hereare,of course, various ways in which information can be shared, and commonknowledge can be created, for instance, by means of coinage, inscriptions(many monuments carry formulae that testify to this intention), advertis

In this view, festivals and ceremonies are stud-ied as spectacular demonstrations of power that offer a blueprint, a culturalmanual for ordinary citizens to live their lives. This approach has yieldedimportant insights into the role of ceremonies in public life, and, in par-ticular, has allowed researchers to investigate the (para)political functionsof religious events, such as processions, as well as the cultural meanings ofmoreovertlypoliticalceremonies,suchasthejoyeusesentréesofearlymod-ern rulers.

The record is dominated by large numbers of public documentsrecording the arrangement and regulation of each and every festival atincreasing levels of detail, suggesting that festivals and public ceremonieswere increasingly a core element of the political culture, which the citieswanted to preserve

exclu-sive than most, was explicit in its social snobbery: ‘Those who may not takepart in the gymnasion: no one may enter the gymnasionand take off hisclothes if he is a slave, a freedman, or a son of these, if he has not attendedthewrestlingschools,ifheisaprostitute,orifhehasexercisedatradeoftheagora,orifheisadrunkardormentallydisturbed.Ifthegymnasiarchknow-ingly allows any of these to anoint themselves, or does so after someone hasreportedtohimandpointedthisout,heshallbefined1,000drachmas’.

embership of the gymnasion appears to have been relatively re-stricted.37 Epigraphical (and papyrological) evidence suggests that the ‘peo-pleofthegymnasion’wererecognizedasaspecialstatusgroup.

gymnasiabecame rich multifunctional build-ings with palaistrai, xystoi (roofed running tracks), practicing rooms, butalso libraries and small auditoria designed for public lectures, as well as formeetings of the neoi or other associations that were based in the gymna-sia.Theyofferedfacilitiesforphysicaltraining,festiveoccasions,intellectualformation, and entertainment, and for a wide range of civic activities.

The gymnasiaof the Hellenistic period were of a totally different nature:they were moved from the margins to the very heart of the cities.

Tradi-tionally the gymnasionwas seen as a response to a new military technique,the phalanx, which required exceptional physical fitness from the citizen-soldiers. The gymnasion was, in this view, the place where the membersof the hoplite class could become—and stay—fit. Fitness they may haveoffered, but it does not seem likely, however, that the archaic and classicalgymnasiawere primarily geared towards specific military training. From itsorigin the gymnasionwas also associated with other physical activities: itwas, of course, also the place where citizens honed their athletic skills andphysical prowess, that they put on display in local festivals, as well as ininternational Panhellenic festivals. Although the gymnasiawere never lim-ited to the aristocracy, they were always dominated by a leisure class whohad the time, money, and inclination to dedicate themselves to the gymna-sion.

Here I want to argue that we might be able to throw some light onthese developments if we can arrive at a better comprehension of the self-understandings that were constitutive of Greek civic life after the classicalage, and of the way they gradually evolved in the Hellenistic and Romanperiods.InthiscontextIwanttoexplorehow,andbywhatmeans,theinhab-itants of the Greek cities managed to create and maintain this remarkablyhomogeneouspoliticalculture,andhowthemainactorsofpoliticallifesawtheir own role.

So, by all accounts, it appears that these later poleisstill served as a mean-ingfulsourceofpoliticalandsocialidentityforcivicleadersandforordinarycitizens,eventhoughitisnotalwayseasytointegrateallthedifferingdevel-opments into one integrative account

linguistic homogenization. In theclassical period, all cities had stubbornly stuck to their local versions ofGreek, but in the Hellenistic period koine, Greek rose to prominence as thelingua franca of commerce, diplomacy and governance. Of course, it wouldultimately become the language in which the new global religion of Chris-tianity spread

uniformity of this new Greek urban world

Theconcept promotes the study of equipollent, interconnected communities,whichmustbeconsideredquanetworkratherthanbytryingtodifferentiatebetween core and periphery. I believe that this model might help organizethe evidence about the Hellenistic poleisinto a single interpretive picture,which will illustrate the continued vitality not simply of the polis, but alsoof a whole network of peer polities’

ekklesia

Most cities were laidout along the familiar Hippodamian grid, and domestic architecture for theordinary citizens does not seem to have varied greatly

arguedthattheGreekpoliswascertainlyvibrantuntiltheadventofRomeintheeasternMediterranean.Thisviewisnowwidelyshared,andisbecominga new orthodoxy.5 More recently, scholars have even argued for the contin-ued significance of the polisas a form of social and political organizationwell into the imperial period.6

myopia

poleis

surrounding walls, a monumentally defmed agora, a theatre, at least one gymnasion, stoas, fountain houses, a council house and/or prytaneion (town hall) . And with this infrastructure went administrative offices - the agoranomos (market warden), the mmnasiarchos (head of gymnasium), amphodarchai (street governors), astynomoi (city wardens) - each of which should be properly defined and regulated by adminis- trative laws