Ancient Literacies

(Marvins-Underground-K-12) #1

still less in composing and recording verse (i.e.,mousike). But it was the


type of literacy needed by an Athenian active enough in the democratic


machinery to enter thebouleor take up a position of responsibility as an


official, a magistrate (for whichtheteswere excluded). I would tentatively


call it ‘‘officials’ literacy,’’ a literacy rather different from the ability to


write a name for an ostracism.


As the democracy developed, so did its processes and the Boule itself


took on more duties. The democracy in the fourth century is quite distinct


from that of the fifth, as is well known.^59 It is therefore inconceivable


that one should consider literacy practices implied in the fourth-century


democracy as automatically similar or parallel to those of the fifth.
60
Even


within the fourth-century democracy, a period, after all, of several de-


cades, one would expect a certain degree of change, as I think we can see.


The Boule alone acquired more responsibility and the democracy in gen-


eral moved more power to committees and subgroups from the Assembly,


whereas the Assembly had commonly voted over even tiny details in the


first flush of radical democracy in the fifth century. Various groups of


officials like thepoletai(‘‘sellers’’) leave extensive stone records of their
activities. One assumes that these were helped by secretaries, but it is hard


to avoid the impression that a fully active member of any of these groups


must have been literate enough to deal with accounts, instructions, and


decrees where necessary (drafting, checking, etc.), though always with the


proviso that secretaries were there to read things out as one of their main


tasks. In a way, these activities may be more of the same in literacy terms,


but one would guess that as such documents became more extensive, the


boulemembers themselves would gradually become more familiar and


experienced, if they were not already (we may perhaps compare Brian


Stock’s concept of ‘‘textual community’’ [1983] but for a context of


democratic Athenian officialdom). The degree of ‘‘functional’’ familiarity


with written texts will now necessary have changed.


The remarkable Grain Tax Law of 374/3 should be mentioned here.


Stroud’s publication of this newly discovered inscription points out the


relatively complicated set of activities the Ten men are expected to


complete to sell the grain coming in from the Grain Tax (which is a tax


in kind), and to ensure that the Athenians have grain.
61
These men are


chosen by election from the Assembly which underlines the democratic


importance of the law and its provisions. Stroud suggests that the law was



  1. For example, Hansen 1991, Rhodes 1972; note also Eder 1995.

  2. A problem with Sickinger’s book (1999) is that although he patiently shows many
    cases in which the orator will have had to delve into the archives to find a decree, or get
    someone to do so, he reads back on a priori grounds a mass of document making and keeping
    from the fourth to the fifth century, and from the fifth to the sixth in a way which seems to
    sidestep the great political, cultural, and social changes occurring over the periods in
    question. See Thomas 2003.

  3. Stroud 1998.


40 Situating Literacies

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