Numbers and Numeracy in the Greek Polis

Robert Sing received his Ph.D. in Classics from the University of Cambridge and is an independent researcher. He has published on the Demosthenic corpus and the Athenian system of pay for political participation. Tazuko Angela van Berkel is a University Lecturer in Classics at Leiden University. She has published on Protagoras, Xenophon, friendship, ancient economic reflection and the rhetoric of numbers. Her 2020 monograph The Economics of Friendship was published by Brill. Robin Osborne is Professor of Ancient History at the University of Cambridge and a Fellow of King’s College. He has published widely in Greek history, archaeology and art history. Contributors are Tazuko Angela van Berkel, Josine Blok, Florin George Calian, Steve Johnstone, Lisa Kallet, Eunsoo Lee, Robin Osborne, Catherine Rubincam, Daniel Mahendra Jan Sicka, Robert Sing.

Acknowledgements

List of Illustrations and Tables

Abbreviations

Notes on Contributors



Introduction

 Robin Osborne, Robert Sing, Tazuko Angela van Berkel



Part 1 Numbers in Society



1 A Counting People: Valuing Numeracy in Democratic Athens

 Lisa Kallet



2 The Appearance of Numbers

 Robin Osborne



3 Punishing and Valuing

 Steve Johnstone



4 Ten Thousand: Fines, Numbers and Institutional Change in Fifth-Century Athens

 Josine Blok



5 Numeric Communication in the Greek Historians: Quantification and Qualification

 Catherine Rubincam



Part 2 Communicating with Numbers



6 Creative Accounting? Strategies of Enumeration in Epinician Texts

 Daniel Mahendra Jan Sicka



7 Hidden Judgments and Failing Figures: Nicias’ Number Rhetoric

 Tazuko Angela van Berkel



8 Performing Numbers in the Attic Orator

 Robert Sing



Part 3 Conceptualising Number



9 Numbers, Ontologically Speaking: Plato on Numerosity

 George Florin Calian



10 Doing Geometry without Numbers: Re-reading Euclid’s Elements

 Eunsoo Lee



Index