Origins of People Engaged in Economic Activity on Delos

The sanctuary carried out an active building program, including not only the construction of new structures but also the repair and upkeep of existing buildings. As at most Greek temples, the Delians hired private contractors to carry out this work.^[32] The accounts name almost a hundred contractors. Unfortunately, only in twenty-eight cases can we identify their origins. Of these, a total of twenty-one came from Kykladic islands or from Karystos on Euboia, which may be regarded as a Kykladic city for our purposes. Of the remaining seven, one came from Lemnos and one from Mytilene on Lesbos. One each are attested from Thebes, Korinthos, Knidos, Rhoiteion in Asia Minor (near Ilion), and Athens. Thus the vast majority of identifiable contractors came from the immediate Kykladic neighborhood.^[33] Some of these men enjoyed long and profitable careers with the temple. For example, Nikon son of Nikokles of Syros signed contracts with Apollo by himself or in consortium with others, including other foreigners, from 304 to 269 B.C. ; over these thirty-five years he collected at least 31,850 dr. It would not be surprising, given his income, if he were the metic Nikon who sponsored a comic chorus in 261 B.C.^[34] Another

[32] See, generally, Alison Burford, The Greek Temple Builders at Epidauros (Toronto, 1969).

[33] Figures derived from a compilation of "entrepreneurs" from ID Index. Tréheux, 7, supposes that most contractors were foreigners, but this is far from assured when ethnics are absent.

[34] ID 500; IG XI 2.145.10–11, 158A55–57, 161A55–56, A58–59, 165.6–7, 36–37 (the latter contract seems to have been embroiled in difficulties which may have led to a lawsuit, cf. 163Bg16–18), 199A24, 203B17–18, 219A57. Cf. Maurice Lacroix, Rev. Phil. 38 (1914): 329, with reservations. IG XI 2.114.16. The Nikon who appears doing labor personally for small payments is likely in my view to be a different person: IG XI 2.144A110, 111, B6; 148.69; 153.10–11; perhaps 157B4; 159A54, provision of a stele (but compare Kharisthenides in 147A19); 161A70–71, with his son; 163Aa13–14, perhaps also 1. 59; 165.19 (?), 48; 161A49–50.

---

foreign contractor, Damasias son of Kypragoras of Paros, dedicated a phiale to Apollo, and Philandrides son of Ekhesthenes of Paros, who received 3,500 dr in 269 B.C. as a first payment on a contract to deliver marble for the theater, was declared proxenos and euergetes and awarded freedom from taxation (

) and the right to own property. These honors may be connected with his gift of (possibly a kind of earth) in the same year.^[35]

Apollo owned agricultural estates and urban houses, which he rented out. Five foreigners are known to have rented estates. Four were from Rheneia (two may have been homonymous father and son); the other was a Kretan.^[36] Some of the houses were rented to foreigners from the islands, including a Parian, a Theran, and perhaps a Tenian. A Phoenician appears as a guarantor in 192 B.C. ; he must have enjoyed the right to own property. Another foreigner, Kleinodemos son of Lebotos of Siphnos, exercised his award of the right to buy property, perhaps after 167 B.C. under the new Athenian domination (although the grant of enktesis had been made under independence).^[37]

The ability of these foreigners to serve as contractors and to rent property implies strong ties within the Delian community. The temple required as guarantors for all contractors and renters men who owned real property. Most Delians found their guarantors among their relatives; foreigners had

---

to have recourse to Delians.^[38] The success of these foreigners in obtaining Delian guarantors bespeaks close ties of either wealth and friendship or—perhaps more likely—intermarriage and more distant kinship.^[39]

Apollo served also as a bank, lending money to both private persons and to cities.^[40] When the beneficiaries were not Delians, they were exclusively Kykladic. The best-preserved account of the fourth century, the so-called Sandwich Marble (ID 98 = IG II² 1635 = Tod II.125), gives the interest paid on loans by thirteen neighboring states (including Karystos on Euboia) amounting to a borrowed capital of 260,600 dr, over 43 talents. Several other accounts over the period add to the picture. These loans should not be connected with "contributions" due under the Second Athenian Confederacy,^[41] but with the chronic cash-flow problems of Kykladic states. Paros borrowed money in the fourth century; all three cities on Amorgos were forced to borrow in the fourth and third centuries; Ios likewise borrowed funds for various public purchases; and on Keos, Ioulis borrowed money in the third century, and another city, perhaps Karthaia, had to borrow pathetically small sums month to month.^[42] Likewise individuals who borrowed from Delian Apollo during the Amphiktyonia came from Tenos, Karystos on Euboia, Andros, and Galessos on Syros.^[43] During independence foreigners were essentially excluded from the bank: only two are known, one of whom, Apollodoros of Kyzikos, was nesiarkhos of the

[39] For two families from Delos and Keos that use the name Pherekleides and may have been related, see Vial, 332–33, Stemma XXXIV. It was this problem of guarantors, and not lack of return (Lacroix in Mélanges Glotz, 519), that kept more foreigners from renting estates or houses.

[40] Bogaert, 126–92.

[41] Ibid., 126–30; Migeotte, 141–47, 151–56. Coupry in Atti, 64–66, has emphasized that the records do not correspond with the foundation and collapse of this organization—Mykonos, Paros, Syros, and some other unidentified states had borrowed by 393/2 B.C. , and interest payments continued until at least 341/40 B.C.

[42] Paros: IG XII 5.112 (= Migeotte, 213–15, no. 61), 113 (with Migeotte, p. 155); Amorgos: IG XII 7.5 (= Migeotte, 166–68, no. 48), 67B (= Migeotte, 168–77, no. 49), 69 (= Migeotte, 177–83, no. 50), 67A (= Migeotte, 183–87, no. 51), 66 (= Migeotte, 187–88, no. 52), 70 (= Migeotte, 188–89, no. 53), 68 (= Migeotte, 189–92, no. 54, with discussion at 192–94), 221 (= Migeotte 194–96, no. 55), 388 (= Migeotte, 196–98, no. 56); los: IG XII 5.1011 (= Migeotte, 210–12, no. 60); Keos, IG XII 5.1102 (= Migeotte, 218–21, no. 63), IG XI suppl. 236.

[43] ID 98A20, 23, B15 (Tenos), B17 (Karystos), B18 (Andros), B19 and 104-9.11 (Syros).

---

Island League in the last decade of the fourth century and came about his debt by buying a garden already hypothecated to Apollo.^[44] The other, Xenon of Hermione, who must have been granted enktesis like Apollodoros, had a native Delian guarantor, Teleson son of Autokles, a member of a rich and powerful family.^[45]

Gifts to deities sometimes also reveal foreigners who made money off the temple; again, these people often came from neighboring islands. The Tenian Ktesias son of Apollodoros offered Osiris an

and paid for construction for Sarapis, Isis, and Anoubis (IG XI 4.1248.3–4, cf. 1247); Roland Etienne regards him as settled on Delos engaged in commercial activity.^[46] Citizens of Amorgos, Kerkyra, and Mylasa who likewise dedicated tithes were probably established in business on Delos (IG XI 4.1220,1241, 1243). The Naxian Polymnestos son of Thibron honored at Delos may have donated a phiale to Apollo in the mid third century; whether his piety flowed from business interests, like the Khian Eutykhos's, cannot be determined.^[47]

Identifying other foreigners who made money off the temple entails many difficulties. For modest laborers—masons, carpenters, smiths, haulers, and practitioners of countless other trades—the hieropoioi rarely give more than a simple name—

(IG XI 2.287A74)—and sometimes not even that: (IG XI 2.146A77). The same is true for the dozens of men who sold Apollo pigs or firewood or other goods. When their names appear, which is rarely enough, the hieropoioi almost never say whether they had imported the goods they sold, and even when we have a name, the rarity of patronymics and ethnics makes it almost impossible to sort out homonymous persons or to identify workers or traders with the same name in different years. For these reasons, many of the identifications offered by Maurice Lacroix rest on very fragile bases.^[48]

[44] G. Reger, GRBS 32 (1991): 229–37.

[46] Bogaert, 179; Etienne, 181 (cf. ibid., 180–81 for other Tenians at Delos, 182–83 for Delians at Tenos).

[47] IG XI 4.701, cf. ID 298A12. On Eutykhos, see p. 71 below.

[48] For example, his "family of dealers in wood" (REG 33 [1916]: 188–237) has been demolished by Jean-Paul Rey-Coquais, Mélanges Beyrouth 37 (1960–61): 249–54 (but still in Marasco, 138). I have not seen M.-F. Baslez, "Les Etrangers à Délos: Formes et évolution de la vie de relation dans un sanctuaire panhellénique" (diss., Université de Paris IV, 1982).

---

There is, however, some evidence. Two citizens of Thera worked for the temple on smallish projects; whether they were contractors in the sense discussed above is not clear. The first at any rate had a partner who was probably a Delian.^[49] In 297 B.C. , a Tenian mason was selected to engrave the contracts of contractors granted that year; ID 500 and 502 are his work (IG XI 2.150B8–10). In 250 B.C. , a Khian—identified only thus, by a purchase

—provided roof tiles (IG XI 2.287A113–14). An entry for 276 B.C. shows Astypalaians providing fine fabric (); their fellow citizens imported wood in 296 B.C.^[50] One item of particular interest is pitch, which was used as a sealant on roofs, altars, and other structures exposed to moisture. We hear of importers from Khios, Klazomenai, Karystos, Naxos, and probably Byzantion.^[51] The funeral monuments of Rheneia, which have yielded disappointingly few specimens from the years of independence, attest to two men from Paros and women from Thasos and Thera, the latter perhaps wives of Delians, as the family of Pherekleides on Delos seems to have had a Keian branch.^[52] Finally, besides those already mentioned, there are another twenty-nine proxeny decrees for assorted islanders. Unfortunately, these decrees rarely give any indication of the benefits performed.^[53]

The temple consumed Kykladic products. Besides the oil, wine, pigs, firewood, and grain that, I shall argue, came predominately from his neighbors, Apollo bought roof tiles from Syros and the mysterious

from

[49] IG XI 2.161A66–68 (the partner Theodemos is not listed in LGPN I); 203A46.

[50] IG XI 2.163A43, cf. also 156A41–42. We hear of Amorgian clothing under the Amphiktyonia, but the actual origin of the items is disputed, ID 104–26 bis C7–11, with comm. p. 104. For a plant used to make red dye that may have been abundant on Amorgos, see G. M. A. Richter, AJA 33 (1929): 27, with 27–28 n. 4, on Etymologicum magnum 129.

[51] IG XI 2.144A94 and 154A48, 203A47–48, 219A41, 144A112, 163A5.

[52] Marie-Thérèse Couilloud, Les Monuments funéraires de Rhénée (Paris, 1974), no. 451, 88, 419. For the epitaphs of independence, see ibid., pp. 243–44, 307, with n. 3 there. The family of Pherekleides: Vial, 332–34. BCH 114 (1990) 812 reports the discovery of the funeral stele of one Kallistion of Paros at Rheneia; the name is not otherwise attested for the island (LGPN I, s.v.).

[53] Andros, IG XI 4.833–34; Ikarios, 539, 811–12; Karystos on Euboia, 516, 673; Keos: Karthaia, 592 (cf. IG XII 5.544B2, 4, 1076.117, 135, and 610.22 perhaps for the family), 769, Keos only, 693 (doctor, cf. IG XII 5.820); Khalkis on Euboia, 706; Melos, 513, 749; Naxos, 552, 611, 656, 832; Paros, 841 (cf. IG XII 5.379); Pholeangros, 612; Seriphos, 639; Sikinos, 511, 688; Siphnos, 587, Syros, 591 (perhaps a relative at IG XII 5.652.1), 633 (doctor); Tenos, 655, 828; Thera, 709–10 (cf. IG XII 3.330.86).

---

Paros.^[54] The cheese, wax, and miltos that appear in the accounts almost certainly came from close neighbors like Syros, Kythnos, Keos, and Rheneia.^[55] Besides building stone quarried on Delos itself, the temple imported marble from Paros and Tenos.^[56] Finally, it is worth noting that Karystos, Naxos, Keos, Mykonos, and Andros maintained treasuries (

) on Delos.^[57]