Virtue in Fourth-Century Athens

This thesis investigates practices of virtue in the Athens of Platon and Aristoteles. Thanks to the legacy of these philosophers, fourth-century BCE Athens looms large in current research and public debate on ethics and politics. The present thesis examines the other fourth-century Athenian: the woman, foreigner, slave or male citizen who may not have left us systematic accounts of their ethical beliefs but nonetheless cared about being and being seen as a good person. It contributes to ancient Greek history by examining how the desire to be morally recognised shaped fourth-century Athenian society and how the structure of that society, in turn, affected its inhabitants’ prospects of achieving virtue in the eyes of others. It contributes to the field of ethics by showing how a philosophical concept, virtue, was lived by ordinary people of a concrete historical society.