In this essay I will be comparing and contrasting monarchy, aristocracy, tyranny, oligarchy, and democracy in Ancient Greece.
Monarchy.
There are two types of monarchy one is a constitutional monarchy and the other is absolute monarchy. Absolute monarchs are really all powerful, they are able to pass laws and veto any law passed or suggested by politicians, a constitutional monarch has less power and is really only a figurehead as a head of state.
In Ancient Greece there were not really a lot of monarchies, there was of course Sparta with its unique two King system. The two Kings come from the direct descendants of the founders of Sparta, they weren’t really absolute monarchs because they had the ephors stopping them from taking too many decisions that could be harmful to the state (Cartwright, 2013). There were other monarchies in the times of Ancient Greece, most notably Macedonia, that went on to conquer Greece in 336 BCE (Brand, n.d. ,p36).
Aristocracy.
This was the rule of a few elite people. They were always the richest people and what we would call today the Lords or Ladies. They were the highest of the upper classes. This would have given them a good chance of perks and probably a good way of becoming wealthier (Mahabal, Joshi, 2017).
Tyranny.
A tyranny could be described as a government that would be
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In Ancient Greece there were two specìfic times when Athens was an Oligarchy. In 411 BCE the oligarchy of 400 took power by overthrowing the assembly, it seems they were a little tyrannical in the way they acted, and were overthrown by the oligarchy of 5000, who were more moderate (Cartwright, 2013). In 404 BCE Athens was defeated in Sicily and then there was yet another power change to the oligarchy of the 30 tyrants, this was a bad time for Athens as these people were really cruel summarily executing people (Cartwright,
In a monarchical society, the leaders had no trust in the people whatsoever so they would take charge. The king was as the people’s father and was over weak and dependent children. As a father would do, he would restrain the people from taking over the country and obeying his commands in the government. Wood explains in his quote how monarchy would only let people say so much, “...monarchies, based on the presumption that human beings were corrupt, had persisted almost everywhere for centuries because they offered security and order. ”(Wood, 93)
On the other hand, in an absolute monarchy, the monarch is presumed to be God-(or other deity)-ordained, and rules with no limits on their power.
Absolute monarchy where a ruler man or woman has complete control over the government. Some may view monarchy as a way to keep everything under control, while most individuals view it as a way a ruler can torment his subjects to his bidding. Rulers viewed proper role of an absolute monarchy as a way to unite the people, on the other hand in their subjects perspective it was a cruel rule and the reason for their laborious life.
Both Athens and Sparta had an Assembly, the members were elected by the people. Sparta who was ruled by two kings, the Agiads and Eurypontids, these two kings who mainly served as generals and high priest. Though they had no real power, they were known for their great influences. They ruled until they died or were forced out of office.
monarchy government. A monarchy government is a government ruled by a King or Queen in a
Thebes each had a spell of oligarchy. As Carr notes, during the Archaic Period, oligarchies were nearly
In Greece, monarchies were found when the Mycenaeans ruled Greece during the period 2000 to 1100 BC. Monarchy is defined as a system of government where a single ruler has supreme power. The word “monarchy” comes from the Greek words “monos” meaning “single” and “archo” meaning “rule”. This single ruler, known as a king, ruled for life and passed the rule on to his heir when he died. The most famous monarchy was that of King Alexandra of Macedonia who ruled all of Greece from 336 BC.
First, the definition of a monarchy is “a state or nation in which the supreme power is actually or nominally lodged in a monarch (Dictionary.com, 2017).” Ancient Greek city-states that had a monarchy were Sparta (partially), as well as Macedonia and Epeiros. Monarchies were not found often in Ancient Greece (Cartwright and Cartwright, 2017). The form of governance most like a monarchy are tyrannies, since the center of power is on one person. The form of governance most unlike a monarchy are democracies, since the center of power rests with the largest group, the people themselves.
Let’s see what is Monarchy? It is a king or queen who gets all the powers of authority from inheritance and power stays in the same family, usually the bloodline from father to son. In Ancient Greeks, there weren’t too many monarchies, but there was some present and even Athens went under the monarchy at the end of the classical period which ended with the death of Alexander the Great. His father Phillip II of Macedon who became king after the deaths of his two brothers conquered Athens after the Peloponnesian war and ended democracy in the great city of Athens. (Wasson, 2014)
Robert Michels believed that any political system eventually evolves into an oligarchy. He called this the iron law of oligarchy. According to this school of thought, modern democracies should be considered as oligarchies. Unfortunately, Oligarchy Governments really hide under the name of democratic. As an example, a number of former Soviet states, including Ukraine. Officially, we live in a democratic state, but we all know who is at the helm of state power. Ukraine is called a democratic state, which governed by a few oligarchic clans.
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Whereas in a monarchy the monarch is the law and there are privileged classes, where no laws apply, just the laws of the king.
The Athenian government evolved from a monarchy into an aristocracy. A monarchy is when a King or Queen exercises central power. In Greece, the government was headed by a privileged minority or upper class, which ruled his or her own city-states. They created a system based on the right of each individual citizen to speak out about issues.
A monarchy is a form of government where a monarch is ruling and usually, they are referred to as a king or queen. Also, a monarchy is hereditary. In history, the ancient Egyptians saw their monarchs as gods. Beginning in 1500, many European monarchs claimed that their power came from gods; also known as the divine right of kings. The World War I ended many important monarchies; however, there are still 26 monarchies around the world some of which are the United Kingdom, Spain, Sweden, The Netherlands, Morocco, Jordan, Japan, Saudi Arabia, and Swaziland.
The third and final type of monarchy is an absolute monarchy. In an absolute monarchy, the monarchy has supreme and absolute authority to do what it wishes. An example of this occurs in the country of Saudi Arabia. In Saudi Arabia, the royal family can enforce any law it wishes- no matter how bad it could be for the country. Absolute monarchies are often very oppressive to its people. For example, Saudi Arabia has very strict laws that have been put in place by the royal family. The people living in the country have no voice in an absolute monarchy.