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Beginning around 650 BCE, individuals called tyrants were allowed to rule to keep the peace.
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Resentment of aristocratic rule led to riots when traders and craftsmen began to prosper but had no say in government. These were the aristoi, meaning “best people,” or the aristocrats. During the Archaic Period, most city-states were governed by a group of rich landowners. The largest of these was Athens, with about one thousand square miles of territory. The inscription reads simply “Pericles, Son of Xanthippus, Athenian.” Without Pericles’s visionary building program the masterpiece of architecture called The Parthenon might never have been built.An independent city-state was called a polis, consisting of the city and surrounding countryside. In the carving Pericles wears his Corinthian helm pushed to the back of his head in the manner of a strategos (general) but he might have been shown this way to hide is famously elongated and bald cranium (he was nicknamed “Leek-head” by his contemporaries). It is a Roman copy based on a lost Greek original carved by Kresilas, a sculptor who created the monument soon after Pericles’s death from the plague in 429 BCE. This bust of the renowned Athenian leader Pericles is from the Vatican Museum’s collection. The Archaic Period came to an end when the rising eastern power of Persia came into conflict with the Greeks over the Anatolian coast. During the next 300 years, the Archaic Period, the Greeks expanded by establishing colonies across the Aegean in Anatolia (Ionia) and along the central and western Mediterranean coasts. By 800 BCE the city-states of the mainland were economic and military powers. Civilization gradually reappeared at old sites, such as Athens, and at new sites, such as Sparta and Corinth. The catastrophe of 1200 BCE (described above) devastated the economy of Greece and ushered in a Dark Age that lasted about 400 years. The city of Troy was also sacked around this time.
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The Mycenaean culture disappeared around 1200 BCE because of outside invasions. This culture was named after its greatest citadel, Mycenae. These were predominantly fortified palaces on hilltops. The Bronze Age saw the rise of the first cities on the mainland. Lion Gate of Mycenae, Argolis, Greece (mid 13th century BCE)The history of ancient Greek culture is divided into several periods-the Bronze Age (2100 to 1200 BCE), the Dark Age (1200 to 800 BCE), the Archaic Period (800 to 500 BCE), the Classical Age (500 to 336 BCE), and the Hellenistic Period (336 to 30 BCE). Rediscovered in the West in large part during the Medieval Renaissance, the culture, art, history and learnings of the ancient Greeks formed the foundation for the growth of modern Western civilization. The Greeks dominated the known world militarily for only a brief period, but their cultural influence spread farther and lasted much longer. Every morning the Greek flag is raised on a pole atop the Acropolis-this stunning monument to human ingenuity and imagination that has survived for nearly 2,500 years.The ancient culture with the broadest and most long-lasting impact on the future of Western civilization was that of Greece. The explosion created the majestic ruins that we see today. In 1687 CE, during a Venetian siege of Ottoman-controlled Athens, the Venetians launched a mortar shell at the Acropolis, hitting the gunpowder stores the occupying Turks had been keeping inside the Parthenon. Tragically, it took only a fraction of a second to nearly obliterate it. Remarkably, the majority of the Parthenon (a temple dedicated to the goddess Athena) was constructed in a mere 9 years, with the finishing touches completed in 432 BCE. Decades after the defeat of the Persians, the Athenian leader Pericles initiated a rebuilding program (beginning in 447 BCE). The original archaic temple on the Acropolis was destroyed by the Persians in the sack of Athens in 480 BCE. The Acropolis (literally “High City”) is the site of the Parthenon-one of the greatest architectural achievements in the history of the world.