Persian withdrawal. These were not simply acts of military opportunism,
but of conscious adjudication.
In inland Thrace there was a similar process of territorial nucleation
and expansion that paralleled events in Macedonia. Here, the Odrysian
dynasty under its historic founder, Teres, established a substantial king-
dom in the second quarter of thefifth centurybc, focusing on the middle
Maritsa (River Hebros) and Tundja (Tonzos), though royal power did
not extend beyond Mount Rhodope at this time.^15 Initially we are ill-
informed, since the political narrative of Thucydides, our principal
source for this early phase, is almost entirely concerned with a highly
localized situation in the 420sbc. More informatively, inscriptions that
refer to formal inter-state agreements, particularly those between the
Athenians and a succession of Odrysian princes in thefirst and second
quarters of the fourth centurybc, make clear that the rulers of the
interior were not uninterested in the coastal zone of Thrace; they had,
indeed, to be negotiated with, because they enjoyed‘traditional’rights.^16
We may not know much about the genesis of these rights. There is no
reason to think that the recognition of these privileges at the time of the
documented agreements was something new. Since these privileges were
legally recognized, over several generations at least, according to surviv-
ing documents, the payment of money by the Athenians to the Thracian
rulers is best explained in terms of economic relations. As we saw in
Chapter 1, coastal sites acted as recipients and as exit points for com-
modities from the interior, and one of the things that rulers could
provide was safe passage of goods, as well as the legal enforcement of
property rights, without which the transport of any materials from
outside local territory was problematic.
However, there was a wider issue as well. The demands for payment of
money made by successive Thracian rulers throughout the Peloponnes-
ian War, often alongside payments made by the coastal cities to the
Athenians on behalf of the Delian League, suggest that such reciprocal
(^15) Thuc. 2.29.2; 97.2–98.1; Archibald 1998, 79–90, 93–107; see further below.
(^16) Archibald 1998, 112–25; Athenian agreement with Sitalkes: Thuc. 2.29.1–5; Ar.
Acharn.145; Diod. 12.50.2;IGII^2 21 & 22 negotiations between the Athenian Thrasyboulos
and a Seuthes (Seuthes II?) with Archibald 1998, 124–5 and n.152 with further references;
RO47 (=IGII^2 126: treaty between Athens and the Thracian kings, Berisades, Amadokos
and Kersebleptes, 357bc; at l.15: we read of the‘ancestral’tribute:[.. pho]ron tom patrion);
ancestral privileges are also referred to in the earlier alliance with Hebryzelmis, 386/5bc:IG
II^2 31 esp. l.9, see the discussion in Archibald 1998, 218–20 and Kellogg 2004/5, who
associates the occasion of the honours granted to Hebryzelmis with his cooperation in the
collection of thefive per cent tax by Athenian ships, notwithstanding any perceived changes
in the region that came about as a consequence of the‘King’s Peace’in 387bc.
48 Herdsmen with golden leaves—narratives and spaces