## PRIVATE ASSOCIATIONS OR PUBLIC BODIES? THE GEROUSIAI OF THE GREEK CITIES IN THE IMPERIAL PERIOD *

By Nikos Giannakopoulos

Summary: The article explores the position of the Gerousia in the associative universe of the Greek cities of the Imperial period. The first section examines the public dimension of the Gerousia, as it emerges from its interaction with the civic institutions, the local notables and the imperial power. The second section focuses on the Gerousia's similarities with private associations, both in their organizational form and in several of their activities, such as the protection of graves and the administration of funerary endowments. The third section draws a comparison between the public role of the Gerousia and that of private associations. Finally, the last section proposes a taxonomy of the various corporate bodies of the Greek polis in relation to their access to events, acts and symbols that expressed the sovereign power of the civic community and its collective identity.  In  these  terms,  the  Gerousia  occupied  an  impressively  high  position  which brought her very close to the Council and the People.

## I ntroduction

During the Imperial Period organised bodies of elders styled Gerousiai or simply - and more rarely gerontes and geraioi are attested in numerous Greek cities, especially in Asia Minor but also in the Aegean islands and in certain important centres of mainland Greece including Athens and Thessaloniki. 1 These Gerousiai first appear in the Late Hellenistic Period

* An earlier version of this paper was read at a Round Table organized by the Copenhagen Associations Project and the Saxo Institute in the University of Copenhagen on 13 November 2015. I would like to thank J.-M. Carbon, B. Eckhardt, V. Gabrielsen, R. Oetjen, M. Paganini, S. Skaltsa, C.A. Thomsen and S. Zoumbaki for their valuable comments. Any fault or misinterpretation are entirely my responsibility.
- 1 Five monographs have been devoted to this institution: Oliver 1941; Van Rossum 1988; Bailey 2006; Giannakopoulos 2008a; Bauer 2014.

Nikos  Giannakopoulos:  'Private  Associations  or  Public  Bodies?  The  Gerousiai  of  the Greek Cities in the Imperial Period' C&M 73 (2024) 1-41.

but from the mid-1st century B.C. onwards they multiply and flourish in a spectacular fashion. Unlike the homonymous bodies of the Archaic and Classical periods - for example, the Spartan Gerousia - they did not perform functions directly relating to civic government and did not acquire or exercise any kind of administrative competence over public affairs. They were not involved in law-making, the administration of justice or in proposing decrees to the popular assembly. Their most characteristic feature, one on which all modern scholars agree, was the fact that they were centred on the gymnasium. Indeed, about two dozen cities provide us with epigraphic evidence of gymnasiarchoi in charge of these Gerousiai and of gymnasial amenities used by them. 2

In the late 19th century certain students of the civic institutions in Roman Asia Minor, especially those focusing on Ephesus, where a Gerousia perhaps involved in civic administration already appears under Lysimachos, 3 treated the Gerousiai of the Imperial Period as public bodies

- 2 The origin of these gymnasial Gerousiai is not clear and the subject cannot be treated here. In a few cities late Hellenistic associations of presbyteroi predate the Gerousia, which emerges later in the Imperial Period. But sometimes the two terms are used in the same document, referring to what seems to have been a single body of elders. According to Van Rossum (1988: 238-39) the Gerousia in these cities may be seen as the continuation of the presbytero i. Zimmermann (2007: 1523-27) argued that at least in some cities the Gerousia may have emerged as the representative council of a broader body of presbyteroi . I have elsewhere argued (Giannakopoulos 2008a: 13-27) in favour of an institutional evolution from associations of presbyteroi to Gerousiai that were more fully integrated in the public sphere (the term presbyteroi remaining in use when referring to the purely gymnasial activities of the members). Focusing on the presbyteroi themselves and not on their relation with the Gerousia, Fröhlich (2013: 49) rightly re-emphasised that local variations constituted the decisive factor (a point already noted by Van Rossum, Zimmermann and Giannakopoulos). Whatever the relation between the presbyteroi and the Gerousia might have been, it should be stressed that in most cities a gymnasial association of elders appears only - and right from the start - with the name Gerousia or gerontes / geraioi .
- 3 The evidence for the Gerousia of Ephesus under Lysimachos consists in a passage of Strabo (14.1.21), who remarks that this body was attached to the epikletoi and two honorific decrees ( I. Eph . 1449, 1470). These testimonies have generated various interpretations regarding the Gerousia's involvement in the local government (see more recently Bailey 2006: 45-58; Bauer 2014: 81-90).

analogous to the Council and exercising some kind of authority and control over religious affairs. 4 However, in the first part of the 20th century it was Mommsen's view that prevailed: Gerousiai were characterised as primarily social organisations composed of respectable citizens of mature age. 5 For example, Jones, in his seminal book on the Greek city from Alexander to Justinian,  treated  the  Gerousiai  as  the  equivalent  of  the groups of neoi : indicatively, he wrote about a society for men of a mature age, characterising it as an aristocratic club. 6 A fairly similar approach was adopted by D. Magie, who also linked the Gerousiai with the groups of neoi and the gymnasium, writing about associations and organisations of social character resembling modern clubs. 7

In an extremely important study published in 1941 James Oliver redefined the problem in many important ways by distinguishing between:

- a)  social  organisations  of  elder  citizens,  private  or  semi-private  in character, corresponding to the organisations of epheboi and neoi .
- b)  public bodies or corporations involved in sacred affairs, what he called the 'sacred Gerousiai', mainly on the basis of evidence from Athens and Ephesus. 8

Oliver's views were criticised and never widely accepted. 9 It was only in 1988 that a comprehensive and systematic study of the Greek Gerousia in the Roman Period was compiled by Van Rossum. 10 The value of this book cannot be overstated and has been widely recognised. Van Rossum

- 4 See e.g. Menadier 1880: 52-63; Hicks 1890: 82; Hogarth 1891: 70-74. The most recent extensive summary of the various views expressed on the nature of the Gerousiai is provided by Bailey 2006: 4-15; Bauer 2014: 66-77. Cf. also Oliver 1941: 9-13; Van Rossum 1988: 1-16; Giannakopoulos 2008a: 7-12.
- 5 Mommsen 1894: 326 n. 2.
- 6 Jones 1940: 225-26.
- 7 Magie 1950: 62-63.
- 8 Without any reservations Oliver (1941: 3, 8) characterises both the Athenian and the Ephesian Gerousiai as public bodies or corporations, as opposed to the (semi)private 'Asiatic' or 'Ionian' Gerousiai centred on the gymnasium.
- 9 See the review compiled by Jones 1944.
- 10  Van Rossum 1988.

studied in detail the prosopographical data and concluded that the Gerousia was composed both of councillors and rich commoners, frequently related to the former. He rightly rejected Oliver's distinction, claiming that any Gerousia could under certain circumstances be called hiera and be involved in religious ceremonies, as a passive agent, invited by rich benefactors. 11 For Van Rossum the Gerousia was 'an institution through which the members are established as a privileged group'. 12 At a formal level, its political role was not significant and was expressed through the means of honorific decrees. Informally, the Gerousia provided a forum for discussion for respectable influential men living in cities where 'patronage and personal relationships were of vital political importance'. 13

Hence,  there  has  already  been  a  considerable  scholarly  discussion about the character and nature of the Gerousia and the main objective has been to define whether the Gerousia was a social or a public corporation, or in Oliver's case, to what extent we may distinguish between public  Gerousiai  with  religious  functions  and  social  ones.  Attention should be paid to the choice of terms: the discussion has evolved mainly around  the  dipole  social-public  and  not  private-public.  However,  as noted above, Oliver did define his social Gerousiai as private or semi-private; moreover, the fact that 20th-century Anglo-American scholars frequently compared the Gerousia with modern clubs suggests in my view that they tended at least implicitly to treat it as a private organisation. The use of the term 'social' on their part was rather dictated by the fact that they quite rightly focused on the Gerousia's relation with the gymnasium and on its similarity to the age-groups established and functioning within and around this institution. In reality, though, the characterisation of the Gerousia as a social organisation rested on a notion similar to the one underlying the juxtaposition between private bodies and public ones: the assumption that private - and, as a matter of fact, social bodies do not, by definition, perform any function relating to the administration of state affairs.

This is of course true but in my view does not suffice to place the Gerousia exclusively in the realm of private-social institutions. Above all, the Gerousia's involvement in the award of civic honours, a phenomenon entering the realm of civic politics and deeply rooted in the public sphere, and its presence in various acts symbolising the civic community's political identity call for another perspective. Thus, in a dissertation compiled in 2004 and published in 2008 I tried to highlight what may be termed as the public, even political, dimension of the Gerousia, a subject left relatively unexplored in Van Rossum's study, which is nevertheless valuable and very illuminating on a wide range of issues. 14 Likewise, in a still unpublished dissertation submitted in 2006 and compiled independently from mine, Colin Bailey also emphasised the semi-public character of the Ephesian Gerousia. Quite recently Ennio Bauer drew our attention to the local variations that characterised the Gerousiai of the Asia Minor cities. Finally, Eckhardt has examined the Gerousia in the light of his general thesis  about  an  officialization  and  institutionalization  of  associations, based on the Roman model. In this line of thought, the Gerousia (and the associations of neoi as well), whose establishment and privileges are frequently recognized by the Roman state, enters the scope of Roman law more fully than other associations and tends to resemble the Roman collegia licita . 15

11  Van Rossum 1988: 87-145, 170-73.

12  Van Rossum 1988: 241.

13  Van Rossum 1988: 242.

My intention in this paper is to present and discuss the Gerousia's public dimension, mainly by focusing on evidence relating to its publicly visible activities and to certain of its organisational aspects. Within this framework I attempt a brief comparison with similar activities deployed by religious and professional associations which we conveniently, but perhaps not always completely accurately, characterise as private. In order  to  better  illustrate  the  differences  between  the  Gerousia  and  the other associations commonly characterised as private, I also take into account the similarities between the Gerousia and another gymnasial association with a considerable public dimension, the neoi . However, as limitations  of  space  do  not  permit  a  fuller  treatment  of  these  similarities here, the reader should refer to B. Eckhardt's works cited in note 15.

A  terminological  clarification  is  necessary:  first  of  all,  the  public sphere is not to be equated with the government and the state. Moreo- ver, even what we call private associations, as they interacted with various social and political agents - by awarding honours, entering into patronage relations with high-standing individuals, cultivating bonds with sanctuaries and official cults, engaging in economic activities and adopting the organisation model of the polis -,  may be seen as creating and obtaining access to what has been recently termed as a 'rather novel form of public space', perhaps similar in some respects to the modern notion of Civil Society. 16 Being very much akin to private associations, in terms of internal organisation and activities (see below Section II), the Gerousiai also participated in this process. However, several of the Gerousia's features and the nature of its interaction with the state authorities (summarised in Section III points a-i) demonstrate a considerable degree of access to what may be termed a 'traditional' public space which, although not completely identified with governmental institutions, was nonetheless directly related to and controlled by the state and its agents (for example, the various civic organs and officials). It is in this sense that the  'public'  dimension  of  the  Gerousia  is  examined  in  this  paper.  Although this distinction is rather artificial, it may be useful and fruitful in comparing the position held by the Gerousia with that of the various private associations.

14  Giannakopoulos 2008a.

15  Bailey 2006: 18; Bauer 2014; Eckhardt 2016; Eckhardt 2021; Eckhardt 2023: 340-41.

## I .   T h e   p u b l i c   r o l e   a n d   p u b l i c   d i m e n s i o n of the Gerousia

To a large extent, Van Rossum's conclusions were based on an implicit underestimation  of  the  significance  attributed  to  the  awards  of  civic honours. However, the latter cannot be treated as a mere formality; they constituted  important  political  acts  which  articulated  a  political  discourse on the part of the honouring party, regarding both the honoured person and the values that he or she promoted through his or her public presence. The award of honours was a matter of thorough debate and discussion, mainly because of a keen awareness that honours functioned as means of enhancing the political capital of each individual benefactor, within the wider framework of an intense intra-elite competition. Benefactors needed the visible honours that the polis and various institutions within it could offer and this in turn gave to all the potential honouring groups a considerable political power and a significant degree of control over the public behaviour of the local political class. 17 In other words, the attribution of honours was the necessary condition which enabled the system of euergetism to continue to function as an important element for the promotion of civic life, in accordance with long-established prevailing norms and cultural expectations regarding the nature of civilised life within the polis . 18

In this respect, the Gerousia's frequent co-operation with the local Council and People in the award of honours, as evidenced by dozens of honorific inscriptions mentioning these three institutions as co-grantors of  honour, 19 demonstrates  how  well-rooted  the  Gerousia  was  in  local civic life. The language of these honorific inscriptions, in terms of what it indicates about the procedures resulting in the award of honours, is revealing. Frequently found in honorific inscriptions, formulas such as ἡ βουλὴ καὶ ὁ δῆμος καὶ ἡ γερουσία ἐτείμησαν may in fact indicate that the Gerousia first issued a separate decree temporally coordinating its actions with the Council and the People and subsequently cooperated with the latter in the erection of a joint monument. The exact form of the procedures behind this cooperation between the different institutions is not

- 17  Van Nijf 1997: 113-20 rightly stresses this point. On the political significance of honours in Roman society see Lendon 1997: 31-57, who rightly insists on the fact that a notable's time depended on the public recognition of his deeds and merits, a function performed by the honours attributed by the community. On honours as a means of establishing a social distance between the euergetai and the rest of the citizens see Sartre 1991: 164-65. For a recent comprehensive treatment of these issues see HellerVan Nijf 2017: 5-15.
- 18  For the diverse ways in which the Greek polis of the Imperial Period defined itself by reference to the cultural values of Hellenism, embodied in various aspects of civic life  partly  financed  by  euergetism,  see  the  recent  synthetic  treatments  by Zuiderhoek 2009: 71-112; Pont 2010. Cf. also the insightful remarks of Mitchell 1993: 80-81, 198-99. On the various considerations taken into account in euergetic choices between games and buildings see now Kokkinia 2012; NG 2015.
- 19  The evidence is assembled and discussed in Giannakopoulos 2008a: 185-247.

easily discernible, but at least two inscriptions of the late Hellenistic Period may provide a clue.

The first one is a decree issued by the Council and the People of Minoa at  Amorgos in honour of the gymnasiarchos Eunomides. 20 Only the last part of the justification clause is preserved; it refers to the fact that Eunomides had also been honoured by a koinon ton aliephomenon and that the People did not want to lag behind. The Council and the People decided to award a crown, an event that was to be proclaimed at certain festivals: the proclamation recorded the People as the sole grantor of the honour. However, the decree also prescribed the erection of an image in the gymnasium with an inscription which referred to both the People and the koinon ton aleiphomenon as the honouring bodies.

The second inscription is the well-known decree of Sestos for Menas. 21 In l. 41 there is a reference to the fact that the epheboi and the neoi had crowned Menas when he served as gymnasiarchos for the first time. Lines 54 ff. refer to Menas' deeds during his second term of office as gymnasiarchos . The Council and the People recognised and approved of the crown given to him by the epheboi and the neoi (l.  95)  and  decided to erect a bronze image of him in the gymnasium with an inscription mentioning both the People and the neoi as the honouring bodies.

Two points need to be stressed here. First, it is hardly accidental that the honouring bodies which cooperated with the Council and the People in the aforementioned decrees were, just like the Gerousia, centred on the gymnasium. The case of the neoi deserves special attention: as has already been noted, this officially recognised gymnasial association bore numerous similarities to the Gerousia in terms of integration into the public sphere (more on this below). Second, in both cases the Council and the People first took into consideration and then accepted the honours voted separately by other associations and then proceeded with the erection of an honorific monument with an inscription mentioning all the parties involved as grantors of the honour. Different institutions inside the polis responded to and honoured a great benefactor at the same time, initially functioning in a formally independent manner but subsequently working together at the final stage of the honorific process. The Gerousia's frequent appearance alongside the Council and the People in honorific inscriptions was probably the result of formal procedures similar to those described in the decrees for Eunomides and Menas. These procedures brought the Gerousia into official contact and interaction with the Council and the People and ended with the association of the names of all three parties in public monuments, i.e. in the civic landscape.

Other verbal formulas in honorific inscriptions demonstrate the participation of the Gerousia in a common decree issued jointly by all the honouring parties. Such seems to be the case in Akmonia, as the honorific  inscription for L. Egnatius Quartus demonstrates. The Council, the People, the Gerousia and a civic tribe awarded honours κατὰ ψήφισμα πάνδημον . 22 At Patara the honorific decree for the Lykiarch Iason explicitly mentions the Gerousia as one of the issuing bodies ( ἔδοξε Παταρέων τῆς μητροπόλεως τοῦ Λυκίων ἔθνους τῇ βουλῇ καῖ τῷ δήμῳ καὶ τῇ γερουσίᾳ ). 23 Once again, it  is  not  easy  to  understand  what  exactly  the Gerousia's role was in a procedure usually and normally involving the popular assembly examining a probouleuma issued by the Council. Nonetheless, this participation in a joint decree marks an even fuller institutional integration and interaction than the one indicated by the honorific formula ἡ βουλὴ καὶ ὁ δῆμος καὶ ἡ γερουσία ἐτείμησαν … The crucial point here is that, whether as a co-operator in the award of honours or as a participant in a common decision-making process, in the language of these inscriptions the Gerousia appears to stand in the same capacity as the Council and the People. It may occupy the third position in the formula but it is placed at the same level as them.

Clearly, the Gerousia's praise was in many cases considered as a necessary element for the full expression of the civic community's gratitude towards its benefactors. The obvious question is why the civic bodies entrusted with local government were willing to accept the Gerousia as a formal institutional partner in their honorific practices. In my view, the Council and the People tended to exploit in this way the political potential created by the existence of organised bodies composed exclusively of mature men. What this political potential actually meant can be seen in  contemporary  discussions  about  the  political  role  of  the  elders,  of which Plutarch's 'Should an Old Man be engaged in Politics?' is a characteristic example. Plutarch emphasised that the elders should not hold administrative posts 24 but rather devote themselves to the role of educators. 25 The truly politically active elder advises those who have power, instructs those who need instruction, helps those who take decisions, corrects those who behave wrongly and supports and encourages those who act rightly. 26 What is of interest here is that the answers that Plutarch put forward do not essentially differ from the way in which the Greek cities of Asia Minor treated the Gerousia. If the attribution of honours was a necessary condition for the continuance of euergetism, the inclusion of the Gerousia amongst the civic agents conferring honour enhanced the honorific arsenal of the civic community and served the purpose of further encouraging public acts of euergetism, which were seen as contributing to the normal function of the local political and social system.

22 IGR IV 642.

23 IGR III 704 II B.

To a large extent this inclusion may be explained by reference to two factors. The first is what may be described as the respectability of old age. The notion that old age was inherently associated with good counsel and practical wisdom, and, consequently, that old men were still able to provide  services  to  the  community,  was  neither  originally  nor  exclusively Plutarchean: it constituted a topos in the Greek and Roman literary tradition and a well-established conviction regarding the status and public role attributed to the older members of the community. Admittedly, the negative treatment of old age, with emphasis laid on old men's physical  and  mental  disadvantages,  was  equally  widespread. 27 Hence,  one may plausibly argue, as Parkin does, that in reality 'old age did not grant automatically authority or superiority'. 28 In this respect we cannot automatically assume that the Gerousia of the Imperial Period was an institution embodying the respectability of old age. 29

24  Plut. Mor. 793c-794b.

25  Plut. Mor. 790e.

26  Plut. Mor. 796e-f.

27  Both approaches to old age are systematically treated by Parkin 2003: 57-89 (analysis

of the relevant literary tradition), 100-10.

Although this is true, it is not, however, the whole truth. When we are faced with corporate bodies whose identity was at least allegedly based on the old age of their members, 30 we come upon a predetermined positive answer to the problem of whether old age deserved or was entitled to claim public respect. The very choice of the name 'Gerousia' inevitably evoked associations with historical entities such as the Spartan Gerousia or the Roman Senate that was so highly regarded in the Greek East, bodies perceived to be characterised by the qualities of consilium , ratio and sententia . 31 In this respect, it is by no means accidental that in their correspondence with the Ephesian Gerousia, one of the notions that the Roman  emperors  and  proconsuls  used  so  as  to  justify  the  privileges awarded to this body was its πρεσβεῖον . 32 In fact, there is no reason to question the fact that in the ideological climate of the Imperial Period this notion was a defining element of the Gerousia's identity. 33

The second factor that accounts for this inclusion is related to the fundamental fact that the Gerousia was centred on the gymnasium. In the Imperial Period the possession of Greek paideia was considered as an indispensable element of individual and collective self-definition 34 in civic communities which prioritised the promotion of Hellenic culture and its various material manifestations (festivals, buildings), placing them at the

- 28  Parkin 2003: 111; cf. 128.
- 29  Bauer 2014: 72 criticising Giannakopoulos 2008a: 251-59, 496-99.
- 30  There is no specific information regarding the age limit for entering the Gerousia. Such a limit surely existed ( I. Sultan Da ğ i 29 refers to a man who, after reaching the appropriate age, was admitted to the synedrion geronton ), but the age limit does not seem to have been very high. A funerary inscription from Nikaia records a Gerousiastes who died at the age of 45 ( I. Iznik 275).
- 31  See Cicero, De Senectute 18-19 and Plut. Mor. 789d-e. Cf. Byl 1977: 108 n. 8 (on a probable influence of Cicero on Plutarch); Talbert 1984: 80-98 (on contemporary attitudes towards the Senate and the high esteem enjoyed by this body in the Greek East); Parkin 2003: 103.
- 32 SEG XLIII (1993) 765, 767.
- 33  Giannakopoulos 2008a: 497-502; Spawforth 2012: 172-74.
- 34  Cf. Kleijwegt 1991: 83-88.

epicentre  of  their  construction  of  civic  identity. 35 In  this  respect,  the gerontes '  attachment  to  the  gymnasium  was  a  public  statement  about their  continuing  devotion  to  a  particularly  Greek  way  of  life  through their participation in the activities of an institution which constituted the  very  core  of  Hellenic  cultural  values  and  identity. 36 Within  this framework the Gerousia could be seen as an organised body which championed these values by investing them with the authority stemming from the prestige of old age. The combination could surely have worked the other way round as well, the Gerousia itself deriving a high status and authority from its commitment to the gymnasium, as it was also the case with associations of neoi .

Since  the  institutional  framework,  legitimised  by  tradition,  of  the Greek  city  still  revolved  around  a  tripartite  political  structure  which comprised the magistrates, the Council and the Assembly of the People, 37 there was obviously thought to be no space for the Gerousia to acquire and  perform  purely  administrative  functions.  On  the  other  hand,  another way to make use of the Gerousia was to assign to it a special position in the politics of civic honours. The public praise awarded by the Gerousia to civic benefactors was nothing more than a material manifestation of the gerontes ' duty to act as the educators of the community: ἀλλ ' εἰ διὰ μηδὲν ἄλλο τῷ γέροντι παιδείας ἕνεκα τῶν νέων καὶ διδασκαλίας πολιτευτέον ἐστίν , as Plutarch eloquently stated. 38 Praise of euergetism

- 35  See the works cited above in n. 18.
- 36  Cf. Van Nijf 2001: 321-29 who points out that gymnasial activity constituted an essential element of the way in which local elites conceptualised civic identity in the Imperial Period and relates this development to the growing popularity of athletic games. See also Zuiderhoek 2009: 89-91. On physical exercise as an indispensable aspect of the way of life of those gerontes who did not resign from civic politics see Plut. Mor. 793 B. Cf. Galen, Ὑγιεινῶν Λόγοι , 5. Parkin 2003: 253 n. 62 assembles other relevant literary testimonies. A decree passed by the Gerousia of Magnesia on the Meander stated that ἡ δὲ τοῦ ἐλαίου χρῆσίς ἐστιν κατάλληλος μάλιστα καὶ ἀνανκαιοτάτη τοῖς σώμασιν τῶν ἀνθρώπων καὶ πλέον τοῖς τῶν γερόντων ( I. Magnesia 116 ll. 9-10).
- 37  Cf. Van Nijf-Alston 2011: 9-11. On the interaction among Council, Assembly and officials in the cities of Roman Asia Minor see Fernoux 2011: 189-236, 348-88; a detailed discussion of civic officials may be found in Dmitriev 2005: 109-246.
- 38  Plut. Mor. 790e.

was perfectly compatible with the Plutarchean notion of the gerontes being responsible not for providing leadership but for ensuring that the community possessed the proper leadership. Hence, the very existence of organised bodies embodying the respectability of old age and the cultural  values  of  the  gymnasium,  combined  with  the  particular  significance of the politics of honour in the Greek cities of the Imperial Period, gave to the Gerousia an important public, even political - in the wide sense of the word - dimension. The Gerousia appeared as an important additional provider of honour, which was highly esteemed both by the traditional honouring parties, the Council and the People, and the honorands themselves. Furthermore, the very fact of the Gerousia's frequent cooperation with the Council and the People, gave to the associations of old men a considerable advantage in their competition with other associations equally not involved in the local government and administration. 39

The Gerousia's close association with the world of civic institutions is also manifest in the benefactions directed to this body so as to support its infrastructure and activities. Two examples are particularly indicative. As is well known, under Hadrian Smyrna underwent an extensive programme of urban embellishment and renovation, partly financed by the emperor himself and partly by local magnates. The stele recording the relevant promises includes a reference to the prytanes Klaudianos' commitment to repair the roof of the Gerousia's aleipterion . Other such interventions included the reconstruction of public gardens, works in two basilikai and the construction of a temple of Tyche. 40 At Thyateira a local benefactor who supervised the construction of an aqueduct and the erection of statues of Eros was also involved in building an oikobasilikos for the Gerousia. 41 In both cases general schemes of more or less public character aiming at associating the benefactors' excellence with a variety of civic institutions accorded to the Gerousia a prominent position.

Moreover, as a recipient of distributions, the Gerousia always appears along with the Council, the civic tribes or the citizen-body as a whole.

39  On the competition between different associations as grantors of honour see Van Nijf 1997: 120.

40 I. Smyrna 697 (see ll.16-18 for the Gerousia).

41 TAM V 2 991.

Admittedly, these distributions were private initiatives, although they were  nonetheless  addressed  to  civic  categories  and  corporate  bodies. Thus, local magnates like Menodora from Sillyon or the anonymous Lycian benefactor whose services are recorded in an inscription from Xanthos included the Gerousia among the beneficiaries of their generosity. 42 At Aphrodisias, a dining-room was dedicated to Aphrodite and the patris , and the donor promised to finance on a regular basis banquets offered to the councillors, the diakosiaprotoi , the Gerousia and the civic tribes. 43 In Philadelpheia and Aphrodisias the Gerousia appears next to the Council as  a  recipient  of  commemorative  donations  prescribing  annually  repeated distributions of money, sometimes held before the statue of the donor. 44 The benefactor Gaius Stertinius Orpex, a freedman serving as scriba  librarius in  Ephesus,  deserves  special  mention.  He  bequeathed money to  the  Council  and  the  Gerousia  for  annual  distributions.  The councillors were gathered for that purpose in front of his honorific monument erected in the market-place and the Gerousiastai in  front  of  his honorific monument erected in the stadium. The Gerousia was also the recipient of another distribution in front of the donor's grave, where a banquet also took place. 45 Orpex's public presence included the Gerousia in a particular way, corresponding to the body's distinct functions relating to its involvement in athletic activities and the perpetuation of the memory of important benefactors.

Another point that should be taken into account is the fact that, when appearing as a participant in banquets or as a beneficiary of distributions of sacrificial meat, the Gerousia attended events that were organised by local sacral magistrates in their official capacity. Thus, a priestly couple at Stratonikeia (Theophilos and Tryphaina) proudly recorded in an inscription summarising their deeds during their term of office that they offered the sacred banquet-hall for the use of all the social and age categories of the polis and that they organised a banquet for the Gerousia, the only local institution to be treated in this way. 46 Several priestesses of Artemis at Ephesos distributed sacrificial meat to the Council and the Gerousia, as part of their official duties. 47 Following the same example, two  Milesian gymnasiarchoi ,  after  performing  the  regularly  prescribed sacrifices to Herakles, Hermes and the local hero Antiochos, distributed the sacrificial meat to the Gerousia. 48 At Stratonikeia another couple of priests (Oulpios Ariston and Ailia Tryphena Drakontis) completed their term of office by distributing equal sums of money to the Council and the Gerousia, 49 while at Seleukeia in Cilicia, the buyer of the local priesthood of Athena was obliged to offer cash handouts to the councillors, the citizens and the gerontes , the latter being more generously treated than the former. 50

42  See IGR III 800-2 and Fouilles de Xanthos

43 IAph2007 12.26 d ( MAMA

VIII 413d).

44  See IAph2007 11 23, 12 317, 12 1111 from Aphrodisias and CIG 3417 from Philadelphia.

45  The inscriptions for Orpex are I. Eph

46 I. Stratonikeia 270.

. 411, 720, 2113, 4123.

VII 67 respectively.

Furthermore, special mention should be made to a similar well-established practice in Syros. From the middle of the 2nd century A.D. the eponymous archontes , the stephanephoroi , organised various ceremonies during the first days of their duties, including sacrifices, distributions of money  and  wine  and  of  course  banquets. 51 The  beneficiaries  were roughly the whole free male population of the island divided into the following categories: the Gerousia, the citizens, the katoikoi, and the foreigners from the neighbouring islands. Sometimes the women and the children also took part. The Gerousia was the only corporate body that participated (note the absence of the Council) and it occupied the most privileged position as far as the amount of distributed money was concerned. Moreover, it was recorded that the privileges of the Gerousia derived from a long-established custom, while those of the other categories resulted from a decree issued by the Council and the People. 52 Among these ceremonies there were banquets offered by the stephanephoroi to the Gerousia and to whomever else they wanted to invite 53 and this implies that the position of the Gerousia was independent from the will of the current stephanephoros , who had to comply with the precedent established by the custom. When a ritualised representation of the civic hierarchy took place, the Gerousia was positioned at the top. Unsurprisingly, according to a sacred law of Magnesia on the Meander regulating an annual procession, the members of the Gerousia occupied the second position right after the stephanephoros and the priests of Artemis. 54

47 I. Eph. 987-88; SEG

XLIII (1993) 779.

48 I. Milet 368.

49 I. Stratonikeia 237 ll. 9-15.

50  Hagel & Tomaschitz 1998: 371 Seleukia 124.

XII 5 659-66. See Van Rossum 1988: 157-58; Nigdelis 1990: 282; Schmitt-Pantel 1992:

51 IG 268-69; Giannakopoulos 2008a: 376-385; Le Queré 2015: 217

52 IG XII 5 662 ll. 12-18.

53 IG XII 5 663 ll. 20-21 and IG XII 5 667 ll. 14-18

What defined the Gerousia's role in these events was not the fact that it acted as a passive agent 55 - every invited group may be considered as passive in such a context, in the sense that it did not organise the event - but the fact that it was chosen by the organisers precisely because as a highly esteemed body it was considered suitable to participate in public ceremonies which dramatised the civic institutional landscape. 56 In this respect, the Gerousia appeared as an essential element of civic identity.

It is in this light that we may interpret the presence of images personifying the Gerousia in the iconography of civic coins issued by cities such as Hierapolis, Aphrodisias, Tiberiopolis (where the Gerousia is depicted along with the Council), Antiocheia on the Maeander and Aizanoi. 57 Similarly, in Akmonia the statue of the Gerousia stood next to those of the People and the Polis , as an honorific inscription dated to 68 A.D. informs us. 58 The absence of the Council is again worth noting in this case, the Gerousia being considered as a corporate body perfectly suitable to stand in the former's place as an institutional embodiment of the local civic community. It is hardly accidental that prominent citizens of Kos and Attaleia  bearing  the  honorific  titles  of hyios  poleos and hyios  boules  kai demou respectively were awarded the title of hyios Gerousias as well. The resulting mixed titles ( hyios poleos kai Gerousias at  Kos  and hyios boules, demou kai Gerousias at  Attaleia)  expressed the institutional weight of a corporate body which was considered important enough to stand next to the traditional civic organs or even next to the inclusive notion of the polis as a distinct element of the civic community in a fictive filial relation that underlined the moral duty of the honorands towards their fatherland. 59

54 I. Magnesia

98 dated to 197/6 B.C.

55  As Van Rossum 1988: 156-77 argues in his thorough analysis of the banquets offered to and attended by the Gerousia.

56  On the function of banquets and distributions as events reflecting and at the same time shaping the civic reality and hierarchy see Schmitt-Pantel 1992: 10-11, 417-20; Van Nijf 1997: 150-57.

57  Hierapolis: BMC Phrygia 240-41 nr. 78-81; see also RPC IV 9789-90 (temporary). Aphrodisias: RPC IV 2200-1 (temporary). Cf. Leschorn-Franke 2002: 79. Tiberiopolis: RPC III 2521. Antiocheia on the Maeander: BMC Caria 17 nr. 18 and 18 nr. 25. Aizanoi: BMC Phrygia 39 nr. 112. Cf. Leschorn-Franke 2002: 79 and Giannakopoulos 2008a: 259-63.

58 SEG XLVI (2006), 1490.

That the citizens and the authorities of a Greek city under Roman rule perceived their local Gerousiai as essentially public institutions becomes equally evident when we examine the language of some of the inscriptions pertaining to benefactions and financial subsidies addressed to this body. In the 3rd century A.D., a lady from Thessaloniki who wished to console herself for the premature death of her son, a local councillor, donated to the city - for the benefit of the Gerousia - the sum of 10,000 drachmas  ( Αὐρ ( ηλία ) ∙ Ἰσιδώρα | ἡ μήτηρ εἰς παραμυ | θίαν ἑαυτῆς , ἐπι | δοῦσα τῇ πόλει ἐπ ' ὀνόματος | αὐτοῦ εἰς γερου | σίαν Ἀττικὰς | μυρίας ). 60 Taken literally, this shows that the civic authorities were the first to receive the donation, which was to be subsequently handed over by them to the local Gerousia. The reason why the donor chose not to address her donation directly to the Gerousia eludes us. 61 But it is equally important that in the donor's mind a gift addressed to the city could be ultimately directed to the Gerousia precisely because the latter was conceived as being an institution fully integrated in the local civic landscape.

A similar notion underlies the construction of a stoa and a bathingroom for the Gerousia of Teos under Augustus. 62 This was a project financed by the interest produced out of the money that a local benefactor had left to the city. The fragmentary honorary inscription which provides the relevant information enables us to grasp some of the details of this enterprise. It is clear that it was the donor's son who had taken the initiative to use the money bequeathed to the city in order to improve the Gerousia's infrastructure. Admittedly, references to this son's other cash donations to the Gerousia, in addition to those given by his parents, demonstrate that strong bonds between the two parties had already existed. But the use of the bequeathed paternal money, that is, the use of public money, for the benefit of the Gerousia, is something strikingly different. It presupposes that the donor's son considered this particular enterprise as perfectly compatible with the testator's intentions and that the  civic  authorities  ultimately  gave  their  approval,  envisaging  this course of action as one leading not to an alienation but to a useful utilisation of public property. In this respect, it is highly indicative that a civic agoranomos at Magnesia on the Meander was praised, amongst other things, for supplying the Gerousia at his own expense with the oil that the city customarily gave to this body each day. 63 Further information on this practice is provided by the well-known decree of the Magnesian Gerousia regulating its internal finances and issued precisely because the daily portion of oil allocated by the city was simply not adequate. 64

59  For Attaleia see IGR III 780; An. Ep. 1974: 635. For the evidence from Kos see Buraselis 2000: 160-62. Cf. Giannakopoulos 2008a: 273-91; ibid. 2008b.

60 IG X 2 1 207.

61  A somewhat similar parallel may be found in the donation of 5,000 denarii by Caius Caninius Synallasson to the city of Iasos for the expenses of the stephanephoria . The city  decided  to  use  the  money  for  the  benefit  of  the  gymnasium  of  the neoi .  An epimeletes was to invest the capital in loans and the interest was to be handed to the dioiketai of the neoi , who were to spend the entire sum on the purchase of oil. See I. Iasos 248 (dated under Hadrian) with Forbes 1933: 42-43.

62 IGR IV 1572.

In the second half of the 2nd century A.D. the Council and the People of  Termessos in Pisidia voted to inscribe their decrees on stelai which were to be erected inside Zeus' sanctuary. This decision included the Gerousia's syngrammata as well. Both these civic decrees and the Gerousia's syngrammata were considered to have been passed 'for the interest and the salvation of private and public affairs' and to have been tested in time;  henceforward they were to be protected as 'sacred'. 65 It  is  quite possible that internal problems and unrest of a political and social character (cf. the explicit mention of private affairs in the decree) had preceded and led to the aforementioned decision. But what matters most for the purpose of this paper is the undisputable fact that for the civic authorities of Termessos the respect for the Gerousia's decisions constituted an indispensable factor of stability.

63 I. Magnesia

179 ll. 15-19.

64 I. Magnesia

116.

65 TAM III 1 3A: περὶ ][ τῶν τῆς βουλῆς καὶ το ] ῦ̣ [ δ ] ή̣ |[ μου ψη ] φ̣ι̣σ̣μ̣άτω̣ ν̣ κ̣ [ α ] ὶ τῶ̣ν̣ ι -|…. τοῦ ] σ̣υ̣ν̣ε̣δρ̣ίου τῆς γε̣ |[ ρου ] σ̣ί̣ [ α ] ς σ̣υ̣ν̣γρ̣α̣μ̣μά̣των | ἐ̣π̣ὶ τῶ̣ συμ̣φέρ̣ον̣τι κ̣α̣ὶ ἐπὶ | τῆ σωτ̣η ̣ ρ̣ία̣ τῶ̣ν τε ἰδιωτι | κῶν κα̣ὶ τῶν δημοσίων | πρα̣γμ̣άτων γεγραμ̣μ̣έ | νων κα̣ὶ πε̣ίρα̣ δ̣εδ̣οκιμ̣ασ | μένων γνώμην ἐξήνεν | κεν ἡ βουλὴ κα̣ὶ ὁ σύμ̣πα̣ς | δῆμ̣ος ἀν̣α̣γραφῆναι αὐ | τὰ̣ ἐν στήλαις κα̣ὶ ταύτας | στ < αθ > ῆναι ἐν τῶ ἱερῶ τῶ τοῦ | Διός , ἵνα̣ κα̣ὶ ὡς ἱερὰ̣ φυλά̣τ | τητα̣ι κα̣ὶ μηδενὶ ἐξῆ | πα̣ρα̣βαίνειν α̣ὐτὰ̣ μ̣η | δὲ διὰ̣ τοῦτο .  Cf.  Rhodes-Lewis 1997: 539; Giannakopoulos 2008a: 267-69; Bauer 2014: 241-43.

After all, whenever we may trace evidence relating to the establishment of such associations, it is absolutely clear that the relevant decision stemmed from the civic authorities. The best-known example is the Gerousia of Sidyma, established by a decree issued by the Council and the People  under  Commodus. 66 There  is  a  little  detail  in  the  justification clause of this decree which in my view clarifies the way that this initiative was conceptualised by the polis of Sidyma:

ἐπεὶ διὰ τοὺς [ εὐ ] τ̣υχεστάτους καιροὺς τοῦ θειοτάτου Αὐτοκράτορος Καίσαρος [ Μάρκου Αὐρηλίου Κομμόδου Ἀντωνείνου ] 〛 Σεβαστοῦ Εὐσεβοῦς Εὐτυχοῦς καὶ διὰ τὴν τοῦ κρατίστου ἀνθυπάτου Γάι̣ου̣ Πομπωνίου Βά [ σ ] σου Τερεντιανοῦ περὶ τὰς πόλεις αὔξησιν καὶ ἡ ἡμετέρα πόλις ἐψηφίσατο σύστημα γερον̣τ̣ικὸν .

The use of καὶ here clearly shows that in establishing a Gerousia, the city of Sidyma was adapting itself to a widespread pattern, in an effort to fill what was felt to be a local institutional vacuum.

An equally well-known series of letters sent by Marcus Aurelius and Commodus to the Areios Pagos, the Council and the People of Athens also testifies to long-term deliberations regarding the establishment of a Gerousia, its financial assets and the conditions of membership. 67 Moreover, inscriptions from Astypalaia, Thessaloniki, Kallatis and Patara attribute the creation of the respective Gerousiai to initiatives taken either by a demiourgos (in Astypalaia) or by a gymnasiarchos (in Thessaloniki, Kallatis and Patara), that is, to civic magistrates acting in their official capacity. 68 It is a fair assumption that at this initial stage the civic authorities also decided who was going to be enlisted in these newly founded Gerousiai. Indicatively, the civic decree of Sidyma mentioning the establishment of the  local  Gerousia  was  followed  by  a  membership-list.  An  inscription from Pompeiopolis refers to a certain Klaudios Asklepiades who was honoured by the city with citizenship and membership of the Gerousia. 69 It is not clear whether he was an original member of a newly established body or a new member of an already functioning institution; if the second hypothesis is correct, it suggests the possibility that the civic authorities  exercised  a  considerable degree of control over the admission of new gerontes , and this, in turn, could again be seen as an indication of the public character of the association in question. 70

66 TAM II 175.

67  See Oliver 1989: 401-13 nos. 193-203.

68  See Peek 1969: 37-38 no. 86 (Astypalaia); IG X 2 1 195-96 (Thessaloniki); IGLScMin III 31 (Kallatis); Engelmann 2012: 191-92 nr. 11 (Patara).

Another relevant hint may be found in the careers of the Gerousia's officials. The leaders of the Gerousia were usually styled gymnasiarchoi , a clear allusion to the association's main focus of activity. The greatest part of the relevant testimonies comes from honorific inscriptions which enable us to conclude that these gymnasiarchoi were prominent politicians occupying important local magistracies as well. One can hardly escape noticing that for these men the gymnasiarchia of the Gerousia was part of a  wider cursus honorum in local politics. 71 Indicatively, an inscription from Xanthos equates the gymnasiarchia of the Gerousia with other civic magistracies (politikai archai ). 72 Prominent members of the local political class were more than willing to include the tenure of the Gerousia's internal  offices  among  their  purely  civic  distinctions,  and  those  who erected these honorific inscriptions, be it their relatives or the civic organs, adopted the same attitude as well.

Quite often what characterises these careers is some sort of specialisation: certain gymnasiarchoi of the Gerousia are also attested as having held the gymnasiarchia of the neoi and the paides . 73 An Ephesian secretary of  the  Gerousia  is  also  attested  as  secretary  of  the polis , 74 while  at

69   Marek 1993: 147-48 no. 38

70  Cf. Giannakopoulos 2013: 18-23.

71  See on this topic Giannakopoulos 2008a: 57-98.

72 TAM II 294: ἱ ] ερασάμεν̣ [ ος πατρῴ ]| ου θεοῦ Ξάνθου , γυ | μνασιαρχήσας τῆς | σεμνοτάτης γερου | σίας , τελέσας δὲ καὶ | ἑτέρας πλείονας πο | λειτικὰς ἀρχάς , τῇ | πατρίδι τὸν ἀνδρι | άντα κατὰ τὰ ἐψη | φισμένα ἐκ τῶν ἰδί | ων ἀνέστησα .

- 73 I. Milet 309 (Iason). I. Didyma 258 (Epikrates). I. Perge 56 (Demetrios). I. Magnesia 164 (Moschion). IGR IV  1676 (Gaios Sauphios Maker). I.  Iasos 250 (Sopatros). SEG XLVII (1997) 1573 (Andronikos). I. Magnesia ad Sipylum 34 (Dikaphenes).
- 74  This is Poplios Routilios Bassos. See I. Eph . 1486 l. 16 (secretary of the Gerousia) and I. Eph . 1233, 2038 (secretary of the polis).

Kadyanda a tamias of the Gerousia also served as tamias of the People. 75 What is even more important is that sometimes the relevant inscriptions demonstrate the simultaneous tenure of magistracies belonging to the Gerousia's and the city's apparatus. This is so in the cases of the gymnasiarchoi Dikaphenes and Epikrates and the secretaries Markos Aurelios Soterichos and Markos Aurelios Onesimos. 76 All this raises the possibility that at least occasionally appointments to the Gerousia's internal offices did not depend on an exclusively internal decision but were subject to a certain degree of collaboration and coordination with the civic authorities. 77

It  should  be  finally  noted  that  the  imperial  power  followed  a  consistent policy of support towards the Gerousia in various Greek cities. Exchanges of embassies and letters and awards of privileges and fiscal immunities are attested for the Gerousiai of Ephesus, Athens, Apameia, Sardeis, Tralleis and Chios. 78 The imperial appreciation of the institution of the Gerousia as such is perfectly illustrated by the short but fully comprehensive and significant answer given by the proconsul to the request

75 TAM II 661.

- 76  See TAM V 2 1367 (Dikaphenes), I. Didyma 258 (Epikrates at Miletos), I. Tralleis 66 (Markos Aurelios Soterichos at Tralleis), 67 (Markos Aurelios Onesimos).
- 77  Based on the fact that the gymnasiarchoi of the neoi frequently acted as gymnasiarchoi of the epheboi as well, Forbes 1933: 22-23 argued that the former were elected by the polis . Admittedly, it is not uncommon to encounter individuals recorded as gymnasiarchoi of various age-groups ( paides , epheboi , neoi , gerontes / Gerousia ), but there is always the problem of determining whether these gymnasiarchiai were held successively or simultaneously (cf. Poland 1909: 40 and Forbes 1933: 31). In the latter case an involvement on the part of the polis is quite certain. But there is absolutely no evidence to demonstrate that Forbes' view that all the administrative officials of the neoi were appointed by the polis (Forbes 1933: 30-36) necessarily applies to the Gerousia as well (or to the neoi themselves as a matter of fact). In any case, the frequent appearance of the gymnasiarchia of the neoi in inscriptions recording municipal careers indicates the public status of this gymnasial association as well (see below, Section III).
- 78  Ephesus: SEG XLIII (1993) 757-72; I. Eph . 1486 (Oliver 1989: 170-73 no. 71); I. Eph . 25 (Oliver 1989: 346-51 no. 11). Athens: Oliver 1989: 401-13, nos. 193-203. Apameia: Oliver 1941: 163-64 nr. 52. Sardeis: I. Sardis 8 V-VI. Tralleis: I. Tralleis 41. Chios: Zolotas 1908: 234 no. 45.

of the Sydimeans to ratify their decree enacting the foundation of a Gerousia: τὰ καλῶς γενόμενα ἐπαινεῖσθαι μᾶλλον προσήκει ἤ κυροῦσθαι . 79 It is clear that the Romans saw in the Gerousia an institution worth encouragement  and  promotion,  as  it  embodied  at  the  local  level  values which were central to the ideology of the Augustan regime as well: conservatism, respect for (and revival of) tradition, paternalism. 80 The various Gerousiai on their part displayed a great zeal for erecting imperial monuments (sometimes of a clear cultic character) and for organising cultic events for the emperors, 81 in a conscious effort 82 to function as a vehicle for diffusing imperial ideology and for expressing the community's imperial loyalty. It is by no means accidental that a Roman provincial governor, Pliny the Younger, communicating with the emperor Trajan about the destruction that a fire caused in Nikomedeia, included the building of the Gerousia among the destroyed publica opera . 83 His view of the Gerousia perfectly corresponds with contemporary conceptions of this institution at the local level, as expressed in the epigraphic record.

## I I .   T h e   G e r o u s i a ' s   f u n c t i o n   a s   a   p r i v a t e   a s s o c i a t i o n

Although I have so far dwelt on the Gerousia's features that demonstrate its  public  dimension,  we  should  also  constantly  bear  in  mind  that  in many other ways the Gerousia did not differ from private associations. It had its own assemblies and its own officials ( gymnasiarchoi , Gerousiarchai , archontes , grammateis , tamiai and ekdikoi are some of the titles used to denote them). 84 It had its own common treasury - we hear of symbolai paid to the Gerousia 85 and its own financial assets which comprised agricultural land and urban real property as well, sometimes even a gymnasium and baths of its own. Although there is usually no information on how the Gerousia came to own agricultural land, a fair assumption would be that this was the result of donations to the body. Indeed an inscription from Perge explicitly refers to vineyards donated to the geraioi by a certain  Markos  Pheridios. 86 Needless  to  say,  such  gifts  were  frequently awarded to private associations as well. 87 Admittedly, individual Gerousiai such as those of Magnesia and Ephesus appear as great land-owners or great lenders on a scale not attested in private associations; but the difference is exactly that: one regarding the scale of financial assets not their nature. 88

79 TAM II 175 ll. 11-12.

80  See in this respect Giannakopoulos 2008a: 496-501; Spawforth 2012: 172-74.

81  For the relevant evidence see Giannakopoulos 2008a: 407-71.

82  Under Marcus Aurelius, the Ephesian Gerousia possessed images of all the past emperors in its own building ( I. Eph . 25).

83  Plin. Ep . 10.33: Cum diversam partem provinciae circumirem, Nicomediae vastissimum incendium  multas  privatorum  domos  et  duo  publica  opera,  quamquam  via  interiacente, Gerusian et Iseon absumpsit . This point had already been noted by Menadier 1880: 52; cf. Bailey 2006: 9. Commenting on this letter, Sherwin-White 1966: 606-7 characterised the Gerousiai as 'civic centres for the elder men of substance'. It is noteworthy that Pliny explicitly distinguishes between the private residences and the two publica opera , the Gerusia and the Iseon destroyed by the fire.

Another point of convergence between the Gerousiai and private associations concerns their involvement in the various strategies relating to the protection of the memory of the dead. Various Gerousiai appear in our  sources  as  recipients  of  endowments  destined  to  finance  posthumous commemorative rites; 89 sometimes these are the rosalia . 90 The Gerousia of Hierapolis received stephanotika for the crowning of graves. In Hierapolis, Ephesos, Smyrna and Kos the local Gerousiai are called upon to look after tombs, the formula used being κήδεται τοῦ μνημείου . Finally, funerary inscriptions frequently record various Gerousiai as recipients of fines in the event of a violation of the tomb. 91 Once again, the same functions were performed by private associations as well. 92

84  For the internal organisation of the Gerousia see Van Rossum 1988: 189-200; Giannakopoulos 2008a: 57-98.

85  Cf. Giannakopoulos 2013: 16-18.

86 I. Perge 66.

87  Cf. Arnaoutoglou 1998: 74.

88  On the Gerousia's financial assets and activities see Van Rossum 1988: 201-16; Giannakopoulos 2008a: 98-129.

89  See Giannakopoulos 2008a: 293-312, 362-68.

90 I. Iznik 95.

91  See Giannakopoulos 2008a: 314-32.

92   Van Nijf 1997: 31-68; Harland 2013: 68.

## I I I .   C o m p a r i s o n   b e t w e e n  t h e   G e r o u s i a and private associations

The argument presented in the first section regarding the public dimension of the Gerousiai rests mainly on the following points:

- a) the	appearance	of	the	Gerousiai	next	to	the	Council	and	the	People as	equal	co-grantors	of	civic	honours;
- b) the	inclusion	of	the	Gerousiai	in	euergetical	schemes	addressed to	the	civic	community;
- c) the	inclusion	of	the	Gerousiai	in	distributions	which	might	have been	privately	initiated	but	were	nonetheless	addressed	to	some or	all	the	constituent	parts	of	the	civic	community	(Council,	civic tribes,	citizens);
- d) the	Gerousiai's	participation	in	distributions,	banquets	and	festivals	which	were	organised	in	an	official,	sometimes	religious,	context	 by	 state	 officials	 and	 dramatised	 the	 institutional	 civic landscape	as	they	involved	categories	of	participants	defined	by purely	political	criteria	(Council,	citizens,	civic	magistrates);
- e) The	use	of	the	Gerousia	as	a	symbol	of	civic	identity	in	various ways	and	contexts	 (coins,	 statues,	 honorific	 titles	 expressing	 a combined	filial	relation	with	the polis and	the	Gerousia	as	well);
- f) The	financial	aid	given	to	the	Gerousiai	by	the polis ;
- g) The	foundation	of	Gerousiai	by	decisions	and	initiatives	taken	by the polis and	its	magistrates;
- h) The	conceptualisation	of	the	Gerousia's	internal	offices	as	part	of the	civic	cursus	honorum	in	honorific	inscriptions;
- i) The	imperial	support	and	recognition	which	expressed	the	notion that	the	Gerousia	was	part	of	the	local	public	institutions.

The Gerousiai of approximately four dozen cities had at least one or several of the features described in the aforementioned points. Local variations probably played an important role. For example, the Ephesian Gerousia is known to have been continuously and considerably supported by the Roman emperors, but did not join the Council and the People in the award of honours, which is one of the most frequent and significant public features of this institution. The Gerousiai of the Bithynian cities as a rule did not meet the aforementioned criteria. Finally, it seems that the Gerousiai of the old Greek cities of coastal Asia Minor and the adjacent islands were not as active in the joint award of honours as those of the more recent poleis of the hinterland (inner Caria, Phrygia, Pamphylia, Pisidia, Lycia) . 93

We may now proceed to draw a comparison between the public role of  the  Gerousiai  and  that  of  religious  and  professional  associations, which we commonly characterise as private.

Point a: As is well known, publicly visible honours were also awarded by private associations. The honorific inscriptions and monuments set up by them reflected their attempt to claim a distinct position in the civic sphere, presenting themselves as caring 'about the city's wider interests, and not merely about their narrow ones'. 94 Moreover, insofar as the erection of these monuments presupposed the approval of civic authorities, it becomes clear that the latter were willing to enter into formal relations and interaction with private associations, allowing them to inscribe their

- 93  It is important to note that in mainland Greece organised bodies of elders appeared that were officially affiliated to specific deities or heroes of their hosting cities. I characterise this affiliation as official because it forms part of the collective's identity, as expressed in its name, something that is completely absent from the Gerousiai  under  examination  here  which  are  always  defined,  especially  in  their  correspondence with the imperial authorities, with the civic ethnic. The 'Sacred Gerousia of Asklepios' at Hyettos was a private religious association ( IG VII 2808; see Oliver 1941: 29-30; Roesch 1982: 159; Van Rossum 1988: 66-68; cf CAPInv 984 (F. Marchand). In the Peloponnese we encounter groups called 'the Argive gerontes descended from Danaos and Hypermestra' in Argos and 'the sacred gerontes of Upesia descended from Kresphontes' in Messene. A body defined as 'Upesia' (an alternative name for Artemis) is also on record in Thuria. These were also cultic associations closely related to constitutive elements of their hosting cities' political and religious identity and involved in the attribution of honours, usually on their own and not in conjunction with the Council and the People. However, an honorific inscription from Korone dated to the 3rd century A.D. was erected according to a decree of the polis and the hiera Gerousia .  See  on  these  bodies,  Makres  2011 and Spawforth 2012: 169-79 who comment on the relevant testimonies and on the similarities between these public bodies and the other Gerousiai under examination here.
- 94  Van Nijf 1997: 121 commenting on the honours awarded by private associations.

name and presence in the civic landscape. 95 This process was in itself a mark of some kind of public significance attributed to private associations. Admittedly, when the Gerousia was conferring honours alone, it was acting and being treated in a way similar to that of professional or religious associations. 96 However, the very fact that Gerousiai frequently co-operated with the Council and the People in the award of joint honours represented a significantly fuller integration in the civic institutional framework than that any private association might have achieved. The latter might also appear in honorific inscriptions together with the Council and the People, but they did so mainly as executive agents of decisions taken by the aforementioned civic organs. Their name was not normally placed next to that of the Council and the People as grantors of honour. On the contrary, their involvement consisted in financing and realising the erection of the honorific monument voted by the Council and the People, as was the case with the bapheis at Thyateira, 97 the technitai at the Skytike Plateia at Apamea, 98 the epi to geuma pragmateuomenoi

- 95  Van Nijf 1997: 121-26. Gabrielsen 2007: 196. Three texts illustrate the relevant processes. The first is a decree issued by the demos of Termessos in Pisidia which allowed a body of technitai to set up a statue of Atalante (honoured separately by the demos as well) and to engrave on its base whatever inscription they chose ( TAM III 1 4, dated to the 2nd century AD). The second is an honorary decree issued by a koinon of priestesses at Mantineia which prescribes the erection of a stele in the Koragion in accordance with a decision taken by the archontes and the synedroi ( IG V 2 265 dated to 4643 BC). The third is the well-known decree of Kyzikos for Antonia Tryphaina which records both a petition addressed by a group of foreign merchants and the subsequent permission given to them to set up an image of Antonia Tryphaina in the temple of Athena Polias ( IGR IV 144 with SEG IV 2 (1930) 707).
- 96  According to a fragmentary decree dated to the second half of the 2nd century BC from Magnesia on the Meander, the local Gerousia first decided to honour a certain Euboulides with an image and subsequently approached the Council and the People seeking permission to erect the image in question at the palaestra. See I. Magnesia 102 with Wilhelm 1906: 69-71 and Derenne 1933: 72-73.
- 97 TAM V 2 989. Another similar collaboration is attested in TAM V 2 1098: an association of Iouliastai constructed the monument consecrated by the People to Gaios Ioulios Xenon. See Hughes 1999: 172.
- 98 IGR IV 790. In IGR IV 791, also from Apameia, the statue voted by the Council, the People and the Roman settlers is erected by the epi tes Thermaias plateias ergastai in accordance with a decree of the polis .

at Ephesos, 99 and the pragmateuomenoi from Alexandria at Perinthos. 100 Hence, if it is possible to see in these acts an indication that the private associations in question were accepted as 'quasi-official institutions', 101 it  has  to  be  stressed  that  their  treatment  was  not  equal  with  that  reserved for the Gerousiai, frequently appearing side by side with the civic bodies, in the nominative case, as a full partner in the award of honours.

Sometimes the verbal formulas used in honorific inscriptions denote that a private association functioned as an honouring body in accordance with decisions taken by the Council and the People. 102 But such formulas simply demonstrate that the honours awarded by the associations (for example, the erection of a statue in a public place) were - and needed to be - approved by the Council and the People. 103 The initiator  and  the grantor of the honour remained the association alone, not the association in conjunction with the Council and the People, as was the case with the Gerousia.

Only very rarely do we find in honorific inscriptions verbal formulas placing the name of cultic or professional associations next to that of the Council or the People in the nominative case, as co-grantors of honour on an equal basis. 104 The synodos ton tes theou myston at Smyrna honoured two female theologoi along with the Council and the People, 105 but this particular group, perhaps identical to the synodos ton myston tes megales theas pro poleos thesmophorou Demetras ,  known by another honorific inscription as a sole grantor of honour, 106 was devoted to a prominent local deity and thus seems to have cultivated strong bonds with the civic or-

- 99 I. Eph . 728.
- 100 I. Perinthos 27-28.
- 101 See Eckhardt 2016: 153-54.
- 102 See for example I. Kibyra 34: κατὰ τὰ δόξαντα τῇ βουλῇ | καὶ τῷ δήμῳ τῆς λαμπρο | τάτης Καισαρέων Κιβυρα | τῶν πόλεως ἡ σεμνοτάτη | συνεργασία τῶν σκυτοβυρσέ | ων Τιβέριον Κλαύδιον | Πολέμωνα , ἀσιάρχην , ἱπ | πικόν …  Other  examples  include TAM V  3  1491 ( skyteis at Philadelphia), I. Smyrna 715 ( synergasia kyrtobolon at Smyrna), IG IV 365 ( thereutores at Corinth honouring a physician psephismati boules ).
- 103 See above n. 95. Cf. Ustinova 2005: 187 commenting on IG XII 2 1033.
- 104 The evidence is assembled and summarised in Suys 2005: 206-7.
- 105 I. Smyrna 653.
- 106 I. Smyrna 655.

gans. The manifestly political overtones of the cultic association of Pompeiastai  at  Delos,  who  honoured  their  patron  Pompey  along  with  the Athenian People, may also explain this co-operation. 107 In both cases the crucial factor was the public significance attributed to the divine figures venerated by the associations in question, and consequently, to the specific associations as well. 108 Finally, oecumenical athletic and artistic associations - and perhaps their branches as well - that were highly esteemed and officially recognised by the Roman State also appeared in this capacity, in cities like Tralleis, 109 Hierapolis 110 and Erythrai. 111

The  case  of  various  associations  of  Roman  settlers  in  Greek  cities needs also to be briefly considered in this framework. From the 1st century BC onwards such corporate bodies often appear side by side with civic organs as grantors of honours. 112 The political importance of these formally  organised  groups  of  Roman  citizens  in  a  world  governed  by Rome may easily explain the willingness of the civic organs to collaborate with them on an equal basis in the award of honours. In this respect, a comparison with the aforementioned case of the Alexandrian traders

- 107 I. Delos 1641 (CAPInv 893, A. Cazemier). Le Queré 2015: 37 and 43 associates the Delian Pompeiastai with Pompey's victory against the pirates and the relevant Pompeian propaganda.
- 108 Cf. on these associations the remarks made by Suys 2005: 206-14. On the collaboration between private associations and civic bodies in the award of honours see also Harland 2013: 86-87, who, however, does not always distinguish between the joint award of honours and the execution of a decision to award honours. Some of the inscriptions he cites ( I. Lindos 391-92) do not record a joint award of honours, or any kind of collaboration, but simply record the names of the various bodies that had independently honoured a distinguished person on various occasions. This is a not uncommon practice in both honorific and funerary monuments. See IG II ² 4013 (Athens); IGBulg V 5464 (Philippoupolis); Segre - Pugliese Carratelli 1949-1951, no. 78 (Kamiros); IG XII 3 104 (Nisyros); I. Hierapolis 32 (Hierapolis); I. Smyrna 534 (Smyrna); LBW 1743n (Troas).
- 109 I. Tralleis 65. Cf. CAPInv 1729 (M. Carbon). See also I. Tralleis 112, 133.
- 110 SEG XXXV (1985), 1380-81. Cf. CAP Ι nv 138 (B. Eckhardt).
- 111 I. Erythrai 60. Cf. Harland 2013: 87. On associations of athletes see Forbes 1955; Pleket 1973; Caldelli 1992. For the Dionysiac artists see Le Guen 2001; Aneziri 2003. For the Imperial Period cf. Aneziri 2008; Aneziri 2014.
- 112 Zoumbaki  2017:  254-62  assembles  the  relevant  evidence  from  Greece.  See  also Zoumbaki's contribution in this volume. On associations of Romans in Phrygia see now Eckhardt 2016: 149-50.

active at Perinthos may be useful. The latter also constituted an organised group of foreigners although, as opposed to the Romans, it was not so important as to be accepted by the local civic bodies as equal partners.

Points b-d: A comparison between the position held by the Gerousia and the role of private associations in distributions and banquets leads to similar conclusions. As mentioned above, the Gerousia appeared in distributions addressed to corporate civic bodies such as the Council, but also in distributions to non-corporate categories defined by political and legal criteria, such as the citizens, the sitometroumenoi , and even the paroikoi or the metoikoi and the freedmen. On the other hand, private associations seldom did so. Most of the distributions and the banquets which involved them did not include categories of participants defined by political/legal criteria; hence these events, even if organised by influential local statesmen and benefactors, normally did not sanction the presence of private associations next to that of civic institutions, as was the case with the Gerousia.

A notable exception is the distributions offered by Aurelios Hermippos at Philadelphia: the beneficiaries were the Council, the Gerousia and the seven tribes of the city, some if not all of them named after professions. 113 As Van Nijf has noted, the inclusion of the term phyle in the official name of these professional associations shows how the latter strove - and presumably succeeded - to gain political recognition. 114 It is by no means accidental that it was such professional groups, invested with the name of a traditional civic institution, that were deemed worthy of taking their own share in a scheme also addressed to the Council and the Gerousia.

Another exception is the distributions organised by Aba in Histria. 115 But even in this case the professional association of tektones , the Hieroplateitai , presumably a neighbourhood association, and the Herakleiastai , a religious association, received a distribution of wine, as opposed to the Council and the Gerousia, which received donations in cash. Admittedly, occupational associations like those of the physicians and the teachers, along with the Taureastai , a private religious association devoted to the cult of the important local deity Poseidon-Taureas, were treated just like the Council and the Gerousia. 116 Another city on the western coast of the Pontus, Dionysopolis, also furnishes examples of distributions including both the councillors and occupational associations of teachers, physicians and agoraioi . 117

113 IGR IV 1632. See also TAM V 3 1490.

114 Van Nijf 1997: 184; cf. Gabrielsen 2007: 197; Harland 2013: 84-85. Eckhardt 2016: 156 n. 167 sees in the use of this term an attempt 'to incorporate professional groups into a Romanized civic order'.

115 I. Histria 57.

It  is  equally interesting to focus on the well-known involvement of certain religious associations in festivals belonging to the official civic cult, as V. Suys and Ph. Harland have recently done. 118 The Poseidionastai from Berytos participated in the Delian Apollonia by offering an ox to the procession; 119 a thiasos of Herakles in early-4th-century B.C. Athens was headed by the official priest and therefore probably participated in the official cult. 120 The orgeones of Bendis at Piraeus, Dionysiac thiasoi at Magnesia on the Meander and Miletus, associations of athletes, performers and hymnodoi also did so. 121

Points  e-i:  To  the  best  of  my  knowledge,  private  associations  did  not function as symbols of civic identity in coins, statues etc. No honorific title indicating the filial relation of the honorand to both the polis and

- 116 On Aba's distributions and the status of the various beneficiaries see the detailed analysis offered by Van Nijf 1997: 160-85.
- 117 See IGBulg I ² 15bis (organised by a priest of Dionysos and gymnasiarchos ) and IGBulg I ² 15ter. Cf. Van Nijf 1997: 170-71. For distributions in Ephesus including the Council,  the  Gerousia,  and  groups  of  sacred  victors  and  worshippers  of  Artemis  see CAPinv 1625 (B. Eckhardt).
- 118 Suys 2005: 209-11; Harland 2013: 103-6.
- 119 I. Delos 1520; cf. Van Nijf 1997: 198.
- 120 IG II ² 2343, 2345.
- 121 For the thiasoi see I. Magnesia 215a and Milet VI 3 1222. Cf. Jaccottet 2005. On the participation of hymnodoi and other religious groups such as chrysophoroi and kouretes in festivals see Van Nijf 1997: 165-68; Harland 2013: 103-6. Cf. Price 1984: 6162, 70-71, 88-90, 118, 129, 191, 209. For a detailed study of associations of chrysophoroi in Asia Minor see Kuhn 2014: 74-81 (with particular emphasis on their participation in processions and distributions). For the orgeones of  Bendis see below n. 124.

one or several such associations existed. Furthermore, honorific inscriptions for members of the local political class normally did not mention private associations' offices as part of a civic cursus honorum. In the Hellenistic Period the aforementioned thiasoi of Maenads at Magnesia on the Meander were established by the polis ,  as was presumably the demosios thiasos active in Miletus. 122 But whether these thiasoi may be characterised  as  private  is  not  at  all  certain. 123 A  substantial  degree  of  official recognition was attributed to, or at least claimed by, the orgeones of Bendis in Athens as well. 124 During the Imperial Period, the hymnodoi , established  with  imperial  encouragement  if  not  initiative, 125 corresponded with  the  emperor. 126 So  did  the  associations  of  athletes  and  performers. 127 The recently published letter of Hadrian to the civic authorities of Miletus shows the polis and the emperor entering into negotiations about the constitution of a professional association of naukleroi : the foundation and the function of this association were a matter of civic concern, if not initiative, and of imperial interest as well. 128 This may be explained by reference to the vital role played by the naukleroi in the normal provision of supplies to the cities of the Empire. 129 But there is no other relevant testimony as far as I know. In my view, the typical way of establishing an

- 122 According to Suys (2005: 207-9) a considerable degree of public recognition may also be discerned in other religious associations which incorporate the civic ethnic in their name such as the mystai kai embastai tes Kores en Smyrnei ( I. Smyrna 726), the synodos of Dionysos Breiseus en Smyrnei ( I. Smyrna 600; but in both cases it is the toponym not the civic ethnic that defines the association), and the Trallianon hoi mystai ( I. Tralleis 74), and in associations called pro poleos such as the Demetriastai at Ephesus ( I. Eph . 1595, 4337).
- 123 Suys 2005: 209 considers them as public associations.
- 124 Gabrielsen 2007: 192, 203 with n. 52-54.
- 125 Price 1984: 118.
- 126 I. Eph. 3801. On the petition addressed to the Roman proconsul by an Ephesian association of initiates performing mysteries to Demeter and the emperors see I. Eph . 213 with Harland 2013: 96-98
- 127 Oliver 1989: nos. 24, 29, 37, 86, 96, 128, 212, 225.
- 128 Ehrhardt & Günther 2013.
- 129 Cf. Eckhardt 2016: 157 on private associations with 'high relevance to the city'.

association is best described in the well-known charter of the eranos philias from Paiania, which records an initiative taken by several individuals outside any civic framework and with no public intervention at all. 130

At various points in this paper it has been noted that it was the various associations of neo i, or other organised bodies centred on the public institution of the gymnasium, which were closer to the Gerousia in terms of  integration  into  the  local  public  life.  Indeed,  the neoi sometimes worked together with the Council and the People in the erection of common honorific monuments (point a). 131 They participated in civic processions  (point  d). 132 Under  Elagabalus  Laodicea  in  Phrygia  issued  coins bearing  the  inscription συνεδρίου νέων (point  e). 133 The  offices  of  the neoi 's administrative apparatus also appear in honorific inscriptions as part of the local cursus honorum (point h). 134 Communication with the emperors and recognition by the representatives of the Roman Imperial power are attested for the neoi of Pergamum and Kyzikos (point i), while financial and legal aid by the polis is recorded for the neoi of Iasos (point f). 135 But the neoi can hardly be regarded as a private association; 136 more importantly, the evidence regarding their integration into the local public  sphere is, in absolute numbers, nowhere near as great as that concerning the Gerousia.

- 130 IG II ² 1369. Cf. Arnaoutoglou 1998: 70-71; ibid. 2003: 129.
- 131 For the neoi as co-grantors of honours with the Council and/or the People see SEG XXIX (1979), 527 (Larisa); EKM I, 113-14 (Beroia); I. Sestos 1 (Sestos); I. Iasos 90 (Iasos); CIG 2944, Ramsay 1883: 272-74 no. 15 and Kontoleon 1886: 520 no. 17 (Nysa); I. Tralleis 77, 93, 112 (Tralleis); I.Aph2007 7.8, 8.84, 12.105, 12.202, 12.215 (restored), 15.262 (Aphrodisias). Cf. Forbes 1933: 43. For the institutional interaction between the neoi and the civic authorities in the award of honours see also Van Bremen 2013: 47-54.
- 132 Forbes 1933: 26, 52-53.
- 133 RPC VI 5497 (temporary). See also Forbes 1933: 17.
- 134 Cf. Forbes 1933: 22-23, 30-36. See also above n. 77.
- 135 Forbes 1933: 38-43.
- 136 On the public character of the neoi see Forbes 1933: 42-44. Van Bremen 2013: 52-53 characterises them as a civic sub-group.

## Final remarks

It has recently been pointed out that the purpose of forming an association, its raison d'être, eludes us and that it is methodologically unwise to draw relevant conclusions from the functions that an association performed. 137 In many ways, this remark applies to the Gerousiai as well. No ancient document gives any account of the reasons for establishing a Gerousia. The closest we can get is the need to fill a vacuum in the civic institutional landscape, as the decree of Sidyma implies. Studying the associations of presbyteroi , Fröhlich has related their emergence to the development and opening of the gymnasium to men over thirty, with the general proliferation of gymnasial (such as the neoi ) and private associations and with the need of individuals of mature age still wishing to frequent the gymnasium to find the necessary means to finance their activities. 138 Similar factors may account for the creation of the Gerousiai as well, the facilitation and encouragement of an ongoing and perpetual use of gymnasial amenities by influential and respectable men of mature age being the main purpose of such associations. After all, the gymnasium was at the very core of the Gerousia's activities. However, the historical significance of any association does not lie only - or even primarily - in its purpose, however well-defined this might have been (and there is no evidence suggesting that the Gerousiai had such a well-defined purpose). It  is  in  terms of the association's functions and interaction with other political and social agents that we may more effectively perceive its position in contemporary society.

So were the Gerousiai under examination public or private bodies? To a large extent this is a matter of perspective. If we examine the Gerousiai from the viewpoint of a student of state institutions administering state affairs, they do not belong to them. But if we consider them from the viewpoint of a student of private religious and professional associations, they do not fit in either (indicatively, Van Nijf defined the Gerousia as a semi-public institution). 139 Their characterisation as social associations may appear to be a way of solving this problem, but in reality this is a way of avoiding it and bypassing it: this approach runs the risk of treating the Gerousia as nothing more than a convivial gathering of individuals  with  greater  prestige  than  others  and  of  strongly  downplaying  its public dimension, which constitutes one of its most dominant aspects as an institutional entity.

137 Arnaoutoglou 2014: 259.

138 Fröhlich 2013: 98.

139 Van Nijf 1997: 74.

But we need to clarify what this public dimension was all about, and for that purpose a different perspective is needed. Taking into account the Gerousia's features summarised above in Section III, I would argue that the crucial point in assessing the public dimension of the Gerousia and in comparing it with that of the various private associations active in the Greek cities is neither its governmental competence nor its presence in the public sphere alone: it is the nature and the character of its involvement in the public sphere that matters. The basic criterion is the specific way in which the sources of state authority allowed each individual association access to acts, events and symbols that expressed the sovereign  power  of  the  civic  community  and/or  its  political  identity. Equally important is the extent to which the sources of state authority were involved in the foundation and the internal function of an individual association. Finally, one should also take into account the particular way in which the place of the association was conceptualised in the contemporary public discourse, as recorded in documents emanating from the agents of political power. In all these respects the Gerousia emerges as an institution that was very closely affiliated and attached to the various formal organs of the polis . 140 Lacking any serious governmental competence, it still had its own share in the politics of civic honours which, as has already been noted, was a fundamental function of the civic community in the Imperial Period (see above Section III point a). Founded by the polis , unlike nearly all the private associations that we know, it enjoyed civic support and recognition, at a material, symbolic and also conceptual level, being treated in the same capacity as purely political categories belonging to the state apparatus and organisation (see above Section III points b-h). It is in this sense that we may speak of the Gerousia's public  dimension, which was further enhanced and consolidated by a mutually beneficial relationship cultivated with the Imperial power (see above Section III point i).

140 Lack of formal affiliation to the polis may be seen as a fundamental attribute of private associations. See Gabrielsen 2007: 186.

On the other hand, the best that most private associations could ever achieve in terms of access to events, acts and symbols that expressed the sovereign power of the civic community and/or its political identity was to gain the permission to erect honorific monuments and inscriptions of their  own  or  to  acquire  distinct  seats  in  the  theatre. 141 There were of course important exceptions. Certain associations could occupy a distinct position in events that dramatised the civic identity, as a constituent part of the polis next to traditional civic organs such as the Council; they could participate in religious ceremonies organised by the state authorities; they could even appear as equal co-grantors of honour along with the civic organs. But their participation in this last act, which formally  expressed  the  sovereign  will  of  the  civic  community,  was  extremely rare. Moreover, I would argue that the associations involved in the aforementioned areas of civic life were hardly the typical private associations of the Greek world (this is surely the case with the groups of Roman settlers abroad). 142 However, they did share with the Gerousia an important common feature: an associative identity which was held to be fundamental by and for the civic community. The Gerousia's public dimension ultimately rested on the combination of the presbeion with the continuous commitment to the cultural values of the gymnasium as a way of life. Likewise, associations either devoted to important deities or related to the proper functioning of civic life (associations of teachers, physicians, athletes, naukleroi )  could  also  under  certain  circumstances claim  and  be  attributed  a  public  dimension,  in  the  sense  described above. 143

With respect to the taxonomy of the various corporate bodies of the Greek polis , we may thus establish a kind of scale, susceptible of changes and dynamic developments. We could then place most of the religious,

141 Van Nijf 1997: 209-40.

142 It is hardly accidental that Van Nijf, studying private professional associations, defined groups such as the hymnodoi , the kouretes and the chrysophoroi as public religious associations (Van Nijf 1997: 168). Kuhn 2014: 74-81 highlights the position of the chrysophoroi next to the Council and the Gerousia in acts of euergetism.

- 143 On such associations cf. Eckhardt 2016: 156-57.

cultic,  neighbourhood  or  kinship  associations  enjoying  minimum  or comparatively little access to the public sphere (mainly indicated by the authorisation to erect honorific monuments either on their own or as executive agents of the civic authorities) at the lower end of the scale, the  less  typical  religious  or  even  occupational  associations  discussed above, the neoi and the Gerousia higher up the scale, together with purely state/civic institutions, such as the various civic subdivisions, and ultimately the People and the Council at the top. 144 We could also describe a similar taxonomy by using the metaphor of a continuum. But the ambiguous nature of the Gerousia (a non-governmental corporate body with a strong public dimension and an internal organisation similar to that of private associations) may also invite us to focus on the particular way in which  the  institutional/associational  landscape  of  the  Greek  city  was conceptualised by its inhabitants, mainly with respect to the various collective and individual needs and services covered and provided by these institutions/associations. Two examples seem to me especially indicative. The Greek city of the Imperial Period needed to display its loyalty towards its gods and emperors and to award honours so as to ensure the ongoing operation of euergetism; we can see that policy-making bodies such as the Council and the People, public bodies such as the Gerousia and various private associations were all active in this area, usually in separate contexts and events, but sometimes in the same ones, formally interacting with each other. The inhabitants of the Greek city searched for ways to perpetuate and protect their posthumous memory and we may easily observe them turning not only to the Gerousia and to private associations but also to the Council for that purpose. It is in these areas, perhaps in others as well, that the boundary between the state, public and private spheres tends in practice to fade away, although it still remains strong and of vital importance in many fundamentally significant ways. Such approaches, ones taking into account what the inhabitants of the Greek city expected from the various corporate bodies that formed part of the civic universe they lived in, may allow us to see all these in-

- 144 I would agree with B. Eckhardt (2016: 155) that private associations approached the status of official institutions 'as closely as they could'. But not as closely as the Gerousiai did. This is the point stressed here.

stitutions  as  parts  of  a  pluralistic  society  encompassing  multiple  formally organised subgroups, which constituted a strongly hierarchical, heterogeneous,  but  nonetheless  internally  coherent  and  meaningful whole.

## BIBLIOGRAPHY

- Aneziri, S. 2003. Die Vereine der dionysischen Techniten im Kontext der hellenistischen Gesellschaft . Stuttgart.
- Aneziri, S. 2008. 'World Travellers: the Associations of Dionysiac Artists' in R. Hunter & R. Rutherford (eds.) Wandering Poets in Ancient Greece . Cambridge, 217-36.
- Aneziri, S. 2014. 'Greek Strategies of Adaptation to the Roman World: The Case of the Contests' Mnemosyne 67, 423-42.
- Arnaoutoglou, I. 1998. 'Between koinon and idion: legal and social dimensions of religious associations in ancient Athens' in P. Cartledge, P. Millet & S. von Reden (eds.) KOSMOS. Essays in Order, Conflict and Community in Classical Athens . Cambridge, 68-83.
- Arnaoutoglou, I. 2003. Thusias heneka kai sunousias. Private religious associations in Hellenistic Athens . Athens.
- Arnaoutoglou, I. 2014. 'Craftsmen Associations in Roman Lydia - A Tale of two Cities?' AncSoc 41, 257-90.
- Bailey, C. 2006. The Gerousia of Ephesus . PhD Diss., University of British Columbia.
- Bauer, E. 2014. Gerusien in den Poleis Kleinasiens in hellenistischer Zeit und der römischen Kaiserzeit. Die Beispiele Ephesos, Pamphylien und Pisidien, Aphrodisias und Iasos . München 2014.
- Buraselis, K. 2000. Kos between Hellenism and Rome . Philadelphia
- Byl, S. 1977. 'Plutarque et la vieillesse' LEC 45, 107-23.
- Caldelli,  M.-L.  1992.  'Curia  Athletarum,  hiera  xystike  synodos  e  organizzazione delle terme a Roma' ZPE 93, 75-87.
- Derenne, E. 1933. 'Gymnastika' Antiquité Classique 2, 65-89.
- Dmitriev, S. 2005. City Government in Hellenistic and Roman Asia Minor . Oxford.

- Eckhardt, B. 2016. 'Romanization and Isomorphic Change in Phrygia: the Case of Private Associations' JRS 106, 147-71.
- Eckhardt,  B.  2021. Romanisierung und Verbrüderung: Das Vereinswesen im römischen Reich . Berlin.
- Eckhardt, B. 2023. 'The Young, the Old and the Blessed' C&M 72, 329-73.
- Ehrhardt, N. & W. Günther 2013. 'Hadrian, Milet und die Korporation der milesischen  Schiffseigner.  Zu  einem  neu  gefunden  kaiserlichen Schreiben' Chiron 43, 199-220.
- Engelmann, H. 2012. 'Inschriften von Patara' ZPE 182, 179-201.
- Fernoux, H. 2011. Le Demos et la Cité. Communautés et assemblées populaires en Asie Mineure à l'époque impériale . Rennes.
- Forbes, C.A. 1933. NEOI. A Contribution to the Study of Ancient Associations . Middletown.
- Forbes, C.A. 1955. 'Ancient Athletic Guilds' CPh 50, 238-52.
- Fröhlich, P. 2013. 'Les groupes du gymnase d'Iasos et les presbytéroi dans les  cités  à  l'époque  hellénistique'  in  P.  Fröhlich  &  P.  Hamon  (eds.) Groupes et associations dans les cités grecques (IIIe siècle av. J.-C. - IIe siècle apr. J.-C.) . Genève, 59-111.
- Gabrielsen, V. 2007. 'Brotherhoods of Faith and Provident Planning: The Non-public Associations of the Greek World' Mediterranean Historical Review 22. 2, 183-210.
- Gabrielsen, V. & C.A. Thomsen 2015. 'Introduction: Private Groups, Public Functions?' in V. Gabrielsen & C.A. Thomsen (eds.) Private Associations and the Public Space. Proceedings of a Symposium held at the Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters, 9-11 September 2010 . Copenhagen, 7-24.
- Giannakopoulos, N. 2008a. Ο Θεσμός της Γερουσίας των ελληνικών πόλεων κατά τους ρωμαϊκούς χρόνους . Thessaloniki.
- Giannakopoulos, N. 2008b. 'Remarks on the Honorary Titles υἱὸς βουλῆς , υἱὸς δήμου and υἱὸς πόλεως in Roman Asia Minor' in A.D. Rizakis & F. Camia (eds.) Pathways to Power. Civic elites in the Eastern Part of the Roman Empire. Athens: 251-68
- Giannakopoulos, N. 2013. 'The Gerousia of Akmonia' Gephyra 10, 13-31.
- Hagel, S. & K. Tomaschitz 1998. Repertorium der westkilikischen Inschriften . Wien.
- Harland,  P.  2013. Associations,  Synagogues  and  Congregations.  Claiming  a Place in Ancient Mediterranean Society . Ontario.

- Heller, A. & O. van Nijf, 2017. 'Introduction: Civic Honours from Classical to Roman Times' in O. van Nijf & A. Heller (eds.) Civic honours. The politics of honours in the Greek Cities of the Roman Empire . Leiden, 1-27.
- Hicks, E. L. 1890. The Collection of Ancient Greek Inscriptions in the British Museum, Part III, Priene, Iasos and Ephesos . Oxford.
- Hogarth, D.G. 1891. 'The Gerousia of Hierapolis' JPh 19, 69-101.
- Hughes, D. 1999. 'Hero Cult, Heroic Honors, Heroic Dead: Some Developments in the Hellenistic and Roman Periods' in R. Hägg (ed.) Ancient Greek Hero Cult . Stockholm, 167-75.
- Jaccottet, A.-F. 2005. 'Du thiase aux mystères. Dionysos entre le 'privé' et l''officiel'' in V. Dansen & M. Piérart (eds.) Ἰδίᾳ καὶ δημοσίᾳ . Les cadres 'privés' et publics de la religion grecque antique . Liege, 191-202.
- Jones, A.H.M. 1940. The Greek City from Alexander to Justinian . Oxford.
- Jones, A.H.M. 1944. 'Review of J. H. Oliver, The Sacred Gerusia' JRS 34, 14546.
- Kleijwegt, M. 1991. The Ambiguity of Youth and the Absence of Adolescence in Greco-Roman Society . Amsterdam.
- Kontoleon, A.E. 1886. 'Varietés' BCH 10, 514-21.
- Kokkinia, C. 2012. 'Games vs. Buildings as euergetic Choices' in K. Coleman, P. Ducrey & J. Nelis-Clément (eds.) L'organisation des spectacles dans le monde Romain (Entretiens sur l'Antiquité classique LVIII) Genève, 97-130.
- Kuhn, A. B. 2014. 'The chrysophoria in the Cities of Greece and Asia Minor in the Hellenistic and Roman Periods' Tyche 29, 51-87.
- Le Queré, E. 2015. Les Cyclades sous l'empire romain. Histoire d'une renaissance . Rennes.
- Le Guen, B. 2001. Les associations des technites dionysiaques à l'époque hellénistique . Nancy.
- Lendon, J.E.  1997. Empire  of  Honour.  The  Art  of  Government  in  the  Roman World . Oxford.
- Leschhorn, W. & P.R. Franke 2002. Lexicon of Greek Coin Inscriptions . Wien. Magie, D. 1950. Roman Rule in Asia Minor . Princeton.
- Makres, A. 2011.  'The  sacred  Gerousia  in  the  Peloponnese:  a  new  epigraphic document from ancient Korone' in. O. Pallagia, H.R. Goette & P.G. Themelis (eds) Sailing to classical Greece: papers on Greek art, archaeology and epigraphy presented to Petros Themelis . Oxford, 70-78.

- Marek, C. 1993. Stadt, Ära und Territorium in Pontus-Bithynia und North-Galati a. Tübingen.
- Menadier, I. 1880. Qua condicione Ephesii usi sint inde ab Asia in formam provinciae redacta . Berlin.
- Mitchell, S. 1993. Anatolia. Land, Men and Gods in Asia Minor . Vol. 1. Oxford. Mommsen, T. 1894. Römische Geschichte Band V . Die Provinzen von Caesar bis Diocletian . Berlin
- Nigdelis, P. 1990. Πολίτευμα και κοινωνία των Κυκλάδων κατά την ελληνσιτική και την αυτοκρατορική εποχή . Thessaloniki.
- Ng,  D.  2015.  'Commemoration  and  Élite  Benefaction  of  Buildings  and Spectacles in the Roman World' JRS 105, 101-23.
- Oliver, J.H. 1941. The Sacred Gerousia (Hesperia Suppl. VI). Baltimore.
- Oliver, J.H. 1989. Greek Constitutions of Early Roman Emperors . Philadelphia. Parkin, T. 2003. Old Age in the Roman World . Baltimore.
- Peek, W. 1969. Inschriften von den dorischen Inseln . Leipzig.
- Pleket, H. 1973. 'Some Aspects of the History of the Athletic Guilds' ZPE 10, 197-227.
- Poland, F. 1909. Geschichte des Griechischen Vereinswesens . Leipzig.
- Pont A.-V. 2010. Orner la cité: enjeux culturels et politiques du paysage urbain dans l'Asie gréco-romaine . Pessac.
- Price, S.R.F. 1984. Rituals and Power. The Roman Imperial Cult in Asia Minor . Cambridge.

Ramsay, W. 1883. 'Unedited Inscriptions of Asia Minor' BCH 7, 258-78.

Rhodes, P.J. & D.M. Lewis 1997. The Decrees of the Greek States . Oxford.

Roesch, P. 1982. Études béotiennes . Paris.

Sartre, M. 1991. L'Orient romain . Paris.

- Schmitt-Pantel, B. 1992. La cité au Banquet . Paris-Rome.
- Segre, M. & G. Pugliese Carratelli 1949-1951. 'Tituli Camirenses' ASAtene 27-29, N.S. 11-13: 141-318.
- Sherwin-White, A. N. 1966. The Letters of Pliny. A Historical and Social Commentary . Oxford.
- Spawforth, A. 2012. Greece and the Augustan Cultural Revolution . Cambridge.
- Suys, V. 2005. 'Associations cultuelles hellénistiques et romaines' in V. Dansen & M. Piérart (eds.) Ἰδίᾳ καὶ δημοσίᾳ . Les cadres 'privés' et publics de la religion grecque antique . Liege, 203-18.
- Talbert, R. 1984. The Senate of Imperial Rome . Princeton.

- Ustinova, Y. 2005. 'Voluntary Greek Associations in the Greek Law' in V. Dansen & M. Piérart (eds.) Ἰδίᾳ καὶ δημοσίᾳ . Les cadres 'privés' et publics de la religion grecque antique. Liege, 177-90.
- Van Bremen, R. 2013. ' Neoi in Hellenistic cities: age class, institution, association?' in P. Fröhlich & P. Hamon (eds.) Groupes et associations dans les cités grecques (IIIe siècle av. J.-C. - IIe siècle apr. J.-C.) . Genève, 31-58.
- Van Nijf, O. 1997. The Civic World of Professional Associations in the Roman East . Amsterdam.
- Van Nijf, O. 2001. 'Local Heroes: athletics, festivals and elite self-fashioning in the Roman East' in Being Greek under Rome , ed. S. Goldhill. Cambridge, 306-34.
- Van Nijf, O & R. Alston 2011. 'Political Culture in the Greek City after the Classical Age: Introduction and Preview' in O. van Nijf and R. Alston (eds.) Political culture in the Greek city after the classical age . Leuven, 1-26.
- Van Rossum, J. 1988. De Gerousia in de Griekse Steden van het Romeinse Rijk . Leyden.
- Wilhelm, A. 1906. 'Epigraphisches' Hermes 41, 69-77.
- Zimmermann, K. 2007. 'Les origines de la gérousie de l'époque impériale' in M. Mayer i Olivé, G. Baratta & A. Guzmán Alagro (eds.) Acta XII Congressus internationalis epigraphiae graecae et latinae . Barcelone, 1523-27.
- Zolotas,  G.I.  &  A.  Zolota  1908.  ' Χιακών και Ερυθραϊκών επιγραφών συναγωγή ' Athena 20, 113-381, 509-26.
- Zuiderhoek A. 2009. The Politics of Munificence in the Roman Empire . Cambridge
- Zoumbaki, S. 2017. 'Romans in the poleis of Greek Mainland and Adjacent Islands:  The  Evolution  of  Their  Relations  in  the  Light  of  Honorific Texts' in O. van Nijf & A. Heller (eds.) Civic honours. The politics of honours in the Greek Cities of the Roman Empire. Leiden, 245-71.