The Hunters of Euboea: Mountain Folk in the Classical Mediterranean

Abstract

The extension of power and altered land-use arrangements by institutions of the classical Mediterranean city, including deforestation, replacement of hunting by agriculture, and other environmental changes, moved toward assimilation of groups with traditional lifeways even as they were resisted by them. A hunter-farmer community on the mountainous periphery of a small port city is described in intimate detail by the Greek orator and philosopher, Dio Chrysostom (Dion Chrisostomos) of Prusa, in his Seventh Discourse. The social system of the mountain-dwelling people is forced to confront the institutions of the city-state, and the conflict of the two is clearly delineated. The operation of city assemblies and courts, and the contrast of their assumptions about appropriate ways of life and modes of production with those of the highland group, give opportunity for analysis and comment. Dio's work helps to elucidate what can be termed an incomplete process of assimilation by the cosmopolitan culture, and is a uniquely valuable work because classical literature generally has little to say about mountain folk in the ancient world.