Harmodius and Aristogeiton

Information about Harmodius and Aristogeiton

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Statue of Harmodius and Aristogeiton, Naples. This is a Roman copy of the Athenian copy (by Kritios and Nesiotes, in 477 BC) of the original bronze by Antenor, stolen by the Persians in 480 BC, now lost


Harmodius (c. 530-514 BC) and Aristogeiton (c. 550-514 BC), known as "the Liberators" and "the Tyrannicides", became heroes in Athens through their role in the overthrow of the Tyranny of the Peisistratid family. They were the first two Greeks considered by their countrymen worthy of having statues raised to them.[1]

Background

Peisistratus seized power in 561 and established a radical regime. Peisistratus is usually called a tyrant, but the Greek word tyrannos does not mean a cruel and despotic ruler, merely one who took power by force. Peisistratus was in fact a very popular ruler, who made Athens wealthy and powerful, although the old aristocratic families he had driven from power hated him. When Peisistratus died in 527/528, his sons Hippias and Hipparchus succeeded him. They continued their father's policies, but their popularity declined after Hipparchus began to abuse the power of his position.

In 514 Hipparchus sought the sexual favours of Harmodius, who was, the historian Thucydides tells us, "then in the flower of youthful beauty," which would have made him about fifteen . Harmodius was the eromenos (younger lover) of Aristogeiton, whom Thucydides describes as "a citizen then in middle rank of life" - possibly aged about 35 and a member of one of the old aristocratic families.

Romantic, erotic and sexual relationships between an adult man (the erastes) and a youth (the eromenos) were sanctioned by custom in Athens and other Greek cities, and Hipparchus's actions in trying to steal Aristogeiton's eromenos was a definite breach of the rules. (Thucydides says bluntly that Aristogeiton "was his lover and possessed him.")

Harmodius rejected Hipparchus and told Aristogeiton what had happened. Hipparchus, spurned, avenged himself by having Harmodius' young sister disqualified from carrying a ceremonial offering basket (Kanephoros) at the Panathenaea festival on the pretext she was not a virgin, as required. This was such a mortal offence to Harmodius's family that he and Aristogeiton resolved to assassinate both Hippias and Hipparchus and thus to overthrow the tyranny.

The assassination

The plot – to be carried out by means of daggers hidden in the ceremonial myrtle wreaths – involved a number of other co-conspirators, but seeing one of these greet Hippias in a friendly manner on the assigned day, the two thought themselves betrayed and rushed into action, ruining the carefully laid plans. They managed to kill Hipparchus, stabbing him to death as he was organizing the Panathenaean processions at the foot of the Acropolis, but the two lovers were killed on the spot by Hipparchus's guards, and there was no revolt.

Aristotle in the Constitution of Athens preserves a tradition that Aristogeiton died only after being tortured in the hope that he would reveal the names of other conspirators. During his ordeal, personally overseen by Hippias, he feigned willingness to betray his co-conspirators, claiming only Hippias' handshake as guarantee of safety. Upon receiving the tyrant's hand he is reputed to have berated him for shaking the hand of his own brother's murderer, upon which the tyrant wheeled and struck him down on the spot. [2] Likewise, there is a tradition that Aristogeiton was in love with a courtesan (see hetaira) by the name of Leæna (lioness) who also was kept by Hippias under torture – in a vain attempt to force her to divulge the names of the other conspirators – until she died. It was said that it was in her honor that Athenian statues of Aphrodite were from then on accompanied by stone lionesses [after Pausanias].

His brother's murder led Hippias to establish an even stricter dictatorship, which proved very unpopular and was overthrown, with the help of an army from Sparta, in 510. This was followed by the reforms of Cleisthenes, who established a democracy in Athens.

Apotheosis of the couple

Subsequent history came to identify the romantic figures of Harmodius and Aristogeiton as martyrs to the cause of Athenian freedom, possibly for political and class reasons, and they became known as "the Liberators" (eleutherioi) and "the Tyrannicides" (tyrannophonoi). According to later writers, descendants of Harmodius and Aristogeiton were given hereditary privileges, such as sitesis (the right to take meals at public expense in the town hall), ateleia (exemption from certain religious duties), and proedria (front-row seats in the theater). Since it is not known if Aristogeiton had any descendants (it is most unlikely that Harmodius did), this may be a later invention, but it illustrates their posthumous status.

After the establishment of democracy, the sculptor Antenor was commissioned to produce a statue group of Harmodius and Aristogeiton that was erected in the Agora. Special laws prohibited the erection of any other statues in their vicinity. The cenotaph of the couple was erected in the Kerameikos, and annual offerings (enagismata) were presented there by the Athenian minister of war (polemarch). [3]

Another tribute to the two heroes was a hymn sung as a drinking song (skolion) at the symposia, written by Callistratus, an Athenian poet known only for this work. This ode, found in Athenaeus, has been translated by many modern poets such as Edgar Allan Poe, who composed his in 1827.[4] Other skolia existed, of which a few have survived, such as the following:
''Harmodius, most beloved. Surely you are not at all dead,
''But on the Isles of the Blessed you abide, they say,
''The same place where swift-footed Achilles is,
Where roams worthy Diomedes, son of Tydeus, they say.[5]


The story of Harmodius and Aristogeiton, and its treatment by later Greek writers, is illustrative of attitudes to pederasty in ancient Greece. Both Thucydides and Herodotus say that the two were lovers, without making any comment on this fact: clearly they assumed that their readers would be familiar with the institution and find nothing remarkable about it. Further confirming the status of the two as paragons of pederastic ethics, a domain forbidden to slaves, a law was passed prohibiting slaves from being named after the two heroes.[6]

The story continued to be cited as an admirable example of heroism and devotion for many years. In 346 BC, for example, the politician Timarchus was prosecuted (for political reasons) on the grounds that he had prostituted himself as a youth. The orator who defended him, Demosthenes, cited Harmodius and Aristogeiton, as well as Achilles and Patroclus, as examples of the beneficial effects of same-sex relationships. Aeschines offers them as an example of dikaios erōs, “just love”, and as proof of the boons such love brings the city.[7] The fact that the statues of the Liberators were still being copied in Roman times shows the durability of their legend.

See also

References

1. ^ W.E.H. Lecky History of European Morals, (ed. 1898), II, 274-95
2. ^ Aristotle, Athenian Constitution 18.1 (ed. H. Rackham) [1]
3. ^ Nigel Spivey, Understanding Greek Sculpture; p.114-5
4. ^ [2]
5. ^ Skolion 894P. D. I. Page, Poetae Melici Graeci;'' Oxford, 1962
6. ^ Aul. Gel. 9.2.10; Lib. Decl. 1.1.71
7. ^ Victoria Wohl, Love among the Ruins: The Erotics of Democracy in Classical Athens p. 5

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Tyrannicide literally means the killing of a tyrant. The Monarchomachs in particular developed a theory of tyrannicide.

Typically, the term is taken to mean the killing or assassination of tyrants for the common good.
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Location

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Time zone: EET/EEST (UTC+2/3)
Elevation (min-max): 70 - 338 m (0 - 0 ft)
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tyrant is a single ruler holding vast, if not absolute power through a state or in an organization. The term carries connotations of a harsh and cruel ruler who places his/her own interests or the interests of a small oligarchy over the best interests of the general population
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Peisistratos or Peisistratus (Greek: Πεισίστρατος)[1] (c.
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Hippias of Athens was one of the sons of Peisistratus, and was tyrant of Athens in the 6th century BC.

Hippias succeeded Peisistratus in 527 BC, and in 525 BC he introduced a new system of coinage in Athens.
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Hipparchus was one of the sons of Pisistratus. Although he was said among Greeks to have been the tyrant of Athens along with his brother Hippias when Pisistratus died, about 527 BC, in actuality, according to Thucydides, Hippias was the tyrant.
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Greek pederasty, as idealised by the Greeks from Archaic times onward, was a relationship and bond between an adolescent boy and an adult man outside of his immediate family, and was constructed initially as an aristocratic moral and educational institution.
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Thucydides (c. 460 BC – c. 395 BC), Greek Θουκυδίδης, Thoukudídēs) was an ancient Greek historian, and the author of the History of the Peloponnesian War,
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eromenos (Greek ἐρώμενος, pl. "eromenoi") was an adolescent boy who was in a love relationship with an adult man, known as the erastes (ἐραστής).
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erastes (ἐραστής, "lover") (pl.: erastai) was an adult male aristocrat involved in a pederastic relationship with an adolescent boy called the eromenos.
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eromenos (Greek ἐρώμενος, pl. "eromenoi") was an adolescent boy who was in a love relationship with an adult man, known as the erastes (ἐραστής).
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Kanephoros (Greek: Κανηφόρος, English translation: "Basket Bearer", also known as Canephorae) was an honorific office given to unmarried young women in ancient Greece, which involved the privilege of leading the procession to
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The Panathenaic Games were a set of games held every four years in Athens in Ancient Greece.

The games were actually part of a much larger religious festival, the Panathenaia, which was held every year.
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For the butterfly genus, see Acropolis (genus).
Acropolis (Gr. acron, edge + polis, city) literally means the edge of a town or a high city.
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Aristotle (Greek: Ἀριστοτέλης Aristotélēs) (384 BC – 322 BC) was a Greek philosopher, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great.
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hetaerae (in Greek ἑταῖραι, hetairai) were courtesans, that is to say, sophisticated companions and prostitutes.
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Pausanias (Greek: Παυσανίας) was a Greek traveller and geographer of the 2nd century A.D., who lived in the times of Hadrian, Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius.
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Sparta (Doric: Σπάρτᾱ Spártā, Attic: Σπάρτη Spártē
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Cleisthenes (Greek: Κλεισθένης, also Clisthenes or Kleisthenes) was a noble Athenian of the Alcmaeonid family.
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Athenian democracy (sometimes called Direct democracy) developed in the Greek city-state of Athens. (comprising the central city-state of Athens and the surrounding territory of Attica).
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Antenor was an Athenian sculptor, of the latter part of the 6th century BC. He was named after the mythological figure also called Antenor.

He was the creator of the joint statues of the tyrannicides Harmodius and Aristogeiton, set up by the Athenians on the expulsion of
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sculptural group of the tyrannicides Harmodius and Aristogeiton is well-known in the ancient world from three major versions.

First version

This was commissioned from the sculptor Antenor after the establishment of Athenian democracy and erected in the Agora and was stolen
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An agora (αγορά), translatable as , was a public space and an essential part of an ancient Greek polis or city-state. An agora acted as a marketplace and a forum to the citizens of the polis.
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A cenotaph is a tomb or a monument erected in honour of a person or group of persons whose remains are elsewhere. It can also be the initial tomb for a person that has since been interred elsewhere.
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Kerameikos is the name of the deme or part of Athens to the northwest of the Acropolis and includes an extensive area both within and outside the city walls, on both sides of the Dipylon Gate and by the banks of the Eridanos River.
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For other uses, see Symposium (disambiguation).
Symposium originally referred to a drinking party (the Greek verb sympotein means "to drink together") but has since come to refer to any academic conference, whether or not drinking takes place.
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