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Pericles and the development of democracy
Pericles impact on athens
Pericles and the development of democracy
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Respect, it is a very simple gesture; however the individual who chooses to be respectful can gain a lot more in return. This was proven through the success of an Athenian political leader, Pericles, who was known for getting his argument across without offending the listener. The gift of communication was something Pericles learned to use to his own advantage. His well worded speeches can be found on the pages of the History of the Peloponnesian War by Thucydides, where it is clear that his sharp tongue and outspoken personality have played a key role in his political career. Through up rises and down fall Pericles continued to lead Athens and never spoke negatively about his city. His nationalism proved the love he had towards his home and demonstrated to the Athenians his untainted means for governing. Many scholars and authors agree on how phenomenal Pericles’s leadership was, while textbooks even award him the title of “the guiding spirit of Athenian imperialism” (Pomeroy 164). Although his methods are approved today, by refereeing to Plutarch’s work Life of Pericles one might notice that there were many authority figures in Athens who did not appreciate Pericles’s style of governing. Yet this did not discourage him, instead led him to become sturdier and closer to his people. Pericles had democratic views unlike the rest of Ancient Greece; however his unique ways of governing helped him maintain order in the Golden Age of Athens. While the success of a political leader is commonly recognized through the greatness of his achievements, Pericles has also acknowledged the importance of understanding and respecting his people.
The people of Athens were Pericles’s wealth. Being born in a well-off family, to his father Xanthippus...
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...ness. And most of all Pericles had great self-respect and was very successful at gaining respect back. All humans want to be treated properly, and Pericles was successful with doing so in his leadership hence why he was such a great political leader.
Works Cited
Plutarch. "The Life of Pericles." The Complete Works of Plutarch. New York: Society of English and French Literature, 1909. Sir Thomas Browne. Web. 06 Nov.2011..
Pomeroy, Sarah B. "Pericles and the Growth of Athenian Democracy." A Brief History of Ancient Greece: Politics, Society, and Culture. New York: Oxford UP, 2009. 164. Print.
Thucydides, Rex Warner, and M. I. Finley. "BOOK TWO: The Policy of Pericles." History of the Peloponnesian War. Harmondsworth, Eng.: Penguin, 1972. 143-64. Print
Pericles believed the more successful the man, the less he had to be afraid of when it came to death. If you were poor and unsuccessful, you didn't have honor becuase you would lose nothing at
Thucydides set out to narrate the events of what he believed would be a great war—one requiring great power amassed on both sides and great states to carry out. Greatness, for Thucydides, was measured most fundamentally in capital and military strength, but his history delves into almost every aspect of the war, including, quite prominently, its leaders. In Athens especially, leadership was vital to the war effort because the city’s leaders were chosen by its people and thus, both shaped Athens and reflected its character during their lifetimes. The leaders themselves, however, are vastly different in their abilities and their effects on the city. Thucydides featured both Pericles and Alcibiades prominently in his history, and each had a distinct place in the evolution of Athenian empire and the war it sparked between Athens and Sparta. Pericles ascended to power at the empire’s height and was, according to Thucydides, the city’s most capable politician, a man who understood fully the nature of his city and its political institutions and used his understanding to further its interests in tandem with his own. After Pericles, however, Thucydides notes a drastic decline in the quality of Athenian leaders, culminating in Alcibiades, the last major general to be described in The Peloponnesian War. While he is explicit in this conclusion, he is much more reticent regarding its cause. What changed in Athens to produce the decline in the quality of its leadership?
It is surprising indeed that Even today, tyrannies and dictatorships exist in the world when more than two and a half thousand years ago the ancient Athenians had developed a functional and direct form of democracy. What contributed to this remarkable achievement and how it changed the socio-political. scene in Athens is what will be considered in this paper. The paper will have three sections, each detailing the various stages. of political development from the kings of Attica to the time of Pericles when, in its golden age, Athens was at the height of its. imperial power.
Athens government and military is considerably different from their neighbors. According to Pericles, Athens government is not a copy of our neighbors...
Rodney, Sydney. "Pericles." Ancient Greece. University Inc., 11 May 2003. Web. 7 Dec. 2013. .
The Peloponnesian War was fought from 431-409 BC. It was a civil war between the Greek city-states and was lead by Sparta and it’s allies against the dominating Athenian government. The Athenian leader, Pericles, was a learned scholar and an ingenious military general. His speeches were known for their ability to motivate and give courage to a crowd whether it was to his soldiers in the final moments right before a battle or to a gathering in the streets of Athens. After the first few battles of the Peloponnesian War, Pericles was asked to give the funeral oration for those that were slain in defense of Athens. He did not offer his condolences to the families of those that died, but he offered them comfort. He did this because the men that died in those battles did not do so in vain, for dying in defense of one’s city-state had nothing to do with vanity in the eyes of the ...
Thucydides’ version of Pericles’ “Funeral Oration” can be read as more of an ironic rendering of Pericles’ original speech since The History of the Peloponnesian War is not just considered to be a historical account but also a “highly imaginative piece of work” in which Thucydides made characters involved in the war say what he believed they actually meant instead of what they might have originally said (Thucydides Introduction pg. x). In the “Funeral Oration”, Pericles praises certain
The book written by Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War, contains two controversial debates between distinguished speakers of Athens. The two corresponding sides produce convincing arguments which can be taken as if produced as an honest opinion or out of self-interest. The two debates must be analyzed separately in order to conclude which one and which side was speaking out of honest opinion or self-interest, as well as which speakers are similar to each other in their approach to the situation.
The death of Pericles was a significant event in the course of the Peloponnesian War; however, even without Pericles' leadership the Athenian Assembly had countless opportunities to prevent their loss and chose not to take them. The fickleness and inefficiency of democracy ('the mob') allowed the Athenians to be easily influenced and therefore electing populists such as Cleon, Lysicles and Hyperbolus into dominant leadership roles. Election, via democratic means, of such populists, meant that the Athenians would take a much more aggressive approach to the war and therefore abandon the policies that Pericles had previously established. So in turn, democracy the institution for which the Athenians fought tirelessly to protect, rather than the death of Pericles, ironically became the dominant factor influencing the final outcome of this Ancient Greek civil war.
The people of Thebes liked their ruler, and he in turn ruled over them in a good and just way, trying to help them in their times of need. Aristotle believed that good in man existed in doing his job well. A good carpenter was one who worked with his wood and built things as best as possible; a good ruler presided over his people justly. Oedipus was a go...
The Editors of Encyclopædia Britannica. "Peloponnesian War (ancient Greek History)."Encyclopedia Britannica Online. Encyclopedia Britannica, 24 Dec. 2013. Web. 05 Apr. 2014
Thucydides, Dent, J. M., & Dutton, E. P. (1910). The Peloponnesian War. London & New
For Pericles, Athenian values are realized through culture and “daily devotion.” He claims that Athenian citizens obey both “the laws themselves” and “agreed-on social values (which need no specific legislation),” not requiring legislation to uphold their values. Accordingly, Pericles views exceptionalism as intrinsic to Athenians. Boasting about the city, Pericles questions “how else did she become great but by this genius in her citizens?” A recommitment to civic values, therefore, is simple to Pericles: Athenians are exceptional at the moment of his speech, and must simply continue their past conduct in order to achieve future
Bowden, Hugh. "Thucydides, Pericles, and Periclean Imperialism." The International History Review 34, no. 3 (2012): 606-607.
The Peloponnesian War is the conflict between the pelopoponesians league led by Sparta and the Delian league, led by Athens. Much of our knowledge on the causes and events of the Peloponnesian War, depends on the Athenian Thucydides 460-400 BC, writer of the History of the Peloponessian War. He servd as an Athenian commander in Northern Greece during the early years of the war until the assembly exiled him as he lost an outpost to the enemy. During this exile, he was able to interview witnesses on both sides of the conflicted. Unlike Heredotus he concentrated on contemporary history and presented his account of the war in an annalistic framework that only occasionally diverts from chronological order. In his account, he discuses the precursors to the war, including the 30 years truce and revolutions, such as the stasis in Corcyra. When looking at wars, the primary focus is normally the fighting itself, such as what we see for World War II. However, it is important to look at the anatomy of war, meaning what effect the war has on the people who are experiencing it first hand, and the consquences that the conflict has on the rest of the world. Therefore in this essay I shall discuss, drawing directly from Thucydides, The History of the Peloponnesian War, how the civilians reacted to the war, their involvement and socio economic factors. Furthermore, the first section of my essay shall focus on the direct effect of war on the people, regarding the plague, and violence and hopelessness that was experienced. Then I shall go on to discuss more general effects of the war and how it affected the Greek world, discussing the social and economic losses that occurred such as the cost of the war in attica, the coup d’etat that occurred in gove...