Greek prehistory dates from the Neolithic Era about 4000 BC and by 2000 BC it affected by the arrival from
lands to the north of peoples who developed the early civilizations of the region.  These Greek speaking northern peoples included those that created the Mycenae civilization and others in the Aegean Sea region, including the Minoan civilization on the island of Crete in the eastern Mediterranean.

All these groups maintained regular trade with each other, and through the Minoan culture to Egypt, Mesopotamia, and Phoenicia.  Between 2600 BC and 1200 BC Minoan civilization dominated Greece.  Between the 14th and 13th centuries BC the Aeolian and Ionian peoples spread throughout Greece from their points of origin in the western Anatolian Peninsula.

By 1000 BC these civilizations gave way to Greek speaking Achaeans who diffused from Peloponnesus (or southern Greece) sometime after 2000 BC.  Between 1100 and 950 BC the Dorians (named after Dorus, the son of Helen of Troy from whom they were supposedly descended) migrated in large numbers from the Macedonian region of northern Greece.

Displacing the Acheans and establishing the domination of Doric civilization in the Peloponnesus and in colonies established in Asia Minor and Italy and Sicily, they left lasting impressions in Classical architecture and the arts.
Affected by a rugged and varied geography and the diversity of tribes, the culture of Classical Greece emphasized the autonomy of the polis, or city-state that emerged by 800 BC.

Though some of these city-states merged into small kingdoms, the autonomy of individual settlements was fiercely asserted, and self-government became a most prized attribute.  Along with the autonomy of the Greek city-state developed expressions of Greek individualism among certain persons that allowed for creative innovation.
Greek innovations are seen in aesthetics  (that involved art and architecture) as well as in the operation of government, the acceptance of democracy  and new ways of thinking related to philosophy.

Within a few decades after the emergence of the Greek city-states, Greek colonies were established throughout the Mediterranean Sea (including the southern shores of France and Iberia and the northern coast of Africa, and Black Sea, and the Bosporus (where the Greek city of Byzantium was established in 667 BC).  Despite these innovations great creative energy, internal rivalries and conflicts continually undermined the potential for union among the autonomous Greek city-states.

Though the city-states evolved independently of one another, there were general patterns in such development.

1. Monarchy gave way to aristocracies (by 700 BC the Greek city-states were free of monarchical rule
    – there were no more kings.

2. Aristocracies yielded to tyrannies

3. Tyranny came to power through force and by championing the causes of the people less privileged,
    promising wealth redistribution.

4. Tyrants prevailed for a time in their effort to establish dynasties.

5. These tyrannies were usually short-lived; they gave way to oligarchies and limited democracies.

a. ATHENS:  the greatest of the Greek democracies was established by the Ionian poet Solon (639–559 BC) at Athens.

There Solon instituted drastic social and economic reforms (he ended the feudal system and annulled all debts) and property limits, while establishing a representative government (limited to property holders).

Solon also rewrote the Athenian constitution and abolished the code of Draco (that called for capital punishment for even the most minor offenses as a means to force obedience to the laws) with a humane system of laws.

b. Solon’s democratic system was eventually undermined with the rule of another tyrant, Peisistratus (605 BC–527 BC) who established a short-lived dynasty (560 BC–511 BC) that established Athenian hegemony over a wide region of Greece.

Though he ruled as a dictator, Peisistratus’s civic improvements were responsible for the building of temples to Zeus and Athena at Athens.

c. With the help of Sparta, the Athenian statesman Cleisthenes instituted reforms and returned Athens to a Solonian system of democratic representation in government.  It came to its greatest power over the region with the defense of Greece against Darius I and his son Xerxes I of Persia in the Persian Wars (500 BC–449 BC).  In one of these wars (480 BC), Spartan King Leonidas and the famous “300 Spartans” (and 700 Thespians – of Thespiae) gave up their lives at Thermopylae in the successful halt of the advance of Xerxes’ army until a Greek alliance could join the fight.

After this Persian War, Athens led the voluntary confederation of Greek city-states under the Delian League that united Peloponnesus and the Aegean Islands.  The league’s treasury and seat of authority was maintained at the neutral island of Delos, where there was a temple dedicated to Apollo.

Infighting among the members of the league threatened its continuation, while Athens argued the need for its existence as a means of defense against Persia, while profiting from tributes paid to Athens under the confederation.  Sparta and Thebes, both traditional rivals of Athens were antagonized by the league’s presence, resulting in minor military offenses and threats between these city-states and Athens.

When Delos came under threat of attack from another Persian invasion in 454 BC the treasury was relocated to the Acropolis at Athens, while it became apparent that the league had become an Athenian empire.

– Athens at this time became the model of Greek democracy under Pericles (495 BC–429 BC) – his mother was the niece of Cleisthenes.

– Under Pericles Athenian governmental offices were made available to most Athenian citizens.

– Under Pericles the Delian League reached its greatest efficiency and power as a tool of Athenian imperialism, while he engineered a 30-year truce between Athens and Sparta that allowed the development of magnificent Athenian aesthetics.

– Pericles was one of the instigators of the Peloponnesian War that ruined Athens.

– Athenian patriotism is expressed in the funeral oration of Pericles.
Members of the league began to vacate the alliance, and when the Peloponnesian War (431–401)  broke out over Spartan and Athenian rivalries and differing world-views (especially over democracy), it died.

Greece in the Fifth Century BC flourished with unsurpassed intellectual energy that produced some of the world’s greatest philosophers, writers, artists, and statesmen.  A list of some of these Classical Greek thinkers includes the following:

– Aeschylus (525 BC–456 BC): dramatist; author of Prometheus Bound, Agamemnon, and many other works of tragedy.

– Sophocles (496 BC–406 BC): tragic dramatist and author of many important works including Oedipus Rex.

– Euripides (485 BC–406 BC): prolific tragic dramatist.

– Aristophanes (448 BC–388 BC): poet and writer of Greek comedy.

– Phidias (500 BC–432 BC): the greatest of the Greek sculptors, he is credited with the statue of Zeus in the temple at Olympus and Athena in the temple Parthenon on the Acropolis at Athens.

– Myron (5th century BC): bronze sculptor in Athens; the Discus Thrower is one of his best-known works.

– Polykleitos (450 BC–420 BC): sculptor

– Heraclitus (535 BC–475 BC): philosopher who emphasized that permanence was illusory; the only permanent reality was change.  Moreover, he taught that there is an opposite of all things in life, and that the real state of being was in becoming.
Heraclitus taught that fire is the underlying element of all things, transforming into other sub-elements, and that there are no individual souls, but all belong to one great universal fire spirit.

– Socrates (469 BC–399 BC): Athenian philosopher, proclaimed by the Oracle at Delphi to be the wisest man in all Greece (to the humble puzzlement of Socrates).
Socrates asserted that through virtuous statements and questions, knowledge is connected to an understanding of the teleological (based in natural phenomena) qualities of things.
Socrates was criticized for refusing to pursue public office.  He was brought to trial for religious heresy and for “corrupting youth” (he opposed democracy and taught and befriended two traitors of Athens).
Socrates died after ingesting an infusion of poison hemlock.
Socrates was the teacher of Plato.

– Plato (427 BC–347 BC): philosopher and founder of the school known as the Academy.  A prolific and exquisite writer, Plato taught Aristotle.  Plato’s three great books include: The Republic, The Statesman, and The Law.  Plato contended that individuals could only reach their potential within the polis.  Moreover, according to Plato, the state should maintain intellectual, emotional, and physical balance; law and order motifs are important to Plato, reflecting the need for predictability at a critical time in Greek history (post-Peloponnesian Wars).

– Aristotle (384 BC–322 BC): philosopher and tutor of Alexander the Great at the court of Macedonia.  In 335 BC Aristotle established a school in the Lyceum (in the Gymnasium) at Athens.
Named in modern society as the “father of science” Aristotle’s school of philosophy was called the Peripatetics.  Aristotle asserted that people and society must be motivated by moral and ethical purposes.  Like his teachers before him, Aristotle did not agree with the ideas of democracy or constitutions.  Emphasizing tradition, he felt that the best government would be a law-abiding monarchy.

– Hippocrates (460 BC–370 BC): physician and the “father of medicine.”
After the Peloponnesian War, Athens and Greece became subject to Sparta and then later to the dominance of Corinth and Thebes by 371 BC.

For nearly two centuries after his death, Hellenic civilization flourished in fragmented kingdoms within the former Alexandrian Empire.  By 146 BC, after a series of Macedonian Wars weakened the Greek city-states, they fell to the invading forces of Rome.  Despite being governed by these conquerors, Greek intellectualism continued to flourish and ultimately outlived the Roman occupation to greatly influence the creation of the Byzantine Empire in 330 AD.