the encyclopedia of ancient history || kleisthenes of athens
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Kleisthenes of AthensMAURIZIO GIANGIULIO
Kleisthenes was an Athenian politician, of the
family of the ALKMAIONIDAI, born in the late 570s
BCE to Megakles (II) and Agariste, the daughter
of Sikyon’s tyrant Kleisthenes. According to
HERODOTUS (6.131.1), he “established the tribes
and the democracy in Athens.”
The influence andwealth of the Alkmaionidai
in the sixth century were enormous. Megakles’
father Alkmaion was well connected at DELPHI
and had close ties with the king of LYDIA.
One generation later, at the time of Agariste’s
wedding, the family was renowned throughout
Greece (Hdt. 6.131.1), andMegakles himself in
the 560s came to hold a position of predomi-
nance at Athens as one of the dynasts involved
in the civil strife from which PEISISTRATOS’
tyranny ultimately arose. Later on, a compro-
mise between the aristocratic families and the
tyrant must have been reached. Kleisthenes
held the archonship in 525/4, and it was only
after the assassination of Hippias’ brother in
514 that the aristocrats resorted to civil war.
Kleisthenes went into exile, and succeeded,
through the influence of the Delphic Oracle, in
persuading the Spartans to overthrow Hippias.
In the resulting power vacuum the Athenian
archon ISAGORAS attempted to place the control
of affairs in the hands of a small elite, while
Kleisthenes gained strong support from the cit-
izens and managed to get his reform bill
approved by the assembly (Hdt. 5.66.1–2,
69.2). The Spartans banned him and his fellows
and laid siege to the ACROPOLIS, but a fiery pop-
ular resistance arose; Isagoras and the Spartans
were driven out, and Kleisthenes returned.
In such a context of strife Kleisthenes must
have realized that the traditional model of
aristocratic political infighting was bound
to threaten the cohesion and autonomy of
Athens. Incorporating a vast majority of the
people of Attica into the political process
and providing the citizens with a chance of
actively participating in public life were in all
probability the only way to forge a cohesive
community of all Athenians.
The cornerstone of Kleisthenes’ reforms
was the invention of the deme as political
unit (see DEMES, ATTIC). The demes were natural
units of habitation scattered all over Attica that
came to be provided with a limited degree of
self-government, and the right to contribute
a fixed quota of members to a new national
council, the BOULE of the 500. Even more
important, a man became a citizen of Athens
by being entered in a deme register. Moreover,
the citizen body was organized into ten new
tribes, built up from the demes in units known
as trittyes (“thirds”; see TRITTYS, TRITTYES). Each
tribe was made up of three groups of trittyes,
one from each of three districts into which the
whole of Attica (including the area of Athens)
was divided (City, Coast, Inland). Such a con-
scious manipulation of the existing spatial
relationships was apparently designed to
bring together men from different parts of
Attica within political units that could hardly
become the nuclei of local factions.
The Athenian polis, thus, was transformed
into a fully integrated region-state, and the
existing political community was provided
with a broader base. Citizens from all over
Attica were given a civic presence in public
life, not so much through the polis assembly
as through the boule, in which every year
500 citizens from all the demes played an
important political role.
Herodotus’ aristocratic informants probably
thought of Kleisthenes as an astute politician
aiming to gain political advantages for himself
and his family. Both the consent he enjoyed and
the stability his measures gave to Athens for
centuries tell against the image of the power-
hungry politician. He was not impelled by pop-
ular pressure nor was he a democratic theorist,
but he was an astute statesman who addressed
the structural problems his polis faced by creat-
ing a “new” political community.
SEE ALSO: Democracy, Athenian; Hipparchos,
son of Peisistratos; Hippias, son of Peisistratos;
The Encyclopedia of Ancient History, First Edition. Edited by Roger S. Bagnall, Kai Brodersen, Craige B. Champion, Andrew Erskine,
and Sabine R. Huebner, print pages 3782–3783.
© 2013 Blackwell Publishing Ltd. Published 2013 by Blackwell Publishing Ltd.
DOI: 10.1002/9781444338386.wbeah04066
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Ionian tribes; Kleisthenes of Sikyon; Megakles
of Athens.
REFERENCES AND SUGGESTED READINGS
Anderson, G. (2003) The Athenian experiment:
building an imagined political community in
Attica, 508–490 BC. Ann Arbor.
Andrewes, A. (1977) “Kleisthenes’ reform bill.”
Classical Quarterly 27: 241–8.
De Ste. Croix, G. E. M. (2005) Athenian democratic
origins and other essays: 129–232. Oxford.
Giangiulio, M. (2007) “Identita civica e parteci-
pazione: Clistene e Atene.” In M. Giangiulio, ed.,
Storia d’Europa e del Mediterraneo, vol. 3: 533–60.
Rome.
Ober, J. (1996) The Athenian revolution: essays on
ancient Greek democracy and political theory:
32–52. Princeton.
Roussel, D. (1976) Tribu et cite: 269–89.
Paris.
Wade-Gery, H. T. (1958) “The laws of Kleisthenes.”
In Essays in Greek history: 135–54.
Oxford.
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