Athenian and Roman imperial citizens would have had to reside in or near the capital in order to attend political assemblies and thereby influence imperial administration. This was the case simply because neither Athens nor Rome developed the kinds of representative political institutions familiar in modern times. If the Athenians were serious about citizen self-government and citizen imperial administration, their restrictive citizenship policies made sense. Apart from Athenian citizen colonies abroad, or cleruchies, most Athenian citizens resided in Attica and therefore did not face insurmountable spatial obstacles to political participation. Even in the case of cleruchies, Athenian citizen-beneficiaries may have continued to reside in Attica and acted as rentiers of their properties abroad (A. Jones 1957: 168-74; Brunt 1966; Erxleben 1975; cf. Rhodes, this volume, chapter 4). Moreover, restrictive Athenian citizenship laws kept immigrants from unduly swelling the citizen registers and overwhelming the sites of Athenian law courts and political and legislative assemblies.
Roman citizen colonies arose at a considerable distance from Rome as early as the third century BCE, and in the second century these colonies were established in Cisalpine Gaul and even outside of Italy itself. Liberal citizenship policies and enfranchised communities far from the capital indicate that, unlike Athens, Rome did not put a premium on substantive duties and powers of Roman citizens in the administration of the affairs of either the city or the empire. It would have been difficult for a nonelite Roman citizen with permanent residence in, let us say, Herdonia to come to Rome for political and legislative assemblies on any sort of regular basis. Generally speaking, admission to citizen status was much easier in Rome than at Athens, largely because Roman citizenship had more to do with legal status and cultural identity than active imperial citizenship. An upper limit on Roman citizen census figures and spatial proximity of Roman citizens to the imperial capital were not therefore issues of primary importance in Roman citizenship policy. In cases at law involving the question of citizenship, we should therefore expect to find imperial ideologies of relative restrictiveness at Athens and relative liberality at Rome.
I suggest that these conditions are reflected in two texts, Ps-Demosthenes’ Against Neaira and Cicero’s Pro Balbo, which reveal dominant ideologies of imperial citizenship at play in specific instances of pragmatic politics. The case of Against Neaira probably occurred sometime between 373 and 339 bce. In this public lawsuit, the prosecutors Apollodorus and Theomnestus charged that an alien woman, Neaira, was living as lawful wife to Stephanus, an old personal and political enemy. Athenian law stipulated that if convicted Neaira should be sold into slavery, and that Stephanus should be fined 1,000 drachmae (§16). The prosecution maintained that Neaira was a former slave and prostitute (§49), and that Stephanus had pretended that her children were his own (§38). Moreover, Stephanus had given Neaira’s two daughters in marriage to Athenian citizens. Stephanus therefore deceived the bridegrooms into believing that Neaira was herself an Athenian citizen woman. Neaira’s legal status was of crucial importance, since according to Pericles’ citizenship law, she must be an Athenian citizen woman in order for offspring from these marriages to become legitimate citizens. Perhaps most serious of all was the fact that one of the deceived husbands was Theogenes, the king-archon, whose wife was entrusted with important ritual duties on behalf of the state (§§72-3; cf. C. Patterson 1994; E. Cohen 2000).
Apollodorus, the principal prosecutor, was the son of a naturalized former slave, the wealthy banker Pasion (§2). He clearly was conscious that his own claims to citizenship could be questioned, as he asked his audience to overlook that he was prosecutor and that the supporters of the defendant were Athenian citizens (§115). Apollodorus stressed that Athenian citizenship was a precious gift bestowed only on those who had performed signal services for the Athenians.
For the civic body of Athens, although it has supreme authority over all things in the
State, and it is in its power to do whatsoever it pleases, yet regarded the gift of citizenship
As so honorable and so sacred a thing that it enacted in its own restraint laws to which it
Must conform, when it wishes to create a citizen. (§§88-9, trans. A. Murray 2001)
Apollodorus went on to argue that those granted Athenian citizenship were ineligible for the archonship and were prohibited from holding any of the priesthoods. Their descendants were eligible for these privileges, but only under the condition that they were born from an Athenian woman in a legally recognized marriage (§92). The prosecutor next expounded upon the heroic services of the Plataeans on Athens’ behalf, concluding with the observation that even in their case these strictures regarding the citizen franchise still applied (§§94-106).
In the course of his indictment, Apollodorus touched upon the theme of Athenian autochthony, which is in itself remarkable in light of the fact that Apollodorus was a second-generation Athenian whose father had once been a slave. Indeed, his brother-in-law Theomnestus felt compelled in his deposition to relay Apollodorus’ past actions, in which he demonstrated his brother-in-law’s patriotism and civicmindedness, clearly in order to remove any doubts as to Apollodorus’ right, as an Athenian citizen, to prosecute the case (§§2-5). In any event, Apollodorus recalled how Stephanus had maliciously and unjustly indicted a certain Xenocleides, who ultimately was stripped of his citizenship. He went on to add:
And yet you do not count it a monstrous thing that this Stephanus has taken the right of free speech from those who are native-born citizens [tous men phusei politas] and are lawful members of our commonwealth, and in defiance of all the laws forces upon you as Athenians those who have no such right? (§28, trans. A. Murray 2001)
Later in his speech, Apollodorus noted that in ancient times, the era of Theseus and kingship at Athens, rulers were all-powerful on account of their being born of the earth (§74, dia to autochthonas einai), therefore employing the myth of Athenian autochthony to make his case. This reliance upon mythology once again stressed citizenship as a jealously guarded and exclusive privilege.
L. Cornelius Balbus was born around 100 bce into an influential family of Spanish Gades, a city tied to Rome by treaty for more than a century ( civitas foederata). Balbus performed conspicuous services for the Roman cause in the war against Sertorius, and was rewarded with a grant of Roman citizenship by Pompey. His Roman citizenship was ratified by the lex Gellia Cornelia of 72 bce (Cic. Balb. 19). He later found favor with Caesar, serving as his subordinate officer in Further Spain (§63). After Balbus had taken up residence at Rome and acquired the Roman citizenship his former fellow citizens, the Gaditani, appointed him as their patronus, or guestfriend in Rome (§§41-3). He was clearly at the center of high Roman politics, having helped to broker the political alliance among Pompey, Caesar, and Crassus, which modern historians call the First Triumvirate (Cic. Att. 2.3.3).
In late summer or early autumn of 56 bce, however, Balbus faced a challenge to his status as Roman citizen - as had the Greek poet Archias, whom Cicero defended some six years earlier. In the case of Archias, the case was an indirect political attack on the powerful Roman general and statesman L. Lucullus, Archias’ patron. Likewise in the case of Balbus, the prosecution was undoubtedly driven by political enmity against Balbus’ friends and supporters, Pompey and Caesar (cf. §§58-9, 65). As for the legal substance of the case, Balbus was prosecuted under the same law as Archias had been charged, the lex Papia of 64 bce, which enabled the eviction of noncitizen residents from Rome.
In his defense of Balbus, Cicero followed the speeches of the defendant’s supporters, Crassus and Pompey. He began with a lengthy introduction on the great achievements, sound character, and moral probity of Pompey, who had granted Balbus the Roman citizenship (§§1-17). Cicero next moved on to the defendant’s own impeccable character, and then to a discussion of the ease and flexibility of Roman citizenship practices: ample precedents for citizenship grants to both individuals and communities, the ability of Roman citizens to change their citizenship by moving to other states, and the imperial logic of rewarding Roman citizenship to those allies who had imperiled themselves fighting on behalf of Rome’s empire. The only restriction was that no one could be a citizen of Rome and another state at the same time (§28). Throughout this part of his oration, Cicero repeatedly stressed Rome’s open citizenship policies:
For we are aware that citizenship has been conferred upon many members of tributary states in Africa, Sicily, Sardinia, and the other provinces, and we know that enemies who have gone over to our commanders and rendered our state great services have been honored with the citizenship; and, lastly, we are aware that slaves, whose legal rights, fortune, and status are the lowest, are very often, for having deserved well of the state, publicly presented with freedom, that is, with citizenship. (§24, trans. Gardner 2005, with slight modification; cf. §41)
For since from every state there is a road open to ours, and since a way is open to our citizens to other states, then indeed the more closely each state is bound to us by alliance, friendship, contract, agreement, treaty, the more closely I think it is associated with us by sharing our privileges, rewards, and citizenship. (§29, trans. Gardner 2005)
Cicero went on to emphasize the incorporative nature of Roman citizenship practices with examples from the earliest Republic (§§53, 55), and he reached back even further into mythical times and the foundation of Romulus.
But what undoubtedly has done most to establish our Empire and to increase the renown of the Roman People, is that Romulus, that first founder of this city, taught us by the treaty which he made with the Sabines, that this state ought to be enlarged by the admission even of enemies as citizens. Through his authority and example our forefathers never ceased to grant and to bestow citizenship. And so, many members of Latin towns, the inhabitants of Tusculum and of Lanuvium, for instance, and from other stocks whole peoples, such as the Sabines, the Volscians and the Hernicians, were admitted to citizenship. (§31, trans. Gardner 2005)
The remainder of the speech consisted in discussion of the nature of the treaty between Gades and Rome, its irrelevance to the question of Balbus’ Roman citizenship, the authority of Roman commanders to grant Roman citizenship and the many precedents for the practice, and the prosecution of Balbus as a political attack on Pompey and Caesar. Cicero drew upon the myth of Roman inclusive heterogeneity, throughout discussing Roman citizenship practices as open and incorporative. It is difficult to imagine an Athenian advocate employing a similar line of argument.
World History
