Great Power Diplomacy in the Hellenistic World by John D. Grainger (review)

John Grainger's study of diplomacy, a concept that he claims did not exist as such in the Hellenistic world (12) and for which no word existed in Greek or Latin (4, 248), encompasses international political relations between what he calls the "great powers," namely the Hellenistic monarchies established by the Macedonian successors of Alexander, the Greek federations (the Aitolian and Achaean leagues), Rome, and Carthage, as well as relations between these powers and individual cities. In addition to negotiations and treaties, Grainger's consideration of diplomacy includes royal marriages, political intrigues, plots, and spying. His main purpose is to examine the development of a system of diplomacy and its evolving function in both the eastern and western Mediterranean until "Roman brutality" (243) destroyed the older practices of the east.

The book is structured as an Introduction followed by 13 chapters divided into four parts. Part I is devoted to the "Techniques and Practices" of diplomacy; Part II to "Diplomacy in Action—The East"; Part III to "Diplomacy in the West"; and Part IV to "The Collision of East and West." At the end there is a brief conclusion. Grainger claims that while diplomacy was conducted using the "old Greek practice of envoys" (2), a new system developed in the eastern Mediterranean early in the Hellenistic period (Chapters 1-6) that was "subject to variation with the person and character of the kings" (3). He examines also the system of diplomacy as it ftinctioned in the western Mediterranean in the early days of Roman expansion (Chapters 7-9), and then the later Hellenistic practice that led to the "collision" of the eastern "great powers" (chiefly Philip V and Antiochus III) with Rome (Chapters 10-12), and finally the diplomacy even later in the east following—and despite—the first collision with Rome (Chapter 13).

In advancing his case for the development of a system of diplomacy, Grainger argues against the characterization of the Hellenistic period as one of "anarchy" (Eckstein 2006, 2008) and claims that it was actually "the very opposite of 'anarchy'" (6) in that in their efforts to avoid war the Hellenistic states established a diplomatic framework that allowed resolution of conflicts (e.g., 182). This is hardly a new development, though, when one considers the diplomatic practices of Philip II (cf., e.g., Aeschines 3.148-151). One of the main points Grainger makes and reiterates is that treaties between kings established "peace" that remained in effect until one king or the other died, at which time war was again possible and interstate relations had to be renegotiated by successors (e.g., 13-14, 82, 113, 139, 185, 208-209, 238); but again the practice is not new, nor is the point newly made.¹ Likewise, when the author states that Antigonos Monophthalmos and the Successors "worked out a method of diplomatic contact by means of trusted envoys" (20), they were doing no differently than Philip II and Alexander, along with many other political leaders, had done before. So there is much here that the reader will find is not "newly" developed about great power diplomacy in the Hellenistic world. Diplomacy does evolve, however, and one conclusion Grainger draws about techniques and practices in Part I is that despite the ongoing regularity of interstate royal marriages, these (in the Hellenistic world) were far more "a matter of social prestige" than of political usefulness to the great powers (49-50; cf. 90, 249), whereas in the pre-Hellenistic Balkan states interstate marriages usually constituted effective diplomacy. What Grainger identifies as "new" is three diplomatic practices appearing in the time of Antigonos: "summit conferences," such as Demetrios Poliorketes with Lysimachos and Pyrrhos in Macedon (64), though this was one of the least used; the justification of opening or declaring war by referring to the (supposed) failure of one party to observe terms of a previous treaty, which was in effect a bid for...