BMCR 2009.04.59: Capponi on Virgilio, Studi ellenistici XX

Biagio Virgilio (ed.), Studi ellenistici XX.  Pisa/Roma:  Fabrizio
Serra Editore, 2008.  Pp. 553.  ISBN 9788862271059. EUR 195.00
(pb).

Reviewed by Livia Capponi, Newcastle University
([email protected])
Word count:  2072 words
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[Authors and titles are listed at the end of the review.]

This volume of collected essays on Hellenism continues the series
founded in 1984, and directed since then by Biagio Virgilio (Pisa). It
comprises twenty essays on different aspects of Hellenism, with no
apparent thematic, chronological or geographical order. Overall, these
studies are a highly valuable collective effort, which contribute
significantly to the current state of research, either by analysing new
evidence, or by redefining and challenging the existing consolidated
scholarly views on this part of Mediterranean history. The series Studi
Ellenistici has proven to be an extremely useful tool for all students
of ancient history, and the director should be thanked for his work.
For reasons of space, in this review, I will comment on a limited
number of contributions.

The introductory essay by Emilio Gabba examines the reception of Greek
Classical culture by the upper classes of the ancient world, starting
from the Hellenistic and Roman periods, and continuing up to the
admiration and emulation of Greek culture as the locus of an imagined
spiritual originality in Neo-classical Europe. After considering modern
types of philhellenism (e.g. the European sympathy for Greece's
struggle for liberation from the Turks) Gabba underlines how from the
middle of the nineteenth century the progression of knowledge of the
Near East helped scholars to shift from the worship of the Greek
miracle to a more balanced, even anti-classical, consideration of the
Greek cultural horizon.

Pierre Briant's first essay could be briefly summarised as 'the
Rostovtzeff delusion'. The scholar highlights the contradictions and
shortcomings in Rostovtzeff's teleological vision of the Achaemenid
state as a pre-Hellenistic reality, and criticises some passages where
the Russian scholar minimised the rupture between the Achaemenid and
the Hellenistic kingdoms, and exaggerated a stereotyped model of longue
dure/e. Briant shows that Rostovtzeff neglected most documentary
evidence available about the Persian domination, such as the
Elephantine papyri from Egypt. Although Rostovtzeff shows himself to be
aware of these documents and interested in them, he does not take
account of them in his larger historical picture of
Achaemenid-Hellenistic continuity.

The stimulating essay by Manuela Mari on the ruler cult in Macedonia
argues that divine honours were attributed to at least two Antigonid
kings, Antigonus Gonatas or Doson, worshipped in the area of Oreskeia
in the Strymon valley (and perhaps in Amphipolis, too) and Philip V in
Amphipolis, in Berge, and in a city of Chalkidike. Probably, such an
initiative followed the concession of privileges or marked the special
relationship between the ruler and a city (the epithet ktistes is
significant and should be taken in a flexible and figurative sense). It
must be noted, however, that this type of interaction between king and
cities was limited to the area outside the 'Old Kingdom' of Macedon, in
other words, to the free poleis that had been annexed by Philip II
(e.g. Pydna, Kassandreia, Amphipolis, Philippoi and Philippopolis,
Maroneia and Thasos). The author concludes that the interaction between
local and state cults was never established in Macedonia in a
standardized way. Differently from other areas of Greece and Asia
Minor, in Macedonia only a few cities, and apparently none of the 'Old
Kingdom', felt the need to approach the kings to solicit their
benefactions through the offer of divine honours. If it is true that
Philip was the only king who consciously tried to introduce a divine
representation of himself, his attempt was a failure.

Biagio Virgilio contributes to this series with a learned essay on the
portrayal of Hellenistic kingship in Polybius. Through the
investigation of different passages, the author shows that Polybius'
negative portrayal of Hellenistic monarchies is both exaggerated and
instrumental to his justification of the rise of Rome. Polybius places
a great emphasis on the political constitution of a state as a
substantial reason for its success or failure, thus it seems natural
and even inevitable that the Roman constitution prevails over the
declining institutional framework of the Hellenistic kingdoms.
Polybius' analysis of the failure of these kingdoms points to different
causes: the moral degradation of individual rulers (e.g. Ptolemy IV
Philopator, caricaturised as a drunkard, or Antiochus Epiphanes, the
'madman') is made worse by the intrigues of Hellenistic courts and the
superpower of courtiers, constantly plotting against the kings, and by
the financial problems of the kings who often begged for loans of cash
from the haute bourgeoisie. Polybius' view is that the chaos and
arbitrary quality inherent to the Hellenistic monarchies would never be
possible in Rome. The other ideological focus of Polybius is the 'ideal
democracy' of the Achaean League, which remains however suspended in a
nostalgic and patriotic limbo. Polybius thus explains the rise of Rome
in terms of technical superiority: stronger army and more efficient
institutions, but no better culture. Culture remains firmly anchored to
the side of the losers.

Lucio Troiani provides a new comparative analysis of 1 and 2 Maccabees.
Through an attentive examination of the differences in background,
readership, language and style, and a careful consideration of the
different emphasis that each book places on different parts of the same
story (the Maccabean revolt against 'Hellenism') he shows that the
purpose, origin and date of composition of the two works are radically
different. 1 Maccabees is a local history, written by an inhabitant of
Judea, of the deeds of the Maccabean brothers Judas, Jonathan and
Simon, that looks at circa forty years and stops with the rise of John
Hyrcanus I.  The historical and cultural background of this work
remains a mystery. However, it seems clear that its main concern is to
show how the Maccabean heroes defended the national religious and legal
tradition against a policy of forced assimilation and homogenization.
This policy brought a revival of Palestinian cults which culminated in
the construction of a bomos, an altar, in the temple of Jerusalem (the
litholatric cults were typical of the Caananite tribes, the historical
enemies of the Jews). In 1 Maccabees, thus, the enemy of Judas is not
Greek culture, but rather globalisation. 2 Maccabees is a more
sophisticated and stratified work. It is a collection of documents with
an edifying purpose, apparently aiming to recall the Diaspora Jews to
the celebration of the traditional cult of Jerusalem (as is clear from
the two introductory letters from the Jews of Jerusalem to the Jews of
Egypt of 143 and 124 BCE). Many of the problems emphasised by the book,
e.g. the laws of purity (amixia) and the sabbath, were burning issues
of discussion among the Jews of the Diaspora cities. For Troiani, the
slogan 'adopt Greek customs', which the author of 2 Maccabees
attributes to the reform of Antiochus IV, is probably a political
catchword that circulated among the Jews who lived in the Greek poleis.
In substance, while 1 Maccabees looks at the effects of the reform
within Judaea, the dossier contained in 2 Maccabees shows the
repercussions and consequences that the reform at Jerusalem and the
Maccabean movement had for the Diaspora. The differences between these
two perspectives do not imply that one is better or more reliable than
the other.

The perceptive essay by John Ma surveys the paradigmatic modern
approaches to various aspects of Hellenism. He starts by contesting two
binary models. The first is the alleged Hellenistic fusion between
cultures, versus a colonial paradigm of radically separate cultures,
with Greek culture of the ethno-e/lite being completely detached from
the local cultures of the dominated groups. The second is the
juxtaposition of a supposed decline versus a continued vitality of the
polis. The author suggests that we should hold both paradigms in our
field of vision, and wonders whether all these categorisations are a
modern problem, rather than an ancient one. Hellenistic Egypt, for
example, is a land of paradoxes. The images of the Ptolemaic rulers,
often mixing Greek style portraits with Egyptian motifs, give us the
impression of 'seeing double', and documents such as the Rosetta stone,
produced by Egyptian priestly e/lites on the model of the Greek
honorific decree, seem 'strange' to both Classicists and Egyptologists.
Moreover, the gradual 'Egyptianisation' of the Ptolemaic rulers seems
to take place precisely when the Egyptian native population is shaken
by rebellions, and loses for good any power of real interaction with
the Macedonian rulers. Other paradoxes may be seen at the local level
in Karia, Lykia, and Hasmonean Judaea, where cultural and military
resistance to a Hellenistic kingdom leads to the creation of an
imperialist and expansionist power, a Hellenistic kingdom such as that
which the pious Jews rebelled against. The author raises the question
whether all these paradoxes are inherent to the object studied, or may
have been superimposed by the interpreters. He concludes that paradoxes
(or, one might say with Finley, 'models') should emerge from the
ancient documents through an exercise of induction. In other words,
only a comparison and analysis of the documents can provide conceptual
models that, in turn, need to be constantly questioned.

The essay by Gianluca Casa is a useful survey of a specific oath
formula (exomosia) in Hellenistic papyri. This contribution shows the
heavy dependence of Hellenistic legal terms on Egyptian, or even on
Near Eastern institutions, and raises the interesting question of the
contribution of Persian institutions and bureaucratic terminology to
the Ptolemaic state.  Domitilla Campanile looks at the introduction of
the Roman conventus in the provinces and argues that this took place
around 129-126 BCE, when Manius Aquillius reorganised the new province
of Asia. Campanile then turns to look at the role of the city e/lites
in the exchange of favours with the Roman government, down to the
imperial period, and finds that a major turning point was the request
in 29 BCE on the part of the Asian legates to build a temple to
Octavian and dea Roma in Pergamum and Nicomedia. This gesture
profoundly affected the life of the assemblies in the cities of Asia,
allowing them to strenghten their ties with the centre of power and to
insert the local e/lites into the imperial administration. Finally, the
most original contribution is that of Omar Coloru, who sketches a
fascinating picture of the reminiscences of the Graeco-Bactrian kings
in Mediaeval and Modern literature, from Boccaccio and Chaucer to
Kavafis, down to the science-fiction novels of the American writer H.P.
Lovecraft.

Overall, this collection of essays represents a vital contribution to
the scholarly research on Hellenism. It is presented in a learned, yet
accessible manner, and is enriched by an open-minded, international and
interdisciplinary approach. The huge size of the work (553 pages) is
perhaps behind the editor's choice of having neither indexes nor
general bibliography. Nonetheless, this is a very welcome contribution
to Hellenistic Studies, and a necessary reference work for all students
of ancient history.

Table of Contents

Emilio Gabba, "Il mondo culturale del Mediterraneo antico e l'idea del
classico", 9

Christian Habicht, "Judicial Control of the Legislature in Greek
States", 17

Bruno Helly, "Encore le ble/ thessalien. Trois de/crets de Larisa (IG
IX 2, 506) accordant aux Athe/niens licence d'exportation et re/duction
des droits de douane sur leurs achats de ble/", 25

Federicomaria Muccioli, "Stratocle di Diomeia e la redazione trezenia
del 'decreto di Temistocle'", 109

Pierre Briant, "Michael Rostovtzeff et le passage du monde ache/me/nide
au monde helle/nistique", 137

Pierre Briant, "Retour sur Alexandre et les katarraktes du Tigre:
l'histoire d'un dossier (suite et fin)", 155

Manuela Mari, "The Ruler Cult in Macedonia", 219

Pierre-Louis Gatier, "He/racle/e-sur-mer et la ge/ographie historique
de la co^te syrienne", 269

Raymond Descat, "Isabelle Pernin, Notes sur la chronologie et
l'histoire des baux de Mylasa", 285

Biagio Virgilio, "Polibio, il mondo ellenistico e Roma", 315

Lucio Troiani, "Note storiografiche sopra I e II Maccabei", 347

John Ma, "Paradigms and Paradoxes in the Hellenistic World", 371

Roberto Mazzucchi, "Mileto e la sympoliteia con Miunte", 387

Andrea Primo, "Seleuco e Mitridate Ktistes in un episodio del giovane
Demetrio Poliorcete", 409

Gianluca Casa, "Giuro di no. Note a PSI com. VI 11", 427

Francis X. Ryan, "Breadth and Depth in the Account of the Dedications
to Athana Lindia", 455

Roberto Sciandra, "Il 'Re dei Re' e il 'Satrapo dei Satrapi': note
sulla successione tra Mitridate II e Gotarze I a Babilonia (ca. 94-80
a.e.v.)", 471

Domitilla Campanile, "Vita da provinciali: Asia e Bitinia in eta\
romana", 489

Patrick Robiano, "Caspe/rius E/lien, ou Claude E/lien? Ou comment
Philostrate e/crit l'histoire", 503

Omar Coloru, "Reminiscenze dei re greco-battriani nella letteratura
medievale europea e nella science-fiction americana", 519


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