ABSTRACT
While Solon may have inadvertently done much to lay the foundations of Athenian democracy, it was the reformer Kleisthenes who established the democracy as such. After the overthrow of the tyranny of the Peisistratidai, Kleisthenes the Alkmeonid and another eupatrid, Isagoras, vied for power. Isagoras’ election to the archonship in 508/7 must have been a great setback to Kleisthenes’ ambitions. The people had been overlooked in this rivalry between Isagoras and Kleisthenes, and so, when Kleisthenes began losing out in the political struggle for influence among the upper-class hetaireiai, clubs, he counteracted with a masterstroke, gaining the support of the people by taking them into his hetaireia (docs 5.1-2, 5.6). Not only were Kleisthenes’ overtures welcomed, but the people were willing to besiege the Spartans on the acropolis rather than submit to Isagoras’ planned oligarchy.
