index

Citizens of Oenoe, I am Pericles. I am the leader of Athens and your new leader. Under my rule, Oenoe will enter a new age. One of enlightenment, prosperity, and security.

Let it be known that under my rule, you will now have the same rights as Athenians. You will be able to pay a small price to have your sons educated by a private tutor with a focus on reading literature such as Homer, learning to write, singing and playing the lyre, and physical exercise. This will prepare them to run our institutions and society. Your daughters will have education at home, with a focus on spinning, weaving, sewing, fundamental math skills, and, for some families, reading and writing.¹

Figure 1: Douris' Cup (School Scene).

Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Antikensammlung, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.

As head of your oikos, you will be responsible for your households. You shall arrange for your daughters’ marriages, arrange your sons’ education, make household rules and enforce them as necessary. You will also oversee hiring or buying slaves who will assist your wife who will run your household.²

You will worship a range of gods, with Zeus being the leader of the gods. You shall also provide a portion of your meal to offer to the gods. Impiety, being skeptical of the gods, may be punished as a crime under Athenian law. Ceremonies will be celebrated at altars such as libations, which will be performed at the start and end of each day, as well as animal sacrifices performed at feasts and in times of hardship to appease the gods.^{3 4}

You shall attend a festival in Athens that we call Dionysia where we will celebrate with four plays. We celebrate this festival in spring when it is safe to sail again.⁵

Laws will be fair and all citizens shall have the right to a court with a jury, who will be paid fairly for their time.⁶ Citizenship will require that both the father and mother have come from an Athenian family to ensure the citizen body does not grow too quickly.⁷

It will be your duty to participate in the assembly where you may vote to declare wars, military strategy, elect a military general and elect other public officials. You will also be able to nominate yourself for public office, hold public office freely and be able to vote to exile politicians you find unfavourable through a process called ostracism.⁸

Life under Athens and my rule will be prosperous. As citizens, you will be granted the right to vote and the right to a court of justice. You will be able to see vibrant festivals in Athens, be protected by Athens’ powerful military and navy, and share the wealth and trade from Athenian markets.

Footnotes

1. Don Nardo, The Greenhaven Encyclopedia of Ancient Greece (Farmington Hills, MI: Greenhaven Press, 2006), 124 - 25. ↩
2. Nardo, The Greenhaven Encyclopedia of Ancient Greece, 143- 44. ↩
3. Cartwright, Mark. “Ancient Greek Religion.” World History Encyclopedia, March 13, 2018. https://www.worldhistory.org/Greek_Religion/ ↩
4. Nardo, The Greenhaven Encyclopedia of Ancient Greece, 143- 44. ↩
5. Hall, Edith, Introducing the Ancient Greeks: From Bronze Age Seafarers to Navigators of the Western Mind (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2014), 140-41. ↩
6. Nardo, The Greenhaven Encyclopedia of Ancient Greece, 197-99. ↩
7. Hall, Edith, Introducing the Ancient Greeks, 138. ↩
8. Nardo, The Greenhaven Encyclopedia of Ancient Greece, 95-96, 154-55. ↩