Classical Athens
Athens Ἀθῆναι (Ancient Greek) | |||||||||
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| 508 BC–322 BC | |||||||||
Owl of Athena, patron of Athens
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Delian League ("Athenian Empire") shown in yellow, Athenian territory shown in red, situation in 431 BC, before the Peloponnesian War. | |||||||||
| Capital | Athens | ||||||||
| Common languages | Attic Greek | ||||||||
| Religion | Greek Polytheism | ||||||||
| Government | Athenian direct democracy | ||||||||
| Eponymous archon | |||||||||
• 508–507 BC | Isagoras | ||||||||
• 322–321 BC | Philocles | ||||||||
| Legislature | Boule Ecclesia | ||||||||
| Historical era | Classical antiquityClassical Greece | ||||||||
• Cleisthenes establishes Athenian democracy | 508 BC | ||||||||
| 478–404 BC | |||||||||
| 404–403 BC | |||||||||
| 378–355 BC | |||||||||
| 322 BC | |||||||||
| Population | |||||||||
• 5th century BC1 | ~250,000 (men with civil rights: ~30,000) | ||||||||
| Currency | Drachma | ||||||||
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Classical Athens, known contemporaneously simply as Athens (Ancient Greek: Ἀθῆναι, Athênai [atʰɛ̂ːnai̯]; Modern Greek: Αθήναι, Athine [aˈθine]), was the major urban centre of the notable polis (city-state) of the same name during the classical period (480–323 BC) of ancient Greece, located in Attica, Greece, leading the Delian League in the Peloponnesian War against Sparta and the Peloponnesian League. Athenian democracy was established in 508 BC under Cleisthenes following the tyranny of Isagoras. This system remained remarkably stable and, with a few brief interruptions, remained in place for 180 years, until 322 BC (amid the aftermath of the Lamian War). The peak of Athenian hegemony was achieved during the Age of Pericles in the 440s and 430s BC.
In the classical period, Athens was a centre for the arts, learning, and philosophy, and it was the home of Plato's Academy and Aristotle's Lyceum. Athens was also the birthplace of Socrates, Plato, Pericles, Aristophanes, Sophocles, and many other prominent philosophers, writers, and politicians of the ancient world. It is widely referred to as the cradle of Western civilization and as the birthplace of democracy, largely due to the impact of its cultural and political achievements during the 5th and 4th centuries BC on the rest of the then-known European continent.