“The Waves of Athenian Law: Imperialism, Sea Power, and Maritime Politics in Ancient Comedy”

BUIS, EMILIANO JERÓNIMO

Pyrgos .- Ancient Olympia

Congreso; 3rd International Colloquium of Ancient Hellenic History "Thalassa. Great is the Power of the Sea"; 2010

Instituto Internacional de Historia Antigua Helénica “Sosipolis”

The general purpose of this paper is to focus on the importance of the legal allusions specifically related to sea expansion and naval imperialism. Considering the frequent references in Comedy to the contemporary Peloponnesian War and the discussions on Athenian imperialism in the context of the Delian League, the aim of the ideas I am presenting here is to unveil the nature of some legal passages in Aristophanes mainly dealing with the situation of foreigners facing the jurisdiction of the maritime courts and the figure of the kleter nesiotikos. By focusing mainly on some concrete passages in Birds, my final purpose is to show by examining the text in which ways the use of the juridical aspects involving the Athenian political expansion throughout the Aegean Sea might have also constituted for the genre an efficient humorous device and a fruitful comic technique.