Aristotele, Solone e le leggi democratiche: indagine critica e criteri di selezione

The aim of this paper is to ascertain what is worthy of mention (axiologon) in Aristotle’s account of Solon of Athens in his Athenaion Politeia (5-13, 1). The section on Solon in the treaty is remarkably useful due to the quantity of the information, the quality of data passed down and the originality of the key to interpreting his reform. However, it is noteworthy that, although Aristotle knew almost all of Solon’s laws, as shown by his composition of a work on his axones, he choose to include only some of the laws in Ath. Pol. Therefore, I will compare the account of Solon’s reforms and laws in the treaty with Plutarch’s Life of Solon, in order to examine the criteria that led to Aristotle’s selection. For this purpose, I will present the laws in a synoptic way, according to the macro-area of Athenian law to which they pertain, namely that concerning private law, moral crimes, offences against the community and family law. I conclude that in the Ath. Pol. Aristotle selected the laws of Solon that pointed to a change or some features of discontinuity with the past in the structure of the constitution, in order to illustrate the ethos of Solon’s politeia.