Ancient Greece Timeline

  • Homer
    850 BCE

    Homer

    DescriptionHomer is the presumed author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, two epic poems that are the central works of ancient Greek literature.
  • First Olympic Games
    776 BCE

    First Olympic Games

    The ancient Olympics, held every four years, occurred during a religious festival honoring the Greek god Zeus.
  • Draco’s code of law
    620 BCE

    Draco’s code of law

    The Draconian law was created by king Draco for the Armenian people.
  • Rise of the Tyrants
    546 BCE

    Rise of the Tyrants

    Tyrant, Greek tyrannos, a cruel and oppressive ruler or, in ancient Greece, a ruler who seized power unconstitutionally or inherited such power. ... Thus, the opportunity arose for ambitious men to seize power in the name of the oppressed.
  • Democracy
    508 BCE

    Democracy

    DescriptionDemocracy is a form of government in which the people have the authority to choose their governing legislation.
  • First Persian War
    492 BCE

    First Persian War

    The first Persian invasion of Greece, during the Persian Wars, began in 492 BC, and ended with the decisive Athenian victory at the Battle of Marathon in 490 BC.
  • Battle of Marathon
    490 BCE

    Battle of Marathon

    It was fought between the citizens of Athens, aided by Plataea, and a Persian force commanded by Datis and Artaphernes. The battle was the culmination of the first attempt by Persia, under King Darius I, to subjugate Greece.
  • Darius I
    487 BCE

    Darius I

    Darius the Great, was the third Persian King of Kings of the Achaemenid Empire
  • Battle of Thermopylae
    480 BCE

    Battle of Thermopylae

    DescriptionThe Battle of Thermopylae was fought between an alliance of Greek city-states, led by King Leonidas I of Sparta, and the Achaemenid Empire of Xerxes I over the course of three days, during the second Persian invasion of Greece.
  • Second Persian War
    479 BCE

    Second Persian War

    DescriptionThe second Persian invasion of Greece occurred during the Greco-Persian Wars, as King Xerxes I of Persia sought to conquer all of Greece
  • Xerxes
    465 BCE

    Xerxes

    Xerxes the Great, was the fourth King of Kings of the Achaemenid Empire, ruling from 486 to 465 BC.
  • Parthenon completed
    432 BCE

    Parthenon completed

    DescriptionThe Parthenon is a former temple on the Athenian Acropolis, Greece, dedicated to the goddess Athena, whom the people of Athens considered their patron.
  • Pericles
    429 BCE

    Pericles

    DescriptionPericles was a prominent and influential Greek statesman, orator and general of Athens during its golden age, specifically the time between the Persian and the Peloponnesian Wars
  • Agamemnon
    411 BCE

    Agamemnon

    Agamemnon was the king of Mycenae and leader of the Greek army in the Trojan War of Homer's Illiad.
  • Peloponnesian Wars
    404 BCE

    Peloponnesian Wars

    was an ancient Greek war fought by the Delian League led by Athens against the Peloponnesian League led by Sparta. Historians have traditionally divided the war into three phases.
  • Catapult
    400 BCE

    Catapult

    A catapult is a ballistic device used to launch a projectile a great distance without the aid of gunpowder or other propellants – particularly various types of ancient and medieval siege engines.
  • Socrates
    399 BCE

    Socrates

    Socrates was a Greek philosopher from Athens who is credited as one of the founders of Western philosophy, and as being the first moral philosopher of the Western ethical tradition of thought.
  • The Academy in Athens
    387 BCE

    The Academy in Athens

    DescriptionThe Academy was founded by Plato in c. 387 BC in Athens. Aristotle studied there for twenty years before founding his own school, the Lyceum. The Academy persisted throughout the Hellenistic period as a skeptical school, until coming to an end after the death of Philo of Larissa in 83 BC
  • Plato
    348 BCE

    Plato

    DescriptionPlato was an Athenian philosopher during the Classical period in Ancient Greece, founder of the Platonist school of thought, and the Academy, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world.
  • Battle of Chaeronea
    338 BCE

    Battle of Chaeronea

    DescriptionThe Battle of Chaeronea was fought in 338 BC, near the city of Chaeronea in Boeotia, between the Macedonians led by Philip II of Macedon and an alliance of some of the Greek city-states led by Athens and Thebes.
  • League of Corinth
    337 BCE

    League of Corinth

    was a confederation of Greek states created by Philip II during the winter of 338 BC/337 BC after the Battle of Chaeronea
  • Philip II
    336 BCE

    Philip II

    Philip II of Macedon was the king of the kingdom of Macedon from 359 BC until his assassination in 336 BC.
  • Alexander the Great
    323 BCE

    Alexander the Great

    Alexander the Great was an ancient Macedonian ruler and one of history's greatest military minds who, as King of Macedonia and Persia, established the largest empire the ancient world had ever seen.
  • Aristotle
    323 BCE

    Aristotle

    DescriptionAristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. Taught by Plato