RIFLESSIONI IN MERITO ALLO STATUTO GIURIDICO DI LEMNO NEL V SECOLO A. C. LA RAGNATELA BIBLIOGRAFICA E L'EVIDENZA ARCHEOLOGICA: UN DIALOGO POSSIBILE?

While there was undoubtedly a cleruchy on Lemnos in the fourth century BC, the juridical status of the community of Athenian origin living on the island during the fifth century BC is still unclear. Were they apoikoi who had severed all ties of dependence with their mother city, founding an autonomous polls, or were they Athenian citizens optimo iure, like the klerouchoi of the following century? The first part of this essay summarizes the long and complex historiographic debate on this issue, which has divided scholars ever since the nineteenth century. The purpose is to establish at a complete and exhaustive status quaestionis, while highlighting at the same time that the bibliographical edifice erected on literary and epigraphic sources about Lemnos is only apparently solid. In fact, when considered individually, the pillars of the most popular current historiographic theories about the island appear considerably weakened by the progress of research, and often compromised in their very theoretical premises. The second part of the present study, instead, draws attention to a series of so far disregarded documents unequivocally attesting to the presence and activity of Athenian citizens on Lemnos as early as the first half of the fifth century. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]