The Character of Greek Colonisation.1 Three

THE CHARACTER OF GREEK COLONISATION.1 THREE movements of expansion can be distinguished in what we know of. the history of the Greeks. The first, that of the so-called Dorian, and Ionian migrations, left them in possession of the Greek mainland, the principal islands of the Aegean, and the western seaboard of Asia Minor. The second, that of Greek colonisation properly so-called, extended the Greek world to the limits familiar to us in the history of Greece during the fifth and fourth centuries. The third, in which. Macedonian kings act as leaders, began with the conquests of Alexander, and resulted in that Hellenisation of the East which was the permanent achievement of his successors. The general character of the second of these movements forms the subject of this essay. Much has still to be done before a detailed history of Greek colonisation can be given to the world. Sites must be excavated, and the main lines of Greek commercial history established, before it can even be attempted. But we know enough already to judge with fair accuracy of that tremendous outburst of activity, which left the Greeks almost undisputed masters of Mediterranean commerce. Here and there the course of development is still uncertain, and almost everywhere we are ignorant of details that would inevitably be instructive; but, since recent historians of Greece aim rather at narrating the story of individual colonies than at presenting general conclusions, it may prove worth while to give here a survey of the whole field. Perhaps the clearest way of presenting such a survey will be to discuss first the causes of Greek colonisation; secondly, the political and social conditions under which it developed; and lastly, the relations which resulted between each colony and its mother-state.2 I.—The Causes of Greek Colonisation. Thucydides had no doubt as to the underlying cause of Greek colonisation : iinTrXeovTe<i ra? vrjaov<; KarearpeôvTO, ical fidXiara ocroi fir) Biapicrj 1 The essay here printed, by permission of course of the essay; but I should like here to the Council of the British Academy, was express my gratitude to Rev. E. M. Walker, awarded the first annual Cromer Prize ' for of Queen's College, Oxford, and to Professor the best Essay on any subject connected with Percy Gardner for the personal help and en- the language, history, art, literature, or philo- couragement which they have given me. It sophy of Ancient Greece' (see J.H.S. xxxvi. will be also plain how much I owe to the p. lxxiii.). recent edition of Beloch's Oriechische Ge- 2 I acknowledge my authorities in the schichte (1914). THE CHARACTER OF GREEK COLONISATION 89 %a>pai\3 It may be objected that the historian had before him little more evidence as to the history of his country in the eighth century than is now at our disposal. From the standpoint of the archaeologist he had perhaps even less; but he had fewer misconceptions to clear away, and there can be little doubt as to the accuracy of his conclusions. Greek colonisation was due, above all else, to the need for land. But the simplicity of this "statement must not rob it of its force. Colonisation, it is true, implies at all times a need for expansion, and under healthy conditions it is a sign that the population of the home-country is fast out-growing its productive capacity ; but Greek colonisation was due to a motive that was peculiarly urgent. Greece is, before all things else, a small country—so small, that the traveller on his first visit needs time to grow familiar with the shock of this discovery. Cultivable land, moreover, is precious where bare rocks are so plentiful; and it is of cultivable land, of course, that Thucydides speaks. Here, then, lies the force of his remark. We have only to look at the map to see how truly his words apply to the chief colonising states of Greece; Corinth, Megara, Chalcis, Eretria, Phocaea, Miletus, all are sea-ports with a territory of some extent and fertility, but so confined either by natural obstacles or by the neighbourhood of powerful states as to preclude the possibility of expansion by land. Yet, when once their population of peasants and farmers began to grow, land must be had somewhere, and, since it could not be had at home, expansion over the seas became a necessity: oaoi firj Si'apicfj el-^pv ôopav. But geography is not alone in teaching us the force of the words used by Thucydides. Greek colonisation begins in the eighth century B.C., continues in full vigour for some 150 years, and begins to decline towards the middle of the sixth century—that is to say, it begins in what we now call " proto- historic" times, and has practically ended at an age of which later Greeks had no connected history. We know now that they filled in many of the gaps in their knowledge by inferences drawn from the history of their own times. For us the temptation to do the same is still great, but we must learn to think away our previous conceptions if we wish the early history of the Greek colonies to become vivid and intelligible. And, in the first place, we must think away all the associations which life in a highly-developed industrial society has inevitably left in our minds. Thucydides tells us that Greece was once a land of villages.4 The fact is undisputed, but its logical consequences in Greek history are hard to realise. There were no cities in the days when Archias sailed from Corinth or the first Ionian settlers from Miletus. The statement sounds almost a contradiction in terms, but it is literally true; In the age to which these early colonies belong, the Greeks had already developed the typical TroXt? or city state; but the city, as we know it, owing its existence to industry and commerce, was still in process of development, for the population of Greece was still mainly agricultural, tillers of the soil, not dwellers in the city.5 The social conditions which we 3 Th. i. 15 ; of. Plato, Laws, 708 B, 740 E. 5 Beloch, Gr. Gesch. (ed. 2), i. 1, pp. 202-3, 4 Th. i. 10. for the development of the WAIS. 90 AUBREY GWYNN know to have existed in pre-Solonian Athens seem to have been typical of many other Greek states. Feudal aristocracies, based on the tenure of land, were still strong throughout the country—possibly the old feudal monarchies had not yet completely disappeared; and though the whole population was grouped in the constitution of a regular state, the majority lived and worked, not in the central town, but in villages or on the land.6 In such a community land is the most, valuable of all possessions, the only guarantee of permanent wealth. The great wars of which we hear in this period (those of Argos against Sparta and of Chalcis against Eretria) were waged in deadly earnest, because each side fought for the possession of a plain; and the states which sent out colonies were urged by the same motives, for here, too, the possession of land was at stake. Here, however, we must make a distinction which is of some importance. In the passage which we have already quoted, it will be noticed that Thucydides makes no distinction between the era of. colonisation, according to the sense in which we are now using the term, and the earlier occupation of the islands by Aeolian, Ionian, and Dorian tribes; and this failure to distinguish between two separate epochs in Greek history can be traced also in an earlier chapter.7 Yet the difference is not merely one of time. The earlier migrations were, it is true, caused by the pressure of advancing tribes, and were thus due, in a sense, to the need for land; but, unlike the later movement of expansion, they were themselves tribal conquests, not settlements organised by a city-state. In the history of modern Europe they correspond rather to the barbarian invasions of the fifth century A.D. than to the movements of colonisation which took place in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The later Greek settlements, on the other hand, were due to the natural growth of a population which had lived for generations under settled conditions, and to them alone can we apply the words of Thucydides: 9 rjav^daaaa rj 'EXXa? /Se/3atco? ical OV/C&TI aviara/ievi] curoi/clas eêne/iyjrev. After the period in which Dorians, Ionians and the other tribes of the mainland had struggled for the supremacy, Greek life, both on the mainland and in the newly-won territories, settled down to a period of agricultural development. Soil hitherto untilled was made productive, tenure of land became more secure, and by sea the pirates, with whom Homer was familiar, were gradually forced to a more regular existence.9 It is in this period of growing- order and prosperity that the origins of Greek colonisation are to be sought. On the one hand, as families began to hold land continuously for generations, and since the amount of fertile soil was very limited, the natural growth of a peasant population soon needed some outlet to replace the earlier custom of restless wandering. On the other hand, with the clearing of the seas from pirates, men grew accustomed to regular intercourse by water. It needed 6 Cf. Bury, History of Greece, pp. 86-7.

Load more