When was athens created

He also formed the boule, a council of or people and the Ekklesia assembly and the Heliaia court. After the wise Solon, there were new social revolts that fractioned the city until Peisistratus took control of Athens by force, so he was considered a tyran. He was succeeded by his sons that compared to their father were a lot more brutal, which created more division among the Athenians. Eventually, Cleisthenes, leader of the democratic movement in B.

Cleisthenes reorganized the boule with members that represented the ten tribes in Athens. The Areopagus was also reformed with three members and the Arconte, ten members. The Ekklesia also grew considerably, integrating the Metics, which were the foreigners living in Athens and the Freedmen. To defend democracy from tyranny, the Ekklesia had the power to banish for a certain period a citizen that was perceived as a threat for the popular sovereignty.

The fifth century B. Pericles was a prominent and renowned political leader that did important reforms to democracy , by establishing the theorikon , a fund for subsidizing attendance at public festivals. He encouraged artists and writers to praise Athens and commissioned beautiful monuments and buildings with the Allies money. He was also very interested in science and encouraged its development. Imposing temples and landmarks were erected during his time in power, including the Temple of Athena Nike , the Erechtheion, and the the Parthenon symbol of Athens , on the Acropolis.

During the Golden Age of Athens, , people lived in the city. The soldier Philippides became famous during this battle for his race to tell Athens of the victory.

This led to the creation of the marathon race. During the second battle, the son of king Darius I, Xerxes I, attacked Athens and destroyed the Acropolis , but were defeated once more at the Battle of Salamis in At that time, Athens was a maritime power and it used this power to form an alliance that neutralized the Spartan hegemony.

During this prosperous period, the political leaders were always from the wealthy families. Athens and Persia went to war once more in B. This displeased the rest of the cities and finally led the city of Samos to revolt in , followed by Thebes, Megara and Corinth.

Eventually, the potent Sparta rebelled, and this led to the Peloponnesian War — B. Athens was named according to the Greek mythology from competition that the goddess Athena had with Poseidon about who will become protector of the city.

The myth says that Poseidon gave a spring with sea water whilst Athena offered an olive tree as she touched the ground of the sacred rock of the Acropolis. The people of Athens choose Athena as their protector and so the city was named after the goddess of wisdom.

The myth is symbolic but the two Gods symbolising the strength of Athens as a city of wisdom and as a sea power. The first settlement of Athens BC was situated on the rock of Acropolis.

According to the tradition, Athens was founded, when the king Theseus united in a state several settlements of Attica. The last king of ancient Athens was Kodros, who sacrificed his life in order to save the homeland.

Later came to power the nobles wealthy landowners. The nobles ruled Athens by their consul the Supreme Court Arios Pagos , from this consul where elected the 9 rulers of Athens.

The main characteristics of Athens are quite different from those of Sparta, because despite the existence of laws and the state, the concept of the individual-citizen was important. The main concern of the legislators was to strengthen the national conscience and to protect the democratic state.

The democracy was briefly overthrown by a coup in due to its poor handling of the war, but quickly restored. The war ended with the complete defeat of Athens in 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 , democracy was restored by Thrasybulus and an amnesty declared. Sparta's former allies soon turned against her due to her imperialist policy and soon Athens's former enemies Thebes and Corinth had become her allies. Finally Thebes defeated Sparta in in the Battle of Leuctra. Then the Greek cities including Athens and Sparta turned against Thebes whose dominance was stopped at the Battle of Mantinea BC with the death of its military genius leader Epaminondas.

By mid century, however, the northern Greek kingdom of Macedon was becoming dominant in Athenian affairs, despite the warnings of the last great statesman of independent Athens, Demosthenes.

Further, the conquests of his son, Alexander the Great, widened Greek horizons and made the traditional Greek city state obsolete. Athens remained a wealthy city with a brilliant cultural life, but ceased to be an independent power. In the 2nd century, after years of Macedonian supremacy, Greece was absorbed into the Roman Republic. In BC, most Athenian houses and fortifications were leveled by Roman general Sulla, while many civic buildings and monuments were left intact.

Under Rome, Athens was given the status of a free city because of its widely admired schools. The Roman emperor Hadrian would construct, a library, a gymnasium, an aqueduct which is still in use, several temples and sanctuaries, a bridge and would finance the completion of the Temple of Olympian Zeus.

The city was sacked by the Heruli in AD resulting in the burning of all the public buildings, the plundering of the lower city, and the damaging of the Agora and Acropolis. After this the city to the north of the Acropolis was hastily refortified on a smaller scale with the Agora left outside the walls.

Athens remained a centre of learning and philosophy during years of Roman rule, patronized by emperors such as Nero and Hadrian. But the conversion of the Empire to Christianity ended the city's role as a centre of pagan learning; the Emperor Justinian closed the schools of philosophy in AD.

This is generally taken to mark the end of the ancient history of Athens. By AD, Athens was under rule by the Byzantines and had grown out of favor. The Parthenon and Erechtheion were transformed into churches.

During the period of the Byzantine Empire Athens was a provincial town, and experienced fluctuating fortunes. In the early years many of its works of art were taken by the emperors to Constantinople. Furthermore, although the Byzantines retained control of the Aegean and its citys throughout this period, during the seventh and eighth centuries direct control did not extend far beyond the coast. From about the city shrank considerably due to barbarian raids by the Avars and Slavs, and was reduced to a shadow of its former self.

As the seventh century progressed, much of Greece was overrun by Slavic peoples from the north, and Athens entered a period of uncertainty and insecurity. The one notable figure from this period is the Empress Irene of Athens, a native Athenian, who seized control of the Byzantine Empire in a palace coup.

By the middle of the 9th century, as Greece was fully reconquered again, the city began to recover. Just as other cities benefited from improved security and the restoration of effective central control during this period, so Athens expanded once more. The invasions of the Turks after the battle of Manzikert in and the ensuing civil wars largely passed the region by, and Athens continued its provincial existence unharmed. When the Byzantine Empire was rescued by the resolute leadership of the three Komnenos emperors Alexios, John and Manuel, Attica and the rest of Greece prospered.

Archaeological evidence tells us that the medieval town experienced a period of rapid and sustained growth, starting in the eleventh century and continuing until the end of the twelfth century.

The agora or marketplace, which had been deserted since late antiquity, began to be built over, and soon the town became an important centre for the production of soaps and dyes. The growth of the town attracted the Venetians, and various other traders who frequented the ports of the Aegean, to Athens. This interest in trade appears to have further increased the economic prosperity of the town.

The 11th and 12th centuries were the Golden Age of Byzantine art in Athens. Almost all of the most important Byzantine churches around Athens were built during these two centuries, and this reflects the growth of the town in general. However, this medieval prosperity was not to last. In , the Fourth Crusade conquered Athens and the city was not recovered from the Latins before it was taken by the Ottoman Turks. It did not become Greek in government again until the 19th century.

From until , Athens was ruled by Latins in three separate periods. It was initially the capital of the eponymous Duchy of Athens, a fief of the Latin Empire which replaced Byzantium. After Thebes became a possession of the Latin dukes, which were of the Burgundian family called De la Roche, it replaced Athens as the capital and seat of government, though Athens remained the most influential ecclesiastical centre in the duchy and site of a prime fortress.

Scientists and mathematicians made progress too: Anaximandros devised a theory of gravity; Xenophanes wrote about his discovery of fossils and Pythagoras of Kroton discovered his famous Pythagorean Theorem. The economic, political, technological and artistic developments of the Archaic period readied the Greek city-states for the monumental changes of the next few centuries. But if you see something that doesn't look right, click here to contact us!

Subscribe for fascinating stories connecting the past to the present. The Acropolis of Athens is one of the most famous ancient archaeological sites in the world. Located on a limestone hill high above Athens, Greece, the Acropolis has been inhabited since prehistoric times. Over the centuries, the Acropolis was many things: a home to kings, a Few monuments in the world are more recognizable than the Parthenon.

Sitting atop a limestone hill rising some feet above the Ilissos Valley in Athens, this soaring marble temple built in tribute to the goddess Athena brings the glory of ancient Greece into the modern world. The Parthenon is a resplendent marble temple built between and B.

Dedicated to the Greek goddess Athena, the Parthenon sits high atop a compound of temples known as the Acropolis of Athens. Throughout the centuries, the The classical period was an era of war and conflict—first between the Greeks and the Persians, then between the In B.

By the time he died 13 years later, Alexander had built an empire that stretched from Greece all the way to India. That brief but thorough empire-building campaign changed the world: It spread For almost 30 centuries—from its unification around B.