IGII34 106 Dedication of an allotment machine (<i>kleroterion</i>)

Dedication of an allotment machine (kleroterion)

IG II³ 4 106 Date: ca. 180 BC

Above l. 1: letter traces, perhaps from an earlier erased inscription In the treasurership for the deposits (epi ta prutaneia) of Habron son of Kallias of Bate.^[1]

Next - Dow, Prytaneis 204-5 no. 3

References:

IG II³ 4 106 (Translated text) (IG Online)

IG II² 2864d (PHI)

Dow, Prytaneis 203-4 no. 2

Tracy, ALC 247c (date)

Translation by: Stephen Lambert, Sjoukje M. Kamphorst

Images: Agora Excavations - (1)

Monument type: Allotment machine

Inscription type: Dedication (treasurer of the deposits (tamias epi ta prytaneia))

Findspot: Acropolis (EM 13255)

Transliterations on Places on

[1] This is one of a number of surviving allotment machines, kleroteria (other examples have been discovered in the Agora excavations). Their use to select panels of jurors in the Classical Democracy is known from literary sources (brief allusion at Aristophanes, Assemblywomen 681; description of the process at Ath. Pol. 63-64). They came to be used also for appointments to offices, in which allotment was a common device, cf. J. Kroll, Athenian Bronze Allotment Plates (1972), 1-5, 51-56. They consist of stelai resembling the aediculae used to frame funerary monuments, except that between the antae there is no figurative sculpture, but columns of slots into which tickets with the names of the candidates were inserted. To the left of the slots there ran down a tube into which black and white cubes or balls were inserted. If a white ball issued from the bottom of the tube a candidate or row of candidates was selected, if a black ball they were not selected. The fundamental study of the surviving machines is S. Dow, Prytaneis, 198-215; see also J. D. Bishop, JHS 90, 1970, 1-14; A. Boegehold Agora XXVIII (1995) pp. 58, and 231-34, Testimonia nos. 324-333. Two of the machines known to Dow were inscribed on the back with prytany decrees in 164/3 BC (Agora XV 220, 221), apparently after they had ceased to be used (the texts have no apparent connection with the machines, besides the stipulation that they be inscribed on them); the fragmentary decree, IG II³ 1, 1222, of ca. 210 BC, is inscribed on the back of another example. This is one of four machines carrying dedicatory headings on the architrave (see also IG II³ 4, 107, 108, 109). This machine has two columns of slots. 7 survive in the first column, 8 in the second. The original number of slots is unknown, but was probably between 10 and 15 per column. The precise function of the machine is unknown (for speculation, see Dow, 211 and 213). The significance of the inscription is also not wholly clear. The term prytaneia in the treasurer’s title was used for financial deposits or court fees required prior to certain lawsuits (Ar. Clouds 1136, 1180, 1191, Wasps 659, Dem. 43.71, 47.64; Dow, 212 n. 3). It is plausible enough that the machine was used in the court system and that, in the early second century, this brought it within the sphere of operations of the “treasurer of the deposits”. The inscription may signify that the machine was out of operation and “laid up” under Habron of Bate by being dedicated on the acropolis (cf. the more explicitly dedicatory wording on IG II³ 4, 109). For the hellenistic practice of officials dedicating objects connected with their duties at the end of their term of office see IG II³ 4, 214 n. 3. Habron son of Kallias of Bate belonged to a distinguished family whose members can be traced from the 6th century BC through to the Roman period (Davies, APF pp. 270-71). In the fourth century the leading politician Lykourgos had married the daughter of a Habron of Bate, Kallisto. This Habron is also attested as proxenos of Delphi in 189/8 BC (Syll.³ 585, l. 106) and a hieropoios for the Athenaia in 166/5 BC (IG II² 1937, l. 9).

Added: 4 May 2018
Updated: 16 May 2021
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