Book Review

Europe: Ancient and Medieval

Over the past fifteen years, Edward E. Cohen has gained a reputation among Greek historians for his unusual ideas about classical Athens. In The Athenian Economy and Society: A Banking Perspective (1992), Cohen boldly criticized many orthodox views about the Athenian economy. Cohen's challenge to the ideas of M. I. Finley and others was healthy and stimulating, but his own modernizing approach to the ancient economy has met with mixed reactions. In this book, Cohen returns to the fray, questioning long-held views and offering bold new ideas.

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In chapter one, "Anomalous Athens," Cohen argues that Athens was too large to be a polis ("city-state") according to Aristotle's definition of the term, but was an ethnos, a term that Cohen considers equivalent to the modern English word "nation." Unfortunately, the author does not pause to consider whether Aristotle's discussion of the term is descriptive or normative and also has a hard time explaining why many Greek authors refer to Athens as a polis. Cohen is clearly uncomfortable with views that depict Athens as an exclusive club of male citizen warriors and stresses the participation of metics (resident aliens) and foreigners in social life. The open nature of Athenian social life has been noted by others, but has no bearing on the nature of Athenian political institutions. Cohen is also uneasy with an Athens that excluded women and argues that women could participate in public life through the oikos or household, which was the basic unit of Athenian law and politics. The problem with his view is that Athenian laws never grant rights to households but to individuals, mostly male citizens.

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