This volume provides a new assessment of Athens’ military capabilities and war efforts in the fourth century BC, highlighting the close connection between its democracy and military affairs.
Athens after the Peloponnesian War has been the subject of intense study, particularly its military capabilities and war efforts and the workings of its democracy. We still do not have, however, a comprehensive assessment of Athens’ military record in the fourth century. This book provides a new detailed picture of this period, exploring what Athens was capable of and what it achieved militarily and diplomatically after its defeat in the Peloponnesian War. The volume also reassesses aspects of Athenian warmaking and warfare, including diplomatic and economic matters, from 404 BC down to and including the Lamian War of 323–322 BC.
Waging War in Fourth-Century Athens: New Appraisals is suitable for students and scholars in Classics and Ancient History, as well as those operating in adjacent fields of study, along with the general reader interested in the ancient world, warfare, and politics.
Table of Contents:
General Introduction
Part 1. Warfare, Politics, and Economics
1 Democracy, Politics, and War in the Fourth Century
2 Rethinking Athenian Military Public Finance: Financial Strategies for War-Making in the Early Fourth Century
3 The Theorika in Its Social, Fiscal, and Discursive Context: Fighting Philip or Helping the Needy?
4 The Military Reforms of Fourth-Century Athens
Part 2. Military Branches
5 The Athenian Navy in the Fourth Century: Restoration, Transformation, Reformation
6 What to Do with the Thousand Hippeis after 404?: Debating Reform to the Athenian Cavalry in the Fourth Century
7 ‘Not Diminished, but Greater and Better’: Athenian Hoplite Performance in the Fourth Century
8 Athenian Peripoloi
Part 3. Military Power and War Efforts
9 From the ‘Sound of the Flute’ to the ‘Death of a City’: Reflections on Athenian Poliorcetics from 404 to 322
10 The Revival of Athenian Hegemony in the Corinthian War
11 From the Cadmea to Chaeronea: The Second League as a Form of Athenian Imperialism
12 The Athenian War Effort Against Philip II of Macedonia
13 From Chaeronea to Lamia: A ‘Shipwrecked State’?
Part 4. Popular Attitudes and the Military
14 Generals and Generalship in the Fourth-Century Orators
15 From Villain to Hero: Conon’s Rehabilitation, Warfare, and Democracy
16 Military Values in Fourth-Century Tragedy
