HISTORY 1M03 Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: Corinthian Helmet, Hoplite, Polis
7 Jan 2018
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Document Summary
States beginning to form throughout the greek world not by the centralization of political authority, with the population becoming the subjects of a king of palace, but by the people coming together as a community of citizens. The greek name for this new citizen-state was polis. These poleis took a long time to form. The landmark developments of the greek renaissance represent only the beginning of this process that took the entire archaic period, from 750-480 bce. The story of archaic greece is the story of the rise of the polis. At base, the polis was a society of citizen-farmers. What sets greece apart is that as society developed, the small farmer maintained his economic independence. He did not lose ownership of his land, becoming a tenant working land that now belonged to a landlord, and he did not lose control over his product, liable to pay labour dues or tithes to some overlord.
