Two New Terms: Perioikoi and Stades
As I've mentioned, I am the King of Rabbit Holes, and following them down. I enjoy digging into unfamiliar terms like hoplites and triremes.
I ran across two terms in this week's reading in Thucydides that I hadn't noticed before in section 4.8: perioikoi and stades. I later realized one of those terms had occurred previously in the text without my noticing, and the other term was lost in translation.
Perioikoi
The perioikoi (Greek: περίοικοι, singular perioikos, περίοικος, literally “those dwelling around”) were free, noncitizen inhabitants of communities in Laconia and Messenia under Spartan control. They retained a measure of local self-government but were politically subordinate to Sparta, particularly in military and foreign affairs.
Spartan society had three principal social groups. There were Spartiates (Homoioi), full Spartan citizens, possessing political rights and serving as the core of the Spartan army. Then there were the perioikoi, which were free people who governed many of their own local affairs but had no political rights in Sparta. They worked as farmers, merchants, craftsmen, and soldiers. And finally there were helots. These were an unfree, hereditary laboring population bound to agricultural production and subjected to Spartan domination.
Why the perioikoi mattered in Thucydides is because the perioikoi were essential to Spartan military and economic power. They served as hoplites alongside Spartan citizens, substantially increasing the manpower available to Sparta. They participated in manufacturing and trade, activities less central to the traditional Spartiate way of life. Although personally free, they had no vote in Spartan political institutions and were subject to Spartan foreign policy. Their communities occupied parts of Laconia and Messenia, including strategically important coastal and frontier areas.
One important distinction when reading The Peloponnesian War is that the perioikoi were neither Spartan citizens nor helots. They occupied an intermediate legal and political position.
The earliest occurrence of this particular term I could find was in section 1.101.2.
Stades
Stades is σταδίους (stadious). It is a unit of measurement. I hadn't noticed it before because in its earliest occurrence I could find in section 1.63, where the term is translated as furlongs by Thomas Hobbes, and miles in The Landmark Thucydides. Evidently, the original Crawley translation used "one mile and five furlongs in length" in section 4.8.6, and the Landmark Thucydides changed it back to stades like the original Greek text.
Strassler explicitly discusses the translation of distance measurements in his notes to 4.8.6.
He explains that Thucydides gave measurements in stades, which Crawley converted into miles and furlongs. The Landmark edition generally converts them into miles. I don't quite understand the editor's choice here, but he seems aware of the differences in texts and translations.
So I can forgive myself for missing that, although it makes me wonder why the term was later translated as stades in section 4.8 of the Landmark.
The Movie 300
Yes, I am aware that the picture I chose is Daxos, who was an Arcadian ally, and not a perioikoi. But I found out that is because the movie doesn't mention the latter at all. Different wars, different times. The events described in 300 happened about 49 years previously, I think.
Bibliography:
Cartledge, Paul. “Perioikoi.” Oxford Classical Dictionary, Oxford UP, 2015, https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780199381135.013.4869
“Daxos.” 300 Wiki, Fandom, https://300.fandom.com/wiki/Daxos
Kagan, Donald. “Lecture 9: Sparta (cont.).” CLCV 205: Introduction to Ancient Greek History, Open Yale Courses, Yale U, 2007, https://oyc.yale.edu/classics/clcv-205/lecture-9
Martin, Thomas R. An Overview of Classical Greek History from Mycenae to Alexander. Perseus Digital Library, Tufts U, https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0009%3Achapter%3D6
Thucydides. Historiae. Edited by Henry Stuart Jones and John Enoch Powell, Scaife Viewer, Perseus Digital Library, https://scaife-reader.perseus.tufts.edu/reader/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0003.tlg001.perseus-grc2:4.8.1/?right=perseus-eng6
Thucydides. History of the Peloponnesian War. Translated by Richard Crawley, J. M. Dent, 1914. Scaife Viewer, Perseus Digital Library.https://scaife.perseus.org/reader/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0003.tlg001.perseus-eng6:4.8
Thucydides. History of the Peloponnesian War. Translated by Henry Dale, Henry G. Bohn, 1851–1852. Scaife Viewer, Perseus Digital Library.https://scaife.perseus.org/reader/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0003.tlg001.1st1K-eng2:4.8
Thucydides. The History of the Grecian War. Translated by Thomas Hobbes, John Bohn, 1843. Scaife Viewer, Perseus Digital Library.https://scaife.perseus.org/reader/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0003.tlg001.perseus-eng4:4.8
Thucydides. History of the Peloponnesian War. Translated by Charles Forster Smith, William Heinemann and Harvard University Press, 1919–1923. 4 vols. Scaife Viewer, Perseus Digital Library.https://scaife.perseus.org/reader/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0003.tlg001.1st1K-eng1:4.8
Thucydides. The Landmark Thucydides: A Comprehensive Guide to the Peloponnesian War. Edited by Robert B. Strassler, translated by Richard Crawley, Free Press, 1996.
