the largest number of votes – but only if the total number of votes cast exceeded 6,000 – was given 10
days to leave Athenian territory, to which he was not allowed to return for a period of 10 years. At the
end of that time he could resume his normal life and, if he wished, continue his involvement in political
affairs. The effect of this procedure was to reduce political tensions in the city by temporarily removing a
controversial figure from circulation; that is, not punishing him so severely that he and his supporters
would be tempted to engage in desperate acts of vengeance.
OSTRACISM The Athenian practice of holding an election, in which fragments of pottery (ostraka)
were used as ballots (figure 41), to determine whether one prominent political figure should be
removed from the polis for a 10-year period.Figure 41 Ostrakon from Athens (P 9950), inscribed “Themistocles (son) of Neocles of (the deme)
Phrearrhioi,” with the name and the deme misspelled (“Themisthocles,” “Phrerrhios”); width 10 cm, 480s
or 470s BC.
Source: American School of Classical Studies at Athens: Agora Excavations.
“For ostracism was not a punishment for wrongdoing. Rather, while it was ostensibly a means of
abasing and curtailing oppressive pride and power, it was in reality a humane method of assuaging
envy, which could direct its malicious desire to injure, not toward some irreparable harm, but
toward a penalty consisting of a ten-year expulsion. But they ceased the practice of ostracism when
some men began inflicting this punishment on low and lawless individuals. Last of all was
Hyperbolus, who was said to have been banished for the following reason. Alcibiades and Nicias,
the most powerful men in the state, were the leaders of rival factions. So, when the people were
about to impose ostracism, and when it was clear that they were going to decree the banishment of
one or the other of them, the two men called a conference, reconciled their respective factions and
brought about the banishment of Hyperbolus. As a result of this, the people, upset because the
institution of ostracism had been abused and debased, entirely gave up the practice and abolished
it.” (Plutarch, The Life of Aristeides 7.2–3)