Crisis and Resilience in Ancient Greek Alliances Cross-Border Cooperation

List of Contributors

1. Introduction – Angela Ganter

I. Alliances Reflected: Concepts and Historiography

2. Enduring and Shaping Crises: Fragile Alliance Constellations in the Archaic and Early Classical Era – Angela Ganter

3. Thucydides and the Relationship between Sparta and Athens in the Early Years of the Pentecontaetia – Massimo Nafissi

4. Friends as Foes in the Delian League: Thucydides on an Alliance in Crisis – Katarina Nebelin

5. From Crisis to Creativity: The Productive Instability of Alliances in Polybius – Felix K. Maier

II. Best Practice: Rituals and Media

6. Fighting for the Tripod? Crisis and Co-operation in the Delphic Amphikytony – Emma Aston

7. Breaking Boundaries and Preserving Alliances. Oaths and Kinship Ties as Crisis Management Tools in Interstate Relations in the Sixths and Fifth Centuries BC: Case Studies – Daniela Bonanno

8. Oaths of Alliance: Material Manifestations and Epichoric Encodings – Hans Beck

9. Commemoration to Overcome Crises? References to the Past in Interstate Relations of Classical Times – Maria Osmers

III. Border Management: Facing Conflicts within and in between Alliances

10. Allied Enemies: On Conflict Persistence in Greek Poleis – Oliver Grote

11. Against All Odds. The Long Theban Hegemony and Its Resilience – Salvatore Tufano

12. Crisis as Opportunity. Intra-federal Disputes between Religion, Politics and Economy – Elena Franchi

13. Aitolian Resilience in the Lamian War and Its Propagandistic Afterlife: An Invitation to Join the League – Sebastian Scharff

14. Diadochi and Epigoni Facing Crisis. Federalism as an ‘Art of Government’ and (Border)land Control in the Early Hellenistic Aegean – Claudio Biagetti

IV. Alliances Compared: Transepochal Perspectives

15. Comparing Alliances under Pressure: An Experimental Approach in Comparative History – Marian Nebelin

16. Conclusions: Alliances and Resilience across Borders – Elena Franchi

Index Locorum

Index Rerum

Biography

Elena Franchi is a full professor of Greek History at the University of Trento. She was granted a postdoctoral fellowship (Freiburg i. Breisgau, 2011–2013) and a fellowship at the level of an experienced researcher by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation (Münster, 2020). In 2022, she was awarded an ERC Consolidator Grant with the project FeBo: Federalism and Border Management in Greek Antiquity (ERC 2021 COG PR. Nr. 101043954). She is currently working on border management cultures in Ancient Greece.

Angela Ganter, née Kühr, is professor and chair of Ancient History at the University of Regensburg. Her research focuses on ethnos and polis identity in Archaic and Classical Greece (Als Kadmos nach Boiotien kam. Polis und Ethnos im Spiegel thebanischer Gründungsmythen, 2006), on Roman Social History, on memory studies and on the interconnection between cults and emotion in Ancient Greece and Rome. She is an editor of Studien zur Alten Geschichte and has recently published a Greek History for a wider audience (Griechische Geschichte. Von der Bronzezeit bis zum Hellenismus, 2024).

Felix K. Maier is a full professor of the history of Asia and Europe in the first millennium at the University of Zurich. His research explores Greek and Roman historiography, ancient conceptions of time and space, the structures of the late antique imperial system, the dynamics of military conflict and the digital humanities. He is the author of a monograph on Polybius and another on imperial self-representation in late antiquity. In addition, he serves as co-editor of two volumes on digital classics and is the editor of the digital project Fragmente der Griechischen Historiker V.