Agora. Detailed history

The agora was a central meeting place in ancient Greek cities. It was the center of town life, a public space where individuals met and engaged in commerce and discussion. In the early development of the city-state, it was the meeting place for citizenry (i.e., free male residents) to gather to hear information from the local king and later the governing board or council. At such meetings, citizens would discuss political actions, including measures for war and peace. The agora also became the central point for gatherings before proceeding on military campaigns.

The agora was a broad, open area usually associated with the political and religious segment of the city. Often, the city would erect shrines and temples around the outer edges, which had the effect of confining the area. During monarchies, it was common for the leading citizens to have their homes near the agora in order to have access to the king, and later, when the monarchy was replaced by the rule of aristocracy or oligarchy, these individuals often became the towns’ leaders.

Ruins of the ancient Greek agora in Athens

The political and religious functions, which also encouraged and promoted discussion, allowed the dissemination of information and views; and in city-states that were democratic, the agora became a crucial space for discussing varying political views. This political discourse gave rise to the other major function of the agora: commercialization.

As a general meeting place, the agora soon developed into an area where goods could be bought and sold. Individual merchants and farmers were allowed at first to set up temporary stalls to ply their wares. Since business occurred on public lands, the buyers and sellers now looked to the city-state to ensure fairness and protection in commercial acts.

This gave rise to city-states enacting laws for commercial activity, including days when business could occur, as well as standardized weights and measures. Each city would often have its own standards, which merchants were required to follow. To safeguard the public, many cities had an official, the agoramus, who was in charge of ensuring that the city’s weights and measures were accurate and were followed, and if merchants violated them, they could be fined or prevented from doing business.

As the commercial life grew, cities began to view the agora as more of a central part of people’s lives. This gave rise to permanent stalls and colonnades and the emergence of other businesses, such as artisans’ workshops. Often, the workshops were built off the agora, with showrooms in the agora. Typically, the workshops employed slaves and artisans and needed space that was not appropriate for the central marketplace, which sold finished products.

The most famous agora was in Athens, located northwest of the Acropolis and north of the Aeropagus hill. The Temple of Hephaestus on the Areopagus overlooked the marketplace and the Agoraios Kolonos, a nearby hill to the west known as a place where the craftsmen set up shop. Numerous buildings were in the agora. On the south side was the South Stoa I, between the Enneakrounos or fountain house, and the Heliaia, built during the Peloponnesian War, where the original supreme court of Athens met.

Nearby was the strategion, a religious structure associated with the general office (strategos), which was used as a meeting place for the ten elected generals. The Prytaneion, the residence of the Prytaneis, or chief executive of the city, was also probably located here. It later became the official residence of the Archons.

On the northwest corner of the agora were several religious and civic buildings. The Stoa of Zeus, a two-aisled stoa, a Greek word meaning covered walkway used for gatherings, built during the Peloponnesian War and used for both religious and civic purposes. Also located here was the Altar of the Twelve Gods, built in 522 by Pisistratus the Younger. It was a sort of pantheon to all of the principal Olympian gods who protected Athens.

It was the center of Athens, and all distances were calculated from this spot. Nearby was another Stoa, the Stoa Basileios (meaning “king”) or Royal Stoa; it was built in the sixth century, where the Are- opagos, or council in charge of religious affairs, met. The Temple of Aphrodite Urania, built in the early fifth century, was also here. In addition, the north side had the Stoa Poikile, or Panted Porch, which was decorated with numerous paintings and loot captured in war. The Stoa included the Battle of Oenoe, the taking of Troy, and the Battle of Marathon, which was described by Pausanius in the second century CE. The stoa was where Zeno taught his philosophy, from which the name stoics came in the third century.

Since the agora was the political center of Athens, other monuments were also celebrated, including the Monument of the Eponymous Heroes, or the ten heroes representing the ten tribes of Athens. A marble podium was used to post proposed decrees and announcements.

It was near the metroon, originally a temple that was probably dedicated to Demeter, on the west side of the agora; and later the public archives of Athens, also known as the Old Bouleuterion, where the city council was housed. Ultimately, when the New Bouleuterion was built at the end of the fifth century, the Old Bouleuterion was converted to a temple to Cybele. The Bou- leuterion was the council house where the Boule, or Council of 500, would assemble.

The Old Bouleterion, on the west side of the agora, was nearly square, with an oblong antechamber going into a larger room with wooden benches arranged around the walls. The New Bouleterion was built just west of the old one, and although smaller, it was arranged as an amphitheater, with 12 levels of benches.

The agora was the central life of Athens not only in the political sense, but in the social world as well. It allowed the Athenians the opportunity to engage not only in trade, but in politics so that their concept of democracy flourished.