Ker Solon's Theoria and The End of The City

Solon's "Theôria" and the End of the City
Author(s): James Ker

Source: Classical Antiquity , Oct., 2000, Vol. 19, No. 2 (Oct., 2000), pp. 304-329
Published by: University of California Press
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JAMES KER
Solon's Theoria and the End of the City
"But you are forgetting something. Isn't there something of an analogy

between the theoretical model and the isonomia of citizens sitting in a circle
around a centre which is nothing more than a public place in which they all take
tums proposing a decision or a law ... the old Greek model of democracy, with
a transcendental void in the middle?"'
Indeed there is something more than an analogy: in the imagination of the
Athenian city the bond between theoria and the laws is intense. Simon Gold
hill has observed that the civic spectacles of the theater and assembly reveal a
political function for the6ria-which was, after all, "the normal Greek for of
ficial participatory attendance as a spectator in the political and religious rites
of the city." The political sphere, then, is regulated visually: "The institutional
spaces of the democratic city ... established the citizens' gaze as the field in
which position was contested and made the collective, participatory spectator
the role of the citizen."2 The picture given by Goldhill for Athens is close to
a model described by Democritus of Abdera (B191 DK) in which the citizen
is urged to "observe" (theorein) other people who are undergoing hardships: in
this way he will be grateful for his own middling circumstances and not at
tempt to do something that the laws (nomoi) prohibit. Yet the political func
tion of theoria, as in conceptions of theory now, was not always viewed as
Earlier versions of this paper were presented in seminars at UC Berkeley (Fall 1996 and Fall 1999) and
in the Cultural Poetics panel of the APA meeting in Chicago (December 1997). I thank the audiences
on those occasions for their stimulating discussions. I received productive criticism especially from
Mark Griffith and Leslie Kurke, and from two anonymous readers for this journal.
1. Lyotard 135.
2. Goldhill 19.
Classical Antiquity. Volume 19, Number 2, pages 304-329. ISSN 0278-6656(p); 1067-8344 (e).
Copyright C) 2000 by The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved.
Send requests for permission to reprint to: Rights and Permissions.
University of California Press, 2000 Center Street, Ste 303, Berkeley, CA 94704-1223.

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KER: Solon's Theoria and the End of the City 305
positive.3 In Thucydides' history the downfall of Athens could be predi

on the citizens as superficial "spectators of logoi" (theatai ton logon, 3.3
on the young men's excessive desire for theoria in Sicily (6.24). And
critique of poetry is partly a critique of the impressionable gaze of a th
audience.
Goldhill's account of a political theoria leads us into the physical space of
Athens where the citizen would stroll along the Stoa Poikile, a colonnade by the
agora, and observe among other monuments "a statue of Solon, a founding figure
of democratic ideology."4 As an object of didactic theoria, this statue should, I
suggest, be seen as part of a "visual tradition" on Solon closely tied to the oral
tradition' which sought to authorize a Solonian lawcode that continued to grow
over time (with a special prominence in the fourth century6). Another part of
this visual tradition was the distinctive structures, the axones (and subsequently
the kurbeis), on which Solon's laws were inscribed and which were available for
inspection even after they were no more than splinters of wood.7 In this situation
both the visual objects and their accompanying narrative functioned as lawgiver:
like the ongoing generation of new Theognidean poems under the authorizing
seal of Theognis,8 an ever-burgeoning Solonian code gained authority through
visualizing and narrating an original Solon. Moreover, according to this narrative,
Solon-whose image here is the object of the citizen's theoric gaze-went on a
famous theoria himself immediately after the introduction of his lawcode.
How to understand the lawgiver's departure from the city "for the sake of
theoria"? In his article on "Legends of the Greek Lawgivers," Andrew Szegedy
Maszak gives as the final stage of the typical archaic lawgiver narrative the
following set of events: "the code is firmly established, with some provision for
its permanence, and the lawgiver departs." Szegedy-Maszak's account of the role
the lawgiver's departure plays in allowing the real hero, the newly codified law, to
take the stage, has been formulated in turn by Jesper Svenbro as a substitution
of law (nomos) for sovereign (basileus), with the law taking on the departed
sovereign's authority in a now disembodied form.9 My purpose here is to explain
3. Jay 21-33 gives a useful survey of Greek contestations of vision.

4. Goldhill 20; on the statue of Solon, cf. Dem. 26.23.
5. Compare the tradition posited by Thomas 280 as Herodotus' source on the would-be tyrant
Cylon: Thomas suggests that the tale of Cylon and the massacre of his associates "probably belonged
to the polis traditions and the shrine where the sacrilege took place, connected with Cylon's statue
and perhaps his precinct."
6. Cf. Moss6; Hansen. On the different strains of the historiographical tradition, see Manfredini
and Piccirilli 117-19, 263-64.
7. Cf. Stroud 41-44.
8. Theognis 19-30 West. Cf. Ford; Edmunds; and Nagy 1985: 32: "Inside the ideology of
narrative traditions about a given lawgiver, his code is static, unchangeable; outside this ideology and
in reality, however, the code is dynamic, subject to modifications and accretions that are occasioned
by an evolving social order."
9. Szegedy-Maszak 208; Svenbro 129-33.

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306 CLASSICAL ANTIQUITY Volume 19/No. 2/October 2000
the mode of this substitution as it appears in the narrative on Solon. In two versions
of the narrative, Solon is said, after introducing his laws, to have left the city for
the sake of theoria, which has usually been taken to mean little more than "to
see the world." I hope to show, however, why the image of Solon the lawgiver
embarking on a theoria is an especially suitable didactic object for the theoric
gaze of the Athenian citizen. Certain aspects of theoria, especially its religious
sense and its connection with gestures of civic guardianship and preservation,
make it uniquely appropriate for Solon's task of establishing the laws as a civic
medium and giving closure to the ideology of the newly legislated city.
The narrative accounts of Solon's travels are many,'0 but we shall be con
cerned principally with those found in Herodotus and the pseudo-Aristotelian
Constitution of the Athenians (Ath.Pol.), which both refer to the travels as a
theoria. According to one tradition mentioned by Plutarch, Solon traveled before
he became archon and lawgiver in Athens (Plut. 2.1).'" In this he resembles
other lawgivers such as the Spartan Lycurgus, who even obtained his lawcode
from the oracle at Delphi or, according to the Spartans, from Crete.'2 Most ac
counts, however, deal exclusively with Solon's travels after the codification of
his laws (especially to Egypt, Cyprus, and Lydia) for which different reasons
are given. Diogenes Laertius says that Solon did not leave Athens immediately
after introducing his laws, but only after Peisistratus had established his tyranny
(D.L. 1.50). The majority of accounts connect his departure directly with the
end of the lawgiving,'3 saying that he did not want to be compelled to explain
his laws to the Athenians (Ath.Pol. 11.1; Plut. 25.6) or to change any of them
now that they were established (Hdt. 1.29; Ath.Pol. 11.1; Plut. 25.6), and that
he was wary of becoming a partisan on the side of the wealthy or of the demos
(Ath.Pol. 12-13.1). In this context, Herodotus reports that Solon's given reason
(prophasis) for leaving was "for the sake of theoria," while the Ath.Pol. says that
he traveled "for commerce and also theoria" (xot-' tioptoLv &'iot xacL OEr&pLio(V,
Ath.Pol. 1 1.1).'I While Solon's involvement in commerce is an important theme
in the narrative on Solon, especially in the account transmitted by Plutarch (Plut.
2. 1; 25.6), in the present inquiry I shall confine it to the background to make room
for a sense of theoria independent of that determined by opposition to commerce.
This will allow us to discern an important connection between Solon's theoria
and the establishment of the Athenian nomoi.
10. For full primary references and a historical reconstruction, see Linforth 297-302.
11. On this tradition, deriving from Hermippus (and the seven sages tradition?), see Manfredini
and Piccirilli 117-18.
12. Plut. Lyc. 4-5.3; Hdt. 1.65.2-66.1. Delcourt 88 suggests that the similarity between the
Solon and Lycurgus narratives derives from an agonistic tradition in which the addition of new
oracles to the narrative gives ever-greater authority to the lawgiver.
13. Once again like Lycurgus; cf. Plut. Lyc. 29.
14. The latter phrase is also used in Isocrates (Trapez. 17.4) with reference to the travels of
a young nobleman from Pontos who is presently visiting Athens.

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We can expect that the representation of Solon's departure will be sign

given the distinctly performative element of archaic Greek political nar
In his article on the tradition of the Seven Sages, Richard P. Martin
episode from the life of Solon to exemplify his combined identity as "
politician, and performer":'5 Solon is said to have delivered publicly
exhorting the Athenians to restart the war over Salamis, while himself f
madness so as to avoid prosecution for this act (Plut. Solon 8.1-3). This pa
"megaperformance," to use Martin's term,'6 is especially relevant to our
into Solon's theoria, as the opening lines of the Salamis poem reveal:
OCUTO6 X4put 'XOOV &.' isep-rj4 EaaXtjVo;,

X00VoV eTE(v t(,Av avt- &yopi OIoEVo4.
(Solon, fr. 1 West)
I have come in person, a herald from lovely Salamis,

setting forth a song in ordered verse instead of a
public speech.'7
The speaking subject's identity as a herald (fleshed out, we are told, by

having delivered it standing on the herald's stone in the agora) illustrates
with which Solon, as poet and politician, "creatively adapts" a traditional
genre in order to represent a political action from a safer and more auth
position."8 Safer, because Solon escapes prosecution by feigning madnes
authoritative, because he adopts the persuasive position of what Martin e
terms the "metanastes," "an outsider who happens to be allowed inside
more generally, it is now recognized that Solon, like other archaic Greek
performers, characteristically operates "with and through ceremonies, rit
festivals," as W. R. Connor has shown for Solon's introduction of the census.2
this type of "embedded" political performance is not a one-way, propaga
communication: Solon's theoria has its effect above all as a metaphor wit
the Athenian citizens visualized an absent Solon for themselves. I thus
the method of Carol Dougherty's treatment of archaic colonization narr
15. Martin 1993: 119.

16. Martin 1993: 116. On the poetics of speech and writing in Solon's political ac
Loraux 1988, esp. 106-108 comparing the different testimonia of the Salamis performanc
17. Translations are mine unless otherwise indicated.
18. For Solonian "creative adaptation," see Connor 50.
19. Martin 1992: 14. Another line from later in the Salamis poem further exploits an
perspective: "This man is from Attica, he's one of the ones who let Salamis go!" (fr. 2
For most of the poem, however, the speaker appears to have spoken from an Athenian per
2.1-3, 3.1-2 West). In fact Solon was himself born at Salamis (according to D.L. 1.45).
20. Connor 47-49; quote from p. 49. Similar readings of archaic political performance
Vernant 1982: 69-81 (on Epimenides and other sages as political performers); Boed
Spartans' retrieval of the bones of Orestes); and Sinos (the Phye episode in Peisistratu
to Athens).

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reading the theoria metaphor as "an active force" in an ongoing negotiation of the
meaning of the lawgiver's absence.21
1. SEMANTICS
What, then, is theoria? Goldhill's model is not, as it happens, typical: in
referring to political participation as theoria and applying it to the theater and
assembly, he omits to mention that theoria would not normally take place within
one's own city.22 Equally unhelpful is the specialized application of the term to
refer to "contemplation" in philosophy. A better working model is provided by
Ian Rutherford's studies of theoria as religious pilgrimage outside the city: the
theoria is a longer than usual journey to visit a sacred place, undertaken for a
religious reason.23
The focus in discussions of theoria's precise meaning has been the semantic
history of the word from which it derives, theoros. The main distinct meanings of
theoros are listed in an article by Clarence Bill: "(a) Spectator ... (b) A delegate
sent by a state to attend a festival in another state ... (c) One who goes to consult
an oracle ... (d) An envoy sent to announce in another state the coming celebration
of a festival [3rd C. BC] ... (e) A regular magistrate employed by certain of the
Greek States."24 The historical relation between these meanings has been thought
significant for understanding whether the meaning of theoria is primarily visual
or religious-that is, whether the first half of the word theoros derives from thea
"sight, spectacle" or theos "god." For example, Bill confidently opts for a visual
origin and claims to detect a semantic broadening over time from (a) to (b-e)
in which theoros started out as "sightseeing envoy" but came to be thought of
as a "sacred envoy," with an eventual blanket application to "any envoy who
performed sacred duties, even though he was not sent to a festival and had no
spectacle to see."25 In contrast to Bill, Hermann Koller derives theoros from an
original religious meaning, "official representative of a city at a festival"-with
the meaning "spectator" coming only later.26
21. Dougherty 7.
22. Koller 279 notes that a sacrifice carried out at home (e.g. during wartime, at Thuc. 5.50.25)
was referred to as thusia, or "sacrifice," never as theoria. Cf. Rutherford 1995: 276: "visiting a
sanctuary in one's home-town would not normally count."
23. Rutherford 1998: 132. Incidentally, Rutherford has suggested that the popularity of the6ria
as a theme in early Greek drama, with the chorus representing a group of pilgrims or the6roi,
may suggest that dramatic performances were a substitute theoria for those unable to make a real
pilgrimage themselves (Rutherford 1998: 135-53, esp. 135, 140)-a partial aetiology for Goldhill's
the6ria within the city?
24. Bill 196; for a similar schema, see Boesch 4-7. Michel (Daremberg-Saglio, s.v. Theoroi)
gives a thorough account of the different meanings.
25. Bill 198; cf. the hypothesis of Boesch 4-7: a broadening from visual-secular (spectator)
to visual-religious (official spectator) to nonvisual-religious (oracle messenger, festival announcer,
magistrate).
26. Koller 276-79. On the dilemma, see Chantraine, s.v. Ouopog.

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Yet all modern linguistic accounts have had to acknowledge that both
mologies are entertained in the Greek tradition,27 and the most persuasive acco
of the meaning of theoria have invoked a Greek conception of "religious s
cle" or "sacred tourism"28 that blends spectacle and religion equally in a
concept; the precise historical origin is thus counted less important than
blended meaning.29
Both the visual and religious elements of theoria will play an important
in our understanding of the Solon narrative (as also for applications of
such as in philosophy30). In addition, however, we must consider the secon
of the word theoros-an element whose importance has been largely negl
in the modern literature, but whose meaning persists in the various applic
and derivations of the term.
The suffix -dros is generally agreed to derive from -(f)opo` (cognate
opo&x, "see"), suggesting the meaning "one who sees," which in modern g
of the6ros tends to be applied straightforwardly to yield the meaning "one wh
a spectacle" or mutatis mutandis "one who sees sacred things."3" A comp
with other words formed from the same suffix, however, reveals a much
specific role than "one who sees." Among these analogs are: aktoros "coastg
huloros "forester, ranger," phruktoros "one who watches on a height to make
signals," puloros "gatekeeper, porter," skeuotros (Cratinus fr. 170 K.-A., g
as skeuophulax by Pollux 10.16) "storekeeper, equipment-guardian," teme
"4guardian of a sacred precinct," and thuroros "doorkeeper."32 These ex
demonstrate clearly that the nature of the role is not simply "one who see
"one who watches over, guards."33 In addition, the guardian role implies a
of duty or office that in addition to guarding one thing preserves the integrit
some second thing, some sphere or institution; for example, the doorkeep
guarding the door, preserves the house; and the fire-signal watcher, in wa
for fire, preserves the chain of communication. The local site of this preserva
role, i.e. the object guarded, is generally a point of potential transfer-su
a door, movable equipment, or the edge of a sacred precinct. This sense
27. On the ancient etymologies, see Rausch 15-18; Boesch 1 with n. 1; cf. Buck 444
ancients associated the title with Os'6 and Odax. Cf. Harpocration (pp. 154f. Dindorf)
IEV?oL ou Qut6ov ol OsotTt, &XX& xai ol ?i5 6EOU; :sp60.tw0t, xct 6X(0
osict (puX6TBoTV-Ct T6 -v QLWv ?ppovtLCov-otq ouw, 6vo`totov .... I now believe
not actually derived from the stem of 6Ot;, a very early popular association with it is th
probable explanation of the form of the title."
28. The latter translation is the suggestion of Rutherford 1998: 135.
29. Cf. Rausch 14-15, 26-47; Rutherford 1995: 277: "It is important to realise that c
plating the sights was itself regarded as a sacred activity."
30. Albert reviews some of the literature on philosophic conceptions of the6ria and th
rience of wonder.
3 1. Chantraine, s.v. Oswpoq; Nagy 1990b: 164.
32. These and further parallels are given by Koller 273-75.
33. Cf. Pokorny, vol.l: 1164.

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310 CLASSICAL ANTIQUITY Volume 19/ No. 2 / October 2000
-oros role can be tested in the case of a new and ironic formation to which we
are witness: Pherecydes is said to have claimed that the term thuoros (literally,
"one who guards sacrificial offerings"-a novel blend of theoros and thuroros,
using thue?, "sacrifice") is the term that the gods use to refer to "table."34 In this
instance the -oros role is given to an inanimate object: it denotes "table" through
signifying the medium (or intermediary) that conveys the sacrificial offerings,
and in a sense guards them, in a ritual setting-where clearly the integrity of the
transfer between mortals and gods is to be preserved.
This semantic profile of the suffix -oros invites us to consider the sense in
which the theoros also serves such a role. That is, it suggests that a theoros is
a guardian who, in addition to guarding some object (viz. a spectacle and/or
religious object), preserves the integrity of some sphere or institution. As to
determining the sphere or institution whose integrity the theoros preserves in
his role as guardian, the answer appears to be the city. The theoros, even as a
"sightseer" embarked on a private and secular theoria, is always in some sense
the city's representative.35 Rutherford has suggested that the journey of theoroi
is a transition from "local space" to "panhellenic space," and that their role is
"to assert the voice of their own polis in the panhellenic community."36 (This
representative aspect of the the6ria is common to all the different applications
of theoros listed by Bill.) Likewise, instances of the "theoric crisis," a common
theme in myth and historical narrative, expose the absence of the theoros as a
period of vulnerability for both theoros and the home polis, resolved only on the
completion of the journey.37
This political role of the theoros allows us to challenge the claim of Bruno
Snell that in contrast to the attitudinal Homeric verbs of seeing such as derkesthai,
meaning "to look with a specific expression," the verb theorein "does not reflect
an attitude nor an emotion linked with the sight, nor the viewing of a particular
object; instead it represents an intensification of the normal and essential function
of the eyes."38 This claim is undermined by both the religious and the political
elements of theoric vision. Snell apparently took the essentialism of theorein as
a defining feature of Solon's the6ria, which he elsewhere calls the first realization
of a scientific ideal of objectivity: unlike Hippocratics or historians, whose
activity is always a praxis, Solon is viewed as concerning himself more with
34. D.L. 1.119: EXEE otL Ol OEO'L IV ITPZCeaV Ou&pOv XOtXOlV.

35. For example, Bill 200-201 discusses the the6ria of Alcibiades at Olympia (Thuc. 6.16.2),
which is technically private but produces fame for the city. Likewise, although Herodotus explicitly
states at 1.59.1 that Hippocrates is on his theoria at Olympia in a private capacity (6OvtL 'L&lWTy
O (l 06 pEOVTL T' 'OX6I7TlX), the omen he sees while sacrificing, warning him against having a
son, has civic relevance since his son turns out to be the tyrant Peisistratus. Cf. Redfield 99: The
Greek traveler, in his acceptance of the role of foreigner, "shows himself comfortable with his own
culture."
36. Rutherford 1995: 276.
37. For a useful typology of theoric crises, see Rutherford 1995: 278-92.
38. Snell 1953: 2-4; quote from p. 4.

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first principles (archai) than with accomplishing any specific end (telos).3
James Redfield makes clear, however, even if the Greek tourist on a theo
does not actively participate in the places he visits, his observations are a
concerned with the comparison of nomoi and with the goal of strengthen
the nomoi of his own city.40 I hope to demonstrate how Solon's theoria h
an end just like any other goal-directed act and to show the specific w
which it serves the end of the city. In section 3 I will show how features
theoria allow Solon to establish his laws as a pseudo-oracular discours
as a purification of the city, appealing to comparative evidence from pass
in Theognis and Plato. In the meantime, however, we shall approach S
theoria negatively, through the extreme misconceptions of Croesus, the
of Lydia.
2. THE VIEW FROM SARDIS

Our oldest account of Solon's departure from Athens occurs as Herodotus
narrates Croesus' illustrious and ill-fated career:
When ... Sardis was at the height of her wealth and prosperity, all the great
Greek sages (aocpYaLcL) of that epoch, one after another, paid visits to the
capital. Much the most distinguished of them was Solon the Athenian,
who had made laws for the Athenians at their request and gone away for
ten years, giving theoria as the reason for his departure (xaxt Oe (3pLr
Tcpyo(xaLv), his real purpose being to avoid being compelled to repeal
any of the laws he had made. For the Athenians were not able to do this
themselves, because they were constrained by great oaths to use for ten
years the laws Solon gave them. For this reason, then, and for the sake
of theoria (auxcv 6t xv toU`tv x(XL -ti-; 6EspiWLr Ex8 np'ac,U 6o EoXwv
ElVExEv), Solon left home and after a visit to the court of Amasis in Egypt
he went to Sardis to see Croesus.
(Herodotus 1.29-30. 1)
When Solon arrives at Sardis, Croesus' words to him will reveal that he has
heard of the specific reason Solon gave the Athenians for leaving, "for the sake
of theoria"-a reason which Herodotus makes prominent in the passage just
cited by repetition and an unusual word order (Cti OE6pLLs Ex xMaaq o 6oZXv
EZLvEx?v). And it becomes clear that Croesus' understanding of this phrase has had
an influence on the way in which he treats and speaks to Solon, with a heavy
emphasis on the dynamics of travel, seeing, and quantity:
[Solon] was entertained hospitably by Croesus in the palace, and three

or four days after his arrival, on Croesus' instruction, some servants
39. Snell 1975: 277-78.

40. Redfield 99, 102, 117.

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took him on a tour of the treasuries and made a show of everything being
great and prosperous (Mipi#yov xro&c tOUC5 63c0xupou% xcd EfsVLxuCXUV
ot&vto6 yXov xo&. ?X4 LC). When Solon had seen and examined
everything as opportunity allowed (Oro&Vir)vo'V ... xocL axEo6uE\vov),
Croesus said: "Well, Athenian guest, much talk has reached me about
your wisdom (Xoyog &cxntXVL ioX)OX6;), and about how you have come
for the sake of the6ria pursuing knowledge over much of the earth (X5
yrXoaocEpv ygv TzoXX v GOEpLs EZ'1VEVxE EX'XuGOca). And now a
desire has come to me to ask you a question (IsEpo; ... VoL ErnX6E):
who is the happiest man you have ever seen (Ft68E)?" The point of the
question was that Croesus supposed himself to be the happiest of men.
(Herodotus 1.30.1-3)
Croesus' words reveal that he thinks of Solon's theoria as a type of intellectual

sightseeing, in which he expects his own wealth to feature as the crowning
spectacle. He figures that the way in which Solon's reputation and Solon himself
have "come" (&aTXT-R, CE' Xu6oq;) is the same way in which his own desire to
ask the question has "come" upon him (EtiwXOs). He also figures that the greatness
of Solon's reputation (X6yo; noXX6O') and of the earth over which he has traveled
(yijv itoXv) have met their match in his own great wealth (cf. VE:y&XC( TE
XOCt 60)4 Cc). Thus he expects there to be a perfect affinity between Solon's gaze
(0qa0'tV&lvov) and the object presented to his gaze, the treasuries (OvYotupou'q).
In giving Solon a guided tour of the treasuries Croesus thinks he is providing him
with the ultimate theoria.
But Solon's response suggests that Croesus has got theoria wrong:
Solon, however, refused to flatter, and answered in strict accordance with

his view of the truth (Xx 6OVTl Xp CIsEVo4). "0 king," he said, "Tellos
the Athenian." Croesus was amazed (&Xo6&[I&Gocr), and he asked sharply,
"How do you judge Tellos to be the happiest?"
Solon's criterion turns out to be not the treasuries of Croesus that he saw,
but a different criterion that closely doubles it: not "everything being great and
prosperous" (nivTot ?6vTc VEY(ixct TE xOCL 64XpLa), but instead a truth construed
minimally as genuine "being" (-Xx E6VTL), and also the "many prosperous things"
(noXX& TE xcL O)43 tL, 1.31.1) that he will proceed to relate from the life of Tellos.
Thus Solon opposes to Croesus' treasuries a treasury of his own: an abundance of
advice and wisdom. Solon's refusal to succumb, and Croesus' amazed response,
signal an inversion of Croesus' understanding of the theoria.
In another version of the same story we are even told that on this occasion
Croesus dressed himself in dyed raiment, precious stones, and gold "so that he
might present a most august and dazzling spectacle" to Solon (60 8t 0gctice
GEVVOI6-wLTOV O0YELv XaL 7rotlxX6tc-rXoV, Plut. Solon 27.2). But as we have seen, in

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response to Solon's reference to Tellos of Athens Croesus becomes the s

the object, of wonder.4' And when he conceives a hope of re-entering t
and at least taking second prize (6utsEup6a y6v OYCjscOMx, 1.31.1), h
only overlooked once more but must himself gaze upon not one but tw
up, Kleobis and Biton, whom Solon introduces as long-standing "priz
(&EOXaYpO6l, 1.31.2). These two young brothers from Argos gained
as a result of having drawn their mother's wagon a distance of 45 stad
she could reach the festival of Hera:
After this exploit, which was witnessed by the assembled crow

(O6k0sLl UnO T6 g M V(YUplO), they had a most enviable death ....
kept crowding round them and admired their strength (EycaXp#Lo
[Their mother] prayed the goddess Hera, before whose shrine she s
to grant Kleobis and Biton, who had brought her such honor, the great
blessing that can fall to mortal man. After her prayer came the ceremo
of sacrifice and feasting; and the two young men, when all was over
asleep in the temple-and that was the end of them, for they never
again....
Here the context of the festival42 and the crowd of spectators desc
Solon simply intensify Croesus' displacement from the role of object o
Ironically, he will only play this role at his own miserable end as a vic
rescued from sacrifice, when king Cyrus and the other Persians take off h
stand in a circle, and "look upon him in amazement" (&i'ne0XOVE
1.88.1).
Already the experience of Croesus has allowed us to see that it is a mistake
to view Solon's theoria as the tour of an impressionable sightseer. Clearly the
theoria is informed by the resistance Solon shows to Croesus' large-scale visual
seductions. But what is the valency of this resistance? In addition to turning
Croesus into a reluctant spectator of Tellos and Kleobis and Biton, Solon follows
this up with the explicit moral advice that Croesus should "look to the end of
everything, how it turns out" (axoiEtlV ... navt65 XpX-roq Tflv TXEEUT-rV, Xn
onopv'rETM, 1.32.9; cf. 1.33.1)-a criterion that finds his Greek exemplars to be
truly happy, but alerts Croesus instead to the huge number of days in an average
human life, on any one of which he could lose his wealth (1.32.2-4). Leslie Kurke
has argued convincingly that this moral doctrine of the end, in its connection with
Solon's examples in which Tellos and Kleobis and Biton receive civic commem
41. An opposite inversion of the6ria takes place in Euripides' Bacchae (Pentheus "was seen
rather than seeing the maenads," WpyOr 8e 1&Xov ) XOTE36 pIltv&6ok, 1075) in the reading of
Rutherford 1998: 148-50: "having gone out to a theoria, Pentheus becomes an object of the gaze
of other people" (p. 150).
42. On the association of theoric seeing with festivals, see Rausch 27-37; Rutherford 1995:
276-77.

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oration after their deaths, is further associated with the ideology of the Greek
polis in opposition to the elitist paradigm of gift-exchange: ultimately Solon's
moral doctrine here serves a discourse in which the polis constitutes itself as "the
final instance."43 Given this political use of the doctrine of the end, the question
arises whether Solon's the6ria also does not belong to the project of constituting
the finality of the polis-there being some significant connection between the
construction of democracy and Solon's departure for the sake of theoria.
Certainly it is easy to observe a loose connection between Solon's theoria and
his identity as a civic legislator." His encounters with two other monarchs during
his journey, Amasis in Egypt (Hdt. 2.177-78) and Philocyprus in Cyprus (Hdt.
5.113; cf. Plut. Solon 26.2-4), go more smoothly than his meeting with Croesus,
and in both cases Solon's identity as a lawgiver plays a prominent role in their
happy interaction. Here Solon's theoria could be understood as a legislative "fact
finding tour," to the extent that he borrows a law from Amasis (even if his Athenian
laws are already in place), and perhaps also as a legislative "consultancy," to the
extent that he imprints both his name and his laws on Philocyprus' new city
named Soli. Likewise, the status of Solon's the6ria as a specifically Greek and
civic institution can be inferred from the case of Anacharsis the Scythian, who
Herodotus says, in a clear echo of 1.29, "had traversed much of the world on
a theoria and throughout this had given evidence of his great wisdom" (yI,v
KZOXXV 6p6w c'G xc X &X ZO6etn E voc, t' axU`v aoqLrnv izoXX'v, 4.76.2). In
brief, Anacharsis' return to Scythia, in which he is observed by the Scythian king
Saulius performing a night festival in honor of the (to Saulius' eyes) Greek Mother
of the Gods (4.76.4-6), results in his death precisely because he imports Greek
knowledge into Scythia, the antitype of the polis.45 As we shall see, however,
the connection between Solon's legislation and his the6ria is more systematic.
In section 3 this connection will be presented in detail; in the meantime, however,
it will be instructive to return to Croesus' misconstrual of the the6ria and trace
it one step further.
Solon's advice to "look to the end" has not the least effect on Croesus,
and Croesus ends his hospitality and "sends him on his way" (oU`E Xo6you VLV
43. Kurke 1999: 146-51; quote from p. 157. Note the implicit contrast between democratic and
Lydian ideologies in terms of time and telos. Croesus thinks his "present things" (Totpeo6vTc, 1.33)
determine his happiness, while Solon seeks to demonstrate that this conception is itself dependent on
(unreliable) future continuance. As a complement to this paradox, Solon asserts the importance of
the end, yet implies that the city ensures finality at every present moment; and although the wealthy
man is "better equipped to put an end to his appetite" (EKl7OU[lAV X-CEXE'acL, 1.32.6), his reliance
on wealth to do this itself exposes his lack of finality. On "presentist and localist" space-time as
"the key to explaining Athenian male egalitarianism and democracy," see Morris 129-30.
44. Cf. Redfield 17: "Solon was both tourist and lawgiver; the two roles are evidently not
unconnected."
45. For Scythian space as the antitype of the Greek polis, see Hartog. Kindstrand 28 suggests
that Herodotus depicts Anacharsis "almost as a martyr for Greek civilization;" this is made especially
clear by the connection between Anacharsis' theoria and Scyles' "affair" with the polis (cf. Martin
1996: 140). For a fuller and more nuanced account of Anacharsis' return, see Martin 1996.

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0LGaVE'VO oC8v0q aZOTITtEtXat, 1.33). Soon after dismissing Solon, he

ceeds to consult Greek oracles about whether or not he should attack Pers
Croesus' consultation of the oracles is significant given the association of
with theoros, which as we saw above can refer to a Greek oracular messe
The oracular sense seems especially relevant for understanding Solon's t
since Croesus' encounters with the oracles mimic his encounter with So
asks loaded questions about himself (e.g. what is the Lydian king doing
exact moment? 1.47.1); he dismisses an unwelcome answer ("None had th
effect on him except the one ... from Delphi," x&xv `v 6t o8Ev pVTEOMlETO P
1.48.1); and just as he had heard from Solon about the single unfortunate
would take to dispossess a rich man of his wealth, he is warned by the
oracle that his mute son will speak for the first time only on an "unhap
(UIOXCL .. O. v6X3y, 1.85.2). Thus Croesus misconstrues the oracles in pr
the same way as he misconstrues Solon. The fact that the conclusion of th
lar narrative coincides with the epiphany or proper " coming" of Solon's d
(ainos) to Croesus (EasEX6Ev . .. .tO ToOU ZXvo9, 1.86.3),47 suggests that
theoria has a special relevance according to the religious meaning of theo
" oracular messenger."48 A similar conclusion can be drawn from Croes
counter with another famous Athenian traveler, Alcmeon, who in contra
Solon gratifies Croesus' desire for admiration to such an extent that he is
much gold-dust as he can carry, and even stuffs some into his mouth (6.1
Because Alcmeon has earned this reward through his aggressive promot
Croesus' interests at the Delphic oracle (6.125.2), Croesus can be seen as m
impositions on a "theoric" body49 -just as the aristocrat Alcmeon appears
compromised a Delphic theoria in order to gain friendship with Croesus.
3. THE VIEW FROM ATHENS

Herodotus' narrative suggests that there are political and religious dim
of Solon's theoria beyond the misconceptions of Croesus. These dimension
emerge more clearly if we re-examine Solon's departure from Athens a
terms in which it is represented. The first problem we face in Herodotus' nar
of this event is the apparent distinction between Solon's "real purpose" (NVa 8
leaving Athens, namely "to avoid being compelled to repeal any of the laws h
46. One celebrated theoros of this type is Laius the father of Oedipus, who goes on a
never to return (Soph. OT 114). Herodotus does not use the term the6ros in the Croesus
but this is easily explained by the fact that his messengers are not Greek.
47. Cf. Kurke 1999: 157-60.
48. Cf. Nagy 1990b: 164: "In this relationship, where the god of inspiration semainei 'in
to the theoros the inner vision of the poetry, we see the hermeneutic model for the process of
and decoding the ainos."
49. The theoric element supplements the reading of Kurke 1999: 143-46, who conclude
this passage "Herodotus maps the effects of Eastern gift exchange on the male citizen bod
from p. 143).

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made," and the "given reason" for his departure, "for the sake of theoria," which is
referred to with the ambiguous term prophasis.50 If Solon's theoria is, as I claim,
systematically connected to his role as lawgiver, Herodotus' representation of it
as if it were somehow a distraction from his real motive appears to be a problem.
The Ath.Pol. tells the story of Solon's departure with some differences from
Herodotus. For example, it represents Solon as wanting to avoid interpreting his
laws-not, as Herodotus states, to avoid changing them. The significant difference
for our purposes, however, is that this version does not imply that "theoria" is
meant to conceal the real reason. After introducing the laws, Solon
made a journey to Egypt for trade and also theoria (xaT' 4trcopta v a4tlc
xci Oewp'Lov), saying that he would not be back for ten years; for [he said]
he did not think (ou y&'p oYesa0c) that it was just for him to remain present
and interpret the laws (touy vo6pouq syEtO6CL 7totpLv) but rather for
each to do what was written (Excacyov Ta yEypaippva 7ZOlSV).
([Aristotle] Ath.Pol. 11.1)
In this version Solon publicly presents his ten-year absence as a solution to the fact
that it would be unjust for him to stay and explain his laws. The passage prompts
us either to discount or to reassess Herodotus' apparent implication that Solon
concealed his "real reason" for departure (to avoid changing the laws) behind
a " given reason" or prophasis (theoria). Herodotus' term prophasis should not
be taken to imply that Solon was hiding the other reason or that the theoria was
a sham excuse:5" most plausibly, Solon is equally frank about both his reason
for departure (theoria) and its justification (to avoid changing or explaining the
laws). The advantage of this interpretation is that it invites us to think how, in
the eyes of his Athenian audience, Solon's absence qua theoria may contribute
in a principled way to his avoidance of changing or explaining the laws. Indeed
some scholars have plausibly claimed that the Ath.Pol. account (here with indirect
speech, cf. OcEGOML) is based on a lost poem in which Solon set forth the reasons
for his departure: Hermann Koller, for instance, suggested that in the lost poem
Solon requested official permission for a state theoria to travel as an ambassador
to festivals and religious sites.52 The proponents of the lost-poem hypothesis,
however, have still not sought to explain theoria as relevant to Solon's legislation
in any significant way, but rather as a handy excuse for getting away.53
50. For an interpretation that distinguishes in this way between a concealed real purpose and the
reason given, see Nagy 1990b: 167n. 93: "So there are two motives, but only one is made explicit by
Solon to his audience; the other motive is kept implicit by Solon but made explicit by Herodotus
to his audience."
51. Cf. How and Wells, ad loc.: prophasis "includes the real as well as the ostensible cause."
52. Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, vol.1: 15-16 with n. 22 (who suggests that frs. 5 and 7 West
both belong to this poem); Linforth 298; Koller 281; Rhodes 170.
53. Cf. Koller 281: "only in an official capacity would [Solon] have been able to release himself
from his prior activity at that critical moment."

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Several elements of theoria, however, make it an especially suitable sol

to the legislative problem. I will discuss these elements one by one, focusi
each case on their role in conditioning the reception of Solon's laws in A
As will become evident, these elements of theoria are suitable not so mu
representing Solon's experiences on his travels, as for representing the e
Solon has on Athens by being absent as a the6ros.
(I) NEITHER ADDING NOR SUBTRACTING

In his account of Solon's decision to leave Athens, Plutarch describes
specific problems faced by Solon, the first of which concerns the integrity of
laws:
No sooner were the laws of Solon put into operation than some would
come to him every day with praise or censure of them, or with advice
to insert something into the documents (E'IPXXELv), or take something
out (&pOCLpE:v).
(Plut. Solon 25.4)
This language of insertion and subtraction, here applied to the written form of
Solon's laws, closely resembles our earliest characterization of the6ros referring
to an oracular messenger, in some verses of Theognis:
T6poVU xii. comqiy xcl yvW[IovoS Wv8pa 6s&)pov

0E06uEpov Xg KE)v Ev KupvE YuXc(G6 PE:vov,
(L,ALVL XEV HuO&AVi OsO XPc3 C X ' LE'pEL
OVpYV a lVTVL TILOVOS Et (Y c6UTOU
OUTe TL y'xp OpO6L OU68V X' 'TL (P(PtIxov EUpOLq,
oUO 49pgXV izpo\ OE6V &k XclxL(rV ZTpOpU5yoL.
(Theognis 805-10 West)
A man who is theoros must be more straight, Kyrnos, being on his guard,
than a carpenter's pin and rule and square
-a man to whom the priestess of the god at Delphi
makes a response, as she indicates the Voice from the opulent shrine.
For you would not find any remedy left if you add anything,
nor would you escape from veering,54 in the eyes of the gods, if you
take anything away. (trans. Nagy)
Theognis here invokes the ideal theoros as a model for the poet.55 For Solon the
theoric ideals are central to his role as a just-retired legislator, in particular his
need to preserve the formal integrity of his laws. The laws are thus analogous to
54. The Suda identifies the punishment for this crime as "one of the three" (VtJot ftv tpWwV):
"he must be deprived of his eyes, his hand, or his tongue" (Suda, s.v. tot cp(ot; cited by Nagy 1990b:
164).
55. On the theoros role as a model for poetry and lawgiving, see Nagy 1990b: 164-67.

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the sacred utterances of an oracle, except that it is Solon himself who has uttered
them.56
Solon's poems also place great emphasis on the "straight justice" (sC066av ...
Li'Xv, fr. 36.19 West) constituted by his laws, which puts him even closer to the
Theognidean the6ros. By departing from Athens on a theoria, Solon performs
his desire not to add to or subtract from his laws. We can plausibly see this as
enacting the guardian-like ideal of a theoros to deliver a text to the city without
interfering with its form.57
(II) NOT INTERPRETING

The second problem faced by Solon relates to the interpretation of the laws.
Plutarch says, following on from the passage quoted above:
Very numerous, too, were those who came to him with inquiries and
questions about them, urging him to teach and make clear (Ex6i66axELv
xcL yaopyvCE:Lv) to them the meaning and purpose of each several item.
He saw that to do this would be out of place (oito7cov) and not to do it
would bring odium upon him (E(Tp60ovov) ....
(Plut. Solon 25.4)
This reluctance of Solon to explain his laws, like his reluctance to add or subtract,
resembles the duty of the theoros to convey an oracle to the city without himself
acting as its interpreter. Just as the god whose oracle is at Delphi "neither says, nor
conceals, but gives a sign" (Heraclitus B93 DK), so too Solon the lawgiver thinks
it would be out of place (Q`oizov) for him to explain his laws beyond their existing
written form. Some sources, we are told, say that "his laws were obscurely and
ambiguously worded on purpose to enhance the power of the popular courts"-the
same courts to which Solon had recently admitted the common people as jurors
(Plut. Solon 18.2-3).58
56. The indirect Delphic associations of the lawcode include Solon's initial advice from the
oracle to proceed with the role of lawgiver: "Take thy seat in the middle of the ship, the pilot's
task is yours" (Plut. Solon 14.4); after introducing the laws, also, Solon requires the thesmothetai,
"guardians of the statutes," to swear an oath that if they transgress any of the laws they will dedicate
at Delphi "a golden statue of commensurate worth" (Plut. Solon 25.2).
57. "Neither adding nor subtracting" also characterizes Solon in at least two other instances:
according to Plutarch, the Athenians deny as "idle gossip" the claim made by other sources that
Solon inserted a verse (E,ut3aoXvxa ... Enor) into Homer's Catalogue of Ships in Iliad 2 and read
it out as proof of a long-standing alliance between Athens and Salamis (Plut. Solon 10.1-2); also, in
a poem Solon says that he didn't take away from the people's honor or reach after more (:Lv,5 ou'
y(pEX&v ocu' bcopEio&Quvos, fr. 5.2 West). This virtue of neither adding nor subtracting appears
also to have characterized the role of early Greek histores, according to Dionysius of Halicarnassus
([ts 7poott6vtsc ... 4Ktm iypapoi3vrEc, On Thucydides 5.3).
58. The writer of the Ath.Pol. regards a democratic motive as anachronistic; but the alternative
explanation offered, that the good cannot be presented in simple form, produces the same outcome:
the interpreters of the law must decide (9.2).

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This outcome apparently intended by Solon, with the ambigui

laws requiring that disputes be resolved through juridical debate, re
further convention in the reception of oracles that is due likewise t
scure and enigmatic form. In Herodotus' account of the "wooden wal
from Delphi which the Athenian the6propoi (the Ionic term corresp
theoroi) write down, take home, and report to the people, a variety o
ing opinions (yv6VaL) are put forward by both specialists (XpVOMX6
nonspecialists, until finally the Athenians judge Themistocles' explan
the oracle "preferable to that of the professional interpreters," and t
ate Athens and take refuge in the "wooden walls" of their ships in a
with his interpretation (Hdt. 7.142-143.3). This debate over the m
an obscure oracle in Athens is very close to the process that the a
Solonian laws appear to set in motion. Solon's identity as a theoro
apart from this process as soon as he has delivered the laws, just as a
lar theoros does no more than convey the god's utterance to the peo
its obscurity.
The two elements of theoria we have considered so far are not models for
Solon's departure as such: for the oracular theoros it is his arrival back in the city
from the oracle, rather than his departure, that is important. The similarity lies in
the fact that at the precise moment of his refusal to add, subtract, or interpret,
Solon represents himself in the role of the theoros, the one person whose ideal
is to avoid just these actions. This treats his laws retrospectively as if they had
always been oracles. Indeed according to one account it was the Delphic oracle
that had told Solon to take on the role of lawgiver in the first place, saying:
"Seat yourself amidships and direct the task of steering" (Plut. Solon 14.6). To
this extent Solon's laws, like the laws of Lycurgus in Sparta, possess Delphic
authority. In contrast, the next two elements of theoria are concerned with the
dynamics of theoric departure.
(III) A FREEZE ON CIVIC TRANSACTIONS

Another pair of connections between Solon's performance as a lawgiver and
the domain of theoria becomes evident when we consider the restrictions placed
on the city of Athens during the theoria sent each year to the island of Delos.59
This theoria does not involve the consultation of oracles, but the performance
of religious rites on behalf of the city. At the beginning of Plato's Phaedo the
restrictions on the city are described, because they are the reason why Socrates'
execution is delayed:
59. On this the6ria, see Ziehen 1934: 2230-31. On restrictions applying to theoriai additional
to those discussed here, see Rutherford 1995. Cf. also Solon's own law against speaking ill (Xocxx&x
XEyEtv) of other people in temples, at the lawcourts, in public office, and "during a theoria at the
games" (OE6pL?ci o0ar; &yxv,v, Plut. Solon 21.2).

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Phaedo: "They have a law (v6,uo; scttv al-coq) that as soon as the theoria
begins the city must be kept pure (xCa06peVslV T(v c6Xlv), and no public
executions may take place (8Pr0oalcx Vlva c 7T0XTELVUVcXL) until the ship
has reached Delos and returned again...
(Plato Phaedo 58bc)
The Delos custom, a nomos that must be preserved by the collectivity of the
Athenians, is an example of a more general convention of theoriai: as Rutherford
notes, "the period during which a theoria was absent was one of extreme religious
observance in the home polis, a period sometimes called a hieromenia"-on the
assumption that this would safeguard the absent theoroi and their mission. Both
the elements mentioned in the Phaedo passage-the freeze on executions, and
purification of the city-correspond to elements in the Solon narrative. First, we
are told that the Athenians "were constrained by great oaths to use for ten years
the laws Solon gave them" (Hdt. 1.29.2), and that Solon's theoria also was to last
for ten years. The Athenians thus effectively swear that none of Solon's laws will
be changed until he returns from his theoria.60 It appears that both the frozen state
of Athens during the Delos theoria and its frozen state during the theoria of Solon
are cases of one and the same religious convention.
(IV) PURIFICATION
The second stipulation of the Delos theoria, that the city of Athens be kept
pure throughout its duration, also has a correlate in the Solonian legislative act.
We are told by Plutarch that at some time before Solon's archonship the mystic
Epimenides of Crete was summoned to Athens in order to purify the city of the
pollution (ocyr, liiCcVot) left by the Cylonian affair (Plut. Solon 12).61 Plutarch also
says that by purifying the city Epimenides "paved the way for Solon's legislation"
(npo8o7toLnTEv al-T6 vo0o6Eaiotg, 12.4). The purificatory rites he carries
out (iLXcx,oL, xcxOotp,uoL, 12.5) are closely associated with Solon's legislation,
since some of the things Epimenides does, such as making the Athenians "milder
in their rites of mourning" (12.5), correspond to the content of specific Solonian
laws (in this case his restrictions on funerary practices, 21.4-5). The connection
between these two civic processes is evident also in Solon's letter to Epimenides
preserved by Diogenes Laertius (D.L. 1.64-66) where the lawgiver laments the
ultimate failure of his legislation, remarking that neither religion (6o 666ov) nor
lawgivers (o'l VOV06EIXL) are sufficient on their own to benefit cities. In addition to
this association between theoria and purification of the city, we may note a further
aspect of theoria which makes it a suitable accompaniment to laws designed to
put an end to stasis: as Rutherford has noted, theoria is repeatedly associated with
60. Rutherford 1995: 277-78.

61. Cf. Vernant 1982: 76-80.

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peace and harmonious reciprocity.62 Thus any stasis that might erupt t
alteration of Solon's laws, to the extent that it disrupts peace, is also
disruption of Solon's theoria.
These four elements of theoria, then, serve as important models f

theoria of Solon: the first two elements, the ideals of the oracular theo
as a model for Solon's refusal to add, subtract, or interpret; the secon
civic restrictions that ensue from the departure of the Delos theoria,
model for Solon's departure and the restrictions it imposes on the city.
But why does Solon say he will be away for ten years?63 Although
says to Socrates that the Delos theoria "sometimes takes a long time, if the
winds which hold [the ship] back" (Phaedo 58b), there are not many day
Socrates' trial and his death. Solon's theoria is much longer, in the ord
"long-term" theoriai which Aristotle says were once granted in arch
The ten-year term, which Solon apparently thought would be long enou
Athenians to "get used to the laws" (ToiG Vo;OlS . .. .uv O1V t, Plut. Sol
significant, since it is the same as the standard term of ostracism, an institu
a similar aim to Solon's self-exile. One of ostracism's most distinctive d
that it removes a voice from the political sphere of the city: "Did not t
[Cimon] served ostracize him, that they might not hear his voice for t
(Plato Gorgias 516d). This is precisely the motive of Solon who, as we
seeks to ensure that his voice will be absent from the political sphere.
the earliest ostracism was probably in 508/7 BC, we are told that Theo
identified Theseus, who was much earlier than Solon, as the first Athe
ostracized.65 Thus it is not surprising to find the dynamics of ostracis
the narrative on Solon's absence also. The ten-year exile, however, al
history in early Greek myth and poetry:' for example, in Hesiod's Th
god who breaks an oath after swearing by the Styx is banished for ni
returning in the tenth (Theog. 793-804); and the hero of the Odyssey
62. On theoria and peace, see Rutherford 1998: 141-45, 1995: 279.
63. Cf. Ath.Pol. 11.1, Plut. Solon 25.5, Hdt. 1.29.1. Note that Plutarch (25.1) and the
(7.2) also state that the laws were initially established for 100 years; in Herodotus no p
than ten years is mentioned (see the comments of Manfredini and Piccirilli 254-55).
64. Aristotle tells us that the office of the6ria was once a source of tyrants bec
times the demoi used to appoint popular officials and sacred embassies for long terms of
Y&p kpXto?v Ol 6ipOl xt6La(TT0aacv zToXuXpoV'Lou; 7t; 8Y) tLoUpY(Otr xcti TX
Politics 13 10b20-22). Although this appears to mean that the office of theoria was longer
it is not clear in what cities this was the case (cf. Newman 1902 ad loc.). Koller 281 use
comment as evidence that Solon (ironically) was exploiting the long-term tenure of th
a way to avoid political involvement. Delcourt 69 interestingly suggests that tyrants e
office of theoros by manipulating oracles as a means of government.
65. Cf. Suda, s.v. &p)(x ExupLot, cited by Reinmuth.
66. I thank an anonymous reader for Classical Antiquity for this observation. S
13-14, 17, 35 on the numerous instances where the number nine serves "to express a ti
completion, the tenth day or the tenth year, a decisive event will occur" (p. 13).

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he was among the Egyptians and Phoenicians for nine years (Od. 14.285-95),
while the real time of his absence from Ithaca amounts to twice ten years. Solon
creatively blends this tradition on exile with the dynamics of a specifically theoric
absence. In the following section we shall consider how the removal of Solon
and his voice operates as a founding gesture of the Athenian political sphere.
4. THE END IN THE MIDDLE

Having identified the theoric elements of Solon's departure, we are in a
position to consider what these elements contribute to the process by which, as
Svenbro represents it, the nomos becomes basileus. In fact, the two pairs of
elements considered above-the ideals of the oracular theoros (= (i) and (ii)), and
the civic restrictions during the Delos theoria (= (iii) and (iv))-already allow
us to see the two basic gestures of this process. The two gestures can be stated
concisely as first the constitution of a middle zone occupied by the medium of
law, and second the ideological closure of the city at and as this middle.
A MIDDLE ZONE OCCUPIED BY LAW (cf. (i) and (ii) above)

One of the first things we learn about Solon is that he occupies a middle
position in society, being the son of Execestides, "a man middle in his wealth
and influence in the city" (&ov8p6; o0o(CX ... xOCt 'Lv&iVkL VEiGOU Txv o0XtT(6v.
Plut. Solon 1.1; cf. 16.2; Ath.Pol.5.3).67 This middleness becomes emblematic
of Solon's political discourse, such as in the advice he gives in one of his
poems to those with an excessive desire for wealth, to whom he says: "Set
your great mind on the mean" (6v pIETpLOLGL TL?oaOE p16ywv VOOV, fr. 4c.3
West; cf. fr. 6.4); and the mean features also in Solon's encounter with Croesus
(Hdt. 1.32.5). In fact, in his mediation between the conflicting parties of the
rich and the demos, Solon represents the preservation of the economic and
moral principle of the mean among the citizens of Athens as depending upon
his own occupation of a middle position between the two parties, distributing
portions to either side and "neither taking away from the people's honor nor
grasping after more" (cf. fr. 5.2 West). During his occupation of the middle
position of the reformer, Solon's restoration of the mean is most tangible in the
repatriation of citizens sold into slavery outside Attica (cf. fr. 36.8-12 West:
Plut. Solon 15.5); in the process he both inscribes the body of the citizen as
an inalienable possession (as reflected in a new law against borrowing against
one's body, cf. Plut. 13.2) and reconstitutes an Athenian linguistic community
through the return of those who when he found them were no longer speaking
67. For an extended account of "middling" ideology, see Morris 114-19, 130-34. Solon's
lineage from the Medontidai (Plut. Solon 1.1) may be consonant with this ideology: as Nagy 1990b:
154n. 41 points out (citing Benveniste), medon signifies two elements: that of authority, and that
of a directing "measure."

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the Attic language (yXcxamxv oUxE&' ATTxX'v / 'Lvta5, fr. 36.11-12 W

This latter construction of the middle as a linguistic community corres
in a general way to the function of Solon's own poetry as a heteroglos
unifying space in which the social conflict is staged; for example, the
explains how in some verses now lost Solon "fights for one group
the other, and quarrels (xlIYaVYLP1yE), then advises them collectively
an end to their present rivalry" (Ath.Pol.5.2; the poem mentioned begi
fr. 4a West).
Solon's eventual departure from the city, however, derives from the
ambiguous nature of the middle position from which he seeks to mediate
and sustain the mean. The ambiguity of the middle position relates to its fun
a source of power which, although it can serve as a site of isonomic disbursem
can easily become tyranny (cf. frs. 32-33 West). Solon's presence at the c
healthy only to the extent that it presupposes his ultimate absence, an
prefigured in his metaphorical representation of himself as "like a boundary
in the no-man's land between the lines" (65arcp Ev E-roLXV&w / gpoq, fr
West)6 -an image that takes on its full ambiguity when brought alongsid
claim that he "pulled up the boundary stones fixed everywhere in the ear
36.5-6 West). Indeed the transformation of Solon's middle position into
inhabited by no man is stipulated in one of his laws, which states that "
who, in time of faction, takes neither side, must lose his citizen rights (
stvWM)" (Plut. Solon 20.1). It is easy to see in this unusual law the expulsion o
lawmaker himself who "pleased neither side" (pacE 8' OUETEpOLr, Plut.
16.1) and instead stood poised in the middle. When Solon says that beca
was defending the poor against the rich he was "turned about like a wolf
a multitude of dogs" (fr. 36.12 West), the image should be read in terms
ambiguous nature of the wolf in Greek thought as consummately isonom
in groups, but as "the mortal enemy of any community" when alone.70 T
logic applies to the Spartan lawgiver Lycurgus, who is an isonomic "wolf-
(XUXoOpyo;, cf. 8VnLto5pyoq) but finally, in his gesture of self-expulsion, "w
off the wolf" (< wergo, cf. Chantraine 1968-1980, s.v. Xuxo;).7` The ison
68. Cf. Morris 113: the political model of the middle, to meson, "provided the valu
made the democracy thinkable."
69. On this "impossible" image and Solon's invention of political space, see Anhalt
and Loraux 1984, esp. 213: "Solon signifies ... that the center must be empty and that he
be it." In her extensive discussion of this phrase, Loraux 210-11 rejects an interpretation
along the lines of oipor, "guardian" (proposed independently by Woodhouse and Wade-Ge
sense, however, would cohere neatly with Solon's identity as a the-6ros in the sense of gu
70. Detienne and Svenbro 1989: 150-52, 155, 157-58, with reference to Aesop Fabl
the wolf as lawgiver upstaged by the ass who reveals that the wolf wants a bigger share
goods for himself; quote from p. 157. Anhalt 125-34 discusses Solon's wolf-simile in great
"Solon's simile recognizes the efficacy of a symbolic 'wolf,' a kind of pharmakos or s
for the promotion of social cohesion" (p. 134).
71. Cf. Nagy 1990a: 272n. 13.

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logic of Solon's laws institutes the necessity of his banishment, and in the end it is
civic discourse, not the archon, that must occupy the middle.72
The operation by which Solon departs from the ambiguous middle and the
laws are left to occupy the central position of the city is authorized above all
by the theoric refusal to add, subtract, or interpret. Solon's refusal licenses the
laws as statutes (Os-lioL) by placing them in the middle to serve as the starting
point of public and juridical debate, performing at the same time the absence of
the potential tyrant from the center. What remains in the middle are the written
texts of the laws themselves located on the acropolis, no longer touched by Solon
and not subject to his interpretation, but inscribed on the axones, wooden tablets
which revolve around a middle axle.73 The Suda tells us that the laws themselves
came to be so closely associated with their medium that they were referred to
as the "axones" (Suda, s.v. E6Xcov). Solon himself is reputed to have said that
"it is silence that puts the seal on speech, and good timing that puts the seal on
silence" (G(pxp0yLo6ctL TV Xoyov LOYn, Tnv be catytv xotLpx, D.L. 1.58), and
indeed it is Solon's theoric silence that gives the laws their formal integrity as
a medium of the city. As we will now see, it is his timely departure that gives
this medium its permanence.
THE END OF THE CITY (cf. (iii) and (iv) above)

Solon places a more long-lasting seal on the laws by freezing the city in the
mode of the Delos theoria, a gesture that requires the city to imagine its laws as
ultimately unchanging and to imagine itself as constituted by these laws. Thus
his departure, together with the projected decade of his absence, amounts to an
ideological closure of the city at and as the middle point. "Ideological closure"
means that the polis already has its realization in the medium of the laws; the
lawgiver's prerogative to add, subtract, and interpret is suspended or terminated.
The city, like the text of the laws, is closed. Indeed the notion that closure emerges
from the middle is evident in a fragment of Solon's verse that articulates the subtle
relation between measure and end:
yV4OuVT; 6' VccVk X0tXE:iTca-O'V EaTL VOncMoL

p1LTPpOV, O 86T 0CVTh)V TC LpOa OUVOV EXEL.
(Solon fr. 16 West)
Most difficult to find is the hidden measure of wisdom,

which alone holds the ends of all.
The couplet represents the measure or mean as constituting (or constituted by)
a special type of knowledge, gnomosune?, that controls all things' end or limit.
72. Cf. fr. 10 West: "A short time will indeed show my madness, it will show [it] when the
truth comes into the middle (oX Eqi s; ISYOV ?PXOVtEVT)."
73. Cf. Stroud 41-44.

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If we envisage the Athenian citizens responding to the "oracular" law

absent Solon through a comparison of their different interpretations,
we perhaps glimpse the production of a juridical mean that controls th
of the city. Solon's theoric departure, then, serves as the perfect con
to his teleiotate arche74-a phrase that denotes Solon's "supremely
archonship" by signifying it as the "most ended" of beginnings.
Thus, for example, in the encounter with Croesus, Solon's focus o
the end," the telos, resembles his having already enacted the ideologic
the city through his theoric departure. To take the specific case of Tellos o
Solon has seen the telos of Tellos and judged him the happiest man by
his valorous death while fighting for Athens at Eleusis. He perhaps s
of himself in Tellos, since the enemy at Eleusis was probably the Megar
same enemy that first made Solon famous in the conflict over Salamis
8-10). The narrative of Tellos shows how an exit from the city never
can constitute the city as the goal-already-reached by a departure in i
And like the burial of Tellos on the battlefield, Solon's departure fro
"thesaurizes" the finality of the city by removing from it the potential fo
both these civic burials, in turn, stand opposed to the overflowing th
the Lydian king.
And what about Solon's homecoming? According to Diogenes Laert
never returns to Athens: he dies in Cyprus and his bones are taken to S
the ashes sprinkled there (D.L. 1.62). Plutarch mentions Solon's return t
where he is greeted by renewed stasis and the impending tyranny of P
(Plut. 29.2).76 But Plutarch says it is unknown how long Solon lived on afte
and he also has Solon's ashes spread in Salamis (Plut. 32.3-4). Like the
of Tellos which results in his burial at Eleusis, Solon's theoria deman
end-or rather its end does not hang on its conclusion. Whereas a tyran
truly happy if he dies "at home," as Chilon tells Periander (D.L. 1.73),7
that the lawgiver ideally dies outside his city to signify the city's per
his absence, performing the final separation between nomos and basile
This trajectory is written large in the departure of the lawgiver Lycurg
Sparta.78 In his final moment among the Spartans, he exacts oaths f
that they will not change his laws until he returns from a mission to
make a special inquiry: although the laws he has introduced are suffi
"in good measure" (,ie-ptGc EXELv, Plut. Lyc. 29.2), he must consult
74. Plut. Banquet of the Seven Sages l51F (of Solon): TpV VEYLGrTiv XotL lE
(pXnv &pXEL vO6ouq Arvco'Lt O4?PsVOR.
75. Cf. How and Wells 67.
76. The accounts oscillate between whether Peisistratus preserved the laws of Solon
D.L. 1.53) or the tyranny "made the laws disappear" (aphanisai, Ath.Pol. 22.1).
77. Cf. the tyrant Hieron's complaint to Simonides that a tyrant cannot go on a the6ri
is replaced while absent (Xen. Hieron 1.1 ff., cited by Rutherford 1995: 281-82).
78. Cf. Szegedy-Maszak 207-208; Svenbro 129-33.

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about something "of the greatest weight and importance" (XupLW'ToV ... Xt
4IEyLcTov). When he departs and comes to Delphi on this theoria (though the
precise term is not used), the god replies that "the city will continue to be in
the highest honor so long as it keeps the constitution of Lycurgus." In response,
Lycurgus forecloses all future change of the Spartan constitution by sending
a written copy of the oracle back to Sparta, and then starving himself to death
overseas so that not even his death is "without political effect" (&oroXLTEuTov, 29.5).
This conclusion to the lawgiver's journey sets itself in opposition to the "loop
of nostos"79 in which the nostos, or homecoming, performs the final appropriation
of glory (kleos) gathered abroad. Instead, we see in the endless absences of Solon
and Lycurgus a social function for the anti-nostos. The incomplete journey, unlike
the usually problematic "theme of the disrupted pilgrimage,"80 is a fragment of
structure or form that precisely through its irresolution becomes the telos at which
it aimed. Thus contrary to Snell's reading of theoria as an endless, disinterested
activity in contrast with the goal-orientation of praxis, we see that theoria already
has its end concealed in itself, as the very basis of its beginning.'
5. CONCLUSION
Croesus was wrong to assume that Solon's theoria made him susceptible to
visual seductions. His theoria turned out instead to be a mode of absence from
the city according to which both he and the citizens were bound to a religious
observance of the unchangeability of the new nomoi. Thus the Athenian citizen
surveying a statue of Solon or the visual representation of his laws was asked to
imagine Solon's theoria outside the city as an originary model for his own theoric
gaze within the city's political space.
A role for the theoros as guardian of the city's laws is illustrated further by a
passage in Book 12 of Plato's Laws, where the Athenian interlocutor explains that
one of the few types of external travel to be permitted in the newly legislated ideal
state will be for any man fifty years old and of high repute to spend as much as
he likes of his next ten years making observations abroad (Laws 951cd).82 The
comparison with Solon is left implicit. The Athenian explains that without the
mediation of this type of emissary, who is to be debriefed in a meeting of the
council on his return, the city "will never in its isolation attain an adequate level
of civilization ("VEpo) and maturity (Xso;), nor will it succeed in preserving
its own laws permanently (ouC' o&u IO0U v6piouU 6LoeyUyXTrElV), unless it grasps
79. Kurke 1991: 15-61.

80. On this theme, see Rutherford 1995: 278-83 (quote from p. 283).
81. This political function of the absence, rather than the return, of the the6ros is reflected
also in the later use of theoros to refer to a herald who travels on behalf of his city announcing
the establishment of new games in honor of a new political regime, such as the Ptolemaia at the
beginning of the Greek dynasty in Alexandria. Cf. Michel 210.
82. This passage is discussed by Rutherford 1995: 282-83; Rausch 1982: 48-55; Koller 281-84.

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them, not by habit only, but by knowledge, gn6me" (95 lb). This Pla
sets out a close correspondence between the discretion of the theoros
hand and the excellence of the city's laws on the other.
But it is another passage in Plato where the nomoi are put to thei
explicit test during the period of a theoria. Although Socrates is said, u
Athenians, never to have been on a theoria except once to the Isthmo
52b),83 his trial and the last days of his life, as we have seen above in
fell within the period of the Delos theoria (Phaedo 58a-c). During the
with Crito, in which Socrates refuses Crito's offer to help him escape f
and flee from Athens, Socrates goes so far as to speak from the persp
the Laws (Nomoi), explaining in detail that Socrates has "entered into a
with them (auvO18xxc, 52b): if he fled it would amount to his "killing
(&vToaTOXXU'RVL, 5 lb) the same laws to which he has adhered all his life
complaint and which have now decreed that it is just for him to be killed.
principled adherence to the nomoi throughout the theo6ria can be seen as a
to the test to which Solon's theoria puts all the Athenian citizens not to ch
nomoi in his absence. Instead of listening to Crito and the others pers
to flout the laws and escape, Socrates says that his ears are filled with
of the nomoi just like Corybants' ears are filled with flute music (54d). It i
as if Socrates can hear the festivities on Delos and understands that
the laws would also be to disrupt the theoria.
University of California, Berkeley

jker@ socrates.berkeley.edu
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Ker Solon's Theoria and The End of The City

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Solon's "Theôria" and the End of the City

Author(s): James Ker

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Solon's Theoria and the End of the City

"But you are forgetting something. Isn't there something of an analogy

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positive.3 In Thucydides' history the downfall of Athens could be predi

3. Jay 21-33 gives a useful survey of Greek contestations of vision.

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We can expect that the representation of Solon's departure will be sign

OCUTO6 X4put 'XOOV &.' isep-rj4 EaaXtjVo;,

I have come in person, a herald from lovely Salamis,

The speaking subject's identity as a herald (fleshed out, we are told, by

15. Martin 1993: 119.

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34. D.L. 1.119: EXEE otL Ol OEO'L IV ITPZCeaV Ou&pOv XOtXOlV.

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2. THE VIEW FROM SARDIS

[Solon] was entertained hospitably by Croesus in the palace, and three

39. Snell 1975: 277-78.

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Croesus' words reveal that he thinks of Solon's theoria as a type of intellectual

Solon, however, refused to flatter, and answered in strict accordance with

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response to Solon's reference to Tellos of Athens Croesus becomes the s

After this exploit, which was witnessed by the assembled crow

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0LGaVE'VO oC8v0q aZOTITtEtXat, 1.33). Soon after dismissing Solon, he

3. THE VIEW FROM ATHENS

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Several elements of theoria, however, make it an especially suitable sol

(I) NEITHER ADDING NOR SUBTRACTING

T6poVU xii. comqiy xcl yvW[IovoS Wv8pa 6s&)pov

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(II) NOT INTERPRETING

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This outcome apparently intended by Solon, with the ambigui

(III) A FREEZE ON CIVIC TRANSACTIONS

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60. Rutherford 1995: 277-78.

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These four elements of theoria, then, serve as important models f

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4. THE END IN THE MIDDLE

A MIDDLE ZONE OCCUPIED BY LAW (cf. (i) and (ii) above)

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the Attic language (yXcxamxv oUxE&' ATTxX'v / 'Lvta5, fr. 36.11-12 W

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THE END OF THE CITY (cf. (iii) and (iv) above)

yV4OuVT; 6' VccVk X0tXE:iTca-O'V EaTL VOncMoL

Most difficult to find is the hidden measure of wisdom,

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If we envisage the Athenian citizens responding to the "oracular" law

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79. Kurke 1991: 15-61.

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University of California, Berkeley