Pericles
The First Citizen of Athens
In 431 BC, as the first year of the Peloponnesian War drew to its close, Pericles son of Xanthippus stood before the assembled citizens of Athens and delivered the funeral oration for the war dead — a speech that would define democracy itself for the next two and a half thousand years. He was not a king, not a general by birth, not a tyrant. He held no permanent office. He was simply the man the Athenians chose to lead them, year after year, for over three decades — elected strategos fifteen times in succession. Under his guidance Athens became the most powerful city in Greece, the wealthiest state in the Mediterranean, and the cultural capital of the ancient world. The Parthenon, the Odeon, the Long Walls, the empire of the Delian League — all bore his mark.
“For famous men have the whole earth as their memorial.”
c. 495–429 BC
Born into the Alcmaeonid aristocracy of Athens — his mother Agariste was the niece of the reformer Cleisthenes. Died of the plague that devastated Athens during the second year of the Peloponnesian War. Sixty-six years that shaped Western civilisation.
30+
Elected strategos (general) at least fifteen times, holding effective leadership of Athens from roughly 461 to 429 BC — the longest unbroken democratic mandate in the ancient world. The Athenians called this period simply 'the age of Pericles.'
447–432 BC
Commissioned the rebuilding of the Acropolis, centred on the Parthenon — a temple to Athena Parthenos designed by Ictinus and Callicrates, with sculptures by Phidias. The project cost 469 silver talents, roughly equivalent to the annual tribute of the entire Delian League.
150–330
At its height, the Delian League — transformed under Pericles from a voluntary alliance into an Athenian empire — comprised between 150 and 330 tribute-paying states across the Aegean, generating roughly 600 talents of silver per year.
Athenian statesman, orator, patron of the arts, architect of the Golden Age of Athens
Defining Events
The Building of the Parthenon
Pericles launched the most ambitious building programme in Greek history — the reconstruction of the Acropolis, devastated by the Persians in 480 BC. The centrepiece was the Parthenon, a temple to Athena Parthenos housing a twelve-metre chryselephantine statue by Phidias. The project employed thousands of craftsmen — stonemasons, sculptors, painters, carpenters, bronzeworkers — and transformed Athens into the most beautiful city in the ancient world. Critics accused Pericles of using allied tribute to 'dress Athens up like a harlot.' He replied that Athens owed nothing so long as it defended its allies — and that the buildings would be its glory for eternity.
The Funeral Oration
In the winter of 431 BC, after the first year of the Peloponnesian War, Pericles delivered the public funeral oration for the Athenian war dead — as recorded by Thucydides in Book II of his History. Rather than praise the fallen individually, Pericles used the occasion to define what Athens stood for: democracy, freedom of speech, openness to the world, merit over birth. 'We are called a democracy, for the administration is in the hands of the many and not of the few.' The speech remains the founding text of democratic political thought — Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address consciously echoed its structure and ideals.
The Plague of Athens
In the second year of the war, as the population of Attica crowded behind the Long Walls, a devastating plague swept through Athens. Thucydides, who survived it, described the symptoms in clinical detail — fever, inflammation, vomiting, ulceration, unquenchable thirst. The disease killed an estimated quarter to a third of the population, including Pericles' sister, both his legitimate sons Xanthippus and Paralus, and finally Pericles himself in the autumn of 429 BC. Modern scholars have proposed typhoid fever, smallpox, viral haemorrhagic fever, and Ebola as possible identifications. The plague shattered Athenian morale and marked the beginning of the end of the city's golden age.
Timeline
Born into Athenian Aristocracy
Pericles is born into two of Athens' most prominent families. His father Xanthippus commanded the Greek fleet at the Battle of Mycale in 479 BC. His mother Agariste was the niece of Cleisthenes, the reformer who established Athenian democracy in 508 BC. The Alcmaeonid clan was wealthy, ambitious, and reputedly cursed — an old blood-guilt from the Cylonian affair that political enemies would invoke for generations.
First Public Act — Funding Aeschylus
At roughly twenty-three years old, Pericles serves as choregos (theatrical sponsor) for Aeschylus' production of The Persians — a drama celebrating Athens' victory at Salamis, where Pericles' own father had fought. The choregic system required wealthy citizens to fund theatrical productions; Pericles' choice of play was a political statement, aligning himself with the democratic, naval faction against aristocratic conservatives.
The Democratic Revolution
Pericles joins Ephialtes in a radical reform of the Athenian constitution, stripping the aristocratic Areopagus council of its political powers and transferring them to the democratic Assembly, the Council of Five Hundred, and the popular courts. In 461 BC Ephialtes is assassinated — Pericles, now roughly thirty-four, inherits the leadership of the democratic faction and begins his three-decade dominance of Athenian politics.
Treasury Moved to Athens
The treasury of the Delian League — the anti-Persian alliance founded after the Battle of Plataea — is transferred from the island of Delos to the Acropolis of Athens. What had been a voluntary alliance of equals begins its transformation into an Athenian empire. The tribute, roughly 460 talents per year, will fund Pericles' building programme and Athenian naval supremacy.
The Acropolis Rebuilt
Pericles commissions the reconstruction of the Acropolis, destroyed by Xerxes' army in 480 BC. The Parthenon (447–432 BC), the Propylaea (437–432 BC), and later the Erechtheion and Temple of Athena Nike transform the sacred rock into the most magnificent architectural ensemble in the Greek world. Phidias oversees the sculptural programme, including the colossal chryselephantine statue of Athena Parthenos — over twelve metres tall, sheathed in gold and ivory.
Thucydides Son of Melesias Ostracised
Pericles' principal political rival, Thucydides son of Melesias (not the historian), is ostracised by popular vote after opposing the use of Delian League funds for Athenian building projects. With his removal, Pericles faces no serious opposition. Plutarch writes that from this point on, 'Pericles was the foremost man in Athens, and held the state in his hands.'
The Revolt of Samos
The island of Samos revolts against Athenian control. Pericles personally commands the naval expedition that besieges and recaptures the island after nine months of fighting. The Samian War demonstrates both the military power of the Athenian empire and the ruthlessness with which Pericles would enforce it. Samos is stripped of its fleet and forced to pay war indemnities.
The Peloponnesian War Begins
War breaks out between Athens and Sparta — the two great power blocs of the Greek world. Pericles' strategy is to avoid pitched land battle against Sparta's superior hoplites, withdraw the population behind the Long Walls connecting Athens to Piraeus, and rely on Athenian naval supremacy to strike at Spartan allies by sea. The strategy is brilliant but demands extraordinary discipline — and it concentrates the population in conditions perfect for epidemic disease.
Key Figures
Aspasia of Miletus
Aspasia was a Milesian woman who became Pericles' companion after he divorced his first wife around 445 BC. She was no ordinary consort — ancient sources describe her as a brilliant rhetorician and philosopher who hosted intellectual salons attended by Socrates himself. Plutarch records that Socrates would visit her 'along with his disciples' and that Pericles 'caressed her, kissing her when he left for the Assembly and again when he returned.' Their relationship scandalised conservative Athenians. She was prosecuted for impiety — Pericles reportedly wept before the jury to win her acquittal. Their son, Pericles the Younger, was eventually legitimised by special decree after the plague killed Pericles' legitimate heirs.
Phidias
Phidias was the greatest sculptor of the ancient world and Pericles' closest collaborator on the Acropolis project. He created the colossal chryselephantine statues of Athena Parthenos in the Parthenon and Zeus at Olympia — the latter counted among the Seven Wonders. Pericles appointed him general superintendent of the building programme, giving him oversight of the entire sculptural scheme. Political enemies attacked Pericles through Phidias, charging the sculptor with embezzlement and impiety — he allegedly included portraits of himself and Pericles on Athena's shield. Phidias was convicted and died in prison or exile, a casualty of the political warfare that constantly surrounded Pericles.
The Legacy of Pericles
Pericles died in the autumn of 429 BC, a victim of the plague that had already taken his sister and both his legitimate sons. Thucydides, who admired him without illusion, wrote that Athens under Pericles was 'a democracy in name, but in fact the rule of the first citizen.' It was meant as a compliment — Pericles led not by force or inheritance but by the power of his reasoning and the trust of the people. After his death, Thucydides noted, Athens was led by men who were 'more on a level with one another, and each grasping at supremacy, they ended by committing even the conduct of state affairs to the whims of the multitude.'
The buildings endured. The Parthenon still stands on the Acropolis — battered by two and a half millennia of war, explosion, pollution, and plunder, but standing. The Funeral Oration still defines what democracy means. The golden age he created lasted barely a generation, but its echoes shaped the Western world. Read his story in his own words — the first-person ePub brings you inside the mind of Athens' greatest statesman.
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