Ancient greece

Wednesday

Tom Williams

Show business

Sport has never held much appeal for me, so I rarely venture into stadiums. But I do appreciate their peculiar power: I was present at the 2012 Paralympics when George Osborne ill-advisedly turned up to award a medal while engaged in a campaign against disability benefits, and was roundly booed by the entire stadium. It was a transporting lesson in the joy of crowds and the proudest I have ever felt to be British. The stadium, ostensibly a facilitator of mass spectatorship, is actually a machine for producing such feelings. The Greeks were explicit about the ritualistic, community-forming function of their games, but it was the Romans who secularised the

Thursday

Peter Jones

Plato on the EU referendum

Our politicians, realising that the referendum campaign will be settled not by themselves under the usual parliamentary constraints but by the Twitter-maddened populace under no constraints at all, have decided to abandon any principles they may have and play the straight populist game. Plato well understood the behaviour and its consequences. In his Republic, he envisages a man in charge of a large and powerful animal who studies its moods and needs. He learns when to approach and handle it, when and why it is savage and gentle, the meaning of the various noises it makes and how to speak to it to annoy or calm it. He might then

Thursday

Martin Gayford

What lies beneath | 2 June 2016

It was not so unusual for someone to turn into a god in Egypt. It happened to the Emperor Hadrian’s lover, a beautiful young man named Antinous, who was drowned in the Nile in the autumn of 130 AD. It was also the fate of Queen Arsinoë II, who had a complicated life. At the age of 15 she became wife to the 60-year-old ruler of Thrace. When he died in battle, she married her half-sibling, who murdered two of her sons. Her next husband was her full brother. A headless sculpture of Arsinoë stands about halfway around Sunken cities at the British Museum. It is, as a label rightly

Peter Jones

Aristotle vs the civil service

The civil service is to be allowed to find out what job applicants’ ‘socio-economic background’ is. What abject drivel is this? Among all the different sorts of wisdom that Aristotle discussed, ‘practical wisdom’ was to the fore. It was for him neither a science nor an art, but ‘a reasoned ability to act with regard to the things that are good and bad for men’. It was especially vital for public servants. One of the characteristics of practical wisdom was the capacity for successful deliberation. This was not about understanding (which only passed judgment and did not come up with solutions); or cleverness (which was a means to an end, that

Thursday

Peter Jones

Plutarch and the EU

Boris Johnson argues that the current European Union is yet another failed attempt to replicate the golden age of a Europe united under the Romans. But how golden was it? The Greek biographer Plutarch (c. AD 100) thought it brought ‘peace, freedom, prosperity, population growth and concord’ but agreed that there was a price to be paid. In his essay on statecraft, he advised the Greek politician ‘not to have too much pride or confidence in your crown, since you can see the boots of Roman soldiers just above your head. So you should imitate an actor, who puts his own emotion, personality and reputation into a play but obeys the

Stephen Bayley

The great pretenders

There is fakery in the air. And maybe the French are done with deconstruction. A drone operated by a French archaeology consultant called Iconem has been languidly circling Palmyra, feeding back data about the rubble with a view to reconstructing the ruins and giving the finger to Daesh. Cocteau said he lies to tell the truth. Iconem flies to tell the truth. In April, an exhibition called The Missing: Rebuilding the Past opened in New York which examined ‘creative means to protest preventable loss’. It was timed to coincide with the temporary erection of a frankly underwhelming two thirds-scale replica of the Palmyra Arch in Trafalgar Square, London. It goes

Michael Tanner

Myth-making

For years I have been telling people that they should listen to, in the absence of staged performances, Enescu’s opera Oedipe, preferably in the marvellous EMI recording from 1990, still available. It only occurred to me when I was preparing to go to the Royal Opera’s new production that I haven’t actually listened to a recording for many years — it seems to belong with its contemporary Busoni’s Doktor Faust as something more admired in the breach than the observance. My feelings now, after seeing the production by La Fura dels Baus, are mixed. There is a lot of lovely music here, and some strong drama. I’m not sure that

Thursday

Peter Jones

Tax returns to boast about

As Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell whinge away about how rich David Cameron’s family is, they might consider that in the last six years he has funded schools ’n’ hospitals to the tune of £402,283. How much have they put in? Since wealthy ancient Athenians loved to boast about the vast sums they contributed via property taxes to the public benefit, they would have been amazed that Cameron did not long to reveal how rich he was. The 5th-century BC thinker Democritus argued that there was nothing like the rich giving to the poor to produce concord that strengthened the community. The Greek orator Hyperides (389–322 BC) pointed out that Athenians allowed statesmen

Thursday

Peter Jones

The Greek Donald Trump

Why does the Republican party loathe Donald Trump? Because Trump is the ultimate loose cannon, beholden to no one. And even worse, he is popular. What trumpery! Ancient Athenians would have loved him. With no known political or military experience behind him, Cleon surged into the gap left by the death of Pericles in 429 BC, when Athens was locked in a difficult war against Sparta. The son of a rich tanner — certainly not ‘one of us’ — he presented himself as the warmongering, go-get-’em alternative to the cautious Pericles. Full of extravagant promises (including state handouts), he increased the tribute from Athens’ imperial possessions and worked up a

Wednesday

Geoff Brown

Carry on Don

One of these days I will probably see a production of Don Giovanni set in a research station in the Antarctic. English Touring Opera, ambitious and valiant, haven’t gone that far yet. But Lloyd Wood’s new staging, part of an ETO threesome now hopping round the country, still makes the eyebrows shoot up. This time the Don and his girl bevy are scuttling round the Viennese sewers, circa 1900. Well, that’s what the programme booklet tells us; though if it hadn’t been for Elvira’s Wiener Werkstätte dress, the hint of a Klimt mosaic and a tiddly horn gramophone, you might just accept Anna Fleischle’s grim designs as a fair solution

Thursday

Peter Jones

Safe space in ancient Athens

Brilliant Oxford undergraduates argue that it is right to prevent us saying things they object to, because speech they do not like is the equivalent of actions they do not like. They had better not read classics, then. There is no safe space there. Greeks made a clear distinction between logos (‘account, reckoning, explanation, story, reason, debate, speech’, cf. ‘logic’ and all those ‘-ologies’) and ergon (‘work, deed, action’). For a Greek, to reject logos was to reject the expression of thought; and so to close down any possibility of people giving an account or reason for why they were thinking and acting as they did; and therefore to prevent any

Thursday

Peter Jones

People power then and now

It does seem extraordinary that the increasingly puce-faced Mr Cameron offered us an ‘in-out’ referendum and is now telling us that ‘out’ would mean the end of the world as we know it. What on earth did he think he was doing? His reaction is to eviscerate MPs who support ‘out’, and intentionally deprive us who will actually make the decision of information enabling us to do so. People power is clearly not for him. One of the great virtues of 5th-century bc Athenian direct democracy was that those who made the policy decisions were citizens meeting weekly in Assembly. Parties did not exist. So there were no such things as

Thursday

Peter Jones

Cleisthenes and the EU

One feels that Sir Stuart Rose, leader of the EU referendum ‘In’ campaign, should really try a little harder. First he says that ‘the stats prove’ that being ‘in’ the EU is better than being ‘out’. Presumably the ‘out’ stats date from before 1973. Then he says that we do not know what the future will hold ‘out’ of the EU. So he knows about the future ‘in’ the EU, does he? So did Greece — once. The ancients generally felt it to be better to stick with the devil you knew. Nevertheless, Athenian history provides many telling examples of radical decision-making that transformed Athenian life. By stabilising the Greek

Thursday

Peter Jones

The mercenaries of IS and ancient Greece

Last week we read that Isis was crumbling, but still a force to be reckoned with. That is true, but its army is by definition a mercenary one, fighting for pay, and when that runs out, so will they. Ancient Greeks knew all about mercenaries. The 6th century bc Cretan mercenary Hybrias proclaimed ‘I have great wealth — a spear, a sword and a fine shield to save my skin. [Ironically] With these I plough, I reap, I tread the sweet grapes and am called master of my serfs. All those that dare not hold athe spear and sword and fine shield to save their skin, all bow and kiss my

Thursday

Peter Jones

Drinking at school with Plato

Rugby and Ampleforth schools have decided to give their charges experience of sensible drinking by introducing a little alcohol, under close staff supervision, at dinner. But, as Plato realised, what they actually need is experience of senseless drinking. Plato’s last work, Laws (c. 350 bc), depicts a new utopia, quite unlike that of the Republic with its philosopher-kings. Called Magnesia, it lays down a detailed code of laws which its inhabitants must obey without question because the code will inculcate moral goodness. A key feature of that is self-control, which the speaker (‘the Athenian’) proposes to achieve by means of symposia, or drinking parties. For, as the Athenian avers, ‘Drunkenness is a

Thursday

Martin Gayford

Best in show | 31 December 2015

Until a decade and a half ago, we had no national museum of modern art at all. Indeed, the stuff was not regarded as being of much interest to the British; now Tate Modern is about to expand vastly and bills itself as the most popular such institution in the world. The opening of the new, enlarged version on 17 June — with apparently 60 per cent more room for display — will be one of the art world events of the year. But, like all jumbo galleries, it will face the question: what on earth to put in all that space? Essentially, there are two answers to that conundrum.

Thursday

Peter Jones

How ancient Athens handled immigrants

Among all the arguments about how many non-EU immigrants we should let in, campaigners are proposing a scheme for private sponsorship of Syrian asylum seekers. The idea of sponsorship for immigrants goes back to Athens in the 5th century bc. Metoikos (literally ‘household-changer’), our ‘metic’, was the category into which any non-Athenian wanting residence in Athens was placed. While having no citizen rights, of which Athenians were very jealous, they did have access to the courts; but they were unable to own property, so were always lodgers, had to serve in the military, pay a metic tax and, if they became wealthy, were liable for taxes on the rich. Most

Thursday

Tom Holland

Of gods and men

Over the stupefyingly long course of Egyptian history, gods have been born and they have died. Some 4,000 years ago, amid the chaos that marked the fragmentation of the original pharaonic state, an incantation was inscribed on the side of a coffin. It imagined a time when there had been nothing in existence save a single divine Creator. ‘I was alone in the emptiness,’ the god proclaimed, ‘and could find no place to stand.’ Nevertheless, beside him, he could feel the gods that were yet to exist. ‘They were with me, these deities waiting to be born. I came into being and Becoming became.’ The gods emerged, to reign first

Thursday

Peter Jones

Pericles vs Corbyn

Whatever else one can say about Jeremy Corbyn, one thing is clear: he is a leader who does not believe in leadership. But he is (he believes) a democrat, and thinks democracy means acceding to the views of those who voted him into the leadership. He should try the 5th-century bc Greek historian Thucydides to see what it really entails. Thucydides’ hero was his contemporary Pericles, a man who so controlled the Assembly — Athens’ sovereign decision-making body (all Athenian citizens over 18) — that Thucydides described Athens at the time as ‘in theory a democracy, but in fact rule by the foremost individual’. This is an exaggeration. Pericles in

Thursday

Peter Jones

Socrates and Galen on the Great British Bake Off

As the national girth expands by the second, Auntie, never backward about lecturing us on the topic, continues to glory in the popularity of The Great British Bake Off. What a take-off, ancients would have thought. Philosophers, naturally, had little time for fancy cooking. Socrates argued that cooks had no interest in health, only in thrilling the client. They were mocked for the extremes they went to in perverting nature. The Roman poet Martial tells us that one Caecilius fashioned a complete meal from pumpkins which he turned into cakes, lentils, beans, mushrooms, sausages, tuna fish, sprats and sweetmeats. All very Bake Off. Athenaeus’s lunatic Professors at Dinner in 15