Athena's City

Athens was the greatest city of ancient Greece and one of the most important cities in human history. Sacred to the goddess Athena, it was the birthplace of democracy, Western philosophy, theatre, and much of the art and architecture that defines Western civilization. At its height in the 5th century BC, Athens was a dazzling metropolis of marble temples, painted colonnades, and public spaces where citizens debated the great questions of existence.

According to myth, Athens received its name after a contest between Athena and Poseidon for patronage of the city. Poseidon struck the Acropolis with his trident and produced a saltwater spring. Athena planted an olive tree. The citizens — or, in some versions, the gods themselves — judged Athena's gift more useful, and the city was named in her honour. The olive tree became sacred to Athens, and olive oil became the foundation of the city's economy.

The Acropolis and Parthenon

The Acropolis — the great limestone outcrop rising 150 metres above the city — was the sacred heart of Athens. Atop it stood the Parthenon, the temple of Athena Parthenos (Athena the Virgin), completed in 432 BC. It is widely considered the most perfect building ever constructed. Inside stood a colossal statue of Athena made of gold and ivory by the sculptor Pheidias — one of the wonders of the ancient world. The Parthenon's perfect proportions, subtle optical corrections, and extraordinary sculptural programme represent the pinnacle of Greek architectural achievement.

Philosophy and Theatre

Athens gave the world Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle — three philosophers whose ideas form the bedrock of Western thought. In the Agora (marketplace), Socrates questioned citizens about the nature of justice, virtue, and knowledge. Plato founded his Academy nearby, and Aristotle studied there before founding his own school. Meanwhile, in the Theatre of Dionysus on the slopes of the Acropolis, playwrights like Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides invented dramatic tragedy, while Aristophanes created comedy. Nearly every myth we know was shaped, performed, and preserved in Athens.

Classical & Archaeological Sources

Historical and mythological accounts of Athens:

Cross-referenced with classical sources and modern archaeological research for accuracy.

Explore More

Athena · Poseidon · Delphi · Mount Olympus · Home

The Earth-Born Kings of Athens

Athenians liked to call themselves autochthonous, "sprung from the soil itself". Their myths gave that boast concrete form. The first king, Cecrops, was born from the earth and had a serpent's tail in place of legs. Apollodorus says he witnessed the contest between Athena and Poseidon, and in his version Cecrops' testimony that Athena had planted the olive first settled the matter. Other versions have the Twelve Gods judge the contest. Augustine, citing the Roman scholar Varro, tells a third version in which the citizens voted. The women outnumbered the men by one and chose Athena. To appease Poseidon's anger, the men took the vote away from women and ruled that children would no longer carry their mothers' names. For more on the rivalry, see Poseidon vs Athena.

The next great king, Erichthonius, had a strange birth. Hephaestus tried to force himself on Athena, and his seed fell on the earth, which bore a child. Athena hid the baby in a chest and gave it to the daughters of Cecrops, Aglauros, Herse and Pandrosos, telling them not to look inside. Two of them looked, saw a serpent coiled with or around the child, and threw themselves from the Acropolis. Euripides' Ion builds on this myth. His successor Erechtheus, whom some sources treat as the same figure, fought Eleusis and its Thracian ally Eumolpus. According to Euripides' lost Erechtheus, he sacrificed a daughter to win, and Poseidon then destroyed him. Later Athenian royal myths include the sisters Procne and Philomela, daughters of Pandion (told in Ovid's Metamorphoses Book 6), and Oreithyia, daughter of Erechtheus, whom the north wind Boreas carried off from the banks of the Ilissus. At the start of Plato's Phaedrus, Socrates and Phaedrus stroll past that very spot.

Theseus, the Areopagus and Mythic Law

Theseus became Athens' national hero over the course of the sixth and fifth centuries BC. Thucydides credits him with the synoikismos, the merger of the towns of Attica into one state centred on Athens. In 475 BC Cimon brought back from Skyros some huge bones said to be Theseus' and gave them a shrine in the city, the Theseion. Plutarch tells the story. The hill of the Areopagus had its own myths. Ares was said to have been tried there for killing Halirrhothius, a son of Poseidon. In Aeschylus' Eumenides, Athena sets up a jury there to try Orestes for matricide and casts the deciding vote for acquittal. The play presents the Athenian homicide court as a gift of the goddess.

Cult on the Acropolis: More Than the Parthenon

The Parthenon is the famous building, but the oldest and holiest image of Athena was elsewhere. It was an olive-wood statue of Athena Polias, "of the city", which Athenians believed had fallen from the sky, and it was housed in the temple known today as the Erechtheion. That building was also the home of the contest relics. Visitors were shown marks of Poseidon's trident in the rock and a well of salt water called the "sea of Erechtheus", while Athena's olive grew in the neighbouring Pandroseion. Herodotus reports that after the Persians burned the Acropolis in 480 BC, the stump of the olive sent up a new shoot within two days. A colossal bronze Athena Promachos by Pheidias stood in the open between the buildings. Pausanias says sailors approaching from Sounion could see the tip of her spear and the crest of her helmet. The small temple of Athena Nike guarded the entrance. The Parthenon's own sculpture told the city's myths. The east pediment showed the birth of Athena, and the west showed her contest with Poseidon.

The religious year was crowded. The Panathenaia honoured Athena every summer, and every fourth year it was held on a grand scale as the Great Panathenaia. A new woven peplos was carried to the goddess, and victors won amphorae of oil from the sacred olives. In the Arrephoria, young girls carried secret objects down from the Acropolis by night. That rite has often been linked to the myth of Cecrops' daughters. The City Dionysia, where tragedies premiered, honoured Dionysus Eleuthereus, and Athens also ran the Eleusinian Mysteries at Eleusis, west of the city.

Common Misconceptions

Pheidias' gold-and-ivory Athena Parthenos was a lavish dedication and partly a reserve of state treasure, since its gold plates could be removed. Many scholars doubt it was ever the focus of sacrifice in the way the olive-wood Polias was. The Parthenon itself had no great altar of its own. The contest of Athena and Poseidon is also not just a fable about naming. The Athenians kept Poseidon in their cult, and he shared space with Erechtheus in the Erechtheion, where some sources call him Poseidon Erechtheus.

Ancient sources

  • Apollodorus, Library 3.14–3.15 — Apollodorus covers Cecrops and the contest for Attica, the birth of Erichthonius, the daughters of Cecrops, and the reigns of Pandion and Erechtheus.
  • Pausanias, Description of Greece, Book 1 — Pausanias tours the Acropolis and lower city. He describes the trident marks, the sea of Erechtheus, the Promachos and the Parthenon pediments.
  • Herodotus, Histories 8.55 — Herodotus tells how the sacred olive put out a new shoot after the Persians burned the Acropolis.
  • Aeschylus, Eumenides — Athena founds the Areopagus court and Orestes is acquitted there.
  • Plutarch, Life of Theseus — Plutarch covers Theseus' unification of Attica and Cimon's return of his bones from Skyros.
  • Augustine, City of God 18.9 — Augustine preserves Varro's version in which the women of Athens voted for Athena and were later stripped of the vote.

Frequently asked questions

Who decided the contest between Athena and Poseidon?

Ancient sources disagree. Apollodorus and others name the Twelve Gods, with Cecrops as witness. Some versions make Cecrops the judge, and Varro's version has the citizens vote, with the women giving Athena her majority.

Can you still see Athena's olive tree on the Acropolis?

An olive tree grows today beside the Erechtheion, where the Pandroseion once stood. It is a modern replanting that marks the spot, not the ancient tree.

Was the Parthenon a temple to Athena?

Yes. It was dedicated to Athena Parthenos and housed Pheidias' gold-and-ivory statue. Athens' oldest cult image, however, was the olive-wood Athena Polias in the Erechtheion, and that statue received the peplos at the Panathenaia.

Who was the first king of Athens?

Most myths name Cecrops, the earth-born serpent-man. Some traditions place an earlier ruler, Actaeus, before him, and Cecrops is said to have married Actaeus' daughter Aglauros.

Books to read next

Links go to Bookshop.org, which supports independent bookstores. We earn a small commission if you buy, at no extra cost to you.