No More Learning

ASK YOURSELF
1. The "official" explanation (according to Plutarch) for the abolition of ostracism votes was that they were being imposed upon degenerate characters like Hyperbolus. But the story of the ostracism of Aristides--not to mention other ostracism victims like Themistocles--implies that
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? influence of the archons gradually
diminished.
Hyperbolus: Ironically, ostracism was
often viewed as a dignified penalty, reserved for prominent citizens who had strayed, perhaps inexpli- cably, from appropriate patterns of behavior. The ostracism of Hyperbolus, a low-born dema- gogue, was apparently viewed as having trivialized the process; Hyperbolus, it seems, was not altogether worthy of such a punish- ment! He was exiled to the island of Samos, where, a few years later, he met his end in the unrest caused by pro- and antidemocracy factions there. The fifth-century historian Thucydides writes that Hyperbolus was ostracized because he was a totally disreputable character, not because the Athenian citizens feared his political status or objectives. In his biography of Alcibiades, Plutarch claims that Hyperbolus was such a buffoon that the local satirists of the time used him unceasingly as ready material for their jokes, but that Hyperbolus did not mind at all because of his total disregard for any criticism, humorous or otherwise.
market-place: The Greek word agora is almost universally translated as "market-place," a somewhat mis- leading rendering. Nearly every ancient Greek city had an agora, and the agora was much more than a section of town devoted merely to shops and markets, as the word "market-place" implies. A better translation would be "downtown"; the agora of a Greek city was home to law courts and public squares, meeting halls and shops, streets with sometimes snarled traffic, conmen
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there may have been additional reasons for its discontinu-
ation. What might some of these reasons be?
2. Talk about a political comeback! To be the "winner" of an ostracism vote--as happened to Aristides around 482-- was probably not an event that any ancient Athenian politician would want to list on his resume. And yet three years later, Aristides experienced a huge upturn in his fortunes; not only was his ostracism revoked (long before the 10-year requirement had expired), but he was placed in a position of great authority, as the Athenian leader at the Battle of Plataea. Can you think of any modern paral- lels in American politics where a political leader's career seemed to be over, perhaps because of a scandal of some kind, only to see that individual rise to prominence once
again?
TOPICS TO CONSIDER
e The Athenian ostracism procedure has rightly been called an "unpopularity contest. " Is there anything comparable to it in the modern American political system? Do you think Athenian-style ostracism would work today? Why or why not?
e AlcibiadesandNiciasweretwoofthemorecolor- ful characters in fifth-century Athenian history; Alcibiades, especially, seemed to be an unpredict- able man of many moods. Briefly research the lives of these two individuals; Plutarch's biographies would be a good place to start. Why do you sup- pose they were such intractable political enemies? Can you find any instances (other than the one cited in the document) where they cooperated with one another?
e Plutarch uses some pretty uncomplimentary terms--illiterate, uncouth, and rustic (as men- tioned in the notes above, "rustic" was a word equating to "hick")--to describe the farmer who asked Aristides to write his own name on the ostrakon. The farmer's level of ignorance is reinforced by the fact that he did not even know Aristides by sight. Do you suppose that Plutarch here is at least subtly hinting that democracy has its flaws, and that maybe the worst of these is that even the most uninformed or unintelligent citizens are allowed to vote in elections? Or would that be reading too much into the text?
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? and muggers. . . in other words, much the same kinds of phenomena that one would find in the down- town area of a modern city.
opposing parties: Care must be taken not to understand "opposing parties" in the modern sense, like Democrats and Republicans. The Greek word used by Plutarch, and here translated as "party," is stasis, which refers more accurately to factions or voting blocs within the political system. The word seems to have a slightly pejora- tive meaning, with overtones of sedition or gang activities.
ostrakon: As Plutarch states, an ostrakon was a "piece of earthenware," or a broken piece of poverty, a potsherd. These ostraka served as ballots in ostracism votes; voters scratched or carved (not really "wrote") on the potsherd the name of the person whom they wished to see ostra- cized. Archaeologists have discov- ered hundreds of these sherds.
the prayer of Achilles: In Book 1 of Homer's Iliad, the mighty Achilles bitterly complained to his mother, the goddess Thetis, about how greatly he had been disrespected and humiliated by Agamemnon, king of the Greeks. He ended his entreaty to her with a plea that she ask Zeus to aid the Trojans (against the Greeks! ) in the Trojan War. By contrast, the just Aristides prayed just the opposite kind of prayer, that the Athenians might be safe during his period of exile.
rustic: The Greek word agroikos, trans- lated as "rustic," can have a negative connotation, as it probably does here, akin to our words "hick" or "hillbilly. "
sentence of ostracism: Notable victims of ostracism votes (in addition to
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Out with Him! An Athenian Method of Ridding the City of Tiresome Politicians
Further Information
Hansen, Mogens Herman. The Athenian Democracy in the Age of Demosthenes. Oxford, 1987.
Thomsen, Rudi. The Origins of Ostracism: A Synthesis. Copenhagen, 1972.
Vanderpool, Eugene. Ostracism at Athens. Cincinnati, 1970. Website
Ostracism. http://www. livius. org/on-oz/ostracism/ostracism. html
Bibliography for Document
Scott-Kilvert, Ian. Plutarch: The Rise and Fall of Athens; Nine Greek Lives. New York, 1960.
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Aristides) included: Xanthippus, the father of Pericles; Themistocles, the Athenian general whose leadership in the Battle of Salamis (480 BCE) helped turn the tide against the invading Persians; Cimon, another Athenian general who achieved many military successes in the 470s and 460s.
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31. WOMEN IN POLITICS? IN ANCIENT ATHENS?
INTRODUCTION
For the second document in this chapter, we turn once again to the biographer/essayist Plutarch. Although we will find no women as the subjects of any of the 50 biographies that Plutarch wrote, there was at least one who certainly could have occupied that niche: Aspasia, a woman from Miletus, which was a powerful city located in what is now southwestern Turkey. Aspasia immigrated to Athens, where she became a force to be reckoned with in both the political and social life of the city. She regularly rubbed elbows with some of the most noteworthy politicians and philosophers of the time, including Pericles and Socrates. The second document is excerpted from Plutarch's biography of Pericles, in which the biog- rapher provides us with a considerable amount of information about Aspasia.
KEEP IN MIND AS YOU READ
1. It was a fact of ancient Athenian life that women generally did not play a prominent role in public life. Women never held any of the political offices in the government, and they were not even allowed to participate in the proceedings of the Assembly, which was the focal point of Athenian democracy. And since, therefore, women do not appear prominently in the writings of historians and biographers, it is not surprising that the lives of Athenian women are not as well attested as the lives of their male counterparts. But if any ancient author would be likely to tell us anything about the topic, that author would be Plutarch, a man whose wide-ranging mind was not constrained by the social expectations of the time.
2. Even though the western world's first functioning democracy arose in fifth-century Athens, it was not without its shortcomings. There was a lingering sense of entitle- ment on the part of rich and influential politicians from prominent families, which made it difficult for men from humble or impoverished backgrounds to ascend too high in Athenian politics. One exception to this general rule might have been Aspasia's husband Lysicles, whom Plutarch identifies as "a man of low birth and character"; Lysicles eventually gained an important post in the Athenian army, but only with a considerable boost from his influential wife.
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? Document: Aspasia: Teacher of Rhetoric, and Much More
[T]his is perhaps a suitable place to consider the extraordi- nary art or power which this woman exercised, which enabled her to captivate the leading statesmen of the day, and even provided the philosophers with a theme for pro- longed and elevated discussions. It is generally agreed that she was Milesian [i. e. , from Miletus] by birth and that her father was Axiochus, and she is said to have set out to rival the career of Thargelia, an Ionian woman of earlier times, in marking down for her conquests only men of great power. Thargelia came to be a great beauty and possessed at the same time exceptional charm and intelligence. She had many lovers among the Greeks, all of whom she won over to the Persian interest, and in this way, since they were all men of high position and influence, the seeds of sympa- thy for the Persians were sown throughout the Greek cities [in Ionia]. In the same fashion, Pericles, too, according to some writers, was attracted to Aspasia mainly because of her rare political wisdom. Socrates visited her from time to time with his disciples and some of his close friends brought their wives to listen to her conversation, even though she carried on a trade that was anything but honor- able or even respectable, since it consisted of keeping a house of young courtesans. Aeschines says that Lysicles the sheep-dealer, a man of low birth and character, came to be the leading figure in Athens because of his marriage to Aspasia after Pericles' death. And in Plato's dialogue, the Menexenus--even though the first section is written partly as a parody of the rhetoricians--there is certainly this element of truth, namely, that the woman had the reputation of being associated with a whole succession of Athenians, who came to her to learn rhetoric. However, Pericles' attach- ment to Aspasia seems to have been a more passionate affair. His own wife was closely related to him; she had been mar- ried first of all to Hipponicus, to whom she bore Callias, who was nicknamed "the rich," and her children by Pericles were Xanthippus and Paralus. Afterwards, when they found each other incompatible, Pericles legally handed her over to another man with her own consent and himself lived with Aspasia, whom he loved dearly. The story goes that every day, when he went out to the [agora] and returned, he greeted her with a kiss. [Tr. Ian Scott-Kilvert. Plutarch: The Rise and Fall of Athens, Nine Greek Lives (Pericles 24). Penguin Classics, 1960. Page numbers: 190, 191. ]
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? according to some writers: Unlike many ancient nonfiction authors, Plutarch is very generous with information about his sources, especially when we consider that he was writing in a time when con- ventions like bibliographies, foot- notes, and works cited lists were unknown, and never created or uti- lized. Often, Plutarch will mention his source(s) by name, as he does with Aeschines, a few lines below. Other times, he might refer to sources with a more generic phrase such as the one highlighted here: "according to some writers. "
Aeschines: Aeschines (393-322 BCE) was a Greek orator and rival of Demosthenes. Three of his speeches are extant, but unfortunately, the Socratic dialogue he wrote featuring Aspasia does not survive. His speech Against Ctesiphon (330 BCE) was directed against Demosthenes, whose friend Ctesiphon had pro- posed that Demosthenes be awarded a golden crown for his many years of service to Athens. The offended Aeschines took the matter to court, and made his speech; Demosthenes's response (On the Crown) so effectively de- molished Aeschines's arguments that, having badly lost his case, he eventually retired to the island of Rhodes. The story goes that he once gave an encore performance of his Against Ctesiphon for the Rhodians, whereupon they marveled that he did not prevail against his famed opponent. "You would not be sur- prised," replied Aeschines, "if you had heard Demosthenes. "
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Women in Politics? In Ancient Athens?
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Callias: Callias owned an imposing home in Athens, which he often made available to philosophers and sophists for their discussions and social gatherings. The philosophical discussion reported in Plato's Protagoras (see chapter 2, on edu- cation) took place at the home of Callias, as did an elaborate banquet described in the historian Xeno- phon's dialogue, entitled, logically enough, Banquet. (Plato recounts an amusing vignette about the arrival of Socrates and a couple of his friends at Callias's front door. The group was in the midst of a serious discussion on some question that had arisen as they were walking to Callias's house, so before knock- ing, they continued their discus- sion. But from inside the house, the butler overheard the talking-- according to Plato, "very likely the great number of sophists . . . made him annoyed with callers at the house"--and so when Socrates did finally knock, the butler opened the door, immediately told the new arrivals to get lost, and slammed the door in their faces. They knocked again. This time, the but- ler did not even open the door but repeated his earlier instruction to them, through the closed door. Finally, after many entreaties, including Socrates's claim that they were not sophists, the butler reluc- tantly admitted them. )
Ionian woman: Ionia was a sort of generic place-name, applied to the western coast of Asia Minor, modern Turkey. Generic place- names are still used today; for example, the northeastern United States is often collectively called "New England. " Since Aspasia's hometown of Miletus was located
? ? ? ? AFTERMATH
Pericles's political opponents found it very difficult to oppose him directly, so they often adopted the strategy of trying to weaken his popularity and influence by attacking his friends and associates. For example, they contrived to put on trial the famous sculptor Pheidias, a close friend of Pericles, on a charge of impiety, because he had allegedly carved his own likeness into a shield held by a statue of the goddess Athena. Pheidias was convicted and died soon thereafter. Likewise, Aspasia was tried, for impiety and also for "pro- curing free-born Athenian women for Pericles and receiving them into her house. " Pericles was able to come to her rescue and win her an acquittal by addressing the jury personally, and with great emotion.
Six months after Pericles's death, Aspasia married the sheep dealer Lysicles, who, despite his low birth, was chosen as a general of the Athenian army in 428.
Some suggest that he owed his new- found prominence to the machinations of Aspasia. Shortly after his military appointment, he and four other generals, along with a contingent of soldiers, were sent out to the hinterlands of Caria, in southwestern Ionia, to do some fund-raising from among the cities allied to Athens. (This was during the initial stages of the Peloponnesian War, when Athens was trying to enhance its military capabilities and required money from outside sources to do so. ) The Carians did not appreciate these efforts, and in the end, they attacked and killed Lysicles, along with a large number of his soldiers.
Aspasia continued to live on in Athens after her husband's death. It is thought that she died sometime during the last decade of the fifth century.
ASK YOURSELF
1. Plutarch says that the Ionian woman Thargelia was instru- mental in sowing "the seeds of sympathy for the Persians . . . throughout the Greek cities. " And yet it is known that there was widespread resentment and resistance to Persian rule on the part of the cities in Ionia. So why do you suppose Thargelia, from Ionia, was apparently trying to advance the Persian cause in her home region?
2. "Power couples. " We hear the phrase quite often these days. Do you think that Pericles and Aspasia could have been considered a "power couple"? What do you suppose Pericles's rival politicians thought when they heard the news that Pericles and Aspasia were "together" (although they apparently never married, because Aspasia was foreign-born)?
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? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? in Ionia, Thargelia obviously came
from the same region.
Pericles' death: Pericles was a victim of
the plague that ravaged Athens in
the 420s. Pericles died in 429. Xanthippus and Paralus: Plutarch records that both Xanthippus and Paralus died from the plague and that both predeceased Pericles. Even though Pericles had thus lost both sons, as well as his sister and many other relatives and friends, he always kept his composure at their funerals. Always, that is, until the death of Paralus, his last remaining legitimate son, during whose funeral, Plutarch says, Pericles "broke into a passion
of tears and sobs. "
? ? ? ? TOPICS TO CONSIDER
e One of the books cited in the "Further informa- tion" section below is Madeleine Henry's Prisoner of History: Aspasia of Miletus and Her Biographical Tradition. In the publisher's description of the book, there appears this sen- tence: "[C]ontinued uncritical reception of her depiction in Attic [i. e. , Athenian] comedy and nai? ve acceptance of Plutarch's account of her in his Life of Pericles prevent us from understand- ing who she was and what her contributions to Greek thought might have been. " Plutarch was a thorough and careful researcher, whose credi- bility has stood the test of time. Why, then, do you suppose some contemporary critics consider it "nai? ve" to accept his account of Aspasia? Do you see anything in the document that would lead you to believe you are being "prevent[ed] . . . from understanding who she was and what her contributions to Greek thought might have been"?
e Plato's dialogue Menexenus is relatively short, and most of it is com- prised of the funeral oration that (according to Plato) Aspasia wrote and Socrates recited. Read Aspasia's speech. Does it sound convincing? Is it well organized? Based only on this speech, would you say that Aspasia deserved her apparently solid reputation as a philosopher and rhetorician?
e As mentioned above, ancient historians, biographers, and other nonfic- tion authors never cited their sources in formats with which we are famil- iar today: bibliographies, footnotes, quotation marks, parenthetical citations, and the like. And they certainly never asked, formally or other- wise, for permission to use or quote material from another author's books in their own work. Apparently, these authors, and the scholarly commu- nity in general, believed that no one could "own" words, ideas, and infor- mation, and therefore, it would be ludicrous to ask permission of, or to offer payment to, another author for the use of his written material. Things are different these days, where copyright laws and antiplagiarism
? ? ? ? ? ASPASIA AS A MATCHMAKER
Among her many other talents, Aspasia was a noted matchmaker. According to the historian Xenophon (in Memorabilia), Socrates once solicited her thoughts on this topic. She responded by stating that above all, a matchmaker has to be certain that she does not misrepresent the qualities or personalities of the people whom she is trying to match. For if she conveys inaccurate or false information, not only will the poorly matched cou- ple hate each other; they will hate the matchmaker, too, which in turn, obviously would damage the match- maker's reputation.
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guidelines have combined to form rigid citation and permission rules to which nonfiction authors must adhere. Which system do you think is superior? Why?
e Plutarch says that Pericles persuaded the Assembly to pass a decree authorizing Athenian military action against the island of Samos (off the western coast of Ionia), because the Samians had disobeyed an Athenian order to end their war against the city of Miletus. (The two of them were fighting over possession of Priene, another city in Ionia. ) Some Athenians believed that Aspasia was responsible for fomenting Athenian involve- ment in this conflict. Why would that suspicion have arisen? Does it make sense?
Further Information
Henry, Madeleine M. Prisoner of History: Aspasia of Miletus and Her Biographical Tradition. Oxford, 1995.
Radice, Betty. Who's Who in the Ancient World (s. v. "Aspasia"). Baltimore, 1973. Websites
Aspasia. http://www. newworldencyclopedia. org/entry/Aspasia
Aspasia biography. http://www. yourdictionary. com/biography/aspasia
Aspasia of Miletus. http://penelope. uchicago. edu/~grout/encyclopaedia_romana/greece/
hetairai/aspasia. html
Bibliography for Document
Bury, The Rev. R. G. (tr. ). Plato: Timaeus; Critias; Cleitophon; Menexenus, Epistles. [LCL. ] London and Cambridge, 1929.
Scott-Kilvert, Ian (tr. ). Plutarch: The Rise and Fall of Athens: Nine Greek Lives. New York, 1960.
Women in Politics? In Ancient Athens?
? ? ? ? ASPASIA AS AN AUTHOR
Aspasia was reputedly the author of not one, but two, funeral orations, including perhaps the most famous such oration of all: the one that Pericles delivered after the first year of fighting in the Peloponnesian War, in which, among other things, he declared that Athens was the "school of Greece. " She receives credit for authoring the second one by no less an authority than Plato, in his dialogue Menexenus. The title character and Socrates are discussing the art of crafting and delivering such a speech: "Menexenus: And do you think that you yourself would be able to make the speech, if required . . . Socrates: That I should be able to make the speech would be nothing [surprising], Menexenus. For she who is my instructor is by no means weak in the art of rhetoric. On the contrary, she has turned out many fine orators, and amongst them one who surpassed all other Greeks, Pericles, the son of Xanthippus. Menexenus: Who is she? But you mean Aspasia, no doubt. Socrates: I do. " [Plato. Menexenus 235 E; 236 A. tr. Bury. ] Socrates goes on to explain that on the previous day, he had heard Aspasia rehearsing a funeral speech that she was preparing. Some of it she had already written; other parts of it she was making up on the spot, and she was doing all of this at the same time she was working on Pericles's funeral oration. Socrates apparently had a copy of the first speech, and Menexenus prevailed upon him to recite it. The rest of the dialogue is taken up with Socrates's presentation of Aspasia's speech.
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32. HOMEGROWN TERRORISM?
INTRODUCTION
First-century BCE Roman politics was as well documented as it was muddled. We have more first-hand literary sources of information about that century than any other in Roman--or Greek--history. It was a time of egomaniacal military and political leaders, whose goals seemed to include domination of the Roman government, and also a time of idealistic individuals determined to stop them. It was a time of shifting political alliances and shifting friendships, changes that seemed to happen weekly . . . or daily . . . or even hourly. The dynamic of the century could be well summarized by one of its most famous events: the assassination of Julius Caesar, in 44 BCE As the circle of almost two dozen conspirators closed around him on the Ides of March, and each one delivered a knife thrust, the mortally wounded Caesar recognized the faces of several men whom he thought were his friends, including Brutus. Young Brutus, his prote? ge? . No wonder Caesar was struck with disbelief--"even you, Brutus? "--at being stabbed in the back, both literally and figuratively, by a friend. Or was he a friend? First century Roman politicians who wanted to survive needed to know who their friends were.
One of the most famous--or infamous--Roman politicians of the time was the dis- appointed office-seeker Lucius Sergius Catilina, better known today as Catiline. Catiline had been a provincial governor (in Africa) in 66, and at the close of his tenure there, he returned to Rome, hoping to run for election to the top office in the Roman government, the consulship. However, irregularities in his African administration pre- cluded his candidacy. He was put on trial for provincial mismanagement, acquitted, and again decided to run for the consulship, this time in 64. He lost. He tried again the next year, and lost again. Now, in effect a three-time loser, Catiline began to search for a more direct, less constitutional, method to gain power: a military coup, which he began organizing toward the end of the year 63. He eventually amassed a large army of followers, over 10,000, and his plot might have worked had not one man gotten in the way, one of the duly elected consuls for 63, the famous orator, lawyer, and statesman Marcus Tullius Cicero.
Cicero found out about Catiline's plot, and exposed it in a memorable series of four speeches, delivered near the end of 63. The document consists of the first several paragraphs of his first speech against Catiline, on November 7, 63.
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? KEEP IN MIND AS YOU READ
1. The Roman Senate was not an elected, legislative body, like the United States Senate, but instead was composed of nonelected statesmen and politicians, drawn from the ranks of former officeholders, who remained senators for life. Its numbers fluctuated, but generally hovered around 300. The Senate's primary role was advi- sory (although its advice was taken seriously, given the composition of its member- ship), but it also exercised some control over financial matters and foreign policy issues. The Senate met when convened by a consul, and Cicero had good reason to call a meeting for November 7: he had been the target of a failed assassination plot engineered by Catiline!
2. Catiline himself had the audacity to attend the November 7 Senate meeting, even though he must have known, or at least suspected, that he was about to be denounced by one of the most eloquent orators of all time. It is uncertain whether Catiline delivered a rebuttal; there is some indication that he made an effort to deny the charges. Or, as some believe, he may have simply walked out of the temple where the meeting took place without attempting to make a reply. It does seem clear, however, that he was shunned by the senators and took a seat by himself during Cicero's speech, well apart from the others.
3. One of the interesting, if unanswerable, questions about Cicero's speech is whether he had a written text of it or simply delivered it extemporaneously. It seems unlikely that he carried a manuscript, or even notes, with him to address the Senate; Roman (and Greek) orators always used elaborate and vigorous arm and hand gestures during their speeches, and it is difficult to envision an orator encumbered by sheets or rolls of paper being able to perform the appropriate gestures. Cicero probably had prepared and rehearsed the speech in advance, rather than making it up as he went along, but he almost certainly did not read it.
4. Like modern attorneys, Cicero bases many of his arguments on legal and historical precedents.
Document: When Cicero Speaks, People
Listen!
In the name of heaven, Catiline, how long do you propose to exploit our patience? Do you really suppose that your lunatic activities are going to escape our retaliation for evermore? Are there to be no limits to this audacious, uncontrollable swaggering? Look at the garrison of our Roman nation which guards the Palatine by night, look at the patrols ranging the city, the whole population gripped by terror, the entire body of loyal citizens massing at one single spot!
Look at this meeting of our Senate behind strongly fortified defenses, see the expressions on the countenances of every one of these men who are here! Have none of these sights made the smallest impact on your heart? You must be well aware that your plot has been detected. Now that every single person in this place knows all about your conspiracy, you cannot fail to realize it is doomed. Do you suppose there is a single individual here who has not got
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A group of senators outside the Temple of Jupiter, Roman, fourth century CE. (Louvre, Paris, France/ Alinari/The Bridgeman Art Library)
the very fullest information about what you were doing last night and the night before, where you went, the men you summoned, the plans you concocted?
What a scandalous commentary on our age and its standards! For the senate knows all about these things. The consul sees them being done.