Download CLEISTHENES BRINGS DEMOCRACY TO ATHENS

CLEISTHENES BRINGS DEMOCRACY TO ATHENS
Born into the rich and aristocratic Alcmaeonid clan around 570 BC, Cleisthenes was raised as a nobleman
at a time when the city was deeply divided between ordinary commoners and their wealthy noble rulers.
Named after his grandfather, the young boy had a great deal to live up to. His grandfather had
ruled the city of Sicyon, won the Olympics as a chariot racer, and become famous all over Greece for the
year long competition he held for suitors seeking to marry his daughter. The eventual winner of the
contest was an Athenian nobleman called Megacles - the younger Cleisthenes' father - but all the other
participants received generous consolation prizes.
Megacles became one of Athens' most important statesmen and would have brought up his son
to embrace the traditional heroic virtues embodied in the works of Homer. To be a leader and to achieve
glory and fame were what counted in life, only through individual deeds could a man hope to achieve
immortality.
But there was another important influence at work in the city, one that the highly intelligent
young boy was almost certainly aware of... In the years before Cleisthenes' was born, the most
influential man in the city had been Solon, an unselfish and model aristocratic reformer who became
known as one of the Seven Wise Men of Greece. Solon had sought to limit the excessive powers of the
nobility and restore Athens to a state of 'eunomia', or 'good order'. To achieve this he had created a
Council of Four Hundred men whose job was to represent the population as a whole, and encouraged
the people, especially the aristocrats, to be responsible for their city, not just themselves.
Solon's ideas were, however, ahead of their time and the ordinary people still had little political
influence. Their main role in the politics of the city was to act as the supporters of their aristocratic
leaders, not act for themselves.
So when Cleisthenes was only 10 years old and his brother-in-law Pisistratus, a popular general,
seized power there was little opposition from the ordinary Athenians. After several failed attempts,
Pisistratus ultimately established himself as 'tyrant', the undisputed leader of the city.
Pisistratus died in 527 BC. His reign would be remembered as a 'Golden Age' of Athenian
progress and development. His son, Hippias, ruled successfully at first, and like his father avoided
interfering in the private affairs of the people.
Cleisthenes was now over forty years old and an established politician with a reputation for
flexibility and clever strategy. For reasons that are still unclear, but possibly because of the political
plotting of his father Megacles, he had already spent a period in exile - a time he spent touring the other
city-states of Greece.
Then in the year 514 BC Hippias' brother and right-hand man, Hipparchos, was assassinated in a
lovers quarrel. In response Hippias became an increasingly brutal and savage dictator.
After long years of waiting, Cleisthenes at last saw his opportunity. Calling in a favour owed him
by the Oracle of Delphi, the greatest shrine in all Greece, he managed to obtain Spartan help and
overthrew Hippias, who fled to Asia Minor.
The year was 510 BC, the traditional date of Athens' liberation from the tyrants. However, almost
immediately Cleisthenes' bid for power was thwarted…
When Hippias was driven out of the city in 510 BC, Athens celebrated its liberation from tyranny.
Now in his 60s, Cleisthenes, the man who more than anyone had brought that liberation about, could
sense power was within his grasp. He had at last lived up to the heroic myths he'd been brought up with
since childhood. But almost immediately another nobleman, Isagoras, emerged to challenge his power.
Cleisthenes responded by appealing for supporters far beyond the normal factions of the
aristocracy, proposing a series of sweeping reforms that would appeal to the ordinary people of Athens.
It was a bold move that forced his opponent Isagoras to dramatically up the stakes.
An old friend of the Spartan King, Cleomenes, with whom he was rumoured to have shared his
wife, Isagoras turned to the king for help. Cleomenes duly dispatched a contingent of Spartan troops to
aid Isagoras and his aristocratic conspirators.
For Cleisthenes, the intervention of the Spartans spelt defeat. In the year 508, before Spartan
troops had even reached the city, he was forced to flee, probably in the vain hope that with him gone
the Spartans would not need to occupy Athens.
Isagoras was appointed as 'archon', chief civil official, in 508 BC. Supported by a faction of
Athen's most conservative aristocrats, his new regime appeared to be a return to tyranny. In reality
Isagoras ruled as the head of an oligarchy of three hundred noblemen, who in turn relied upon the
military backing of Sparta.
Under instructions from the Spartan king, Cleomenes, the first task of the new government was
to banish Cleisthenes' most powerful allies. Altogether over 700 households were brutally cast out of the
city, including the whole of Cleisthenes' clan, the Alcmaeonids. Calling them 'The Accursed', the
justification used by Isagoras and his allies was based on an ancient misdeed the clan had been
responsible for.
To the ordinary people of Athens, Isagoras was clearly putting an end to all opposition so that he
and his allies could rule unhindered, even if that meant relying on Spartan help. Isagoras' next target
was one of the last vestiges of Solon's rule, the Council of Four Hundred; a sort of consultative assembly
with little real power.
But though the Council was largely symbolic, disbanding it was the beginning of the end of Isagoras'
rule…
As the reformer Cleisthenes agonised in exile with the 700 families called 'The Accursed', his
arch-enemy and current ruler of Athens, Isagoras, continued to dismantle the last vestiges of the city's
traditional government with the help of his Spartan allies.
Neither man had quite realised the power or feelings of the ordinary Athenians. So when a riot
turned into a full-scale revolt both leaders were taken by surprise.
For two days and nights, people who they had always considered their inferiors trapped Isagoras
and his Spartan allies on the Acropolis. Unprepared and overwhelmed by the united opposition against
them, they were forced to agree to a humiliating truce. The Spartans left Athens, while Isagoras' allies
were executed. The would-be tyrant somehow managed to escape.
It was a new dawn for Athens. The ordinary Athenians had rescued their city and seized power
for themselves. Now they turned to the man whose unique experience and disappointments had helped
give them a new vision of themselves.
Cleisthenes was recalled from exile and asked to build the world's first government of the people
- the demos - a system of government we now know as democracy.
When Cleisthenes returned from exile to Athens in the year 507 BC, he faced a situation for
which there was no precedent in history. Having proposed reform before Isagoras usurped power, he
now had to make good on his promises and forge a government that genuinely reflected the will of all
Athenians; aristocrats and commoners.
His solution was to form a general assembly of all Athenian free men, with each man having one
vote - a type of government we now call direct democracy. These men would then meet regularly to
discuss and vote on all aspects of their city, from the price of olives to the raising of taxes and
declarations of war. Though we do not know for sure, it was probably Cleisthenes who established the
Pnyx, the small hill in the shadow of the Acropolis, as the location of this general assembly.
The impact of Cleisthenes' reforms was felt almost immediately, revolutionizing all aspects of
Athenian life. Democracy released unheard of potentials in its citizens and ushered in an age of
achievement and prosperity.
What happened to Cleisthenes after instituting his reforms is, however, a mystery.
Answer the following questions:
1. How had Solon tried to bring “eunomia” to Athens? To what extent was Solon successful?
2. How did Isagoras challenge Cleisthenes’ power around 510 BCE? How did Cleisthenes respond?
3. How was Isagoras able to come to power in Athens? Who supported him?
4. What did Isagoras do to increase his power in Athens?
5. What did Isagoras do that brought about his downfall?
6. What roll had ordinary Athenians played in the downfall of Isagoras? What was the significance
of this?
7. What are some of the things Cleisthenes did to reform the government of Athens?