What is the Concept of Law in Ancient Greece? (3)

Solon

Aristocrat Solon, who was descended from the Medontids, one of the ancient noble royal families of Athens, was also a merchant who traveled to many countries during his commercial activities. Solon came from a wealthy family, but for some reason they remained poor. For this reason, Solon had to engage in commercial activities to earn a living. This gave him great benefits in mediating between the nobility and the lower class. For this matter Plutharkos; "The rich admired him because he was rich, and the poor because he was chaste." he said. The Athenian society of his time was divided into tribes, religious, military and financial. At the head of each tribe was a member of the nobility. However, the society was experiencing economic difficulties due to unequal income distribution. The lower part of the society was dissatisfied with the economic difficulties, and due to the increasing discontent, the Athenians remained in BC. In 594 they elected Solon the supreme ruler (archon) of the state. He was in a position to become a tyrant with the powers given by his solo position, but there are opinions that he never accepted this. Solon had been involved with the law long after he took office. BC Around 570 he was asked to solve political and economic problems. Following this request, Solon initiated reforms by taking the Assembly of Areopagos with him. Laws envisioned to be valid for ten years have been in the fields of economy and society. Among the laws Solon made in the economic field are the following: He removed the elements of balance against the middle class. So much so that he wrote off some of the debts of the debtors (isakhtheia). Those who became slaves because they could not pay their debts were also liberated. On the other hand, Euboia, which was more convenient, replaced Attica, the unit of measurement used in Athens. Solon sought to bring skilled craftsmen living in different places to Athens. Solon divided society into four classes based on wealth, not ancestry:

Pentakosiomednoi
Hippeis (horsemen)
Zeugitai (small farmers)
Thetes (poor peasants and land-bound slaves and workers)

Citizens in the first and second classes could become archons, enter the Areopagos. Third-class citizens, on the other hand, could be elected to some civil service positions and to the Bule. Those in the fourth-class category could be selected for Ekklesia and Heliaia. This class was also exempted from military service and tax. Only third-class citizens were able to do military service. Thus, a class system emerged according to income and expenditure. Solon's reform of the judicial system was a new court "heliaia" in which all four classes could be chosen by juries.

Solon had abolished all of Drakon's laws, except for the murderous parts. With the reforms and laws enacted by Solon, the foundation of the legal system that developed in Athenian democracy was laid. to ancient Greek political life; He brought the institutions of the People's Assembly (Ekklesia), the Consultative Assembly (Bule), known as the Dörtyüzler, the Nobles-Aristocrats Assembly (Areopagos) and the People's Court (Heliaia). The most striking democratic part of his constitution is the citizen's right to apply to the court (dikasterion) against the decision of an arkho (high public official), so that the people could seek their right. The full text of Solon's laws was written on rotating wooden slabs, originally called "tesmos" and later "nomos". There are summaries of these laws on the conical stone stelae.

Peisistratos

Solonian reforms put an end to class struggles. In sixth century Attica, as the aristocratic class in the interior had lost power, the peasant class in the highlands were unsatisfied as they were waiting for Solon to become a tyrant, but their hopes were not answered. In the case of Athens, it is known that there were some uprisings, archon elections were not held, and a person named Damasia attempted tyranny by having him elected two years in a row. BC In 561, Peisistratos, who was more assertive than Solon, became a tyrant by backing the villagers residing in the inner regions of Attica. Peisistratos did not touch Solon's organization, he transferred his own men to some high public officials. However, it is known that Archons and Areopag assemblies also lost their value. On the other hand, he broke the population and power of the aristocrats by distributing large farms to the peasantry. With the intention of improving Attic agriculture, Peisistratos distributed seeds, double oxen, and borrowed money to the peasants. Village judges established the organization and thus linked the law of the peasantry to new laws. He protected the gods that the villagers had dedicated. The tyranny of Peisistratos was, in this respect, the golden age of the peasant class. In the light of these developments, Athens became one of the biggest industrial and commercial centers of the period. Thus, great success has been achieved in foreign relations. After Peisistratos died, his sons took over the administration. During this period Persian 

They occupied all Anatolia. So much so that the Aeolian and Ionian policemen lost their independence. As such, the tyranny lost its authority day by day. After the tyrant Hippias used his power arbitrarily, the people started a long struggle against the tyrant with Cleisthenes, the son of Megacles from the family of the Alkmaionids, who had been exiled by the tyrants. After the tyrant Isagoras, Cleisthenes took over the administration.

Cleisthenes

The reforms of Cleisthenes did not consist of changes in the existing order like the reforms of Solon. His reforms aimed to eradicate the population of the aristocratic class, that is, to establish a regular state organization and to have all citizens participate in the administration. The establishment of democracy as a political regime in Athens It was realized in 507, thanks to Cleisthenes. Cleisthenes divided the people of Athens into ten nets, meaning that they contain the peoples living in certain regions. According to Thucydides, Attica and Athens were united during the time of King Thetus, but in the time of Cleisthenes, Athens was again considered as a separate police and reorganized accordingly. With the arrangement, Attica was administratively divided into three as the city (asti), the coast (paralia), and the inner region (mesogeios). Merchants and industrialists dwelt in the city, sailors and fishermen on the coast, and smallholder peasants in the interior. Each major region was also divided into ten trittus. There are thirty trittus in a phyle and many demos in each trittus. Demos were settlements with farmland. Citizens also used the name of the demo they belonged to along with their names. By registering for the demo, citizens were confirming their citizenship. Cleisthenes increased the number of members of the Council of the Four Hundreds, founded by Solon, to five hundred. Thus, this parliament has become a place where the policy is carried out rather than the place where the policy is produced. Ekklesia, who carried out the legislative and judicial system, was the policy-making element of the state. Regarding this organization, Aristotle, in his work "The State of the Athenians", says that it was done in order to confuse the masses of the people with each other. Cleisthenes authorized the People's Assembly not to interfere with the democratic process again by tyrants, allowing it to function as a "Pottery Court" once a year. Citizens were writing the names of people they suspected and worried about being a tyrant in the Pottery Court on the pottery shards. In subsequent censuses, if someone's name was written by the majority, that person was driven away from the city for ten years. Commanders and high officials such as Themistocles, Kimon, and Alcibiades were sent out of Athens by decisions of the Pottery Court. The success of Lykurgos in Sparta, Solon in Athens, but also Cleisthenes in Athens; Institutions and administrative administrators affiliated with religious faith unions and kinship relations have been liquidated by giving them a new form on different criteria.

Criticisms of Greek Government Forms

Greek democracy was exposed to many criticisms at the time it was committed. The majority of the criticisms brought to the political structure consisted of the limitation of those who have political rights in terms of their current number and competencies. There were anti-democratic philosophers as well as pro-democratic philosophers in ancient Greece. The leading anti-democratic philosophers are Pythagoras, Heraclitus, Parmenides, Plato and Aristotle. Each of them criticized the democratic regime for different reasons and revealed its inadequacies and deficiencies. According to them, the inadequacy of ontological, epistemological, ethical, political and legal principles of democracy causes chaos, conflict and coups in society. Since Pythagoras was conservative and respectful of tradition, he favored aristocratic rule. In The Constitution of the Athenians, the negative aspects of not including the poor people in the government were underlined. Xenophon also emphasized that the holders of political rights on this issue should be limited. Therefore, when we look at the criticisms of the Greek political system, namely democracy, it is concluded that the majority have opinions that the administration should be undertaken by a limited number of people. Two famous philosophers of Ancient Greece, Plato and Aristotle, who had a great influence on the next ages, classified the forms of government and evaluated and criticized democracy as a form of bad government. According to Aristotle, 4th-century Athens was a radical democracy, in some ways akin to tyranny, because of its regulations that made the will of the majority prevail and the increase in the number of citizens. Aristotle, in the distinction between oligarchy and democracy, based on the assets of the citizens, and emphasized that the feature that distinguishes oligarchy and democracy from each other is the presence or absence of wealth.

References:

KAYNAKÇA:

Periodicals

1. YETİŞ Mehmet, “Antik Atina’da Demokrasinin Gelişimi: Soloncu Pasif Devriminden Peisistratos’un Tiranlığına”, Ankara Üniversitesi Siyasal Bilgiler Fakültesi Dergisi, Cilt: 54, No:2 (1999), s. 164-197.
2. KIŞLALI Ahmet Taner, Eski Yunan’da Demokrasi ve Demokratik Düşünce, Amme İdaresi Dergisi, Cilt: 17. Sayı: 1 (1984).
3. AKKOÇ Aslıhan, Yunan Demokrasisinin Kavramsal Yönü ve Toplumsal Arka Planı, Afyon Kocatepe Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Dergisi, Cilt:16, Sayı 1 (2014).
4. KEÇECİ Ali İzzet, Sokrates’ten Çipras’a Yunanistan’ın Demokrasi Serüveni, Europolitika Dergisi, Sayı 1 (2016), s. 34-44.
5. SİNA Ayşen, Eski Yunan Yargı Sistemi: M.Ö. IV. Yüzyılda Atina’da Yargıçlar ve Mahkemeler, Türkiye Barolar Birliği Dergisi, Sayı: 123 (2016), s. 419-450.
6. AYDOĞDU Hüseyin, Antik Yunan’da Demokrasi: Yaklaşımlar, Deneyimler, Darbeler, International Social Sciences Studies Journal, Cilt: 5, Sayı: 43 (2019), s. 4737-4750.
7. DİNÇKOL Bihterin, Atina Demokrasisinden Roma Cumhuriyetine – “Demos”tan “Populus Romanus”a, Marmara Üniversitesi Hukuk Fakültesi Hukuk Araştırmaları Dergisi, Cilt: 23, Sayı: 3 (2017), s.751-765.

Books

1. TANİLLİ Server, Uygarlık Tarihi, Remzi Kitabevi, İstanbul 2014.
2. MANSEL Arif Müfid, Ege ve Yunan Tarihi, Türk Tarih Kurumu Yay., 2011.
3. CROİX G.E.M de Ste., Antik Yunan Dünyasında Sınıf Mücadelesi, çev.: Çağdaş Sümer, Yordam Kitap Yay., İstanbul 2014.
4. UYGUN Oktay, Demokrasinin Tarihsel, Felsefi ve Ahlaki Boyutları, İnkılap Yay., İstanbul 2003.
5. TEKİN Oğuz, Eski Yunan ve Roma Tarihine Giriş, İletişim Yay., İstanbul 2008.
6. PUTARKHOS, Lykurgos’un Hayatı, çev.: Sebahattin Eyüboğlu, Vedat Günyol, İş Bankası Kültür Yay., 2017.

Thesis

1. ÖZALP Ahmet Nusret, Antike’de Demokrasi: Ortaya Çıkışı Temel Özellikleri, Karabük Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü, yüksek lisans tezi, Karabük.