Title: Tyranny in Ancient Greece and Rome – Brewminate
Headings: Tyranny in Ancient Greece and Rome
Tyranny in Ancient Greece and Rome
Peisistratus, copper engraving, 1832 / Wikimedia Commons
Introduction
Etymology and Definition
Harmodius and Aristogeiton murdering Hipparchus, the brother of Hippias, tyrant of Athens. / Wikimedia Commons
Historical Forms
Overview
Aesymnetes
Populism
Archaic Tyrants
Sicilian Tyrants
Later Tyrants
Roman Tyrants
In the Classics
Enlightenment
Methods of Obtaining and Retaining Power
Overview
Obtaining
Retaining
Notes
Like this:
Comments

Content: Support for the tyrants came from the growing middle class and from the peasants who had no land or were in debt to the wealthy landowners. It is true that they had no legal right to rule, but the people preferred them over kings or the aristocracy. The Greek tyrants stayed in power by using mercenary soldiers from outside of their respective city-state. To mock tyranny, Thales wrote that the strangest thing to see is “an aged tyrant” meaning that tyrants do not have the public support to survive for long. Aesymnetes
Bust of Pittacus, Roman copy of a Greek original of the Late Classical period, / Louvre Museum, Wikimedia Commons
An aesymnetes (plural aesymnetai) had similar scope of power to the tyrant, such as Pittacus of Mytilene (c. 640–568 BC), and was elected for life or for a specified period by a city-state in a time of crisis – the only difference being that the aesymnetes was a constitutional office and were comparable to the Roman dictator. Magistrates in some city-states were also called aesymnetai. Populism
Greek tyranny grew out of the struggle of the under classes against the aristocracy, or against priest-kings where archaic traditions and mythology sanctioned hereditary and/or traditional rights to rule. Popular coups generally installed tyrants, who often became or remained popular rulers, at least in the early part of their reigns. For instance, the popular imagination remembered Peisistratus for an episode – related by (pseudonymous) Aristotle, but possibly fictional – in which he exempted a farmer from taxation because of the particular barrenness of his plot. Peisistratus’ sons Hippias and Hipparchus, on the other hand, were not such able rulers, and when the disaffected aristocrats Harmodios and Aristogeiton slew Hipparchus, Hippias’ rule quickly became oppressive, resulting in the expulsion of the Peisistratids in 510 BC, who resided henceforth in Persepolis as clients of the Persian Shahanshah (King of kings).