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Athens
Hooker, Richard. “Athens.” 1996. Web. August 1, 2004.
http://www.wsu.edu/~dee/GREECE/ATHENS.HTM
The Areopagus
Athens entered the Archaic Period (750 BCE-480 BCE) in the same way as so many of its
neighbors, as a city-state ruled by a basileus , or "king." Unlike Sparta, however, Athens' history
was not dominated by invasion of a neighbor, for the land around Athens was agriculturally rich
and the city had a harbor so that it could trade easily with city-states around the Aegean. The
power of the basileus slowly faded; underneath the basileus was a council of nobles, which were
called the Areopagus, from the name of the hill on which they met. In the eighth century BCE,
these nobles gradually became very wealthy, particularly off of the cash crops of wine and olive
oil, both of which require great wealth to get started. As their wealth increased, the nobles of the
Areopagus slowly stripped the king of power until Athenian government imperceptibly became
an oligarchy [rule by the few, generally nobles]. The Areopagus consisted of a varying number of
members, and it elected nine archons, or "rulers," to run the state. The archons, however, always
had to submit to the approval or veto of the Areopagus, and they also became members of the
Areopagus when their term in office expired, so, in reality, the Areopagus ruled the country.
Rule by the wealthy, however, is often inherently unstable. In Athens, the farmers in the
surrounding countryside produced mainly wheat, while the wealthy and nobility owned estates
that produced wine and olive oil. Wheat farming was badly managed, however; the average
Athenian farmer didn't rotate crops or let fields lie fallow. Production of wheat plummeted at the
same time that Athenians began to import wheat and to export olive oil and wine. So not only did
production of wheat fall, so did its price. Pretty soon, even though the wealthy farmers were
making money hand over fist, the average farmer had fallen deeply into debt to the wealthiest
members of society. To pay for that debt, farmers sold their children, their wives, and even
themselves into (limited) slavery both in Athens and abroad. The situation was a powder keg
waiting to go off; suffering under unmanageable debts, sold into slavery, with the government
under the control of the wealthy people that were the causes of their problems, the average
Athenian farmer was primed for revolution.
The Reforms of Solon
But history takes strange turns sometimes. Recognizing the danger of the situation, in 594 BCE,
the Areopagus and the people of Athens agreed to hand over all political power to a single
individual, Solon. In effect a tyrant,1 Solon's mission was to reform the government to stem the
tide of privation and exploitation and set up a system to guarantee that Athens didn't slip into such
a situation again.
Solon immediately dismissed all outstanding debts, and he freed as many Athenians as he could
from the slavery they had sold themselves into. He banned any loans that were secured by a
promise to enter into slavery if the loan is defaulted, and he tried to bring people who had been
sold into slavery abroad back to Athens. In addition, he encouraged the development of olive and
wine production, so that by the end of the century, most of Athenian land was dedicated to these
lucrative crops.
The original sense of “tyrant,” from the Greek tyrannos means one who has taken power by their own
means (as opposed to being elected or inheriting it) and does not necessarily have the negative sense that
the modern use does. However, the institution of tyrannos very quickly degenerated into the negative sense.
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As far as government is concerned, he divided Athenian society into four classes based on wealth.
The two wealthiest classes were allowed to serve on the Areopagus. The third class was allowed
to serve on an elected council of four hundred people. This council was organized according to
the four tribes making up the Athenian people; each tribe was allowed to elect one hundred
representatives from this third class. This council of four hundred served as a kind of balance or
check to the power of the Areopagus. The fourth class, the poorest class, was allowed to
participate in an assembly; this assembly voted on affairs brought to it by the council of four
hundred, and even elected local magistrates. This class also participated in a new judicial court
that gradually drew civil and military cases out of the hands of the wealthiest people, the
Areopagus.
Peisistratus and the Tyranny
The Athenians considered Solon the great hero of their state and pointed to the reforms of Solon
as the basis of their state. Solon's new state, however, lasted very briefly. Although he brilliantly
reformed the government, he really didn't solve the economic crisis, and within a few years,
Athens was collapsing into anarchy. A nobleman, Peisistratus, swept into power during this
anarchy and set about restoring order. The tyranny of Peisistratus, however, was as important to
the foundation of Athenian democracy as Solon's reforms had been. Although he was a military
leader who backed up his power with a frightening mercenary army [soldiers for hire],
Peisistratus began to actively build in and around Athens, and actively reform Athenian religion
and religious practices, and, in particular, devoted his government to cultural reform. He sought
out poets and artists in order to make Athens a culturally sophisticated and dynamic society. But,
in particular, he launched a full attack on the power of the nobility. He increased the power of the
Assembly and the courts associated with the poorest classes, and used all his power to make sure
that the Solonian government worked smoothly and that elections were held (provided his
supporters were elected).
Like most tyrants, Peisistratus had monarchical ambitions; on his death, the tyranny fell to his
son, Hippias. The life of a tyrant is not a comfortable one, and although Hippias began in the
mold of his father, the assassination of his brother [Hipparchus] caused him great fright and
consternation. He became suspicious and withdrawn and increasingly arbitrary. His enemies,
which were many, if they hadn't already started, began plotting his overthrow. In particular, a
wealthy family, the Alcmaeonids, who had been exiled by Peisistratus, prevailed on Sparta to
assist them in the overthrow of Hippias. Under the Spartan king, Cleomenes I, Athens was
overcome in 510 BCE and Hippias ran to exile in Persia
Cleisthenes
The Spartans followed their usual practice and entered into a truce with Athens and installed their
own hand-picked Athenians to lead the government. The Spartans, however, were too clever for
their own good. They chose an individual, Isagoras, whom they felt was the most loyal to Sparta;
Isagoras, however, was a bitter rival of the Alcmaeonids, who had been the original allies of
Sparta. Isagoras, for his part, set about restoring the Solonic government, but he also set about
"purifying" Athenian citizenship. Under Solon and later Peisistratus, a number of people had been
enfranchised [given rights, such as voting] as citizens even though they weren't Athenian or who
were doubtfully Athenian. For in the Greek world, you could only be the citizen of a city-state if
you could trace your ancestry back to the original inhabitants of the state. Isagoras, however,
began to throw people off the citizenship rolls in great numbers. Cleisthenes, an Alcmaeonid
noble, rallied popular support and threatened the power of Isagoras, who promptly called for the
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Spartans again. The Spartans invaded a second time, and Cleisthenes was expelled, but soon a
popular uprising swept Isagoras from power and installed Cleisthenes.
From 508 to 502 BCE, Cleisthenes began a series of major reforms that would produce Athenian
democracy. He enfranchised as citizens all free men living in Athens and Attica (the area
surrounding Athens). He established a council which would be the chief arm of government with
all executive and administrative control. Every citizen over the age of thirty was eligible to sit on
this council; each year the members of the council would be chosen by lot. The Assembly, which
included all male citizens, was allowed to veto any of the council's proposals and was the only
branch of government that could declare war. In 487, long after Cleisthenes, the Athenians added
the final aspect of Athenian democracy proper: ostracism. The Assembly could vote (voting was
done on potsherds called ostraka) on expelling citizens from the state for a period of ten years.
This ostracism would guarantee that individuals who were contemplating seizing power would be
removed from the country before they got too powerful.
So by 502 BCE, Athens had pretty much established its culture and political structure, just as
Sparta had pretty much established its culture and political structure by 550 BCE. Athens was
more or less a democracy; it had become primarily a trading and commercial center; a large part
of the Athenian economy focussed on cash crops for export and crafts; it had become a center of
art and literature; the city had become architecturally rich because of the building projects of
Peisistratus—an architectural richness that far outshone other Greek city-states; and Athenian
religious festivals were largely in place. The next one hundred years would be politically and
culturally dominated by Athens; the event that would catapult Athens to the center of the Greek
world was the invasion of the Persians in 490 BCE.
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