Periclean Athens
Thirty years in one city produce drama, history, philosophy and the Parthenon.
- When
- —
- Duration
- 32 years
- Known to
- ± 2 years
- Era
- Classical, Holocene
Under Pericles from around 461 BCE Athens converts the tribute of its naval alliance into public building and public pay — jurors and officials are salaried, which lets poor citizens actually participate. The Parthenon is built between 447 and 432 BCE. In the same few decades the city produces Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Aristophanes, Herodotus, Thucydides, Socrates, Phidias and Hippocrates' contemporaries. The concentration is extraordinary, and it rests on empire and on slavery.