Van Wees, JGB; (2018) Citizens and soldiers in archaic Athens. In: Duplouy, A and Brock, R, (eds.) Defining Citizenship in Archaic Greece. (pp. 103-143). Oxford University Press: Oxford, UK.

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Abstract

A reconsideration of the precise nature and extent of the military obligations of citizens in classical Athens reveals that under Athens’ democratic regime these obligations were relatively limited and not systematically enforced. The relevant classical legislation, later historical tradition, and some contemporary archaic evidence are combined to show that in archaic Athens, by contrast, formal military obligations were more extensive and more stringently enforced, but applied only to the leisured elite. The bulk of the working population was also obliged to serve, but only in ‘general levies’, with whatever arms and armour they could afford. This system was fully developed already under Solon and remained in operation until the late fifth century BC, when social and economic changes and the exceptional strain of the Peloponnesian War caused it to be abandoned.

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