AN ATHENIAN AEGEAN

Athens is most famous for being the naval superpower of the fifth century BC, establishing an empire that saw the entire Aegean under Athenian control. Even before the Greco-Persian Wars, which saw Athens’ rise to prominence, Athenians had sought to control the Aegean for over one hundred years.

Owain Williams

SPECIAL POLITICS AND COLONIZATION IN ARCHAIC ATHENS During the Archaic period of ancient Greek history, Athens seems relatively unimportant. While city-states like Chalcis, Eretria, Corinth, and Miletus were establishing colonies throughout the Mediterranean and Black Sea, Athens seems to have undertaken what is termed ‘internal colonization’, content with the land of Attica. Yet, by the beginning of the sixth century BC, we see Athenians striving to exert control over much of the Aegean. Early Athens Athens at the beginning of the sixth century BC was vastly different from Athens of the fifth century BC, which most people will be familiar with. For one, while Athenians claimed the unification of Attica was completed by Thesus, as Thucydides records (2.14-16), this was a later fabrication to legitimize Athens’ regional power by projecting…

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Ancient History (Digital) - 1 Issue, AH 46

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