Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin - August-Boeckh-Antikezentrum

Many 20th Century scholars would have answered this question in the negative. Rather than nice, it was thought appropriate to characterize the Greeks in general and the Athenians in particular by terms such as ‘vindictive’, ‘violent’, ‘feuding’, et cet. I will present evidence that the distinguishing features of the moral culture developed under Athenian democracy were rather different.