The Battle of Salamis and the Origins of Political Theory

Abstract

HIS IS AN ESSAY about the origins of politics and political theory in classical Athens. My aim is not to provide a comprehensive survey of those origins but to emphasize a single source that is fundamental in itself and illuminates the others.' That source is the interpretation the Athenians made of their victory over greatly superior Persian forces in the 480 B.C. Battle of Salamis.2 Given the disparity of power and the enormity of the risk, the sheer fact, let alone the magnitude, of the victory seemed nothing less than miraculous. When a that was no city except in desperate hope3 risked all only to have those hopes realized beyond their most fervent prayers, it is easy to understand how that victory provided a moment of shared faith and a lasting vision of civic achievement. As far as we know, Salamis was the only historical event elevated to the mythical status accorded those heroic legends from which tragedy drew its inspiration and stories. In and through Aeschylus' Persians, Herodotus' Histories, and Thucydides' History, we can see how the triumph there became a spiritual foundation of democratic Athens promising safe guidance through the limitless spaces of the future, and an empowering vision of action and being, sustained through emulation and reenactment.4 As Salamis was interpreted as a democratic victory that competed for renown and significance with the earlier aristocratic land triumph at Marathon, this essay is also about the origins of the Athenian democratic ethos as it relates to the beginnings of politics and political theory.5 Although Athenian politics continued to be directed by the sons of eminent families for 60 years after Salamis, the triumph there became the basis of claims by the poor sailors for greater political equality and of