Monarchy In Athens Essay

Monarchy: We’ve heard by monarchy a form of government with a monarch at the head. We mean by monarch, a king or queen that rules on the country. If I base my answer to the two states that we’ve studied so far from the Ancient Greek city-states, I would take the Sparta’s government as an example of a monarchy in some points because it has two kings that stood at the head of the state even though they were not the only power of the state. I can say that the Athens’ government was not a monarchy.

Aristocracy: According to the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, aristocracy means “...people in the highest social class, who traditionally have a lot of land, money, and power...” In this case, there were aristocrats in both societies. In the Paul Cartledge reading, it explains that there were

In the reading of this week, I have read and discorvered in the Wikipedia’ that some Athenians were tyrants like “...Peisistratos and his two sons, Hipparchus and Hippias...”

Oligarchy: In my research in the LDCE, I read that oligarchy means “...a small group of people who run a country or organization, or a country that is run by a small group of people...” In this case, the Spartan government is an example of it. In the Spartan society, there were people who “...envied the Spartan rejection of democracy as well as its noble military society in which the best people ruled by virtue of their strength and virility...” those people were called oligarchs. They were a few that has the power and the rules. I can’t say that the Athens’ government was an Oligarchy.

Democracy: The LDCE defines it as “...a system of government in which every citizen in the country can vote to elect its government officials...” that was the case of the Athenians’ government.