poor citizens, but nothing could be done to reduce the rivalry among the aristoi. As we saw in chapter 5,
this rivalry often resulted in the rise to power of a tyrant, and Athens was no different from many Greek
poleis in this regard. In 561 BC Peisistratus, a distant relative of Solon’s, seized power and made himself
tyrant of Athens. Although Peisistratus was driven out on more than one occasion by rival aristoi, he
repeatedly managed to return to power and he and, later, his son Hippias maintained the tyranny until 510
BC. Like most Greek tyrants, Peisistratus and Hippias sought support among “the people” in their
conflicts with rival aristoi. This support was encouraged, as we saw in chapter 5, by the tyrants’
promotion and expansion of popular festivals like the Panathenaea, which fostered a sense of community
among all residents of the polis. In this way, the influence of “the people,” which had been strengthened
by the reforms of Solon, was further increased under the tyranny. In addition, the period of the tyranny was
a time when expanding markets for Athenian pottery and olive oil (like the Panathenaic amphoras and
their contents) brought considerable prosperity to Athens, a prosperity that, as a result of Solon’s reforms,
gave a larger number of Athenians a greater stake in the government of the polis. The role of “the people”
was extended even further after the end of Hippias’ tyranny. The expulsion of Hippias, which was brought
about by an alliance between a prominent Athenian family and one of the kings of Sparta, opened Athens
up to still further rivalry among the aristoi who hoped to attain the kind of power that Hippias had
exercised. One of those rivals, a man named Cleisthenes, recognizing that the success of Peisistratus and
Hippias lay in the support they received from “the people,” courted and won popular support by
proposing, in 508 BC, a series of reforms that made Athens into a thoroughly radical democracy.

The Development of Democracy in Athens: Cleisthenes

We saw earlier that the new plan for the city of Miletus, following its destruction in 494 BC, created a
geometrically regular structure on an irregular terrain. The reforms of Cleisthenes imposed a similar
pattern, not on the land of Attica but on its citizen population. Following Cleisthenes’ reforms, the
fundamental division of the population was according to DEMES, a word whose basic meaning appears
to have been something like “divisions.” In the rural parts of Attica, the deme was a village or a town,
while in the urban area of Athens the deme corresponded to what we would call a “neighborhood.” There
were 140 of these demes, which Cleisthenes distributed into 30 newly created entities, called
TRITTYES, each consisting of a number of demes, from one or two large ones to about 10 smaller ones.
Ten of these trittyes were located in and near the city of Athens, 10 along the coast, and 10 in the inland
area away from the city. While the demes in each trittys were in many instances geographically
contiguous, that was not always the case, and in some instances 40 or more kilometers might separate two
demes belonging to the same trittys (map 11). The purpose of these trittyes seems to have been to arrange
Athens in such a way as to create divisions that could represent a cross-section of the population. For one
trittys from each of the three areas, city, coast, and inland, was combined into one of 10 newly created
tribes (figure 40). Previously, the population of Attica had been divided among four ancestral tribes, the
names of which are also found as the names of tribes in several Ionic poleis. The 10 new tribes were
named after legendary Athenian heroes and membership in them was hereditary, giving the impression that
all members of the tribe were descended from a common heroic ancestor. In fact, this new and arbitrary
arrangement represented a significant break with the past and had the (undoubtedly intended) effect of
reducing the influence of traditional family connections. What is perhaps most surprising is the ease with
which the Athenians appear to have been willing to adopt this new organization. Cleisthenes must have
counted on the readiness of the Athenians to reinvent their past, a readiness that, as we have seen, is
characteristic of the Greeks generally.