Ancient Greece Corinth

The site of Corinth in ancient Greece was first inhabited in the Neolithic period (5000-3000 BC), and flourished as a major Greek city from the 8th century BC until its destruction by the Romans in 146 BC. Ancient Corinth, the original Corinth, founded in the 10th Century BCE, had been the richest port and the largest city in ancient Greece. Corinth was a rival of Athens, and sided against it with Sparta in the Peloponnesian War.

Corinth was a town right where southern Greece and northern Greece come together. It was certainly a Mycenaean city. Strategically located guarding the narrow isthmus that connects the Peloponnesus (as southern Greece is called) to the mainland, it was a powerful commercial center near two seaports only 4 miles apart. Corinth became the center of commercial traffic between Europe and Asia reaching its height circa the 5th century BC.

The city was immensely wealthy-a key center of the Greek and Roman worlds controlling trade between the northern mainland of Greece and the Peloponnese. Lechaeum, the western harbor in the Corinthian Gulf was the trading port to Italy and Sicily, and Cenchreae, the eastern harbor in the Saronic Gulf, was the port for the eastern Mediterranean countries.

By around 800 BC, the Corinthians had begun making things themselves to sell to the traders who were always in their port. They made perfume, and fancy little pots to put the perfume in.

Coinage was essential to Corinth as an important commercial center. After Aegina, Corinth was one of the earliest cities in Greece to strike and use coins--in the 7th century B.C. Her silver stators, the "colts" or "poloi" (in Greek), issued from the earliest times, carried on their obverse the winged Pegasus, wondrous horse of Greek mythology, connected with Poseidon, god of the sea, and with Athena, goddess of wisdom.

Although Corinth's schools were not as fine as those of Athens, their boys were educated in the arts and the sciences. As a child, kids were taught at home. From age 7-14, boys attended a nearby day school, where they studied poetry, drama, public speaking, accounting, reading, writing, math, science, and the flute. Boys attended a higher school if their parents could afford it. All boys went to military school for at least two years.

The Corinth Paul knew had been re-founded by Julius Caesar as a Roman colony in 44 BCE.

Some say that the city was punished by God when two huge earthquakes struck it in 375 and 521 A.D., which leveled the Roman buildings and cleaned out the population once again.

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