Athens: The Birthplace of
Democracy
June 11, 2015
Mary Evelyn McCutcheon
Table of Contents
Overview
Location, Location, Location
Founding a City State
Historical Timeline
Government
Persian Wars
Battle of Salamis
The Golden Age
Peloponnesian Wars
Alexander the Great
Rome
Summary
Overview
Athens has a rich history, being inhabited for around
5000 years
Cultural influence with Homer, Democracy,
Herodotus, Thucydides, and Socrates
Persian and Peloponnesian Wars are some of history’s
most decisive battles
Like most great ancient cities, the city fell to the
Romans
Location, Location, Location
Located in Greece
12 miles from the
Mediterranean
Has a defensible Acropolis
Centrally located for trade
Founding a City State
Inhabited since 15th
Century BCE
Began as a trade city for
Mycenaean civilization
Suffered destruction around
13th Century BCE
Had explosive growth in 6th
century BCE
Historical Timeline
Government
Founded under
kings
Solon reforms
True democracy
emerges
Persian Wars
Started in 490 BCE
Defeat Darius I at
Marathon
480 BCE Xerxes returns
Battle of Thermopylae
War ends at Battle of
Salamis
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/
244117/Greco-Persian-Wars
Battle of Salamis
The Golden Age
480-404 BCE
The Age of
Pericles
Delian League
Herodotus
Thucydides
Socrates
Peloponnesian Wars
Began in 431 BCE
Athens fought Sparta
Sparta eventually won in
404 BCE
Heavily decimated
Greek city-states
http://www.history.com/topics/ancie
nt-history/peloponnesian-war
Alexander the Great
Weakened city-states left
open door for a
conqueror
Philip II conquers
Greece
Alexander spreads Greek
culture with conquests
Newfound spreading
known as Hellenization
Rome
88-85 BCE Sulla destroys
Athens
Remained a ‘free city’
Hadrian’s building
campaign
Temple of Olympian
Zeus
http://www.ancient.eu/Roman_Empire/
Summary
Athens was birthed out of the Mycenaean Civilization
The Persian Wars helped set the course for Western
civilization
The Peloponnesian Wars weakened Greece resulting in
the conquest of Philip II and his son Alexander the
Great
Athens fell to the Romans in the 1st century BCE