Laws of the City-State vs. Higher Law as Seen in Sophocles' "Antigone" In Ancient Greece, after 800 bc., new ideas came to the forefront concerning the governing of society. These ideas led to a more organized leadership and a government whose decisions were primarily based on majority rule. This system took the form of city-states, large self-governing towns. These city-states were founded on principals of "freedom, optimism, secularism, rationalism,…[and] the glorification of body and mind". Accompanying these principals was an obligation of fierce loyalty to the city-state and a willingness to shed blood for its betterment. These ideals, while ambitious