ANCIENT GREECE
Greek Geography
The City-states of Ancient Greece
ATHENS
POLIS
ACROPOLIS
Where did Athens get its name?
The Parthenon
The Goddess Athena
How was Athens’ democracy
different from ours?
• Athens had a direct democracy where
all citizens could meet in the Assembly
and vote on laws.
• The United States has a representative
democracy where we elect officials to
make decisions for us.
How else was Athens’ democracy
different from ours?
• Athens had a more limited democracy
• Why? Who couldn’t vote?
– Slaves
– Women
– Men under 30
– Many immigrants
Spartan Society
• Military society
– Boys began
training at the
age of 7
– Military service
began at 20
– Ate and slept at
barracks until
age 60
– Women were
also told to
exercise…why?
The Olympics
How did 2 city-states become so
powerful?
• By defeating Persia
in the Persian Wars
- Battle of Marathon –
Athens defeats
Persians
- Battle of Thermopylae
– 300 Spartans help to
hold off Persians while
Athens builds a navy
- Battle of Salamis –
Persian fleet is
destroyed
Why was this victory so important?
• IT WAS THE TURNING POINT IN
WESTERN CIVILIZATION!!!
• Without this victory, democracy would
ceased to exist.
What happened to Athens and
Sparta?
• Peloponnesian War
– Delian League (Athens) v. Peloponnesian
League (Sparta)
– Both began messing with each other’s allies
– Sparta’s side won, but everyone was
weakened
– This paved the way for the……………….
The Macedonian Conquest
• Alexander the Great
was able to conquer the
weakened city-states
• He then conquered land
all the way to India
• He died undefeated in
battle, but then his
empire was split up (it
was taken over by the
Romans)
Philosophy
• Socrates
– Socratic questioning in
search of Truth
– Taught Plato
– Death sentence – why?
Philosophy
• Plato
– Wrote the
Republic
• Favored
aristocratic
government
run by the most
intelligent
• Philosopherking
Philosophy
• Aristotle
– Studied biology,
anatomy, physics,
government, etc.
– Tutored Alexander
the Great
Mathematics
• Pythagoras
– Calculated the sides of a right triangle
• Euclid
– Modern geometry
Science
• Archimedes
Astronomy
• Ptolemy
– What’s
wrong with
this
picture?
Drama
• Comedy and
Tragedy