The population of Athens has rapidly increased. In 1834 it was below 5000; in 1870 it was 44,510; in 1879, 63,374; in 1889, 107,251; in 1896, 111,486. The Peiraeus, which Population. in 1834 possessed only a few hundred inhabitants, in 1879 possessed 21,618; in 1889, 34,327; in 1896, 43,848. The total population of Athens in 1907 was 167,479 and of Peiraeus 67,982.
(J. D. B.)
III. History
1. The Prehistoric Period.—The history of primitive Athens is involved in the same obscurity which enshrouds the early development of most of the Greek city-states. The Homeric poems scarcely mention Attica, and the legends, though numerous, are rarely of direct historical value. In the Minoan epoch Athens is proved by the archaeological remains to have been a petty kingdom scarcely more important than many other Attic communities, yet enjoying a more unbroken course of development than the leading states of that period. This accords with the cherished tradition which made the Athenians children of the soil, and free from admixture with conquering tribes. Many legends, however, and the later state organization, point to an immigration of an “Ionian” aristocracy in late Mycenaean days. These Ionian newcomers are almost certainly responsible for the absorption of the numerous independent communities of Attica into a central state of Athens under a powerful monarchy (see [Theseus]), for the introduction of new cults, and for the division of the people into four tribes whose names—Geleontes, Hopletes, Argadeis and Aegicoreis—recur in several true Ionian towns. This centralization of power (Synoecism), to which many Greek peoples never attained, laid the first foundations of Athenian greatness. But in other respects the new constitution tended to arrest development. When the monarchy was supplanted in the usual Greek fashion by a hereditary nobility—a process accomplished, according to tradition, between about 1000 and 683 B.C.—all power was appropriated by a privileged class of Eupatridae (q.v.); the Geomori and Demiurgi, who formed the bulk of the community, enjoyed no political rights. It was to their control over the machinery of law that the Eupatridae owed their predominance. The aristocratic council of the Areopagus (q.v.) constituted the chief criminal court, and nominated the magistrates, among whom the chief archon (q.v.) passed judgment in family suits, controlled admission to the genos or clan, and consequently the acquisition of the franchise. This system was further supported by religious prescriptions which the nobles retained as a corporate secret. Assisted no doubt by their judicial control, the Eupatridae also tended to become sole owners of the land, reducing the original freeholders or tenants to the position of serfs. During this period Athens seems to have made little use of her militia, commanded by the polemarch, or of her navy, which was raised in special local divisions known as Naucraries (see [Naucrary]); hence no military esprit de corps could arise to check the Eupatrid ascendancy. Nor did the commons obtain relief through any commercial or colonial enterprises such as those which alleviated social distress in many other Greek states. The first attack upon the aristocracy proceeded from a young noble named Cylon, who endeavoured to become tyrant about 630 B.C. The people helped to crush this movement; yet discontent must have been rife among them, for in 611 the Eupatrids commissioned Draco (q.v.), a junior magistrate, to draft and publish a code of criminal law. This was a notable concession, by which the nobles lost that exclusive legal knowledge which had formed one of their main instruments of oppression.
2. The Rise of Athens.—A still greater danger grew out of the widespread financial distress, which was steadily driving many of the agricultural population into slavery and threatened the entire state with ruin. After a protracted war with the neighbouring Megarians had accentuated the crisis the Eupatridae gave to one of their number, the celebrated Solon (q.v.), free power to remodel the whole state (594). By his economic legislation Solon placed Athenian agriculture once more upon a sound footing, and supplemented this source of wealth by encouraging commercial enterprise, thus laying the foundation of his country’s material prosperity. His constitutional reforms proved less successful, for, although he put into the hands of the people various safeguards against oppression, he could not ensure their use in practice. After a period of disorder and party-feud among the nobles the new constitution was superseded in fact, if not in form, by the autocratic rule of Peisistratus (q.v.), and his sons Hippias and Hipparchus. The age of despotism, which lasted, with interruptions, from 560 to 510, was a period of great prosperity for Athens. The rulers fostered agriculture, stimulated commerce and industry (notably the famous Attic ceramics), adorned the city with public works and temples, and rendered it a centre of culture. Their vigorous foreign policy first made Athens an Aegean power and secured connexions with numerous mainland powers. Another result of the tyranny was the weakening of the undue influence of the nobles and the creation of a national Athenian spirit in place of the ancient clan-feeling.
The equalization of classes was already far advanced when towards the end of the century a nobleman of the Alcmaeonid family, named Cleisthenes (q.v.), who had taken the chief part in the final expulsion of the tyrants, acquired ascendancy as leader of the commons. The constitution which he promulgated (508/7) gave expression to the change of political feeling by providing a national basis of franchise and providing a new state organization. By making effective the powers of the Ecclesia (Popular Assembly) the Boulē (Council) and Heliaea, Cleisthenes became the true founder of Athenian democracy.
This revolution was accompanied by a conflict with Sparta and other powers. But a spirit of harmony and energy now breathed within the nation, and in the ensuing wars Athens worsted powerful enemies like Thebes and Chalcis (506). A bolder stroke followed in 500, when a force was sent to support the Ionians in revolt against Persia and took part in the sack of Sardis. After the failure of this expedition the Athenians apparently became absorbed in a prolonged struggle with Aegina (q.v.). In 493 the imminent prospect of a Persian invasion brought into power men like Themistocles and Miltiades (qq.v.), to whose firmness and insight the Athenians largely owed their triumph in the great campaign of 490 against Persia. After a second political reaction, the prospect of a second Persian war, and the naval superiority of Aegina led to the assumption of a bolder policy. In 483 Themistocles overcame the opposition of Aristides (q.v.), and passed his famous measure providing for a large increase of the Athenian fleet. In the great invasion of 480-479 the Athenians displayed an unflinching resolution which could not be shaken even by the evacuation and destruction of their native city. Though the traditional account of this war exaggerates the services of Athens as compared with the other champions of Greek independence, there can be no doubt that the ultimate victory was chiefly due to the numbers and efficiency of the Athenian fleet, and to the wise policy of her great statesman Themistocles (see [Salamis], [Plataea]).
3. Imperial Athens.—After the Persian retreat and the reoccupation of their city the Athenians continued the war with unabated vigour. Led by Aristides and Cimon they rendered such prominent service as to receive in return the formal leadership of the Greek allies and the presidency of the newly formed Delian League (q.v.). The ascendancy acquired in these years eventually raised Athens to the rank of an imperial state. For the moment it tended to impair the good relations which had subsisted between Athens and Sparta since the first days of the Persian peril. But so long as Cimon’s influence prevailed the ideal of “peace at home and the complete humiliation of Persia” was steadily unheld. Similarly the internal policy of Athens continued to be shaped by the conservatives. The only notable innovations since the days of Cleisthenes had been the reduction of the archonship to a routine magistracy appointed partly by lot (487), and the rise of the ten elective strategi (generals) as chief executive officers (see [Strategus]). But the triumph of the navy in 480 and the great expansion of commerce and industry had definitely shifted the political centre of gravity from the yeoman class of moderate democrats to the more radical party usually stigmatized as the “sailor rabble.” Though Themistocles soon lost his influence, his party eventually found a new leader in Ephialtes and after the failure of Cimon’s foreign policy (see [Cimon]) triumphed over the conservatives. The year 461 marks the reversal of Athenian policy at home and abroad. By cancelling the political power of the Areopagus and multiplying the functions of the popular law-courts, Ephialtes abolished the last checks upon the sovereignty of the commons. His successor, Pericles, who commonly ranked as the “completer of the democracy,” merely developed the full democracy so as to secure its effectual as well as its theoretical supremacy. The foreign policy of Athens was now directed towards an almost reckless expansion (see [Pericles]). The unparalleled success of the Athenian arms at this period extended the bounds of empire to their farthest limits. Besides securing her Aegean possessions and her commerce by the defeat of Corinth and Aegina, her last rivals on sea, Athens acquired an extensive dominion in central Greece and for a time quite overshadowed the Spartan land-power. The rapid loss of the new conquests after 447 proved that Athens lacked a sufficient land-army to defend permanently so extensive a frontier. Under the guidance of Pericles the Athenians renounced the unprofitable rivalry with Sparta and Persia, and devoted themselves to the consolidation and judicious extension of their maritime influence.
The years of the supremacy of Pericles (443-429) are on the whole the most glorious in Athenian history. In actual extent of territory the empire had receded somewhat, but in point of security and organization it now stood at its height. The Delian confederacy lay completely under Athenian control, and the points of strategic importance were largely held by cleruchies (q.v.; see also [Pericles]) and garrisons. Out of a citizen body of over 50,000 freemen, reinforced by mercenaries and slaves, a superb fleet exceeding 300 sail and an army of 30,000 drilled soldiers could be mustered. The city itself, with its fortifications extending to the port of Peiraeus, was impregnable to a land attack. The commerce of Athens extended from Egypt and Colchis to Etruria and Carthage, and her manufactures, which attracted skilled operatives from many lands, found a ready sale all over the Mediterranean. With tolls, and the tribute of the Delian League, a fund of 9700 talents (£2,300,000) was amassed in the treasury.
Yet the material prosperity of Athens under Pericles was less notable than her brilliant attainments in every field of culture. Her development since the Persian wars had been extremely rapid, but did not reach its climax till the latter part of the century. No city ever adorned herself with such an array of temples, public buildings and works of art as the Athens of Pericles and Pheidias. Her achievements in literature are hardly less great. The Attic drama of the period produced many great masterpieces, and the scientific thought of Europe in the departments of logic, ethics, rhetoric and history mainly owes its origin to a new movement of Greek thought which was largely fostered by the patronage of Pericles himself. Besides producing numerous men of genius herself Athens attracted all the great intellects of Greece. The brilliant summary of the historian Thucydides in the famous Funeral Speech of Pericles (delivered in 430), in which the social life, the institutions and the culture of his country are set forth as a model, gives a substantially true picture of Athens in its greatest days.