Within the space of three centuries, up to the great Persian invasion of 480BC, Greece was transformed from a simple peasant society into a sophisticated civilization which dominated the shores of the Mediterranean from Spain to Syria and from the Crimea to Egypt - a culture whose achievements in the fields of art, science, philosophy and politics were to establish the canons of the Western world. The author of this book places this development in the context of Mediterranean civilization, providing an account of the transformation that launched Western culture.