According to the PBS series Empires, classical Greece, and Athens in particular, was the melting pot of civilization. As the inventors of democracy, rationalist philosophy and other institutions valuable to the West, the documentary highlights the importance of Athenian influence on modern society. He also attempts to analogize the feuds between Greek city states and the Peloponnesian War to internal conflicts in Western society. Greek civilization originated with the Minoans in Crete, who were then followed by the Mycenaeans, the heroic peoples of the Trojan War. After their fall, Greece entered a period of decline, “the Middle Ages,” until the re-emergence of classical culture around 600 BC. In this period, the city states of Attica, Peloponnese, and Ionia were slowly gaining power. In particular, the Dorians who had founded Sparta, although supposedly existing since ancient times, established their rule over the Peloponnese. The emphasis on the Spartan martial tradition seems to suggest a criticism of their underdevelopment in other cultural aspects, such as the arts or philosophy....