The rise of the Greek polis from poverty and obscurity to the self-confident splendours of the classical period in the fifth century formed the birth of western culture, and the start of Greek supremacy over a large part of the Mediterranean. During the Glory of Greece democracy was invented and argued about, achieved and attacked. It was also a period unparalleled in history for its brilliance in literature, philosophy and the visual arts.

This site will take you on a voyage through long forgotten ages, to a place which is distant from ours, far removed in space, time and scale. A place where the Greeks worshipped many Gods, owned slaves and had different ideas about sex. To see that such things can be true of people who in some ways we find intelligible and recognizable can help to deliver us from the tyranny of the present, from the assumption that our habits of action and thought are really inescapable, and from the idea that there are no alternatives. That is the liberating power of the past.

-- Want to put a survey about ancient Greece on the Web? --
-- Just E-mail it to me, and I'll add it to this site. --