Power and Politics: Athens’ Fall from Grace Essay examples

After the onset of the Persian War most Greek city states chose to submit to Persia save for a few including Athens and Sparta. The city-states that did choose to agree to a Persian rule did so because of the damage they faced during the first Persian invasion. The other city-states that chose to resist joined Athens in 478 B.C. and formed what is known as the Delian League. The purpose of the Delian League was to defend city-states from invasions and to get revenge against Persia. City-states could gain membership to this league by means of paying a tax or offering its military to fight for the League. The leader of this group of city-states quickly became Athens due to the money it was receiving in the form of a tax from the other city-states to build its already massive navy.

- Athens had become an imperial power
- Delian League ask for contributions & would not let anybody leave
- Trireme – row ship used for war
- Democracy in Athens
- Athens made a form of taxes
- Sophists – traveling teachers
- Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle - Athens had become an imperial power
- Delian League ask for contributions & would not let anybody leave
- Trireme – row ship used for war
- Democracy in Athens
- Athens made a form of taxes
- Sophists – traveling teachers
- Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle - Athens had become an imperial power
- Delian League ask for contributions & would not let anybody leave
- Trireme – row ship used for war
- Democracy in Athens
- Athens made a form of taxes
- Sophists – traveling teachers
- Socrates,

The Delian League, an alliance of Greek city-states with Athens as the leader, was proven to be very successful during the Persian Wars.

Following the victorious repelling of the Persian invaders, the coastal and Aegean poleis formed an alliance – the Delian League (478 BCE), of which deferred to Athens as hegemon (leader), for reasons of her military successes in the battles of Marathon (army) and Salamis and Mycale (both navy). These Ionian city-states banded for mutual defense against common enemies with oaths of allegiance --that swore no secession, purposing to punish Persia and liberate captured Greeks. Members of the League symmachia (treaty) included the Greek islands, Ionian poleis, Hellespont, Caria, and Thrace. The confederation established a treasury in the Delos temple, whereas Aristides appointed representatives, an admiral, financial officers, and treasurers.

I will attempt express my views on the topic of how successful the Delian League was under Athenian governance, and whether it was truly an alliance or an Athenian Empire.

The long anticipated war between Athens and its allies and Sparta and its allies has begun. The Delian League of democratic Athens has started as a naval alliance to protect Greece from Persia, but with the outbreak of war it more closely resembles an empire with subject states. Athens opponent, Sparta, is the greatest land power of Greece, a strict military oligarchy that has brutally conquered neighboring states.

"If we do go to war, have no thought that you went to war over a trivial affair" (Pericles, in Hunt 101¬). With a sudden rise to power after the end of the Persian War, Athens became a naval superpower in control of many other city-states in the Delian alliance that struck fear into their rival, the Spartans, who believed that the Athenians might destroy Sparta's control over their own alliance. Becoming as powerful as Athens did, the city-state became power-hungry and led the Greeks into long years of turmoil, leading to the end of the Golden Age. Sparta may have started the war, but Athens holds most of the blame, for creating an empire through the Delian League, prospering economically,

The Delian League was an alliance formed by the Ancient Greek city states to form a mutual defense against a common enemy, the Persians (www.FlowofHistory.com, n.d.). The goal of the Delian League was to fortify Greece’s defenses from its foreign enemies (mainly via a strong navy); and the League was largely successful at achieving this goal. The Delian League was predominantly maintained by Athens and was partly responsible for developing a strong mutual defense and navy; consisting of varying degrees of capital, support, and manpower from surrounding Greek city-states (especially city states near the Aegean Sea), (www.FlowofHistory.com, n.d.). Moreover, although the Delian League was successful at its goal of implementing a mutual defense strategy for Ancient Greece, it also became overwhelmingly influenced by Athens; as made evident from a quote in the assigned reading: “The Delian League was turning into an Athenian Empire” (www.FlowofHistory.com, n.d., p. FC23).

The Delian League was an alliance of eastern Greek city states formed in 478 BCE, to protect the rights and interests of those states against additional attacks from the Persians, following the battles of Marathon, Salamis, and Plataea (Cartlwright, 2016). How successful that alliance was is a matter of perspective and timeline.

The Delian League membership was made up of Athens and many other polis, city states, with the exception of Sparta and a few others. Protection from the Persians and the keeping the islands free of Persian rule were the main reasons for forming the League. (Flow of History, n.d.) By having the money and ships of the members, the Athenians had more free time to promote the learning, art, and trading, which allowed the cultural growth. Things seemed to go smoothly for the League until the Athenians moved the treasury to Athens, “for safe keeping." (Brand, n.d., p28) Athens began treating their fellow members the way I think the mob treats it's lackeys. The members were treated more as slaves than allies. The power the Athenians wielded along with their treatment of others caused distrust among the other police. Eventually leading to war.

These states formed the multipolar system as they exercised control over activities and negotiations of the surrounding weaker units. Then, Athenians established and ruled over the Delian League, alliances made up of independent and tributary city-states. Many of these city-states voluntarily accepted the effective Athenian laws, courts and currency. In turn, Athens provided their allies with protection against Persia and pirates. Athens also facilitated trade connections between its allies and the non-Hellenic people. Amidst the success of Athens, serious disputes over the fear Athenian imperialism and expansion rose. For that reason, the Spartans led the competitors and established a rival organization, the Peloponnesian League. By 431 B.C., the Greek city-state system shifted from being multipolar to bipolar. Athens led one bloc and had the support of its voluntary and tributary allies. On the other hand, Sparta led the other bloc with the members of the Peloponnesian League. The bipolar characteristic of the Greek city-states was stable. First of all, no wars were fought (no state lost power at all) in order to create the Delian League or Peloponnesian League. Voluntary actions to accept alliances with the two blocs of Athens and Sparta made this bipolar system stable even with the conflicting

In 478BC, an alliance of about 150 Ionian city-states (Martin, 2000), was formed on the island of Delos which, according to contemporary historian Thucydides, officially purported to “avenge the wrongs they suffered by ravaging the territory of the king” (Thucydides). The members of the alliance had to contribute any combination of money, warships, soldiers, and supplies; yet, most of the allies opted to contribute money and let Athens do the actual fighting. Well-funded by allied capital, Athens led the alliance against a series of campaigns against the Achaemenid Persia, clearing the Greek coasts from Persian garrisons, transplanting Athenian ideals to the liberated cities,

The Delian League was an alliance of mainly coastal and Aegean city-states against Persia at a time when terror of such a vast army tore through Greece. The reasons as to why this association was established, was to ward off any imminent Persian attacks and to recapture initial Greek city states. This motive is clearly portrayed through the organisations, Leadership and Relationships with the allied states of the league. Yet, Conflicts arose from prejudice and mistreatment from both Sparta and Athens; however this is overcome by the unity of the Delian league when war was Forthcoming.

There are some historians that believe before the Parthenon began, Athens concluded a peace treaty with Persia in 449 BC. The Athenian Empire was at the height of its power when the work on the Parthenon began in 447 BC and continued until 432 BC. The Delian League/Athenian Empire continued to exist even after the reason for its existence ceased to be valid. It is now openly acknowledged that Athens was not just the head of the Greek defense league but an imperial master over other Greek states. The Parthenon, chamber of the virgin goddess was built with League funds, which shows the confidence of the Athenians in their imperialism and represented the Greek ideals of humanism, idealism, and rationalism.

According to Butler (2007), Athens victory over the Persian Empire in in 478 B.C.E was a moral boost for the city-state and it gave them a new sense of confidence. The cost of this newly gained self-confidence was all the destruction war had left behind, including the partial destruction of Athens, vineyards and olive groves. This fact combined with the threat of Persians’ return to Greece motivated Greece to unite and form an offensive against Persians; the newly formed Greek alliance was the Delian League. Both of its objectives – defending Aegean islands, and, liberating Ionian Greeks required a strong sea power. Athens had a strong navy and the experience to lead it and that made this city-state the best candidate for leadership (“Formation of the Delian League”). In order to evaluate the success of the Delian League, we are going to look at a few factors, including Economy, military control, the expansion of democracy, and achievements.