Essay on Greece's Golden Age Under Pericles' Rule

Athens is a major Greek city-state in European history. It was a great center of cultural and intellectual development, and thus home to philosophers. Socrates and Pericles, two of these philosophers, had polarizing opinions about the city-state and its citizens. While Pericles chooses to praise the Athenian citizen, Socrates criticizes Athens’ people. Pericles gave his opinion at a funeral during the first battles of the Peloponnesian War, while Socrates gave his during the trial that ultimately led to his death. The Athenian city-state has become a model for today’s systems of government and a hearth for western philosophy, so Pericles’ opinion seems to be the one that is more accurate.

Though there were rulers, Athenian government was held primarily in the hands of the people of the citizens, thus making it a democratic system. This is beneficial to the Athenian slaves as it means that the voters are not voting for an elite group, but rather the entire group as a whole.

What qualities of Athenian life does Pericles mention? How do these contrast with those that Archidamus points out for Sparta? The qualities of the Athenian life that Pericles mentions are that they are far from practicing a jealous surveillance over each other because they do not feel like they should be angry with there neighbors for doing what they like, but all there private relations does not make them lawless as citizens. He also say’s that they provide plenty of means for there mind to refresh itself from the business, that they celebrate games and sacrifices all the year round. On the other hand Sparta is war-like, because they have self control and they honor bravery. They are also educated with the laws and with a self-control to

After reading Pericles funeral oration it is defiantly clear that he strongly believed that democracy was the best possible form of government. Pericles saw Athens as superior to other city states based on their implementation of democracy which ultimately represented freedom, liberty, courage, honor and justice. In his funeral oration, Pericles refers to the Athenian democracy as a system of government where men are able to advance in society as a result of their merits rather than on class or wealth. In the Athenian democracy “class considerations are not allowed to interfere with merit” and therefore any man who showcased his ability to rule could do so, even if he wasn’t part of the upper class or had some wealth to back himself up. Pericles

Being born into one of the most leading families in Athens, Pericles was brought up in a very well off family. His father Xanthippus (meaning yellow horse) was known for his heroism in the Persian War also as a wealthy politician, which would have helped stem Pericles interested in politics from a young age having his father so heavily involved in politics. His mother, Agariste was from a culturally powerful Alcmaeondiae family which was also very wealthy. Due to his family’s wealth they could afford to educate Pericles and feed his growing interest in education, in fields such as Politics and Philosophy and music. Because of his high education he is known as one of the

In 400 B.C, The Athenian civilization experienced a golden age. The Athens experienced a great amount of peace and prosperity due to their contact and trade with others, and rare warring. During this time, ideas and philosophies were produced. These ideas influenced western civilizations in the areas of politics, science, art and architecture.

Athens and Sparta were two of the most powerful city-states. They were similar in the way that they both feared revolt and civil war. But how they dealt with it was different. Sparta, concluded that the only ways to survive was to create a strong city state and they adopted a strong set of laws where boys had to leave for training at the age of 7 and stayed in the service for many years. Athens dealt with the fear of civil war by making timely reforms, creating a democracy. Sparta and Athens also differed in the way that Sparta may have had the strongest army in Greece, they lacked excitement of the mind and Athens educated people and raised them to act as free people. The Golden age came about after the Persians were finally driven out of

As we have learned that Democracy came from the word ‘demos’ which means people, that makes people the ruling party or majority rule. Ancient Greeks who were experimenting with different kinds of political system and were much interested in which system works best. By far the most radical kind of democracy is a direct democracy which lasted less than two centuries in a Greek city-state of Athens. Citizens of Athens were directly involved in the process and participated in decision making and they were proud of it, they deemed their system to be the best and superior to other systems in other Greek city-states. As Cartwright stated an excerpt from Pericles himself who was one of the greatest supporters of democracy in classic

What is considered the “Golden age of Athens”? It was the rule under Pericles. It was the power that Athens had acquired which was considered a threat to the Spartans. Looking back at the Persian wars, Athens and Sparta fought together against the Persians. The rebuilding of the Athenian empire started with the formation of the Delian League, which allowed Athens to take the lead in the wars against Persia. This led to providing Athens with the communal treasury. This treasury was used by Pericles to rebuild Athens. It became a power hub and forced other city state to do what is best for Athens. Apart from this, other city states were forced to make payments to Athens for the maintenance of the fleet but the money was mostly directed to remaking the city of Athens.

Pericles started the rebuild programme of the acropolis to celebrate the victory over the Persians and also because it was in ruins from the number of wars it had suffered. At the time Athens was slowly becoming a dominant city in Greece and Pericles wanted to showcase Athens in that way. Pericles realised that the city was never properly rebuilt after the last Persian war, every grand temple was still burnt to the ground and as a soon to be popular city , this was no way for an empire to look. Pericles did not want his city to be resembled as ruined. He also built a new meeting hall for the assembly along with other public buildings. As Pericles had a great passion for the arts, he also incorporated sculptures to make the city look even more

Pericles, the man whose name has the meaning “surrounded by glory” behind it certainly lived up to that title, considering the years he ruled Athens is known to be called the ‘Age of Pericles’. Being born into a wealthy leading family, Pericles was surrounded by artists and philosophers and received an excellent education which would subsequently lead him to his career. He first made a name for himself in the courtroom where he prosecuted the leading statesmen, Cimon, for accepting bribes in exchange to not invade Macedonia after winning a victory in Thrace. Although he was unsuccessful, it was this trial that began the conflict between Cimon and the democratic reformers (Blackwell, section 5). Pericles strongly disliked Sparta for their oligarchy practices, such as driving out foreigners (Harris, 163). Being strongly opposed to Sparta and the reform of the constitution in Athens, this is what drove Pericles to want to make changes in Athens. He worked closely with Ephialtes, someone who shared the same democratic views as himself but was a more established leader. The duo was eventually elected as generals during the years of 462-461 BC and planned an attack upon Cimon. Pericles and Ephialtes proceeded to carry out radical democratic reforms which removed all constitutional powers from the Areopagus Council, while in the meantime, Cimon was ostracized. Cimon convinced Athenians to assist Sparta during a helot, however, the Spartans rejected their help and sent the Athenian

‘I entreat you, by your life, by your knees, by your parents, do not let the dogs feed on me by the ships of the Achaians… give my body to be taken home again, so that the Trojans and the wives of the Trojans may give me in death my rite of burning’ (22.338-343). This heart wrenching plea represents nearly the final words uttered by Hektor upon his death at the hands of Achilles. Hektor, who recently boasted of his martial prowess, vowing just moments before to do ‘some big thing first, that men to come shall know of it’ (22.305), is reduced to begging before his killer for the basic privilege of an honorable burial. In this moment of his famous Iliad, Homer offers a cynical reflection on human life and the social constructs mortals establish, especially the idea of the ‘heroic code’ that was so prominent during the Golden Age of Greece. Demonstrably, he implies throughout the work that since all humans are destined to die and memories have limited effect after death, the entire concept of the ‘heroic code’- and to a certain extent, conviction in worldly systems instead of personal beliefs- are pointless given the natural chaos of the world and man’s ultimate fate.

In the fifth-century BC, Athens emerged as one of the most advanced state or polis in all of Greece. This formation of Athenian ‘democracy’ holds the main principle that citizens should enjoy political equality in order to be free to rule and be ruled in turn. The word ‘democracy’ originates from the Greek words demos (meaning people) and kratos (meaning power) therefore demokratia means “the power of the people.” The famous funeral speech of Pericles states that “Our constitution is called democracy because power is in the hands not of a minority but of the whole people.” However, only citizens (free adult men of Athenian descent) could participate in political matters. Women and slaves held no political rights, although they were

Although Athenian democracy allowed for the citizens of Athens to select their own political bodies, however this may not have always been such a good idea. In the Athenian academic system the learning was centered mainly on the languages and writing.(Ancient Greece) There was not very much access to the political knowledge of the world at that time. Since there was a much smaller pool of knowledge at their disposal it did not always make sense to have people who were quite uneducated in the manor of formal government, to be selecting people to rule their city. While it did allow for all people to have a say, the rulers in Sparta were appointed at an elder age allowing them to use their previous knowledge to make decisions. While the Athenian system may select those who were capable, the Spartan system ensured that there would always be capable leaders in charge. “Insanity in individuals is something rare - but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule.”(Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil) This is something that must be considered when looking at democracy. While one person may not have the ability to put some insane idea into fruition, a whole group of people believing together could behave very destructive consequences. Plato once stated, “Democracy... is a charming form of government, full of variety and disorder; and dispensing a sort of equality to equals and unequals alike.”

The Golden Age of Greece was one of the most remarkable periods of time for Athens. During this period, the Athenian people had come very far in advancement , such as art, architecture, sports , philosophy and theater. First of all there were many famous philosophers who had introduced new ideas to the public. Some of these philosophers were Anaxagoras, Socrates, Plato and Aristotle. They had a big influence on the public, because of their writings. Anaxagoras was one of the first to bring philosophy to Athens, he was also a scientist who lived and taught in Athens. In a similar way, Plato was the student of Socrates and the teacher of Aristotle, he was famous for writing plays. He usually made himself the main character of a most of his plays . His most famous work is