Matt Simonton | Arizona State University (original) (raw)

Books by Matt Simonton

Classical Greek Oligarchy thoroughly reassesses an important but neglected form of ancient Greek ... more Classical Greek Oligarchy thoroughly reassesses an important but neglected form of ancient Greek government, the "rule of the few." Matthew Simonton challenges scholarly orthodoxy by showing that oligarchy was not the default mode of politics from time immemorial, but instead emerged alongside, and in reaction to, democracy. He establishes for the first time how oligarchies maintained power in the face of potential citizen resistance. The book argues that oligarchs designed distinctive political institutions—such as intra-oligarchic power sharing, targeted repression, and rewards for informants—to prevent collective action among the majority population while sustaining cooperation within their own ranks.

To clarify the workings of oligarchic institutions, Simonton draws on recent social science research on authoritarianism. Like modern authoritarian regimes, ancient Greek oligarchies had to balance coercion with co-optation in order to keep their subjects disorganized and powerless. The book investigates topics such as control of public space, the manipulation of information, and the establishment of patron-client relations, frequently citing parallels with contemporary nondemocratic regimes. Simonton also traces changes over time in antiquity, revealing the processes through which oligarchy lost the ideological battle with democracy for legitimacy.

Classical Greek Oligarchy represents a major new development in the study of ancient politics. It fills a longstanding gap in our knowledge of nondemocratic government while greatly improving our understanding of forms of power that continue to affect us today.

Articles by Matt Simonton

Journal of Sortition, 2025

An influential body of scholarship draws on the political history of ancient Athens to argue that... more An influential body of scholarship draws on the political history of ancient Athens to argue that elections are inherently aristocratic. The present paper challenges this view by highlighting the Classical Greek concept of ‘ambition for elective office’ and showing how ancient authors understood by this the idea that aspiring politicians would ‘play the demagogue’ to win the people’s votes. It then analyses historical instances of this phenomenon from the fifth and fourth centuries BCE. It concludes that the potential cost of this tendency was the ‘politicization’ or rather ‘factionalization’ of offices meant to reward technical competence.

Demokratie und Populismus in der griechischen Antike und heute, 2024

Der vorliegende Band vereinigt die grundlegend überarbeiteten und um die Einleitung sowie einen A... more Der vorliegende Band vereinigt die grundlegend überarbeiteten und um die Einleitung sowie einen Artikel von Daniel Kübler erweiterten Beiträge zur ersten internationalen Tagung des ZAZH-Zentrum Altertumswissenschaften Zürich, diegerade noch rechtzeitig vor dem ersten pandemiebedingten Lockdownvom 12.-14. Februar 2020 unter lebhafter Anteilnahme des zahlreich erschienenen inner-und ausserakademischen Publikums in den Räumen der Universität Zürich über die Bühne gehen konnte. Die Frage nach dem Verhältnis zwischen Demokratie und Populismus stellte sich damals auch im Hinblick auf den 45. Präsidenten der USA mit besonderer Dringlichkeit, doch hat das Thema, das in diesem Band aus antiker Perspektive und in stetem Dialog mit moderner Politikwissenschaft beleuchtet wird, seither kaum an Aktualität verloren. Dies gilt umso mehr, als die in der Zwischenzeit stärker in den Vordergrund gerückten Probleme, darunter die Pandemie, die Klimakrise und der Ukrainekrieg mit seinen weltweit spürbaren Folgen, populistischem Aktivismus neue Nahrung bieten. Die Durchführung der Tagung, an der ausser den Autorinnen und Autoren dieses Bandes auch Joachim Voth (Zürich) und Vanessa Zetzmann (Würzburg) vorgetragen haben, wäre nicht möglich gewesen ohne die Unterstützung zahlreicher Personen und Institutionen. Unser herzlicher Dank geht an das aus Valentin

Polis, 2022

This paper introduces scholars of Greek political thought to the continued existence of the pheno... more This paper introduces scholars of Greek political thought to the continued existence of the phenomenon of demagoguery, or '(mis-)leadership of the people' , in the Hellenistic period. After summarizing Classical elite discourse about demagoguery, I explore three areas in which political leaders continued to run afoul of elite norms in Hellenistic democratic poleis: 1) political persecution of the wealthier members of a political community; 2) 'pandering to' the people in a way considered infra dignitatem; and 3) stoking bellicosity among the common people. I show that considerable continuities link the Classical and Hellenistic periods and that demagoguery should be approached as a potential window onto 'popular culture' in Greek antiquity.

Classical Quarterly, 2020

TAPA, 2020

A Hellenistic inscription from Iasos prompts a reconsideration of the career of the Athenian poli... more A Hellenistic inscription from Iasos prompts a reconsideration of the career of the Athenian politician Teisamenos the son of Mechanion. I first address some interpretive problems that have beset the study of this figure before turning to the new information from Iasos. I argue that we should understand Teisamenos as a “demagogue” as that term was coming to be known
already in antiquity, with negative connotations. Finally, the physical form of Teisamenos’s decree, known from an earlier Attic copy, invites us to rethink the relationship between democratic rhetoric and material culture, in this case decrees adorned with sculpted reliefs.

Journal of Hellenic Studies , 2019

Recent studies of local historiography in ancient Greece have overlooked the importance of Hippia... more Recent studies of local historiography in ancient Greece have overlooked the importance of Hippias of Erythrai, whose lone surviving fragment reveals complex processes of memory making and the politics of place. This article argues that Hippias should be understood as a participant in Early Hellenistic struggles between democracy and oligarchy, concluding with an exploration of how the historian's language interacts with the text and iconography of a Late Classical Athenian monument.

Link: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2972/hesperia.87.3.0497?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents

A reexamination of the burial and heroization of the Spartan general Brasidas at Amphipolis in 42... more A reexamination of the burial and heroization of the Spartan general Brasidas at Amphipolis in 422 in terms of political contestation between democrats and oligarchs invites broader theorizing about the political role of public commemoration in the Classical period. Forms of commemoration, including hero-cult, statues, and public burials, were often closely associated with political regimes, which might hope to promote their legitimacy and stability through the regular gathering of massed groups of citizens around commemorative monuments. Tyrannicide-and founder-cults, as well as honorary statues, also often instructed citizens of democracies in how to resist takeover by anti-democratic factions. Memorials thus had a dynamic and practical function in addition to an ideological one. Oligarchies by contrast might manipulate existing forms of commemoration to deliver a political threat and strengthen their rule.

Existing attempts to understand the relationship between violence and stability within Classical ... more Existing attempts to understand the relationship between violence and stability within Classical Athens are undermined by their failure to compare democracies with oligarchies. The exclusion-ary policies of oligarchies created a fragile political equilibrium that required considerable regulation if oligarchic regimes were to survive. By contrast, the inclusiveness of democracies largely defused the danger that disputes would lead to regime collapse. Citizens of democracies faced fewer incentives to police their behavior, resulting in higher levels of public disorder and violence ; this violence, however, was at the same time less likely to escalate into deadly force and stasis. The distinctive cultures of democracies and oligarchies were determined in part by considerations of basic political order.

Book Reviews by Matt Simonton

Classical Review, 2021

Our knowledge of Athenian decrees of the classical period has advanced considerably over the past... more Our knowledge of Athenian decrees of the classical period has advanced considerably over the past decade. Especially notable have been studies by S. Lambert (Inscribed Athenian Laws and Decrees 352/1-322/1 BC. Epigraphical Essays [2012]; Inscribed Athenian Laws and Decrees in the Age of Demosthenes. Historical Essays [2017]) and M. Canevaro (The Documents in the Attic Orators: Laws and Decrees in the Public Speeches of the Demosthenic Corpus [2013]). Along with the new third edition of Inscriptiones Graecae vol. 2/3 (of which Lambert has edited Part 1, Fascicle 2), these works have put the study of Athenian decrees, particularly those that survive epigraphically, on sounder footing. L. has now delivered his own blockbuster catalogue and analysis of all the decrees mentioned in the literary evidence, down to the dissolution of the Athenian democracy by order of Antipater after the Lamian War. Rich in insight, up-to-date bibliography and theoretical sophistication, this contribution provides new quantitative evidence sufficient to alter our conception of fourth-century decrees as well as much argumentative food for thought for future discussions. The long first volume collects 245 decrees, some dated with certainty and others floating, that can definitely be ascribed to a decision of the Athenian assembly (Inventory A, in two chronological segments, 403/2-353/2 and 352/1-322/1) as well as 90 actions that probably entailed decrees of the assembly (Inventory B). The extremely useful Table 1 compares the subject matter of this literary evidence with that of the epigraphical material. It is a truism that the great majority of inscribed decrees from Greek antiquity are honorific in nature, and that is indeed the case for the period in question at Athens (69.2%). What is striking is the diverse range of topics of the decrees attested in the literary sources, a majority of which deal with non-honorific matters (64.1%): the proportions are almost exactly reversed. Notwithstanding the incomplete nature of our evidence, this figure lends support to the position, defended among others by Lambert (Inscribed Athenian Laws and Decrees in the Age of Demosthenes, Chapter 2), that not all Athenian decrees were inscribed on stone. One can only speculate that this may have also been the case with other poleis for which literary evidence is lacking, but whose epigraphic corpora give the (perhaps misleading) impression that they did little else other than honour benefactors. Each entry in Inventory A of Volume 1 provides a section on the literary context of the text quoted, testimon(ies) for the decree in question (in facing-page Greek and English translation), a commentary, a note on the date and a bibliography. If the proposer of the decree is known, his PA and PAA numbers are noted, as is his appearance in J.K. Davies's Athenian Propertied Families where applicable. It is not surprising that a majority of the decrees fall into the later period (352/1-322/1), when the texts of Demosthenes, Aeschines and their contemporaries furnish so much evidence. More striking is the THE CLASSICAL REVIEW 466

Classical Review, 2021

Where do 'human rights', as a concept and as a legal regime, come from? In the present book S. ar... more Where do 'human rights', as a concept and as a legal regime, come from? In the present book S. argues that the Athenians of the classical period 'invented humane values' (p. 2) and that a 'parallel wave' of humane discourse arose in the eighteenth century in Western Europe, in the work of authors directly influenced by Greek texts. Across an introduction, six chapters, three 'explorations' and a conclusion, S. traces the language of compassion and 'humaneness' in classical Athens, comparing those values to similar-looking ideological developments in eighteenth-century Europe. S.'s purpose is couched in interested terms, as an attempt to correct a recent 'phase of polemical disdain for and partial rejection of the Greeks' (p. 7), by showing that, '[f]or all our political correctness or genuine Angst', 'this heritage has borne important fruit' (p. 8). While S. addresses an important subject, the book suffers from numerous errors and insufficient argumentation. The first 'exploration' introduces us to an odd work of the French abbé Jean-Jacques Barthélemy, Travels of Anacharsis the Younger in Greece, which was first published in 1788 and featured in the personal library of Thomas Jefferson. The work purports to be the travelogue of a Scythian in Greece in the fourth century BCE, replete with descriptions based on the author's knowledge of the ancient sources. S. suggests that Barthélemy understood ancient Greek slavery to be relatively 'humane' and that this understanding, conveyed through Anacharsis' description, would have informed Jefferson's picture of Greece. (Jefferson is elsewhere said to have 'treated [his slaves] as kindly as possible', p. 18; compare the official Monticello website, which maintains that 'there is no such thing as a "good" slaveholder'.) S. also wishes to read Barthélemy's work in its historical context, as reflecting the concerns of Enlightenment France. Some thoughts are not Barthélemy's editorialising, however. For example, S. sees 'intriguing ambiguity' in his description of the painter Parrhasius' portrait of the Athenian dêmos, which shows it as 'violent, unjust, gentle, compassionate, vain-glorious, crouching, haughty, and timid' (p. 14, emphasis in S.). But any ambiguity here is due not to Barthélemy but to Pliny the Elder, whose description of Parrhasius' painting Barthélemy has copied word for word (iracundum iniustum. .. clementem misericordem; gloriosum. .. humilem, ferocem fugacemque, NH 35.69). Chapter 1 depicts both classical Greece and eighteenth-century Europe as periods of progressive enlightenment, with Protagoras' rationalism, for example, finding its counterpart in the work of Adam Smith. One reads here very traditional accounts of the Greek move from mythos to logos and of the superiority of 'difficult' Thucydides over Herodotus, 'old-fashioned fun reading' (p. 27). The Greeks are credited with 'the beginnings of city planning' (p. 27), but planned urban space goes back thousands of years earlier, as can be seen in sites like Mohenjo-daro in Pakistan (mid-third millennium BCE). Chapter 2 claims to test the legal scholar Alan Dershowitz's theory that notions of rights develop in reaction to wartime atrocities. S. argues that this happened in classical Greece and in eighteenth-century Europe, but she does not examine other time periods or places. Dershowitz's theory would seem to predict that rights talk would emerge anywhere there was terrible violence. The theory is pertinent here only if fifth-century BCE Greece and eighteenth-century Europe were uniquely bloody. Chapter 3 plausibly THE CLASSICAL REVIEW

Polis: The Journal for Ancient Greek Political Thought 36: 396-400, 2019

Classical Greek Oligarchy thoroughly reassesses an important but neglected form of ancient Greek ... more Classical Greek Oligarchy thoroughly reassesses an important but neglected form of ancient Greek government, the "rule of the few." Matthew Simonton challenges scholarly orthodoxy by showing that oligarchy was not the default mode of politics from time immemorial, but instead emerged alongside, and in reaction to, democracy. He establishes for the first time how oligarchies maintained power in the face of potential citizen resistance. The book argues that oligarchs designed distinctive political institutions—such as intra-oligarchic power sharing, targeted repression, and rewards for informants—to prevent collective action among the majority population while sustaining cooperation within their own ranks.

To clarify the workings of oligarchic institutions, Simonton draws on recent social science research on authoritarianism. Like modern authoritarian regimes, ancient Greek oligarchies had to balance coercion with co-optation in order to keep their subjects disorganized and powerless. The book investigates topics such as control of public space, the manipulation of information, and the establishment of patron-client relations, frequently citing parallels with contemporary nondemocratic regimes. Simonton also traces changes over time in antiquity, revealing the processes through which oligarchy lost the ideological battle with democracy for legitimacy.

Classical Greek Oligarchy represents a major new development in the study of ancient politics. It fills a longstanding gap in our knowledge of nondemocratic government while greatly improving our understanding of forms of power that continue to affect us today.

Journal of Sortition, 2025

An influential body of scholarship draws on the political history of ancient Athens to argue that... more An influential body of scholarship draws on the political history of ancient Athens to argue that elections are inherently aristocratic. The present paper challenges this view by highlighting the Classical Greek concept of ‘ambition for elective office’ and showing how ancient authors understood by this the idea that aspiring politicians would ‘play the demagogue’ to win the people’s votes. It then analyses historical instances of this phenomenon from the fifth and fourth centuries BCE. It concludes that the potential cost of this tendency was the ‘politicization’ or rather ‘factionalization’ of offices meant to reward technical competence.

Demokratie und Populismus in der griechischen Antike und heute, 2024

Der vorliegende Band vereinigt die grundlegend überarbeiteten und um die Einleitung sowie einen A... more Der vorliegende Band vereinigt die grundlegend überarbeiteten und um die Einleitung sowie einen Artikel von Daniel Kübler erweiterten Beiträge zur ersten internationalen Tagung des ZAZH-Zentrum Altertumswissenschaften Zürich, diegerade noch rechtzeitig vor dem ersten pandemiebedingten Lockdownvom 12.-14. Februar 2020 unter lebhafter Anteilnahme des zahlreich erschienenen inner-und ausserakademischen Publikums in den Räumen der Universität Zürich über die Bühne gehen konnte. Die Frage nach dem Verhältnis zwischen Demokratie und Populismus stellte sich damals auch im Hinblick auf den 45. Präsidenten der USA mit besonderer Dringlichkeit, doch hat das Thema, das in diesem Band aus antiker Perspektive und in stetem Dialog mit moderner Politikwissenschaft beleuchtet wird, seither kaum an Aktualität verloren. Dies gilt umso mehr, als die in der Zwischenzeit stärker in den Vordergrund gerückten Probleme, darunter die Pandemie, die Klimakrise und der Ukrainekrieg mit seinen weltweit spürbaren Folgen, populistischem Aktivismus neue Nahrung bieten. Die Durchführung der Tagung, an der ausser den Autorinnen und Autoren dieses Bandes auch Joachim Voth (Zürich) und Vanessa Zetzmann (Würzburg) vorgetragen haben, wäre nicht möglich gewesen ohne die Unterstützung zahlreicher Personen und Institutionen. Unser herzlicher Dank geht an das aus Valentin

Polis, 2022

This paper introduces scholars of Greek political thought to the continued existence of the pheno... more This paper introduces scholars of Greek political thought to the continued existence of the phenomenon of demagoguery, or '(mis-)leadership of the people' , in the Hellenistic period. After summarizing Classical elite discourse about demagoguery, I explore three areas in which political leaders continued to run afoul of elite norms in Hellenistic democratic poleis: 1) political persecution of the wealthier members of a political community; 2) 'pandering to' the people in a way considered infra dignitatem; and 3) stoking bellicosity among the common people. I show that considerable continuities link the Classical and Hellenistic periods and that demagoguery should be approached as a potential window onto 'popular culture' in Greek antiquity.

Classical Quarterly, 2020

TAPA, 2020

A Hellenistic inscription from Iasos prompts a reconsideration of the career of the Athenian poli... more A Hellenistic inscription from Iasos prompts a reconsideration of the career of the Athenian politician Teisamenos the son of Mechanion. I first address some interpretive problems that have beset the study of this figure before turning to the new information from Iasos. I argue that we should understand Teisamenos as a “demagogue” as that term was coming to be known
already in antiquity, with negative connotations. Finally, the physical form of Teisamenos’s decree, known from an earlier Attic copy, invites us to rethink the relationship between democratic rhetoric and material culture, in this case decrees adorned with sculpted reliefs.

Journal of Hellenic Studies , 2019

Recent studies of local historiography in ancient Greece have overlooked the importance of Hippia... more Recent studies of local historiography in ancient Greece have overlooked the importance of Hippias of Erythrai, whose lone surviving fragment reveals complex processes of memory making and the politics of place. This article argues that Hippias should be understood as a participant in Early Hellenistic struggles between democracy and oligarchy, concluding with an exploration of how the historian's language interacts with the text and iconography of a Late Classical Athenian monument.

Link: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2972/hesperia.87.3.0497?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents

A reexamination of the burial and heroization of the Spartan general Brasidas at Amphipolis in 42... more A reexamination of the burial and heroization of the Spartan general Brasidas at Amphipolis in 422 in terms of political contestation between democrats and oligarchs invites broader theorizing about the political role of public commemoration in the Classical period. Forms of commemoration, including hero-cult, statues, and public burials, were often closely associated with political regimes, which might hope to promote their legitimacy and stability through the regular gathering of massed groups of citizens around commemorative monuments. Tyrannicide-and founder-cults, as well as honorary statues, also often instructed citizens of democracies in how to resist takeover by anti-democratic factions. Memorials thus had a dynamic and practical function in addition to an ideological one. Oligarchies by contrast might manipulate existing forms of commemoration to deliver a political threat and strengthen their rule.

Existing attempts to understand the relationship between violence and stability within Classical ... more Existing attempts to understand the relationship between violence and stability within Classical Athens are undermined by their failure to compare democracies with oligarchies. The exclusion-ary policies of oligarchies created a fragile political equilibrium that required considerable regulation if oligarchic regimes were to survive. By contrast, the inclusiveness of democracies largely defused the danger that disputes would lead to regime collapse. Citizens of democracies faced fewer incentives to police their behavior, resulting in higher levels of public disorder and violence ; this violence, however, was at the same time less likely to escalate into deadly force and stasis. The distinctive cultures of democracies and oligarchies were determined in part by considerations of basic political order.

Classical Review, 2021

Our knowledge of Athenian decrees of the classical period has advanced considerably over the past... more Our knowledge of Athenian decrees of the classical period has advanced considerably over the past decade. Especially notable have been studies by S. Lambert (Inscribed Athenian Laws and Decrees 352/1-322/1 BC. Epigraphical Essays [2012]; Inscribed Athenian Laws and Decrees in the Age of Demosthenes. Historical Essays [2017]) and M. Canevaro (The Documents in the Attic Orators: Laws and Decrees in the Public Speeches of the Demosthenic Corpus [2013]). Along with the new third edition of Inscriptiones Graecae vol. 2/3 (of which Lambert has edited Part 1, Fascicle 2), these works have put the study of Athenian decrees, particularly those that survive epigraphically, on sounder footing. L. has now delivered his own blockbuster catalogue and analysis of all the decrees mentioned in the literary evidence, down to the dissolution of the Athenian democracy by order of Antipater after the Lamian War. Rich in insight, up-to-date bibliography and theoretical sophistication, this contribution provides new quantitative evidence sufficient to alter our conception of fourth-century decrees as well as much argumentative food for thought for future discussions. The long first volume collects 245 decrees, some dated with certainty and others floating, that can definitely be ascribed to a decision of the Athenian assembly (Inventory A, in two chronological segments, 403/2-353/2 and 352/1-322/1) as well as 90 actions that probably entailed decrees of the assembly (Inventory B). The extremely useful Table 1 compares the subject matter of this literary evidence with that of the epigraphical material. It is a truism that the great majority of inscribed decrees from Greek antiquity are honorific in nature, and that is indeed the case for the period in question at Athens (69.2%). What is striking is the diverse range of topics of the decrees attested in the literary sources, a majority of which deal with non-honorific matters (64.1%): the proportions are almost exactly reversed. Notwithstanding the incomplete nature of our evidence, this figure lends support to the position, defended among others by Lambert (Inscribed Athenian Laws and Decrees in the Age of Demosthenes, Chapter 2), that not all Athenian decrees were inscribed on stone. One can only speculate that this may have also been the case with other poleis for which literary evidence is lacking, but whose epigraphic corpora give the (perhaps misleading) impression that they did little else other than honour benefactors. Each entry in Inventory A of Volume 1 provides a section on the literary context of the text quoted, testimon(ies) for the decree in question (in facing-page Greek and English translation), a commentary, a note on the date and a bibliography. If the proposer of the decree is known, his PA and PAA numbers are noted, as is his appearance in J.K. Davies's Athenian Propertied Families where applicable. It is not surprising that a majority of the decrees fall into the later period (352/1-322/1), when the texts of Demosthenes, Aeschines and their contemporaries furnish so much evidence. More striking is the THE CLASSICAL REVIEW 466

Classical Review, 2021

Where do 'human rights', as a concept and as a legal regime, come from? In the present book S. ar... more Where do 'human rights', as a concept and as a legal regime, come from? In the present book S. argues that the Athenians of the classical period 'invented humane values' (p. 2) and that a 'parallel wave' of humane discourse arose in the eighteenth century in Western Europe, in the work of authors directly influenced by Greek texts. Across an introduction, six chapters, three 'explorations' and a conclusion, S. traces the language of compassion and 'humaneness' in classical Athens, comparing those values to similar-looking ideological developments in eighteenth-century Europe. S.'s purpose is couched in interested terms, as an attempt to correct a recent 'phase of polemical disdain for and partial rejection of the Greeks' (p. 7), by showing that, '[f]or all our political correctness or genuine Angst', 'this heritage has borne important fruit' (p. 8). While S. addresses an important subject, the book suffers from numerous errors and insufficient argumentation. The first 'exploration' introduces us to an odd work of the French abbé Jean-Jacques Barthélemy, Travels of Anacharsis the Younger in Greece, which was first published in 1788 and featured in the personal library of Thomas Jefferson. The work purports to be the travelogue of a Scythian in Greece in the fourth century BCE, replete with descriptions based on the author's knowledge of the ancient sources. S. suggests that Barthélemy understood ancient Greek slavery to be relatively 'humane' and that this understanding, conveyed through Anacharsis' description, would have informed Jefferson's picture of Greece. (Jefferson is elsewhere said to have 'treated [his slaves] as kindly as possible', p. 18; compare the official Monticello website, which maintains that 'there is no such thing as a "good" slaveholder'.) S. also wishes to read Barthélemy's work in its historical context, as reflecting the concerns of Enlightenment France. Some thoughts are not Barthélemy's editorialising, however. For example, S. sees 'intriguing ambiguity' in his description of the painter Parrhasius' portrait of the Athenian dêmos, which shows it as 'violent, unjust, gentle, compassionate, vain-glorious, crouching, haughty, and timid' (p. 14, emphasis in S.). But any ambiguity here is due not to Barthélemy but to Pliny the Elder, whose description of Parrhasius' painting Barthélemy has copied word for word (iracundum iniustum. .. clementem misericordem; gloriosum. .. humilem, ferocem fugacemque, NH 35.69). Chapter 1 depicts both classical Greece and eighteenth-century Europe as periods of progressive enlightenment, with Protagoras' rationalism, for example, finding its counterpart in the work of Adam Smith. One reads here very traditional accounts of the Greek move from mythos to logos and of the superiority of 'difficult' Thucydides over Herodotus, 'old-fashioned fun reading' (p. 27). The Greeks are credited with 'the beginnings of city planning' (p. 27), but planned urban space goes back thousands of years earlier, as can be seen in sites like Mohenjo-daro in Pakistan (mid-third millennium BCE). Chapter 2 claims to test the legal scholar Alan Dershowitz's theory that notions of rights develop in reaction to wartime atrocities. S. argues that this happened in classical Greece and in eighteenth-century Europe, but she does not examine other time periods or places. Dershowitz's theory would seem to predict that rights talk would emerge anywhere there was terrible violence. The theory is pertinent here only if fifth-century BCE Greece and eighteenth-century Europe were uniquely bloody. Chapter 3 plausibly THE CLASSICAL REVIEW

Polis: The Journal for Ancient Greek Political Thought 36: 396-400, 2019

Review essay covering V. Azoulay, Pericles of Athens; T. R. Martin, Pericles: A Biography in Cont... more Review essay covering V. Azoulay, Pericles of Athens; T. R. Martin, Pericles: A Biography in Context; and L. J. Samons, II, Pericles and the Conquest of History: A Political Biography. NOTE: I state wrongly at the beginning of the paper that the "Pericles Cup" was discovered in 2008. It was discovered in 2014.