret his philodikia as an underscoring of his
citizen status.53
A further strategic choice of social signicance was Apollodorus
marriage to the daughter of a well-off Athenian citizen, another
citizen privilege. In about 365, he married the daughter of Deinias,
son of Theomnestus of Athmonon (Dem. 45.55, 59.2) and father of
Theomnestus, formal prosecutor in the Demosthenic speech Against
Neaira ([Dem.] 59). In this speech, Theomnestus states that his father
decided to give his own daughter in marriage to Apollodorus because
he approved of the peoples decision to grant Athenian citizenship to
Pasion and his descendants, bestowed for his benefactions to the city
([Dem.] 59). This seems on the face of it a rather weak explanation
for choosing a newly made citizen with servile origins as the preferred
marriage-partner for his oldest daughter. Although Davies describes
Apollodorus family by marriage as a well-off but rather shadowy
family, which merits entry in the Register in its own right and can be
traced back for several generations,54 little evidence for this wealth
can be tracked down.55 It is therefore not out of the question that
Apollodorus undeniable wealth was one of the motives behind
Deinias decision.

51
According to Apollodorus, his father made a series of unsecured loans to Timotheus in the
late 370s (Dem. 49.3).
52
Trevett (n. 4), 1245. The fact that other newly made citizens (although few), such
as Heracleides of Clazomenae and Charidemus of Oreus, are known to have had an active
political career, and that Apollodorus of Cyzicus, Phanosthenes of Andros, and of course the
less representative Pericles (II), naturalized son of the statesman Pericles, were elected as official
Athenian generals, strengthens the presupposition that a successful public career, characteristic
for members of the social and political Athenian elite, was quite feasible for (wealthy) demopoietoi.
See respectively Osborne (n. 7), T27, T51, T8, T9, and T5, for discussion.
53
Non-citizens were only allowed to initiate certain cases: see A. Lanni, Law and Justice in the
Courts of Classical Athens (Cambridge, 2006), 153, for discussion.
54
Davies (n. 23), 437.
55
This has rightly been remarked by Trevett (n. 4), 1667.
 NATURALIZED CITIZENS AND SOCIAL MOBILITY IN ATHENS 171

For Apollodorus, this marriage was in the rst instance intended

to conrm his newly obtained legal status. In addition, the family ties
that it consequently shaped had an important social signicance. A
citizens social identity, as Just remarks, mainly

derived from his situation within a network of what remains essentially kinship
connections; connections that supplied him with his social and religious identity and
life.Citizenship, the right to hold and exercise political power, was more than a
compact whereby the common acceptance of certain rights and duties by individuals
was creative of a community; it was the consequence of a mans membership of a
community already well dened by bonds of kinship and religion.56

By marrying Deinias daughter, Apollodorus entered into this close

civic community, characterized by mutual dependency.57

Performing citizen duties

Obviously, Athenian citizenship was not only marked by rights and

privileges but also by various responsibilities. Thus citizens were
expected, if called upon, to perform military service as hoplites and to
support the city nancially in a multiplicity of ways.58 Despite the fact
that only part of the citizen body was liable to these diverse obligations,
civic ideology placed their performance at the core of good citizenship.

56
R. Just, Women in Athenian Law and Life (New York, 1989), 20. The family ties were doubly
strengthened by the marriage of one of Apollodorus daughters to Theomnestus himself ([Dem.]
59.23). This marriage between uncle and niece also had the advantage that property was kept
within the immediate family (ibid., 76104), and that the husband was in a position to have
accurate knowledge of his new wifes social and legal background, the latter being crucial with
a view to the birth of legitimate heirs, the central concept in a marriage (R. Sealey, Women and
Law in Classical Greece [Chapel Hill, NC, 1990], 2536). Theomnestus describes his marriage as
a conrmation of his acceptance of Apollodorus act of goodwill namely, the good treatment
of his wife and the rest of his family by marriage and thus as a reciprocal favour. However, as
Deinias with Apollodorus, Theomnestus was also possibly inuenced by the fact that his new
wife would bring a substantial dowry. For discussion, see Carey (n. 4), 85; Kapparis (n. 2),
1701.
57
The practicalities of this are, for instance, evident in Theomnestus introduction to
Apollodorus speech Against Neaira ([Dem.] 59). It has been argued that Theomnestus
exaggerated his own role as victim and thus as avenger, since he himself, unlike Apollodorus,
faced neither exile nor disenfranchisement (Carey [n. 4], 845). However, his assertion that the
entire group of persons clustered around Apollodorus was endangered by Stephanus negative
efforts against him corresponded to civic ideology. See Cohen (n. 11), 367; Kapparis (n. 2),
168, for discussion.
58
Rhodes (n. 45), 3823; Sinclair (n. 6), 49, 5465; Manville (n. 11), 9; Hansen (n. 49),
99101; D. Whitehead, Norms of Citizenship in Ancient Greece, in A. Molho, K. Raaaub, and
J. Emlen (eds.), City States in Classical Antiquity and Medieval Italy (Ann Arbor, MI, 1991), 149;
M. R. Christ, The Bad Citizen in Classical Athens (Cambridge, 2006).
172 NATURALIZED CITIZENS AND SOCIAL MOBILITY IN ATHENS

Apollodorus spent an above-average amount on liturgies.59 He

functioned, for instance, as syntrierarch at an unknown date before his
fathers death (IG II2 1609.839), in 362360 (Dem. 50), and in 356
(IG II2 1612.110); as trierarch in 368/367 (Dem. 53.5); as proeispheron
in 362 (Dem. 50.810); and as victorious choregos in boys dithyramb
for Oeneis at the Dionysia in 352/351 (IG II2 3039).60 All of these
liturgies can be regarded as an important element within his strategy
of display (epideixis) and appearance (schema).61 As the choregia at the
City Dionysia was the most visible liturgy in Athens, it certainly was
the best medium for prestige acquisition and status display, both social
and legal. Large numbers of Athenians attended this festival, and a
choregos was very much in the public eye before, during, and after the
performance that he was funding.62 Although the (syn)trierarch was
considerably less visible to the public, it was (bearing in mind its price
tag of 4,0006,000 drachmae)63 for Apollodorus not less effective as
an instrument for winning prestige, since he managed to give every
one of his liturgies additional public visibility by repeatedly boasting
about them when addressing the courts and the Assembly.

Citizen ideology

Of course, the Athenians did not view citizenship narrowly and

exclusively in terms of right of entry into and privileges in governing
bodies, or of the performance of formal obligations.64 In fact, citizen
norms and ideals included a wide range of behaviours. Correspondingly,
Apollodorus appears not only to have been keen to be involved in
59
Although it cannot be determined precisely how much Apollodorus spent on the known
liturgies in total, it may have been around 10 talents: Trevett (n. 4), 41. For parallels of
extraordinary liturgical service, see Davies (n. 24), 256; P. J. Rhodes, Problems in Athenian
Eisphora and Liturgies, AJAH 7 (1982), 2; V. Gabrielsen, Phanera and Aphanes Ousia in
Classical Athens, C&M 37 (1986), 11213.
60
Davies (n. 23), 4402; Trevett (n. 4), 39.
61
For the importance of these concepts in the study of the democratic Athenian performance
culture, see S. Goldhill, Programme Notes, in S. Goldhill and R. Osborne (eds.), Performance
Culture and Athenian Democracy (Cambridge, 1999), 129.
62
P. Wilson, The Athenian Institution of the Khoregia. The Chorus, the City and the Stage
(Cambridge, 2000), 95103, 198262; See also P. Millett, The Rhetoric of Reciprocity in
Classical Athens, in C. Gill, N. Postlewaite, and R. Seaford (eds.), Reciprocity in Ancient Greece
(Oxford, 1998), 2467.
63
The surviving gures for the costs of various liturgies are set out in Davies (n. 23), xxixxii.
64
For warnings on interpreting Athenian citizenship too narrowly, see P. Manville, Toward
a New Paradigm of Athenian Citizenship, in Boegehold and Scafuro (n. 3), 2133; Connor (n.
38), 40; J. P. Euben, Introduction, in J. P. Euben, J. R. Wallach, and J. Ober (eds.), Athenian
Political Thought and the Reconstruction of American Democracy (Ithaca, NY, 1994), 3; J. F.
McGlew, Citizens on Stage. Comedy and Political Culture in the Athenian Democracy (Ann Arbor,
MI, 2002), 6.
 NATURALIZED CITIZENS AND SOCIAL MOBILITY IN ATHENS 173

politics to affirm his own citizen status but also to have taken an eager
interest in the citys affairs, which is demonstrated by his thorough
knowledge of the laws, civic tradition, and Athenian history, as shown
in his speeches.65 Moreover, in the same way as he asserted that he
considered it as his ultimate duty as a good citizen or agathos polites
(cf. Arist. Pol. 3.4) to convict those who despise you and the laws and
refuse to obey the laws, and to get them punished in your presence
(Dem. 50.65), his cases against both Neaira and the former slave
Phormio clearly give the impression of a patriotic Athenian defending
the highest civic values and sacred laws of his ancestral polis.66

Physical distance

As a nal point, Apollodorus also unmistakably sought to distance

himself physically from his metic and commercial background. As
might be expected, Pasion seems to have moved his money into landed
property as soon as he received the grant of citizenship. Since the
possession of land was a right reserved for citizens (except for xenoi
with egktesis) and characteristic of most wealthy citizens, this act, which
brought him not only prestige but also nancial security, can above all
be regarded as a clear conrmation of his citizen status. In spite of
this, he did not change his lifestyle dramatically, but continued to work
at the bank and live in Piraeus, the centre of the metic commercial
community (Dem. 49.6; 52.8, 14).67 Apollodorus, in contrast, did
everything to distance himself physically from this community, as
he moved to the countryside after his fathers death (Dem. 53.4)
and seems to have embraced the rather extravagant lifestyle (Dem.
36.8, 45) and ideology of the long-standing landed Athenian elite.
By proling himself as a landowner in order to emphasize his citizen
status, Apollodorus sadly turned into a somewhat anachronistic gure.
After all, as demonstrated by Davies, in the fourth century it became
increasingly normal to have a mixed holding, consisting of both real
property in land and houses, manufacturing property in the form of

65
Although Apollodorus speeches demonstrate some knowledge of rhetorical theory, it is
difficult to determine precisely what kind of paideia he received. Since an expensive education
could function as a source of prestige (Isoc. 15.161) and as an important factor in facilitating
Apollodorus acceptance into the Athenian elite, it seems at least likely that the wealthy Pasion
ensured his son received the best available education. See Trevett (n. 4), 11123, for discussion.
66
Lape rightly assumes that, in this way, Apollodoros engaged in one of the most potent
methods of affirming group membership, namely, claiming that others do not belong. See Lape
(n. 5).
67
Trevett (n. 4), 1624.
174 NATURALIZED CITIZENS AND SOCIAL MOBILITY IN ATHENS

revenue-earning slaves, and liquid investments. The mixed holdings of

Apollodorus own father, Pasion, of Arizelus of Sphettus, of Ciron, and
of Euctemon of Cephisia appear to have been standard for the fourth-
century propertied class, while those of men such as Demosthenes the
elder or of Diodotus were probably exceptional.68
By describing and explaining the tactics and strategies listed above,
I certainly do not intend to assert that Apollodorus conduct is to
be considered as representative for the whole group of newly made
citizens, however small this group may have been. On the contrary,
Apollodorus was apparently an extraordinary demopoietos, whose
attempts to be more Athenian than the Athenians69 caused much
resentment. His behaviour, however, may be taken as symptomatic of
the problems and pains, mainly caused by the blurring of identities in
Athenian society, that all newly made citizens had to overcome when
trying to display their new legal status and hence their social mobility.

A final thought

Thinking beyond our current topic, one might wonder how the
Athenians tolerance towards the invisibility of the various legal
categories which stands in stark contrast to all the trouble that
a newly made citizen such as Apollodorus went through in order
publicly to demonstrate and make visible his new citizen status
can be explained. According to the Old Oligarch, the Athenians
deliberately maintained outward equality between slaves and free men,
and between metics and citizens, because of nancial and economical
considerations ([Xen.] Ath. Pol. 1.1112). A comparable explanation
has recently found its way into modern scholarship, with Vlassopoulos
assertion that, in a cosmopolitan centre such as Athens, laxity and
toleration was necessary in order to maintain the social peace and
continuation of the networks of manpower and goods, on which this
centre depended.70
This may be so, but the fact that Athenian citizens at both ends of
the social scale, by tolerating the apparent blurring of identities for
economical considerations, automatically renounced the possibility of
externally denoting their privileged legal position, necessitates some

68
For discussion, see Davies (n. 24), 378.
69
Trevett (n. 4), 178.
70
Vlassopoulos (n. 30), 38.
 NATURALIZED CITIZENS AND SOCIAL MOBILITY IN ATHENS 175

additional reection on the importance in classical Athens of citizenship

as a status symbol for those who owned it by birth. Might it be possible
that, in contrast to the keenness of candidate-citizens and naturalized
citizens, the average classical Athenian was not as concerned about
his citizenship as has in the past been taken as read? Some scholars
have recently thought so.71 A possible explanation for this hypothesis
might be found in Connors suggestion that, despite the Athenians
recurring assertions of being born from the earth,72 Athenian civic
identity as a concept might have suffered from the reality that being
an Athenian was in fact not the automatic result of being born into
a society in which all of the members shared the same genetic and
cultural inheritances.73 Moreover, it has rather convincingly been
suggested that, by about 430, the overpoweringly egalitarian ethic
making all citizens equal, which had dominated Athens in the rst
two-thirds of the fth century, began to disintegrate, in favour of a less
rigid system that provided opportunities for the kaloikagathoi to assert
their status.74 Such a change in civic ideology might ultimately have
resulted in the devaluation of Athenian citizenship as a status symbol
for those who owned it by birth. This particular topic, however, one of
the core elements that shape our understanding of Athenian society,
is clearly beyond the scope of this article and hence remains as an
important question for future research.
Yet, if citizenship as a status symbol had in effect become of relatively
minor importance to the average Athenian, this would explain the
tolerance on the part of the citizen body towards the notable blurring
of identities. Moreover, this would also make it possible to interpret
Apollodorus vigorous appeal towards the Athenians to guard the purity
of the Athenian citizenry not as some form of zealous patriotism75
but rather as an anxious response to reality.

MARLOES DEENE
Marloes.Deene@UGent.be

71
See in particular R. Osborne, The Citizen Body, in Osborne (n. 30), and for a rather
radical devaluation of Athenian citizenship Cohen (n. 11), 4968.
72
For recent examinations of the tendency of Athenian citizens to increasingly appeal from
the mid-fth century onwards to a language of birth and ancestry, see in particular Cohen (n.
11), 79103, and S. Lape (n. 5).
73
Connor (n. 38), 40.
74
I. Morris, Everymans Grave: Athenian Identity and Civic Ideology, in Boegehold and
Scafuro (n. 3), 67101.
75
For the phrase, see Patterson (n. 3), 199.
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