"Sitopolai" and "Sitophylakes" in Lysias' "Against the Graindealers": Governmental Intervention in the Athenian Economy

L YSIAS' ORATION AGAINST THE GRAINDEALERS (22) provides us with a rare glimpse into Athenian governmental supervision of the trade in grain, that most vital of imports. This speech by an unknown speaker was delivered in court against a group of metics who were sitopolai (graindealers). The charge involves purchases of more than a permitted amount of grain, 50 phormoi. Our subject will be how and why the graindealers transgressed this law, and what was the economic context of this legislation and what were the likely effects of the transgression. While most scholars have seen their crime as hoarding (or striving for individual monopoly), I shall argue that Athenian legislation acted against collaboration in the buying of grain and against anti-competitive practices which involved pricefixing. Lysias' client, the speaker of Oration 22, who paints a dark picture of the destructive machinations of the anti-social sitopolai, has been followed all too quickly. Previous work on this speech has over-estimated the extent and efficacy of regulation of the grain trade and exaggerated the individual actions of sitopolai and emporoi (importers), the principal agents in supplying Athens with food from abroad.' This episode ought not to be made a test case for an evaluation of the management by the state of crisis in the grain supply. Moreover, this speech is discernibly a bad brief (below,