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Athens is one of the oldest named cities in the world, having been continuously inhabited for at

least 7000 years. Situated in southern Europe, Athens  became the leading city of  Ancient Greece 

in the first millennium BCE and its cultural achievements during the 5th century BCE laid thefoundations of  western civilization. 

During the early Middle Ages, the city experienced a decline, then recovered under the later Byzantine Empire and was relatively prosperous during the period of the Crusades (12th and

13th centuries), benefiting from Italian trade. Following a period of sharp decline under the rule

of the Ottoman Empire, Athens re-emerged in the 19th century as the capital of the independentGreek  state.

The name of  Athens, connected to the name of its patron goddess Athena, originates from anearlier, Pre-Greek  language.

[1] The etiological myth explaining how Athens acquired this name

through the legendary contest between Poseidon and Athena was described by Herodotus, 

Apollodorus, Ovid, Plutarch, Pausanias and others. It even became the theme of the sculpture on

the West pediment of the Parthenon. Both Athena and Poseidon requested to be patrons of the

city and to give their name to it, so they competed with one another for the honour, offering thecity one gift each. Poseidon produced a spring by striking the ground with his trident,[2]

 

symbolizing naval power.

Athena created the olive tree, symbolizing peace and prosperity. The Athenians, under their ruler 

Cecrops, accepted the olive tree and named the city after Athena. A sacred olive tree said to bethe one created by the goddess was still kept on the Acropolis at the time of  Pausanias (2nd

century AD).[3]

 It was located by the temple of  Pandrosus, next to the Parthenon. According to

Herodotus, the tree had been burnt down during the Persian Wars, but a shoot sprung from the

stump. To the Greeks they seen this as a symbol that Athena still had her mark there on the city.[4]

 

Plato, in his dialogue Cratylus, offers a speculative etymology of Athena's name connecting it to

the phrase ἁ  θεονόα or hē theoû nóēsis (ἡ θεοῦ  νόηζις, 'the mind of god').[5]

 

Geographical setting

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Map of the Environs of Ancient Athens.

The site on which Athens stands was first inhabited in the  Neolithic  period, perhaps as adefensible settlement on top of the Acropolis ('high city'), around the end of the fourth

millennium BC or a little later .[6]

 The Acropolis is a natural defensive position which commandsthe surrounding plains. The settlement was about 20 km (12 mi) inland from the Saronic Gulf , in

the centre of the Cephisian Plain, a fertile valley surrounded by rivers. To the east lies Mount

Hymettus, to the north Mount Pentelicus. 

Ancient Athens, in the first millennium BC, occupied a very small area compared to the

sprawling metropolis of modern Athens. The ancient walled city encompassed an area measuringabout 2 km (1 mi) from east to west and slightly less than that from north to south, although at its

 peak the ancient city had suburbs extending well beyond these walls. The Acropolis was situated

 just south of the centre of this walled area.

The Agora, the commercial and social centre of the city, lay about 400 m (1,312 ft) north of the

Acropolis, in what is now the Monastiraki district. The hill of the Pnyx, where the AthenianAssembly met, lay at the western end of the city. The Eridanus (Ηριδανός) river flowed through

the city.

One of the most important religious sites in ancient Athens was the Temple of Athena, known

today as the Parthenon, which stood on top of the Acropolis, where its evocative ruins still stand.

Two other major religious sites, the Temple of Hephaestus (which is still largely intact) and the

Temple of Olympian Zeus or Olympeion (once the largest temple in mainland Greece but now inruins) also lay within the city walls.

According to Thucydides, the Athenian citizens at the beginning of the Peloponnesian War  (5th

century BC) numbered 40,000, making with their families a total of 140,000 people in all. The

metics, i.e. those who did not have citizen rights and paid for the right to reside in Athens,

numbered a further 70,000, whilst slaves were estimated at between 150,000 to 400,000.[7]

 Hence, approximately a tenth of the population were adult male citizens, eligible to meet and

vote in the Assembly and be elected to office. After the conquests of  Alexander the Great in the

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4th century BC, the city's population began to decrease as Greeks migrated to the Hellenistic

empires in the East.

 Antiquity

Origins and early history

The Greek goddess Athena. 

Athens has been inhabited from  Neolithic times, possibly from the end of the 4th millenniumBC, or nearly 7000 years.

[8] By 1412 BC the settlement had become an important center of the

Mycenaean civilization and the Acropolis was the site of a major  Mycenaean fortress whose

remains can be recognised from sections of the characteristic Cyclopean walls.[9]

 On the summitof the Acropolis, below the later  Erechtheion, cuttings in the rock have been identified as the

location of a Mycenaean palace.[9]

 

Between 1250 and 1200 BC a staircase was built down a cleft in the rock to reach a protected

water supply,[10]

 in a similar way to ones at Mycenae. Unlike other Mycenaean centers, such as

Mycenae and Pylos (see Bronze Age collapse), we do not know whether Athens suffereddestruction in about 1200 BC, an event often attributed to a Dorian invasion, and the Athenians

always maintained that they were "pure" Ionians with no Dorian element. However, Athens, like

many other Bronze Age settlements, went into economic decline for around 150 years following

this.

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Iron Age  burials, in the Kerameikos and other locations, are often richly provided for and

demonstrate that from 900 BC onwards Athens was one of the leading centres of trade and

 prosperity in the region; as were Lefkandi in Euboea and Knossos in Crete.[11]

 This position maywell have resulted from its central location in the Greek world, its secure stronghold on the

Acropolis and its access to the sea, which gave it a natural advantage over inland rivals such as

Thebes and Sparta. 

According to legend, Athens was formerly ruled by kings (see Kings of Athens), a situation

which may have continued up until the 9th century BC. From later accounts, it is believed thatthese kings stood at the head of a land-owning aristocracy known as the Eupatridae (the 'well-

 born'), whose instrument of government was a Council which met on the Hill of  Ares, called the

Areopagus and appointed the chief city officials, the archons and the  polemarch (commander-in-

chief).

Before the concept of the political state arose, four tribes based upon family relationships

dominated the area. The members had certain rights, privileges, and obligations:

  Common religious rights.

  A common burial place.

  Mutual rights of succession to property of deceased members.

  Reciprocal obligations of help, defense and redress of injuries.

  The right to intermarry in the gens in the cases of orphan daughters and heiresses.

  The possession of common property, an archon, and a treasurer.

  The limitation of descent to the male line.

  The obligation not to marry in the gens except in specified cases.

  The right to adopt strangers into the gens.

  The right to elect and depose its chiefs.[12]

 

During this period, Athens succeeded in bringing the other towns of  Attica under its rule. This process of   synoikismos  – the bringing together into one home – created the largest and wealthiest

state on the Greek mainland, but it also created a larger class of people excluded from politicallife by the nobility. By the 7th century BC social unrest had become widespread, and the

Areopagus appointed Draco to draft a strict new code of law (hence the word 'draconian'). When

this failed, they appointed Solon, with a mandate to create a new constitution (in 594 BC).

Reform and democracy

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The ruins of the Temple of Olympian Zeus.

The reforms that Solon initiated dealt with both political and economic issues. The economic

 power of the Eupatridae was reduced by forbidding the enslavement of Athenian citizens as a punishment for debt, by breaking up large landed estates and freeing up trade and commerce,which allowed the emergence of a prosperous urban trading class. Politically, Solon divided the

Athenians into four classes, based on their wealth and their ability to perform military service.

The poorest class, the Thetai, (Ancient Greek Θήται) who formed the majority of the population,received political rights for the first time and were able to vote in the  Ecclesia (Assembly). But

only the upper classes could hold political office. The Areopagus continued to exist but its

 powers were reduced.

The new system laid the foundations for what eventually became Athenian democracy, but in the

short-term it failed to quell class conflict and after 20 years of unrest the popular party, led by

Peisistratus, a cousin of Solon, seized power (in 541 BC). Peisistratus is usually called a tyrant,  but the Greek word tyrannos does not mean a cruel and despotic ruler, merely one who took 

 power by force. Peisistratus was in fact a very popular ruler, who made Athens wealthy,

 powerful, and a centre of culture, and instituted Athenian naval supremacy in the Aegean Sea and beyond. He preserved the Solonian constitution, but made sure that he and his family held all

the offices of state.

Peisistratus died in 527 BC and was succeeded by his sons Hippias and Hipparchus. They proved

to be much less adept rulers and in 514 BC, Hipparchus was assassinated in a private dispute

over a young man (see Harmodius and Aristogeiton). This led Hippias to establish a realdictatorship, which proved very unpopular and he was overthrown in 510 BC. A radical

 politician with an aristocratic background named Cleisthenes then took charge, and it was he

who established democracy in Athens.

The reforms of Cleisthenes replaced the traditional four "tribes" ( phyle) with ten new ones,

named after legendary heroes and having no class basis; they were in fact electorates. Each 'tribe'

was in turn divided into three 'trittyes' and each trittys had one or more demes, which became the basis of local government. The tribes each elected fifty members to the Boule, a council which

governed Athens on a day-to-day basis. The Assembly was open to all citizens and was both a

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legislature and a supreme court, except in murder cases and religious matters, which became the

only remaining functions of the Areopagus.

Most public offices were filled by lot, although the ten strategoi (generals) were elected. This

system remained remarkably stable and, with a few brief interruptions, it remained in place for 

170 years, until Philip II of Macedon defeated Athens at the Battle of Chaeroneain 338 BC.

Classical Athens

The city of Athens during the classical period of Ancient Greece (508 – 322 BC)[1]

 was a notable

 polis (city-state) of  Attica, Greece, leading the Delian League in the Peloponnesian War  against

Sparta and the Peloponnesian League. Athenian democracy was established in 508 BC under 

Cleisthenes following the tyranny of  Hippias. This system remained remarkably stable, and witha few brief interruptions remained in place for 180 years, until 322 BC (aftermath of  Lamian

War ). The peak of Athenian hegemony was achieved in the 440s to 430s BC, known as the Age

of Pericles. 

In the classical period, Athens was a center for the arts, learning and  philosophy, home of  Plato's

Akademia and Aristotle's Lyceum,[2][3]

 Athens was also the birthplace of  Socrates, Pericles, Sophocles, and many other prominent philosophers, writers and politicians of the ancient world.

It is widely referred to as the cradle of  Western Civilization, and the birthplace of  democracy,[4]

 

largely due to the impact of its cultural and political achievements during the 5th and 4thcenturies BC on the rest of the then known European continent.

[5] 

Rise to power (508 – 448 BC)

Main articles: Ionian Revolt, Persian Wars, and First Peloponnesian War 

Hippias - of the Peisistratid family - established a dictatorship in 514 BC, which proved veryunpopular, although it established stability and prosperity, and was eventually overthrown withthe help of an army from Sparta, in 511/510 BC. The radical politician of aristocratic background

(the Alcmaeonid family), Cleisthenes, then took charge and established democracy in Athens. 

The reforms of Cleisthenes replaced the traditional four Ionic "tribes" ( phyle) with ten new ones,named after legendary heroes of Greece and having no class basis, which acted as electorates.

Each tribe was in turn divided into three trittyes (one from the coast; one from the city and one

from the inland divisions), while each trittys had one or more demes (see deme) — depending on

their population — which became the basis of local government. The tribes each selected fiftymembers by lot for the Boule, the council which governed Athens on a day-to-day basis. The

 public opinion of voters could be influenced by the  political satires written by the comic poets and performed in the city theaters.

[6] The Assembly or Ecclesia was open to all full citizens and

was both a legislature and a supreme court, except in murder cases and religious matters, which became the only remaining functions of the Areopagus. Most offices were filled by lot, although

the ten strategoi (generals) were elected.

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Early Athenian coin, 5th century BCE. British Museum. 

Prior to the rise of Athens, Sparta, a city-state with a militaristic culture, considered itself theleader of the Greeks, and enforced an hegemony. In 499 BC Athens sent troops to aid the Ionian 

Greeks of  Asia Minor , who were rebelling against the Persian Empire (see Ionian Revolt). This

 provoked two Persian invasions of Greece, both of which were repelled under the leadership of the soldier-statesmen Miltiades and Themistocles (see Persian Wars). In 490 the Athenians, led

 by Miltiades, prevented the first invasion of the Persians, guided by king Darius I, at the Battle of 

Marathon. In 480 the Persians returned under a new ruler, Xerxes I. The Hellenic League led bythe Spartan King Leonidas led 7,000 men to hold the narrow passageway of  Thermopylae 

against the 100,000-250,000 army of Xerxes, during which time Leonidas and 300 other Spartan

elites were killed. Simultaneously the Athenians led an indecisive naval battle off  Artemisium. 

However, this delaying action was not enough to discourage the Persian advance which soonmarched through Boeotia, setting up Thebes as their base of operations, and entered southern

Greece. This forced the Athenians to evacuate Athens, which was taken by the Persians, and seek 

the protection of their fleet. Subsequently the Athenians and their allies, led by Themistocles, defeated the Persian navy at sea in the Battle of Salamis. It is interesting to note that Xerxes had

 built himself a throne on the coast in order to see the Greeks defeated. Instead, the Persians were

routed. Sparta's hegemony was passing to Athens, and it was Athens that took the war to Asia

Minor. These victories enabled it to bring most of the Aegean and many other parts of Greecetogether in the Delian League, an Athenian-dominated alliance.

Athenian hegemony (448 – 430 BC)

Main article: Age of Pericles 

Pericles — an Athenian general, politician and orator  — distinguished himself above the other  personalities of the era, men who excelled in  politics,  philosophy, architecture, sculpture, history 

and literature. He fostered arts and literature and gave to Athens a splendor which would never 

return throughout its history. He executed a large number of public works projects and improvedthe life of the citizens. Hence, he gave his name to the Athenian Golden Age. Silver mined inLaurium in southeastern Attica contributed greatly to the prosperity of this "Golden" Age of 

Athens.

During the time of the ascendancy of  Ephialtes as leader of the democratic faction, Pericles was

his deputy. When Ephialtes was assassinated  by personal enemies, Pericles stepped in and was

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elected general, or   strategos, in 445 BC; a post he held continuously until his death in 429 BC,

always by election of the Athenian Assembly. 

Peloponnesian War (431 – 404 BC)

Main article: Peloponnesian War 

Further information: Athenian coup of 411 BC 

The modern National Academy in Athens, with Apollo and Athena on their columns, and Socrates and

Plato seated in front.

Resentment by other cities at the hegemony of Athens led to the Peloponnesian War  in 431,which pitted Athens and her increasingly rebellious sea empire against a coalition of land-based

states led by Sparta. The conflict marked the end of Athenian command of the sea. The war 

 between Athens and the city-state Sparta ended with an Athenian defeat after Sparta started itsown navy.

Athenian democracy was briefly overthrown by the coup of 411, brought about because of its poor handling of the war, but it was quickly restored. The war ended with the complete defeat of 

Athens in 404. Since the defeat was largely blamed on democratic politicians such as Cleon and

Cleophon, there was a brief reaction against democracy, aided by the Spartan army (the rule of 

the Thirty Tyrants). In 403, democracy was restored  by Thrasybulus and an amnesty declared.

Corinthian War and the Second Athenian League (395 – 355 BC)

Sparta's former allies soon turned against her due to her imperialist policies, and Athens's former 

enemies, Thebes and Corinth, became her allies. Argos, Thebes and Corinth, allied with Athens, 

fought against Sparta in the decisive Corinthian War  of 395 BC – 387 BC. Opposition to Sparta

enabled Athens to establish a Second Athenian League. Finally Thebes defeated Sparta in 371 inthe Battle of Leuctra. However, other Greek cities, including Athens, turned against Thebes, and

its dominance was brought to an end at the Battle of Mantinea (362 BC) with the death of its

leader, the military genius Epaminondas. 

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Athens under Macedon (355 – 322 BC)

Further information: Alexander the Great, Antipatrid dynasty, and Antigonid dynasty 

By mid century, however, the northern kingdom of  Macedon was becoming dominant in

Athenian affairs, despite the warnings of the last great statesman of independent Athens,Demosthenes. In 338 BC the armies of  Philip II defeated Athens at the Battle of Chaeronea, 

effectively limiting Athenian independence. Athens and other states became part of the Leagueof Corinth. Further, the conquests of his son, Alexander the Great, widened Greek horizons and

made the traditional Greek city state obsolete. Antipater  dissolved the Athenian government and

established a plutocratic system in 322 BC (see Lamian War  and Demetrius Phalereus). Athensremained a wealthy city with a brilliant cultural life, but ceased to be an independent power.

In the 2nd century BC, following the Battle of Corinth (146 BC), Greece was absorbed into the

Roman Republic as part of the Achaea Province, concluding 200 years of Macedoniansupremacy.

Geography

Overview

Map of ancient Athens showing the Acropolis in middle, the Agora to the northwest, and the city walls.

Athens was in Attica, about 30 stadia from the sea, on the southwest slope of  Mount Lycabettus,  between the small rivers Cephissus to the west, Ilissos to the south, and the Eridanos to the north,

the latter of which flowed through the town. The walled city measured about 1.5 km (0.93 mi) indiameter, although at its peak the city had suburbs extending well beyond these walls. TheAcropolis was just south of the centre of this walled area. The city was burnt by Xerxes in 480

BC, but was soon rebuilt under the administration of  Themistocles, and was adorned with public

 buildings by Cimon and especially by Pericles, in whose time (461-429 BC) it reached itsgreatest splendour. Its beauty was chiefly due to its public buildings, for the private houses were

mostly insignificant, and its streets badly laid out. Towards the end of the Peloponnesian war , it

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contained more than 10,000 houses,[7]

 which at a rate of 12 inhabitants to a house would give a

 population of 120,000, though some writers make the inhabitants as many as 180,000.

Athens consisted of two distinct parts:

 The City , properly so called, divided into The Upper City or Acropolis, and The Lower City,surrounded with walls by Themistocles.

  The port city of  Piraeus, also surrounded with walls by Themistocles and connected to the city

with the Long Walls, built under Conon and Pericles. 

The Long Walls

Map of the environs of Athens showing Piraeus, Phalerum, and the Long Walls 

The Long Walls consisted of two walls leading to Piraeus, 40 stadia long (4.5 miles, 7 km),running parallel to each other, with a narrow passage between them. In addition, there was a wall

to Phalerum on the east, 35 stadia long (4 miles, 6.5 km). There were therefore three long walls

in all; but the name Long Walls seems to have been confined to the two leading to the Piraeus,while the one leading to Phalerum was called the Phalerian Wall . The entire circuit of the walls

was 174.5 stadia (nearly 22 miles, 35 km), of which 43 stadia (5.5 miles, 9 km) belonged to the

city, 75 stadia (9.5 miles, 15 km) to the long walls, and 56.5 stadia (7 miles, 11 km) to Piraeus,Munichia, and Phalerum.

The Acropolis (Upper city)

The Acropolis, also called Cecropia from its reputed founder, Cecrops, was a steep rock in the

middle of the city, about 50 meters high, 350 meters long, and 150 meters wide; its sides were

naturally scarped on all sides except the west end. It was originally surrounded by an ancientCyclopean wall said to have been built by the Pelasgians. At the time of the Peloponnesian war  

only the north part of this wall remained, and this portion was still called the Pelasgic Wall ;

while the south part which had been rebuilt by Cimon, was called the Cimonian Wall . On thewest end of the Acropolis, where access is alone practicable, were the magnificent  Propylaea, 

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"the Entrances," built by Pericles, before the right wing of which was the small Temple of Athena

 Nike. The summit of the Acropolis was covered with temples, statues of bronze and marble, and

various other works of art. Of the temples, the grandest was the  Parthenon, sacred to the"Virgin" goddess Athena; and north of the Parthenon was the magnificent  Erechtheion, 

containing three separate temples, one to Athena Polias, or the "Protectress of the State," the

 Erechtheion proper, or sanctuary of  Erechtheus, and the  Pandroseion, or sanctuary of  Pandrosos, the daughter of Cecrops. Between the Parthenon and Erechtheion was the colossal Statue of  Athena Promachos, or the "Fighter in the Front," whose helmet and spear was the first object on

the Acropolis visible from the sea.

The Acropolis imagined in an 1846 painting by Leo von Klenze 

Lower city

The lower city was built in the plain round the Acropolis, but this plain also contained severalhills, especially in the southwest part. On the west side the walls embraced the Hill of the

 Nymphs and the Pnyx, and to the southeast they ran along beside the Ilissos. 

Gates

There were many gates, among the more important there were:

  On the West side: Dipylon, the most frequented gate of the city, leading from the inner

Kerameikos to the outer Kerameikos, and to the Academy. The Sacred Gate, where the sacred

road to Eleusis began. The Knight's Gate, probably between the Hill of the Nymphs and the Pnyx. The Piraean Gate, between the Pnyx and the Mouseion, leading to the carriage road between

the Long Walls to the Piraeus. The Melitian Gate, so called because it led to the deme Melite,

within the city.

  On the South side: The Gate of the Dead in the neighbourhood of the Mouseion. The Itonian

Gate, near the Ilissos, where the road to Phalerum began.

  On the East side: The Gate of Diochares, leading to the Lyceum. The Diomean Gate, leading to

Cynosarges and the deme Diomea.

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  On the North side: The Acharnian Gate, leading to the deme Acharnai. 

Districts

  The Inner  Kerameikos, or "Potter's Quarter," in the west of the city, extending north as far as the

Dipylon gate, by which it was separated from the outer Kerameikos; the Kerameikos containedthe Agora, or "market-place," the only one in the city, lying northwest of the Acropolis, and

north of the Areopagus. 

  The deme Melite, in the west of the city, south of the inner Kerameikos.

  The deme Skambonidai , in the northern part of the city, east of the inner Kerameikos.

  The Kollytos, in the southern part of the city, south and southwest of the Acropolis.

  Koele, a district in the southwest of the city.

  Limnai , a district east of Milete and Kollytos, between the Acropolis and the Ilissos.

  Diomea, a district in the east of the city, near the gate of the same name and the Cynosarges. 

   Agrai , a district south of Diomea.

Hills

  The  Areopagus, the "Hill of  Ares," west of the Acropolis, which gave its name to the celebrated

council that held its sittings there, was accessible on the south side by a flight of steps cut out of 

the rock.

  The Hill of the Nymphs, northwest of the Areopagus.

  The Pnyx , a semicircular hill, southwest of the Areopagus, where the ekklesia (assemblies) of the

people were held in earlier times, for afterwards the people usually met in the Theatre of 

Dionysus. 

  The Mouseion, "the Hill of the Muses," south of the Pnyx and the Areopagus.

Streets

Among the more important streets, there were:

  The Piraean Street , which led from the Piraean gate to the Agora. 

  The Panathenaic Way , which led from the Dipylon gate to the Acropolis via the Agora, along

which a solemn procession was made during the Panathenaic Festival. 

  The Street of the Tripods, on the east side of the Acropolis.

Public buildings

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The Temple of Hephaestus in modern-day Athens 

  Temples. Of these the most important was the Olympieion, or Temple of Olympian Zeus, 

southeast of the Acropolis, near the Ilissos and the fountain Callirrhoë, which was long

unfinished, and was first completed by Hadrian. The Temple of Hephaestus, located to the west

of the Agora. The Temple of Ares, to the north of the Agora. Metroon, or temple of the mother

of the gods, on the west side of the Agora. Besides these, there was a vast number of other

temples in all parts of the city.

  The Bouleuterion (Senate House), at the west side of the Agora.

  The Tholos, a round building close to the Bouleuterion, built c. 470 BC by Cimon, which served as

the Prytaneion, in which the Prytaneis took their meals and offered their sacrifices.

  Stoae, or Colonnades, supported by pillars, and used as places of resort in the heat of the day, of 

which there were several in Athens. In the Agora there were: the Stoa Basileios, the court of the

King-Archon, on the west side of the Agora; the Stoa Eleutherios, or Colonnade of Zeus

Eleutherios, on the west side of the Agora; the Stoa Poikile, so called because it was adorned

with fresco painting of the Battle of Marathon by Polygnotus, on the north side of the Agora.

Artist's impression of the Theatre of Dionysus 

  Theatres. The Theatre of Dionysus, on the southeast slope of the Acropolis, was the great

theatre of the state. Besides this there were Odeons, for contests in vocal and instrumental

music, an ancient one near the fountain Callirrhoë, and a second built by Pericles, close to the

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theatre of Dionysius, on the southeast slope of the Acropolis. The large odeon surviving today,

the Odeon of Herodes Atticus was built in Roman times. 

  Panathenaic Stadium, south of the Ilissos, in the district Agrai, where the athletic portion of the

Panathenaic Games were held.

Suburbs

  The Outer  Kerameikos, northwest of the city, was the finest suburb of Athens; here were buried

the Athenians who had fallen in war, and at the further end of it was the  Academy , 6 stadia from

the city.

  Cynosarges, east of the city, across the Ilissos, reached from the Diomea gate, a gymnasium 

sacred to Heracles, where the Cynic Antisthenes taught.

  Lyceum, east of the city, a gymnasium sacred to Apollo Lyceus, where Aristotle taught.

Culture

Main articles: Age of Pericles, Greek philosophy, Athenian festivals, and Greek theatre 

The Karyatides statues of the Erechtheion on its Acropolis.

The period from the end of the Persian Wars to the Macedonian conquest marked the zenith of Athens as a center of literature, philosophy (see Greek philosophy) and the arts (see Greek 

theatre). Some of the most important figures of Western cultural and intellectual history lived in

Athens during this period: the dramatists Aeschylus, Aristophanes, Euripides and Sophocles, the

 philosophers Aristotle, Plato and Socrates, the historians Herodotus, Thucydides and Xenophon, the poet Simonides and the sculptor  Phidias. The leading statesman of this period was Pericles, 

who used the tribute paid by the members of the Delian League to build the Parthenon and other 

great monuments of classical Athens. The city became, in Pericles's words, "the school of Hellas[Greece]."

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