1. Kagan 1969, 231–232, 235–236.

2. Ste. Croix 1972, 70.

3. Ste. Croix 1972, 71. He cites S. Usher (The Historians of Greece and Rome [Norman, Okla.: University of Oklahoma Press, 1969] 48–49) as saying that the Corinthian argument was very strong: “Arguments based on justice were the strongest that the Corinthians had.” Ste. Croix also castigates Kagan (1969) for accepting part of the argument.

4. Salmon 1984, 285.

5. Salmon 1984, 286.

6. Cogan 1981a, 10.

7. Cogan 1981a, 13.

8. Connor 1984, 34 n. 33.

9. Kagan 1969, 235–236.

10. Salmon 1984, 288.

11. See not only their emphatic pronouncements at 1.41.3 and 42.2–3 that Athenian action at this juncture will define the relationship between the two poleis but also the theatrical gesture described at 1.53 with which a small number of men risk their lives to force the Athenians to declare themselves one way or another.

12. Malinowski 1922, 10.

13. Plattner 1989, 15; the context is a controversy in economic anthropology: “Formalists” applied microeconomic techniques to tribal societies without regard to their cultural contexts, and “Substantivists” argued that people from different cultural contexts would not always view the same choice in the same way. Perfectly rational Muslims would, for example, view a decision about whether to consume alcohol very differently from their Christian counterparts.

14. The sequence of events in 1.26.3 is unclear. Thucydides informs us that the Corcyraeans became angry (ἐχαλέπαινον) when they learned Corinth had chosen to appropriate Epidamnus, but he goes on to inform us that the exiles from Epidamnus had come to Corcyra and presented themselves as formal suppliants. It is not clear whether the Corcyraeans accepted them before news of Corinthian activity arrived, or whether the Corinthian intervention only accelerated a Corcyraean action that had already been decided upon. Since Thucydides picks up the story at Corcyra at the point where news of the Corinthian moves had arrived, the story of the suppliant exiles could have naturally fit into the narrative at this point, and there would have been no need for retrospective and parenthetical explanation of why Corcyra demanded the exiles be accepted back.

15. The following interpretation of the religious terminology at Thuc. 1.25.4 is owed to Albert Henrichs.

16. On the connection between the right to sacrifice or to perform other ritual acts and the status of politês, see Manville 1990, 8, 25. Who could and could not sacrifice or participate in such activities often defined who was and was not a member not only of a polis, but of a genos, phyle, or other association.

17. See Stengel 1910, chap. 7, "κατάρχεσθαι und ἐνάρχεσθαι," 40–49; the Thucydidean passage is discussed on pp. 44–46, esp. p. 45.

18. Sealey 1976, 314.

19. De Romilly 1963, 80 and n. 3.

20. Kagan 1969, 219. He cites Beaumont 1936, quoting p. 183: “Is it really credible that the Corinthians disliked the Corcyreans to such an extent as to fight them for the reasons that Thucydides gives…? It is surely justifiable to look for something more concrete.” Beaumont’s whole purpose, it should be emphasized, was to explore the economic penetration of the Adriatic, and he handles Thucydides only in passing.

21. Ste. Croix 1972, 70.

22. Salmon 1984, 283.

23. For a general discussion of this view, see Connor 1977a and Lateiner 1977a and b; for an illustration of how Thucydides constructs an emotionally charged narrative from seemingly dry details, see Hornblower 1987, 191–197.

24. For a discussion of the role played by fear, see, for example, de Romilly 1956a. For ambition, see, among other passages, Thuc. 2.65.10–11, where Perikles and his successors are contrasted; for irrational desire, see, for example, the remark καὶ ἔρως ἐνέπεσε τοῖς πᾶσιν ὁμοίως ἐκπλεῦσαι at 6.24.3.

25. Thucydides does not mention Odysseus by name, but the phrase οἱ παλαιοὶ τῶν ποητῶν (1.5.2) would have suggested Homer to any fifth-century reader. The following comment about asking travelers if they are pirates might well suggest passages such as Od. 3.69–74, 9.252–255.

26. Contrast the rhetorical pose of Sthenelaidas at 1.86 with the analysis offered at 1.88; the Athenians themselves are reported not to have believed ὁ βελτίων λόγος that the Spartans offered when they sent back Athenians who came to their aid against the helots a generation earlier (1.102.3–4); Thucydides likewise attributes Spartan behavior after the fall of Plataia to their desire to please the Thebans (3.68.4).

27. The society in question is that of the Tiv of Nigeria, as described by Bohannen (1955, 60–69); for a recent discussion, see Plattner 1989, 175–178.

28. Thucydides often uses the term epairô to describe people who let foolish considerations carry them away (e.g., 1.81.6: elpis, “hope”; 1.83.2: “the arguments of the allies”; 3.38.2: kerdos, “profit”).

29. Hammond (1967, 318) assumes that states such as Epidaurus and Hermione “were less interested in the fate of the volunteers than in the re-establishment of naval control in the Ionian Sea.”

30. On the relationship between Corinth and its colonies, see Graham 1964, 139–142; for the religious background, see Malkin 1987, esp. 189ff. for a discussion of the cult of the founder, a primary ritual mechanism by which to maintain the link between apoikia and metropolis.

31. Abu-Lughod 1986, 85, discussing the way in which the family model structures hierarchical relationships within and beyond the family.

32. Schwartz 1929, 252: “Das Redenpaar der Korkyraeer und der Korinther dreht sich um die κεφάλαια des συμφέρον und δίκαιον jenes beherrscht die Reder der Korkyraeer, dieses die der Korinther. Aber nicht ausschliesslich.” Schwartz goes on to show how Thucydides lets each group seize the strong points of the other. The Corcyraeans turn to to sumpheron only after securing to dikaion for their side. For a similar analysis, see Kurt von Fritz, Die griechische Geschichtsschreibung (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1967) 1:631–635; White (1984, 64), by contrast, sees little or no difference between the two sides.

33. Schwartz (1929, 252) specifically alludes to the formal rhetorical strategy προσδεχομένον γενήσεσθαι for which he cites Anaxim. p. 14t Hammer.

34. De Romilly (1963, 21) focuses her brief discussion of the debate on the “true cause” of the war, Spartan fear of Athens and the inevitable conflict between the two; she points out that the Corinthians do not deny the probability of war but only emphasize that a war remains en afaneî (42.2).ἐν ἀφανεῖ Cogan (1981a, 14) believes that “the appeal was genuine, at least at the moment it was given, even though it is impossible to say that a favorable Athenian decision would have avoided the war.”

35. Finley 1967, 12–13.

36. So Cartledge (1979, 225), who presents this as a summary of the view put forward by Ste. Croix (1972, 5–34).

37. Herman 1987, 130–142; Herman documents the importance of reciprocal guest friendships within the classical period as a whole.

38. Meiggs and Lewis 1988, no. 37.14–15.

39. Hunter 1989; Morrison 1994.

40. Mauss 1990, first published in 1950 as Essai sur le don. The study of exchange, especially as explored by Karl Polanyi, was developed in classical studies by Moses Finley, in such works as Finley 1954. For Polanyi and classics in general, see Humphreys 1978, 31–75. Recently, interest in the ethics and pragmatics of exchange has grown considerably: see, for example, Herman 1987; Compagner 1988; Kurke 1991. For the application of these ideas in an archaeological context, see, for example, Renfrew and Cherry 1986.

41. See Mauss 1990, vii.

42. See Loraux (1986a, 81), who vividly depicts the Athenian allies smothered with Athenian largesse: “Forced to leave all initiative to Athens and laden with its benefits, these “friends” had no alternative but the weakness of the debtor—rather like Euripides’ Herakles, described in the last lines of the tragedy (Eur. Her. 1424) as “following Theseus like a boat being towed by another.” ”MacLachlan (1993, 151) suggests that Perikles’ usage “reflects the dramatic change in social conventions which took place during the mid fifth century BCE;” yet though the bluntness may be peculiar to Thucydides, I doubt competition was ever absent from charis.

43. Thuc. 1.77.2: καὶ οὐδεὶς σκοπεῖ αὐτῶν τοῖς καὶ ἄλλοθί που ἀρχὴν ἔχουσι καὶ ἧσσον ἡμῶν πρὸς τοὺς ὑπηκόους μετρίοις οὖσι διότι τοῦτο οὐκ ὀνειδίζεται.

44. Bourdieu 1977, 12–13. In this passage, Bourdieu actually uses the term elbahadla, and I have substituted for this the phrase “extreme humiliation publicly inflicted,” which Bourdieu uses to define elbahadla on p. 12.

45. The classic discussion of apragmosunê vs. polupragmosunê in Greek society is Ehrenberg 1947; for more recent analyses, see Carter 1986; Demont 1990.

46. Thuc. 3.38.2: Kleon vilifies the venal speaker τὸ εὐπρεπὲς τοῦ λόγου ἐκπονήσας, and Diodotos takes up this language in his response (3.44.4: καὶ οὐκ ἀξιῶ ὑμᾶς τῷ εὐπρεπεῖ τοῦ ἐκείνου λόγου τὸ χρήσιμον τοῦ ἐμοῦ ἀπώσασθαι During the stasis of Corcyra μέλλησις δὲ προμηθής is damned as δειλία εὐπεπής (3.82.4), and demagogues from all sides push themselves forward (3.82.8) μετὰ ὀνόματος…εὐπρεποῦς (3.82.8). Thucydides is particularly fond of the term εὐπρεπής which appears twenty times in his History, as opposed to six times in the somewhat longer work of Herodotus.

47. For analyses of alternate ways in which societies organize their views of self, see, for example, Dumont 1970; Geertz 1973, 360–411.

48. See Donlan 1985.

49. Bourdieu 1977, 171–183.

50. The Corinthians do this again in their first speech at Sparta (1.69.6–70.1).

51. The overall argument is a variation of the traditional “near and the far” topos. Foolish mortals, impelled by hope and desire, throw away a present situation for a distant (and ultimately unattained) future; on this, see Young 1968, 116–120.

52. Gomme, commenting ad loc., emphasizes the difference between Samos, the Athenian ally, and Corcyra, which was one of the ἄγραφοι πόλεις, when the Thirty Years Peace was signed. Ste. Croix (1972, 71) states that “Athens was certainly entitled to ally herself with Corcyra” and dismisses the Corinthian “specious provisos” to equate Samos and Corcyra; Cogan (1981a, 12) notes that the Corinthian argument is “so peculiar and periphrastic that it must lead us to believe that no such qualification existed in terms of the treaty,” but he goes on to remark that “the Corinthians do not raise the point as a legal point, they raise it as a political one.” Salmon (1984, 275) comments that “the argument is plainly false” and that it “flies in the face of the facts” (pp. 285–286). Kagan (1969, 234), however, does accept the Corinthian position: spheres of influence had been established for Athens and Corinth, and “the Corinthians were surely not mistaken in their understanding that the Athenians had accepted this modus vivendi.”

53. Meiggs (1972, 305) concludes his chapter on religious sanctions as follows: “It is interesting, however, that almost all our evidence for Athens’ religious policy towards the allies derives from inscriptions. This is perhaps an indication that religion played only a superficial part in determining the attitude of the allies.” The lack of literary evidence may more properly reflect the prejudices of our literary sources and especially of Thucydides, who in many ways set the tone for accounts of the Athenian empire.

54. For the panoply and the cow required from all colonies, see Meiggs and Lewis 1988, no. 49.11–12; schol. ad Ar. Nub. 386; for the panoply and the cow demanded from the allies as well, see Meiggs and Lewis 1988, no. 46.41–42.

55. See, for example, Goldhill 1990.

56. Rosaldo 1980, 252–253.

57. For an analysis of the reasons behind Athens’s decision, see Stadter 1983.

58. Pindar Isthm. 2.11 quotes this as (τὸ) τὠργείου ῥῆμα the saying of the Argive man, and the scholia attribute a simpler form of this saying to Alkaeus. A quick glance through the Theognidean corpus would illustrate the ambivalent and demoralizing effect that archaic and classical elites could attribute to material wealth. For the corrosive effects of money on Sparta, see already Thucydides’ younger contemporary Xenophon, Lak. Pol. 14. On Isthm. 2, see Nagy (1990, 341 and 429), who illustrates how this proverb is employed when the speaker feels betrayed; also Kurke 1991, 240–256.

59. Seven times in the Corcyraean speech: 33.1, 33.4, 34.1, 35.1, 35.4, 36.1, 36.3; nine times in the somewhat longer Corinthian speech: 37.1, 37.2, 37.3, 37.5, 39.2, 40.1, 40.2, 40.4, 43.3.

60. See “From the Mechanics of the Model to the Dialectic of Strategies” in Bourdieu 1977, 3–9.