Athens was a city in Greece controlled by aristocrats that became a unified polis in 700 B.C.E. Athens was pretty much down the toilet in terms of political turmoil. People owed money left and right, others had hardly any land. Athens practically ha...
During the 7th c. Athens had fallen under control of the aristocrats, a major problem for many of Athenians, especially the poor. According to Rachel Sternberg in Pity and Power in Athens, Ancient Athens held a "moral discomfort with the empire" (Sternberg 1). It seemed, in Ancient Athens, the biggest existential crisis was where power and authority derived from. All the city-states were at constant war with each other due to rivalries among power and wealth. No one trusted each other; nor did they want to, which evidentially, began causing the appearance of tyrants among the city-states.
What exactly does this have to do with democracy in Athens? The people of Athens discontentment with the empire paved the roadway towards democracy. Throughout Ancient Athens, Democracy had eventually evolved for reasons such as finding that democratic reforms made their city more harmonious, prosperous, and culturally alive. Leaders also found that each step toward democracy made their cities better able to defend themselves. A way to look at democracy was that no one, no matter how big was above the law, which was why it became such a struggle for Athens, the constant discontentment with power and origin of authority became too much for the rich and arose tyrants and wars.
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School of Athens fresco, by Raphael, (c.1510). Apostolic Palace, Vatican City
