Ancient Greek Thought and Civilization Part II: The Greek Enlightenment and the Golden Age of Athens (510-399 BCE) | 2025

In this course we will continue our examination of key works and developments in the history, art, and literature of Ancient Greek civilization through the first century of the so-called “Classical Age” (c.490-323 BCE), from the end of the Peisistratid tyranny and birth of Athenian Democracy (c.514-508 BCE) and the Persian Invasions (490, 480-79 BCE) down through the Peloponnesian War (431-404 BCE) and its immediate aftermath.

During this period, Greece’s foremost city states, Athens and Sparta, helped lead the successful defense of Greece against Persian invasions. Athens, the world’s first democracy, became the leader of the Delian League, an Anti-Persian military alliance. But the alliance soon became a maritime empire, as Athens exploited its allies and dominated the Eastern Mediterranean. At the same time, Sparta expanded its own league of allied, Greek city-states. Spartan society and government were as unique as Athens’, but with different and often diametrically-opposed values. Where Athens was the preeminent naval power in Greece, radically democratic, relatively egalitarian, and vibrantly open to trade and ideas, Sparta was a closed, hyper-elitist and militaristic aristocracy that dominated warfare on land. At the same time, the women of Athens lived highly restricted lives, while Spartan women enjoyed a far greater degree of autonomy than was typical elsewhere in the Greek world. The opposed ambitions and ideologies of these two societies and their hegemonies would ultimately plunge the entire Greek world into the ruinous Peloponnesian war (431-421, 415-404 BCE) that would scar Greece and shatter Athens’ empire.