Editing Thebes, Greece (section)

===Archaic and classical periods===
{{further| Epaminondas|Theban hegemony|Boeotarch}}
[[File:Plan of Thebes.jpg|thumb|left|Topographic map of ancient Thebes]]
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 "[[Thebes, Egypt|Hundred-Gated Thebes]]" (Θῆβαι ἑκατόμπυλοι, ''Thebai hekatompyloi'') in Egypt (''Iliad'', IX.383).

[[File:Amth82.jpg|thumb|160px|Ancient coin depicting a Boeotian shield, [[Archaeological Museum of Thebes]]]]
In the late 6th century BC, the Thebans were brought for the first time into hostile contact with the [[Classical Athens|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{{according to whom|date=August 2021}} to explain the apparently unpatriotic attitude which Thebes displayed during the [[Second Persian invasion of Greece|Persian invasion of Greece]] (480–479 BC). Though a contingent of 400 was sent to [[Battle of Thermopylae|Thermopylae]] and remained there with [[Leonidas]] before being defeated alongside the Spartans,<ref>Herodotus [[#Bibliography|Bibliography]] VII:204 ,222,223.</ref> 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.{{citation needed|date=December 2022}} 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|Delphic amphictyony]] was only frustrated by the intercession of Athens.{{citation needed|date=December 2022}}

[[File:Thebes Harmonia AR Stater 83000129.jpg|thumb|Thebes silver [[stater]] (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.
[[File:Greek Silver Stater of Thebes (Boeotia), a Stunning Depiction of Dionysos.jpg|thumb|200px|Silver [[stater]] of Thebes (405–395 BC). Obverse: Boeotian shield, reverse: Head of bearded [[Dionysus]].]]
[[File:362BCThebanHegemony.png|thumb|300px|Map of Greece during the height of Theban power in 362 BC, showing Theban, Spartan and Athenian power blocks]]

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)|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 [[Battle of Leuctra|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.