Thursday, May 04, 2023
The Fats
J. Irving Manatt, Aegean Days (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1914), p. 119 (here = on Naxos):
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As the veil lifts and recorded history begins, we catch glimpses of the same social struggle here which marks the growth of the Greek city-state in general. The landed gentry, dubbed the Fats (οἱ παχεῖς) and doubtless sprung from the first families of the Ionian migration, find their monopoly of privilege and power threatened. For the industrial classes, attaining to wealth and weight, there arises a leader in Telestagoras, a noble so beloved of the commons that they freely supply his table, and when the gentry haggle about prices the word is always "Why, we'd rather give it to our Telestagoras than sell it to you!" So the 'Fats' forget themselves and misuse the noble demagogue and his daughters, whereupon the people rise against them and Naxos enters upon her stage of tyrannis.Herodotus 5.30.1:
ἐκ Νάξου ἔφυγον ἄνδρες τῶν παχέων...The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, s.v. παχύς, sense 4:
(of persons) fat, plump (as a sign of prosperity) Ar. Men.; prosperous, wealthy Hdt. Ar.John Miller Baer, "Organized Big Business Interests" (November 17, 1919): Dave Granlund, "Wall St. and Main St." (October 10, 2011):