Socrates Athens Who was Socrates A citizen of

Socrates’ Athens

Who was Socrates? • A citizen of Athens • born 470 BCE to a stone mason & a midwife. • Full participant in life of the polis. • Inquired into the nature of “virtue”

Greece’s Golden Age: 5 th C BCE.

Athens was the cultural capital of the ancient world, known for achievements in art, science, literature, commerce and politics.

Age of Pericles • Pericles promoted democratic reforms • arts & culture • expanded Athens's power & prestige • fl. 438 BCE • d. 429 BCE

“Our government is called a democracy because it exists for the sake of the majority, not the few. The law guarantees all citizens equality with respect to their private interests and yet recognizes claims of individual excellence. ”

The Sophists • A group of traveling teachers for hire. • Known for teaching virtue, among other subjects, such as equestrian skills, “Man is the measure of public speaking, all things, of what is that math, science, etc. it is and of what is not that it is not. ” Protagoras

The Oracle at Delphi Know thy self Founded in 1400 BCE

• He spent time in the agora seeking a man wiser than he – among the politicians, the poets, the generals, the priests. – He questioned them on the nature of virtue or human excellence. – Plato recreates these conversations in his early Dialogues. – A group of mostly aristocratic young men followed him and imitated him.

Alcibiades • Brilliant, talented, beautiful • Follower of Socrates • Elected General of Athens • Betrayed Athens to Sparta

Jean-Léon Gérôme (1824 -1904) Socrates Seeking Alcibiades at the House of Aspasia, 1861,

Regnault. Socrates Dragging Alcibiades from the Embrace of Sensual Pleasure (1791, Paris, Musйe du Louvre)

Michele De Napoli "Death of Alcibiades" (1839)

War with Sparta • 431 -404 BCE • Athenian democracy was utterly defeated • Ended the “Golden Age of Athens”

Trial & Death of Socrates • Socrates was associated with the sophists & Alcibiades by his enemies. • He was charged with impiety and corruption of the youth And sentenced to death in 399 BCE

Socrates’ Legacy • Believed human excellence (virtue) was knowledge • Demanded we question ourselves and one another. • “Follow the argument. ”

“The unexamined life is not worth living. ”

The Skeptics The Hedonists Plato Aristippus The Cynics Antisthenes Aristotle Epicurus Diogenes The Stoics Zeno

“Which of us goes to the better is unclear to all but the gods. ”