A fine patinated bronze bust of Pericles on a stepped black marble base. Provenance: Purchased from an antiques dealer in Hamptons, NY. Pericles (495–429 BCE) was a prominent Greek statesman, orator, and general during the Golden Age of Athens. The period in which he led Athens, in fact, has been called the Age of Pericles due to his influence, not only on his city's fortunes, but on the whole of Greek history during the 5th century BCE and even after his death. Pericles, leader of Athens from 460–429 B.C., organized the construction of the Parthenon and developed a democracy based on majority rule. For over 20 years, at Athens' height, with a reputation for scrupulous honesty, Pericles deepened and extended the reforms that Cleisthenes had set in motion some 50 years before. A keen patron of learning and the arts, he masterminded the construction of the Parthenon. However, in glorifying Athens, he set it upon a collision course with Sparta that would ultimately lead to its ruin.