& Rome, Vol. 48, No.

2, October 2001 Greece

THORUBOS: INTERVENTIONS, ECCLESIASTIC AND POPULAR INTERRUPTIONS, IN THE ATHENIAN INVOLVEMENT ASSEMBLY
By JUDITH
TACON

'If any of the rhetores,speaking in the boule or in the assembly of the people, ... shall interrupt the proceedings, or in the midst of the deliberations shall get up and speak on anything that is not in order, or shall shout approval . . . a fine of not more than 50 drachmas for each offence.'1

Aeschines in his speech Against Ctesiphonsets out for the benefit of the jurors the theoretical position concerning ecclesiastic thorubos(clamour, tumult), specifically the illegality of interruptions of the speaker by individuals or shouts of the demos.However Aeschines' comments in his earlier speech Against Timarchussuggest that the reality seems to have been somewhat different to the ideal of debate as laid out in the laws:
'I could wish, ... the assemblies of the people were properly conducted ..., and the laws enforced which Solon enacted to secure orderly conduct on the part of public speakers; for then it would be permitted to the oldest citizen, as the law prescribes, to come forward to the platform first, with dignity, and, uninterrupted by shouting and tumult (thorubou),out of his experience to advise for the good of the state.'2

For an example of that reality of debate in the Assembly (or something approaching it), we turn to Demosthenes. Here he reminds the jurors in a lawcourt speech of 343 B.C., later to be titled On the False Embassy,of an exchange in the Assembly: barbed banter which plainly left him looking foolish in front of the Athenian demos:
'I continued: "If any of these promises come true, men of Athens, be sure you give thanks and honours and decorations to these gentlemen; but not to me. If, however, things turn out otherwise, see that it is on them that you vent your anger. I stand aside." "Not now," said Aeschines, interrupting me, "do not stand aside now; only do not put in your claim then." "Agreed; " said I, "if I do, I shall be in the wrong." Then Philocrates rose, and said, in a very supercilious manner: "No wonder Demosthenes and I disagree, men of Athens. He drinks water; I drink wine." And then you all laughed.'3

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We may conclude that the jibe hit home because Demosthenes had referred to it previously in an Assembly speech given a year earlier, the so-called 'Second Philippic'.4 Aeschines' citation of the law, as quoted above, declared such interruptions of the speaker in the Assembly as illegal. Aeschines attempts to give weight to his paraphrase of the law by attributing it to Solon, but modern commentators have identified it as being more likely to come from the new code of 403.5 The punishment the law laid down was not trivial; 50 drachmas being in the fourth century roughly equivalent to 120 days' food for a family of four.6 This discrepancy between the law as quoted by Aeschines and Demosthenes' and others' descriptions of ecclesiastic debate has naturally not escaped the notice of commentators. There has, however, been no systematic analysis of this phenomenon. As Hansen states in his standard treatment TheAthenian Assembly:
'In principle there was no communication from the participants to the speakers or between the participants. And there was no intercourse between the speakers, except that one speaker could always comment on the speech made by a preceding speaker.'7

However, he immediately qualifies this statement by adding how the Athenians may never have held one single session in which this pattern of debate was strictly respected. Two conflicting models of ecclesiastic debate emerge. Adherence to 'Solonic' law, apparently supported by the speeches recreated by Thucydides and a survey of the written record of the orators' speeches, would seem to suggest a serene and civilized discourse, in which speakers take it in turn to speak to the Athenian people and to respond to each other's points through carefully composed speeches. The alternativenegative concept is of disruptive banter created by popular vocal participation between speakers and of thorubos in Assembly debate. To an extent, the conflict can be resolved by considering the motive of ancient authors in recording instances of rhetores'interruptions and ecclesiastic thorubos.Xenophon and Thucydides present distinctly anti-populist histories which feature ecclesiastic debates disrupted by the demosas ochlos;although significantly the setpiece speeches composed by Thucydides to be put into the mouths of the leading politicians rarely feature interruption by the people or other speakers. Plato and Aristotle also present negative judgements on the created by popular vocal participation, which seems in line with thorubos their broadly anti-democratic views. are broadly dependent upon the Presentations of ecclesiastic thorubos author's motive for their inclusion resulting in images of debate in the

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Assembly that are ideologically loaded. As Finley put it in his classic

paper on Athenian demagogues, '. . . the distorting mirror of men like

Thucydides, Xenophon and Plato magnifies the exceptional incidents of extreme democratic intolerance.'8 The published speeches of the orators present a particularproblem in interpretation. Dover questions whether the terms 'publish' and 'publication' ought to be used in this context at all. He argues that once a speech was delivered or a written copy of it seen by another the composer had lost control of its distribution and thus had no control over the number of copies made and their accuracy and integrity.9 However, it is quite possible that large-scale editorial changes occurred before the speaker had even produced his edited version. Dorjahn, in his attempts to identify instances of Demosthenes speaking extemporaneously in the lawcourt, commented in a series of papers on the possible disparity between pieces of forensic oratory as delivered and actually published. Such extempore speaking might be stimulated by shouts and interruptions of the jurors and the corona.As Dorjahn noted, in almost Thucydidean tones:
'If a few men had shouted for all the details, mob psychology would probably have moved the rest to join in the clamour. Then Demosthenes would have been obliged to take up matters, which he had not intended to discuss, and, therefore, had omitted from his prepared speech.'0

Yet such deviations from a prepared speech would not necessarily have appeared in the final published version, especially if they had not reflected well on the orator." As Bonner observed in his study of lawcourt speeches, there certainly seems to be a distinct lack of banter, jokes, and humorous anecdotes such as might be expected in the surviving pieces of Attic forensic oratory.'2 Dorjahn concluded that as this sort of material had to be improvised and its utility pertained to the moment only, it had no function in a lawcourt speech revised for the reading public.13 The published speeches that we are forced to consult for evidence of ecclesiastic thorubosare likewise often lacking in the spur-of-the-moment banter and response to the demos and other speakers. It would be too much to hope that both a published speech and an independent summary of its circumstances should survive from Athens. Even so, some indication of the likely scale of the discrepancy can be gained from a reading of the Hansard written record of parliamentary debates in the House of Commons and personal accounts of the same

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events. According to Factsheet 42, The Official Report, House of Commonsrevised by John Keeley in July 1998, Hansard undertakes to transcribe every speech made in the House, but cheers, shouts, taunts, and interruptions are rarely recorded unless a distinct verbal point is made by an identifiable speaker. Consequently the picture that emerges from a reading of Hansard of parliamentary debate in the House of Commons is generally one of well-ordered speech-exchange; evidence of thorubos is never explicit and can only be inferred by reading between the lines of the Hansard record. The potential distance between the published form and reality is evident in a comparison of Hansard and Martin Gilbert's account of a now famous debate in the House of Commons on May 7th-8th 1940.14 This crucial session culminated in the removal of Chamberlain as prime minister and the installation of Churchill as the leader of a new coalition government. Gilbert uses personal diary records of events to add the colour and noise of informal vocal contributions to the transcribed debate in Hansard. Although the personal diaries such as those quoted below cannot provide objective accounts of 'how it really was', they add a crucial extra dimension. Hansard records Chamberlain's speech of 7th May 1940 in its entirety but it is only through Harold Nicolson's diary that one gains any impression of the vocal role played by the rest of the House in the debate:
'The House is crowded, and when Chamberlain comes in, he is greeted with shouts of "Missed the bus!" He makes a very feeble speech and is only applauded by the Yes-men. He makes some reference to the complacency of the country, at which the whole House cheers vociferously and ironically, inducing him to make a little, rather feminine, gesture of irritation.'15

In his discussion of the same debate Gilbert uses the diary of the Conservative MP Sir Henry 'Chips' Channon to illuminate a quickin the House fire riposte of Churchill and the ensuing episode of thorubos of Commons which is not at all recoverable from a reading of Hansard:16
'But as he [Churchill] spoke, his remarksbrought him in direct collision with the Labour Opposition, and led to uproar. At one point Churchill commented angrily, of the Labour MP Emanuel Shinwell: "He skulks in the corner", whereupon there was a burst of indignation on the Labour benches. Another Labour MP who had never heard the word "skulking"before thought Churchill said "skunking".He thereupon accused Churchill of unparliamentarylanguage. Amid the ensuing clamour, Churchill was unable to continue. "Honourable Members," he called out, "dare not listen to the argument. All day long we have had abuse, and now Honourable Members opposite will not even listen.""17

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Small wonder that in his own account of this debate, in which he personally participated, Duff Cooper concluded:
'Feelings ran very high in the House during those two days. The dead columns of Hansard cannot reproduce it. They can only provide those who were present with the necessary aids to memory.'8

Members of Parliament all seem to agree that this verbal give-andtake is part and parcel of dramatic debate in the House. In the remainder of this paper it will be argued analogously that both direct and indirect evidence suggest that informal banter between the speakers themselves, interruptions of the speakers by the demos, and vocal debate between sections of the demos aligned behind opposing politicians were wholly typical and actually integral features of Assembly debate, and, by extension, of Athenian democracy.

II Plutarch, in his role as biographer, has a different agenda from historians His Lives and philosophers and is more sensitive to ecclesiastic thorubos. bear out his well-known statement in the Life of Alexanderthat 'a slight thing like a phrase or a jest often makes a greater revelation of character he supplies than battles where thousands fall'.19In his Life of Demosthenes a supposedly amusing Assembly exchange between Demosthenes and Demades. This is in order to prove the point that his subject's extempore replies could be humorous. Apparently it was an important skill to better one's political opponent through quick-fire banter during Assembly debate, thus gaining vocal public approval:
'Demades exclaimed, "Demosthenes teach me?Athena might as well take lessons from a sow!" Demosthenes retorted, "That was the Athena who was seen the other day in a
brothel in Collytus."'20

It is occasionally through the asides of rhetores preserved in their speeches that the important role played by the demos in the debate in the Assembly may be inferred. Demosthenes, in his speech On Organization, apparently had to contend with an adverse and highly vocal public response to his proposals:
but hear me before you 'My idea of our duty - do not shout me down (me thorubosete), judge - my idea is that, as we have devoted a meeting of the Assembly to the question of receiving the dole, so we ought also to devote a meeting to organization and to equipment for war.'21

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This aside is presumably allowed to stand (or even inserted) in the written transcription of Demosthenes' speech to illustrate his resolute determination in the face of mass opposition in the Assembly. Close reading of the historians also reveals effective popular participation in Assembly debate with the demos ranging themselves behind opposing speakers and adding with shouts and cheers their vocal weight to the rhetoric of the politicians. Xenophon, from his non-democratic perspective, records just such an occasion during the notorious trial of the strategoiafter Arginusae:
'And some of the people applauded this act, but the greater number cried out that it was monstrous if the people were to be prevented from doing whatever they wished. Indeed, when Lyciscus thereupon moved that these men should be judged by the very same vote as the generals, unless they withdrew the summons, the mob (ochlos) broke out again with shouts of approval, and they were compelled to withdraw the summonses.'22

The concept of popular, if informal, vocal participation in the Athenian democratic process has long been established in another major popular institution: the lawcourts. Dikastic thorubos and the particularrole played by the coronahave been examined in this context, enabling the modern reader to flesh out the recorded forensic speeches which as preserved appear as pure pieces of rhetoric, uninterrupted by the demos in any way.23 Bers uses a variety of evidence ranging from comedy to rhetorical treatises and even the lawcourt speeches themselves, to conclude that 'there is ample reason to believe that some, or much, shouting often erupted during the trial'.24He also identifies the different types of thorubos,specifically that which the speaker deliberately requests or incites and the spontaneous vocal response of the jurors or the corona to the assertions of the speaker. Demosthenes calls the jurors to state their preference for the order that he might present his points and seemingly receives a clear response to his question:
'It is right to give you, you who will hear the choice: What is it your pleasure to hear first, second, and last? Consider what you want, so I can make that my first point. You want to hear first about the un-constitutionality? Then that's what I will talk about.'25

There is also a well-known incident in the speech On the Crown when Demosthenes encouraged the jurors to shout out their derogation of his opponent by asking them whether they regard Aeschines as Alexander's 'foreign friend' (xenos) or 'hireling' (misthotos).26He is said to have encouraged the cry of 'hireling' by deliberately mispronouncing the word as a proparoxytone to encourage vocal correction of his mistake.27 This tactic seems to have provoked the desired response from the jurors,

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because he then says, 'You hear what they are saying', presumably directed at Aeschines. The corona,the spectators around the lawcourt, was also appealed to by the speakers for support or confirmation of particular points, and appeased and flattered as an important influencing factor in the final judgement made by the jurors. Lanni has identified several such occasions. For example, Dinarchus asks, 'Can any of you or of the spectators name any public or private matter in which he [Demosthenes] has been involved which he has not ruined?'28The speaker in Antiphon's speech On the Choreutesstates:
'Many of the bystanders know all these things quite precisely; they hear the oath; and they are paying attention to my defence. I would like them to think that I respect your oath and that by telling the truth I persuade you to acquit me.'29

There would thus appear to be a strong parallel between this dikastic thorubos identified by Bers and Lanni and the vocal participation of the demosand their interruptions of the speakers in the Athenian Assembly.

III Ecclesiastic thorubos, in the form of informal banter and interruptions of the speakers, was widely regarded as subversive by a range of fourthcentury observers, orators, philosophers, and historians, albeit for different reasons. As noted above, Aeschines, in his speeches Against Timarchusand Against Ctesiphon,asserted that such interruptions were illegal. The idea that ecclesiastic thoruboswas seen as subversive of the Athenian democratic process is apparently supported by the frequent appeals made to the demos by the orators to listen to their speeches in peace. This was indeed one of the primary purposes of the exordium,as laid down by Aristotle in his treatise on rhetoric.30Demosthenes is the only Attic orator for whom we possess a large number of free-standing exordia.His introductions repeatedly berate the members of the Assembly who favour speakers who tell them what they like to hear and shout down unpopular speakers who might have something worthwhile to say:
'It is your duty, men of Athens, to listen to every proposal made, since it is your prerogative to adopt whichever of them you choose ... and so by shouting him down (thorubein)when displeased you may perhaps deprive yourselves of many useful ideas, whereas by attending with decorum and in silence, you will act on every sound proposal, and if you think someone is making a foolish suggestion, you will ignore it.'31

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Demosthenes sees fit in several other exordiato request the demos'not to make an uproar (me thorubesai)'and reiterates that it is their duty 'to be willing to listen to all [their] counsellors' and that 'it is wrong to stop those who wish to speak'.32He apparently adjudges that interruptions and heckling of the speakers by the demossubvert the legitimate process of ordered debate in the Assembly. Of course, such complaints relate only to his own speeches and he may well have considered the interruptions of his opponents as necessary democratic participation. Paradoxically, far from being subversive, informal vocal participation in Assembly debate on the part of the demosmay be seen as a crucial element of Athenian democracy. It may be regarded as the vital way, aside of course from the voting process itself, in which ordinary people could make their thoughts known. The concept of informal interruptions, shouts, and cheers in the Assembly by the demoscomplements the importance for democracy of ordinary Athenians being able formally to address the Assembly. In his paper 'The Number of Rhetoresin the Athenian Ecclesia,355-322 BC' Hansen argued persuasively that 'at any meeting of the ecclesiasome 300-600 citizens out of more than 6000 attending may have been prepared, if necessary, to move a proposal'. Whilst this statistic indicates a more widespread active participation in political life on the part of the demosthan most historians had previously assumed, Hansen also notes that the number of speakers who regularly addressed the people was probably much smaller.33These 'professional' and 'semi-professional' orators numbered between only ten and twenty citizens and thus the major part played by the demos in ecclesiastic debate was probably of an informal rather than formal nature. Through vocal interruptions, heckling, shouts, and cheers, the demos would be able to communicate its views en masse, constituting a key aspect of democratic behaviour. Recognition of ecclesiastic thorubosas a feature of democratic discourse helps to confirm the broadly anti-democratic perspective of its opponents. In Plato's Laws 'The Athenian Stranger', often identified as the instrument of tumult whereby with Plato himself, defines thorubos the multitude compels young men to accept its debased notion of wrong and right.34Plato's voice echoes through this definition, an elitist who regretted the power and influence that the mass of the demoswas able to exert over the few who alone in his view possessed the particular skills required to excel in politics. Similar criticisms were voiced by Socrates in the Republic, in the course of his objection to prejudice against philosophy:

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'Whenever the populace crowds together at any public gathering, in the Assembly, the law-courts, the theatre, or the camp, and sits there clamouring its approval or disapproval (polloi thoruboi), both alike excessive, of whatever is being said or done; booing and clapping (ekboonteskai krotountes)till the rocks ring and the whole place redoubles the noise of their applause and outcries.'35

He later describes in unflattering terms the vocal contribution that the demos made: 'its keenest members make the speeches and transact the business, while the other drones settle on the benches round, humming applause to drown any opposition.'36

IV
The scattered and often indirect or implicit evidence of ecclesiastic thorubosin the ancient sources in part explains the failure to appreciate its significance. In the following section an attempt is made to classify it according to its source, direction, and nature. each other Speakersinterrupting As illustrated by the exchange between Demosthenes and Philocrates noted at the beginning of this paper, speakers in the Assembly did not merely stand up and deliver prepared speeches to each other and the demos. Informal banter, insults, and barbed comments regarding an opponent's policies or oratorical style formed an important part of ecclesiastic debate and fostered a more informal atmosphere, encouraging popular participation, applause, and laughter. In his Life of Phocion Plutarch cites two examples of his subject besting his opponent with quick retorts rather than pieces of set-piece oratory:
'When Lesosthenes was making a boastful and arrogant speech in the assembly, Phocion said, "Your speeches, young man, remind me of cypress trees. They are towering and stately, but they bear no fruit." And when Hypereides once rose and demanded of Phocion, "Will the time ever come when you will advise Athens to go to war?" Phocion retorted, "Yes, she can go to war when I see the young men willing to observe discipline, the rich to make contributions, and the demagogues to refrain from embezzling public funds." 37

In Aristophanes' Ecclesiazusaethe women comment negatively on the speakers' conduct in the Assembly: 'And they rail at each other like men who've had a few, and then someone turns violent and is carried out by the archers.'38The very presence of archers in the Assembly suggests

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that there were occasions upon which the demosneeded to be restrained

(see below).39

Demos interrupting speakers The most democratically important facet of ecclesiastic thoruboswas direct popular participation in Assembly debate. In the Protagoras Socrates warns that the people in the Assembly do not tolerate advice from any individual whom they do not consider to be an expert in his field. Instead 'they merely laugh him to scorn and shout him down, until either the speaker retires from his attempt, overborne by the clamour' or is physically removed.40 Accordingly, on several occasions during his speech On the ChersoneseDemosthenes feels the need to criticize the Athenian demos,who in his opinion are all too quick to question, heckle, and shout the speakers down but less inclined to listen or to put any of the speakers' policies into action:
'Now there are some who think they confute a speaker the moment they ask, "What then ought we to do?" To these I will give the fairest and truest answer: not what you are doing now. I will not, however, shrink from going carefully into details; only they must be as willing to act as they are eager to question.'41

Demosthenes goes on to accuse the Athenian people of being unwilling to blame Philip for the troubles afflicting the city; indeed 'if anyone comes forward and asserts that the cause of all our evil is Diopithes or Chares or Aristophon, or any other citizen that he happens to name, you at once agree and applaud (thorubeithein) the truth of the remark.'42 His call to the people for action ends with a statement as to their ecclesiastic contribution:
'If, however, you sit here, confining your zeal to cries of dissent or approval (thorubesai), and drawing back from every call to duty, I see not that any words, divorced from the necessary action on your part, can ever save the State.'43

As indicated above, instances of the demosinterruptingthe speakers in the Assembly are hardly ever recorded in the transcriptions of the orators' speeches but references to such interruptions regularly occur mentions indirectly in forensic speeches. Lysias in Against Eratosthenes the vocal reaction of the demosto Theramenes' proposal to entrust the government of Athens to the Thirty and supplies an interpretation:
'... you showed by your uproar (ethorubeite) that you would not do as he proposed; for

you realized that you were choosing between slavery and freedom in the Assembly that day.'44

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In his prosecution speech Against Timarchus,Aeschines devoted a large section of his denigration of Timarchus' character to recalling the vocal attacks he had suffered in the Assembly at the hands of the people: 'you immediately shouted and laughed (eboate kai egelate), and yourselves spoke the words that belong to those exploits of which he, to your knowledge, is guilty'; which is certainly plausible if not true.45In On the False Embassy, Demosthenes recalls Aeschines' actual response to the demos'shouts, to remind the jurors of an incident which he felt reflected badly upon his opponent:
'When you raised a clamour (thorubounton),and refused to hear him, he came down from the bema, exclaiming, in order to a cut a figure before Philip's ambassadors - you cannot have forgotten it - "Plenty of shouters, but very few fighters, when it comes to fighting!" - but being himself, I suppose, such a marvellous fighter.'46

Plutarch includes several instances of the demos interrupting the subjects of his Lives as they attempted to speak in the Assembly. Pericles allegedly suffered vocal opposition from the people in the Assembly on account of his ambitious building projects, funded by Athens' subject states. 'They cried out (dieballon)in the Assembly that Athens had lost her good name and disgraced herself by transferringfrom Delos into her own keeping the funds that had been contributed by the rest of Greece. . . "The Greeks must be outraged," they cried.'47Plutarch returns to this subject again when he states that 'Pericles appealed to the people in the Assembly to declare whether in their opinion he had spent too much. "Far too much," was their reply.' Pericles continued this verbal exchange with the demos by stating that he would then continue the building with his own money, encouraging the people to change their mind. As Plutarch concludes 'they raised an uproar (anekragon)and told him to draw freely on the public funds and spare no expense in his
outlay.'48

Demosthenes, according to Plutarch, also had to cope with ecclesiastic thorubos created by the demos.Early in his career this was apparently because his voice and rhetoricaltechnique were not able to cope with the rigours of Assembly debate: 'When he first came before the people he was interrupted by heckling and laughed at because of his inexperience.' As he allegedly told Satyrus, 'he never succeeded in gaining the ear of the people: drunken sailors and illiterate louts were listened to with respect and could hold the platform, but he was always ignored.'49Even as an experienced public orator he allegedly suffered at the hands of the demos;sometimes, as he explained, on account of his political morality,

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but also when, as his opponents had it, he was thought to have cheated the Athenian people. In the latter instance, he was, according to Plutarch, on the receiving end of both the peoples' anger and the insults of a fellow speaker:
'Afterwardsit became clear to the whole assembly that he had been bribed, and when he tried to get a hearing to explain his conduct, the people showed their indignation by raising an uproar and shouting'him down. At this another speaker rose and shouted sarcastically, "Men of Athens, won't you give a hearing to the man who has the cup in
his hand?" '50

This anecdote illustrates the possible interaction between the various forms of interruptions and informal contributions within the process of Assembly debate. Aristophanes, writing from a broadly, if not uncritically democratic position, portrayed the vocal participation of the demos in Assembly debate in his comedies in a more positive light.51 In Acharnians, Dicaeopolis openly states his intention to participate in ecclesiastic thoruboswhen he informs the audience as he sits in the Assembly: 'I've come absolutely prepared to shout, interrupt, abuse the speakers (boan, hupokrouein, loidorein tous rhetores), if anyone speaks about anything but peace.'52In the Ecclesiazusae,Chremes reports an example of verbally distinct popular participation in the Assembly debate:
'First of all, straight after the preliminaries,that bleary-eyed Neocleides edged his way to the platform. At that the public cries out, you can't imagine how loud, "Isn't it shocking that this man should dare address the people, and that too when the debate is about saving the City, when he hasn't been able to save his own eyelids!"'53

Of course, the people could not really have shouted such a complicated comment in unison, but the concept of public vocal contribution to the debate would presumably strike a responsive chord with Aristophanes' audience. Demos allying with opposingspeakers The vocal support given to opposing rhetores by different sections of the demossupports the idea that the people in the Assembly should not be seen as a homogeneous entity. The ranging of Athenian citizens behind political opponents in the Assembly has led certain historians to assert that a system of 'fixed groupings' existed in democratic Athens. As Hansen has summarized in his synoptic study The Athenian Assembly, historians have in the past gone so far as to identify particular political

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parties, whilst others have preferred to speak of 'political groups' based on kinship, friendship or regional influence, and a third group has wholly rejected the idea that political groups of any consequence existed in Athens.54 Vocal support from groups of citizens seated around political opponents during debate does not prove the existence of a sophisticated political party system in Athens in the modern European mould. The most frequently cited reference to organized seating in the Assembly in this political context comes from Plutarch's Life of Pericles:
'Thucydides of Alopece did not allow the aristocrats ... to become dispersed among the mass of the people in the Assembly. Instead, by separating and grouping them in a single body, he was able to concentrate their strength.'55

Most commentators have concluded that there was no all-encompassing law which forced people to sit in any particular order in the Assembly. There is also evidence to contradict the passage from Plutarch, indicating that people rarely chose to sit together in political claques.56 However the discussion does indicate that the demos should not be regarded as a mob with a single voice, shouting support or insults at individual politicians on a whim, as perhaps envisaged by Mitford and his fellow-conservatives (see below in Section V). By ranging themselves behind rhetores advocating different policies, the Athenian people demonstrated that there was a definite political dimension to their participation in ecclesiastic debate, reinforcing the democratic importance of ecclesiastic thorubos. Both historians and orators record impassioned debates in the Assembly in which the demos was split in its vocal contribution to the proceedings. Xenophon records one such debate on whether the Athenians should go to the aid of the Lacedaemonians, in which the argument was focused on the precedent set by the Mantineans:
'At these words an uproar (thorubos)again ran through the Assembly; for some said that the Mantineans had done right in avenging the followers of Proxenus who had been slain by the followers of Stasippus, while others said that they were in the wrong because they had taken up arms against the Tegeans.'57

Aeschines, in his speech Against Ctesiphon, recalled the differences in the demos' reaction to his opponent's speech in the Assembly: 'The people shouted, some applauding his forceful brevity, but more of them rebuking his abominable jealousy.'58 Perhaps the best-known occasion when Assembly debate led to a split in the Athenian citizenship was the launching of the Sicilian Expedition during the Peloponnesian War. Nicias' proposal received enthusiastic vocal support;

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Thucydides politically manipulated the lack of opposition in his explanation of the one-sided public response: 'The result of this excessive enthusiasm of the majority was that the few who actually were opposed to the expedition were afraid of being thought illdisposed towards the polis (kakonous tei polei) if they voted against it, and therefore kept quiet.'59 Ecclesiastic thorubosgenerated by a large section of those present was allegedly such a powerful influencing force as to cow the few opponents to Nicias into submission. Drama, both comedy and tragedy, also refers to incidents of opposing shouts from different sections of the citizens in the Assembly. In EcclesiazusaePraxagorahas packed the Assembly with women disguised as shoemakers and herself spoken in favour of a motion to hand the government of the city over to the women. Chremes unknowingly reports: 'they cheered and shouted "Well said", said the shoemaking crowd; but the folk from the countryside raised a rumble of dissent.'60 Assembly debate featuring popular vocal participation occurs in tragedy in a scene reported by a messenger in Euripides' Orestes. In the deliberations over whether Orestes should be put to death for committing matricide, four speakers take turns to speak to the crowd seated in the assembly of Argives. Talthybius is described as appealing in his speech to a particular section of the crowd, suggesting seating arranged in groups of shared political sympathies as 'with every sentence he gave ingratiating glances towards Aegisthus' friends'. Popular response to Prince Diomedes' proposal of exile was divided: 'some shouted in approval (eperrothesan),others disagreed.'61 The presumption is that such a scene would have struck a responsive chord with Euripides' Athenian audience. Indeed the direct mirroring of Athenian Assembly debate is confirmed in the detail of procedure, including the herald's inquiry: tis agoreueinbouletai?62

The image of debate in the Assembly and the particular importance of ecclesiastic thorubos, as detailed above, if noticed at all has been variously embraced and emphasized or dismissed by historians from the eighteenth to the twentieth century, writing to their own political agenda.63Turner has traced the transformation of writing on Athenian politics 'from a stronghold of conservative polemic into a model of liberal political development and behavior'.64Judgements made on the

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character of Assembly debate played a central role in this discourse. It was William Mitford in his ten-volume History of Greece who first formally expressed the idea that Athenian democracy and the power the people enjoyed through the verbal exercise of their rights in the Assembly constituted, if reproduced, the greatest threat to the mixed constitution of Britain.65In the absence of the representative principle, the members of the Assembly were responsible to no one and thus Athenian democracy was nothing less than 'A TYRANNY IN THE HANDS OF THE PEOPLE' (Mitford's capitalization).66Mitford and fellow-conservatives regarded debate in the Assembly as mob oratory: tumult, shouts, and interruptions which repeatedly led to irrational, immoral, and ill-judged political decisions being taken. Mitford's prime example of a decision taken under the pressure of a vocally passionate yet ill-informed demos was the judgement passed on the strategoiafter Arginusae. He describes this as 'one of the most extraordinary, most disgraceful, and most fatal strokes of faction known in history'.67 According to his account of the proceedings, certain orators 'directed their rhetoric to the jealous temper of democracy' which inflamed the demos: 'the Assembly was in uproar.' 'The multitude, with renewed jealousy of their ill-conceived and undefined rights, indignantly called for those to appear who resisted the orders of the people.' Unsatisfied, their passion led to a fatal judgement being passed on the 'unfortunate
generals'.68

George Grote's A History of Greececonstituted the most influential refutation of Mitford's position.69 Grote presented ancient, democratic Athens as almost a mirror image of a stable, liberal mid-Victorian polity. As Turner noted, by imposing the nineteenth-century parliamentary context on the ancient Athenian institutions, 'Grote allowed and practically compelled his readers to associate the Athenian Assembly with structures, procedures and a sense of decorum that had never existed there.'70 'To render the Ekklesia efficient, it was indispensable and free. Men thus became trained to the duty both of speakers and hearers, and each man, while he felt that he exercised his share of influence on the decision, identified his own safety and happiness with the vote of the majority, and became familiarised with the notion of a sovereign authority, which he neither could nor ought to resist.'71The evidence I have assembled suggests that Mitford and Grote were both partly correct and partly wrong in their assessment of Assembly debate and the stability of democratic government in Athens. Mitford's portrayal of the Athenian people's vocal contribution to Assembly

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debate was in a formal sense actually more accurate than Grote's picture
of serene, well-ordered discourse. Yet thorubos in the Assembly need not condemn Athenian democracy as a tyranny of the people but rather may strengthen the case for Athens' status as a truly participatory democracy: as opposed merely to voting passively, the people were (literally) able to get their collective voice heard.72 Interruptions of the speaker by other speakers and by the demos at large with shouts, heckles or cheers formed an integral part of Assembly debate and constituted a major aspect of the Athenian people's ability to communicate its collective views to the elite. Ecclesiastic thorubos has typically been marginalized or presented negatively by a succession of ancient and modern commentators, often writing in support of their own particular political agenda. It is through identification of their motivation in recording vocal popular participation in Assembly debate, combined with a close reading of the variety of texts needed to build up a body of evidence, that a clearer assessment of the function of ecclesiastic thorubos can be made. Two passages seem to sum up the occurrence of, and attitudes towards, interruptions, interventions, and popular involvement in Assembly debate: significantly, both occur in Plutarch's Lives. In his Life of Demosthenes he comments upon Demosthenes' reluctance to engage in impromptu banter with other speakers and the people in the Assembly:
'The people often called on [Demosthenes] by name as he sat in the Assembly to speak on the subject under debate, but he would never come forward unless he had given thought to the question and could deliver a prepared speech. For this reason many of the popular leaders used to sneer at him, and Pytheas in particulartold him mockingly that his arguments smelled of the lamp. Demosthenes had a sharp retort for this. "I am sure that your lamp, Pytheas," he told him, "sees a very different kind of night life from mine." '73

This anecdote encapsulates the importance for a successful orator to be able to engage in repartee and banter. Finley argued in his paper on Athenian demagogues that Athenian politicians were under constant pressure to perform in Assembly debate, not merely to win the vote at the end of each day but to avoid a fine, a politically inspired lawsuit, exile or even the death penalty.74 This pressure becomes even more relentless

if the rhetoreswere also forced consistently to contend with interruptions, shouts, taunts, and jeers from other speakers and the demos. The exchange between Demosthenes and Pytheas represents one of a presumed multitude of occasions on which a speaker was bested by

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his opponent through an insult and left looking foolish. His reputation could be temporarily and possibly more permanently tarnished in front of the demosby repeated failure to respond appropriatelyto individual or collective interruptions. In a second passage from Plutarch, in his Life of Phocion,the members of the demosthat call for the election of Charidemus to the position of general in the Assembly are described as being both thorubopoioikai neoteristai, identifying the most vocal citizens with those demanding 'newer things'.75 Either Plutarch or his source has thus associated thorubos with political upheaval, reflecting the antagonism felt by members of the elite towards the vocal participation of the demos in Assembly debate. Interruptions, interventions, and vocal participation on the part of the demosare typically treated generically in our sources as the term that has cropped up throughout this paper. Liddellthorubos: Scott-Jones define thorubosas 'noise, especially the confused noise of a crowded assembly, uproar, clamour, tumult or confusion'. The passages cited in this paper and the interpretation placed upon them seems to suggest, however, that the term may have a more positive meaning in the context of the democratic process in Athens.

NOTES 1. Aeschines 1.35. 2. Aeschines 3.2. 3. Demosthenes 19.46. 4. Demosthenes 6.30. He talks there about his opponents as 'the men who told you that, because I was a waterdrinker,I was naturally awkward and disagreeable'. 5. See E. Ruschenbusch, ZOAQNO? NOMOI:Die Fragmentedes SolonischenGesetzeswerkes mit einer Text und Uberlieferungsgeschichte, Historia, Einzelschriften Heft 9 (Wiesbaden, 1966), 43. 6. M. M. Markle, 'Jury Pay and Assembly Pay at Athens', 265-97 in P. A. Cartledge and F. Harvey (edd.), CRUX: Essays presentedto G. E. M. de Ste. Croix on his Seventy-FifthBirthday (Exeter, 1985) estimated that a family of 4 could be fed on 212 obols per day during the 4th century, pace W. T. Loomis, Wages, WelfareCostsand Inflation in ClassicalAthens (Michigan, 1998), 232-9. 7. M. H. Hansen, TheAthenianAssemblyin theAge of Demosthenes(Oxford, 1987), 70. Hansen has not gone much further in his discussion of ecclesiastic thorubos, beyond noting it as a phenomenon in Athenian politics. This may reflect his comparative material on the Swiss in which such interruptions and interventions do not play an important role: see Landesgemeinde 207-26 in TheAthenian Ecclesia:a Hansen, 'The Athenian Ecclesiaand the Swiss Landesgemeinde', Collectionof Articles 1976-1983 (Copenhagen, 1983). 8. M. I. Finley, Studies in Ancient Society (London, 1974), 22. 9. K. J. Dover, Lysias and the CorpusLysiacum (Berkeley, 1968), 152. 10. A. P. Dorjahn, 'A Further Study on Demosthenes' Ability to Speak Extemporaneously', TAPA 81 (1950), 12. 11. Dorjahn, 'On Demosthenes' Ability to Speak Extemporaneously', TAPA 78 (1947), 72. 12. R. J. Bonner, Evidencein Athenian Courts (Chicago, 1905), 97-103. 13. Dorjahn, 'A Third Study on Demosthenes' Ability to Speak Extemporaneously', TAPA 83 (1952), 170.

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14. HC Deb., (5th series) 7 May 1940 vol. 360 cc 1073-1361 and M. Gilbert, Finest Hour: WinstonS. Churchill 1939-41 (London, 1983), 290-7. 15. N. Nicolson (ed.), HaroldNicolson,Diaries and Letters1939-45 (London, 1967), 76, as cited in Gilbert, op. cit., 290. 16. HC Deb., (5th series) 7 May 1940 vol. 360 cc 1360-1 and R. R. James (ed.), 'Chips', the Diaries of Sir Henry Channon (London, 1967), 246. 17. Gilbert, op. cit., 297. 18. D. Cooper, Old Men Forget:an Autobiography of Duff Cooper(ViscountNorwich), 2nd edn. (London, 1953), 277. 19. Life of Alexander 1. 20. Life of Demosthenes11. 21. Demosthenes 13.3. See also Demosthenes 5.15, On the Peacein which he again says, 'Let no one drown me out (thorubesei)before you have heard me'. 22. Xenophon, Hellenica 1.7.12-14. Regarding this debate, reference is made to ecclesiastic thorubos by Socrates in Plato, Apology32b (cf. Diodorus 13.101.6). See also Mitford's account of the debate on p. 187. 23. Notably by V. Bers, 'Dikastic Thorubos',1-15 in Cartledge and Harvey, op. cit. and A. M. Lanni, 'Spectator sport or serious politics? O 7TEpltETr1TKOrES and the Athenian lawcourts', JHS 107

was the termgivenby the Romansto ol (1987), 183 and n. 6: corona

7TEptEaTr-KOTrE,

the spectators

who stand at the edges of the courtroom watching and listening to the cases. 24. Bers, op. cit., 1. The title of my paper owes an obvious debt to Bers. Bers, 1 n. 1 deliberately omits evidence of thorubosin Plato's Apology claiming that he is a 'tainted witness'. 25. Demosthenes 23.18-19. 26. Demosthenes 18.23. 27. For a defence of the historicity of this anecdote see W. B. Stanford, The Sound of Greek: Studiesin the GreekTheoryand Practiceof Euphony(Berkeley, 1967), 31-2, 45 n. 22, pace H. Wankel (ed.), Demosthenes:Rede Fur Ktesiphon iiber den Kranz (Heidelberg, 1976), 259-60. See also Demosthenes 3.16 in which the series of rhetorical questions he poses regarding Alexander's character presumably expect a vocal response from his audience. 28. Lanni, op. cit. Dinarchus 1.30. 29. Antiphon 6.14. 30. Rhetoric3.14. 31. Exordia 4.1. 32. Exordia 21.4, 26.1, 10.1. 33. GRBS 25 (1984), 154. 34. Laws 876b. The identification of 'The Athenian Stranger' with Plato is made among others by T. Saunders, 'Plato and the Athenian Law of Theft', 63-82 in P. Cartledge, P. Millett, and S. Todd (edd.), Nomos: Essays in Athenian Law, Politics and Society (Cambridge, 1990), 63. 35. Republic6.492. 36. Republic8.564. 37. Life of Phocion23. Cf. Life of Phocion 10 for an example of bantering between speakers in the council. 38. Ecclesiazusae143-4. 39. Reference to Aristophanes in this context encounters the inevitable problem of reading comedy to reveal the realities of Athenian politics. For a classic theory see V. Ehrenberg, The People a Sociologyof Old Attic Comedy,2nd edn. (Oxford, 1951), 6: 'comedy is extremely of Aristophanes: truthful about all real facts, above all those relating to the general conditions of life, for they are the self-evident presuppositions of the comic plot.' Compare the similar approach of E. Handley, of the ClassicalAssociation82 (1985), 7-16. 'Aristophanes and the Real World', Proceedings 40. Protagoras 319c. See also Xenophon, Memorabilia 3.6.1 in which Socrates speaks with Ariston's son Glaucon who 'gets himself dragged from the platform and makes himself a laughingstock'. 41. Demosthenes 8.38-9. See also Demosthenes 10.11. 42. Demosthenes 8.30-1. This is a case where thorubosseems to be given a more positive meaning. 43. Demosthenes 8.77. 73. 44. Against Eratosthenes

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45. Against Timarchus80-1. See also 82-5. 46. Demosthenes 19.113. See the same technique in 13.4 and 25.95. 47. Life of Pericles 12. 48. Life of Pericles 14. For a discussion of this incident and its likely historical validity see most recently A. J. Podlecki, Periklesand His Circle (London, 1998), 86-7. 49. Life of Demosthenes6, 7. H. A. Holden (ed.), Plutarch, Life of Demosthenes(Cambridge, 1893), 60 identified Satyrus as a celebrated comic actor. See p. 182 and n. 43. 50. Life of Demosthenes14 and 25. The joke alludes to the gold cup with which Demosthenes was bribed by Harpalus and the custom at Greek feasts whereby a cup was passed from hand to hand: the person holding it had the right to speak or sing without interruption. 51. For a discussion of Aristophanes' political outlook see G. E. M. de Ste. Croix, The Originsof the PeloponnesianWar (London and Ithaca, 1972), Appendix XXIX, 355-71, D. M. MacDowell, Aristophanesand Athens: an Introductionto the Plays (Oxford, 1995), 350-6, and P. A. Cartledge, Aristophanesand his Theatreof the Absurd (Bristol, 1990), 43-53. 52. Acharnians37-9. See n. 35. 53.Ecclesiazusae398-403. 54. Hansen (1987), op. cit., 72 f. and n. 464-6. 55. Life of Pericles 11. 56. Hansen, TheAthenian Democracyin theAge of Demosthenes: Structure,Principlesand Ideology (Oxford, 1991), 137-8 concludes that there was no arranged seating in the Assembly and cites Thuc. 6.13.1 and Theophr. Char. 26.5 in support of his argument. See also A. Andrewes, 'The Opposition to Perikles', JHS 98 (1978), 2. In support of seating arrangements see E. S. Staveley, Greek and Roman Voting and Elections (London, 1972), 81-2 and P. J. Bicknell, 'Athenians Politically Active in Pnyx II', GRBS 30 (1989), 98-100. 57. Hellenica 6.5.36-7. 58. Aeschines 2.51. 59. Thucydides 6.24. See also Plutarch, Life of Nicias 12. 60. Ecclesiazusae430-2. B. S. Strauss, Athens After the Peloponnesian War: Class, Faction and Policy 403-368 BC (London, 1986), 59-63 concluded that 'tension between country and city played only a minor role in postwar Athenian politics' in a discussion of Aristophanes, Ecclesiazusae197-8, 'We need to launch a fleet: the poor man says yes, the rich and the farmers say no'; pace Ehrenberg, op. cit., 82-9 and L. B. Carter, The Quiet Athenian (Oxford, 1986), 76-98. 61. Orestes893-903. 62. Orestes885. See commentaries ad loc by C. W. Willink, Euripides,Orestes: Introduction,Text and Commentary(Oxford, 1986) and M. L. West (ed.), Euripides,Orestes(Warminster, 1987), both of whom comment on the parallels between Euripides' assembly of Argives and the Athenian ecclesia. 63. F. M. Turner, The GreekHeritage in VictorianBritain (Yale, 1981), 187-263 analyses the historical debate over the Athenian constitution from the 18th century to the end of the Victorian era. 64. Turner, op. cit., 189. 65. W. Mitford, The History of Greece,10 vols. (London, 1784-1810). 66. Mitford, op. cit., v. 9. 67. Mitford, op. cit., iv. 359. Whilst basing his account of proceedings upon Xenophon's Hellenica 1.7.1-35, Mitford inserts his own negative interpretations of the actions of the citizens, and goes further than Xenophon in his criticism of the 'popular passion' which led to the final misjudgement. 68. Mitford, op. cit., iv. 365-6. 69. G. Grote, A History of Greece,10 vols. (London, 1846-56). However, this was not the first such refutation: cf. C. Thirlwall, A History of Greece(1833-44). For a helpful discussion of Grote's contribution to the writing of Greek history see A. Momigliano, 'George Grote and the Study of Greek History, 56-74 in Studies in Historiography (New York and Evanston, 1966) and M. Chambers, 'George Grote's History of Greece', 1-22 in W. M. Calder and S. Trzaskoma (edd.), GeorgeGrote Reconsidered (Hildesheim, 1996). 70. Turner, op. cit., 229. 71. Grote, op. cit., IV: 187. 72. The dual aspect of public participation of the Athenian demos through voting and vocal

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interventions differs from the shouts of the Roman plebs at the games: cf. F. Millar, The Crowd in Rome in the Late Republic(Ann Arbor, 1998), 94-123. 8. 73. Life of Demosthenes 74. Finley, op. cit., 15. 75. Life of Phocion 16.

APOLOGY Earlier this year, the editors received a letter protesting about sentences which had appeared in a book review in the October 2000 number of the journal and informing them that these sentences had caused offence to Japanese readers of Greece & Rome and embarrassment to western scholars working in Japan. The editors accept that these sentences should not have appeared in the journal and offer their sincere apologies to those who were distressed by them. I.M., K.C., C.B.