Greek Antiquities

Mahaffy, John Pentland 1896. Greek Antiquities. With Illustrations. London: Macmillan and Co., Ltd. [First Edition 1876]

The private life of the Greeks seems in fact to us a curious mixture of cruelty and kindness, of rudeness and refinement. We shall find, accordingly, as we describe it, that both their life and temper had as distinct a character as the life and temper of each of the nations which are around us nowadays. (Mahaffy 1896: 8)

Oppositions, oppositions.

Their Quick Sympathies. - As we might expect from people in good health, they were happy in their temper, and ever ready to enjoy themselves, while their own natural good taste and beauty made them keen judges of beauty in other things, and very impatient of ugliness. In fact they set so much store upon beauty, that they were even known to worship it, and were usually disposed to think it the same thing as goodness, if not superior. If they wished to say of a man that he was a perfect gentleman, [|] they said he was "fair and good" (καλοκάγαθός), meaning by fair, not only fair in his condict, but in his looks, and meaning by good, not only good in character, but in birth. They also speak of it as a curious thing, that Socrates was a great and a good man, though he was very ugly. (Mahaffy 1896: 8-9)

"The physical attractiveness stereotype is a tendency, described by psychologists, to assume that people who are physically attractive also possess other socially desirable personality traits."

Their Reasonableness. - No doubt these very quick sympathies would have constantly led them astray, but for the great reasonableness which was another strong point in the nation. They insisted upon discussion and understanding things, upon hearing both sides, and were generally satisfied to be led by the majority. It was this quality which made them, in politics, love councils and cities, and hate tyrants and solitude; in art it made them love symmetry and proportion, and hate vagueness and display. It made them also in literature love clearness and moderation, and hate both bombast and sentimentality. (Mahaffy 1896: 9)

They were prone to the opposite of phatic communion, then.

They always had a strong bent for power, and for money as the key to power, and were not scrupulous as to the means they employed to obtain either. They were not truthful, but were ready to tell lies and to deceive for their own advantage. (Mahaffy 1896: 9)

If you want to make money, go into politics.

For in spite of all differences, there was ever a striking unity in the Greeks, which made them feel quite distinct from all other people and quite superior to them; and this feeling, like a sort of great freemansory, was a bond which united the most distant Greeks, whenever and wherever they met. Thus the merchants of Massilia in Gaul and Trapezus near the Caucasus, of Olbia on the Euxine, and Cyrene in Africa, met as fellow countrymen, and talked together with ease, while the other nations of the earth held intercourse with difficulty. This is that unity of the Hellenic race of which Hellenes were so proud, unity which was shown in a common language, a common religion or religious, in great national feasts, and in a general contrast to all the other world as mere barbanians. Perhaps the most kindred feeling we now can compare with it, is that of all English-speaking people in all parts of the world, when they met among foreigners, as they call those who speak any other tongue. The pride which they feel in their Anglo-Saxon race and language is not unlike the national spirit of the Greek. (Mahaffy 1896: 11)

Doesn't some feeling of superiority describe all nationalities? The unity formed by language, religion, and festivities detail the "community of knowledge" (cf. Trotter 1921: 119).

In old days the fear of pirates and plunderers, in later days the taste for talking and for politics, kept men from staying in the country, and brought them into the towns, where they found safety and society. (Mahaffy 1896: 12)

Note the easy association between talking and politics (politics consists, on the examples of Hitler and Trump, in the ability to talk to a large crowd for two hours straight).

At first the gods has been worshipped in the form of rude stones, or of trees, sometimes carved roughly into the form of an image. There had been an altar before the god, but no covering or temple. But when the Greeks began to carve marble statues, and offer rich gifts to their gods, it was necessary to provide them with a more permanent shelter. (Mahaffy 1896: 21)

How can stones be rude, you ask? I think he means those busts with genitals, herma.

But even there trade, gossip, and gymnastics filled up the day. In Sparta, too, silence and extreme modesty were taught to the young, and even in conversation men were taught to ponder a long time, and then give utterance to their thoughts in the shortest and pithiest shape, somewhat like what we find described at state meetings of North American Indians. But this must be looked on as an exceptional case, and all over the rest of Greece, ordinary life was much more like the life lived at Athens, than the life lived at Sparta. (Mahaffy 1896: 25)

Laconic.

When to be used, it was often strained and cooled with snow, and always mixed with a good deal of water. Half-and-half was the strongest mixture allowed among respectable people, and th use of pure wine was rejected as low and dangerous, and only fit for northern barbarians. In the present day the wines of Greece, which are strong, are distasteful to the natives and even to travellers without water, and this natural consequence of a southern climate is increased by the strong flavour of fir-tree resin, which the Greeks add to almost all their wines. (Mahaffy 1896: 33)

A piece of common knowledge.

In some states, such as Sparta, it was said that the nobles, or conquering race, divided the land so as to leave the greater portion in equal lots for themselves to be worked by their slaves or dependants, and a smaller portion to the former owners, who were obliged to pay a rent to the state. But of course no such equality of lots, if ever carried out, could last. In all states we find the perpetual complaint that property had come into the hands of a few, while the many were starving. (Mahaffy 1896: 35)

Bernie Sanders before Bernie Sanders.

Nor could a household exist (except perhaps in Sparta) without the master. If he died, his widow became again the ward of her father or eldest brother, or son; and so strongly was this sometimes felt that men on their deathbeds betrothed their wives to friends, who were likely to treat them and their orphan children with kindness. (Mahaffy 1896: 45)

Extreme patriarchy.

The dowry seems to have been partly intended as a useful obstacle to divorce, which required its repayment, but we find that heiresses made themselves troublesome by their airs of importance, and this is referred to in Greek literature, in which men are frequently advised not to marry above them in wealth or connections. As all citizens were considered equal in birth, and as marriages with aliens were illegal and void, we do not hear of advice to young men not to marry beneath them. To marry a poor citizen girl was always considered a good deed, and is commended as such. (Mahaffy 1896: 49)

An endorsement of hypergamy.

But for grown people, we do not find many games, properly speaking, played for the game's sake, like our cricket. There was very simple ball playing, and, of course, gambling with dice. Of gymnastic exercises I will speak separately. (Mahaffy 1896: 52)

"For the difference between play and work or 'serious' activities strikes every one" (Shand 1914: 287).

The more advanced teaching of reading and writing was done by the γραμματικός, whose house was called, like that of philosophers and rhetoricians, σχολή, a place of leisure. (Mahaffy 1896: 54)

Ages of leisure.

In aristocratic societies all work in the way of trade or business was despised by the landed gentry, and idleness was called the sister of freedom. In such states (as, for example, in Sparta) the pursuit of a trade often disqualified a man from political rights, and in any case, deprived him of all public influence. This feeling did not die out even in the complete democracies of later days, and there was always a prejudice in the Greek mind against trades and handicrafts, because they compelled men to sit at home and neglect the proper training of the body by sports, and the mind by society. (Mahaffy 1896: 62)

Nice. Of the variety, "sleep is the cousin of death", though the latter has mythological underpinnings.

There was also in almost all democracies special encouragement, in the absence of crown lawyers, for any citizen to denounce any violation of the laws which he could detect. This gave rise to a profession called sycophancy, which usually degenerated into that of a spy or informer; and such men constantly extracted money from rich people and from politicians by threats of accusation. (Mahaffy 1896: 69)

Define:sycophancy - "obsequious behaviour towards someone important in order to gain advantage". Define:obsequious - "obedient or attentive to an excessive or servile degree". Not exactly the same.

Social Amusements. - By way of transition to the religion of the Greeks, a word may be said upon their social intercourse of a lighter kind. This may be divided into Entertainments, Visits, Athletic Meetings and Festivals, if we may separate, for arrangement's sake, things usually combined. (Mahaffy 1896: 72)

Somewhat broader than "social intercourse" is commonly portrayed.

There were besides professional makers of amusement, jesters who came in uninvited (parasites), and were made the butt of the company, jugglers who performed their tricks, and even had a sort of ballet danced by their attendants. (Mahaffy 1896: 74)

Simple but striking.

But we are bound to add that in addition to all the splendour of the Festivals and Athletic Contests, there was the usual collection of mountebanks, jugglers, thimble-riggers, and other bad characters, who now frequent horse races. This was so much the case in later days, that Cicero indignantly denies the report that he had gone to the Olympic Games, just as some sober divine might now object to being seen at the Derby. On the other hand we must regard the home festivals in each Greek city among the most humane and kindly institutions in their life. They corresponded to our Sundays and holydays, when the hard-worked and inferior classes are permitted to meet, and enjoy themselves. (Mahaffy 1896: 79)

Subtly bringing holy communion closel to phatic communion.

Such were Pan, the shepherd god, who was the cause of those terrors still called panics, the nymphs of wells, the hamadryads of trees, and the river gods. (Mahaffy 1896: 85)

I wonder if this has anything to do with the association between crowds (herds) and panic.

General Character of Religious Worship. - As in every other religion, prayer is the leading feature of Greek religion. But when the Greek raised his hands to the gods at their temple, he sought to conciliate them by sacrifices of oxen, goats, or other animals, as well as with incense, and thought them bound in fairness to hear him. The animals were at times wholly burnt (holocausts), at others partly, and the remainder used for a religious feast. (Mahaffy 1896: 87)

"The word Holocaust is derived from the Greek holokauston, a translation of the Hebrew word ʿolah, meaning a burnt sacrifice offered whole to God." (Britannica.com)

Litigants accordingly used all manner of devices to excite the sympathy and commiseration of the dicasts; they wept in court, they brought their little children with them, they appealed to past good deeds, and raked up scandal against their adversaries. (Mahaffy 1896: 92)

Beyond mere pity.

Homicide, for example, or drun kenbrawling, provided no magistrate was assaulted, was atoned for by satisfying the injured people or their relatives; nor did the State interfere with such a settlement, except to prevent any public pollution by means of guilt. (Mahaffy 1896: 96)

Was that a hiccup?