DEVELOPMENT OF ANCIENT GREECE
:Crete: Minoan Civilization (ca. 3,000 - 1,400 B.C.)
1. Excavated by Sir Arthur Evans (early 20th Century).
2. Flourished between 1600-1400 B.C.: Period of Minoan Domination.
3. Unwalled Cities: Confidence in their navies -- ie. "Theseus and the Minotaur" relates to the domination and liberation of the Greeks.
4. Architecture:
a. Homes: usually two or more stories.
b. Palaces: built around a rectangular court, many stair cases with smaller courts surrounded by a colonade.
c. Running Water.
* Knossos - Labrinth - maze -- a Greek conception.
* Final destruction ca. 1400 B.C. - probably by Mycenean Greeks.
5. Religion: An Agrarian Society (importance of Fertility).
a. Earth Mother Goddess: a dominant role.
b. Male gods in a subordinate role.
c. Dancing and Bull Leaping formed a part of the religious ceremony.
Migration Into Greece:
1. Greece: Hellas
Greeks: Hellenes
2. Legend: descended from Hellen.
* Achaeus: Acheans
* Ion: Ionians
* Dorus: Dorians
3. The Three Generations of Gods paralleling Greek migration into the Grecian (Balkan) Peninsula.
* Uranus - Cronus - Zeus
* Magna Graecia: Roman
4. Migrated from the North: Thrace (ie. Yugoslavia and Bulgaria).
5. Ionians: 2500-2000 B.C.
a. Settled in Central Greece and the islands of the Aegean.
b. Autothons: stone age people they encountered.
6. Achean or Mycenean Kings:
a. Built cities on the Pleoponesus: Mycenae and Pylos.
b. War Like: carried out raids in the Eastern Mediterranean.
c. Traded with Sicily and Italy.
d. Destruction of Knossos.
Destruction of Troy. (10 year struggle)
* Heinrich Schlieman (ie. significance of Homer: the Iliad and the Odyssey.)
1.) Disruption after the war.
2.) Internal warfare and revolution: the Nostoi.
3.) Possible reasons for Dorian successes.
7. Dorians: ca. 1100 B.C.
a. Much more massive than the first migration of Greeks.
b. Conquered and enslaved earlier inhabitants.
c. Refugees:
1.) Moved to Attica - Athens became a center of the remains of Mycenean Civilization.
2.) Movement to the island of Lesbos and Western Asia Minor.
3.) People displaced from the Peloponese: occupied islands of the Central Aegean and the central sector of Asia Minor.
8. Center of Dorian Power:
a. The Peloponesus: Sparta - Laconia.
b. Part of Crete, southern islands of the Aegean.
c. Southern Section of Asia Minor.
* Map of Classical Greece was drawn by 900 B.C.
Writing:
1. Minoans: Three Types (ie. Arthur Evans)
a. Pictograms
b. Linear A: pictograms and additional characters.
c. Linear B: combined signs from Linear A with other new signs.
2. 1939: Carl Blegen, an American discovered Linear B at Pylos, an Achean city.
3. Michael Ventris: 1952
a. He showed Linear B was system of phonograms, an ancient form of Greek.
b. Linear B may indicate that the Acheans controlled Crete late in their history.
Dark Ages: 900 - 600 B.C.
1. There was a Renaissance (rebirth of learning).
2. Relearned how to write by 700 B.C. (from the Phoenicians).
* Ionic and Doric Dialects.
Polis: the City State
1. Origins in the geographical features of Greece -- ie. division and independence.
2. Constitutions Varied: usually small in size and small in population.
* 5,000-10,000 - citizens, resident aliens, and slaves.
3. Original Polis: an Acropolis, a fortified refuge or asylum in case of danger.
* Became a convenient center where villagers or clans might sacrifice to the gods or exchange goods.
4. Birth was essential for citizenship.
* The polis made possible the development of literature, art, philosophy, and republican government.
5. Public Meeting Place: Assembly of Citizens
6. Under the Aristocracies (oligarchs), there was significant growth.
a. Steady pressure against the kings.
b. By the 8th Century B.C.: the nobles had become the real power in the Polis.
* Usually done by making the Monarchy an elective office.
7. Codification of Laws: most important contribution of the city state.
8. Period of Colonization: 7th Century B.C.
Why: limited access to the political and financial circles of the Polis - desire for land.
Religion:
1. Explanation of nature and why man lost self control. ie. human passions (hubris)
2. How to gain a good life, fortune and a good harvest.
Temples: only a shrine to the god; they cremated their dead.
3. Gods: (Anthropomorphic) - man like.
* Man-like with human weaknesses living on Mount Olympus.
Zeus Hades Apollo Hephaestus
Hera Athena Hermes Artemis
Poseidon Aphrodite Dionysus Hestia
4. Belief in Oracles: foretelling of the future.
The Delphic Oracle: the medium at Delphi was an elderly woman, Pythia (knowledge with or from snakes). At first there was only one and eventually there were three on duty at any given time.
a. Dressed in the style of a young girl, but she had to be over 50 years old (to prevent the molesting of the priestesses).
b. The message was given to a male priest, and he took it to a priestess in the temple sitting on a tripod.
c. There was hole under the tripod from which fumes of burnt barely, laurel leaves and hemp came.
d. This priestess would give her answer to an Exgete (one skilled in interpretation) who would then write it down in verse form. Then another priestess would help interpret it.
* Loxion or Loxias Apollo: The Ambiguous One.
e. A.D. 363: the last oracle given at Delphi.
* Given to the Roman Emperor Julian, the last pagan emperor (known as the Apostate). ie. Our beautiful house is gone etc.
5. Olympic Games: held every fourth year in Olympia in honor of Zeus.
ie. 776 B.C.: dated time in Olympiads.
Rise of Nobles: ca. 800 B.C.
1. Supplied military forces (cavalry); land was also controlled by the Nobility.
2. An Increase in Slavery: if you could not pay your debts, you could be sold into slavery.
* Prisoners of war and children of slaves added to the slave population.
3. Movement to the cities -- caused a commercial and merchant class to develop.
4. Colonization: ca. 750 - 550 B.C.
Byzantium
Syracuse
Cyrene - North Africa
5. Oligarchy - city states controlled by nobles.
6. Discontent led to the rise of the Age of Tyrants: ca. 650-500 B.C.
Athens: Attica (Ionians)
1. 13th Century B.C. fortification of the Acropolis of Athens is probably connected with the formation of the Athenian State.
* It is attributed to Theseus.
2. The monarchy gave way to the aristocracy as elsewhere in Greece.
3. The Archonship (nine of them) became an annual office in 683 - 682 B.C.
a. The Aristocracy retained and increased their power.
b. Controlled political offices and most of the land.
4. 632 B.C.: Cyclon attempted to overthrow aristocratic power.
* He was defeated and the power of the oligarchs remained intact.
5. Draco: ca. 621 B.C.
a. Credited with the Codification of Laws in Athens.
b. Dealt with murder: death penalty/harsh punishments, ie. "draconic"
* He may not have existed (historic/legendary figure).
6. Solon: challenged the authority of the aristocracy.
a. Elected Archon in 594 B.C.
b. Freed debtor slaves whether held on the land (Attica) orsold abroad.
c. Democratic Foundation: made the Ekklesia, Assembly, independent of the Archons.
* The Council of 400 proposed laws to the Ekklesia.
d. Established the Heliaea (law court) and made magistrates responsible to the people.
* these moves created dissatisfaction among the Aristocracy.
e. Instituted Timocracy: division of classes (4) based on annual wealth.
ie. Property Qualifications.
7. Political Instability after Solon left office.
* The State was divided into Three groups or factions.
a. Landed Aristocrats.
b. Owners of Small Farms and those without land.
c. Artisans and Traders.
d. Political Parties Forming: Solon was upset; he had attempted to find some kind of political harmony.
8. Tyranny: Pisistratus (560 - 546 B.C.) attempted three times to overthrow the government.
a. First two attempts were failures -- need for support and aid.
b. He believed in unlimited power with support from a large part of the population.
c. Opposition: from the Aristocrats, Artisans, and Traders.
9. A Ten Year Struggle: Pisistratus forced into exile.
a. Forms personal alliances with Argos and Naxos.
b. Went to Thrace: gained wealth from silver mines there.
c. Created a mercenary army personally loyal to him.
10. 546 B.C.: Pisistratus landed near Marathon and established his Tyranny in Athens.
a. Remains in power until 527 B.C., Pisistratus' death.
b. The Tyranny is maintained by his son, Hippias, until 510 B.C.
1.) Hippias expelled from Athens with Sparta's aid.
2.) True democratic forms develop after the Tyranny.
11. Reformer: Cleisthenes - Post Dictatorem
a. Reorganized society into (10) social and military tribes; the power of certain families was broken.
b. The Council of 500: Fifty individuals from each tribe which took over most of the duties of the Archons.
c. Opened government to all classes: ended land requirements.
* All male citizens over 20 years could participate in government.
DIRECT/REPRESENTATIVE DEMOCRACY
d. Introduced Ostracism -- the expulsion of a citizen from the state.
12. Weaknesses:
a. Women could not vote; limited to males, citizen by birth.
b. Slaves and Metics (resident aliens) could not become citizens.
c. Existence of Slavery - prisoner of war and debtors.
d. Freedom of Speech was even denied at times (practice of ostracism).
Sparta: Laconia (Dorians)
1. Invasion (1100 B.C.) and settlement in the Peloponesus (ca. 1000 B.C..
2. Dual Monarchy: two families
Agiads and Eurypontids
3. By 700 B.C., all but the Easter Coast (of the Peloponesus) had been conquered.
4. Population (native) reduced to:
a. Perioikoi: retained partial independence but were subject to obligation to serve in the Spartan Army during war.
b. Helots (Acheans): were serfs bound to the soil which they cultivated for their Spartan Masters (actual slave population).
5. Second Half of the 7th Century B.C.
a. Refinements of life - causing the Spartans to lose their war-like character.
b. Fundamental Problem:
1.) How could they lead a life devoted to commerce, agriculture, and the arts and keep in subjugation a population ten times their size. (the Helots)
2.) The Helot System was too appealing: the Spartans reordered their lives -- commerce was out, iron money was their only currency.
Lycurgus: the law giver; probably a mythological character.
* He was associated with reforms (ca. 600 B.C.) which created a new state.
6. Thus Sparta constituted a perpetual army - transformed their city into an unwalled military camp.
a. Life was completely occupied with military training.
b. Marriage, birth, education of children, economy, and occupation were controlled by the state.
c. Grecian Custom: the father had the right to raise his child or put him to death.
* In Sparta, this power was taken over by a board who could order the exposure (death) of a child.
d. The child was placed in the care of his mother until the age of seven then place under the direct control of the state.
e. Youths organized for athletic and military drill.
* Stealing was encouraged (purpose: an exercise in agility).
f. Supreme Test of Endurance: once a year each youth submitted to a flogging at the alter of Artemis Orthia.
g. At Twenty, a youth became a man and was liable for military service in the field.
1.) Military Obligation: 20 - 60 years of age.
2.) Permitted to marry but not to live with her. He lived in military barracks.
* A Spartan was compelled to marry at Thirty.
h. At 30, a Spartan became a mature man and could attend the Assembly, Apella.
7. Similar training for girls until they married.
* Marriage Ceremony: a mock abduction.
8. The Purpose of the rigid system: control of the Helots, Pre-Dorian Serfs.
a. Helots were assigned to the lands of the citizens and could not be freed or sold outside of the country (polis).
b. Helots belonged to the state rather than the individual.
c. They had to produce a fixed amount by law. Failure to meet one's quota could result in expulsion from your military unit.
* The Spartan to whom the Helots had been assigned.
d. Menial Labor - many indignities, liable for service in time war. Only on rare occasions.
* Helots were forced to wear a dog skin cap.
e. Crypteia: Secret Police formed to spy on the Helots.
1.) The Ephors (executive): Five men elected by the Apella.
2.) To avoid a murder charge, the Ephors were accustomed each year on entering office to declare war on the Helots.
9. The Perioikoi: mixture of Pre-Dorian and Dorians -- dependent on Sparta.
a. Used to defend the land and hedge the Helots in.
b. Free in local government; made up the business class of Laconia.
10. The Kings: Ceremonial Office
* They were priests of Zeus and functioned as judges in cases concerning family law and public highways.
11. The Gerousia: Council of Elders
a. Twenty Eight Members past the age of Sixty and the two kings.
b. Considered measures to be presented to the Apella, Assembly.
c. Also functioned as the Supreme Criminal Court.
d. Presidency of the body was eventually transferred from the Kings to the Ephors.
12. Ephors: Five Men (Democratic Element)
a. Supervised the training of youths.
b. Presided over the Gerousia and the Apella.
c. Absolute power over the Helots.
d. Could in an emergency, put a perioikoi to death untried.
e. Power over the kings, omens every nine years - if seen, could depose a king or force him into exile.
13. League: By the 6th Century B.C. all the state of the Peloponesus with a few exceptions were in league with Sparta.
a. Separate treaties with each state.
b. Reluctant to leave the Peloponesus.
1.) Fear of the Helots (revolt).
2.) Argos
3.) Fear of exposure to corrupting influences of the outside.
14. Important Historical Perspective: Sparta's military state was coming to its heighth when the dangers of Oriental Conquest (Persia) began to threaten Greece. (Fifth Century B.C.)
THE PERSIAN WARS:
Herodotus: "Greece suffered more sorrows than in twenty generations before." (The reigns of Darius, Xerxes, and Artaxerxes)
1. 521 B.C.: Darius I of Persia crossed the Bosporus and conquered Thrace and Macedonia (492).
* Empire included Persia, Afghanistan, Northern India, Turkestan, Mesopotamia, Northern Arabia, Egypt, Cyprus, Palestine, Syria, Asia Minor; the Eastern Aegean, Thrace, and Macedonia.
2. 510 B.C.: Darius had hardly hear of Greece.
3. 506 B.C.: Hippias, the deposed tyrant of Athens went to the Satrap of Sardis in Asia Minor.
* Offered to keep Attica under Persian dominion if they helped him regain power. (Little attention paid to him at this time - Greece viewed as no threat to Persia.)
4. ca. 500 or 499 B.C.: Greek City States of Asia Minor dismissed their satraps and declared their independence. They had been ruled for 50 years by Persia.
a. Aristagoras of Miletus went to Sparta seeking aid, without any success.
b. Then he went to Athens: they sent a fleet of twenty ships to help in the revolt.
5. 494 B.C.: The Persians defeated the Ionian Navy - captured Miletus, killed all the men, and enslaved the women and children.
* Persian Rule was re-established - Darius resolved to conquer Greece because of aid that had been given.
6. 492 or 491 B.C.: A Persian Fleet of 600 ships under Datis (200,000 men) was sent against Greece.
a. Camped on the Plain of Marathon - Hippias - advised that the Persians could use their cavalry there.
b. Athens: Miltiades freed and enlisted slaves as well as freemen.
c. Rival Greek Armies had some 20,000 men to the Persians' 100,000.
d. The Persians were unaccustomed to individual fighting and were not trained for mass defense and the attack of the Greeks.
(Ten Generals - one supreme for a day) - Aristides yielded command to Miltiades.
e. Greek Account: 6400 Persians died to 192 Greeks.
f. The Spartans arrived after the battle was over.
Aristides and Themistocles:
1. Miltiades asked for a fleet of seventy ships under his unchecked command.
a. Went to Paros and demanded 100 talents ($600,000) on pain of death.
b. Recalled and fined 50 talents, but died soon afterwards.
c. Paid by his son Cimon, future rival of Pericles.
2. Power shifted to Aristides.
a. Felt democracy had gone far enough.
b. The Persian Treasure and Tribute was placed at Delos.
c. Power of the Assembly would lead to administrative corruption and public disorder. (Belief of Aristides)
d. Themistocles, leader of the democratic party, had him exiled in 482 B.C. (ostracism).
3. Themistocles:
a. As early as 493 B.C.: he began construction of a new harbor at Piraeus.
b. In 482 B.C.: Themistocles persuaded the Athenians to forgo distribution from silver mines at Laurium and used the money to build a fleet of 100 ships.
XERXES:
1. Darius died in 485 B.C. and was succeeded by his son, Xerxes.
2. Xerxes prepared and sent a force of 2,641,000 men/1207 ships to invade Greece.
3. Sparta dispatched a small force to Thermopylae: fathers - no sons.
* Leonidas and the 300: held the Persians for a time until betrayed by a fellow Greek, but gave Greece time they needed.
4. Athens: proclamation - Save your family as best you can. The city was evacuated.
* A deserted city was all that awaited the Persians.
5. 480 B.C.: the Persian Fleet was in the Bay of Salamis. Themistocles sent a slave to convince the Persians that the Greeks were attempting to flee - the Persians land a large number of troops.
* Resulted in an Athenian Victory - Xerxes fled leaving 300,000 men under Mardonius isolated in Greece.
6. A year later 479 B.C. at Plataea: a Greek force of 110,000 led by the Spartan King Pausanias.
* The Boetian Plain near Plataea.
* Greeks' 159 to the Persians' 260,000 - the Ionian Cities in Asia Minor were eventually freed.
EMERGENCE OF ATHENIAN POWER: THE GOLDEN AGE
1. Conflict with Persia continued intermittently - Conquest of Ionia by Cyrus to the overthrow of Darius III by Alexander.
2. 477 B.C.: The Delian Confederacy (League) was established.
a. Purpose: the protection of the city states of Asia Minor and the Aegean against Persia.
b. Each member contributed to a common fund in the temple of Apollo on Delos.
c. Athens contributed ships instead of money -- exercised control over its allies.
CONFEDERACY = ATHENIAN EMPIRE
3. Pericles: leading Athenian statesman from 461 B.C. to his own death in 429 B.C.
a. Made Athens the center of the Greek World both Culturally and Politically.
b. Constructed a long wall connecting Piraeus with the city.
* 4 1/2 miles in length and 550 feet in width.
c. Pericles transferred the treasury of the League from Delos to Athens in 454 B.C.
THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR: 431` - 404 B.C.
1. Causes of the War:
a. Growth of Athenian Power.
b. Athenian claims to leadership was incompatible with the independence of individual city states.
c. Corinthians charged Athens with the enslavement of her allies and designs to do the same to the rest of Greece.
d. Rivalry in trade, Athenian monopoly of pottery in the Italian Market.
e. Pericles, 60, became reconciled to war and thought it better while Athens was in good military condition.
2. Peloponnesian Strategy was to invade Attica and devastate the fields forcing the Athenians from within their walls to meet them.
a. The Athenian army and calvary was not that strong and it was needed to protect the long wall and frontier posts.
b. The Pelopnnesians could do little against the fortifications of Athens at Piraeus.
c. The Athenian Navy could cut off the commerce of the Peloponnesian Coast.
d. In 429 B.C., Pericles died of the plague which had come into Piraeus from the East.
3. The fighting continued until Sparta with the help of Persia forced Athens to surrender in 404 B.C.
DIVISION IN THE GREEK WORLD:
1. 404 - 371 B.C.: Spartan Rule of Greece
* Sparta lacked the money and sea power to rule effectively.
* It was harsher than the Delian League.
2. 371 - 362 B.C.: Theban Domination
3. Need for Union: foreign intervention had been the only possible way to bring union (ie. the Persian Wars).
4. Macedonia was to fill the vacuum created by the failure of the city states.
PHILIP II OF MACEDONIA: Becomes King in 359 B.C.
1. He unified Macedonia by removing the semi-independent principalities of Upper Macedonia.
2. He created a nationalistic sentiment in the army by favoring trade and promoting urbanization.
3. He created an economic power capable of supporting a standing army and launching the expedition of Alexander.
4. 352 B.C.: Philip had penetrated all the way to Thermopylae.
5. Athenian Opposition:
a. Demonthenes attacked Philip as a tyrant and destroyer of Greek liberty. (ie. the Philipics)
b. Athens was defeated at the Battle of Chaeronea in 338 B.C. and Philip was master of Greece.
6. 336 B.C.: Philip was assassinated at the age of 46, when he was about to lead the forces of Macedonia and Greece against Persia.
ALEXANDER III (THE GREAT) 356 - 323 B.C.
1. The son of Philip II and Olympias of Epirus.
2. Aristotle became his tutor, and at a very early age he showed his power of intellect and command.
3. Despite some serious quarrels with Philip (and some palace plots), Alexander did succeed to the throne in 336 B.C.
4. He then devoted himself to the plan of invading Asia:
a. Experience had shown that a Greek Army could penetrate to Mesopotamia and with a good cavalry might defeat any Persian Army.
b. Distances and communication were a problem, but an army could usually live off the land.
5. Having secured Macedonia, Greece and his northern frontiers; Alexander crossed the Hellespont in 334 B.C.
6. Alexander's immediate object was to liberate the Greek cities of Asia Minor.
a. After the Battle of Granicus (near the Hellespont), he reduced the Persian advance forces.
b. As a result, he had achieved his first goal: the liberation of Greek Cities.
7. Alexander then disbanded his navy, and proceeded to defeat the Persian Fleet by land.
* He did this, by conquering Persia's remaining bases in Phoenicia and Egypt.
8. He then completed his conquest of western and souther Asia Minor.
9. This brought the Grand Army of Persia to Action:
a. The Battle of Issus (near Alexandretta) was fought on ground favoring the Persian cavalry.
b. It was won by the superiority of the Macedonian infantry and Alexander's leadership of the cavalry.
c. Alexander refused a favorable peace: this indicated that he intended to conquer the whole of the Persian Empire.
10. Instead of Proceeding East: Alexander spent the next year in occupying Phoenicia, Palestine, and Egypt.
* The capture of Tyre represents his greatest military achievement, and with it Persia ceased to be a Mediterranean Power.
11. 331 B.C.: Alexander left Egypt for Babylon where Darius III had collected another army.
a. At the Battle of Gaygamela (in the plain of Mesopotamia) he outmaneuvered and defeated the Persians on their own ground.
b. Darius escaped, but he just became a mere fugitive.
12. Alexander began to occupy the Persian Capitals (Babylon, Susa, Persepolis, Ecbatara) where the vast treasures of the empire were stored.
13. After the death of Darius, Alexander took the title of Basileus (Great King) and treated further resistance as rebellion (330 B.C.).
14. In a great sweep from the Caspian to the southeast slopes of the Hindu Kush he found little opposition (330 - 329 B.C.).
15. The Indian Expedition (327 - 325 B.C.): Alexander extended the eastern frontiers to the lower Indus.
* The nations of northwestern India, unable to unite, presented to Alexander an opportunity like that which the disunion of Greece had given to Philip.
16. His only formidable opponent was Porus of Paurava whom he defeated.
a. His army refused to follow him any further.
b. The return journey to Persia was quite difficult. The return march was almost disasterous but he arrived safe. (325 - 324 B.C.)
17. The last year of his life shows how great his difficulties would have been if he had survived.
a. Misgovernment and disloyalty among his subordinates.
b. Mutiny of his Macedonians.
c. A uprising of Greek soldiers in Bactria and imminent war in Greece.
18. Alexander died of a fever in Babylon on June 13, 323 B.C.
THE DIADOCHI: (THE SUCCESSORS)
1. The Army was stunned by his death, and a power struggle began between Alexander's family and his generals.
2. By 305 B.C.: Alexander's empire was divided between three generals.
a. Antigonus: Greece and Macedonia
b. Ptolemy: Egypt and Palestine
c. Seleucus: Fertile Crescent and Asia Minor
3. Eventually these Greek Hellenistic Kingdoms were incorporated into the Roman Empire.
THE HERITAGE OF GREECE
THE CLASSICAL AGE: From Xerxes' defeat (479 B.C.) to the beginning of the
Peloponnesian War (431 B.C.)
* Greek Culture: characterized by achievements in drama, philosophy, history, rhetoric, architecture, and sculpture.
Greek Drama:
1. Origin: "Goat songs" honoring the god of win, Dionysus, sung by masked choruses.
2. Training of Choruses: for competitions during the festivals of Dionysus.
3. Role of the Chorus changed:
a. Main attention now on the actors.
b. Chorus: secondary role; commenting, warning, or setting the mood of the play.
4. Written in Poetic Meter: to construct stories that confronted fundamental problems of human life.
5. Outdoor Theaters usually built on the slope of a hill.
* All male citizens could attend freely, for the festivals were regarded as public acts of worship.
6. Actors: men playing both ale and female roles.
7. Masks used to indicate the characters and emotions of roles played by actors.
Tragedies:
1. Themes: relationship of the gods to en, of fate to free will, of private to public duty.
2. Protagonist: central character struggling against fate.
* Classical concept of fate!
a. He is overcome by outside forces that were too strong.
b. Weakness: hubris (pride) - disregard of moral laws and restraint.
3. Aeschylus (400's B.C.): Father of Tragedy
a. Relationship between the gods and men -- Myth viewed as history.
b. Murder of Agamemnon and the revenge that follows.
4. Sophocles: Oedipus Rex
5. Euripides: Trojan Women -- showed the misery of war.
Comedies:
1. More truly satires -- made fun of ideas and people.
2. Aristophanes: The Clouds - made fun of Socrates' theories of Education.
Women taking over the government - the folly of war and its causes.
PHILOSOPHY
Socrates:
1. Short, bald, snub nosed man: Athenian (469 - 399 B.C.)
2. Gave up sculpture for teaching - lived in poverty and refused to take money for his teaching.
3. Critic of Athenian Education:
a. Sophists: taught poetry, government, ethics, geometry, astronomy, and rhetoric.
1.) Socrates considered them deceitful.
2.) Reputation (of the Sophists) for tricky arguments not the use of logic.
b. Socrates: called himself a philosopher, "lover of wisdom".
c. Criticized the sophist method of memorizing; imitation of their elders.
* Importance: Socrates' belief - to think for yourself, one could gain wisdom.
4. Method of Teaching: Questions (Socratic Method)
a. Purpose: to make men to think in order to answer questions for themselves.
b. Socrates told his students to know thyself (yourself).
5. Belief: There was on God, and everyone had a soul that was immortal.
a. Charged with teaching a false religion and corrupting the minds of Athenian youths.
b. Guilty: Socrates was condemned to die by drinking a poison made from hemlock.
Plato:
1. Socrates never wrote down his ideas -- recorded by hisstudent Plato.
2. The Academy established by Plato became a center for Philosophic, mathematical, and scientific work.
For More than 900 Years: Athens became the center of higher education in the Classical World.
3. The Dialogue: dealt with government, education, justice, virtue, and religion.
a. An imagined conversation of a group of students with Socrates.
b. Doubt - Whose Ideas? -- were they Socrates or Plato.
4. The Republic: Ideal form of government.
a. Work that is best fitted to each individual.
b. Workers should be free but not all citizens.
c. Government controlled by Philosophers because of their wisdom.
d. Everything should e owned in common.
e. Aristocracy: of intelligence and ability.
Aristotle: (Tutor of Alexander the Great)
1. Student of Plato who founded his own school in Athens (335 B.C.), the Lyceum.
2. Facts: should be arranged and organized then compare them one to another -- this process became important to modern scientific thinking.
3. Works of Aristotle:
a. Politics: studied the political organization of 150 city states drawing his own conclusions.
b. Ethics: studied the acts and beliefs of men to learn what brought the greatest virtue and happiness.
c. Poetics: a study of Greek drama to show the differences between a good and bad play.
d. Logic: principles of correct thinking.
Philosophy After Aristotle:
1. Greek cities lost real independence -- true political life disappeared.
ie. Conquest of Alexander.
2. Philosophy -- became a guide to life for the rich and the well educated Greek.
* A reasonable code of conduct for the well born.
3. New thoughts and information became a taboo - they were avoided.
4. Quest for truth (ie. Socrates, Plato, Aristotle) faded away.
* Importance: heritage of these men for later generations.
Science, Rhetoric, History:
1. The main development of Greek Science came after the Macedonian Conquest (338 B.C.).
2. Pythagoras (500's - before the Classical Age):
* From the island of Samos.
a. Everything could be explained or expressed with numbers.
b. Developed some principles of geometry to define and measure the surface of the earth.
3. Plato was attracted by geometry and geo-metric astronomy.
4. Aristotle: foundations of botany, zoology, anatomy (systems of physics).
5. Democritus: said all matter is composed of living particles called atoms that can not be divided.
* Question: How was he wrong? The atom can be divided.
6. Hippocrates - Father of Medicine:
a. Founded a school of medicine that put emphasis on careful observation and diagnosis of disease.
b. Disease comes from natural causes not the gods.
* Best Cures: rest, fresh air, and a proper diet.
* The body is made up of humors, and disease comes from an imbalance of these body fluids.
7. Rhetoric: Public Speaking
a. A political necessity in a democratic State.
b. Developed rules of correctness for proper delivery (could be admired whether the speaker had anything to say or not).
c. Decline: after the Polis lost its independence.
ie. The Hellenistic Age
8. History:
a. Herodotus of Halicarnasus: The Persian Wars
1.) Portrayed the war as a struggle between freedom and slavery.
* The Greek Victory proved the superiority of free, self governing communities over the greatest monarchies.
2.) Belief: men remain under the gods and are subject to fate.
* Pride (Hubris) invites divine retribution.
3.) Divine Retribution (thematic) is used to explain Xerxes' defeat.
b. Thucydices (from Athens): the Peloponessian Wars
1.) The body politic like the human body was subject to disease through an imbalance of its parts (ie. humors).
2.) 424 B.C. - elected general - exiled because he failed to prevent a military setback.
3.) Wanted to discover the cause of the imbalance to find the cure (on both sides).
4.) Athens: a tragic hero, betrayed by flaws in her own greatness.
HELLENISM - HELLENISTIC AGE: The intermingling of cultures, (West and East) especially the spread of Greek Culture after the death of Alexander (332 - 133 B.C.)
1. Alexander's unexpected death in Babylon in 332 B.C. led to a struggle among his generals.
2. Nearly a half of century of warfare until three stable monarchies emerged.
a. Ptolemies: Egypt
b. Seleucids: Asia
c. Antigonids: Macedonia
Greek Emigration:
1. Both the Ptolemaic and the Seleucid Empires depended to a large extent on Greek immigrants.
a. Hope of fortune and a better life in a foreign land.
b. Governmental officials and administrators; military service; and farmers in special military colonies.
c. Majority: Urban population, governmental service, business, free professions.
2. Massive Emigration: because of economic set back in Greece.
a. Countryside abandoned by citizen farmers -- replaced by foreigners and slaves.
b. Social Gap: between the upper class of the towns (landowners drawing rents from the country) and the peasants.
* The same was true of the urban poor.
c. Greek Culture came to be the possession of the urban upper class -- it became exportable to the rest of the Greek World.
Hellenistic Philosophy:
1. Philosophers: concerned with providing a code of ethics.
ie. rules or a code of conduct recognized by a particular class, group, or culture.
2. Cynics: founded by Diogenes
a. Men should seek virtue by a return to nature.
b. Rejected pleasure, wealth, and social position.
3. Stoicism: founded by Zeno
a. Concerned with conduct and emphasized duty.
* Some early Christians were attracted by Stoicism.
b. All men were brothers and the best life was one spent in working for the welfare of others.
4. Epicureanism: founded by Epicurus (341-270 B.C.)
a. Freedom of Choice - one should pursue what is most important.
b. Pleasure was the most important pursuit -- the pleasure of the mind over physical pleasure.
Hellenistic Science:
1. Astronomy: Babylonians had observed such events as eclipses, and developed a workable way of locating objects in the sky by means of a spherical grid.
2. Aristarchus of Samos:
* Proposed that the earth revolved around the sun - yet, he could not prove it.
3. Hipparchus of Rhodes:
a. Calculated the times of eclipses of the sun and moon, and the length of the year according to both the sun and moon.
b. First scientist to make systematic use of trigonometry.
4. Eratoshenes (a geographer from Alexandria).
* Maintained that the earth was round, and calculated the diameter of the earth with an error of less than 1%.
5. Euclid: geometric theorems develop logically, author of the Elements (became the standard text for geometry).
6. Archimedes calculated (pi) and the relation between the diameter and circumference of a circle.