The Greek City States

Political activity and political thinking began in the cities and other states of ancient Greece, and terms such as tyranny, aristocracy, oligarchy, democracy and politics itself are Greek words for concepts first discussed in Greece. Rhodes presents in translation a selection of texts illustrating the formal mechanisms and informal workings of the Greek states in all their variety. From the states described by Homer out of which the classical Greeks believed their states had developed, through the archaic period which saw the rise and fall of tyrants and the gradual broadening of citizen bodies, to the classical period of the fifth and fourth centuries, Rhodes also looks beyond that to the Hellenistic and Roman periods in which the Greeks tried to preserve their way of life in a world of great powers. For this second edition the book has been thoroughly revised and three new chapters added.

From antiquity until the nineteenth century, there have been two types of state: macro-states, each dotted with a number of cities, and regions broken up into city-states, each consisting of an urban centre and its hinterland. A region settled with interacting city-states constituted a city-state culture and Polis opens with a description of the concepts of city, state, city-state, and city-state culture, and a survey of the 37 city-state cultures so far identified. Mogens Herman Hansen provides a thoroughly accessible introduction to the polis (plural: poleis), or ancient Greek city-state, which represents by far the largest of all city-state cultures. He addresses such topics as the emergence of the polis, its size and population, and its political organization, ranging from famous poleis such as Athens and Sparta through more than 1,000 known examples.

This book introduces the reader to the serious study of Greek history, concentrating more on problems than on narrative. The topics selected have been prominent in modern research and references to important discussions of these have been provided. Outlined are controversial issues of which differing views can be defended. Mr. Sealey's preference is for interpretations which see Greek history as the interaction of personalities, rather than for those which see it as a struggle for economic classes or of abstract ideas. Sealey assumes that the Greek cities of the archaic and classical periods did not inherit any political institutions from the Bronze Age; that the extensive invasions that brought Mycenaean civilization to an end destroyed political habits as effectively as stone palaces. Accordingly, he believes that the Greeks of the historic period were engaged in the fundamental enterprise of building organized society out of nothing. The first chapters of this work deal with the stops taken by the early tyrants, in Sparta and Athens, toward constructing stable organs of authority and of political expression. In later chapters, interest shifts to relations that developed between the states and especially to the development of lasting alliances. Attention is given to the Peloponnesian League, to the Persian Wars, to the Delian League, and to the Second Athenian Sea League of the fourth century.

A well-grounded study of the Greek contribution to law

This title provides an examination of the rise, evolution and decline of the city-state, from ancient times to the present day.

Combining archaeological and textual evidence the author suggests that most of the 8th Century settlements that would become the city-states of classical Greece were defined as much by the boundaries of civilised' space as by their urban centres.

A Greek historian investigates the importance of local identity in the Mediterranean world in a “rare, genuinely original book . . . Highly recommended” (Choice). Much as our modern world is interconnected through global networks, the ancient Greek city-states were a dynamic part of the wider Mediterranean landscape. In Localism and the Ancient Greek World, historian Hans Beck argues that local shifts in politics, religion and culture had a pervasive influence in a world of fast-paced change. Citizens in these communities were deeply concerned with maintaining local identity, commercial freedom, distinct religious cults, and much more. Beyond these cultural identifiers, there lay a deeper concept of the local that guided polis societies in their contact with a rapidly expanding world. Drawing on a staggering range of materials—including texts by both known and obscure writers, numismatics, pottery analysis, and archeological records—Beck develops fine-grained case studies that illustrate the significance of the local experience. Localism and the Ancient Greek City-State builds bridges across disciplines and ideas within the humanities. It highlights the importance of localism not only in the archaeology of the ancient Mediterranean, but also in today’s conversations about globalism, networks, and migration.