Ancient Greece

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Ancient Greece

• The Emergence of Western Intellectual Thought

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First of all, why study the ancient Greeks and
Romans?

• It is primarily from the Greeks and Romans that
  we, as westerners, received our basic
  understanding of science, mathematics, religion,
  and socio-political philosophy, developed our
  legal framework, organized our cities, educated
  our young, and began advanced medical practices.
• The modern novel, as well as comic books, have as
  their origins the ultra-heroic and fantastic
  characters found in Hellenistic literature.
• We, as a people, owe our world view to that of
  the ancient Greeks and Romans, both cosmopolitan,
  global economic and military superpowers whose
  distinctive worldview provide them with a sense
  of world citizenship.

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Greek Mythology and Early History

• The specifics of ancient Greeces earliest
  origins are lost in a unique blend of mythology
  and epic history a recounting of oral tradition
  captured in tales of heroism, trials, and
  tribulation
• A series of ever-changing bards tales that both
  entertain and serve to educate the public.
• Among the best surviving examples of such
  histories are the works by Homer The Iliad
  and the Odyssey

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• Not to be born is best, when all is reckoned, But
  when man has seen the light of day
• The next best thing by far is to go back
• Where he came from, and as quick as he can.
• Once youth is past, with all its follies,
• Every affliction comes on him,
• Envy, confrontation, conflict, battle,
  blood,
• And last of all, old age lies in wait to
  besiege him,
• Humiliated, cantankerous,
• Friendless, sick and weak,
• Worst evil of all.
• -- Sophocles, Oedipus at Colonus

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In the beginning . . .

• Greeks are descended from Indo-European peoples
  who begin to populate southern Europe 12 15000
  years ago
• Their specific origins are obscure, shrouded in
  myth and pre-history
• They began to settle the peninsular land mass
  during the 8th millennium BCE and did so in a
  series of waves each one accompanied by the
  violent displacement of previous settlements
  and ending with the Dorian migration around 1100
  BCE

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The Origins of Man

• The ancient Greeks (from the word Graeci) held
  many and various views as to the origins of
  mankind, however, they almost universally
  accepted the fact that Greece itself was the
  center of the universe and that mankind
  originated there.
• One thought was that man was autochthon, gegenes,
  an aborigine species that sprang from the earth
  as did the legendary men of Cadmus who rose from
  dragons teeth sown in the ground or that of Zeus
  changing ants into men.
• Another popular and somewhat familiar creation
  myth has Prometheus create man from blocks of clay

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Greek Cosmology

• The Greek world view was shaped in part by the
  various tribal migrations and displacements, as
  well as, geography.
• The Greek peninsula is small, approximately
  45,000 sq. miles or roughly the size of the
  modern state of Louisiana. It is rugged with an
  east-west mountain chain across its northern
  section and a north-south series of mountains
  down its spine in the lower part of the
  peninsula. These mountains at 8 10,000 ft
  serve to isolate the population into pockets of
  habitation along the few river systems, high
  plains, and coastal lowlands. The coastline
  itself is rocky, uninviting with foreboding high
  cliffs, occasionally offering some well-protected
  natural harbors

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• Each village, eventually each major urban center
  ( gr. Polis, poleis, pl), believed in its own
  legendary and mythical beginnings, established
  its own festivals, rituals, and means of worship.
  
• Each community appropriated its own gods as did
  its citizens. The mythical heroes of ancient
  Greece descended from gods and many of its most
  prominent citizens made similar claims.
• Even Plato, philosopher and rationalist, claimed
  that his parents descended from the sea-god
  Poseidon, and further claimed that the god Apollo
  had visited his mothers bed and that he was the
  product of that union

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• To the Greeks, gods and men were of the same
  race, the gods only being immortal and possessing
  a more extreme range of human characteristics and
  emotion.
• While the gods could be benevolent, often times
  they were vindictive, envious, subject to fits of
  rage, and often amoral.
• Other than the gods, the Greeks believed in the
  Fates, the inescapable force of nature which
  ultimately determined mans lifespan on earth
• Here too, we have the legend of the Flood that
  destroyed mankind and a second story of creation
  or re-creation that predates the written
  biblical account and may have influenced the
  writers of the Noah story.

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• The gods demonstrated their concern for the
  Greeks in many ways. According to various
  legends it was the Greeks who received, before
  all other nations, the gift of viticulture
  (pruning), small grains, such as, wheat and rye,
  the olive tree, the fig tree, the first ivy , and
  the bean a native plant of Greece. In
  mythology, it was Prometheus who gave to man (the
  Greeks) the gift of fire.
• The cultural history of the Greeks also lays
  claim to several inventions as first being Greek
  Argo, the first ship to sail the sea in
  Sparta, Myles (the Greek word for miller) had
  invented the first mill but, the Athenians lay
  claim for teaching men how to use fire
• The Greeks readily conceded that the more banal
  inventions of human toil were acquired from
  others the trumpet, helmet, and shield from
  Lydia the war chariot and geometry they received
  from Egypt draperies from Libya the alphabet
  from Phoenicia and, the sundial and division of
  the day from Babylon

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Greek Socio-political Life

• As early fortified villages grew in size and
  population, larger urban centers formed. These
  autonomous communities, known as poleis, became
  for the Greeks the embodiment of the State, the
  religious, and economic center.
• Citizens, normally adult males, determined the
  communal course of action in all affairs. Women
  and children, although citizens, had no political
  voice or legal rights. Slaves were not
  considered citizens and had no rights or voice.
• At the heart of the polis was the agora or
  marketplace, it was the place to see and be seen
  and was a central focus in the lives of the
  communitys elite. The agora was the place where
  reputations were made or broken, deals and
  alliances arranged, and business conducted.

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• The Greeks were very curious about the cosmos and
  the world in which they lived. They struggled
  with questions of their existence and sought
  rational explanations for things around them.
  They made great strides in mathematics, i.e., the
  Pythagorean Theorem (a² b² c²), construction
  and architecture, metal fabrication, and ship
  building.
• In philosophy, we continue to study Socrates,
  Plato, and Aristotle while literature students
  struggle through The Theban Plays, the works of
  Homer, and Sophocles Oedipus Tyrannus.
  Historians continue to garner more from the works
  of Herodotus (Historias) and Thucydides, whose
  history of the Peloponnesian War remains the
  seminal work of that disastrous affair.

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The Golden Age of Athens, 420 365 B.C.E.

• The idea of the Golden Age is as mythical as are
  the early legends of Greece. It is an invention
  of the 18th Century Enlightenment and the 19th
  Century Victorian Age in Great Britain in which
  the Greek revival took place
• Despite all of the advances in art and philosophy
  that are admired today, ancient Greece was still
  largely a violent and dangerous place to live.
  When not at war with each other, the various
  Greek tribes fought against other external
  forces the Persians, the Egyptians, the
  Carthaginians, and ultimately, Rome. Not until
  Phillip of Macedonia finally united the
  individual Greek states in 338 B.C.E. were the
  Greeks ever united

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• Displaced by war, famine, excess population and
  natural calamities, the Greeks began to inhabit
  the areas surrounding them and colonized southern
  Italy, Sicily, the Ionian coast of the Anatolian
  Peninsula, the area adjacent to the Black Sea,
  and the numerous islands of the Aegean Sea.
• These colonizers established their colonies along
  the lines of their particular polis of origin.
  At these fringes of the Greek world they came
  into contact with other peoples, cultures, and
  traditions. They established a growing network
  of trade and political alliances, subjugating
  some and, in turn, being subjugated by others.

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Greek Family Life

• For the elite upper classes family life was
  decidedly different than it was for the commoner.
  Monogamy was hardly ever practiced by the
  nobility who married repeatedly to establish
  important social and political alliances.
• Disgruntled wives would often plot against or
  murder their philandering husbands and their
  offspring.
• Infanticide was routinely practiced with the
  noted exception of the first-born male child.
• Both men and women practiced homosexuality
  although it was more common for males than
  females (See Sapphos, author of lesbian poetry
  in ancient Greece). The Greeks practiced
  pedophilia, the body of a ten year-old boy would
  be a sought after sexual conquest in their
  society.
• Greeks had an obsession with youth and living in
  the moment. Even older Spartans, who served
  actively in the military to age sixty, would dye
  their hair for a more youthful appearance.

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The Greek Tragedy

• Life in Greece reflected and, in turn, was
  reflected in the works of the famous dramatists
  Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides
• The tragedies were performed at times of
  religious festivals and celebrations of the 5th
  and 4th centuries BCE and typically dealt with
  one or more of the following themes
• The struggle of individual conscience and
  sensibility against the needs of the community
  (polis) and the power of the state
• Arrogance (hubris) that blinds the strong or
  self-righteous individual to possible misfortune
  and defeat
• The endless series of bloody revenges triggered
  by mad acts rising from anger and sexual drive
• Tragedies strip human nature of its protective
  clothing and societies from its pious myths

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Greek Communal Life

• At the heart of Greek communal life was the
  Polis, or the city-state. Each citizen
  subordinated themselves to the needs of the
  polis, whether a cave dwelling or urban city.
• Adult males served the polis in both
  socio-political roles and the military.
• The surrounding farmers fed the urban population
  in time of peace and served as its infantry in
  time of war
• The agora served as the community marketplace,
  chamber of commerce, and business development
  center.
• Warfare was a community activity. The victors
  vanquished the losers by laying waste to their
  lands, fields and polis, slaughtering their
  defeated enemies, men, women, and children, or
  hauling off survivors for use as slaves. If they
  felt generous, they would allow the ruling
  citizens to commit suicide.

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Persian Wars

• Ionian Revolt supported by Athens angers Darius
  who brutally puts down the revolt and then
  declares war on Athens which culminates in the
  Battle of Marathon 490 BCE.
• In 486 BCE, Xerxes begins preparations to renew
  the war against the Greeks. He assembles an
  large army of possibly 150,000 300,000 men,
  although Herodotus claims more than 2 million,
  and a navy of over 700 ships, many of them manned
  by Phoenicians, Egyptians, and Ionian Greeks. In
  a series of land and naval battles, Thermopylae,
  Artemesium, Salamis, and, finally, Plataea in
  480 - 479 BCE, the Persians are defeated.
• (Nike, gr. victory)

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The Peloponnesian Wars, 431 -404 BCE

• Following the Persian Wars, the Greek city-states
  began to align themselves with one of the two
  remaining powerful city-states, Athens, with its
  demos and vast commercial enterprise, and Sparta,
  rich in its martial traditions and presumptive
  invincibility
• Athens, a naval power and dependent upon trade
  wanted to eliminate any further threat posed by
  the Persians remaining in the Aegean and
  Anatolian Peninsular following the Persian Wars.
  Sparta and her allies had no interest in
  continuing the war against Persia or contributing
  to Athens growing economic prosperity and
  political power
• During the period of the 440s BCE, the two
  superpowers engaged in a series of conflicts,
  without result, and then hastily agreed to a
  peace proposal that neither could ensure.

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• The war itself was conducted in four major phases
  over 27 years. Political in-fighting,
  internecine rivalries, and self-serving motives
  all acted to continue the conflict and prevent a
  suitable resolution during the time
• The fighting ultimately ended when the Athenian
  navy was destroyed and a Spartan force entered
  Athens after destroying her food production and
  means of replenishment by sea. In addition, the
  Athenian colony in Sicily suffered an out break
  of the plague further reducing Athenian influence
  and resolve.
• Although the terms of surrender were generous by
  Spartan standards, many of Athens citizens were
  slaughtered or committed suicide

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Athens and Sparta

• Athens, under the leadership of Pericles was
  governed by a demos, a body of all male citizens
  over 18 years of age (numbering around 43,000),
  which had the power (gr. kratia) to, among other
  things, legislate, establish treaties, and
  declare war.
• It was, by the 5th century, a cosmopolitan city
  built around commercial enterprise and
  international trade. Its citizenry consisted of
  predominately lower and upper middle-class
  families, foreigners, and a significant number of
  slaves a total population of 150,000.
• Athenians produced about 35 of their food
  supply, relying on imports to feed its populace.
  Its Sicilian colony contributed to much of this
  trade.
• Athens controlled the treasury of the Delian
  League and moved the treasury form Delphi to
  Athens, which gave Athens control over its
  allies, forcing them to remain in the League and
  to pay tribute

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• Sparta, located in the southwestern Peloponnesus,
  was an oligarchy a militaristic society whose
  prime function was warfare.
• A small population, never exceeding 35,000,
  Sparta relied upon conquest to expand its control
  over the Peloponnesus rather than establishing
  external colonies like other states.
• Spartas conquest of neighboring Messenia in 730
  B.C.E. and subsequent subjugation of its
  population who had been reduced to serfs serving
  the Spartan state a.k.a. helots, from the Greek
  meaning capture
• At the age of 7, young males were taken from
  their families and moved into military barracks
  where they would be trained in martial arts and
  educated in Spartan ways. Spartans served in the
  army until age 60.
• Spartan women had more, albeit relatively
  speaking, rights than women in other Greek
  city-states, but they too served the state.
  Their primary function was to raise warriors.

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Rise of Western Culture Classical Greece

• Herodotus (c. 484 -425 B.C.E.) the Father of
  History. His History of the Persian Wars is
  commonly regarded as the first real historical
  work in western civilization, that is a
  systematic analysis of past events. His biased
  writings lauded Athens and presumed the wars to
  be a struggle between freedom (or state freedom)
  and despotism. He also traveled extensively,
  catalogued human behavior and is considered more
  of an anthropologist today.
• Thucydides (c. 460 c. 400 B.C.E.) a failed
  and exiled Athenian general who participated in
  and wrote extensively about the Peloponnesian
  War. Unconcerned with the influence of the gods
  and fate, Thucydides examined the causes of the
  war in a clear, methodical, objective fashion,
  placing much emphasis on accuracy and the
  precision of his facts, and is considered by
  scholars to be the greatest historian of the
  ancient world

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• Classical Greek art is represented primarily
  through both architecture and sculpture.
• The construction of the Parthenon, built between
  447 432 B.C.E. as a dedication to Athena, the
  patron goddess of Athens, perhaps best represents
  the style and characteristics of fifth century
  Greek architecture in Athens. It typifies both
  the enthusiasm for construction and the defining
  principles of classical architecture the search
  for calm, clarity, and the freedom from
  superfluous details. Greek revival architecture
  dominated the American scene in the 19th century
  and is commonly seen today.
• In sculpture, the male nude form was the favorite
  subject of the classical Greeks who attempted to
  achieve an idealized form, life-like, yet
  perfected. Polyclitus, a 5th century sculptor
  authored a treatise (Doryphoros) on proportions
  that utilized mathematical ratios found in nature
  that produced the ideal human form, perfected and
  refined the dominant feature of standards in
  classical sculpture

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Greek Philosophy love and wisdom

• Early Greek philosophers were concerned about the
  development of critical or rational thought about
  nature and the divine forces operating in nature,
  however, most Greeks had no interest in such
  speculations.
• By the 5th century, a group of philosophical
  teacher known as Sophists rejected such
  speculations as foolish arguing that
  comprehension of nature was beyond the reach of
  the human mind the improvement of the individual
  was a more worthwhile endeavor, therefore, they
  stressed the study of human behavior.
• Sophists were wandering educators who sold their
  services as teachers of young men
• They stressed the importance of rhetoric (or the
  art of persuasive oratory) in winning debates and
  swaying an audience
• Sophists were typically skeptics who questioned
  traditional values in their society.

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• To Sophists there was no absolute right or wrong,
  true wisdom consisted of the ability to perceive
  and pursue ones own self-interests. Is this
  attitude beneficial or harmful to society?
• Of Greeces city-states, the one most closely
  associated with philosophy is Athens. Socrates,
  Plato, and Aristotle all lived there making
  Athens the center for the development of western
  thought

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• Socrates (469 399 B.C.E.) a stonemason whose
  true love was philosophy. He left no writings of
  his own and what we know about him comes
  primarily from his pupils, especially Plato. He
  taught a number of students, however, he took no
  pay believing that the goal of education was to
  improve the individual. His teaching style made
  use of a question-and-answer method that is still
  in use today and is known as the Socratic Method.
• Socrates believed that all knowledge was within
  each person and critical examination was needed
  to bring that knowledge out. Such was the real
  task of philosophy.
• His questioning of authority, particularly in the
  aftermath of the Peloponnesian War during a
  climate of intolerance caused Socrates to be
  accused and convicted of corrupting the minds of
  Athens youth a sentence that resulted in his
  death

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• Plato (c. 429 327 B.C.E.) one of Socrates most
  famous students is considered by many scholars to
  be the greatest philosopher of the western world.
  Unlike his famous teacher, Plato wrote
  extensively, questioned reality, and arriving at
  the conclusion that a higher world of eternal,
  unchanging ideal Forms had always existed and to
  understand these Forms was to attain the
  knowledge of truth.
• The Republic is a collection of Platos thoughts
  on government. As a citizen of Athens, he
  distrusted the masses as individuals could not be
  trusted to be ethical, just, or rational. He
  divides the population into three groups the
  ruling elite or philosopher-kings, the warriors
  who protected society, and the masses, those not
  driven by wisdom or courage, they were the
  producers of society, the tradesmen, artisans,
  and farmers. Plato also believed that men and
  women should have equal access to education and
  all positions contrary to popular belief
• The Academy a school in Athens established by
  Plato to train philosophers. One of his students
  was Aristotle who later tutored Alexander the
  Great

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• Aristotle (384 322 B.C.E.) rejected the
  teachings of Platos Ideal Forms and taught the
  analysis and classification of things based on
  thorough research and investigation. His
  interests and writings were wide ranging and
  included topics on ethics, logic, politics,
  poetry, astronomy, geology, biology, and physics.
  He founded the Lyceum, a school to educate young
  men
• In his political treatise, Politics, Plato also
  questioned the efficiency of the Athenian
  government, but he carefully examined 158
  different forms of constitutional governments and
  determined that constituted good forms monarchy,
  aristocracy, and constitutional government. He
  also recognized that each form had certain
  drawbacks and that a constitutional form was his
  favorite. Platos work influenced the writings
  of 18th century philosophes and enlightenment
  thinkers to include those of the American and
  French Revolutions.
• With regard to women, Aristotle believed them to
  be inferior to men in all respects an influence
  that persisted well into the 20t h century of the
  modern era.

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Unification and Conquest

• Greece in the 4th century BCE was in turmoil
  following the fighting in the Peloponnesian Wars.
• Macedonia, to the north of Greece, was inhabited
  by rural tribal clans who the Greeks thought to
  be barbarians, but it was in Macedonia that
  Philip II rose to power and would, by treaty and
  warfare, unite all of Greece for the first time
  in 338 B.C.E.
• Philip united the Greek states into the
  Corinthian League.
• Philip planned to invade Persia and end Persian
  influence in the Aegean once and for all, but was
  assassinated in 336 B.C.E. on the eve of the
  planned invasion.

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Alexander the Great

• Alexander was one of two children born to Philip
  and Olympias and he was estranged to his father
  until late in his fathers military campaign to
  unite Greece
• At the age of 20, Alexander becomes king of
  Macedonia and leads his army against rival and
  rebelling Greek factions before embarking on an
  invasion of Persia.
• Between 334 B.C.E. and his death on June 10, 323
  B.C.E., Alexander and his Macedonians conquer
  most to the known world Asia Minor, Egypt,
  Persia, and western India.
• There are many inconclusive views of Alexander
  which scholars use today to portray him. He
  certainly was a capable military commander, both
  bold and brutal, but also visionary. He was
  distrustful of all but few of his closest
  intimates. He divided the administration of the
  conquered territories and often relied upon local
  leaders to remain loyal, which most did. He
  created opportunities to extend Greek culture,
  language, architecture throughout the empire.

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The Hellenistic Kingdoms

• Alexanders death resulted in a power struggle
  amongst his generals and the empire that was
  created so quickly, dissolve even more rapidly.
• From 323 283 B.C.E., Alexanders generals and
  their sons bickered and fought each other.
  Eventually four Hellenistic monarchies emerged
  the Macedonian kingdom under the Antigonid
  dynasty Syria and Palestine under the Seleucids,
  the Attalid kingdom of western Asia Minor and
  the kingdom of the Ptolemies in Egypt, which
  lasted until 30 B.C.E. and ended with the death
  of Cleopatra resulting in the change of control
  of Egypt to Roman hands.

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Quiz 3 Identifications

• Mycenaean(s)
• Iliad and Odyssey
• Phalanx
• Tyrants
• Oligarchy and democracy
• Delian League
• Peloponnesian War
• Oracle at Delphi
• Battle at Chaeronea
• Antigonid, Seleucid, Attalid, and Ptolemaic
  Dynasties
• Use the instructions for doing identifications
  found on my website to properly complete this
  assignment