The Rise of Athens

At the heart of the Athenian achievement, Pericles claimed, lay its democratic constitution. When it is a question of settling private disputes, everyone is equal before the law; as for social standing, what counts is not membership of a particular class but a person’s ability. Class is not allowed to interfere with merit, nor is poverty an obstacl

Once the rebels had been brought to heel they realized to their dismay that they had lost all freedom of action and in future had to do as they were told. From these small beginnings an alliance of independent states gradually grew into an empire. The first ally to announce unilaterally its secession was the powerful island of Naxos. The Athenians

This was greatly in the interest of Athens, for the triremes that membership income financed came under its direct control and were, in effect, an addition to its fleet. In time only three members, the rich and large islands of Lesbos, Chios, and Samos, insisted on contributing their own small but effective

The league was a full offensive and defensive alliance. Some members provided ships for the fleet, and others—especially those miniature island states that could not afford to fit out even a single trireme—made a financial contribution to Athens. To begin with it was agreed that members who paid in cash rather than kind should in total cover the co

The two parties were so exhausted by the fighting that they agreed to submit the quarrel to the Spartans, who were the acknowledged if informal leaders of the Greek world.

The anecdote is an elaborate fiction, but all the same it expresses a profound truth about the Hellenic mind. It embodies Apollo’s maxims at Delphi—“nothing in excess” and “know yourself”—and was a bleak reminder that the fate of human beings lay not in themselves, but (as Homer put it) “on the knees of the gods.”

On its walls three inscriptions were carved, which summed up basic principles of the good and fulfilled life. They were “know yourself,” “nothing in excess,” and, somewhat cynical advice to steer clear of rash pledges, “make a promise and ruin follows.”

They told him off for his stupidity. Far better to let the animal be found than lose his life. “No!” he replied, though mortally wounded. “Better to die without giving in to the pain than to save a life and live ever after in disgrace.”

The Iliad and the Odyssey are fictions, but in one crucial sense they embody an essential historical truth, in that they showed many generations of Greeks who they were and what values to live by.