ABSTRACT
In this book are discussed the form, layout, and buildings of thirteen places in the Greek and Roman world, all of which had the status of cities. They vary considerably, and no simple definition embraces them all. They differ in their political systems, their economies, their size, their history. One of the oldest of them, Mycenae, is also the smallest, but this is a coincidence. Most of them are successful, if success is to be judged by their longevity. Athens can trace its origins to the second millennium BC at least, and has existed as a city ever since, while Thessalonike has flourished as a major city without a break since its foundation in 316 BC. All of them, at one time or another, are particularly important, though that importance may fade with changing circumstances. It is these that determine the city’s fate, that bring it into existence, encourage its development, and then allow it either to continue or to fade away. More specifically, my cities are dominated by the classical concept of the Greek city-state, even if not Greek. For the Greeks, the citythe polis-was not merely a natural way of life, but the only acceptable one for normal human beings. Aristotle’s definition of man as a political animal meant exactly this: man is by nature destined to live in cities.1 Politics form the art of living in cities, and citizenship is the right-and privilege-of those who form the community. Translate them into Latin, as cives, and their form of life is the basis of civilisation. All this reflects the historical realities: that is, in the conditions of the Mediterranean world in the first millennium BC and after, it is the normal thing for the human population to form communities, rather than live in isolation, and these communities are the essential basis for those advances which constitute the achievements of civilisation.
