Early history Archaeological excavations in and around Thebes have revealed
cist graves dated to
Mycenaean times containing weapons, ivory, and tablets written in
Linear B. Its attested name forms and relevant terms on tablets found locally or elsewhere include ,
te-qa-i, understood to be read as *
Tʰēgʷai̮s (Ancient Greek: ,
Thēbais, i.e. "at Thebes",
Thebes in the
dative-
locative case), ,
te-qa-de, for *
Tʰēgʷasde (,
Thēbasde, i.e. "to Thebes"), and ,
te-qa-ja, for *
Tʰēgʷaja (,
Thēbaia, i.e. "Theban woman"). *
Tʰēgʷai was able to pull resources from Lamos near
Mount Helicon, and from
Karystos and
Amarynthos on the Greek side of the isle of
Euboia. The central area of Thebes, known as the
Cadmea, shows signs of destruction towards the end of the Mycenaean era and much of the site was abandoned. In the words of
Richard Hope Simpson, "The decline of Thebes after the end of the LH IIIB period recalls the Hypothebai (or "sub-Thebes") of the Homeric Catalogue of the Ships (
Iliad ii 505), but we have no reliable indications as to where this residual "lower town" may have been located." The Homeric Hypothebai may have been the seed of the Archaic and Classical polity of Thebes when the city was reestablished in earnest.
Archaic and classical periods As attested already in
Homer's
Iliad, Thebes was often called "Seven-Gated Thebes" (Θῆβαι ἑπτάπυλοι,
Thebai heptapyloi) (
Iliad, IV.406) to distinguish it from "
Hundred-Gated Thebes" (Θῆβαι ἑκατόμπυλοι,
Thebai hekatompyloi) in Egypt (
Iliad, IX.383). In the late 6th century BC, the Thebans were brought for the first time into hostile contact with the
Athenians, who helped the small village of
Plataea to maintain its independence against them, and in 506 BC repelled an inroad into Attica. The aversion to Athens best serves to explain the apparently unpatriotic attitude which Thebes displayed during the
Persian invasion of Greece (480–479 BC). Though a contingent of 400 was sent to
Thermopylae and remained there with
Leonidas before being defeated alongside the Spartans, the governing aristocracy soon after joined King
Xerxes I of Persia with great readiness and fought zealously on his behalf at the
Battle of Plataea in 479 BC. The victorious Greeks subsequently punished Thebes by depriving it of the presidency of the
Boeotian League and an attempt by the Spartans to expel it from the
Delphic amphictyony was only frustrated by the intercession of Athens. (450–440 BC) portraying
Harmonia In 457 BC
Sparta, needing a counterpoise against Athens in central Greece, reversed her policy and reinstated Thebes as the dominant power in Boeotia. The great citadel of Cadmea served this purpose well by holding out as a base of resistance when the Athenians overran and occupied the rest of the country (457–447 BC). In the
Peloponnesian War, the Thebans, embittered by the support that Athens gave to the smaller Boeotian towns, and especially to Plataea, which they vainly attempted to reduce in 431 BC, were firm allies of Sparta, which in turn helped them to besiege Plataea and allowed them to destroy the town after its capture in 427 BC. In 424 BC, at the head of the Boeotian levy, they inflicted a severe defeat on an invading force of Athenians at the
Battle of Delium, and for the first time displayed the effects of that firm military organization that eventually raised them to predominant power in Greece. of Thebes (405–395 BC). Obverse: Boeotian shield, reverse: Head of bearded
Dionysus. After the downfall of Athens at the end of the Peloponnesian War, the Thebans, having learned that Sparta intended to protect the states that Thebes desired to annex, broke off the alliance. In 404 BC, they had urged the complete destruction of Athens; yet, in 403 BC, they secretly supported the restoration of its democracy in order to find in it a counterpoise against Sparta. A few years later, influenced perhaps in part by Persian gold, they formed the nucleus of the league against Sparta. At the
Battle of Haliartus (395 BC) and the
Battle of Coronea (394 BC), they again proved their rising military capacity by standing their ground against the Spartans. The result of the war was especially disastrous to Thebes, as the general settlement of 387 BC stipulated the complete autonomy of all Greek towns and so withdrew the other Boeotians from its political control. Its power was further curtailed in 382 BC, when a Spartan force occupied the citadel by a treacherous
coup de main. Three years later, the Spartan garrison was expelled and a democratic constitution was set up in place of the traditional oligarchy. In the consequent wars with Sparta, the Theban army, trained and led by
Epaminondas and
Pelopidas, proved itself formidable (see also:
Sacred Band of Thebes). Years of desultory fighting, in which Thebes established its control over all Boeotia, culminated in 371 BC in a remarkable victory over the Spartans at
Leuctra. The winners were hailed throughout Greece as champions of the oppressed. They carried their arms into
Peloponnesus and at the head of a large coalition, permanently crippled the power of Sparta, in part by freeing many
helot slaves, the basis of the Spartan economy. Similar expeditions were sent to
Thessaly and
Macedon to regulate the affairs of those regions.
Decline and destruction The predominance of Thebes was short-lived, as the states that it protected refused to subject themselves permanently to its control. Thebes renewed its rivalry with Athens, which had joined with them in 395 BC in fear of Sparta, but since 387 BC had endeavoured to maintain the balance of power against its ally, preventing the formation of a Theban empire. With the death of
Epaminondas at the
Battle of Mantinea (362 BC), the city sank again to the position of a secondary power. In the
Third Sacred War (356–346 BC) with its neighbor
Phocis, Thebes lost its predominance in central Greece. By asking
Philip II of Macedon to crush the Phocians, Thebes extended the former's power within dangerous proximity to its frontiers. The revulsion of popular feeling in Thebes was expressed in 338 BC by the orator
Demosthenes, who persuaded Thebes to join Athens in a final attempt to bar Philip's advance on Attica. The Theban contingent lost the decisive
battle of Chaeronea and along with it every hope of reassuming control over Greece. Philip was content to deprive Thebes of its dominion over Boeotia; but an unsuccessful revolt in 335 BC against his son
Alexander the Great while he was campaigning in the north was punished by Alexander and his Greek allies with the destruction of the city (except, according to tradition, the house of the poet
Pindar and the temples), and its territory divided between the other Boeotian cities. Moreover, the Thebans themselves were sold into
slavery. Alexander spared only priests, leaders of the pro-Macedonian party and descendants of Pindar. The end of Thebes cowed Athens into submission. According to Plutarch, a special Athenian embassy, led by
Phocion, an opponent of the anti-Macedonian faction, was able to persuade Alexander to give up his demands for the exile of leaders of the anti-Macedonian party, and most particularly Demosthenes and not sell the people into slavery.
Hellenistic period Ancient writings tend to treat Alexander's destruction of Thebes as excessive. Although Thebes had traditionally been antagonistic to whichever state led the Greek world, siding with the Persians when they invaded against the Athenian-Spartan alliance, siding with Sparta when Athens seemed omnipotent, and famously derailing the Spartan invasion of Persia by
Agesilaus. Alexander's father Philip had been raised in Thebes, albeit as a hostage, and had learnt much of the art of war from
Pelopidas. Philip had honoured this fact, always seeking alliances with the Boeotians, even in the lead-up to Chaeronea. Thebes was also revered as the most ancient of Greek cities, with a history of over 1,000 years. Plutarch relates that, during his later conquests, whenever Alexander came across a former Theban, he would attempt to redress his destruction of Thebes with favours to that individual.
Restoration by Cassander Following Alexander the Great's death in 323 BC, Thebes was re-established in 315 BC In restoring Thebes, Cassander sought to rectify the perceived wrongs of Alexander – a gesture of generosity that earned him much goodwill throughout Greece. In addition to currying favor with the Athenians and many of the Peloponnesian states, Cassander's restoration of Thebes provided him with loyal allies in the Theban exiles who returned to resettle the site.
Benjamin of Tudela visited Thebes around 1161 or 1162. At that time, the city served as a regional administrative center, home to a local elite, a major producer of
silk textiles, and an important regional market, all of which contributed to urban and demographic growth. Although there is no specific data on Thebes's overall population, estimates suggest it housed between 20,000 and 30,000 inhabitants, typical for a major Byzantine provincial city. Benjamin of Tudela reported that Thebes had a
Jewish population of 2,000, the largest Jewish community in any Byzantine city of the 12th century, except for Constantinople. In 1205, Thebes was conquered by the Latins of the
Fourth Crusade.
Latin period Thanks to its wealth, the city was selected by the Frankish dynasty de la Roche as its capital, before it was permanently moved to Athens. After 1240, the Saint Omer family controlled the city jointly with the de la Roche dukes. The castle built by
Nicholas II of Saint Omer on the Cadmea was one of the most beautiful of Frankish Greece. After its conquest in 1311 the city was used as a capital by the short-lived state of the
Catalan Company. In 1379, the
Navarrese Company took the city with the aid of the
Latin Archbishop of Thebes,
Simon Atumano.
Ottoman period Latin hegemony in Thebes lasted to 1458, when the
Ottomans captured it. The
Ottomans renamed Thebes "İstefe" and managed it until the
Greek War of Independence (1821, nominally to 1832) except for a
Venetian interlude between 1687 and 1699.
Modern town In the modern Greek State, Thebes was the capital of the prefecture of
Boeotia until the late 19th century, when
Livadeia became the capital. Today, Thebes is a bustling
market town, known for its many products and wares. Until the 1980s, it had a flourishing agrarian production with some industrial complexes. However, during the late 1980s and 1990s the bulk of industry moved further south, closer to
Athens. Tourism in the area is based mainly in Thebes and the surrounding villages, where many places of interest related to antiquity exist such as the battlefield where the
Battle of Plataea took place. The proximity to other, more famous travel destinations, like
Athens and
Chalkis, and the undeveloped archaeological sites have kept the tourist numbers low. A notable portion of the inhabitants of Thebes are
Arvanites. File:Rottmann - Theben 1842.jpg|Thebes, 1842 by
Carl Rottmann File:Volksfest in Theben - Schweiger Lerchenfeld Amand (freiherr Von) - 1887.jpg|Popular festival at Thebes, 1880s File:Statue of Pindar, Thiva, Greece.JPG|A bust of
Pindar File:Thiva Archaeological Museum 2016.jpg|Entrance to the archaeological museum File:Holy Monastery of Transfiguration-Sagmata 02.jpg|Monastery of the Transfiguration of Christ, Sagmata == In Greek myth ==