Slave labor and tribute from conquered provinces relieved a great deal of the population of Athens—and, later, most of the population of Rome—of the need to work for food. In place of smallholding farmers, the fifth-century Athenians and the first-century Romans became soldiers and slave-masters. Half of Periclean Athens’ food supply was imported and paid for with tribute from subject cities.11 And as soon as the constraints of traditional society fell away, the Athenians stopped raising children. Within an oligarchy, families jostle for control, and their chances of maintaining power depend
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