Defining the Greek City: Language, Ancestors, Gods, and Buildings

Even though cultivated men sometimes romanticized rusticity, deep down everybody knew that civilized life was a performance that needed an audience. Greek athletic and cultural activities required an urban setting. So to be fully Greek was to live in a city. But what made a city Greek? Above all, Greek cities felt connected to each other and to the past through language. Educated men conversed in Greek from southern Gaul to Syria and from Thebes in southern Egypt to the Bosporan kingdoms north of the Black Sea. Indigenous languages were still used in Cappadocia, Galatia, and rural Phrygia in Augustus’ time. In Western Asia, however, indigenous languages had mostly died out, a process Strabo saw as connected with the advent of Roman rule, whose administrative boundaries did not correspond with those of pre-existing ethnic groups (Strabo 12.4.6; Mitchell 2000: 120-1). It can be difficult to know what language ordinary people spoke, though we do have evidence of what they wrote. In Jerusalem and Galilee, Hebrew, Greek, and Aramaic were all in current use before the destruction of the Temple in 70 ce (Millar 1993a: 352); Greek was the public language of the cities of northern Syria, though Syriac was used along the Euphrates (Millar 1993a: 241-2). In Egypt, peasants spoke demotic, but Greek was the official language of administration (Lewis 1983: 187). In Naples, people used Latin in their epitaphs, but Greek for honorific decrees (Lomas 1993: 176). In general, in cities where the elites had pretensions to Greek culture, Greek was the language of city government and public inscriptions, of rhetorical and literary performance. Greek was also the language in which the city and its representatives communicated with the emperor and his representatives. And Greek was the language in which the emperor addressed his communications in return (Millar 1977). Romans might boast of being bilingual; Greeks did not (Dihle 1994: 45-6; Swain 1996: 40-2).

In addition, a Greek city had certain characteristic ways of locating itself in space and time. Greeks’ sense of a common identity as a kinship group informed the practice of tracing a city’s origin back to colonization by a mother-city in Classical

Greece or to foundation by a god or hero from Greek mythology. It was important to be ‘‘on the map’’ of the Greek past, historical or mythical. A city that claimed to have been founded by Perseus, for example, would celebrate that connection in oratory, allude to it in diplomatic dealings, and commemorate it in coinage and in cult (C. P. Jones 1999: 115; Robert 1987: 74-86). The people of Aphrodisias did not hesitate to remind the Romans that their city had been founded by Aphrodite, the divine ancestor of Julius Caesar and Augustus (Tac. Ann. 3.62; J. Reynolds 1982 no. 32). This diplomatic game was played competitively. For example, in the reign of Tiberius, 11 cities claimed to be the most suitable spot for Asia’s new temple of the emperor. Eleven diplomatic teams converged on the capital to claim the honor, variously citing antiquity of origin, grandeur of setting, and previous services to Rome. Sardis alleged a common ancestry with the Etruscans, and hence with the Romans; Smyrna somewhat absurdly claimed title to the honor on the grounds of three incompatible genealogies (descent from Tantalus, Theseus, or perhaps an Amazon), but had the best record of service to the Roman state and for this reason (in Tacitus’ opinion) won the day (Ann. 4.55-6; Strubbe 1984-6). Again we see that the exigencies of dealing with Rome accentuated claims to Greekness.

Religion was also an important part of Greek identity, and a prominent part of city life. Greek cities worshipped more or less the same gods in more or less the same ways. Processions, sacrifices, hymns, and feasts provided a common format that allowed for infinite local variations in ritual details. The gods themselves varied regionally in their titles and attributes. Our Artemis would not look exactly like your Artemis, perhaps because she had evolved out of syncretism with a different local goddess, or perhaps because her cult statue had different features. However, our statue of Hadrian would look pretty much like your statue of Hadrian, because emperors seem to have found ways to propagate fairly consistent visual images of themselves (Potter 1994: 128). Our Hadrian might reside as a guest in the temple of Apollo, while yours might adorn a gymnasium, a complex of public fountains or even, by imperial permission, have a special temple of his own.

Worship of the gods was only one of the features of urban life that required an architectural setting (Mitchell 1993: 1: 80-1). A Greek city had a fairly standard set of architectural components, some of which definitely show Roman influence (Macready and Thompson 1987; MacDonald 1986). Commerce required public structures: a harbor, an agora, arcades with shops, aqueducts, and sometimes less glamorous structures like channels for industrial waste (van Nijf 1997: 89-90; Pliny Ep. 10.98). Many commercial activities required water, as did the ancient city’s leisurely habits of personal hygiene. Fountains and public baths were a delightful by-product of the Roman peace, since the aqueducts required to fill them could not be constructed across hostile territory (Coulton 1987). Greek gymnasia, elaborated by the zeal of local benefactors, evolved into bath-gymnasium complexes. The gymnasium was often simple, of classical Greek design, but the baths right next to it were more elaborate structures inspired by Roman habits of monumental architecture and incorporating the Roman idea of taking the waters in a sequence of different temperatures (Fagan 1999a; Yegul 1992). These complexes often contained a room devoted to imperial statuary. The statues of local benefactors, living and dead, adorned the site of their benefactions - indeed all the public places of the city. Structures of commemoration were a basic ingredient of urban space.

Gatherings devoted to politics and entertainment, which drew large crowds, often used the same venue. The assembly often met in the theater for routine business. Criminal justice was often handled in the marketplace, but the interrogation of a celebrated criminal might be transferred to the theater by popular demand when the marketplace overflowed (A. Pion. 7). Traditional Greek theaters were often modified to accommodate wild beast hunts or gladiatorial combats, and of course regularly played host to less sanguinary diversions: performances or competitions in rhetoric, music, drama, and mime. A Greek fable conned by schoolboys shows how closely connected urban living, politics, and entertainment were in people’s minds. In this fable the monkeys decide to build a city for themselves like the cities of men:

Look how happy men are because they have cities: they have each their own house, and go up all together into the assembly and into the theater and delight themselves with all kinds of sights and sounds. (Hermog. Prog. p. 3 Rabe)

Men did indeed take pride in the architectural amenities of their native cities, and both public funds and the philanthropy of leading citizens were devoted (sometimes unwisely) to improving them. One could hold one’s head up higher visiting another city if one’s native city were known for its fine public buildings; it was painful to blush for ramshackle shops and dilapidated bathhouses when the governor came to town (D. Chr. 40.9).