Monday Notes with Review

483 B.C. the Athenians discovered silver in the town and they wanted to divide it amoung themselves. Cleisthenes wanted too use the money for the ships, but he knew it would be difficult to win. They built 200 tyrenes for the naval force. Darius died in 486 BC and his son Xerxes took over. He wanted to burn Athens to the ground, so he gathered all his troops from all over and the rumors spread to Athens that the Persians were coming over for war. Athenians turned to the Gods and sent someone to the oracle. Cleisthenes plan was to avoid conflict on land and fight in the water. Xerxes force entered Athens and burned the acropolis and temples to the ground. Cliesthenes sent his servant to Xerxes to make it look like he was betraying the Greeks and he told Xerxes that the Greeks were going to flea and the only way to attack them was in Straights of Salamis. The Persians went to that area of the water and got defeated by the Greeks again and the Persians lost 200 ships. Athens could now build an empire and they were head of the navy. In 450 the Delieah League had become Athens empire and that is an organized bunch of city states all chipping in money. Cliesthenes ended up getting ostracized because they took him as a threat and thought he would go to be the dictator and he ended up dying in the Persian land. Pericles was leader of Athens at its climax. Pericles knew the people wanted an empire, so he proposed to make a Parthenon. It was extremely expensive and it took 15 years to build, it was a glorious symbol of the Greeks of Athens. Twice a year Athenian people would gather at a theater to watch comedies and tragedy's  An example is Ascapascha was known as an escort and she "hung out" with Pericles but she was extremely educated and Pericles treated her as an equal. An example of a tragedy play was Oedipis and it was written about a king that was told when he was a young boy he would kill his father and marry his mother, and it ended up all being true, and he couldnt stand the look on peoples faces when they found out he married his mother so he gouged his eyeballs out. Hubris is a greek term used to describe people in power who are arrogant and they feel like they can do whatever they want.