'Liturgies' were an important source of income for the polis. The liturgy is an interesting institution. On one view, it was able to inspire pride in the Athenian taxpayer, for it placed his estate at the service of his city. In theory, and for the most part in practice, the wealthiest Athenian men came forward eagerly to carry out various services for the good of their polis in the best possible fashion. What they got out of it, initially, was notability and self-respect.

'Liturgies' were divided into 'regular' and 'irregular': they related either to the army or to the state. The trierarchy was an 'extraordinary liturgy', and so was the eisphora (property-tax): both these were directly related to wartime. 'Ordinary liturgies' comprised: [theatre] sponsorship (choregia); running the gymnasia (gymnasiarchia); providing civic meals (hestiasis; presidency (prostateia, also called leadership of the theoria (architheoria); and horsebreeding (hippotrophia), this last being imposed only on the pentakosiomedimnoi and triakosiomedimnoi.


A citizen became, nominally at least, captain of a trireme for twelve months. He did not have to have reached his thirtieth birthday in order to be considered a candidate for this post. The trierarch was responsible for keeping the ship in good trim and for recruiting and training (but not paying and feeding) the crew. The trierarchy was the most expensive liturgy of them all, and could cost the citizen up to one talent.


The eisphora was expensive, too. It was imposed in cases of emergency - mostly after an outbreak of hostilities.
The theatre sponsor (choregos) had the job of getting together the theatre chorus; training them; paying them a wage; and costuming them. In tragedy the chorus numbered fifteen people; in comedy, twenty-four; there were fifty members in a dithyramb chorus and in a troupe of pyrrich dancers. The sponsor was always in competition for first prize with other sponsors.
The gymnasiarchos was responsible for training and paying a team of runners to take part in the Panathenaia, Hephaisteia and Prometheia torch-races.
The hestiarchos undertook to provide members of his own tribe with meals during the Great Panathenaia and the Great Dionysia.
The architheoros undertook leadership of diplomatic missions - to an oracle or to the Panhellenic festivals (at Olympia, Delphi, Nemea, the Isthmus [of Corinth], and Delos).
The hippotrophos undertook to manage and breed horses for the army, or for great festivals and racing.

There were occasions when a wrong choice of sponsor was made. An Athenian to whom the 'liturgy' was assigned could produce proof that he was not as well-to-do as had been thought. There were two ways of releasing him from his obligation: either by a jury verdict in court, or by a procedure known as antidosis.
Suppose citizen A had been entrusted with a liturgy, but thought that citizen B was in a better financial position than himself. He could then ask to be released from his 'liturgy' obligations. To be exact, A was in a position to challenge B either to undertake the 'liturgy' himself, or to exchange estates, by the antidosis procedure, with A. If B failed to take up the challenge, the case went for trial.


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