Pericles delivers the Funeral Oration
430 BCE · Event
Over the first winter's dead, Pericles turns a funeral into the definitive statement of what Athens is fighting for: a city open to the world, ruled by the many, the school of Greece. As reported by Thucydides it becomes the most famous speech of antiquity — democracy's own self-portrait, delivered at the start of the war that would ruin it.
On these timelines: The Peloponnesian War, Ancient Greece, Arts and Thoughts, Master
More from The Peloponnesian War
- Peloponnesian War (431 BCE)
- Battle of Aegospotami (405 BCE)
- Death of Pericles (429 BCE)
- Athens destroys Melos (416 BCE)
- Alcibiades defects to Sparta (415 BCE)
- Sparta votes for war with Athens (432 BCE)
- Peace of Nicias (421 BCE)
- Pylos and Sphacteria (425 BCE)
Around 430 BCE
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- Reign of Alexander the Great (336 BCE)
- Aristotle (384 BCE)
- Plato (428 BCE)
- Roman Republic founded (509 BCE)
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- Alexander the Great (356 BCE)
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- Ramayana (500 BCE)