respect there was a gulf between the Greeks and the others.... But the
gulf is rather between Aristotle and our other sources. In Herodotus,
Thucydides, and Xenophon we hear about hundreds of barbarianpoleis,
often in the sense of city rather than state, but sometimes obviously in
the sense of political community, and the terminology used by the
historians does not convey the impression that the Greeks themselves
feltpolisto be one of the essential differences between Greeks and
barbarians.’^50 It is altogether unclear why these insights were not
ultimately translated into the form and composition of theInventory.
Perhaps the task may have appeared too complex and unmanageable,
even with the large expert team brought in to put the individual
chapters together.
Far from being a defining term,polishas become a slippery and diffuse
word as a result of the Polis Centre’s investigations. TheInventoryhas
enormously enriched our knowledge of specific political units and the
locations with which their names are associated. Nevertheless, it would
be misleading to imagine that the information contained in these lists is
representative of wider settlement patterns. Even in comparatively well
documented areas, such as the Chalkidic peninsula, the socio-economic
history of local communities needs to be understood in a dynamic
fashion. Even over the period covered by theInventory, some prospered,
while others contracted. Beyond the coastal fringe, where Greek speakers
were plentiful, stretched a landscape of other language groups—Thra-
cians, Macedonians, and users of a plethora of dialects that can no longer
be recognized or adequately characterized in terms of modern linguistic
distinctions.^51 It is this linguistic divide that explains why we know so
little about urban sites in the interior of Thrace and Macedonia. Greek
monoglots relied on bilingual speakers for information about these areas,
which automatically created a practical limitation. The fact that some
Macedonian urban centres, not just on the coastline, but also inland,
were recognized aspoleisby Greek writers shows that self-conscious,
autonomous cities did exist in the region. By the same token, and
following the same logic, there would have been autonomous native
civic centres in Thrace; this is what the evidence of pre-Macedonian
urban foci indicates.^52
(^50) Hansen 1996, 204.
(^51) Hatzopoulos refers to‘pre-Greek’populations and names (1996, I, 70–3, 77, 106, 182
n.5, 193 n.6, 195 n.8, 209–13, 232, 247.
(^52) Archibald 2004; see further discussion below and in Chs 4 and 5.
Herdsmen with golden leaves—narratives and spaces 65