Athens began on a natural hill of white limestone rock about 7km from the sea. It was a good site and easy to defend. Today it is called the Acropolis, meaning highest city. But Athens outgrew its Acropolis and so new houses were built on the plain below and over time the hill was turned into a religious sanctuary, flattened off and great temples built on it, including the most famous building of Greek times, the Parthenon.

Rich Athens

Athens was the largest of the city-states in ancient Greece. It may have had a population as large as 300,000. (At this time the biggest city in Britain had just a few hundred people!)
Athens also controlled the fertile land around it, forming a region called Attica. Within the land of Attica there were also gold, silver and lead mines and marble quarries. This made Athens a very rich city. Because it was also close to the sea, it could trade these precious metals and rocks for the extra food it needed beyond what its own land could provide. The port for Athens was called Pireus.
Athens became so wealthy from trade and the spoils of wars it could spend large sums of money on paying the best artists and builders of the time.

Democracy

Athens was first run by kings, then by nobles, then by a single general called a tyrant.

In 510 BC the people tried a new experiment in running their city by giving its male citizens (but not women) the right to vote for their leaders. Any free man (citizen) could go to the assembly, where they could speak and vote freely. When there was disagreement, people held public debates.
Athens also developed new ways of dealing with criminals using public law courts and trials by juries of hundreds of people. The jurors voted by placing discs in one of two jars - one for guilty, one for not guilty.

Slaves

Like other cities, Athens was run on slave labour. A third of all people living in Athens were slaves. Some slaves were children of slaves, while the stock of slaves was added to by capturing people during wars.

Slaves were not necessarily the poorest and least educated of people. Although slaves did work in the mines and at rock breaking, and toiled in the fields, teachers and nurses, for example, might well be slaves. Even those who kept the peace (the Athens form of a police force, were made of slave archers from Scythia).

Festivals and leisure

The citizens of Athens had the time, the money and the imagination to do things other than work. There were yearly festivals to honour gods, for athletics competitions and a season of plays.

Rich citizens were happy to be asked to pay for the performers, just as companies and rich people might sponsor events today.