The Rise and Fall of Athens: Nine Greek Lives

by Plutarch, Ian Scott-Kilvert (Introduction)

Nine Greek biographies illustrate the rise and fall of Athens, from the legendary days of Theseus, the city's founder, through Solon, Themistocles, Aristides, Cimon, Pericles, Nicias, and Alcibiades, to the razing of its walls by Lysander.

Genres: History, Classics, Nonfiction, Ancient History, Biography, Greece, Ancient

ebook

First published January 1, 100

About the author

Plutarch (later named, upon becoming a Roman citizen, Lucius Mestrius Plutarchus; AD 46–AD 120) was a Greek historian, biographer, and essayist, known primarily for his Parallel Lives and Moralia. He is classified as a Middle Platonist. Plutarch's surviving works were written in Greek, but intended for both Greek and Roman readers.

Reviews

[John Conquest · Rating 5 out of 5]

BORN TO DIE
WORLD IS A FUCK
Kill Em All 410 BC
I am perioeci man
410,757,864,530 DEAD SPARTANS

[Perry Whitford · Rating 5 out of 5]

Plutarch's Parallel Lives is one of the great works of antiquity, in which the 1st century AD writer juxtaposed biographies of celebrated Greek and Roman statesmen, comparing and contrasting them by their various actions and legacies.

I particularly love everything Athenian, the birthplace of democracy, so as you can imagine this highly selective editing and translation of Plutarch's work, summarized perfectly in the title, was like ambrosia to me.

For the first life Plutarch had to delve back into the time of myth and sift the various conflicting stories to try and tell a coherent tale of the city's founder, Theseus.
Pretty obviously he was a figure created by the aspiring Athenian's in need of a hero. In his early career 'he was following Heracles' example' rather too closely, whereas the minotaur legend clearly speaks of how Athens overcame Crete on the way to independence.

Next up is Solon, famed for his wisdom, who 'stood apart from the injustices of the time' and became the trusted lawmaker of Athens.
His laws established, he left his homeland for ten years, traveling in Egypt, Crete and Lydia, where he famously met and exasperated King Croesus by failing to recognise him as a happy man despite his great wealth.
Returning to Athens, he failed to prevent the rise of the tyrant Pisistratus, despite seeing through his deceitful public image as a friend to the poor. But he was revered until his death, declaring that 'I never cease to learn as I grow old'.

'No man has ever been more ambitious than Themistocles'. Quite a claim if you consider that a biography of Alcibiades is not far off, yet it may be true of the Athenians' victorious general at Salamis, a man of the people and yet very much for himself.
After the Greeks defeated the Persians at Marathon, he didn't celebrate. Instead 'he prepared, as it were, to anoint himself ... and come forward as the champion of Greece: in face he sensed the danger while it was till far away, and put his city into training to meet it.'
Do you know who he reminds me of?
That pessimistic yet accurate vision, as well as so many other things, such as his work with the navy, his love of the good things in life, his sharp tongue, and his belief that the people only called for him when they had their backs up against it, reminds me of a similarly pugnacious politician from the best part of two and a half thousand years in the future - one Winston Churchill.

Themistocles' great rival, Aristides, could not have been more different in character and behaviour. The hero of Platea was modest and uninterested in fame or fortune. His abiding principle was justice, which he always tried to serve, even at his own expense.
Plutarch clearly approved of Aristides' principles, moralising that 'a life that is spent in the midst of power and great fortune and authority still needs justice to make it divine, for injustice renders it merely brutish.'
Of course the Athenians still found a way to ostracize him, though he was recalled when the Persians attacked. Plutarch probably gives Aristides the most blameless of all the biographies here, though the editor points out that a few of the anecdotes of his admirable actions could not possibly have been true.

Cimon was Athens' general of empire, harrying the Persians out of Ionia and establishing colonies along the way. Though he admired the Spartans to a degree which often called his loyalty into question, it was his wise leadership that effectively relegated Sparta below Athens in terms of influence amongst the combined Greek army.
He was the champion of the aristocracy, but also generous and charitable to an extravagant degree (though how he acquired his money was often questioned). Says Plutarch, 'in a sense, he restored to human experience the fabled conditions of the golden age of Cronos, when men owned everything in common.'

At its zenith in the middle of the 5th century BC the primary politician of Athens was indisputably Pericles, whose building projects and rousing oratory brought both himself and his city lasting acclaim.
Plutarch is amazed by both the splendor of the public works he commissioned, how each 'possessed a beauty that seemed venerable the moment it was born', and by the speed with which they will built, all in Pericles' time.
He was called 'the Olympian' by his peers in mockery of his lofty manor, but Plutarch concludes that he was worth the title without irony. But even he was less than perfect, antagonizing their allies by the tributes he demanded and very much leading the Athenians towards the confrontation with Sparta that would prove their undoing.

Nicias was the obvious successor to Pericles for the aristocratic element in Athens. Things started well for him with victory after victory, at the same time his natural timidity preventing him from over stretching his ambitions.
Obsessed with divination, things ended in disaster for him when he led a sizable war party to Sicily against his better judgement, making numerous mistakes there leading to a crushing defeat and his own execution.

No single figure better personified all that was great and misguided in the Athenian spirit than Alcibiades. Feted from an early age due to his beauty and prowess, he was besieged with lovers yet scorned them all in favor of Socrates, a wise choice.
Yet he was hubristically vain, refusing to play the flute because it ruined his features, defaming the sacred Mysteries of Eleusis in a drunken revel, turning traitor and assisting both the Spartans and the Persians when he lost favor at home.
But the Athenians' fortunes in the Peloponnesian War seemed to wax and wane with his own. Despite betraying his countrymen at every turn they recalled him again and again because nobody could galvanize the populace as he could.
Inevitably he came to a bad end.

Lysander was not even an Athenian, was in fact a hated Spartan, but it's fitting that the narrative arc ends with his biography as he was the man who more than any other brought to an end the Athenian ascendancy in Greece.
Born poor and no richer by his death, he none the less enriched his city. His victories decimated the Athenian navy and when the city surrendered he demolished their democracy. He was harsh and unstinting on prisoners.
He was criticized at home for his deceitful tactics, which were considered not in keeping with the descendants of Hercules, to which he replied "Where the lion's skin will not reach, we must patch it out with the fox's."
He subdued Athens, but he made new enemies for Sparta and died upon the field. Within a generation Sparta too would be ruined.

This is a great place to start if you have an interest in either Plutarch or Athens of the Golden Age. The translation is highly readable, the footnotes few but informative and the choice of biographies spot on.

As for Plutarch, despite deciding not to include dramatists or philosophers for his Lives, he calls on both sets frequently for quotations, as well as providing a great insight into how the oracles and ceremonies of the Greeks shaped and symbolized them.

Essential.

[Saumen · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book will remain forever close to my heart!!!I am out of my words to describe such an enlighting, deep book!!

তবে বইটা গুরুমুখী। এরমানে হচ্ছে, কেউ বুঝিয়ে না দিলে, আপনি যদি নিজে পড়েন, আপনি এটার গ্রেটনেস ধরতে পারবেন না, নেহাতই কিছু জীবনী মনে হবে। ইতিহাসের দাঁড়িপাল্লায় এই লাইভস এর ওজন অনেক হলেও, আসল মানবিক মূল্য তখনই জানবেন যখন কোন অভিজ্ঞ লোক সেটা আপনার বোধগম্যভাবে উপস্থাপন করবেন।দুই-একটা উদাহরণ দিচ্ছি।

Cimon:

সিমোন(Cimon) এর জীবনী থেকে শুরু করি, One of my absolute favourite. এক্ষেত্রে দুটি বিষয় আমি অনুভব করলাম। প্রতিযোগিতার একটা লিমিট আছে। আমরা সবাই বলি, ভাল কাজের প্রতিযোগিতা কর(যেমন ছিলেন সিমোন ও পেরিক্লিস)। দুজনেই নিজেদের মত করে জনগণের ভাল অবশ্যই করেছেন, ব্যাক্তিগত জীবনে এককভাবে তারা বেস্ট। কিন্তু দুজনের মধ্যে? তারা প্রতিযোগী। সে ভাবটা পেরিক্লিসের মধ্যেই বেশী ছিল। পেরিক্লিস সিমোনের প্রতি সুবিচার করতে পারলেন না! আরেকটা শিক্ষা হচ্ছে, আমরা নিজেদের রাগে, কতটা অন্ধ হতে পারি যে একটা চমৎকার জিনিসও রাগের মাথায় ভেঙে টুকরো টুকরো করতেও আমাদের বাধে না। আমাদের শত্রুর মধ্যেও যদি কোন ভাল গুণ থাকে, তাহলে তার প্রশংসা কি করা উচিত? হয়তো উচিত। স্পার্টানদের মধ্যেও নিশ্চয়ই কোন ভাল গুণ ছিল, সিমোন সেই গুণের গুণগ্রাহী ছিলেন। কিন্তু ফলে কি হল? স্পার্টানরা যখন এথেন্সকে অপমান করে তাড়িয়ে দিল, তখন এথেন্স রাগ হয়ে সিমোনের মত মানুষকে বহিষ্কারের আদেশ দিল, কারণ স্পার্টানদের প্রতি তার সফট কর্ণার ছিল। কি আফসোস! কি আফসোস!! পেরিক্লিসও চুপ করে রইলেন। pericles the just.. তার প্রতিদ্বন্দ্বীর প্রতি সুবিচার করতে পারলেন না!

Themistocles:
থেমিস্টেক্লেস ইতিহাসে অমর হয়ে আছেন ব্যাটল অফ সালামিসের জন্য, যেখানে পার্সিয়ানরা চূড়ান্তভাবে পরাজিত হয়৷ এরপরের ঘটনা সহজেই অনুমেয়, তিনি হয়ে উঠলেন সকলের নয়নের মণি। সবাই মাথায় তুলে নাচতে লাগল তাকে নিয়ে। কিন্তু তার শেষ পরিণতি কি হল? গর্বিত থেমিস্টেক্লেস নিজেকে বিরাট হনু(যা তিনি অবশ্যই ছিলেন) ভাবতে লাগলেন। যেখানে সেখানে আত্মপ্রচার চালাতে লাগলেন, তার বীরত্বের কাহিনী বিক্রি করে সবার কাছ থেকে সুবিধা নিতে চাইলেন। শেষ পরিণতিতে তিনি এথেন্স থেকে বিতাড়িত হয়ে আশ্রয় নিলেন সেই পারসিক রাজা জেরেক্সেস(যার কাহিনী আপনারা 300: The Rise of Empire এ পাবেন) এর ছেলে আর্টেরেক্সেসের কাছে। যিনি আশ্রয় দিলেন, সম্মান দিলেন, বিনিময়ে থেমিস্টেক্লেস এর কাছে চেয়ে বসলেন তার সবচেয়ে বড় আনুগত্য, গ্রীস আক্রমণে তার নেতৃত্বে যুদ্ধে যাবেন থেমিস্টেক্লেস, তার প্রাণের গ্রীসকে ধ্বংসে নেতৃত্ব দেবে সেই তরবারি, যে একসময় গ্রীসকে রক্ষার রক্তশপথ করেছিল!! হা হতোস্মি!! এর চেয়ে কি বিষপানই উত্তম না??

Aristedies:
সুশাসক বা একজন বিচারকের গুণ যে শুধু তার বিচার নয়, তিনি বিচারাসনে বসে একটি জাতির বিবেকের প্রতিনিধিত্ব করেন। তাই আপাত কঠিন সিদ্ধান্ত নেওয়াও তাঁকেই মানায়, কিন্তু বিবেককে কলুষিত করা যাবে না। এই মহান শিক্ষা তো Astidies দিয়েছেন। পার্সিয়ানের আক্রমণে তখন এথেন্স জ্বলে গেছে, দুর্ভিস্পার্টার ভগ্নদশা। পার্সিয়ান সম্রাট বলে পাঠিয়েছেন, তার আনুগত্য স্বীকার করলে তিনি এথেন্স, স্পার্টা পুনরায় গড়ে দেবেন, আর্থিক সাহায্যও করবেন। স্পার্টা গলে গেল। তারা এথেন্সকে তার মত জানিয়ে চিঠি দিল। এরিস্টিডেস ঘৃণাভরে লিখে পাঠালেন, গ্রীসের বীরগণ কি এতই দুর্বল হয়ে গেছে যে নিজের দুর্বলতা শত্রুর সামনে প্রদর্শন করতে হবে? গ্রীসের কি এতই অভাব যে শত্রুর সাহায্যে জীবনরক্ষা করতে হবে? তারা যে বীরের রক্ত, তাদের সে ���েজ কি যুদ্ধক্ষেত্রেই তারা রেখে এসেছে??

প্লুটার্ক আসলে জীবনীর মধ্যে দর্শন খুঁজেছেন। এই জীবনীগুলির যেখানেই শিক্ষামূলক কিছু পেয়েছেন, সেখানে বেশি ফোকাস করেছেন, অনান্য অনেক গুরুত্বপূর্ণ ঐতিহাসিক বিবরণকে পাত্তা না দিয়ে। তাই এগুলিকে খন্ডিত জীবনী বলা যায়। ব্যক্তি নির্বাচন থেকে কাহিনী বর্ণনা, সবখানেই ন্যায় অন্যায়, মনুষ্যত্ব এর উত্থান পতন, রাজনৈতিক ডামাডোলের সি স পজিশন বেশি গুরুত্বপূর্ণ হয়ে উঠেছে বইটাতে। মূল বই(Parallel Lives) এ প্রতিটি গ্রীক চরিত্রের মানানসই রোমান চরিত্রকে সন্নিবেশিত করে দেখাতে চেষ্টা করেছেন," History repeats itself". আগের সময় আর বর্তমান প্রেক্ষাপটে কিভাবে চরিত্রগুলি Evolve করে, সেটা নিয়েও বলেছেন। কিন্তু তিনি কোন সিদ্ধান্ত দেননি। সেটা পাঠকের উপরেই,ছেড়ে দিয়েছেন।

You dont read books only for yourself.You will oneday become older, guide your future generation to the path of good and bad, you will teach them from your wisdom gathered throughout your all life.This book is for my kids.

May this book survive many more light years to show us light at the darkest of times!!
I Love this pages with all my heart and Soul!!!.

N.B: I always will be thankful to Muhammad Vai for attracting me to Plutarch's Lives.He is a treasure trove of knowledge. Please check out his other reviews on Makers of Rome, which threw me into the deep water of this gigantic work

Date: 10/3/2021

[Andrew Reece · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ploútarchos' Nine Athenian Lives Chronicle The Exploits Of The Legendary Greek Heroes Of Classical Antiquity.

Plutarch's The Rise & Fall Of Athens was originally published in 1960 in a Penguin edition which was translated by Ian-Scott Kilvert, & since that time Penguin Classics has published utterly exceptional reissues of Plutarch's other collections such as On Sparta, The Fall Of The Roman Republic, Makers Of Rome, Rome In Crisis, The Rise Of Rome, & The Age Of Alexander with additional expanded notes, bibliographies, & updated reading suggestions. Plutarch's Life Of Epaminondas & Life Of Scipio are both lost (it is unknown whether this was Scipio Africanus or his adopted grandson, Scipio Aemilianus) but he did write 23 paired short biographies, 19 with comparisons, called Parallel Lives, of popular Greek & Roman historical figures, as well as 4 standalone Lives : Artaxerxes, Aratus Of Sicyon, Galba, & Otho. This brand-new, updated 2024 Penguin Classics edition of the original 1960 Rise & Fall Of Athens set of 9 Athenian Lives features a revised introduction & translation work with an unbelievable amount of additional polish administered by John Marincola, who was educated at Swarthmore College, the University of Pennsylvania & Brown University, & is the author of the 2017 On Writing History From Herodotus To Herodian, published by the Penguin Classics. This edition features the Lives of Theseus, Solon, Themistocles, Aristides, Cimon, Pericles, Nicias, Alcibiades, & Lysander, as well as considerable portions of Plutarch's famous invective on the Greek Historian Herodotus, entitled On The Malice Of Herodotus.

The Greek hero Theseus is widely considered to be the founder of Athens whose mythical exploits paved the way to the city's early rise to dominance over the Attica region, & in Plutarch's 'Parallel Lives' collection of short biographies, Theseus' Life is paired with that of Rome's legendary founder, Romulus. Portions of the Life Of Theseus contain fantastical, unbelievable tales which are pulled straight from Greek folklore featuring mythical figures & creatures such as half-human centaurs, a vicious minotaur, & tribes of female Amazon warriors who attack Athens while Theseus desperately rallies the citizens to drive them back after a fierce battle ensues. Scarcely more believable are the poetically-vicious encounters between Theseus & a motley assortment of outlaws & brigands he meets while traveling the Attican countryside, ne'er-do-wells with names such as Perphetes 'The Club-Bearer', Sinis 'The Pine-Bender', & Phaea 'The Wild Sow Of Crommyon' are each dealt with according to Theseus' own brutal moral code as he progresses, "..punishing the wicked & meting out to them the same violence that they had inflicted on others, so that they suffered a justice that was modelled on their own injustice." The Life Of Theseus is the sole biography in this set which features these obviously non-historically accurate vignettes yet it still remains an immensely entertaining read.

The Athenian lawgiver Solon's far-reaching & all-encompassing reforms affected practically every aspect of Attican life, from marriage, to commerce, & he even enacted a series of laws regulating the drawing of wells, the placing of bee-hives, & the planting of trees. Solon was considered a champion of the poor with his decree known as the 'shaking off of burdens' which cancelled all existing debts & prevented the person of a debtor from being accepted as security in future. He also increased the value of money by fixing the value of the mina from 73 drachmas to 100. Solon was far from perfect, however, & after prematurely divulging his intention to abolish debts to his 3 dear friends Conon, Clinias, & Hipponicus, according to Plutarch, "They promptly took advantage of this confidence & anticipated the decree by borrowing large sums from the rich & buying up big estates. Then, when the decree was published, they went on enjoying the use of their property but refused to pay their creditors." This brought great shame & dishonor upon the lawgiver's name, & his friends became ever after known as 'debt-cutters'. Solon regulated the export of certain Attican resources, ruling that olive oil was the only commodity which was legal to ship abroad, imposing upon offenders either a 100-drachma fine or the curse of the Archon, & the export of Attican figs was expressly forbidden, with any who informed against illegal merchants being called skophanteis, or 'fig-declarers'. Finally, Solon held a census during his time as archon in which he assigned specific titles & duties to the 4 levels of Athenian society: the 500-measure men, the horse-tax payers, the teamsters, & the thetes. These 4 tiers were primarily wealth & property-based & denoted which civic duties were eligible to each of the classes. Plutarch & the translators, Ian Scott-Kilvert & John Marincola, perform admirable work in rendering the bureaucratic material found in the Life Of Solon surprisingly exciting to read about. The expanded notes for this Life are nothing short of remarkable.

Such was Aristides' selflessness as a politician that he would introduce his own reforms & proposals via other men so as not to allow his bitter rivalry with Themistocles prevent measures from coming to pass which benefitted all Athenians, & as the reader proceeds through Aristides' Life he or she will likely agree with the high praise of the Greek historian Herodotus, cited in the volume's extended notes : "..the more I have learned of his character, the more I have come to believe that he was the best & most just man that Athens ever produced."

Cimon executes a daring maneuver to expel the Persian forces who had invaded & occupied the Chersonese & enlisted the assistance of the neighboring Thracians at around 466/5, where with a mere 4 triremes he sets sail from Athens & expertly captures 13 Persian vessels & subdues their Thracian allies to successfully restore the territory to Athenian control. Cimon later wins a decisive sea battle against the citizens of Thasos who had revolted from Athenian sovereignty where 33 Thasian ships are captured before the city is besieged & forced into surrender & the neighboring gold mines on the mainland are annexed & made to be Athenian assets. Cimon's popularity with his fellow citizens does not last, however, & he garners extreme criticism when he sends military aid to Athens' mortal enemy when in either 465/4 or 464/3 BC a cataclysmic earthquake wracks the city of Sparta during the 4th year of the Spartan King, Archidamus, son of Zeuxidamus, & subsequently ignites a brutal revolt of the Spartan helots to such an degree that Sparta must entreat the allies for assistance. Sparta again entreats the Delian League for aid against the Messenians & the helots in Itholme around 461/0 BC, but, according to Plutarch's narrative, "..because the Spartans feared the Athenians' daring & brilliance, they sent them alone of the allies, away as dangerous revolutionaries. The Athenians returned home in a fury & proceeded to take revenge against the friends of Sparta & Cimon in particular. They seized upon some trifling pretext to ostracize him for ten years, for this was the period laid down for all those banished by ostracism." The Life Of Cimon despite being the shortest in the set of 9 is extremely engaging & should appeal to a wide variety of readers.

During his Archonship Pericles undertook an ambitious building programme which resulted in the construction of much of Athens' classical architecture, although men would occasionally poke fun at his propensity for speech over action, such as when the Athenisan poet Cratinus' used good-natured, mocking verse to make fun of the long time it was taking to complete the initiation chamber at Eleusis: "For so long has Pericles moved it forward in words; but in fact he has not even started it." In chapter 27 of the Life Of Pericles Plutarch references the writings of Theophrastus the philosopher, who recorded that in order to forestall war with Sparta Pericles would send a yearly bribe of 10 talents to the Spartan political leadership which proved effective until the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War in 431 BC. Plutarch's Life Of Pericles is paired with that of Fabius Maximus 'Cunctator', the Roman general who successfully utilized tactics of avoidance & prevarication against the well-trained Carthaginian army led by the Hannibal Barca during the Second Punic War.

For the 'Life Of Nicias', Plutarch supplements Thucydides' excellent base narrative with the writings of the Sicilian historians Philistus of Syracuse & Timaeus of Tauromenium, & he uses the verse of poets such as Aristophanes, Teleclides, & Eupolis to provide examples of Nicias' negative character traits, such as his cowardice & propensity to bribe informers & his enemies. Nicias was a prominent Athenian general & statesman who swiftly rose to power in the years following the death of Pericles in 429, during the first half of the Peloponnesian War which lasted 27 years in total, from 431 - 404 BC. Enormously wealthy & also very pious, Nicias owned valuable commissions at the lucrative silver mines at Laurium & would regularly stage costly religious processions in an effort to further his career in Athenian politics.

Overall, this new 2024 edition of Plutarch's The Rise & Fall Of Athens is a truly exceptional update to an already-outstanding piece of classical scholarship which serves as the capstone to Penguin's impressive library of Plutarch's considerable body of work. It is a wonderful companion piece to the other Greek-oriented Plutarch compilations such as The Age Of Alexander, 'On Sparta', & to a lesser extent, The Rise Of Rome. It is by far the most complex & nuanced of the Plutarch sets & as such it is best recommended for readers who possess a reasonable comfort level with Plutarch's language & writing style. This should make a fantastic addition to any Greek history lover's library.

[Genni · Rating 3 out of 5]

This edition of Plutarch serves as something of a Plutarch reader. It takes some of the Grecian biographies from Plutarch's Parallel Lives and titles them The Rise and Fall of Athens, tracing the chronological order from the earliest part-mythological founding of Athens by Theseus to Lysander, the Spartan general who subdued Athens. It may serve as a good introduction to Plutarch's writing, but I left feeling I should have just committed to the full work. I think that separating the biographies into Greek and Roman misses a major point of what Plutarch was trying to accomplish. Maybe some day I will have time to read all of them....

[Nicole · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read for class. Not gonna lie, Plutarch's writing kind of slaps.

[Brandon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Theseus - The mythical parts of Theseus's story are fun, especially Sinis the Pine Bender and Procrustes, who stretched or chopped guests to fit to his bed. Then comes the weirdly political stuff (for a myth). Theseus's father Aegeus had a brother, Pallas, who had 50 sons. The Pallantides scorned Aegeus because he was childless, and they planned to take the throne for themselves, so they were very upset when Theseus, a foreigner, showed up. So Theseus fought a war with the Pallantides and ended up killing them all. It makes a lot more sense now why Aegeus was so grief-stricken when he saw the black sails as Theseus returned from Crete.
After this Theseus established a bunch of laws such as consolidating most of the Attic villages into a single city at Athens and apparently also tried to establish a democracy. But he then went off the rails and became a woman-abductor. He went down to Sparta and abducted Helen, who was still a young girl. Theseus hid her with his mother Aethra in Aphidna near Athens. The Spartans marched on Athens; in the meantime Theseus had set off to the Molossians (in other myths, to the Underworld) to find a girl for Pirithous to abduct, and got himself chained to a rock. So the Spartans took Athens, probably with the aid of Menestheus, Theseus's political opponent (and also Theseus's successor/leader of the Athenians in the Iliad), and captured Helen and also Theseus's mother, Aethra. I find it incredible that this event is actually referred to in the Iliad, when Helen is mentioned as leaving her room in Troy followed by her handmaids, one of whom is Aethra!
When Theseus came back to Athens, the city was in turmoil and Theseus was unsuccessful in dealing with the demagogues and factions. So he left Athens and headed to Scyros (the same island where Achilles hid himself). Lycomedes (the same king who hid Achilles) eventually pushed Theseus off a cliff. So yeah, a pathetic way for Athens' hero to die. If this story were completely myth, I don't understand why the Athenians would choose to make their national hero a woman-abducting failure who lost his own mother to the Spartans and got pushed off a cliff after being exiled.

Solon - Solon was a real Athenian law-giver, and very Athenian - he had a 'somewhat luxurious and extravagant way of living,' and he wrote a lot of poetry recording and defending his policies. He came to prominence in part by inciting the Athenians to war against the Megarians (over Salamis) and in making a Greek coalition to protect Delphi. Later when the city was 'on the brink of revolution' due to intense factional strife, Solon campaigned as someone who would benefit all parties, and the people wanted him to be tyrant. Instead of making himself a tyrant, however, Solon worked within the existing framework of the laws to overhaul the laws as much as possible and bring harmony back to the city. He gave the state an upper (noble) and a lower (popular) chamber - "His object here was that the state with its two Councils should ride, as it were, at double anchor and should therefore be less exposed to the buffetings of party politics..." "He recognized that the country was for the most part poor and unproductive, and that seafaring peoples else where are not in the habit of sending their goods to those who have nothing to offer in exchange. He therefore encouraged the Athenians to turn to the arts of manufacture and made a law that no son was obliged to support his father unless he had first been taught a trade."
Next, he went on a self-imposed exile as a merchant. He famously (and chronologically impossibly) met Croesus, the famously rich king of Lydia. "Croesus asked him whether he had ever known anyone more fortunate than he. Solon said that he had, and mentioned the name of Tellus, a fellow Athenian. Tellus, he went on to explain, was an honest man, he had left behind him children who upheld his good name, he had passed his life without ever being in serious want, and he had ended it by dying gloriously in battle for his country."

Themistocles - the war hero of the Battle of Salamis. Themistocles was not born to a distinguished family, but his intense ambition and boldness helped him gain prominence in Athens. "Whenever he was on holiday or had time to spare from his lessons, he did not play or idle like the other boys, but was always to be found composing or rehearsing speeches by himself." After the Battle of Marathon, Themistocles foresaw that the Persians would be back, so "he was the only man who had the courage to come before the people and propose that the revenue from the silver mines at Laurium... should be set aside and the money used to build triremes." Themistocles showed two interesting traits during the war - his capacity for compromise and his cunning. Compromise - he recalled his political enemy Aristides from exile and he gave up command to the Spartan Eurybiades in order to maintain unity among the Greek allies. When the allied forces retreated into the Peloponnese, Themistocles convinced the Athenians to not give up but rather to abandon the city and send their families to Troezen and their men to Salamis. Next, his cunning - when the allied forces wanted to abandon the straits of Salamis, he sent a Persian over to Xerxes pretending to betray the Greeks and alerting them to the Greek retreat. So Xerxes engaged the Greeks and forced the allies to fight. After the Greeks won at Salamis, Themistocles sped Xerxes along his way out of Greece by sending another messenger to him claiming that the Greeks planned to destroy his bridge of boats spanning the Hellespont. After this Themistocles played a big role in converting Athens into a maritime power. He turned the Piraeus into a fortified port and played some trickery on the Spartans in order to buy time for the Athenians to fortify their city.
However, Themistocles eventually became such an overbearing annoyance in Athens that the Athenians exiled him. Themistocles was later charged with treason for not reporting Pausanias's correspondence with the Persians, and he fled from place to place until he went to Asia and became a client of Artaxerxes, the successor of Xerxes. He even learned Persian so he could converse with Artaxerxes. An interesting turn of events for one of Greece's most famous war heroes.

Aristides - the hero of the Battle of Plataea. Even in their youth, Aristides and Themistocles were fierce rivals: "this rivalry quickly revealed their respective natures, Themistocles’ being resourceful, daring, unscrupulous, and ready to dash impetuously into any undertaking, while Aristides’ was founded upon a steadfast character, which was intent on justice and incapable of any falsehood, vulgarity, or trickery even in jest." Whereas Themistocles attempted to ingratiate himself with the lower classes, "Aristides, by contrast, avoided any attachments in political life and chose to follow his own path." "Of all Aristides’ virtues it was his justice which most impressed itself on the masses... For this reason, although he was poor and had no standing but that of a popular leader, he won that most royal and godlike title of The Just."
Of course, the Athenians decided to exile him. This was the occasion for a famous anecdote: "The story goes that on this occasion [the vote on the ostracism], while the votes were being written down, an illiterate and uncouth rustic handed his piece of earthenware to Aristides and asked him to write the name Aristides on it. The latter was astonished and asked the man what harm Aristides had ever done him. ‘None whatever,’ was the reply, ‘I do not even know the fellow, but I am sick of hearing him called The Just everywhere!’ When he heard this, Aristides said nothing, but wrote his name on the ostrakon and handed it back." (Aristides was recalled as Xerxes was marching towards Greece).

Cimon - Cimon is the Athenian hero of the period immediately after the Persian Wars, when the Athenians beat back the Persians from Ionia and started to establish an empire throughout the Aegean. Cimon started off bad - "he earned a bad name for disorderly behaviour, heavy drinking..." "Cimon was especially prone to form passionate attachments to women." However, Cimon apparently aged well and became one of the most respected Greek leaders of his day. He was as competent general and won over allies from the harsh Spartans while remaining a great friend of theirs. Cimon was also kind of lucky, since he was the one who got to reap the benefits of the Greek victory over Persia. He established many colonies for Athens and even went to Scyros to return Theseus's (supposed) bones to Athens. He was also famously generous: "He had all the fences on his fields taken down, so that not only poor Athenians but even strangers could help themselves freely to whatever fruit was in season. He also provided a dinner at his house every day, a simple meal but enough for large numbers. Any poor man who wished could come to him for this, and so received a subsistence which cost him no effort and left him free to devote all his attention to public affairs."

Pericles - Pericles was Athens' leading statesman during her height. Pericles was famous for cultivating a majestic, inaccessible, and intellectual aura. Plutarch mentions an anecdote about Pericles that reminds me of the one about Aristides: "It is a fact... that once in the marketplace, where he had urgent business to transact, he allowed himself to be abused and reviled for an entire day by some idle hooligan without uttering a word in reply. Towards evening he returned home unperturbed, while the man followed close behind, still heaping every kind of insult upon him. When Pericles was about to go indoors, as it was now dark, he ordered one of his servants to take a torch and escort the man all the way to his own house." Pericles seems to have been the butt of countless jokes made by Athens' comic poets, who were almost like the tabloid press of the classical world. Anyway, "he refused not only invitations to dinner but every kind of friendly or familiar intercourse, so that through all the years of his political career, he never visited one of his friends to dine." "Pericles took care not to make himself too familiar a figure, even to the people, and he only addressed them at long intervals." However, he pandered to the masses. He initiated a massive public works program which created the Parthenon among many other famous works of art, and turned Athens into a city of craftsmen. Pericles lived with a famous courtesan named Aspasia. Interestingly, despite being Athens' leading citizen, Pericles still suffered the people's wrath. At a certain point Aspasia was charged for impiety, his favorite artist, the famous Phidias, was imprisoned and died, and his mentor Anaxagoras was driven from the city. Later, during the war, Pericles suffered immensely at the hands of the plague. He "lost his sister and most of his relatives and friends, as well as those who had been his most trusted assistants during his administration. ... [and then his last legitimate son]. Even though he was crushed by this blow, he strove to persist steadfastly in his normal conduct and to sustain his greatness of spirit; but as he laid a wreath on the dead body, the sight overwhelmed him and he broke into a passion of tears and sobs, a thing he had never done before in his life." Pericles himself died from the plague soon after.

Nicias - Nicias is the Bad Luck Brian of these Lives. He was a serious, hard-working man with good intentions, but he was also extremely cautious and "by nature timid and inclined to defeatism." Nevertheless he had a successful career as a general as he always thoroughly prepared for his assignments and also avoided risky endeavors. So basically, he was uniquely ill-suited to lead the Sicilian Expedition, which required boldness and an enterprising spirit. Even though he argued vehemently against the expedition, he eventually ended up being its sole general. His caution resulted in him not being able to take Syracuse; moreover, he was ill for much of the campaign. Plutarch relates the Athenians' harrowing retreat from Syracuse, which I always find difficult to read about because it's so sad, like when the soldiers are dying from thirst and drinking at a river as they are being slaughtered by the Syracusans.

Alcibiades - "The people’s feelings towards him have been very aptly expressed by Aristophanes in the line: They long for him, they hate him, they cannot do without him..." The most interesting of these Lives. In his youth he and Socrates were extremely close - they may have been lovers, and Socrates saved his life in 2 battles. However, even Socrates' mentorship could not ameliorate Alcibiades' strong spirit - "he went to a schoolmaster and asked him for a volume of Homer. When the teacher said that he had none of Homer’s works, Alcibiades struck him with his fist and went off." He randomly punched a man on a dare - then won the man over by exposing himself for punishment. Later the man married his daughter to him. She later tried to divorce him due to his many affairs, but as she was going to court he "seized her and carried her home." Alcibiades cut of his dog's tail, offending many Athenians. He said, "That is exactly what I wanted. I am quite content for the whole of Athens to chatter about this; it will stop them saying anything worse about me." Through clever treachery he turned Argos, Elis, and Mantinea against Sparta and caused Sparta great trouble. He instigated the Sicilian Expedition but was recalled to face trial for a conspiracy - he fled to Sparta and did great damage to Athens by convincing the Spartans to send Gylippus to Syracuse and to invade Attica. Though he was a hedonist in Athens, in Sparta he conformed perfectly with their austerity. However, he seduced King Agis's wife, fathered a child by her, and fled to Persia where he gained great favor. But Athens was in such bad shape that he went over to Athens, although he instigated an oligarchic coup. His soldiers at Samos wanted to return to Athens to restore democracy, but he convinced them to continue their campaign and led them on brilliant victories. At the Battle of Cyzicus he destroyed the Spartan fleet, leading to the famous laconic message "Ships lost: Mindarus dead: men starving: do not know what to do." However, he eventually had a failure, and fearing the Athenians he fled to the Chersonese and later to Phrygia where he was killed. From Athens to Sparta to Persia to Athens to exile, Alcibiades left a trail of feats, successes, and failures behind him.

Lysander - the Spartan commander who defeated Athens as Aegospotami and established Spartan-backed oligarchies in the Greek cities. He was basically a nasty, oath-breaking dictator (according to Plutarch) who apparently also made an elaborate plot to open the Spartan kingship to all Spartans but died before he could carry it out.

[Gregg Wingo · Rating 5 out of 5]

The nature of the polis has been floating around my head of late. The clear decline of American democracy has been chronicled from the Classical perspective by the late Senator Robert C. Byrd in his "The Senate of the Roman Republic: Addresses on the History of Roman Constitutionalism". It is a look at the failure of republicanism from a distance of 2000 years. This excerpt from Plutarch's "Parallel Lives" covers the rise and fall of not just the Athenian Empire but Athenian democracy from Plutarch's perspective of 400 years.

Covering the lives, intrigues, and machinations of eight Athenians and one Spartan it follows the heights of honor and patriotism, and the lows of avarice and traitorous behavior. As one reads the work one realize that the capacity of brilliance and darkness is a commonality of the human experience. While the Ancients are alien to us, they are also still lurking within for better and worst. As Plutarch envisioned in his original historiography these individuals are meant to provide a moral lesson on the nature of the body politic.

It is as applicable today as it was 2000 years ago. As we regard the antics and corruption of our democracy at all levels we see the same repugnant behaviors and greed acting as a disintegrating process including wars, recessions, trading and military alliances, and irrational partisanship. Hopefully, through the positive insights we can find a way to redeem our politics and our nation.

[Paul Haspel · Rating 5 out of 5]

The rise and fall of the Athenian empire, in the estimation of the biographer Plutarch, had everything to do with the good and bad decisions made by nine powerful Greeks. And the biographies of Theseus, Solon, Themistocles, Aristides, Cimon, Pericles, Nicias, Alcibiades, and Lysander that are brought together for this Penguin Books volume tell quite effectively the story of how Athens first gained great-power status, and then lost it.

A word, first, about who Plutarch was and how he came to write his biographies, as the way these nine biographies are presented to us by translator and editor Ian Scott-Kilvert is not the way Plutarch’s original readers would have encountered them. When Plutarch, a Greco-Roman historian of the 1st and 2nd centuries A.D., first set down his histories, he did so in the form of Parallel Lives – 23 pairings of an eminent Greek and a comparably famous Roman, with two biographical essays followed by an evaluative comparison of both individuals. Thus, Alexander and Caesar are compared and contrasted as conquering generals, Demosthenes and Cicero as noted orators, and so on. In practice, many modern scholars presenting Plutarch’s Parallel Lives to a contemporary audience have reorganized the biographies around a particular period of history or thematic framework, as Scott-Kilvert does here.

Taken in those terms, The Rise and Fall of Athens works well as a concise history of Athens. Theseus, the legendary founder of Athens, is of course more a mythological than an historical figure, and therefore it is no surprise to find Plutarch grappling with a variety of accounts of Theseus’ life and deeds, and considering his sources, as when he looks at the variety of unfavourable Athenian depictions of King Minos of Crete and states “how dangerous it is to incur the hatred of a city which is the mistress of eloquence and poetry” (p. 23).

Plutarch is on firmer historical ground, and seems more comfortable, when considering the career of Solon, the Athenian lawgiver who worked to reform the once-Draconian legal code of Athens. It is Plutarch who gives us the famous story of the fabulously wealthy king Croesus of Lydia hosting Solon and asking, “Am I not the most fortunate of men?” Solon’s cautious reply: “The future bears down upon each one of us with all the hazards of the unknown, and we can only count a man happy when the gods have granted him good fortune to the end” (p. 71). Croesus dismisses Solon as a fool – until he is defeated in battle by Cyrus of Persia, and placed on a funeral pyre to be burned alive, at which point he understands the wisdom of Solon’s words and cries out the lawgiver’s name.

Themistocles, the general and politician who advocated a strong Athenian navy, and who led that navy to victory over the Persians at the decisive battle of Salamis in 480 B.C., was, in Plutarch’s reading, as controversial as he was ambitious. In pushing naval tactics on a city-state whose people had always preferred a straight fight on land, “He turned [the Athenians], to use Plato’s phrase, from steadfast hoplites into sea-tossed mariners, and he earned for himself the charge that he had deprived the Athenians of the spear and the shield and degraded them to the rowing bench and the oar” (p. 81).

Plutarch’s tone becomes more unambiguously laudatory when he examines the life and career of the statesman Aristides, whose concern for the welfare of Athens’ ordinary people earned him the epithet “Aristides the Just.” In his praise for Aristides, Plutarch offers an insight to the values that no doubt motivated the writing of the Parallel Lives generally – his beliefs regarding what truly makes a life great:

“Of all Aristides’ virtues it was his justice which most impressed itself on the masses….For this reason, although he was poor and had no standing but that of a popular leader, he won that most royal and godlike title of The Just. That is an epithet which was never sought after by kings or tyrants: some of them delighted in being styled The Besieger of Cities, the Thunderbolt, or the Conqueror, and others The Eagle or The Hawk, but all of them, apparently, preferred a renown which was founded on power or violence rather than on virtue. And yet the divine nature, with which these men strive to be associated and to resemble, is believed to be distinguished by three superior attributes, immortality, power, and virtue, and of these the noblest and most truly divine is virtue.” (pp. 115-16)

Cimon (510-450 B.C.), like Solon and Aristides, is praised by Plutarch for his moderation; Plutarch places Cimon, a successful general who defeated Persian forces in a number of crucial battles, among those “moderate statesmen who succeeded better than any others in giving their countries a breathing space in which to recover from the violence of party strife, though each of them set up trophies and won resounding victories” (p. 143).

Pericles (495-429 B.C.), the wise and eloquent leader who provided the Athenians with steady leadership during the early years of the Peloponnesian War, receives comparably high praise from Plutarch: “Pericles deserves our admiration…not only for the sense of justice and the serene temper that he preserved amid the many crises and intense personal hatreds which surrounded him, but also for his greatness of spirit….[A] character so gracious and a life so pure and incorrupt in the exercise of sovereign power might well be called Olympian” (p. 205).

But things turned much less Olympian for the Athenians with the next leaders whose lives and careers are analyzed by Plutarch. Nicias emerges as a deeply religious and reverent man whose career was dogged by ill-fortune; when the Athenians, hoping to break the years-old Peloponnesian stalemate by opening a new front, made the questionable decision to invade the Sicilian city-state of Syracuse, Nicias was given the command of an expedition that he had strongly opposed. Accordingly, Nicias had the unhappy distinction of presiding over Athens’ most decisive and ignominious defeat. “What perhaps moved [Nicias’] men the most,” Plutarch writes, “was not merely the sight of his distress, but the memory of the speeches and the warnings whereby he had done everything in his power to dissuade the Athenian people from the whole venture, and as they recalled these, they felt that his misfortunes were the least deserved of all” (p. 240).

When it comes to Alcibiades, I am struck by this particular passage of characterization: “Alcibiades possessed, we are told, one special gift which surpassed all the rest and served to attach men to him, namely that he could assimilate and adapt himself to the pursuits and the manner of living of others and submit himself to more startling transformations than a chameleon. Even the chameleon cannot take on the colour of white, but Alcibiades was able to associate with good and bad alike, and never found a characteristic which he could not imitate or practise” (p. 267). It is an apt descriptor, as the wily Alcibiades was quite the political chameleon; at various times times during the Peloponnesian War, he aligned himself with (a) his Athenian homeland, (b) the Spartan enemy, and (c) agents of the Persian Empire that was watching the long war while hoping to advance its own interests in the region. With leadership like that of Alcibiades, the original “triple agent,” is it any wonder that, by his time, Athens was on the decline and headed toward defeat?

And the last of the Nine Greek Lives included in this volume is the only one that is not an Athenian life: Lysander, the Spartan admiral who finally forced the Athenians to surrender in 404 B.C., ending the then 27-year-old Peloponnesian War. Plutarch acknowledges Lysander’s importance as the Spartan leader who was in at the kill, but one senses the disapproval with which Plutarch writes that Lysander “did not believe truth in itself to be any better than falsehood, but valued each of them according to the needs of the moment. He laughed at those who insisted that the descendants of Heracles should not stoop to trickery in warfare and remarked, ‘Where the lion’s skin will not reach, we must patch it out with the fox’” (p. 293).

Scott-Kilvert’s introduction and notes are informative, and his translation captures the workmanlike if stylistically uninspiring quality of Plutarch’s prose style. For Plutarch, as for Aristotle before him, character is action and action is character: a person is what a person does. For Plutarch, an individual life is to be revered to the extent to which a person pursued virtue; too many leaders waste their time pursuing immortality, “to which no flesh can attain”, or power, “which remains for the most part in the hands of fortune”, when they could be working to achieve virtue, “the only divine excellence of which we are capable” (p. 116).

The Rise and Fall of Athens is helpful as history, and is even more useful in terms of its own insights regarding how Plutarch, and the Greco-Roman world of which he was a part, judged human action and evaluated its consequences.

[Linniegayl · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed the introductions and comments by Scott-Kilvert in the volume I read. Plutarch is definitely entertaining, but I have a lot of problems with the characters combined in this volume. Theseus is a mythological character. Virtually nothing is really known about Solon. Aristides appears only briefly in other historical accounts, and apparently Plutarch bases much of his “biography” on mentions of his character by Plato, while numerous events included by Plutarch are termed “unhistorical” (by Scott-Kilvert). Finally, I’m a bit puzzled that Lysander, the Spartan military leader who destroyed the Athenian fleet, is the last “Life” in the book. I really expected another Athenian. But, I guess Lysander greatly contributed to the “fall” of Athens, so his addition may make sense.

As always, with Plutarch and the actual historical characters, I’m left wondering how much is real, and how much is imagination. Still, parts of this were very entertaining. If nothing else, the life of Alcibiades is definitely worth a read; he intrigues me like no other character in Greek history.

[The Smol Moth · Rating 4 out of 5]

Yeah I'm cheating because I haven't read this all the way through, I think there were one or two that I skipped, but I can do what I want. Solon, Alcibiades, and Themistocles were my favorite biographies in this. Especially Themistocles, he was a tricky old bastard and I loved it. Anyway, I'm happy I read (most of) this for high school!

Edit: I...apparently confused Thucydides and Themistocles' names, so thank you to anyone who saw the earlier review and didn't make fun of me lmao

[Zardoz · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good companion read to Thucydides's Peloponnesian War. Not as detailed, but each life can be read almost like a collection of short stories.
Very striking similarities between Athens and America. Showing how democracies can be empires that overreach.

[Davvybrookbook · Rating 5 out of 5]

Plutarch’s Parallel Lives is quite the accomplishment. This volume tells a history of democratic Athens through the lens of nine Greek biographies. The Rise and Fall of Athens: Nine Greek Lives reveals names that feel familiar (Theseus, Solon, Themistocles, Pericles) and others that we really ought to know (Aristides, Cimon, Nicius, Alcibiades, Lysander). While Plutarch’s conceit is to compare Greek and Roman leaders, the threads also tie together Themistocles and Aristides, Cimon and Pericles, Nicias and Alcibiades make this a compelling read. It is his way to link, connect, compare, and interpret the character and actions these men engage, accept, and forge. They appear as great men who guide their societies in both good and bad ways, some conservatively and some with bold dating. For the most part, there are a few just and good men to compare with others who may have excessive desire for wealth or glory.

Personally this has been a masterful education of a history I am peripherally familiar with through an intimacy of living in Athens as a child with a father who majored in ancient Greek. My readings of The Iliad and The Odyssey in high school, and this year working through 20 of the 31 extant Athenian tragedies, I am beginning to read through all the ancient classics I can get my hands on. The comedians Menander and Aristophanes will be continuations of the tragedians. Another history, the narrative adventures of Xenophon’s Anabasis, or March Up Country is surprise chronological (370 B.C) followup to Plutarch’s Athenian biographies (560-400 B.C.). And then perhaps following Xenophon up with Plutarch’s The Age of Alexander (330 B.C.). At some point too I would like to tackle all of Plato’s dramatic dialogues. I wish there were one collected translation of them all, though I have never seen one. Such a rich period.

What is so surprising of this work is it begins with the mythological Theseus, the founder of Athens, date unknown. The next biography is of Solon, who influenced Athens around 560 B.C. and fundamentally changed the Draconian system of capital punishment for all crimes; Draco it seems was also an Athenian legislator circa 620 B.C. Basically, Solon is significant for repelling excessive punishment for minor crimes.

Then there are the Persian War heroes: Themistocles, Aristides, and Cimon. My favorite leaders I think were Aristides and Cimon. Their real political savvy and military maneuvering led Athens through a critical period. Aristides and Cimon seemed to have a more moderate, diplomatic, and viewed as pro-Spartan when in fact he might more surely be considered pan-Hellenic in the face of a common enemy.

3. So when I considered whom I should compare to Lucullus, I concluded that it must be Cimon. Both of them were men of war, and both gained brilliant successes against the barbarians. Yet they were also moderate statesmen who succeeded better than any others in giving their countries a breathing space in which to recover from the violence of party strife, though each of them set up trophies and won resounding victories. Leaving aside the legends of Heracles, or Dionysus, or Jason, or those exploits of Perseus against the Ethiopians, the Medes, and the Armenians of which any credible record has come down to us, we may say that no Greek before Cimon and no Roman before Lucullus ever carried his wars into such distant lands. On the other hand in both men's campaigns the element of finality was lacking. Each of them crushed his opponent without finishing him off.

In the end, the Peloponnesian War leaders of Athens: Pericles, Nicias, and Alcibiades. Among the three, it is Alcibiades that surprises and interests. From his beauty and rhetoric to sleeping with Socrates, from winning the Peloponnesian War to flipping sides as he was exiled, Alcibiades is a man who could do it all. Athens last great general before the Spartan Lysander was able solidify the Athenian surrender and the destruction of their long walls to the sea. If only Athenian political divisions hadn’t turned on Alcibiades…

[Hanna (lapetiteboleyn) · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a grouping of tales from Plutarch's Lives- this one works well, narrating a relatively short span of time in the history of Athens before (and during, and slightly after) the Spartan siege. There's a lot of detail to soft through, some that feels superfluous, but all of which adds to the broader picture that is painted of a lost world.

[Manuel Del Río Rodríguez · Rating 5 out of 5]

*Big Books from Antiquity, Anyone?*

The sands of time — and the negligence of men — have robbed us of countless masterworks from ancient Greek literature. Much of what does remain survives only as mutilated fragments or in shorter, less ambitious pieces. Yet a few monumental works slipped through the cracks, and for that we owe endless gratitude to the amanuenses (literally, “hand-servants”) who toiled for centuries to keep these texts alive until the age of print and easy reproducibility. Among the survivors we count Herodotus’ Histories, Strabo’s Geographica, Athenaeus’ Deipnosophistae, and Diodorus Siculus’ Bibliotheca historica. In the same league stands Plutarch of Chaeronea’s Parallel Lives (1st–2nd c. CE), an enormous collection amounting to some 230,000–250,000 words.

Wordiness, however, can be a mixed blessing. In Plutarch’s case, the sheer scale of the Lives has left us without a truly modern, complete translation of this great work, despite its historical, aesthetic, and intellectual importance. The standard remains the bilingual Loeb edition, translated by Bernadotte Perrin between 1914 and 1926 in eleven volumes. More recently, Penguin has issued a patchwork of around fifty biographies, serviceable but marred by flimsy spines, dull paper, and an awkward thematic arrangement. Oxford World’s Classics, with Robin Waterfield as translator, has begun to tackle the Lives afresh, though only in selected volumes so far. Until a proper modern edition arrives, we must make do with what we have, though, and for today, that means The Rise and Fall of Athens: Nine Greek Lives, translated by John Marincola and Ian Scott-Kilvert.

*But back to Plutarch: who was he?*

A Greek, of course, born into a well-to-do family in Chaeronea, near Thebes — but also a Roman citizen, living in the early Empire (late first to early second century CE), mostly under the Antonines. He studied at the Platonic Academy, moved in the circles of prominent Roman nobles, and held various posts: magistrate of his hometown, priest at Delphi, organizer of the Pythian games, and, late in life, honorary procurator of Achaea. As an intellectual, he wrote widely in many genres, though much is lost; his most enduring work, without question, is the Parallel Lives.

Horace captured the cultural paradox of Plutarch’s world in a line the Greeks often quoted to console themselves for their political impotence under Rome: Graecia capta ferum victorem cepit et artes intulit agresti Latio — “Captured Greece took her savage conqueror captive, and brought the arts into rustic Latium.” The phrase was not just clever but true: the Roman Empire became the universal Hellenistic state that Alexander had failed to build, drinking down Greek culture — its art, writings, philosophy, and language (which every cultivated Roman spoke) — to the very dregs, while buttressing it with Latin pragmatism in military skill, statesmanship, engineering, and law.

Like many of his contemporaries, Plutarch found solace in this synthesis and took it as the basis for an ambitious project: a massive set of biographies that paired a famous Greek with a Roman counterpart, symbolically cementing the bond between captive Greece and rustic Latium. Yet the project was also deeply colored by Plutarch’s moralism. Here he followed not Greece but Rome — more precisely Cicero and his dictum Historia vero testis temporum, lux veritatis, vita memoriae, magistra vitae, nuntia vetustatis. For Plutarch, too, history justified itself above all as a source of ethical instruction: a treasury of examples to emulate and of rotten apples to avoid.

And Plutarch relishes the role of moralist. He loves to draw connections between outward appearance and inner character, and while he is generally an engaging writer, the result can be preachy, over-simplified, and overly focused on anecdote and trivia. Still, the Parallel Lives are not only a historical record but an exploration of human nature. In this they recall Theophrastus, Aristotle’s successor at the Lyceum, who composed his little book Characters (Χαρακτῆρες) with sketches of the different personality types, intending to expose vices and offer moral instruction.

*The current volume*

The Rise and Fall of Athens presents us with the biographies of nine Greeks: eight are Athenians and the last one is Spartan. The biographies have been chosen to act as a min-history of sorts of Athens, from its mythical founding to its 5th century glory, democratic constitution and defeat and fall in the Peloponnesian War, the Greek world’s equivalent to our First and Second World Wars. Except for the first two biographies, the timespan for this history is little more then a century: from the battle of Marathon, in 490 BCE, to the capitulation of Athens and the demolition of its Long Walls to the tune of flute-playing in 404 BCE. The nine biographies are as follows:

Theseus: the legendary king of Athens, second Herakles, famed slayer of the Minotaur and alleged founder of the city’s institutions (including quasi-democracy and putting an end to kingship).

Solon: the early 6th-century BCE lawgiver and poet who enacted reforms to ease debt, broaden participation in politics, and lay foundations for later Athenian democracy.

Themistocles: one of the first ‘leaders of the popular party’, architect of Athens’ naval power and mastermind of the victory at Salamis (480 BCE) against Persia; later ostracized and died in exile.

Aristides: known as “the Just”, rival of Themistocles and head of the aristocratic party; respected for fairness in managing the Delian League’s finances and a model of incorruptible public service.

Cimon: Son of Miltiades (the commander at Marathon), a general who expanded Athenian power after the Persian Wars, securing victories against Persia but politically aligned with Sparta.

Pericles: the preeminent statesman of Athens’ Golden Age; champion of democracy, sponsor of the Parthenon, and leader during the early Peloponnesian War.

Nicias: a wealthy, superstitious and overcautious Athenian general and head of the aristocratic party; negotiated the Peace of Nicias (421 BCE); disastrously led the Sicilian Expedition, where he was captured and executed.

Alcibiades: the most brilliant but also the most reckless Athenian politician and general of the period; shifted allegiances between Athens, Sparta, and Persia; becomes a symbol of charisma undone by ambition.

Lysander: Spartan admiral who defeated Athens at Aegospotami (405 BCE), ending the Peloponnesian War; not personally greedy but quite amoral and pusher for ruthless Spartan hegemony; killed in the Corinthian War at Haliartus (395 BCE).

As mentioned, the biographies overlap, weaving together a tapestry of Athenian history: the glory of the Persian Wars, the rise of empire, the consolidation of democracy, and the long struggle with Sparta for mastery over Greece. The stories are eminently readable, full of narrative charm and anecdote. Plutarch does make a genuine effort at accuracy, citing many sources now lost (Theopompus, Ephorus, and others), but his method places him closer to Herodotus — with their shared taste for hearsay and dubious detail — than to Thucydides’ rigorous analysis.

His biases do come through, though usually muted. He tends toward a moderate, gently pro-aristocratic outlook, presenting democracy and the popular party in a more skeptical light, while often casting aristocratic figures as the more trustworthy side. His philosophical and religious views, too, reveal a spirit of moderation and balance: he still respects oracles and traditional religion, yet also credits naturalistic explanations of fate and phenomena that first emerged, controversially, in fifth-century Athens. In a manner almost Averroean, he sees faith and reason not as enemies but as complementary, and he offers reflections in this vein throughout.

The book remains a highly entertaining read. It refreshes one’s memory of the historical foundations of our civilization while also prompting reflection on the limits of the sources that have reached us. We may still be waiting for a fresh, complete modern translation of the Parallel Lives, but this volume offers a fine appetizer.

[Cameron · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fascinating biographies of great Athenian men from early and late classical Greece. The nine men profiled in this book are aggregated from Plutarch's seminal Lives, a series of alternating Greek and Roman biographies. Through these individuals, Plutarch traces the entire history of Athens in the classical period through the founding of the city to its eventual capture and defeat by the Spartans. The level of detail available to Plutarch on his subjects and their time is nothing short of astonishing. Highly recommended read, particularly to anyone with an interest in antiquity.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

The story of Athens as told through its great leaders, from Theseus to Lysander.

[Eric · Rating 2 out of 5]

Interesting but hard to get through.

[mel. ♡ · Rating 4 out of 5]

4 STARS ✨
𝒓𝒆𝒂𝒅 𝒇𝒐𝒓 𝒎𝒚 𝒅𝒆𝒈𝒓𝒆𝒆.

[Solomon Bloch · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting. Aristedes and Themistocles feud is one of the ages (not for the ages, but of the ages). Bit of tough reading had to fight myself putting it down often.

[Emilio · Rating 5 out of 5]

I had the shame of reading penguin classic’s edition, the editors butchered this masterpiece… (°_°). Hands down best Roman historian

[Andrew · Rating 3 out of 5]

It would be a little bit silly to try and write or review the biographies of Plutarch as translated in this Penguin edition, because this book embodies some of the most well-known and critically discussed writing to have survived from ancient Graeco-Roman civilisation. To try and make any more informed or revolutionary critical statements about how good Plutarch's lives are would be futile in that context. So, what I will do here is briefly discuss reasons why I enjoyed this particular book.

The first thing that attracted me to reading this translation of Plutarch is that each one of the lives in this edition follow a historical narrative that has a chronological and thematic unity. This is a book that does exactly what it describes in its title, tracking the rise and fall of the city state that was Athens. Plutarch, via Scott-Kilvert's translation, maps the story of one of the most famous ancient cities known to us through engaging biographies that each develop arguments relating to how individuals and ideas shape society, culture, politics, history. Putting aside the historiography, with all the relevant challenges and non-modern constructs, Plutarch's lives in this book all illuminate the complexity of how a state and its individual members interact, nominally for the benefit of each party.

Another aspect of this edition (and I suspect others in this Penguin series) that I enjoyed is the references to other ancient authors in Plutarch's text. Of course the likes of Plato, Thucydides, Aristophanes are well known and have survived in such an extant form that we don't need to rely on Plutarch to give us an idea of how these writers composed their works, and to what end. On the other hand, the quotations of lost or badly fragmented texts from authors such as Ephorus, Cratinus, Ion and Solon (the last the subject of one of these biographies) is fascinating and informative. Plutarch may not have followed the critical skills when citing sources for his Lives as one would expect from a biographer today, however his compilation of literary evidence is rewarding as an indication of what has been lost in the last two Millenia.

Of course it needs to be said that when one reads these biographies, one is also coming into contact with the kind of stories that have defined how one views the ancient Greeks for centuries. The tragedy of Nicias and the Athenian expedition to Sicily, the wisdom of Solon, the cunning political pragmatism of Themistocles and of Alciabades, these are all here, just as they have been for generations. There are dozens of rattling good and famous yarns embedded in Plutarch's work that bear reading again.

In conclusion, this is a very readable and enjoyable classics text in translation that sheds plenty of light on Plutarch the biographer, and of course those ancient personalities he writes about.. For anyone interested in Ancient Greece this book is a must read.

[Tom · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you're confused with Plato's writing, don't be discouraged to read this book. Plutarch's writing is positively accessible and enjoyable, although he might not be the most unbiased historian.

The Rise and Fall of Athens unveils the story of nine influential people in Athens between the 5th to 4th century. Most of them were involved in the Persian Invasion and Peloponnesian War (Athens vs. Sparta).

Here are the nines and their chronological episodes:
1. Theseus (mythical founder of Athens)
2. Solon (ancient lawmaker)
3 & 4. Themistocles and Aristides (Persian Invasion)
5. Cimon (the closing of Persian Invasion)
6. Pericles (created the "Athenian empire", his power provoked the war against Sparta)
7. Nicias (statesman during Peloponnesian War)
8. Alchibides (a young statesman during Peloponnesian war)
9. Lysander (Spartan general who conquered Athens)

Plutarch kept his focus to the nines, so he didn't go into the details of the wars which lasted for years, and we wouldn't find that "This Is Sparta" moment from that ignoble film. Nonetheless, he wrote some interesting anecdotes about the culture, politics, and science in the Ancient Greek. Read this and you will understand why Greek was said to be the birthplace of Western Civilization.

Ancient figures such as Anaxagoras, Euripides, Socrates, and Plato also made some appearances. And here are my most and least favorites from the nines:

1. Pericles
Some of his decisions might be controversial, but he did make Athens great and pave the way for its ancient glory.
2. Aristides
A wise statesman. The antithesis of Themistocles.
3. Nicias
A statesman known for his very cautious personality, sometimes too cautious. His hallmark was his great effort to end the war with Sparta.
4. Themistocles
A very controversial figure, but somehow his bold, almost unreal journey was entertaining. His story would remind you of a certain former president.
5. Solon
He was probably of the earliest pioneers of representative democracy in Greece. A great political scientist, but some of his "moralistic" laws were baffling.

Next:

6. Theseus
If Rome had Remus, Athens had Theseus. His story against "Minotaur" is quiet interesting. Plutarch offered a realistic version of that story.
7. Cimon
Known as an amiable general, quite effective, but I didn't find his story too engaging.

Now for the worse:

8. Lysander
A pragmatist general/politician from Sparta. The sort of person who would break an oath.
9. Alcibiades
The grace who was disgraced. Simply the worst. He was known for his handsomeness and amazing social skills, yet he used them for his vain purposes. Later, he did some great feats to save Athens, but in my view his petty jealousy and treachery led to the devastation of Athens. Who would expect a disciple of Socrates could become like that?

[James Carrigy]

At the risk of sounding psychotic...

In the introduction to this, the first volume of Penguin Classic's seven-part edition of Plutarch's Parallel Lives, John Marincola states that in previous editions, "not much attention" was paid to the comparative approach of Plutarch, who paired his biographies of Greek and Roman historical figures with a respective introduction and conclusion. So, as a result, the first Penguin Classics of Plutarch's Parallel Lives were arranged on the basis of region/city, and seperatng each lif from its subsequent pair.

Absolute clownery.

Marincola goes on to state the "unsatisfactory" nature of this approach, and how Penguin were debating whether or not to "respect Plutarch's own authorial intentions" in new editions.

They didn't.

This was decided on the supposed basis of practicality, quote:

"Many, perhaps most, readers of Plutarch will be reading him to see what he has to say about a
particular period, and will wish to compare his treatment of the major players to see
how the different parts of his historical jigsaw fit together. If one kept the pairings, that
would inevitably mean buying several different volumes of the series; and if, say, one
organized those volumes by the Greek partner (so that, for instance, Pericles–Fabius
Maximus, Nicias–Crassus and Coriolanus–Alcibiades made one volume), anyone
primarily interested in the Roman Lives of the late Republic would probably need to
buy the whole set. That is no way to guarantee these finely crafted works of art the wide
reading that they deserve."

I personally, do not concur.

Needless to say, this entire endeavour was doomed for me from the start. There's no way I feel I can offer up a satisfactory rating when the project is so far removed from the approach/structure of Plutrach for the flimsiest of commercial reasons. I'll hopefully get around to reading the Loeb Classical Library editions, but for now, all I can do is disregard these with the air of academic/literary disdain they deserve.

[Steven H · Rating 5 out of 5]

"NINE GREEK LIVES" BY PLUTARCH

Plutarch (46-120 CE) was a Greek historian, biographer, essayist, and Platonist. This book contains nine of the "Greek Lives" that Plutarch wrote: covering Theseus; Solon; themistocles; Aristides; Cimon; Pericles; Nicias; Alcibiades; and Lysander.

He observed, "That age, it seems, produced a race of men who, for sheer strength of arm and swiftness of foot, were indefatigable and far surpassed the human scale, but who did not apply these gifts of nature to any just or useful purpose. Instead they exulted in an overbearing insolence and took advantage of their strength to behave with savage inhumanity..." (Pg. 17)

He asserts, "men long for immortality... and for power... while they give virtue, the only divine excellence of which we are capable, the last place in their scheme of values. But here they show themselves fools, since a life that is spent in the midst of power and great fortune and authority still needs justice to make it divine, for injustice renders it merely brutish." (Pg. 116)

Of Pericles' works, he says, "Each one possessed a beauty which seemed venerable the moment it was born, and at the same time a youthful vigour which makes them appear to this day as if they were newly built. A bloom of eternal freshness makes them appear to this day as if they were newly built. A bloom of eternal freshness hovers over these works of his and preserves them from the touch of time..." (Pg. 179) He adds, "Pericles deserves our admiration, then, not only for the sense of justice and the serene temper that he preserved amid the many crises and intense personal hatreds which surrounded him, but also for his greatness of spirit." (Pg. 205)

Plutarch's works are essential parts of any library of ancient history.

[James Horgan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Plutarch is always an enjoyable read and, here, nine Greek lives covering the glory and ruin of Athens are recounted. In doing so Plutarch lays bare the wisdom and folly of Athenian democracy.

Big figures strut the political stage, seeking personal renown, convinced they know best. Some live frugally, others are rapacious, but all depend on the whims and foibles of the Athenian populace. As Athens waxed in power after the repulse of the Persians, the city swapped the military service due by its allies for tribute, supposedly the maintain a defensive naval capacity but the city's adornments grew suspiciously sumptuous, leading to revolts aided and abetted by the Spartans.

A long war followed and wars are rarely successfully prosecuted where the selection and recall of a general is by popular vote. Whipped up with nationalistic pride to launch a massive expedition to capture Sicily by Alcibiades, the project was doomed by mismatched leadership alongside cautious Nicias. Alcibiades was then sentenced to death in absentia, recalled when the city was in dire straits, fled again and ended his days with with the Persians being assassinated by a rival. His career may be extreme but it was not untypical.

Personalities, politics, grandiose foreign invasions, democratic divisions...Plutarch gives shows us there is nothing new under the Sun.

[Marc · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kicking myself taking so long to get to this one.

The numerous anecdotes are fascinating. There is an observation how a person who speaks well and looks good was judged to be lazy or stupid when things didn't go well later in his life when the reality was more complex. Another instance talks of a leader chastising people for focusing so much on their pet animals at the expense of concern for the welfare for fellow humans. These examples illustrate patterns common in most Western societies, it's enlightening to finally have a glimpse of their origin.

These nine short biographies set out what any good biography should do. There is a clear timeline of events and how the individual's decisions were shaped by the micro and macro forces of their time. These were all public individuals famous in their time so there is a careful look at how each responded to duties and opportunities that shaped Athens. Evidence is presented objectively and author always attempts to examine the validity of any claim that is not well founded.

[Dawid Łaziński · Rating 5 out of 5]

This subset of Plutarch “Lives” deals with Athens and her most prominent statesmen and generals. You will find here all that can be expected of Plutarch: colourful characters, anecdotes and occasional digressions. To those beginning their journey with this great ancient biographer, keep in mind that the sources the author relied on had not always been the most reliable. He also had a propensity for extolling his protagonists. While vigorously praising their strengths he frequently misportrayed their blatant malefaction as mere expedience. Still, Plutarch remains a great read and a perfect supplement to any history study, breathing life into otherwise meaningless names and dates. Penguin edition, which I used and recommend, has useful footnotes to help readers keep track of time and alert them of any glaring historical discrepancies.

[ile · Rating 3 out of 5]

Crazy to see how some leaders who brought glory and victory to Athens, were quickly shamed, ostracized or even sentenced to death if they lost subsequent battles. Ostracism was a main tool used by a rival and tended to be successful. Found it surprising how easily a leader's allegiance would change when this happened. I was hoping Plutarch's writing would have been more captivating. I didn't find the characters to be that interesting or compelling. There were moments that grabbed my attention, but these were few and far between.

[Jonathan · Rating 3 out of 5]

despite being dry at times, it kept my interest overall, and has some great episodes and anecdotes throughout. I imagine something is lost by not reading the lives in their original pairs (Greek/Roman compare/contrast) but there's still plenty of lessons to be gleaned from each life, and Plutarch does a good job of expressing his views without over-editorializing.