Athens: A History: From Ancient Ideal to Modern City

Macmillan, 2004. Hardcover. As New/As New. Beginning with the classical period, when it reached its pinnacle of power and cultural genius, Athens: A History is peopled with fascinating individuals. Athens' remarkable ascent had been inspired by the ideals embodied in the ancient Olympic games, but the city deliberately turned its back on those ideals, in Athens' stunning rise and rapid fall lies a timeless tragedy of excessive pride brought low. Contrasting its noble ideals and arrogant actions, Waterfield finds in Athens' story a moral for all time - and vital lessons for the current era."\ xx, 410 p. [14] p. of plates ; 24 cm. Contents The Olympic ideal 1. The festival at ancient Olympia 2. Nineteenth-century Athens and the 1896 Olympics The early city and the foundation of democracy 3. Athens in prehistory 4. Archaic Athens 5. Solon : poet and statesman 6. The peisistratid renaissance and the Athenian revolution 7. The Persian wars The classical city : democracy and empire 8. Cold war, empire, and democracy 9. Periklean Athens The city at leisure 10. Religion 11. Drama 12. Education : the Sophists and Sokrates 13. Indoor life : sex, symposia, and sandals The city at work 14. Work, money, and taxes 15. The Agora, women, and slaves The downfall of Athens : a greek tragedy 16. Open warfare 17. The Arkhidamian war 18. The tipping of the scales 19. Defeat and civil war The Hellenistic and Roman city 20. Athens in the fourth century 21. Hellenistic Athens 22. The coming of the Romans Athens reduced and reinvented. 23. Athens under Byzantion 24. Athens under the Franks 25. Ottoman Athens and Elgin's Marbles 26. Byron and the war of independence Epilogue 27. The 2004 Olympics 28. Envoi.