LAVELLE, B. M., The Pisistratids and the Mines of Thrace , Greek, Roman and Byzantine 
Studies, 33:1 (1992:Spring) p.5 

The Pisistratids and the Mines 
of Thrace 

B. M. Lavelle 

I T IS GENERALLY MAINTAINED that Pisistratus of Athens and 
his successors enjoyed significant income from the mines 
that he is presumed to have worked in western Thrace 

during his sojourn there in the mid-sixth century, and that the 
Pisistratids continued to receive these revenues until their 
control of the mines was disrupted by the Persian invasion of 
Thrace ca 513.1 For example: "It is clear and certain that during 

1 Cf e.g. C.]. Wheeler, Herodotus I (Boston 1842) 327; D. W. Turner, Notes 
on Herodotus (Oxford 1848) 30f; A.]. Grant, Herodotus I (London 1897) 33 
n.l;]. Wiesner, Die Thraker (Stuttgart 1963) 80f; H. Berve, Die Tyrannis bei 
den Griechen I (Munich 1967) 50, 69f; J. B. Bury and R. Meiggs, A History of 
Greece to the Death of Alexander the Great4 (London 1975) 129; C. Kraay, 
Archaic and Classical Greek Coins (Berkeley 1976) 59, 62; J. F. Healey, 
Mining and Metallurgy in the Greek and Roman World (London 1978) 53 
and 264 n.139; A. ANDREWES, "The Tyranny of Pisistratus," in CAIJ2 III (1982: 
hereafter 'Andrewes') 408f. H. A. Bengtson and E. F. Bloedow, History of 
Greece from the Beginnings to the Byzantine Era (Ottawa 1987) 81. Cf also 
A. R. Burn, The Lyric Age of Greece (New York 1967) 308f; ]. M. Balcer, 
"}he Persian Occupation of Thrace," Actes du II' Congres International de 
Etudes du Sud-est europeen (Athens 1972) 243; and ]. Boardman, The Greeks 
O'lJerseas 2 (London 1980) 230; D. M. Lewis, "The Tyranny of the 
Pisistratidae," in CAH2 (1988) 297. B. ISAAC, The Greek Settlements in Thrace 
until the Macedonian Conquest (Leiden 1986: hereafter 'Isaac') 14-15; and E. 
BORZA, In the Shadow of Macedon (Princeton 1990: hereafter 'Borza') 117, 
while accepting that the resources were ongoing, are nevertheless more 
circumspect in attaching them specifically to exploitation of Thracian mines. 
On the Persian invasion and occupation see H. Castritius, "Die Okkupation 
Thrakiens durch die Perser und der Sturz des athenischen Tyrannen 
Hippias," Chiron 2 (1972) 1-15; ]. M. Balcer, "Persian Occupied Thrace 
(Skudra)," Historia 37 (1988) 1-21; and N. G. L. HAMMOND, "The Extent of 
Persian Occupation in Thrace," ChiTOn 10 (1980) 53-61 and The Macedonian 
State (Oxford 1989: hereafter 'Hammond') 42f. A useful and considerate 
summary of the Pisistratids in Thrace is to be found in K. A. Dusing, The 
Athenians and the North in Archaic Times (diss.University of Cincinnati 
1979) 57-69. The present article is a fuller treatment of the topic of Pisistratid 
finances raised in B. M. Lavelle, "Herodotus, Skythian Archers, and the 
doryphoroi of the Peisistratids," Klio 74 (1992) 78-97. 

5 



LAVELLE, B. M., The Pisistratids and the Mines of Thrace , Greek, Roman and Byzantine 
Studies, 33:1 (1992:Spring) p.5 

6 PISISTRA TIDS AND THE MINES OF THRACE 

his exile after 556 Pisistratus secured control of the gold and 
silver mines of Pangaion in Thrace, and that the diversion of 
their revenues to pay for a mercenary army both helped to 
secure a favorable outcome at Pallene and subsequently acted as 
one of the sheet-anchors of his regime .... "2 It is further 
assumed that, while they lasted, these mine revenues provided 
the Pisistratids the means by which to embellish the city 
handsomely with public works and liberally to ply its citizens 
with subsidies. 3 Indeed, the Athenian tyrants are thought to 
have possessed "immense wealth" largely on account of their 
Thracian holdings.4 

Unfortunately, the construction and maintenance of this 
orthodoxy have involved overlooking or sidestepping some 
rather serious problems. If appreciable amounts of Thracian 
gold or silver were continually flowing down to the tyrants at 
Athens from 546, we should expect some commensurate signs 
of prosperity, especially in the coinage of the times. But the 
signs we have are rather to the contrary: the Wappenmiinzen, 
the so-called 'heraldic' coins of Pisistratus' final tyranny are 
relatively few in number, small in denomination, and apparently 
designed for local use and circulation only; they do not bespeak 
abundance or prosperity, but rather a limited economy and re­
stricted resources of silver even compared with the tyranny 
after Pisistratus. 5 The archaeological record at Athens for the 

2 J. K. Davies, Athenian Propertied Families, 600-300 B.C. (Oxford 1971) 
453 (cf M. Stahl, Aristokraten und Tyrannen im archaischen Athen [Stuttgart 
1987] 84 n.106); cf A. Andrcwcs, The Greek Tyrants (London 1956) 101 and 
supra n.1. But see the criticisms of Castritius (supra n.1) 12-15. 

3 Public works: cf Bengston and Bloedow (supra n.1); H. A. Shapiro, Art 
and Cult under the Tyrants at Athens (Mainz 1989) 5-8; Burn (supra n.1) 
308f; see also Stahl (supra n.2) 233-43; subsidies: cf Andrewes ( supra n.2) 111 
and (supra n.1) 407. 

4 Cf e.g. Shapiro (supra n.3) 3: "[Pisistratus'] sons ... had grown into middle 
age amid immense wealth and privilege." 

5 Cf Kraay (supra n.1) 62; on the limitation the coins bespeak see also text 
below. On the Wappenmunzen see, inter alios, W. P. WALLACE, "The Early 
Coinages of Athens and Euboia," NC 2 (1962: hereafter 'Wallace') 23-42; C. 
Kraay, "The Early Coinage of Athens: A Reply," N C 2 (1962) 417-23, and 
(supra n.1) 58f; J. H. Kroll, "From Wappenmiinzen to Gorgoneia to Owls," 
ANSMN 26 (1981) esp. 10-15; J. H. Kroll and N. M. Waggoner, "Dating the 
Earliest Coins of Athens, Corinth and Aegina," AJA 88 (1984) 325-40; H. 
NICOLET-PIERRE, "Monnaies archaYques d' Athenes sous Pisistrate et les 
Pisistratides (c. 545-c. 510), II: Recherches sur la composition metallique des 
Wappenmunzen, " R N 27 (1985: hereafter 'Nicolet-Pierre') 23-443; cf also D. 



LAVELLE, B. M., The Pisistratids and the Mines of Thrace , Greek, Roman and Byzantine 
Studies, 33:1 (1992:Spring) p.5 

B. M. LAVELLE 7 

older tyranny supports the same estimation: buildings assigned 
to Pisistratus or dated to the period of his rule are, for the most 
part, meager in number, modest in plan and appointments. (, 
Thus, even the obvious material remains of the early tyranny 7 

make it difficult to accept that Pisistratus at least had amassed or 
continued to receive a significant supply of Thracian silver or 
gold, that he could have distributed largesse on any appreciable 
scale, or that he could have sustained an 'army' of even three 
hundred mercenaries, the enumeration most often given in 
ancient sources for his doryphoroi. 8 

Foraboschi, "Monetazione arcaica e constituzione di Atene," AIIN 36 (1986) 
67-82. This is, of course, only a partial bibliography on the Athenian 
Wappenmunzen. 

6 Cf. J. S. Boersma, Athenian Building Policy from 561/0-405/4 B.C 
(Groningen 1970) 11-18; T. L. Shear, Jr, "Tyrants and Buldings in Archaic 
Athens," in W. A. P. Childs, ed., Athens Comes of Age: From Solon to 
Salamis (Princeton 1978) 8; Shapiro (supra n.3) 7f (contra Shapiro 8: although 
Pisistratus may not have differed from his successors in aspiration, he 
certainly differed from them in the use of wealth as a means to achieve such 
aspirations: see infra). 

7 I do not know what real bearing pottery trade can have on the estimation 
of Athens' general prosperity especially during Pisistratus' final period of 
tyranny, even if black- and red-figured wares are valued as luxury items (cf 
Shapiro [supra n.3] 5): after all, do luxury goods manufactured in, say, Mexico, 
and then shipped abroad attest to general Mexican prosperity? Could they 
even in proliferation be useful as an indicator of Mexico's overall economy? 
Cf S. Isager and M. H. Hansen, Aspects of Athenian Society in the Fourth 
Century B. C, tr. J. H. Rosenmeier (Odense 1975) 41. For recent criticism of 
the "ceramo-centric view of trade and the ancient economy" see D. W. J. Gill, 
"Pots and Trade: Spacefillers or Objets d'Art?" JHS 111 (1991) 29ff (I thank 
the anonymous referee for these two references). Cf Lewis (supra n.1) 291. 

8 Polyaenus 1.121.3; L PI. Resp. 566B; cf Nic. Dam. FGrHist 90F58 (on 
Periander). But cf Pluto Sol. 30.3 where the number is given as fifty. On the 
doryphoroi of the Pisistratids see Lavelle (s u pr a n.1), which rej ects the 
common assumption that the Pisistratids like other Archaic Greek tyrants 
employed foreign mercenaries (epikouroi) as bodyguards (doryphoroi) to 
support their regimes. The assumption rests largely on (1) Hdt. 1.64.1 (see text 
infra) and (2) the appearance of Thracians and Scythians in Attic vase­
paintings of the mid-sixth century (see n.11 infra). But Herodotus is 
misconstrued, for the original meaning of epikouros was 'ally', a connotation 
that fits Herodotus' context much better than 'mercenary', as we shall see. 
Again, the appearance of barbarians on Attic vases connotes only that and 
can hardly be taken as positive proof for the conformation of the Pisistratids' 
doryphoroi. Finally and most significantly, there is positive proof to indicate 
that the Athenians, not foreigners, served as the doryphoroi. In fact, em-



LAVELLE, B. M., The Pisistratids and the Mines of Thrace , Greek, Roman and Byzantine 
Studies, 33:1 (1992:Spring) p.5 

8 PISISTRA TIDS AND THE MINES OF THRACE 

Questions about the nature of Pisistratid wealth actually go to 
the heart of this orthodoxy. No one to my knowledge has ever 
explained how the Pisistratids first exploited, then continued to 
exploit the mines of Thrace as absentee landlords. Actually no 
one has elaborated upon the nature of Pisistratus' Thracian 
enterprise at alP Today's orthodoxy has evolved instead rather 
gratuitously from assumptions based on two very slender reeds 
of testimony. 

I 

According to Herodotus (1.64.1), 1tEl80JlEVWV O£ 'trov 'A81l­
vaiwv, 01)--rW oil ITElaia'tpaws 'to 'tpiwv axffiv 'A8ftvas Eppi~waE 
'tilv 'tvpavvioa E1tt1COUpOtat 'tE 1tOAAOiat Kat XPllJl<1'tWV 
auvoOotat, 'trov Jl£V au'to8Ev, 'trov O£ U1tO L'tPUJlOVOC; 1tO'taJlOU 
auvtoV'twv, K'tA.I0 This passage is usually construed as a formula 
for how the tyranny was maintained and hence to mean that 
Pisistratus' control of revenue-producing Thracian mines was 
ongoing. ll The testimony of the Ath. Pol. (15.2) is assumed to 
supplement it: EKEi8EV O£ 1tapllA8Ev tis 'tous 1tEpt ITayyatov 
't01tOUs, 08EV XPllJlanaaJlEVOs Kat a'tpanonw; Jlta8waaJlEVOs, 
EA8ffiv tis 'EPE'tPWV EvOEKa'tql 1taAtV E'tEl K'tA.12 a'tpanonas 
Jlta8WaaJlEvoc; here and E7ttKOUpOtat in Herodotus are usually 
taken together as proof for Pisistratus' employment of a foreign 

ployment of natives, not foreigners, appears to have been the rule among 
Archaic Greek tyrants. 

9 Recognized to some degree by D. Viviers, "Pisistratus' Settlement on the 
Thermaic Gulf: A Connection with the Eretrian Colonization," fIlS 107 
(1987) 194 n.1 0; Isaac; and Borza 11M. 

lD "The Athenians obeying, Pisistratus thus obtained Athens for a third 
time and (thus) rooted his tyranny by means of many epikouroi and 
confluences of money, coming together partly from the place itself, partly 
from the river Strymon .... " 

11 Cf the translations ad loco of Rawlinson (New York 1859); Macaulay 
(London 1904); Godley (=Loeb ed. [London 1921J); Dc Selincourt (=Penguin 
ed. [Harmondsworth 1954]); LeGrand (Paris 1970); Marg (Munich 1973); D. 
Grene, The History of Herodotos (Chicago 1987) 61. Cf also Davies (supra 
n.2) 453; G. R. STANTON, Athenian Politics, c. 800-500 B.C. (London 1990: 
hereafter 'Stanton') 105; and supra nn.1 and 2. 

12 "from there (Sc. Rhaecelus), he (Pisistratus) arrived at the region around 
Mt Pangaeum, from which having enriched himself and having hired soldiers, 
he came back to Eretria in the eleventh year .... " 



LAVELLE, B. M., The Pisistratids and the Mines of Thrace , Greek, Roman and Byzantine 
Studies, 33:1 (1992:Spring) p.5 

B. M. LAVELLE 9 

mercenary bodyguard, Thracian or Scythian in composition. 13 
There is, it should be noted, no sense whatsoever of ongoing 
exploitation of Thracian holdings in the Ath. Po!., which has 
borne on this subject really only as a supplement to 
Herodotus. 14 

Epikouros in Herodotus is almost invariably translated 'mer­
cenary', because it is presumed to mean that almost invariably.15 
But it can also mean 'ally' or rather 'fighter alongside', and this 
meaning actually predominates Herodotus' usage (el Lavelle 
[supra n.15]). If E1tlKOUPOlO"l is translated 'mercenaries' here, 
there is no real context for it, and the passage becomes 
temporally fragmented: an imperfect sense must be wrung 
from Eppi~wo"E to make it describe maintaining the tyranny,16 
although its tense and that of every other verb indicating action 
taken by Pisistratus (hostage-taking, purification of Delos) is 
aorist. If E1ttKOUPOtO"l is translated as 'allies', however, the word 

13 K. Wernicke, "Die Polizeiwache auf der Burg von Athen," Hermes 26 
(1891) 67f; G. Busolt, Griechische Geschichte II (Gotha 1896) 32Sf with n.1; 
H. W. Parke, Greek Mercenary Soldiers (Oxford 1933) 8f; M. Vos, Scythian 
Archers in Archaic Attic Vase-Paintings (Groningen 1963) 66£, 68 n.2; J. G. P. 
Best, Thracian Peltasts and their Influence on Greek Warfare (Groningen 
1969) Sff; P. J. Rhodes, A Commentary on the 'Aristotelian' Constitution of 
the Athenians (Oxford 1981) 208; Stanton 99 n.8; Borza 144 n.32. But cf. 
Lavelle (supra n.8). 

14 That the author of the Ath. Pol. followed Herodotus for the tyranny has 
long been established (cf F. Jacoby, Atthis [Oxford 1949] 153; Rhodes [supra 
n.D] 189ff). That the former can have had valid information that exceeded 
Herodotus' account is, I think, indicated by his correction of Herodotus on 
the Argives (see n.19 infra). In this instance, however, he seems merely to be 
embellishing Herodotus based on anachronism of (1) later Greeks' en­
richment from the Thraceward area, and (2) Thrace's later renown as a 
supplier of mercenaries. In combination with these, he may well have also 
misunderstood Herodotus: see text infra. I could not posit a source for Ath. 
Pol. that might provide valid information about Pisistratus' Thracian sojourn 
exceeding Herodotus' meager testimony. 

15 Cf e.g. G. Sheets, Herodotus. Book 1, Commentary (Bryn Mawr 1981) 
31, who translates E1UKOUPOt<n as 'mercenaries' without further comment; cf 
also Andrewes 399, 406; Stanton (supra n.11); also G. Siebt, Griechische 
Soldner im Achaemenidenreich (Bonn 1977) 42. R. Drews, "The First Tyrants 
in Greece," Historia 21 (1972) 141 correctly criticizes this tendency; cf B. M. 
Lavelle," Epikouroi in Thucydides," AJP 110 (1989) 36; and supra n.8. 

16 Cf De Selincourt: "He (sc. Pisistratus) now proceeded to establish"; 
Rawlinson: "he set himself to root"; Godley: "That his sovereignty might be 
well rooted"; Marg: "verwurzelte"; Stanton: "fortified." 



LAVELLE, B. M., The Pisistratids and the Mines of Thrace , Greek, Roman and Byzantine 
Studies, 33:1 (1992:Spring) p.5 

10 PISISTRATIDS AND THE MINES OF THRACE 

both finds and enhances its context, and there is temporal and 
logical consistency within the passage. 

Herodotus' logos recounting Pisistratus' final rise to power 
(1.59-64) culminates in the battle of Pallene and its immediate 
aftermath: the narrative context is Croesus' enquiry into Greek 
affairs before his fall ea 546,17 Herodotus repeatedly stresses that 
Pisistratus earned his victory and his return to Athens through 
money (five references in two short chapters: 61.3 [x3]; 61.4; 
62.2, four of which are forms of XPlll.W.) and men (four times: 
61.4 [x2]; 62.1 [x2]). The men are not mercenaries but allies: 
allies from Thebes, from Naxos, and very probably from 
Eretria (el Ath. Pol. 15.2); partisans from the Attic countryside; 
and city fighters who answered Pisistratus' call to arms. 

The Athenians were certainly not mercenaries, for they were 
fighting for or against their own country in their own country, 
after all. Nor were the majority of foreign contingencies 
mercenary: Thebes and Naxos contributed Xpl),.ta'tu; Eretria 
served as base for the whole operation, while Pisistratus 
continued to ask for and receive contributions from cities 
"whichever owed him." 18 Herodotus does call the Argives 
Illa8o)'tot ('hirelings'), but we note that the author of the Ath. 
Pol. contradicts Herodotus, stating that Argives served from 
<InA-la and that is undoubtedly correct if they were led by 
Pisistratus' son (17.4). Herodotus had his own fifth-century 
reasons for calling the Argives Ilta8o)'tot. 19 There may have been 
some mercenaries, but their numbers were quite small by 
comparison. Where they came from is not clear: Herodotus, 
we o?serve, says nothing about Thracian or Scythian mer­
cenarIes. 

Because the cooperating contingents were overwhelmingly 
allied and not mercenary, the translation of btlKOUpOlcn as 'allies' 
not only better fits Herodotus' context, but further serves to 
underscore Herodotus' repeated emphasis in the logos. The 
passage is not a formula without context for how the tyranny 
was maintained, but a last emphatic reminder of how the 
tyranny was anchored once for all: money and allies brought 

17 Cf Stahl (supra n.2) 56f; Rhodes (supra n.13) 199: "Herodotus' account of 
Pisistratus' rise to power implies that Pallene preceded the fall of Sardis." 

18 R. A. McNeal, ed., Herodotus. Book J (Lanham 1986) 134. 
19 B. M. Lavelle, "Herodotus on Argive misthotoi," LCM 11 (1986) 150; cf 

also "Herodotus on the Argives of Kourion," Hermes 112 (1984) 249-52. 



LAVELLE, B. M., The Pisistratids and the Mines of Thrace , Greek, Roman and Byzantine 
Studies, 33:1 (1992:Spring) p.5 

B. M. LAVELLE 11 

about the debacle of Pallene that caused resistance to Pisistratus 
to collapse. The demonstrative 015'[(0 and the aorist £ppt1~(()m: 
close the ring Herodotus began at 1.60.3: Pisistratus 'rooted' his 
tyranny immovably by means of 'allies' and 'assemblies of 
money'.20 Hostages were taken, Delos purified-all aorists­
and Pisistratus then ruled (£'tupavvEuE: imperfect), by what 
means we are not told. 

Thus XpllJ.lUCH at 1.64 refers to income on hand rather than to 
ongoing revenues from the Strymon (or elsewhere) that helped 
Pisistratus to establish his tyranny. This is further signalled by 
Herodotus' use in the passage not of 1tp6cro8o~, the usual word 
in Herodotus for 'revenue', but of the rather unusal cruvo80~, 
'confluence':21 money kept coming together (crUVtov'!(()V, the so­
called 'imperfect' participle) partly from the "place itself," or, as 
some translators have had it, "from native sources," and partly 
"from the Strymon." 22 Surely the antithesis Herodotus intends 
is 'from here', that is, within Greece, and 'from there', outside 
it: Pisistratus' resources when the final tyranny began were 
precisely what he had on hand at the time of the battle, no 
more. 

We cannot in any case infer from the Greek at 1.64.1 that 
Pisistratus' revenues from the Strymon continued and certainly 
not that he possessed or worked any Thracian mines. Rather, 
without any interpretation at all of the logos, we should more 
reasonably conclude that his resources on arrival at Eretria were 
much circumscribed: why else would Pisistratus have been 
compelled to call in contributions of money from cities that 
owed him if his Thracian assets were robust and continually 
increasing?23 

20 Cf Temple Stanyan, The Grecian History I (London 1781) 193: "(he) 
established himself by his money and allies"; L. Humbert, llistoires d' 
lIerodote (Paris 1879) 36; LeGrand (supra n.11) 68; F. Solmsen, "Ety­
mologien. I. Gr. E1thco'\)po~," ZVerglSprF 30 (1890) 600f. On ring-composition 
in Herodotus see I. Beck, Die Ringkompositon bei H erodot und ihre 
Bedeutung fur Beweistechnik (Hildesheim 1971). 

21 For Herodotus' use of crUvoSo~ and 1tp60"o8o~ see Lavelle (supra n.1) 85 n.36. 
22 a\yt69Ev is most often taken to refer to a continuous domestic source of 

'revenue', either the mines at Laurium or taxes levied at Athens; but see 
Lavelle (supra n.1) 85 n.36. 

23 Viviers' suggestion (supra n.9: 193f) that Pisistratus collected funds on his 
way to the north is not at all creditable: the order of events in Herodotus and, 
therefore, his chronology clearly indicates that Pisistratus collected funds from 



LAVELLE, B. M., The Pisistratids and the Mines of Thrace , Greek, Roman and Byzantine 
Studies, 33:1 (1992:Spring) p.5 

12 PISISTRATIDS AND THE MINES OF THRACE 

Pisistratus, we note, was never marked out as a particularly 
rich Athenian in any ancient source-as say, Callias was-and 
yet he would have been very wealthy indeed if he controlled 
Thracian mines: Alexander I of Macedon received a talent of 
silver a day from a single mine on Mount Dysorum.24 Contribu­
tions of money and men made Pisistratus temporarily wealthy 
and enabled him to overwhelm his relatively impoverished 
Athenian opponents; but they were also vital to his war efforts: 
Herodotus' implication is that they were in fact requisite to his 
success. That Pisistratus' finances were limited after Pallenc and 
not primarily or even largely derived from Thrace accords also 
with the numismatic evidence. 

II 

Limited testing has demonstrated conclusively that the alloy 
of extant Wappenmunzen is quite inconsistent, varying rather 
substantially in content of impurities even from coin to coin. 25 

A few examples will suffice to show the variation: 

Wallace: Wheel didrachm (22): 5.8% eu .9% Au 
Wheel drachm (23): 3.5% eu 2.6% Au 
Wheel obol (37): 17.0% eu .9% Au 

Nicolet-Pierre: Wheel didrachm (234): .62% eu 1.09% Au 
Wheel didrachm (235): 2.88% eu .42% Au 
Wheel didrachm (236): .81 % eu .11 % Au26 

cities only after his return to Eretria. 1taAtV at Ath. PoL 15.2 certainly refers to 
that return. Cf Isaac 14. 

24 Hdt. 5.17. Cf Borza 119f; cf also Hammond 45ff on Alexander's coins 
and wealth. Callias' wealth altogether was only 200 talents (cf Davies [supra 
n.2] 260f), under a year's revenue from one Thracian mine on the scale 
provided by Alexander. 

25 Wallace 26ff; Nicolet- Pierre 26ff; cf also M. Jessop Price, "The Uses of 
Metal Analysis in the Study of Archaic Greek Coinage: Some Comments," 
Metallurgy in Numismatics 13 (1980) 50-54. The variation seems especially 
pronounced in copper content. I do not think copper mixing intentional (cf 
Jessop Price 52) in the case of the Wappenmunzen, since the "owls" that 
follow show no such signs of dilution. After all, why disrupt the very lucrative 
practice of dilution if it were already employed? 

26 Wallace 27; Nicolet-Pierre 33f. These I take to be representative of the 
general variance in the content of the Wappenmunzen. 



LAVELLE, B. M., The Pisistratids and the Mines of Thrace , Greek, Roman and Byzantine 
Studies, 33:1 (1992:Spring) p.5 

B. M. LAVELLE 13 

The silver used in the 'Wheel' -stamped coins, for instance, may 
have derived partly but cannot reasonably have derived wholly 
from any single sourceY One type or even limited types of im­
pure silver demonstrating slight rather than substantial variations 
in impurities should predominate-or at least be quite conspicu­
ous-if the metal came from fewer rather than many mines 
located, we should imagine, in one area of Pangaeum. As the 
table given above demonstrates, the content of the coins is, in 
fact, quite inconsistent. Thracian mines must be ruled out as the 
sole or even predominant supplier of bullion for the Wappen­
munzen: there was, quite obviously, no single or majority 
supplier of silver for the coins. Actually, the metal's place of 
origin is entirely unknown: Kraay pointed out some time ago 
that we do not know that any of the bullion used for the 
Wappenmunzen came from Thrace.28 

The coins of the early tyranny sharply contrast with the Attic 
"owls," which first appeared around 525 (cf Kraay [supra n.1J 
60ff). The silver of the" owls" is much purer and almost cer­
tainly derived from the mines at Laurium in Attica. The fact that 
the coins were minted in higher denominations (tetradrachms) 
and en masse surely indicates that an adundant supply of silver 
had been located and was being exploited by the Athenians, a 
supply that was obviously unavailable before. Significantly, the 
majority of 'heraldic' coins demonstrates no affinity of content 

27 Cf Wallace 28, who compares Wappenmiinzen to Eretrian coins: "Or 
perhaps her (Eretria's) silver merely comes from miscellaneous sources-about 
half of her coins contain a good deal of copper while about a third of them 
have less than half of 1 per cent." The logic I employ here is that of Kraay for 
differentiating the content of the Wappenmiinzen from that of the "owls" (cf 
"Gold and Copper in Early Greek Silver," Archaeometry 1 [1958] 1; cf also 
] essop Price [supra n.25] 50ff) simply in reverse: the latter show less variance 
coin to coin, which indicates the likelihood of a common derivation (i.e., from 
Laurium). 

28 Kraay (supra n.5 [1962]) 421; cf Wallace 28. Kraay (supra n.l) 59 n.1: "The 
level of gold in the Wappenmiinzen tends to be higher than in the fifth­
century owls, which suggests that a different source may have supplied the 
silver for each of them .... " I have stated elsewhere (Lavelle [supra n.8]) that 
the pronounced variances in fabric might best be explained if the coins were 
minted from silver that came to Pisistratus in Eretria from the contributions he 
was forced to call in from quite diverse sources. He then simply minted the 
silver as he required coin. 



LAVELLE, B. M., The Pisistratids and the Mines of Thrace , Greek, Roman and Byzantine 
Studies, 33:1 (1992:Spring) p.5 

14 PISISTRA TIDS AND THE MINES OF THRACE 

with the "owls" and almost certainly did not derive from 
Laurium. 29 

The modest denominations of the Wappenmunzen, their 
absence in hoards abroad, and that they are unmarked as to place 
of origin have implied to scholars limited local use and cir­
culation, not international trade. 30 The economy these attest is 
circumscribed, not expansive or greatly prosperous: clearly, 
these 'modest' coins were the ones permitted by the silver 
available to the Pisistratids before 525, whatever its source. They 
demonstrate that the tyrants' treasury was not at all as well off 
early on as it was later, a fact that caused at least one scholar to 
speculate that Pisistratus' main contribution to the Athenian 
economy was the attention he paid to Athenian agriculture 
(Andrewes 409), but which, in any case, will not support a 
picture of ongoing revenues from Thracian mines. It is in fact 
quite unreasonable to assume that Attica or Athens was extra­
ordinarily or even uniformly prosperous beginning with Pisis­
tratus' final accession to power due to such revenues, for these 
revenues simply did not exist (cf supra n.7). 

III 

We turn now to the north and the nature of Pisistratus' en­
richment "from the Strymon." Put simply, we do not know 
from any source whether the Pisistratids owned or leased mines 
or obtained their Thracian wealth in some other way: there is no 
explicit information about the precise nature of their enrichment 
in the north. In lieu of specific testimonia about the Pisistratids, 
it seems reasonable to adduce pertinent historical facts about the 
Strymon/Pangaeum region in the sixth and early fifth centuries 
to approximate some basis for judgment about their presence 
and the nature of their enrichment in those parts. 

The history of the Strymon region indicates that the key to 
controlling and exploiting it-indeed the only real means to its 
exploitation by the Greeks-was a substantial permanent pres­
ence. That is presumably why the Parians settled Thasos first 
and then moved on to colonize Neapolis on the mainland, and 
why they founded other cities in the Pangaeum area. That is 
why Histiaeus and then Aristagoras desired to settle M yrcinus 

29 Cf Kraay (supra n.5 [1962]) 420f, (supra n.1) 59; Wallace 25f. 
30 Cf Kraay (supra n.1) 58f; Andrewes 409. 



LAVELLE, B. M., The Pisistratids and the Mines of Thrace , Greek, Roman and Byzantine 
Studies, 33:1 (1992:Spring) p.5 

B. M. LAVELLE 15 

on or near the Strymon, and finally, why the Athenians first 
colonized Ennea Hodoi near the river, then pushed on in their 
thousands to annihilation at Drabescus. It has been forgotten 
that there is no continuous Pisistratid colonial presence on the 
Strymon attested in the literary record as there is for Sigeum in 
the Troad and Elaeus in the Thracian Chersonnnese: there is 
only Rhaecelus on the Thermaic Gulf, which seems to have 
been but a temporary settlement. 31 Neither Herodotus nor the 
author of the Ath. Pol. mention any Pisistratid settlement on the 
Strymon. 

To complement their silence, no archaeological trace of an 
Archaic Athenian settlement has been found in the area of the 
lower Strymon. Yet there is abundant evidence of occupation 
by others, and so explanation for that absence. Except for what 
may have been Argilos, an Andrian foundation to the west of 
Amphipolis, the archaeological record suggests that at the end of 
the sixth century the Parians settled at Eion and perhaps Ennea 
HodoiY Thracians were everywhere else then and before: the 
Pieres and Odomanti blocking up the Pangaeum-Symbolum 
valley; the Satrae on the mountain itself; the Edoni up the 
Strymon to the north and northeast. 33 If Hammond is correct, 
the Paeonians were in control of much of the rest of the 
Strymon basin from ca 550 until they were deported to Asia by 
Megabazus ca 512.34 

Megabazus' invasion occasioned a general contraction of Thra­
cian power in the Strymon region, which is evidenced by 
Darius' surrender of the wall-less Edonian Myrcinus, a few 
kilometers northeast of Ennea Hodoi, to Histiaeus: the Edoni 

31 Sigeum: Hdt. 5.65.3, 91.1, 94f; Thuc. 6.59.4; Ktes. Epit. 18 (=Just. 2.9.1); 
Cic.Att. 9.10.3; Suda S.7). 'I1mta~; cf J. M. Cook, The Troad (Oxford 1973) 
178ff; Stahl (supra n.2) 220-26; Isaac 162ff; Elaeus: Hdt. 6.140; Ps.-Scymnus 
707ff; cf Isaac 192f, who notes great quantities of Attic pottery at both Sigeum 
and Elaeus; Rhaecelus: Dusing (supra n.l) 57; N. G. L. Hammond and G. T. 
Griffith, A History of Macedonia II (Oxford 1979) 68; Viviers (supra n.9) 
193ff. 

32 Cf Isaac 4-8, 15 on the inconsiderable size of the Thasian/Parian set­
tlements of the lower Strymon. 

33 Pieres and Odomanti: Hdt. 7.112; Thuc. 2.99.3; Satrae: Hdt. 7.112; Edoni: 
Hdt. 7.113f; Thuc. 1.1 00.3; 4.107.3. Cf Borza 85ff. 

H Hdt. 5.13.2, 15.3,23.1; cf Hammond 41f, (supra n.31) 55-58. 



LAVELLE, B. M., The Pisistratids and the Mines of Thrace , Greek, Roman and Byzantine 
Studies, 33:1 (1992:Spring) p.5 

16 PISISTRATIDS AND THE MINES OF THRACE 

had obviously been forced from the site. 35 Yet, even at that, the 
Satrae who lived on Mt Pangaeum and controlled its mines were 
never brought to heel by the Persians or by anybody else accor­
ding to Herodotus. 36 They and their neighbors the Edoni, who 
dwelt between the Satrae and the river, were still formidable and 
certainly capable of sustained resistance up to the time of Dra­
bescus (465), when they annihilated a force of 10,000 Athenian 
settlers. 37 They are hardly likely to have done other than protect 
their interests earlier on when they were in a far stronger 
position to do SO.38 

Now the Thracians of the Strymon region appear to have been 
unanimously and unremittingly hostile to all Greek settlers 
attempting to make inroads into their domains. From the arrival 
of the Parians at Thasos (ca 680) to Drabescus, the Thracians 
forcibly opposed Greeks who would settle there, especially 
along the Strymon it would appear. 39 And why not? The 
Thracians comprehended the wealth of their lands and their 
mines, worked the latter, and even sought to acquire others: the 
Paeonians and Siriopaeonians were minting their own very 

35 Cf Hdt. 5.23.1, 124.2. On its proximity to Ennea HodoilAmphipolis see 
Thuc. 4.102.3,107.3; cf Isaac 16ff. The site of Myrcinus is likelier to have been 
at modern Myrhinos rather than modern Myrkinos. The former is a defen­
sible site nearer to Pangaeum and away from the flooding and attendant 
problems (malaria?) of the Strymon: it could conceivably control movement 
around the northwestern flank of the mountain. The latter is in a flat, nearer 
the river and relatively indefensible: cf Dusing (supra n.l) 94 n.ll. 

36 7.111: Di-tpm OE ouoEv6~ K(J) av8pw1t(J)v UnT]1COOl r:y£vov'to, ooov TjIlEt~ '{OIlEV, 
aAM Ola'tEAEuOl 'to Il£XPl EIlEU aid E6v'tE~ EAEU8EPOl 11OUVOl 8P1l1K(J)V· oiK£0'l)01 
'tE Y,o.p ~pw U'I'llAa, 'tOnOl 'tE 1tanOlnm Kat X10V1 O'l)VllPE<p£a, Kat dOl 'to. 
1tOAEllla aKp<n. 

37 On Drabescus: Hdt. 9.75; Thuc. 1.100.3. The blow inflicted on the 
Thracians by Megabazus was only glancing: their formidability was re­
established with the death of Aristagoras (see n.38 infra). Cf also Isaac 6f on 
fighting between Greeks and Thracians in the lower Strymon at the end of the 
sixth century. 

38 Myrcinus may have reverted to the Edoni immediately upon the death of 
Aristagoras and the destruction of his forces (Hdt. 5.126.2), but in any case 
before the Peloponnesian War (Thuc. 4.107.3). Hammond (supra n.l [1980]: 
59) states that Myrcinus reverted when Histiaeus was recalled (Hdt. 5.24.2f), 
but there is no evidence that the walled town was held by Edoni, let alone 
that they resisted Aristagoras when he took possession of it (Hdt. 5.126.1). 

39 Cf Thuc. 1.100; cf also J. W. Cole, "Peisistratus on the Strymon," G&R 22 
(1975) 43f. 



LAVELLE, B. M., The Pisistratids and the Mines of Thrace , Greek, Roman and Byzantine 
Studies, 33:1 (1992:Spring) p.5 

B. M. LAVELLE 17 

heavy silver coins in the mid-sixth century.40 Surely mInIng 
rights in Thrace were invariably wrung or won from the 
Thracians by force of arms. 

The strength of the mine-owning Thracians of Pangaeum is 
amply attested by their resistance to the Persians. Megabazus, 
undoubtedly hoping to acquire for Darius the wealth of the 
Strymon region, including its mines, had overwhelming force 
with him and was able to defeat and deport the Paeonians to 
Asia; but he was unable to dislodge the Thracians on Pangaeum, 
apparently the toughest of this very powerful race. 41 In fact, the 
mines were still in Thracian hands when Xerxes came through 
the Pieri an gap in 480. 42 The Thracians were universally re­
nowned as fierce fighters, and the failure of the Persians to dis­
lodge them from the mountain is testimony to the stubborn re­
sistance of the Pangaeum tribes. What inroads can a relatively 
small party of Athenians settled some distance from the mines 
of Pangaeum have possibly made? 

The Thracians were substantially aided in any struggle for the 
mines with the Strymon Greeks by the mines' very positions. 
In a recent article, Dr Koukouli-Chrysanthaki has shown that 
by far the greatest number of Pangaeum silver mines were on 
the eastern side of the mountain near Nikisiani and Palaiochori. 43 

40 Hammond 41ft; Viviers (supra n.9) considers that the mines of Mt 
Pangaeum were in Edonian hands. Contra Boardman (supra n.1) 230: we do 
not know when, if ever, the mines were "owned by the Greeks." 

41 Cf. supra n.36. One must agree with Isaac (17) that the importance of the 
area to the Persians is illustrated by their deportation of the Paeonians: Darius 
may have wanted to resettle the region with more loyal Asiatics permanently 
to absorb it into the Persian commonweal. A further index of its importance to 
the Persians may be found in the resistance, extravagant gallantry, and suicide 
of Boges, the garrison commander of Eion (Hdt. 7.107), who so acted in 
anticipation of his disgrace and in consideration of his surviving sons' peril for 
his losing this valuable property. On the other hand, we may disagree with 
Isaac's unsubstantiated assertion (18) that "Megabazos '" came to a satis­
factory understanding with the Edonians": it is neither supported by evidence 
nor likely in view of Mardonius' follow-up operation (Hdt. 6.44ff). 

42 Hdt. 7.112; cf. Castritius [supra n.1] 13f. 
H C. Koukouli-Chrysanthaki, "TO. ' M£'taAAU' tllC; 8UOHlJdjC; IIcpuiuC;." in 

MVTlIlT\ ~, AUSUptOT\: ITOAtC; Kat Xcopu OtT\V APXT\uiu MUKCOOvtU KUt 8pQlCTl 
(ITpUKt\KQ ApXUWAoYl1WU r'Uvcopio'U. Ku~QA.a, 9-11 MU'io'U 1986) (= EA­
AEVOYUAAtKCC; Epc'UvcC; 1 [1990]) 493-514; cf. O. Davies, "Ancient Mines in 
Southern Macedonia," JRAS 62 (1932) 155ff. I thank Dr Koukouli­
Chrysanthaki for the gift of an offprint, and her assistants, Drs Dimitra 
Malamidou and Zisis Bonias, for their kind help during my visit to the 
Archaeological Museum of Kavala in May, 1991. 



LAVELLE, B. M., The Pisistratids and the Mines of Thrace , Greek, Roman and Byzantine 
Studies, 33:1 (1992:Spring) p.5 

18 PISISTRATIDS AND THE MINES OF THRACE 

The preponderant number of gold-bearing mines in the area are 
further east still, beyond Krenides-Philippi. 44 Settlements such 
as Eion, Ennea Hodoi, and Amphipolis were more than thirty 
kilometers distant and separated from the mines by hostile Thra­
cians. How could the mines then ever have been controlled and 
directly exploited by mere bands of Strymon Greeks, especially 
in the sixth century, when considerable Persian forces could not 
obtain their control?45 

The impediments affecting Greek exploitation of the area 
(Thracian hostility, relatively small numbers of Greek settlers, 
strategic disadvantages of settlements with respect to the mines, 
etc.) are hardly likely to have been overcome by the Pisistratids, 
whose presence in the area, notable neither historically nor 
archaeologically, was apparently ephemeral in any case. Pis is­
tratid numbers could not have been many, their capabilities 
were quite limited by that and their environment. Circumstan­
tially, Pisistratus' wealth "from the Strymon" must have been 
based on other than direct exploitation of the mines of Mt Pan­
gaeum. That is not an unreasonable conclusion if other Greek 
ventures in the Strymon area are, once again, kept fully in view. 

Actually, these offer the most pertinent evidence in determin­
ing how the Pisistratids were enriched in the region. That the 
Parians mounted something like a grand strategy of settlement 
and exploitation has already been mentioned. In the case of 
Histiaeus who with Aristagoras attempted to settle Myrcinus, 
hard by Ennea Hodoil Amphipolis and Drabescus,46 Megabazus' 
foreboding words to Darius (Hdt. 5.23.2) describe the pos­
sibilities of the region, the objects of the Milesians' efforts: 

44 Surely 'Pangaeum' gold can be ruled out of court in relation to the 
Pisistratitids: traces only are found in the Wappenmunzen, and these were 
surely not consciously admixed (see supra n.25). 

45 Cf supra n.326 If it were argued that the Pisistratids were intent upon 
exploiting the mines of Mt Dysorum, they would have been blocked in the 
mid-550's by the Paeonians or other inland tribes, just as the Athenians were 
at Drabescus. 

46 Drabescus is much more likely to have been away from the Strymon 
(rather than on it), perhaps on the northwestern or northern flanks of Pan­
gaeum, but in any case toward the gold mines of Daton (=Krenides-Philippi): 
Hdt. 9.75. Cf Davies (supra n.43) 156; Dusing 96£ n.ll; cf also Isaac 25-30, 
who places Drabescus nearer Ennea Hodoi, which either preceded or was 
proximate to Amphipolis. I take it that Ennea Hodoi was superseded by 
Amphipolis and so is identical to it. Isaac's placement, however, does not 
conform to the testimony of Herodotus. 



LAVELLE, B. M., The Pisistratids and the Mines of Thrace , Greek, Roman and Byzantine 
Studies, 33:1 (1992:Spring) p.5 

B. M. LAVELLE 

".0 Ba<JlA£u, KO'iOV 'tl XPlllla brotT\<Ja<;, avbpt "EAAT\Vl 
{)Elvcp 't£ Kat <Jo<pcp {)OU<; EyK'tlcracr8al1tOAtV EV 8PT\lKTI 
tva t{)'Tl 't£ vaU1t'TlrT1<Jtll0<; Ecrn a<p80vo<; Kat 1tOAAOt 
KOO1t££<; Kat 1l£'taAAa aprUp£a, OlltAO<; 't£ 1tOAAO<; Il£V 
<tEAAllV 1t£PtoK£El, 1tOAAOs ()£ ~ap~apos, o'i 1tpocr­
'ta't£oo E1ttAa~oJ.l£vot 1totflcroucrt 'tOU'tO 'to av K£tVO<; 
E~'TlYE'Tl'tat Kat llllEP'Tls Kat VUK'tOS· 47 

19 

Of course Herodotus has Megabazus exaggerating for Darius' 
benefit the inducements to war, but it is clear that the power he 
envisions is linked to Histiaeus' permanent settlement and ex­
ploitation of Myrcinus and its environs. 48 

In fact the Strymon region had several attractions for settlers. 
The soil of the area was remarkably fertile, in fact the "best land" 
in Thrace. 49 It would provide its own rich agricultural basis, a 
source of wealth in its own right. In addition, Amphipolis' 
position on the Strymon, as that of Eion, Ennea Hodoi, and 
perhaps Myrcinus, was well-situated for the converging trade of 
several regions, but especially for trade with the miners of the 
mountains. Amphipolis, a highly prized settlement of the Athen­
ians, was a great entrepreneurial center that unlocked the region's 
wealth for them (Isaac 20f); its loss in 424 shut it off, and well they 
understood and lamented it. From that point, through the fourth 
century B.C., the Athenians moved heaven and earth to have it 
back (Thuc. 4.108). A multiplicity of favorable factors, not just the 
mines, encouraged such as Histiaeus and Aristagoras, and later the 

47 "0 King, what thing have you done to allow a Greek man, both deinos 
and sophos, to found a city in Thrace, where there are abundant timbers for 
ships and oars, silver mines, and many Greeks dwelling about, and many 
barbarians, who accepting him as leader will accomplish what he says by night 
and by day?" 

48 Contra Davies (supra n.43: 155), Herodotus does not say that the mines 
were "at Myrcinus," but in Thrace. The mines that Histiaeus and Aristagoras 
were attempting to acquire may have been on Mt Dysorum, then freed from 
Paeonian control but not yet under Alexander of Macedon's. Megabazus' 
deportation of the Paeonians created a power vacuum and new (but temporary) 
possibilities for Greeks and other enemies of the Thracians (cf Hammond and 
Griffith [supra n.31] 57f): that is perhaps why Alexander was able to seize the 
mine on Dysorum, why the Parians were attempting to colonize (or recolonize) 
the lower Strymon at the end of the sixth century or the beginning of the fifth, 
and perhaps why the Athenians, beginning with the leads of Miltiades and then 
of Cimon, were so interested and active in the area in the first part of the fifth 
century. 

49 Strab. 7 fr. 33; Plut. Cim. 7.3; Isaac 1 on the richness of the Strymon plain. 



LAVELLE, B. M., The Pisistratids and the Mines of Thrace , Greek, Roman and Byzantine 
Studies, 33:1 (1992:Spring) p.5 

20 PISISTRA TIDS AND THE MINES OF THRACE 

Athenians to settle the Strymon region. This is not to say that the 
proximity of silver was not a prime attraction, simply that it 
served to enhance an already vivid picture of opportunity and 
prosperity there. 50 Surely the same factors, not just the one, en­
couraged Pisistratus' course of action. 

A speculation: in lieu of further evidence, it is perhaps best to 
conceive of the Pisistratid settlement on the Strymon in roughly 
the same terms as the Milesians' at Myrcinus. The latter must 
have been a frontier pyrgos-town that combined a number of 
advantages for its proprietors. It should have been an emporion 
and stronghold for trade, for extortion and expansion (if possible), 
and certainly for protecting one's gains. 51 Force and violence are 
implicit in the history of the region, and we recall that one of 
Pisistratus' salient skills was military command, a skill that he had 
honed in Athens' successful struggle with Megara over Salamis. 52 

He was capable of exploiting the area militarily; and he will 
certainly have been called upon to use his skill against the 
Thracians, especially in view of what must have been his limited 
numbers. It is most reasonable to assume that Pisistratus too 
conceived a similar, albeit more modest strategy for exploiting the 
Strymon region as best he could and, getting out, for using its 

50 I think that Perdrizet's assumption ("Scaptesyle," Klio 10 [1910] 5) that 
Pisistratus showed the way north for the Athenians is undoubtedly correct, 
albeit not solely with the possession of the mines in view: see supra n.49. 
Pisistratus' limited success there and the wealth of the lower Strymon basin 
inspired Miltiades to make his famous promise of "immeasurable gold" to the 
Athenians after Marathon (cf. Hdt. 6.132; Perdrizet 6ff; Borza 118 n.46) and to 
route his expedition through Paros: surely he was intent upon absorbing the 
Thasian and Pari an colonies on the Thracian mainland. Contra T. J. Figueira, 
Athens and Aegina in the Age of Imperial Colonization (Baltimore 1991) 159, 
who believes that Miltiades was hinting to the Athenians of "a colonial 
expedition [against Paros?] in the grand manner of the Peisistratids": detaching 
Paros from her colonies of Thasos, Neapolis, in the lower Strymon basin, and 
from any concessions that Paros and her colonies possessed in Thrace made 
excellent strategic sense, especially since Paros was influential in the area (cf. 
Isaac 6ff) but already weakened and made ripe for the taking by the withdrawal 
of the Persians from the mid-Aegean. Figueira seems to miss completely the 
purport of the promised xpuQ"o<; iiqi:)ovo<;. which Paros can hardly have supplied 
on its own. On the excitement caused by Cimon's taking of Eion see Isaac 20f. 

51 Isaac (15) suggests that Pisistratus became wealthy as a middle man doing 
business with the Thracian miners. A1cibiades' Thracian stronghold (Xen. Hell. 
2.1.25) may have been similar in character to Histiaeus' and Aristagoras' at 
Myrcinus, though doubtless much reduced in size and possibilities. The former 
perhaps desired isolation more than enrichment. 

52 Hdt. 1.59.4; Ath. Pol. 14.1; cf. Rhodes (supra n.13). 199f 



LAVELLE, B. M., The Pisistratids and the Mines of Thrace , Greek, Roman and Byzantine 
Studies, 33:1 (1992:Spring) p.5 

B. M. LAVELLE 21 

proceeds to effect return to Athens and tyranny, ever the object 
of his ambitions. 

His foundation should not have been far from the sea or much 
farther up the Strymon than Amphipolis/Ennea Hodoi, for he 
was hemmed in by such Thracian settlements as Edonian 
Myrcinus, only a few kilometers from the "Nine Ways," and by 
other Thracian tribes in settlements to the north and east. Of 
course, all Greek colonies in the Strymon/Pangaeum region were 
close to the sea, and Pisistratus' cooperation with the Eretrians 
makes it certain that communication by sea was crucial to his 
enterprise "on the Strymon.» 

IV 

We must revise our estimate of Pisistratid finances, especially 
for the period of Pisistratus' final tyranny. Originally these were 
limited to Pisistratus' war-chest and then to revenues he could 
obtain from Attica. These limitations explain (1) Pisistratus' ob­
vious need for contributions of money from city-states in his 
debt; (2) the fact that the coinage of the early tyranny was 
meagerly produced and small in denomination relative to what 
Pisistratrid coinage became; (3) variation in the alloy of the 
Wappenmunzen: the bullion derived came from varied sources; 
(4) why, as Andrewes states, Thucydides "leaves out the account 
of resources from the Strymon": there were none ongoing or 
considerable; and (5) why, according to Kroll, the Pisistratids 
troubled to search out new resources not long after their return 
to Athens.53 

It was taxation after all, Thucydides assures us (6.54.5), that 
undergirded the tyranny. The taxes imposed were moderate 
because the needs of the Pisistratids were modest to begin with: 
the old tyrant had effectively extirpated opposition at Pallene and 
wanted to maintain the goodwill of the Athenians. Pallene 
dispensed with the need for further foreign military help: a mer­
cenary bodyguard, expensive and ineffectual at best, was not re­
quired; resources on hand, among them family and retainers, were 

53 Andrewes 408; Kroll (supra n.S) 1 of. 



LAVELLE, B. M., The Pisistratids and the Mines of Thrace , Greek, Roman and Byzantine 
Studies, 33:1 (1992:Spring) p.5 

22 PISISTRATIDS AND THE MINES OF THRACE 

sufficient for sustaining the tyranny amidst a people who were 
not generally ill-disposed toward it anyway (cf Lavelle [supra 
n.8]). 

The economic watershed signalled by the "owls" occurred ca 
525. A new and rich source of silver was discovered almost surely 
at Laurium, enabling the Pisistratids to mint the first "owls" in 
higher denominations and in far greater numbers than the 
Wappenmunzen had ever been produced. Their newfound 
wealth helps to account for such extravagances as the Temple of 
Zeus Olympius and other adornments for the city, as well as 
Hipparchus' dazzling coterie of court poets; 54 it may well have 
contributed to the general picture of wealth at Athens in the last 
quarter of the sixth century. The "owls" of Laurium stand in stark 
contrast to the Wappenmunzen of the earlier tyranny, as do the 
buildings of the younger tyrants to the modest edifices datable to 
their father's reign. 

The Pisistratids were evidently never sustained appreciably by 
Thracian revenues, and it is very doubtful that the tyrants ever 
had direct access to the mines of Pangaeum or anywhere else in 
Thrace. Pisistratus' exploitation of the Strymon area was, as his 
settlement at Rhaecelus, temporary and only moderately suc­
cessful. A first-generation monarch, he owed the tyranny 
primarily to his ambition, his enterprise, and his intelligence­
apparently his greatest asset; he built upon his successes, taking 
what he could get from Thrace and then resorting to subscrip­
tions. What he finally amassed was enough to effect his return, 
renew his tyranny, and found it once for all. 

Pisistratus' circumscribed wealth may well have influenced him 
to have been more conciliatory towards the aristocracy and to 
become a careful cultivator of public good will as long as he 
reigned, setting a pattern of rule for his heirs to follow and making 
thereby a reputation for mildness. The main financial props of the 
early tyranny were a relatively rich war-chest secured from his 
enterprise and his allies, moderate taxes imposed on a largely won­
over populace, and the increasing prosperity that maintained the 

54 Simonides, for example, was renowned as the first poet to take pay (L Pind. 
Isthm. 2.9a), and Hipparchus is alleged to have plied him with his munificence 
([Pl.] Hipparch. 228c; cf Arist. Rhet. 140Sb14; Ar. Pax 697f with L; cf also M. 
Lefkowitz, The Lives of the Greek Poets [Baltimore 1981] SOH). Hipparchus is 
also reputed to have sent a trireme to fetch Anacreon from Samos to Athens: 
[Pl.] Hipparch. 228c; Ael. VH 8.2. 



LAVELLE, B. M., The Pisistratids and the Mines of Thrace , Greek, Roman and Byzantine 
Studies, 33:1 (1992:Spring) p.5 

B. M. LA YELLE 23 

contentment of the Athenians through to the tyranny's end. 
These were supplemented by a new strike at Laurium just after 
Pisistratus' death. 

LOYOLA UNIVERSITY, CHICAGO 

July, 1992