Ancient Greece

Ancient Greece refers to the civilization belonging to the period of Greek history lasting from the Archaic period of the 8th to 6th centuries BC to 146 BC and the Roman conquest of Greece after the Battle of Corinth. At the center of this time period is Classical Greece, which flourished during the 5th to 4th centuries BC, at first under Athenian leadership successfully repelling the military threat of Persian invasion. The Athenian Golden Age ends with the defeat of Athens at the hands of Sparta in the Peloponnesian War in 404 BC.

Classical Greece is generally considered to be the seminal culture which provided the foundation of Western civilization.

Harry Turtledove uses Ancient Greece as a setting frequently in his writing. Conversely, stories set in Modern Greece are few and far between.

Ancient Greece in "Counting Potsherds"
Greece fell to Persia in 480 BC when Athens was decisively defeated.

Ancient Greece in "The Daimon"
Greece was a group of autonomous city-states. After Alkibiades successfully conquered Syracuse, Sparta, and his own Athens, Hellenic Greece was sufficiently unified to launch a war with its eternal enemy, Persia.

Ancient Greece in "The Horse of Bronze"
The ancestral home of the centaurs was overrun by the Lapiths who believed they were entitled to take from all lesser beings simply because of their innate superiority.