What is so ‘Primitive’ about ‘Primitive Democracy’? Comparing the Ancient Middle East and Classical Athens

Abstract

Among studies of the ancient world and its politics, there is an overwhelming emphasis on the significant achievements of the Greeks. This is, at least in part, because there are records of the administration of their societies and the ‘Athenian Revolution’ might be better understood not so much by what the Athenians did—as most of their activities have at least some precedent—as by what they wrote down. However, of the many texts produced in Greece from the fifth century bc onwards, only fragments remain. This means we must be cautious about making general inferences based on these sources, as they may well have been written in the context of a great many other texts, which have since been lost (Davies, 1978: 13–20). This is particularly true of the Greek texts that concern democracy. In a very real sense, we don’t know much about Greek democracy, about how it functioned, or the core principles on which it was founded and grew. As the renowned scholar of classical Athenian politics Josiah Ober has conceded, ‘we have no surviving texts written with the explicit intention of explaining the principles on which Athenian democracy was predicated’ (Ober, 1994: 151). In addition, as Ober points out elsewhere, ‘[m]ost ancient [Greek] texts were written by elites, specifically for an elite readership’ (Ober, 1989: 43).