Athens, 403 BCA Democracy in Crisis?Part of Classical Scholarship in TranslationAuthors:Vincent Azoulay, Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, ParisPaulin Ismard, Université d’Aix-MarseilleTranslator: Lorna Coing, University of CambridgeAt the end of the fifth century BC, the Peloponnesian War resulted in Athens’ shattering defeat by Sparta. Taking advantage of the debacle, a commission of thirty Athenians abolished the democratic institutions that for a century had governed the political life of the city and precipitated a year-long civil war. By autumn 403 BC, democracy was restored. Inspired by the model of the ancient chorus, this strikingly innovative book interprets a crucial moment in classical history through the prism of ten remarkable individuals and the shifting groups which formed around them. The former include more familiar names like the multifaceted Sokrates, the oligarch Kritias and the rhetorician Lysias, but also lesser-known figures like the scribe Nikomachos, the former slave Gerys and the priestess Lysimakhe. What leads a community to tear itself apart, even disintegrate, then rebuild itself? This question, explored through profound reflection on the past, echoes our tormented present.Offers a fresh and innovational interpretation of a key event in Athenian political history: the civil war of 404 403 BC and the refoundation of democracyCreative reflections on the past are now seen to have much contemporary resonanceBoldly and controversially argues for sustained reflection on the necessary nature of conflict within any democratic regimeTable of ContentsIntroduction. Towards a choral history1. Critias and the oligarchs2. Thrasybulus and the democratic resistance3. Archinus or the victory of the ‘moderates’4. Socrates and the voices of neutrality5. Lysimache: the priestess of Athena and her doubles6. Eutherus and the precarious workers7. Hegeso or the family torn asunder8. Gerys and the world of the merchant agora9. Nicomachus and the servants of the city10. Lysias, a multi-faceted manConclusion. The city in chorus.
