The birthplace of democracy and the cultural center of ancient Greece; also a naval empire, with most of its splendor and wealth resulting from maritime trade.
Classical Athens has always been regarded as the shining star of the ancient world, excelling in almost every field of human enterprise. By 600 B.C.E., Greek trade was flourishing, largely because of the establishment of permanent trading posts (emporia) in Egypt, the Levant, and Italy. It was during this time that Athens started to develop as a major commercial center. The distribution of the distinctive Athenian black-figure ware is the clearest indication of the growth of Athenian trade. In the period 560–520 B.C.E., Attic pottery reached most of the Aegean islands, Asia Minor, Cyprus, the Black Sea, Egypt, southern Italy, Sicily, and southern France. This does not mean, however, that Athenian merchants were totally responsible for carrying their city’s wares to all these parts of the Mediterranean world and the Black Sea. Others, such as the Phoenicians, for instance, were also active during this period, especially in the western Mediterranean.
After the Greek victory over the Persians at the beginning of the fifth century B.C.E., Athens found itself the leader of an alliance known as the Delian League. Gradually, however, the alliance transformed to an Athenian empire. Athens now controlled the Aegean Sea and hence the flow of goods, especially of grain. As to many other Greek states, grain was the most vital import for Athens, and therefore it was closely supervised. Other imported products that were heavily controlled were timber and metals, as both were connected with the manufacture of warships. Athens’s main exports consisted of olive oil and fine pottery, while wine seems to have played only a minor role as an export commodity. Athens certainly carried on a thriving trade in olive oil from as early as the seventh century, although it was in the fifth and fourth centuries that it played a major role in this field, with the Black Sea region being its most profitable market.
Athens’s main trading place was Piraeus with its three natural enclosed harbors: Mounichia, Zea, and Kantharos. The latter was the main mercantile port, while the other two were military harbors. It was at Piraeus that the establishment known as the Deigma had been set up by the city to enable foreign merchants to display samples of their goods. The Deigma, which literally means “sample,” was the heart of the Athenian port, to which, as Pericles said, the products of all the world came.
Athens’s naval supremacy came to end with its defeat by Sparta in 404, and with it came the loss of control of the main trade routes.
Ioannis Georganas
See also: Greek City-States.
Meijer, F., and O. Van Nijf. Trade, Transport and Society in the Ancient World: A Sourcebook. New York: Routledge, 1992.
Parkin, H., and C. Smith, eds. Trade, Traders and the Ancient City. New York: Routledge, 1998.
