THE LAWS GREATS Zaleucus: An Eye for Justice and an Eye for Mercy

(fl. 660 B.C.)

The highest Law rules Locri Epizephyrii . . . PINDAR, OLYMPIAN ODES X, 17-18 1

On the cusp between archaic Greece and the Greece of history comes to us the lawgiver Zaleucus of Epizephyrian Locri. The precise dates of Zaleucuss birth and death are unknown, and probably unknowable, but he is believed to have flourished about 660 B.C. Unfortunately, as is the case for most of our knowledge of this era, little is known of Zaleucus. It is impossible to sort out the legendary from the historical in what comes to us from various sources. Indeed, the Greek historian Timaeus of Tauromenium (ca. 356 ca. 260 B.C.) rejected the historicity of Zaleucus. But we may answer such skepticism along with the Roman lawyer Cicero, who in his dialogue On the Laws, relates the following exchange between Quintus and Marcus: QUINTUS: What of the fact that Timaeus denies that Zaleucus ever existed? MARCUS: But Theophrastus, 2 a no worse authority in my opinion (and many people think him a better one), says that he did, and his own fellow citizens, our clients the Locrians, refer to him. But it makes no difference whether he existed or not: what I say is what has been reported. 3 Zaleucus: First Lawgiver (Nomothets) of the Greeks Zaleucus warrants more than passing attention, for (as Cicero tells us) it makes no difference whether he existed or not, as it has been reported that Zaleucus was the first of the Greeks to write down laws. As a result of his famous judgment against his son, Zaleucus has also been regarded as a symbol of the tension between justice and mercy, and the efforts to reconcile the demands of both without the slighting of either. It is wrong to be unjustly merciful. It is equally wrong to be mercilessly just. It is rightthough frequently the process of reconciliation is fraught with struggleto be both mercifully just and justly merciful. This is the principle that Zaleucus symbolized.

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Zaleucus was a Greek from the city-state or polis of Locris in the Greek mainland. He or his family emigrated to the Greek colony of Locri Epizephyrii, a colony founded by the Locrians around 679 B.C. in Italy (Magna Graecia) on eastern side of the Italian peninsulas toe. If we are to believe the testimony of Strabo (among others) Zaleucus is the author of the first written code of laws among the Greeks, which places him among the Laws Greats. 4 Aristotle documents the received story of Zaleucuss role in fashioning the Greek worlds first laws. 5 The Locrians faced chronic lawlessness and disorder in their young colony. How, the Locrians asked themselves, were they to solve this problem? Seeking a solution, the Locrians consulted the oracle at Delphi. The oracle answered that they had to make laws for themselves. As the colony struggled to fashion its laws, a shepherds slave named Zaleucus appeared around 663 B.C. with a set of laws to propose to the citizens of Locris. 6 They were amazed that this shepherds slave had gathered together such a set of laws. Where, they asked, had such laws been found? Zaleucus answered that the goddess Athena had revealed them in a dream. The Locrian laws written by Zaleucusthough beneficialwere severe and with stern punishments. They seem every bit as harsh as the later laws that Draco promulgated for his fellow Athenians on the Greek mainland. 7 Draconian Before Draco: The Laws of Zaleucus The laws attributed to Zaleucus are no longer extant, and we must rely on often unreliable and late sources for their mention. 8 According to these, Zaleucus prevented the alienation of land except when a family was in misery, forbad the ownership of slaves, and simplified the making of contracts. 9 Zaleucus also prohibited lawsuits unless the parties had first tried to reconcile. Sumptuary restrictions were also part of Zaleucuss laws. One of these sumptuary laws regulated the dress of womendistinguishing between married women who were commanded to wear white and unmarried women who were free to wear garments of different colors. Another sumptuary law forbad women from wearing ornaments and gold and silk garments except during their marriage rites. One sumptuary law mentioned by the Roman rhetorician Aelian stated that Zaleucus prohibited the drinking of pure wine except by a physicians orders. The penalty for infraction? Naturally, death. 10 Personal injuries were handled by the laws of Zaleucus on the basis of the lex talionisan eye for an eye. 11 To prevent changes in the laws passed by Zaleucus for transient reasons and to encourage law-abiding behavior, the Locrians passed a law providing that anyone who interpreted a law differently from the chief magistrate (the cosmopolis) or anyone who wished to propose a new law or amendment of an
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existing law had to appear before the ruling council with a rope around his neck. If the council ruled against the proponent of change, he was to be immediately strangled. An Eye for Justice and an Eye for Mercy The laws of Zaleucus provided for rigorous punishment. The draconian punishments for listed criminal offenses were fixed by law, and the judge before whom the case was tried had absolutely no discretion in assessing punishment to look toward any mitigating circumstances in the crime. 12 For example, adultery, proscribed under the laws of Zaleucus, was punished with the loss of both eyes. This law and its punishment was the source of the famous Judgment of Zaleucus. It is said that Zaleucuss son was caught in the act of adultery. Brought before the magistrate Zaleucus, Zaleucus found his own son guilty of the crime and would not ameliorate the penalty that required two eyes to be put out. In an effort to reconcile the demands of justice with the demands of mercy, Zaleucus had one eye of his son put out, while he put out one of his own. That story became a symbol of the reconciliation between justice and mercy and became popular with theologians as a symbol of the reconciliation of Divine Justice and Divine Mercy in the sacrificial and redemptive death of Jesus Christ. Zaleucus Killed by His Own Law Zaleucuss strict laws and the uncompromising punishments attached to them led to his own death. Of Zaleucuss many strict laws, one restricted entry into the Locrian senate house with a weapon in hand during times of war. This ban was enforced by the penalty of death. The Greek historian Eustathius tells the story of how one unfortunate day Zaleucus inadvertently entered into the senate house in violation of the law. When his infraction was pointed out, Zaleucus ran upon the point of his sword declaring that the law had to be enforced for the good of the city. Thus Zaleucus, the criminal, was self-dispatched by the Zaleucus, the executioner, as a result of the strict application by Zaleucus, the judge, of the strict laws passed by Zaleucus, the lawgiver.

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John Adams on Zaleucus So much for Zaleucus, the first nomothets or lawgiver among the Greeks. In conclusion, one can do little better than quote the words of John Adams, and his encomium of Zaleucus: Unfortunately little remains of [Zaleucuss] laws but their preamble: but this is in a style so superior to all the other legislators, as to excite regret for the loss of his code. In this preamble he declares, that all those who shall inhabit the city, ought, above all things, to be persuaded that there is a God; and if they elevate their eyes and thoughts towards the heavens, they will be convinced, that the disposition of the heavenly bodies, and the order which reigns in all nature, are not the work of men, nor of chance; that therefore they ought to adore the gods, as the authors of all which life presents us of good and beautiful; that they should hold their souls pure from every vice, because the gods accept neither the prayers, offerings, or sacrifices of the wicked, and are pleased only with the just and beneficent actions of virtuous men. Having thus, in the beginning of his laws, fixed the attention of his fellow-citizens upon piety and wisdom, he ordains, above all things, that there should never be among them any irreconcilable enmity; but, on the contrary, that those animosities which might arise among them, should be only a passage to a sure and sincere reconciliation; and that he who would not submit himself to these sentiments, should be regarded as a savage in a civilized community. The chiefs of his republics ought not to govern with arrogance nor pride; nor should the magistrates be guided in their judgments by hatred nor by friendship. This preamble . . . places religion, morals, and government, upon a basis of philosophy, which is rational, intelligible, and eternal, for the real happiness of man in society, and throughout his duration. 13 So wrote our nations second president, himself a notable lawyer, on the merits of Zaleucus. Sources William Smith, ed. Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870), v. 3, p. 1309 (s.v. Zaleucus). Michale Gagarin, Early Greek Law. Berkely: University of California Press, 1989.

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Photo of Zaleukos: http://www.phil-fak.uniduesseldorf.de/philo/galerie/antike/zaleukos.html

nmei gr Atrkeia plin Lokrn Zefurvn (Nemei gar Atrekeia polin Lokrn Zephurin). Theophrastus (ca. 372-287 B.C.), a friend of Aristotle, was a Greek philosopher and scientist from the island of Lesbos. 3 Cicero, On the Laws, II.15 in Zetzell, James E.G., ed., Cicero: On the Commonwealth and On the Laws (Cambridge: University of Cambridge Press, 1999), 135. 4 Strabo, Geography VI. 5 Aristotle, Frag. 548 Rose (=schol. To Pindar Ol. 11.17) quoted in Gagarin, 58. 6 Gagarin, 52, 130. The Greek historian Diodorus Siculus stated that Zaleucus was of noble birth, but he also says he was a pupil of the philosopher Pythagoras, which could not be true, as such is an anachronism. Diod. Sic. xii.20 7 Zenobius 4.10 cited in Gagarin, 66. 8 The laws of Zaleuscus are a patchwork taken from the writings of Diodorus, Strabo, Zenobius, Aristotle, Aelian, Eustathius, and others. 9 Gagarin, 68 n. 77, 74. 10 Aelian, Historical Miscellanies, II.37. 11 Gagarin, 66 & n. 63. 12 Gagarin, 64 citing the Greek historian Ephorus. 13 John Adams, Defence of the Constitutions, Vol I, Letter LI (Locris. Zaleucus). The preamble, found in the Greek historian Diodorus Siculus (xii.20) and Stobaeus (Serm. xliv. 20.21), is probably historically spurious, and not part of Zaleucuss work.
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