DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.13851#0430
408
OF THE MILITARY AFFAIRS OF GREECE.
getius(l), who, speaking of the military oath, and the muster-roll, where-
in the soldiers' names were registered, mentions also, that they were
victurisin cute punctis scripti, branded with lasting marks in their flesh.
These marks commonly contained the name or proper ensign of their
general. To distinguish soldiers from slaves, who were commonly mark-
ed in the forehead, as has been elsewhere observed, they had s-iynara. iv
reus Xeg<t'i their characters impressed upon their hinds, as we are informed by
jRIian. By the same ceremony, it was customary for men to dedicate
themselves to certain deities. Whence is that question mentioned in
Zechariah (2), where he speaks of the prophets and votaries of the pa-
gan gods: • and qne shall say unto him, what are these wounds in thy
hands V And the beast who requires all men to worship him in the book
of Revelation (3), is there said to ' cause all, both small and great, rich
and poor, free and bound, to receive a mark in their right hands, or in
their foreheads (4).' And to the same custom St. Paul is thought to al-
lude, in his epistle to the Galatians (5), where, speaking o£ the wounds
he had received in his Christian warfare, he tells us, that he bore in his
hody the ^'r/fmra, or marks of the Lord Jesus.
The Carians were the first that served in Greece for pay (6), and have
thereby rendered their names infamous to posterity, being represented by
all the writers of those times as a base and servile nation ; insomuch,
that xagixol, and x«f i'fjt,oi£oi, are proverbial epithets for persons of abject
and pusillanimous tempers, or servile condition (7) ; and Kdgss is a syno-
nymous term for slaves, as in that proclamation at the end of the Athenian
festival Anthesteria, whereby the slaves were commanded to be gone out
of doors :
Begone, ye slaves, the Anthesteria are ended.
Thus the Carians were reproached for introducing a custom, which, in
a few ages after, was so far from being looked upon as unworthy their
birth or education, that we find it practised by the whole nation of the
Greeks, who not only received pay for serving their own commonwealth,
but listed themselves under foreign kings, and fought their battles for hire;
their chief magistrates not disdaining to accompany them in such expedi-
tions. Several instances of this might be produced, were not that famous
one of the great Agesilaus's condescending to serve Ptolemy king of
Egypt, instead of many others.
The first that introduced the custom of paying soldiers at Athens, was
Pericles, who, to ingratiate himself with the commonalty, represented
how unreasonable it was, that men of small estates, and scarce able to
provide for their families, should be obliged to neglect their business,
and spend what their industry had laid up, in public service ; and there-
upon preferred a decree, that all of them should have subsistence-money
out of the exchequer (8) ; which seems to have been received with ge-
neral applause. What sum they daily received, cannot be easily deter-
mined, it being decreased or diminished as occasion required. At first
we find the foot-soldiers had two oboli a-day, which in a month amounted
(l)De re militari, lib. ii. cap, 5. (6) Strabo, Hesychius, Etymologici Auctor.
0 Cap. xiii. v. 6. (3) Cap. xiii. v. 16. (7) Hesychius.
(4) Conf. Archaeologia; hujus, lib. i. cap. de (8) TJlpianus in Orat. de Syntaxi.
servis. (5) Cap. vi. v. 17.
OF THE MILITARY AFFAIRS OF GREECE.
getius(l), who, speaking of the military oath, and the muster-roll, where-
in the soldiers' names were registered, mentions also, that they were
victurisin cute punctis scripti, branded with lasting marks in their flesh.
These marks commonly contained the name or proper ensign of their
general. To distinguish soldiers from slaves, who were commonly mark-
ed in the forehead, as has been elsewhere observed, they had s-iynara. iv
reus Xeg<t'i their characters impressed upon their hinds, as we are informed by
jRIian. By the same ceremony, it was customary for men to dedicate
themselves to certain deities. Whence is that question mentioned in
Zechariah (2), where he speaks of the prophets and votaries of the pa-
gan gods: • and qne shall say unto him, what are these wounds in thy
hands V And the beast who requires all men to worship him in the book
of Revelation (3), is there said to ' cause all, both small and great, rich
and poor, free and bound, to receive a mark in their right hands, or in
their foreheads (4).' And to the same custom St. Paul is thought to al-
lude, in his epistle to the Galatians (5), where, speaking o£ the wounds
he had received in his Christian warfare, he tells us, that he bore in his
hody the ^'r/fmra, or marks of the Lord Jesus.
The Carians were the first that served in Greece for pay (6), and have
thereby rendered their names infamous to posterity, being represented by
all the writers of those times as a base and servile nation ; insomuch,
that xagixol, and x«f i'fjt,oi£oi, are proverbial epithets for persons of abject
and pusillanimous tempers, or servile condition (7) ; and Kdgss is a syno-
nymous term for slaves, as in that proclamation at the end of the Athenian
festival Anthesteria, whereby the slaves were commanded to be gone out
of doors :
Begone, ye slaves, the Anthesteria are ended.
Thus the Carians were reproached for introducing a custom, which, in
a few ages after, was so far from being looked upon as unworthy their
birth or education, that we find it practised by the whole nation of the
Greeks, who not only received pay for serving their own commonwealth,
but listed themselves under foreign kings, and fought their battles for hire;
their chief magistrates not disdaining to accompany them in such expedi-
tions. Several instances of this might be produced, were not that famous
one of the great Agesilaus's condescending to serve Ptolemy king of
Egypt, instead of many others.
The first that introduced the custom of paying soldiers at Athens, was
Pericles, who, to ingratiate himself with the commonalty, represented
how unreasonable it was, that men of small estates, and scarce able to
provide for their families, should be obliged to neglect their business,
and spend what their industry had laid up, in public service ; and there-
upon preferred a decree, that all of them should have subsistence-money
out of the exchequer (8) ; which seems to have been received with ge-
neral applause. What sum they daily received, cannot be easily deter-
mined, it being decreased or diminished as occasion required. At first
we find the foot-soldiers had two oboli a-day, which in a month amounted
(l)De re militari, lib. ii. cap, 5. (6) Strabo, Hesychius, Etymologici Auctor.
0 Cap. xiii. v. 6. (3) Cap. xiii. v. 16. (7) Hesychius.
(4) Conf. Archaeologia; hujus, lib. i. cap. de (8) TJlpianus in Orat. de Syntaxi.
servis. (5) Cap. vi. v. 17.