You Decide: The Ostracism of Hyperbolus (A PoD for a Victorious Athens)

Whom would you ostracize from Athens in 416?

  • Alcibiades

    Votes: 7 29.2%
  • Nicias

    Votes: 15 62.5%
  • Other: if so, please post who and why

    Votes: 2 8.3%

  • Total voters
    24
The stakes are simple: the future of democracy and Western Civilization. The choice: a young rogue or an aging coward?

As with many things in the Peloponnesian War that Thucydides doesn't mention, we don't know the exact date of this event. I'm convinced (and I believe scholarly consensus validates this conclusion) that it took place in the sixth prytany (sometime in February) of 416. [1] At this point, Athens has lost the Battle of Mantinea, but is still technically at Peace with Sparta under the terms of the Peace of 421, better known as the Peace of Nicias. Sparta, however, has not fully complied with peace because it has yet to return Amphipolis (an important colony to control the ship building supplies of the Northern Aegean; Ancient Greece's Skagerak) to Athenian control.

Ostracism to the citizen of modern, liberal democracy seems like a typical excess of Athenian democracy. Nonetheless, "
throughout its history ostracism served both as a referendum on issues and as a vote of confidence in political leaders. Themistocles and Pericles followed the example and the intention of Cleisthenes when, as leaders of the majority, they used ostracism to rid themselves of dangerous political rivals. It was a safety valve that helped avoid the explosion of stasis which might rent Athens with factional strife and prematurely destroyed its greatness. The success of ostracism is attested to on the one hand by the weakness of subversive groups so long as the law was in force, and on the other hand by the small number of ostracisms necessary to the safety of the state." [2] Ostracism, IMHO, is correctly understood as having a very important dual effect on Athenian politics: it allows Athens to make long-term policy choices by silencing the voice of a major factional leader and hence his ideas and it guards domestic political integrity. The Ostracism of Hyperbolus was the last time the institution was used. I don't think it's a coincidence that after the last ostracism, Athens suffered two coups.

OTL Hyperbolus moved the ostracism in somewhat of surprise move. He's a minor historical figure so we don't know much about him. He was probably a radical democrat like Cleon; if so, both Alcibiades and Nicias were political opponents. He was probably hoping one of them would be exiled, allowing him the chance to further his own ambitions. As events unfolded, Alcibiades and Nicias, the two leading figures at Athens, had both suffered major setbacks: Alcibiades' Peloponnesian policy had was a failure due to the loss at Mantinea. Nicias' Peace (made in 421) is defunct due partly to the recent battle but mostly because Sparta has not return Amphipolis. Neither has enough support to be certain of avoiding being ostracized. This led Alcibiades OTL to approach Nicias to make a deal: they would both agree to have their supporters ostracize Hyperbolus. This meant that the institution failed to resolve the foreign policy deadlock (setting a poor precedent for the debate in the next year regarding the Sicilian expedition). Alcibiades and Nicas are also able to use their political "clubs" to undermine democratic institutions. Athenian politics will remain polarized for the next century or more.

In the spirit of democracy, before I offer up the beginnings of a TL, I'd like to get your input. Whom would you want ostracized from Athens in 416, Alcibiades or Nicias? (Pity I can't turn this into a poll, now, but I don't figure everybody on the site will want to participate, necessarily).

Alcibiades iOTL after 416 would be the major force behind the decision to go to Sicily in 415 (not its composition and the decision will occur again due to events in Sicily, so there's still a chance Athens will go a-conquering without him). Exiled in 414/3 because of complicity in a religious perversion, he will then go on to advise the Spartans on how to defeat Athens at Syracuse; he also at one point defects to the Persians. In 411, he aids the oligarchic conspirators of the 400 only to lead the Athenians of the fleet against the coup, restore democracy, win a series of battle in the eastern Aegean in 410-407, eventually winning the title of Supreme Commander. He is disgraced in 407 and retires to the North Aegean coast (where he probably meets Thucydides, also in exile nearby). He attempts to warn the Athenians in 405 at Aegos Potomoi of their tactical blunder but is ignored because no one trusts him.

Nicias iOTL was a competent general, but a somewhat timid politician. He has successfully conquered Cythera, off the coast of the Peloponnse, and Delos. He is rich and overly religious and tends to like proving how pious he is. His mistakes, as I outlined above, were probably responsible for the disaster at Syracuse. He loses an army of more than 10,000 men even though he has every chance to defeat the Syracusan forces arrayed against him. He dies when the Syracusans finally catch the remaining Athenians.

My fellow Athenians, the choice is yours. Cast your potsherds.

Click Here to see More about this Poll and to comment on the discussion

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My apologies, the previous thread wasn't a poll. Hopefully, a nice moderator will help correct this error.
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1. Others suggest it occurred in either 417, directly after the Battle of Manitnea in 418. An inscription seems to prove the presence of Hyperbolus at Athens after the legal date for the ostracism of 417, so we can reject that. Still others suggest it occurred in 415 as a part of the decision regarding the Sicilian Expedition. A passage from Theopompus suggests that we prefer 416, however.

2.
Donald Kagan, “The Origin and Purposes of Ostracism,” Hesperia, Vol. 30, No. 4. (Oct. - Dec., 1961), 401. Don't worry; I'm just excerpting from an old college paper; I did not do this much research for this post. :)
 

Keenir

Banned
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My apologies, the previous thread wasn't a poll. Hopefully, a nice moderator will help correct this error.
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is it too late to simply delete the error thread? just a thought.
 
is it too late to simply delete the error thread? just a thought.

I tried last night, but couldn't figure out how. I also belatedly realized this morning that I probably could have edited the mistaken thread to include a poll rather than creating a new one. Ah the mistakes of a neophyte.
 
Good poll! That took maybe a good quarter second's thought: Alcibiades.

Not only was Alcibiades a betraying bastard, but, as you say, he was pushing the Syracusan Expedition that ended Athens' power; I don't see Nicias even being persuasive enough to get any such stupid thing happening even if he had - and he opposed the Expedition long and hard.

Plus, extant political leaders tend to drain opportunity from others - without Alkibiades, we might have seen the return of ept Athenian political leadership in charge. Nicias was much weaker politically.

Hell, if the Athenian Empire survived, likely they could've booted Philip and Al where they deserved when they tried to rise.

I'm also in Texas, Nico, in Austin.
 

Hecatee

Donor
I'm not sure that throwing Alcibiade out would be the good thing, in fact it would simply send him to Sparta or Persia earlier, not a very good idea in fact. On the other hand weakening Alcibiade's ennemies could be a better solution because it might mean no Hermes' scandal and thus Alcibiade still in command when the fleet comes to Sicily. Without Nicias as main commander of the expedition we get a more agressive athenian force that does probably not loose so much time as they did under Nicias and thus bring a victory home instead of a defeat, especially with the diplomatic skills of Alcibiade which could persuade more southern italian cities to lend help to the Athenians.

So the question one has to ask is who, beside Hyperide, is a threat for Alcibiade ? ( Nicias is still needed in order to have the OTL expedition of Sicily because it is him who ironically gave more ships, money and men to Alcibiade )
 
Alcibiades probably would go to Sparta and Persia, but it's not clear that his activities in Sparta really contributed to Sparta's efforts. There's six months in between his supposed speech to the Spartans and their appearing to act on his advice.

If you remember that Thucydides says he researched thoroughly and if you recall that by the time they're both good and exile, Alcibiades and Thucydides lived very close to one another, there's every reason to suppose that Thucydides may have interviewed Alcibiades for information about his doings in the war. This may explain Thucydides' beneficial view of Alcibiades, which doesn't really hold with his aristocratic sentiments. Plus, there's every reason to additionally suppose that Alcibiades may have exaggerated every story he told Thucydides, but that Thucydides would have very little ability to recognize the duplicity. Alcibiades was seizing the chance to make history think better of his exploits, by putting his own actions at the center of Thucydides' story.

Whether or not that's true, Alcibiades would have faced political opposition from two groups, radical democrats who hail from the lower classes and truly conservative politician with oligarchic views. Alcibiades is an aristocrat with democratic pretensions, rather like Julius Caesar. If Nicias is ostracized, Alcibiades will probably have a few years of prominence. There will be a Sicilian Expedition, but it will be far different than OTL.

It's still a pretty open question, so I'll give the poll a bit longer.
 
This is an interesting question, though difficult to answer. On the one hand Alcibiades was the one pushing for the invasion of Sicily, which was a distraction from who they should have been fighting. On the other hand, Alcibiades was a chameleon and went from being a model Athenian, to being a model Spartan, then going to Persia (I think he went back to Athens again and then returned again to Persia) so ostracism may have caused him to go to the other side.
Then again, this might not be the case. We have to remember that ostracism was not permanent, and it was not really a punishment, per se. It was more of a way to remove a very popular politician for a time to prevent the populace from developing too many hard feelings about him, it was not necessarily about whether the person being ostracized was bad or not. So, this makes me wonder, would having Alcibiades ostracized have led him to switch sides? The reason he did this in OTL was because he was going to be tried for the mutilation of the Herms, so it is hard to tell if he would have done the same because of ostracism, which would have allowed him after 10 years to return to Athens and his property.
 
This is an interesting question, though difficult to answer. On the one hand Alcibiades was the one pushing for the invasion of Sicily, which was a distraction from who they should have been fighting. On the other hand, Alcibiades was a chameleon and went from being a model Athenian, to being a model Spartan, then going to Persia (I think he went back to Athens again and then returned again to Persia) so ostracism may have caused him to go to the other side.
Then again, this might not be the case. We have to remember that ostracism was not permanent, and it was not really a punishment, per se. It was more of a way to remove a very popular politician for a time to prevent the populace from developing too many hard feelings about him, it was not necessarily about whether the person being ostracized was bad or not. So, this makes me wonder, would having Alcibiades ostracized have led him to switch sides? The reason he did this in OTL was because he was going to be tried for the mutilation of the Herms, so it is hard to tell if he would have done the same because of ostracism, which would have allowed him after 10 years to return to Athens and his property.


You're quite right about ostracism not being a punishment. As I suggest above, it's better to consider as the mechanism for forming a government coalition at Athens. Most of the leaders of the democracy used ostracism to get rid of their politics opponents. They did so when they were near the height of their power and needed to consolidate their base in order to enact their programs. The question in 416 is quite difficult because Hyperbolus has surprised Nicias and Alcibiades neither of whom were strong enough to oust the other.

If Alcibiades is exiled, he may bide his time for a return a decade later. Alternatively, a political crisis at Athens may prompt a recall. This happened in the first Peloponnesian War and led to the early return of Cimon. However, Alcibiades will still need to do something if he wants to return home a hero. Perhaps he leads something like a filibuster into Sicily and sets up a quasi-kingdom their.

Athens under Nicias will probably stick to diplomacy, but Nicias' policies will not remain popular for long. Nor will Sparta remain peaceful, if Corinth continues to goad it into war. Sparta may chose however to deal directly with Corinthian malfeasance rather than go to war against Athens.

Athens under Alcibiades will attempt something in Sicily, but not on the scale of OTL. Their success is not guaranteed, but they are not likely to suffer the kind of catastrophic loss they did OTL.

Long term, the question at Athens will be whether the coup of 411 will surface in some form or another and how the allies will take continued Athenian rule. The politicians of who emerged OTL between 416 and 404 will probably do so again. The most prominent will be Theramenes and Thrasybulus. The former sided with the oligarchs in both 411 and 404; he became something of a martyr in 404 because he was trying to keep the 30 true to instituting a new constitution of moderate democracy, rather than ruling for their own benefit. Thrasybulus is also more of a moderate at heart, though he sides with the democrats more often than not. In 411, he leads the democrats at Argos to accept Alcibiades as a leader. In 404, he personally mounts a guerilla campaign to restore the democracy. Later in the 390s he leads the campaign which sees Athens nearly resurrect her former Empire.

The biggest question of course will be whether the war breaks out again and if so, how quickly Athens wins and on what terms. I promise, I won't go through all of this to have Athens defeated in 402, rather than 404. How she fares in the 4th century is still up for grabs; a convenient defeat or hard won victory may be a good spur for imperial reform.

Also, there's the fate of Socrates, far from certain if the democracy is not so on edge in 400/399 and sensitive to any who might undermine it. I should point out that H. Turtledove has a short story in which Socrates goes with the Sicilian Expedition, gives Alcibiades impetus to rebuff the envoys calling for his dismissal. The Expedition is victorious; the invigorated Athenians gather forces and on their return to Attica stop in Laconia and in a lightening march burn Sparta itself. Upon his return, Alcibiades takes on nearly unlimited power as supreme commander. Socrates doesn't like this. Alcibiades eventually has Socrates killed. The fate of the beguiling father of Western philosophy will be a factor in whatever story emerges from the vote counted in 416.

Things seem to be heating up in that regard. What was the "other" vote? A suggestion or an abstention?
 
I think I'm starting to lean towards ostracizing Nicias based on the skill Alcibiades had as a general.
 
Well, I think the votes are in. Nicias it is.

Expect the first post of the TL sometime this weekend.

Any thoughts on what Alcibiades does with his newfound dominance? I have my own ideas, but here are the possibilites:

-Sicily
War between Segesta and Leontini will still see envoys sent to Athens. Will Alcibiades argue for an expedition? Hyperbolus was said to have had ambitions as far afield as Carthage.

-Renewed campaign in the Peloponnese
Alcibiades in 417 led an expedition to Argos, which had just revolted (again) and a newly restored democracy, in support of the democracy. This will most directly challenge Sparta, but also may be a key to defeating the Sparta and her allies.

-Reconquer Amphipolis
IOTL, Nicias tried this in 417/6, but his plan failed due to the perfidy of Perdiccas of Macedon. Recovering the city and control of the surrounding region would further increase Athens' financial power and increase her ship-building capacity. IOTL, Athens never succeeded in reconquering this city, despite trying off and on for sixty years.

-Melos
OTL, the first action of Nicias and Alcibiades, who were both elected to the board of generals after the ostracism, was to conquer the island of Melos. The island was of Doric heritage and had remained stubbornly independent, despite benefiting from the peace maintained by the Athenian Empire. This was the occaision that spawned Thucydides Melian Dialogue, a discussion of the futility of hope and resistance against sheer force of arms. Despite the seeming tyranny of the episode, the force sent to Melos was remarkable for the large contingent of allied troops who took part in the decimation of the island's population.
 
Aww fook. I didn't have a chance to cast my vote. Now I would have probably gone for Nicias but that's not the point.

Anyway. Sir, I look forward to the timeline which may arise from this with great interest, you obviously being an expert on all things related to this and all.
 
Aww fook. I didn't have a chance to cast my vote. Now I would have probably gone for Nicias but that's not the point.

Anyway. Sir, I look forward to the timeline which may arise from this with great interest, you obviously being an expert on all things related to this and all.

Sorry, you missed the vote, but it's still going on: who knows you might change folks' minds by friday. ;)

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As a more general question, would some kind of explanation of the OTL history of a given timeframe be helpful. Most of the TLs I've read here tend to concentrate on the 18th and 19th centuries in Europe. I was thinking it might increase the accessibility of things if I included a brief summary of OTL history for each post as well as explantory footnotes. Thoughts? I'd like to make sure I have a sense of the audience as I write, though revisions are of course expected and comments will be welcome.
 
Well any TL is good, so long as its grounded by well-done research into what happened in OTL and what the effects would be in different ATLs. The reason why a lot of TLs here take place in 18th-19th century Europe or similar is partly because there is a lot of research that can be done around this. In fact, I do know that some people who have included bits of OTL in their timelines, either throuch OOC footnotes or what have you (one I can think of off the bat is Thande's Look to the West, where he does OOC footnotes). I wish you the best of luck on any TL related to this "ostracism".
 
As a more general question, would some kind of explanation of the OTL history of a given timeframe be helpful. Most of the TLs I've read here tend to concentrate on the 18th and 19th centuries in Europe. I was thinking it might increase the accessibility of things if I included a brief summary of OTL history for each post as well as explantory footnotes. Thoughts? I'd like to make sure I have a sense of the audience as I write, though revisions are of course expected and comments will be welcome.

That's a good idea actually. I know quite a bit about the general history of the period but the intricacies of Athenian doemstic politics would probably escape me. If you're going to do it in some detail, which I assume you are, then I think it would be best to provide a little intro/post-script on what happened historically.

Also, footnotes. Footnotes are your friend.
 
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