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Chapter 1 Open Authorship within Ancient Traditions of Techneμ and Praxis In mid-fifth-century b.c.e. Athens, architecture, sculpture, and other technical arts came to be closely allied with political practice. Pericles’ vast program of building construction on the Acropolis supported and indeed was intrinsic to his rulership of democratic Athens. Pride in Athenian democracy, successful political control, and spectacular new building construction all went hand in hand. Yet the alliance of techneμ and praxis did not last. A hundred years later, Xenophon and Aristotle explicitly separated material construction and the technical arts (techneμ) from the praxis of political and military leadership. In the succeeding centuries, throughout Hellenistic and then Roman rule, the separation of the two entities, although never complete or absolute, continued. In general , the ancients thought that rulers and military leaders achieved success because of character traits such as courage and virtue, not because of technology or technique. They viewed technical matters, including weaponry and material production of all kinds, as separate from praxis and subordinate to it. In this chapter I explore the changing relationships between praxis and techneμ, particularly as they influenced the development of authorship. These ancient categories differ significantly from modern ones. Modern cultures, for example, usually associate agriculture with technology. The ancients certainly used technologies and techniques in the actual practice of agriculture, but they considered it to be conducive to the development of good character traits in the landholder that would prepare him for political and military action. They believed that agriculture inculcated virtue, training elite males to be good leaders. It was a discipline appropriate to the praxis of political and military leadership, quite separate from lower-status occupations involving the technical arts. It often has been noted that ancient crafts, carried out for the most part by slaves and manumitted slaves, suffered from a profoundly low status.1 Yet craft practice and material production seem to have enjoyed great prestige in fifthcentury b.c.e. Athens. Although the technical arts never achieved such status again, their cultural role did not remain static. Certain kinds of material invention and production, such as those involved in military engineering and architecture , enjoyed higher standing, though never the highest. These higher technical disciplines came to be explicated in writings. Further, ancient techneμ authors seemingly wrote openly, belying the view that technological and craft production invariably involved secrecy. Even ancient writings about complex weapons such as catapults reveal no concern for secrecy. The Roman architect and military engineer Vitruvius explicitly advocated the open, written transmission of knowledge. Authors of praxis writings, including those on military topics such as generalship, wrote openly as well. Distinctions between praxis and techneμ, and the separation of both from episteme μ, or theoretical knowledge, significantly influenced the cultures of authorship in the ancient Mediterranean world. Such conceptual categories are relevant to who the authors were, what topics they treated, and their prospective readership. This chapter concerns the cultures of authorship associated with the categories techneμ and praxis. It does not focus upon the vast majority of technical arts that did not find explication in treatises; nor does it attempt to reconstruct historical narratives about ancient politics or war using praxis writings. Rather, it focuses on authorship per se as it concerns the technical arts on the one hand and political and military action or praxis on the other. Democratic Rule and Building Construction in Periclean Athens An alliance between political praxis and the building arts emerged in Athens in the mid-fifth century b.c.e., one result of the Athenian democratic revolution. The revolution began when a prodemocratic party established reforms after gaining the upper hand over an aristocratic faction. Pericles persuaded the Athenian assembly to pass additional laws in the 450s to complete a process of democratization . A crucial reform provided that jurors in the dikasteμria (law courts) would be paid by the state for their services, allowing citizen participation regardless of economic status. There were limits to the new democracy: women were excluded , as were foreigners (metics), and slaves; only about 30 percent of the male population participated.2 Nevertheless, the creation of the world’s first participatory democracy had great cultural and historical significance. The generals, or strategos, of whom there were usually ten, effectively ruled the city-state. Because they were deemed to possess special skills, they could be elected as often as the people wanted them. Pericles thus won reelection year after year for at least fifteen years. Although...

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