The Myth of the \'Middle Class\' Hoplite

[SigniferOne]

Given that we are discussing a simplistic and arbitrary division of 'social classes' into 'Rich' 'Middle' and 'Poor', in this division where do those urban artisans/merchants/enterpreneurs that I referred to fit ? They are clearly generally wealthier than our small-holder 'Hoplite Class' but a potter with his small workshop could hardly qualify as one of Athens 'rich'....perhaps to answer my own question, it depends on their 'net worth' in Solonic terms....

A difficult question. A small potter would have as much to fight for as the small-holder farmer of the countryside. On the other hand the mercantile classes (at least in Rome) were not liked very much, and were usually shuffled to the back of the line, or disqualified from the army altogether. I don't know how the Greeks resolved this issue (after all, a merchant doesn't have anything to really fight for, just like a proletarius).

Either way, Athenian history doesn't afford enough scope to trace how these social changes played out, or even how they would've played out if things turned out fine. Unfortunately the course of action that did take place was a takeover of Athenian society by the proleterian sub-stratum, led by power-hungry politicians with Pericles at the helm. This element never gets sufficiently emphasized, but Pericles was little different from Caesar in subverting the Constitution and riding his popularity on the wave of handouts and demagogic mob-rule (disbanding the Areopagus Council wasn't okay...). Once the spell of his personality wore off, men like Cleon clearly showed the system for what it was.

So -- where did this developing urban middle class fit into the hoplite schema? I don't know, and the Athenians didn't either, because the civic hoplite ethic was swiftly undermined and by 450s BC Athens was scarcely recognizable as a hoplite city-state anymore.

Something tells me that if we were to put this generalisation under the microscope and look in detail, as we have with the Hoplites, we would find that not just the Athenian 'Hoi Polloi' provided the fleet's rowers, but that many came from the islands and Empire, many others were hired mercenaries etc.......

Perhaps you may be falling back on the Peloponnesian War statistics here. I thought it was uncontroversial that when Themistocles organized the hoi polloi into the navy, it was fueled primarily by the Athenian citizens themselves.