Athenians meted out harsh punishments to those who fell afoul of prevalent laws or societal norms. If citizens had done something terrible, they ran the risk of being exiled from the city for up to 10 years. An interesting system was put in place whereby citizen peers voted by scratching the name of the charged person on an ostracon (Greek for shard of pottery; plural ostraca), that was later counted. The fate of the accused was sealed if the majority felt he or she deserved to be “ostraciz...
