> It is absolutely true that under Pericles, Athens became the economic and cultural center of the Greek world (Meltzer 61). Politically, the style of democracy utilized during this period extended the rights of participation to male citizens only. This policy would, by consequence, disenfranchise the majority of the Athenian population, as it has been estimated that during the Periclean Age, nearly 100,000 slaves of both sexes lived in Athens; it is probable that no more than two in five adult males would have enjoyed the right to vote and hold office (Stockton 17-18).
Other figures, though more conservative, nonetheless put the number of slaves in Periclean Athens before the Peloponnesian War (431 BC) at 70,000, with an additional 25,000 metics (resident aliens without political rights) rounding out the non-citizen mix. Compared with the 60,000 citizens of Athens, these numbers show that at the h
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