64 ALAIN BRESSON (TRANSLATED By EDwARD M. HARRIS)
in his analysis of the meaning of the term συνθῆκαι in Aristotle: not only ‘formal treaty
between cities’ but more generally ‘act of public law’ emanating from a sovereign power.
55 We have already explained this translation of εὐπρεπὲς ἄσπονδον in Bresson 2000 : 29
note 66.
56 Thuc. 1.37.3-4: καὶ ἡ πόλις αὐτῶν ἅμα αὐτάρκη θέσιν κειμένη παρέχει αὐτοὺς δικαστὰς
ὧν βλάπτουσί τινα μᾶλλον ἢ κατὰ ξυνθήκας γίγνεσθαι, διὰ τὸ ἥκιστα ἐπὶ τοὺς πέλας
ἐκπλέοντας μάλιστα τοὺς ἄλλους ἀνάγκῃ καταίροντας δέχεσθαι. καὶ τοῦτο τὸ εὐπρεπὲς
ἄσπονδον οὐχ ἵνα μὴ ξυναδικῶσιν ἑτέροις προβέβληνται, ἀλλ ̓ ὅπως κατὰ μόνας ἀδικῶσι
καὶ ὅπως ἐν ᾧ μὲν ἂν κρατῶσι βιάζωνται, οὗ δ ̓ ἂν λάθωσι πλέον ἔχωσιν, ἢν δέ πού τι
προσλάβωσιν ἀναισχυντῶσιν.
57 Wine-producing estates of the oligarchs at Corcyra: Thuc. 3.70 (surely worked by slaves just
as those held by the democrats were: see Thuc. 3.73). Storage of merchandise in the area
of the agora of the port where the oligarchs essentially live: Thuc. 3.74. For the export of
Corcyrean amphoras (“B amphoras”), especially to Cyrenaica and Euesperides, but also to
North Africa in general, the western Mediterranean and the Aegean, see Wilson 2006 and
Göransson 2007 : 82–114.
58 Plb. 4.38.8-9. Cf. above with note 35.
59 Arist. Pol. 3.5.11 and compare with note 47 in this chapter. As for ἀδικία, it is very striking
that one of the rare examples of a commercial letter that we possess, the lead letter from
Berezan (Vinogradoff 1971: 74–100; cf. Vélissaropoulos 1980 : 38 note 52, for the rich litera-
ture that this text has stimulated) begins in this way (lines 1–2): ἀδικεται ὑπὸ Ματάσυος ̑...
This shows that Aristotle or Thucydides do not write in an intellectual language, cut
off from reality, but a language in direct contact with the vocabulary of the merchants
themselves.
60 Tod 1947 no. 111.
61 This συμμαχία is naturally connected to the γραφαὶ περὶ συμμαχίας in which we just men-
tioned in our discussion of Aristotle.
62 See note 60 in this chapter.
63 Meiggs and Lewis 1969 no. 91 [IG i^3 117].
64 Cf. Gernet 1909 , especially 314–26. On the relations of Athens with the Spartocids one can
consult Vélissaropoulos 1980 : 179–83, but one should nevertheless stress the formal nature of
the δωρειαί of the Bosporan kings.
65 IG XII 2, 3 (Tod 1947 no. 168); cf. Gajdukevič 1971 : 99–100.
66 Aside from the Black Sea hoard (cf. Kraay and Moorey 1981 ), in which the appearance
of Athenian coins can apparently be explained by political reasons, Athenian coinage is
absent from the Black Sea: cf. Schönert-Geiss 1971: 105ff. the same article in VDI 116, 1971,
pp. 25–35 in Russian (we thank R. Descat and F. Thomas for these references). The notion
of reciprocal exchange (see note 52 in this chapter) is of central importance for analyzing
exchange between Athens and the Bosporus.
67 The decree is known primarily from Thuc. 1.42, 67, 139, 140, 144. On Megara one can
now consult the excellent synthesis of Legon 1981 : 200–27. Legon shows with excellent
arguments that Megara had probably replaced Aegina, which had been under the con-
trol of Athens since 456, in the role of an intermediary between the Aegean world, the
Propontis and the Black Sea on the one hand and the Peloponnese on the other. By their
famous decree the Athenians will have excluded the Megarians from the agora of Attica
mainly to block access the Megarians would have to timber from Northern Greece, nec-
essary for the construction of Peloponnesian fleets (in particular that of Corinth). In this
case one can better understand why the Peloponnesians will have made the Megarian
decree into a causa belli. They intervened to have the decree against Megara lifted not as
a pretext for declaring war, as one has claimed, or as a simple declaration of solidarity
with a Dorian city of the Peloponnesian League, but as a reaction in defense of their
own interests. Of course, such an analysis of the facts has nothing to do, however, with a
desire to explain the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War through economic causes. On