The Encyclopedia of Ancient History Phase 2 Additions

Themis

Journal: The Encyclopedia of Ancient History Phase 2 Additions

Manuscript ID WBEAH300482.R1
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Wiley - Manuscript type: Year 3 batch 2 Dec 2017

Date Submitted by the Author: n/a

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Complete List of Authors: Reggiani, Nicola; Università degli Studi di Parma, Dipartimento di Discipline
Umanistiche, Sociali e delle Imprese Culturali

Keywords: Archaic Period, justice, legal history, religion, Greek history

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Author-supplied keywords:

With the term themis, ancient Greeks indicated both a legal and social
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concept and a divine notion. The former is related to juridical systems of

oral tradition, where the themistes are the set of rules or norms that
established rights and obligations within the society, constituting the
background and the framework of a justice administered by the “kings”
through debates and arbitrations. The latter embodies – through the
Abstract: goddess Themis – the abstract regulation that runs the entire cosmic
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order, with which the gods themselves must comply, and can well be
regarded as a metaphysical elaboration of the former’s mechanics. In both
the human and the divine frameworks, themis is strictly connected with
dike, “justice”, which literally is the pathway “showed” (deiknumi) by the
decisions compliant with the themistes; according to Hesiod’s Theogony,
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indeed, Dike is Themis’ daughter.

Page 1 of 2 The Encyclopedia of Ancient History Phase 2 Additions

Themis

Nicola Reggiani
Università degli Studi di Parma
nicola.reggiani@unipr.it

Word Count: 711

Abstract
With the term themis, ancient Greeks indicated both a legal and social concept and a divine
notion. The former is related to juridical systems of oral tradition, where the themistes are the set
of rules or norms that established rights and obligations within the society, constituting the
background and the framework of a justice administered by the “kings” through debates and
arbitrations. The latter embodies – through the goddess Themis – the abstract regulation that runs
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the entire cosmic order, with which the gods themselves must comply, and can well be regarded
as a metaphysical elaboration of the former’s mechanics. In both the human and the divine
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frameworks, themis is strictly connected with dike, “justice”, which literally is the pathway
“showed” (deiknumi) by the decisions compliant with the themistes; according to Hesiod’s
Theogony, indeed, Dike is Themis’ daughter.
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Keywords
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justice; Greek history; legal history; Archaic Period; religion

Main Text
The notion of themis developed in the framework of archaic Greek social and legal thought and
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practice. It seems to have been conceived as the set of rules or norms (in the plural form,
themistes) that established rights and obligations within the society, being conveyed by tradition
in compliance with divine law (see below). They were not proper laws: they were not recorded in
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any way but transmitted orally, and they existed in their tacit acceptance by those who abode by
them. Actual power was in the hands of the “kings” (see BASILEUS, GREECE), and public justice
was administered through debates and arbitrations. Indeed, the term for “justice” itself, dike (see
DIKE, DIKE), points to a pathway that is “showed” (deiknumi) by resolutions that had to comply
with the themistes. These in turn take their name from the verb tithemi, meaning what
“establishes” a rule, or what “is established” by an authority (alternatively from histemi, meaning
something “fixedly placed”).
Not being sovereign laws, themistes could be subject to the discretion of those who
settled disputes, namely the kings holding the scepter (skeptouchoi basileis). The scepter gave
the kings the power of eloquence and the authority of speech, the ability to discern the most
appropriate among the possible rules (Hes. Th. 85) and reach “straight” decisions (Hes. Th. 86).
This was the ideal situation, as depicted by the Homeric poems (see HOMER) and HESIOD’s
Theogony. However, the arbitrariness of this process could lead to corruption, as exemplified in
Hesiod’s Works and Days, where the leitmotiv of “crooked resolutions” (scholiai dikai, e.g. Hes.
 The Encyclopedia of Ancient History Phase 2 Additions Page 2 of 2

E. 262, 264, etc.) permeates the poem. “Crooked regulations” (skolias themistas) at any rate
already appear in Homer (Il. 16.387).
The inherent risk of such a kind of arbitrary law was fixed by subsequent transformations
in the social and legal sphere. The widespread activity of archaic lawgivers, who wrote down
stable regulations, at the same time avoiding arbitrary interpretations and granting public access
to the law codes, led to a new, absolute concept of justice (for which the term dike was retained),
as well as to an entirely new vocabulary, which superseded the older concept of themis with the
newer terms thesmos (apparently from the same root as themis itself) and nomos (likely from
nemo, “to distribute”, indicating a different way of establishing law than imposing it from the top
down) (see NOMOS AND NOMOTHESIA). NOMOTHETAI and thesmothetai eventually replaced the
scepter-holding kings in the ruling capacity.
From the religious viewpoint, conversely, Themis embodied the unique and absolute
universal rule regulating the entire kosmos, including the gods themselves. In the meaningful
genealogy deployed in Hesiod’s Theogony, Themis is the mother of Dike and some other female
entities related to the cosmic establishment (the Horai, Eunomie, Eirene, and the Moirai), whom
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she generates with Zeus, who is indeed the supreme judicial authority among the immortals. This
conceptual relation between Themis and Dike is significant from the viewpoint of a systematic
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interpretation of the entire universe. Themis is indeed the supreme law, with which the gods
themselves must comply (cf. Hes. Th. 396: he themis estin, “such is the rule”, with reference to
Zeus’ new distribution of honors among the gods), and Dike and Themis’ other daughters
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embody the good, regular, lawful aspects of Zeus’ kingdom, as well as of human society (cf.
Hes. Th. 903: “who mind the works of mortal men”). In fact, cultic and mythological attestations
of Themis’ oracular centres are related to the revelation to the mortals of the supreme, universal
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law with which any earthly regulation had to comply.

Cross-references
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BASILEUS, GREECE; DIKE, DIKE; HOMER; HESIOD; NOMOS AND NOMOTHESIA; NOMOTHETAI

References and Suggested Readings

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Corsano, M. (1988) Themis. La norma e l’oracolo nella Grecia antica. Galatina.

De Romilly, J. (2001) La loi dans la pensée grecque. Des origines à Aristote. Paris.
Gagarin, M. (1986) Ancient Greek Law. Berkeley – Los Angeles – London.
Havelock, E.A. (1978) The Greek Concept of Justice: From Its Shadow in Homer to Its
Substance in Plato. Cambridge (MA).
Pelloso, C. (2012) Themis e Dike in Omero. Alessandria.
Reggiani, N. (2016) La Giustizia cosmica. Le riforme di Solone tra polis e kosmos. Firenze.
Roebuck, D. (2001) Ancient Greek Arbitration. Oxford.
Rudhardt, J. (1999) Thémis et le Horai. Recherche sur les divinités grecques de la justice et de la
paix. Genève