12-17-2011, 04:41 AM
Quote:One might think that upon reflection of the Greeks' misfortunes that some would be drawn to the conclusion that the Polis as an independent entity became obsolete in the new world of empires. I can see how a diehard democrat would be blinded by his archaic views but men like Polybius seemed to have questioned the institution and began examining the Roman oligarchy as a superior system of government.
Actually, this was not the case until much much later. You see, Empires of the time were not that different to the Greek hegemonies. They were essentially a certain dominant nation which kept its own political traditions (kingship among the Persians, a republic among the Romans) with a whole lotta tributary states that were mostly indirectly governed by the central state, who kept overseers where it saw fit, garrisons at points of strategic interest etc. But those tributary states kept their own governments which were to a certain, sometimes even none at all, degree controlled by the central seat. If you think of it, this is no different than what the Athenians and the Lacedaemonians did when they held hegemony, so I think that what many view as a peculiarity of the Greeks is actually the norm at these times. Of course there are examples of larger states with a strangely homogenous sense of nationality, such as the Egyptians and, I think, the Latin colonies of Rome which were founded qute late in Rome's history. But think of the Celts, the Thracians, the Illyrians, the Paeonians, the Indians, actually the Persians themselves with all their tribes, the Numidians, the Phoenicians, the Germans... So, Polybius is indeed praising the Roman government but not because of some unity it provided, IMO.
Furthermore, a polis was not a democracy. It could have any governmental system and it need not even be a single city. We call them city states, but the rihgt translation would rather be just "state" and could comprise by any number of cities.
Quote:If political unity was to be achieved I think it would have to have been done by monarchists or oligarchs in positions of power. Now that you mention the Epirotans, Pyrrhus almost achieved the political unity of the entire Balkan peninsula. He died as King of Epirus and Macedonia with a foothold in Italy. It's too bad he didn't live long enough to make a new marriage alliance to solidify the two kingdoms. In theory that is how any union would take place, marriage alliances. Although this didn't work in the Eastern Meditarranean - too many betrayals, wars, and deaths of would be dynasts undermined such efforts. So, since this was at least tried I can't see how a political union, especially in hindsight, would seem like science fiction to the Greek mind.
Actually, Pyrrhus, IIRC, was king of Macedon only for a very limited period of time and then practically stepped down for it was evident that the Macedonians would go with his rival, so he did not die a king of Macedon, he did not even cross theAdriatic as one. As for Epirus, he also did not achieve their political union, not more than any other hegaemon. The Epirotans remained divided after him. The Macedonians remained as tribes more time "unified" although they always longed for independence from the Argeads as was later evident when the Romans split them up.
Actually I do not see it happening... indeed there were royal marriages and staff, but very very rarely any ancient nation achieved even partial unity. Do not confuse hegaemony, union under the force of arms, with union accepted by the people. OF course, there were many instances when a state became a dependency of another, but in those times, willing acceptance to participate in such an endeavor was indeed not considered at all.
Quote:Well, the bulk of the survivors didn't break up which at least showed that Greeks could get along with each other even when the existential threat from Persia no longer compelled them to unite.
Oh! They DID know they could co operate! They had already done so in both Persian wars, their battles were usually between sides with allies, often multiple allies. But uniting was very very uncommon. For example, Athens, was actually a little "kingdom" It was not just a city with its environs ut many large cities feeling united. Athens, Peiraeus, Elsusis, Acharnes... all these were Athenians. There are some more such examples, but they are quite rare. Some other attempts at such "unions" were the Achaean League and the Aetolian Confederation, the Common of the Boeotians etc, but again, regional over city identity was as far as Greeks could go...
As far as the 10,000 are concerned.... just read the last books of their exploits. There you will see that once the danger as ALMOST over, they could not co operate any more... They split up, they backstabbed each other... it was chaos...
