John Malcolm Mitchell

“ OSTRACISM, a political device instituted, probably by Cleisthenes in 508 B.C., as a constitutional safeguard for the Athenian democracy. Its effect was to remove from Athens for a period of ten years any person who threatened the harmony and tranquillity of the body politic. ”

“ As in the case of other privilegia, ostracism did not take effect unless six thousand votes in all were recorded. Grote and others hold that six thousand had to be given against one person before he was ostracized, but it seems unlikely that the attendance at the Ecclesia ever admitted of so large a vote against one man, and the view is contradicted by Plut. Arist. c. 7. The ostracized person was compelled to leave Athens for ten years, but he was not regarded as a traitor or criminal. ”

“ There is no doubt that Cleisthenes' object was primarily to get rid of the Peisistratid faction without perpetual recourse to armed resistance (so Androtion, Ath. Pol. 22, Ephorus, Theopompus, Aristotle, Pol. iii. 13, 1284 a 17 and 36; viii. (v.) ”