西元前五世紀末，在伯羅奔尼撒戰爭的下半段（415 - 404 BCE）裡，以實行民主政治聞名的雅典，分別於411年及404/3年發生了兩次寡頭「政治實驗」，導致民主政治的中斷。第一次導因於415年西西里遠征的慘敗；為了因應財政與戰局的危機，雅典人民在公民大會中決議將政權集中於少數人手中，形成了「四百人寡頭政權」。第二次的「三十僭主」則是由於雅典在戰爭中徹底戰敗，根據和平條約中「祖宗政體」的規定，在斯巴達的干涉下成立。這兩次寡頭「政治實驗」的時間都不長，最大的特徵便是這兩個寡頭政權的成立，在法理上，皆透過立法手段，訴諸「祖宗法制」，來形塑其政權的合法性。此外，411及404/3年兩次寡頭「政治實驗」象徵著民主政治的挫敗，但在實驗過後，讓雅典人民認清寡頭政治的缺點，下定決心維護並且改善民主政治。在這段期間，雅典人也開始整理與編定法律（nomos），限制人民的「決議」（psephisma），象徵雅典從「人民的統治」（popular sovereignty）走向「法律的統治」（sovereignty of laws）。從此雅典的民主政治得以在更加穩固的基礎上運作，直到322年被馬其頓征服前，雅典再也沒有出現過寡頭政體，而所有的紛爭也轉移到公民大會及法庭中解決。此外，403年民主政治恢復，對寡頭人士決定採取「和解共生」的政策，也是雅典民主發展上的一大成就。雅典之民主政治不僅涉及政體設計及權力分配，更是建立「民主社區」的過程；「和解共生」之所以成功，乃是對一個歷經戰亂以及內爭而分裂之社區，以最大之包容來重新膠合之。415年到403年間的政治實驗於是必須放在雅典的「民主社區」這個母體的發展脈絡下來探討，才能看出其歷史意義及重要性。

At the last stage of the Peloponnesian War (415–404 BCE) the democratic Athens decided to conduct two “political experiments” of oligarchy respectively in 411 and 404/3 that brought about profound repercussions on the Athenian democracy of the 4th century. The first experiment of the “Oligarchy of Four Hundred” was conducted to solve the financial and military crises that came with the disastrous ending of the Sicilian expedition and the comprehensive collapse of Athenian empire. The second one of the “Thirty Tyrants” was imposed after the defeat at the end of the Peloponnesian War by the victorious Spartans in cooperation of an even smaller group of people. Both regimes were set up in accordance with the “ancestral constitution” but the durations of both were short and soon rejected because they did not produce the results they had promised. Furthermore, both became notorious in Athenian political history for their alleged brutality.

These political experiments also symbolized the failure of a democracy which, according to ancient political commentators, was weak in theory but successful in practice until it was disproved by the losses of wars. After the oligarchic political experiments, Athenians recognized the defects of democracy and determined to improve it. It is in such a context that the significance of Athenian oligarchic experiments could be grasped for it is during this critical period that Athenians started to compile past laws and decrees and institute the “rule of laws” in place of “the popular sovereignty”. This produced a democracy known for its stability and resilience in the next century until Athens was conquered by Macedonia in 322. In addition, the reconciliation with and amnesty for oligarchs in 403 helped the creation of a more tolerant democracy. It is also an attempt to reconstruct a civic community torn by external wars and internal struggles and shows Athenians’ ability to take into account a greater spectrum of political opinions after learning their lessons. These political experiments with the consequent changes thus marked this period as a most vital stage of Classical Athens in its political development.

原典史料（Primary Texts）：
Aeschines: The Speech of Aeschines (Trans. by Charles Darwin Adams) (Leob
Classical Library, London: Heinemann, 1st imp. 1919, rep. 1988)
Aeschylus: The Oresteia: Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers, The Eumenides (Trans. by Robert Fagles) (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1984)
Andocides: Antiphon & Andocides (Trans. by Michael Gagarin and Douglas M.
MacDowell) (Austin: University of Texas, 1998)
Aristophanes: Knights (Edited with translation and notes by Alan H. Sommerstein)
(Warminster: Aris & Phillips Ltd., 1981)
------: Peace (Edited with translation and notes by Alan H. Sommerstein)
(Warminster: Aris & Phillips Ltd., 1985)
------: Frogs (Edited with translation and notes by Alan H. Sommerstein)
(Warminster: Aris & Phillips Ltd., 1999)
------: Aristophanes. Acharnians, Lysistrata, Clouds (Translation with introduction
and notes by Jeffrey Henderson) (Newburyport: Focus Publishing/R Pullins, 1997)
Aristotle: Aristotle. The Athenian Constitution (Translation with introduction and
notes by P. J. Rhodes) (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1984)
------: Aristotle. Politics (Trans. by T. A. Sinclair, rev. by Trevor J. Saunders)
(Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1962, rev. and rep. 1984)
------: Aristotle. Rhetoric (Trans. by W. Rhys Roberts) (New York: Modern Library,
1984)
Diodorus of Sicily: The Library of History. Volume V. Books XII.41-XIII (Trans. by C. H. Oldfather) (Leob Classical Library, London: Heinemann, 1st imp. 1950, rep. 1994)
------: The Library of History. Volume VI. Books XIV-XV.19 (Trans. by C. H.
Oldfather) (Leob Classical Library, London: Heinemann, 1st imp. 1954, rep. 1993)
Dionysios of Halcarnassos: Dionysios of Halcarnassos. Critical Essays, Volume I
(Ed. and trans. by Stephen Usher) (Mass., Cambridge: Havard University Press, 1974, rep. 2000)
Euripides: Euripides. Supplices (Trans. by Christopher Collard ) ( John Benjamins
Pub Co, 1975)
Hellenica Oxyrhynchia (Edited with translation and commentary by P. R. Mckechnie
and S. J.) (Warminster: Aris & Phillips, 4th imp. 1993)
Herodotus: Herodotus. The Histories (Trans. by Aubery de Selincourt)
(Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 2003)
Homer: The Iliad of Homer (Trans. by Richmond Lattimore) (Chicago: University
of Chicago, 1961)
Isocrates: Isocrates. Volume I (Trans. by George Norlin) (Leob Classical Library,
London: Heinemann, 1st imp. 1928, rep. 1991)
------: Isocrates. Volume II (Trans. by George Norlin) (Leob Classical Library,
London: Heinemann, 1st imp. 1929, rep. 1992)
------: Isocrates. Volume III (Trans. by Larue Van Hook) (Leob Classical Library, London: Heinemann, 1st imp. 1945, rep. 1998)
Lycurgus: Dinarchus, Hyperides, and Lycurgus (Trans. by Ian Worthington, Craig R.
Cooper and Edward M. Harris) (Austin: University of Texas, 2001)
Lysias: Lysias (Trans. by S.C. Todd) (Austin: University of Texas, 2000)
Pausanias: Pausanias. Guide to Greece. Volume I: Central Greece (Trans. by Peter
Levi) (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1st imp. 1971. rep. 1979)
Plato: Plato. Apology of Socrates (Trans. by Michael C. Stokes) (Warminster: Aris
& Phillips Ltd., 1997)
------: Plato. Gorgias (Trans. by Chris Emlyn-Jones and Walter Hamilton)
(Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, rev. 2004)
------: Plato’s Seventh Letter (Trans. by Ludwig Edelstein) (Leiden: E. J. Brill,
1966)
------: Plato. IX. Timaeus, Critias, Cleitophon, Menexenus, Epistles (Trans. by R. G.
Bury) (Leob Classical Library, London: Heinemann, 1929)
Plutarch: Plutarch’s Lives II. Themistocles and Camillus, Aristides and Cato major,
Cimon and Lucullus (Trans. by Bernadotte Perrin) (Leob Classical Library, London: Heinemann, 1st imp. 1914, rep. 1985)
-----: Plutarch’s Lives III. Pericles and Fabius Maximus, Nicias and Crossus (Trans.
by Bernadotte Perrin) (Leob Classical Library, London: Heinemann, 1st imp. 1916, rep. 1984)
------: Plutarch’s Lives IV. Alcibiades and Coriolanus, Lysander and Sull (Trans. by
Bernadotte Perrin) (Leob Classical Library, London: Heinemann, 1st imp. 1916, rep. 1986)
------: Plutarch's Moralia Volume X (Trans. by H. N. Fowler) (Leob Classical
Library, London: Heinemann, 1st imp. 1936, rep. 1991)
Thucydides: Thucydides. History of the Peloponnesian war. Books I and II (Trans.
by C. F. Smith) (Leob Classical Library, London: Heinemann, 1st imp. 1919, rep. 1991)
------: Thucydides. History of the Peloponnesian war. Books III and IV (Trans. by C.
F. Smith) (Leob Classical Library, London: Heinemann, 1st imp. 1920, rep. 1998)
------: Thucydides. History of the Peloponnesian war. Books V and VI (Trans. by C. F. Smith) (Leob Classical Library, London: Heinemann, 1st imp. 1921, rep. 1992)
------: Thucydides. History of the Peloponnesian war. Books VII and VIII (Trans. by
C. F. Smith) (Leob Classical Library, London: Heinemann, 1st imp. 1923, rep. 1996)
Xenophon: Xenophon. A History of My Times (Trans. by Rex Warner, with
introduction and notes by George Cawkwell) (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1979)
------: Xenophon. The Persian Expedition (Trans. by Rex Warner, with introduction
and notes by George Cawkwell) (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1950)
------: Xenophon. Conversations of Socrates. Socrates’ Defence, Memoirs of Socrates,
The Dinner-party, The Estate-manager (Trans. by Hugh Tredennick and Robin Waterfield, and edited with new material by Robin Waterfield) (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1990)
------: Pseudo-Xenophon. The Old Oligarch. Pseudo-Xenophon’s Constitution of the
Athenians (Introduction, translation and commentary by Robin Osborne) (Lactor, 2004)

資料選輯（Collection of Sources）：
Crawford, Michael, and David Whitehead, edd. Archaic and Classical Greece: A
selection of ancient sources in translation. (London: Cambridge University Press, 1984)
Fornara, Charles W., ed. & trans. Archaic Times to the End of the Peloponnesian War.
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983)
Gomme, A. W., A. Andrewes, and K. J. Dover. A Historical Commentary on
Thucydides: volume IV (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1970)
------, A. Andrewes, and K. J. Dover. A Historical Commentary on Thucydides:
volume V (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1981)
Kinzl, Konrad H., ed. A Companion to the Classical Greek World, (Malden:
Blackwell, 2006)
Rhodes, P. J., and Robin Osborne, edd. & trans. Greek Historical Inscriptions 404-323
B.C. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003)
Robinson, Eric W., ed. Ancient Greek Democracy: Readings and Sources. (Oxford:
Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2004)

參考文獻（Secondary Literature）：
Bengtson, Hermann, trans. & updated by Edmund F. Bloedow, History of Greece:
From the Beginning to the Byzantine Era (Ottawa: University of Ottawa Press, 1997)
Bury, J. B., and Russell Meiggs, edd. A History of Greece (London: Macmillan,
1993)
------, S. A. Cook, and F. E. Adcock, eds. The Cambridge Ancient History
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1927, 4th. ed. 1993)
Cartledge, Paul, Sparta and Lakonia: A Regional History 1300-362 B.C. (London,
Boston and Henley: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1979)
------, Paul Millett, and Stephen Todd, et al. Nomos: Essays in Athenian Law, Politics,
and Society (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990)
Chrimes, K. M. T., Ancient Sparta: A Re-Examination of the Evidence (Midsomer
Norton: Manchester University Press, 1st imp. 1949, special edition for Sandpiper Books Ltd. 1999)
Connor, W. R., The New Politicians of Fifth-Century Athens (Princeton: Hackett
Publishing Company, 1971)
Dillon, Matthew, and Lynda Garland, Ancient Greece: Social and Historical
Documents from Archaic Times to the Death of Socrates (c.800-399 B.C.) (London and New York, Routledge, 1st pub. 1994)
Ehrenberg, Victor, ed. From Solon to Socrates: Greek History and Civilization during
the sixth and fifth centuries B.C. (London and New York, Methuen, 2nd. ed. 1990)
Forrest, W. G., A History of Sparta: 950-192 B.C. (London: Gerald Duckworth & Co.
Ltd., 1st imp. 1968, 2nd ed. 1980)
Gagarin, Michael, and Douglas M. MacDowell, trans. Antiphon & Andocides (Austin: University of Texas, 1998)
Garland, Robert, The Piraeus: From the Fifth to the First Century B.C. (Ithaca and
New York: Cornell University Press, 1988)
Gribble, David, Alcibiades and Athens: A Study in Literary Presentation (Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1999)
Hammond, N. G. L., A History of Greece to 322B.C. (Oxford: At the Clarendon Press, 1963)
Hignett, C., A History of the Athenian Constitution: To the End of the Fifth Century
B.C. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1952)
Kagan, Donald, The Peace of Nicias and the Sicilian Expedition (Ithaca and London:
Cornell University Press, 1981, 2nd. Imp. 1992)
------, The Fall of the Athenian Empire (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1987, 2nd. Imp. 1992)
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1982)
Lewis, D. M., John Boardman, J. K. Davis, and M. Ostwald, et al. The Cambridge
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Lintott, Andrew, Violence, Civil Strife and Revolution in the Classical City:
750-330B.C. (London/NY/Sydney: Croom Helm, 1982)
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University Press, 1995)
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and Politics in Fifth-Century Athens (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1986)
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from 478 B.C. (London: Routledge, 1988)
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the Ancient Greek City (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992)

工具書（Reference Book）：
Hornblower, Simon, and Antony Spawforth, edd. The Oxford Classical Dictionary
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 3rd. ed. 2003)
Howatson, M. C. and Ian Chilvers, edd. The Concise Oxford Companion to Classical
Literature (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993)
Talbert, Richard J. A., ed. Atlas of Classical History (London/NY: Routledge, 1985)

期刊論文（Journal）：
Harding, Philip, “The Theramenes Myth,” Phoenix, Vol. 28, No. 1, Studies Presented
to Mary E. White on the Occasion of Her Sixty-Fifth Birthday. (Spring, 1974), pp. 101-111.
McGregor, M. F. “The Genius of Alcibiades,” Phoenix XIX (1965), pp.27-46.
Stem, Rex, “The Thirty at Athens in the Summer of 404,” Phoenix, Vol. 57, No. 1/2.
(Spring-Summer, 2003), pp. 18-34.
Stevenson, G. H., “The Constitution of Theramenes,” The Journal of Hellenic Studies,
Vol. 56, Part 1. (1936), pp. 48-57.
Taylor, Martha C., “Implicating the Demos: A Reading of Thucydides on the Rise of
the Four Hundred,” The Journal of Hellenic Studies, Vol. 122. (2002), pp.91-108.
Tieman, William, “Cause in History and the Amnesty at Athens: An Introduction,”
Transactions of the American Philological Association, Vol. 132, (2002), pp. 63-69.
Wolpert, Andrew, “Lysias 18 and Athenian Memory of Civil War,” Transactions of the
American Philological Association, Vol. 132, (2002), pp. 109-126.
Woodhead, A. G., “Peisander,” The American Journal of Philology, Vol. 75, No. 2.
(1954), pp. 131-146.

中文資料：
翁嘉聲，〈身體與政體身體之社會建構：對希臘Pederasty及同性變之初步探討〉，
《成大西洋史集刊》，第7期，台南：成功大學歷史系，1997年12月，頁1-109。
------，〈希臘舊喜劇之嘉年華理論:試論亞里士多芬尼斯之《雅典女人在婦女節
（Thesmophoriazusae）》〉，《成大西洋史集刊》，第9期，台南：成功大學歷史系，1999年12月，頁1-125。
楊晨光，《蘇格拉底的審判：以市民城邦的觀點重新詮釋》，碩士論文，台南：成
功大學歷史研究所，1999年。

網站資料（Website）：
http://hermes.his.ncku.edu.tw/ accessed at 2008/05/28。
http://www.willdurant.com/news.htm accessed at 2008/05/28。
http://www.skidmore.edu/classics/courses/2002fall/cc226/PeloponnesianWar.jpg accessed at 2008/06/02。

縮寫（Abbreviation）：
CAH1 V The Cambridge Ancient History, V. 1st. ed.
CAH2 V The Cambridge Ancient History, V. 2nd. ed.
GHI R. Meiggs and D. Lewis, A Selection of Greek Historical Inscriptions
HCT A. W. Gomme, A. Andrewes, and K. J. Dover, A Historical Commentary on Thucydides
OCD Simon Hornblower and Antony Spawforth, edd. The Oxford Classical Dictionary
筆者按，文中出現之其他古代人名及書名縮寫係根據Oxford Classical Dictionary。