It seems that the Athenian playwright Aeschylus considered his participation at Marathon to be his greatest achievement in life ( rather than his plays ) since on his gravestone there was the following epigram:

Upon crossing the Rubicon, Caesar, according to Plutarch and Suetonius, is supposed to have quoted the Athenian playwright Menander, in Greek, " the die is cast ".

262 BC ), an Athenian poet and playwright of the New Comedy

* 484 BC: Athenian playwright Aeschylus wins a poetry prize

* 468 BC: Sophocles, Greek playwright, defeats Aeschylus for the Athenian Prize.

According to the Athenian playwright Aeschylus, who actually fought at Salamis, the Greek fleet numbered 310 triremes ( the difference being the number of Athenian ships ).

* 484 Aeschylus, Athenian playwright,

* 468 Sophocles, Greek playwright, defeats Aeschylus for Athenian Prize

* 441 Euripides, Greek playwright, wins Athenian prize

* 427 Aristophanes, Greek playwright, wins Athenian Prize

* 316 Menander, Greek playwright, wins Athenian prize.

The city forms the setting of The Persians ( 472 BCE ), an Athenian tragedy by the ancient Greek playwright Aeschylus that is the oldest surviving play in the history of theatre.

* Euripides, Athenian playwright ( b. c. 480 BC )

* Philemon, Athenian poet and playwright of the New Comedy ( b. c. 362 BC )

* Sophocles, Greek playwright, defeats Aeschylus for the Athenian Prize.

The Bacchae (, Bakchai ; also known as The Bacchantes ) is an ancient Greek tragedy by the Athenian playwright Euripides, during his final years in Macedonia, at the court of Archelaus I of Macedonia.

In 467 BC the Athenian playwright, Aeschylus, is known to have presented an entire trilogy based upon the Oedipus myth, winning the first prize at the City Dionysia.

* The Athenian playwright Aeschylus completes his trilogy The Oresteia ( which comprise Agamemnon, Choephoroi ( The Libation Bearers ) and The Eumenides ).

* The Greek playwright Euripides ' play Alcestis is performed in the Dionysia, an Athenian dramatic festival.

The Athenian comic playwright Eupolis once remarked that they " are already reduced to silence by the disinclination of the multitude for elegant learning ".

Thebes is often used in Athenian dramas as a city in which proper boundaries and identities are not maintained, allowing the playwright to explore themes like incest, murder, and hubris in a safe setting.

* Sophocles ( an Athenian orator, not the playwright )

The Persians (, Persai ) is an Athenian tragedy by the ancient Greek playwright Aeschylus.

Euripides first competed in the City Dionysia, the famous Athenian dramatic festival, in 455 BC, one year after the death of Aeschylus, and it was not until 441 BC that he won a first prize.

Meanwhile tragedy, as developed by Athenian dramatists of the calibre of Aeschylus and Sophocles, had begun to emerge as the leading poetic genre, borrowing the literary dialect, the metres and poetic devices of lyric poetry in general and the dithyramb in particular ( Aristotle Poetics IV 1449a ).

According to an anonymous biographer of Aeschylus, the Athenians chose Simonides ahead of Aeschylus to be the author of an epigram honouring their war-dead at Marathon, which led the tragedian ( who had fought at the battle and whose brother had died there ) to withdraw sulking to the court of Hieron of Syracuse — the story is probably based on the inventions of comic dramatists but it is likely that Simonides did in fact write some kind of commemorative verses for the Athenian victory at Marathon.

* Aeschylus, Athenian playwright of the 5th century BC, best known for the Oresteia trilogy

The Achilleis ( after the Ancient Greek, Achillēis, ) is a lost trilogy by the Athenian dramatist Aeschylus.

It was a popular subject in Greek tragedies, and there are surviving versions from all three of the great Athenian tragedians: Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides.

Over time he worked through almost the entire canon of Athenian dramas ( Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides in tragedy ; Aristophanes in comedy ).

The dream sequence that Atossa narrates near the beginning of Aeschylus ' Athenian tragedy The Persians ( 472 BCE ) may be the first in the history of European theater.

Finally, Athenaeus ( a grammarian of the 2nd and 3rd centuries AD ), wrote of a contemporary Athenian festival dedicated to Prometheus: " Aeschylus clearly states in the Unbound that in honor of Prometheus we place a garland on the head as recompense of his bondage.

Given the title of the play, and considering that Aeschylus ' Oresteia provides an aetiology for Athens's Areopagus, it has been suggested that Prometheus the Fire-Bringer concludes with providing an aetiology for a yearly Athenian torch race honoring the Titan.

Finally, Athenaeus ( a grammarian of the 2nd and 3rd centuries AD ) wrote in Book 15. 16 of his Deipnosophists the following regarding a contemporary Athenian festival dedicated to Prometheus: " Aeschylus clearly states in the Unbound that in honor of Prometheus we place a garland on the head as recompense of his bondage.

* Euripides ' play Medea wins third prize at the Dionysia, the famous Athenian dramatic festival.

* 429 Phormio, Athenian admiral, wins the Battle of Chalcis

* The Athenian general, Iphicrates, with a force composed almost entirely of light troops and peltasts ( javelin throwers ), wins a decisive victory against the Spartan regiment that has been stationed at Lechaeum in the Battle of Lechaeum.

* The Athenian general, Thrasybulus, sails to Lesbos, where, with the support of the Mytileneans, he defeats the Spartan forces on the island and wins over a number of cities.

* The Athenian admiral Chabrias wins a naval victory for Athens over the Spartan fleet, off the island of Naxos ( the Battle of Naxos ).

Anacharsis was the first foreigner ( metic ) who received the privileges of Athenian citizenship.

Despite this limited franchise, Athenian democracy was certainly the first — and perhaps the best — example of a working direct democracy.

In the first ten years of the league's existence, Cimon / Kimon forced Karystos in Euboea to join the league, conquered the island of Skyros and sent Athenian colonists there.

It was also known as Cecropia, after the legendary serpent-man, Cecrops, the first Athenian king.

If the first theory is correct ( see above ), then the absence of cavalry removed the main Athenian tactical disadvantage, and the threat of being outflanked made it imperative to attack.

The Athenians had honed their style of fighting in combat with other phalanxes, wooden shields smashing against wooden shields, iron spear tips clattering against breastplates of bronze ... in those first terrible seconds of collision, there was nothing but a pulverizing crash of metal into flesh and bone ; then the rolling of the Athenian tide over men wearing, at most, quilted jerkins for protection, and armed, perhaps, with nothing more than bows or slings.

A further example comes from Ancient Greece, where the Athenian legal system was first written down by Draco in about 621 BC: the death penalty was applied for a particularly wide range of crimes, though Solon later repealed Draco's code and published new laws, retaining only Draco's homicide statutes.

The transition to the torsion catapults, which are not considered crossbows and came to dominate Greek and Roman artillery design is first evident in inventories of the Athenian arsenal from between 338 and 326 BC.

It first prevented the candidate for expulsion being chosen out of immediate anger, although an Athenian general such as Cimon would have not wanted to lose a battle the week before such a second vote.

During the first Persian invasion of Greece, he fought at the Battle of Marathon, and was possibly one of the 10 Athenian strategoi ( generals ) in that battle.

* 455 BC: Euripides presents his first known tragedy, Peliades, in the Athenian festival of Dionysia.

Pericles had such a profound influence on Athenian society that Thucydides, his contemporary historian, acclaimed him as " the first citizen of Athens ".

When he first left the ecclesia ( the Athenian Assembly ) disheartened, an old man named Eunomus encouraged him, saying his diction was very much like that of Pericles.

* 426 Demosthenes, Athenian general, and Cleon, Athenian demagogue, revitalizes Athenian forces, makes bold plans opposed by Nicias, his first military campaign barely succeeds

Solon was the first of the Athenian poets whose work has survived to the present day.

Throughout his two decades of prominence, whether in or out of leadership, Thrasybulus remained a steady advocate of traditional Athenian imperial democracy, and he died fighting for the same cause he was advocating on his first appearance in 411.

Alcibiades first rose to prominence when he began advocating aggressive Athenian action after the signing of the Peace of Nicias.

This Athenian soldier first completed a two-day run to seek Spartan help against the invading Persians in the Battle of Marathon, and then ran from the town of Marathon to Athens days later to announce the victory, dying as a result of his heroic efforts.

* The first of the Athenian sculptor Phidias ' monuments to Athena, the bronze Athena Promachos, is placed on the Athenian Acropolis.