A 'polis' (πολις) — plural: poleis (πολεις) — is a city, or a city-state.

The word originates from the ancient Greek city-states, which developed during the Archaic period, the ancestor of both modern city and state, and persisted (though with decreasing influence) well into Roman times, when the equivalent Latin word was civitas, also meaning 'citizenhood', while municipium applied to a non-sovereign local entity.

History

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The bounds of the ancient polis often centred around a citadel, called the acropolis, and would of necessity also have an agora (market) and typically one or more temples and a gymnasium. Note that many of a polis' citizens would have lived in the suburbs or countryside. The Greeks did not regard the polis as a territorial grouping so much as a religious and political association: while the polis would control territory and colonies beyond the city itself, the polis would not simply consist of a geographical area.

Each city was composed of several tribes or demes, which were in turn composed of phratries and finally gentes. Metics (resident foreigners) and slaves lay outside this organization. Birth typically determined citizenship. Each polis would also worship a number of patron deities for protection and kept its own particular festivals and customs.

In the East beyond Asia Minor a major instrument of hellenization by Alexander the Great was the polis. He is said to have founded no less than seventy cities, destined to become centres of Greek influence; and the great majority of these were in lands in which city-life was almost unknown. In this respect his example was emulated by his successors, the diadochi.

Derived words

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Derivatives of polis are common in many modern European languages. This is indicative of the influence of the polis-centred Hellenic world view. Derivative words in English include policy, polity, police and politics.

A number of words end in the word "-polis". Most refer to a special kind of city and/or state. Some examples are:

• Astropolis - star-scaled city/industry area; complex space station; a european star-related festival.
• Cosmopolis - a large urban centre with a population comprised of many different cultural backgrounds; a novel written by Don DeLillo.
• Ecumenopolis - a city that covers an entire planet, usually seen in science fiction
• Megapolis, megalopolis - an urban area resulted by merging several cities and their suburbs.
• Metropolis can refer to the mother city of a colony, the see of a metropolitan archbishop or a Metropolitan area - a major urban population centre.
• Necropolis 'city of the dead' - a graveyard.
• Technopolis - city with high-tech industry; room full of computers; the Internet.

Other refer to part of a city or a group of cities, such as:

• Acropolis 'high city' - upper part of a polis, often citadel and/or site of major temple(s).
• Decapolis a group of ten cities
• Pentapolis a group of five cities

Names

In Cyprus there is a town called Polis on the northern coast of the Republic of Cyprus, identified with the Ancient Lampa.

Names of a number of places contain the suffix "-polis" (sometimes modernized, e.g. "-pol") since Antiquity:

• Acropolis, Athens, Greece
• Constantinople (Constantinopolis), now known as Istanbul (from is tin Poli 'to "the" city' being Byzantium)
• Heliopolis
• Megalopolis, Greece
• Neapoli(s) 'new city' - common name for daughter foundations of older polis in ancient Greece and Rome including the modern cities of Nablus and Naples. The adjective Neapolitan is often used to describe things that have their origin in Naples.
• Persepolis
• Sevastopol, Crimea, Ukraine
• Seuthopolis, a ruined Thracian city now in Bulgaria
• Simferopol, Crimea, Ukraine
• Tiraspol, Moldova
• Tripoli, Libya and a namesake in Lebanon

In other cases the term is hardly still regognizable, e.g.:

• Antipolis, now Antibes, in southern France

Such names were also given later, either referring to older ones or unrelated:

• Anápolis, Brazil
• Annapolis, MD
• Biopolis - a biological research center in Singapore.
• Cambysopolis, a Catholic titular see in Asia Minor, the name being a curious accidental 'creation'
• Indianapolis, IN
• Minneapolis, MN
• Motherwell - nicknamed Steelopolis
• Sebastopol, CA
• Sophia-Antipolis, a technology park in France

And an enterprise:

• Micropolis Corporation - a defunct computer hard drive manufacturer.

Sources

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(incomplete)

See also

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• Corinth
• apoikia
• synoecism
• ville

Suffixes | Government institutions | Ancient Greece

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