Law and Social Status in Classical Athens

This study focuses on the way in which the law of Athens constructed and sustained social status by enshrining privileges for the citizens and disabilities for metics and slaves. The subject of this collection is the articulation of law and social status in classical Athens. Its chapters, written by leading scholars from Canada, Britain, and the United States, cover a wide range of topics, among them the Athenian rationale for torture, different methods of execution, the contract and the legal context of prostitution, and metics in court. This book is unique in concentrating on the way in which the law of Athens constructed and sustained social status by enshrining privileges for the citizens and disabilities for metics and slaves. As a whole, the collection reinforces the reality of three juridically defined status groups whose social and economic roles and whose personal lives were deeply affected by their place in the prevailing hierarchy.