Early Greece
Attica, Peloponnesus, and
Asia Minor
Ages of Early Greece
1. The Heroic Age 2. The Age of Colonization
3. The Archaic Period
The Heroic Age
 Religious Worldview
 Civic (city-state deities)
 Private (chthonic deities)
 Urban Lifestyle
 Polis
 Agora
 Acropolis
[Image 2.1]
Zeus (Poseidon?)
The Iliad & The Odyssey
 Heroic Verse / Epic Poetry
 “the Homeric question”
 Editor / Author
 Oral Tradition
 Epithets
 Iliad
 Theme of Human Responsibility
 Elaborate Similes
 Odyssey
 Return of the Epic Hero
Iliad: Themes
 Anger
 War
 Glory
 Honor
The Iliad
Greeks:
Achilles (Pain / Tribe-people)
Agamemnon (Very Steadfast)
Menelaus (Abide / The People)
Helen (Torch / Venus”ish”)
Patroclus (Glory of the Father)
Trojans:
Hektor (Holding Fast)
Paris (Backpack)
Priam (Exceptionally Courageous)
Key Players:
Thetis
The Gods
The Odyssey
 Story of Odysseus
(Trouble)
 Odysseus’ journey
home to Ithica
 Continues after the
Trojan War
 Hero’s return despite
trials
Art and Heroic Age
Society
Painted Vases
 Protogeometric
(1000-900 B.C.E.)
Concentric circles
semi-circles
Geometric
(900-700 B.C.E.)
Linear designs
the meander
Human Forms
(~800 B.C.E.)
Age of Colonization
 Prosperity of City-States
 Status shown through Temple Art
 Wealth + Over-Population =
Colonization
 Italy, Sicily, Egypt, Asia Minor
 Trade and Cultural Exposure
 Orientalizing
Visual Arts
at Corinth and Athens
 Trade Rivalry: Corinth vs. Athens
 Corinthian Art
 Eastern Motifs
 Commercially Successful
 Athenian Art
 Narrative style (Myth, Daily Life)
The Archaic Period
 Tyrants
 Artistic Patronage
 Civic Pride
 Artistic Developments
 Freestanding Figures
 The “Archaic Smile”
 Vase Painting
 Black- Figure and Red-Figure Styles
[Image 2.15]
Euphronios, painter, Euxitheos,
potter, red-figure calyx krater
Beginnings of
Greek Sculpture
 Heavy Egyptian influence
 Kore / Korai (Female)
 Kouros / Kouroi (Male)
 Increasing Realism, Naturalism
 Careful study of human anatomy
 Representation of Life and vigor
Korous
Kore
The Doric Order
 Simple dignity
 “Classic”
 No Base
 Capital – plain
 Frieze
 triglyphs/metopes
 Pediment
[Image 2.16]
Basilica at Paestum
The Ionic Order
 Ornate Style
 Base
 Capital – Volutes
 Running Frieze
Poetry – Lyric Verse
Sappho – d.~570BCE
• Aristocratic Birth
• Political upheaval common
• Exiled from Lesbos to
Sicily (Syracuse) c. 604594)
• Similar to Plato and
Socratic Love
• Married / Daughter
Historic Verse
 Herodotus
(Father of History)
 History of the
Persian Wars
 Right over Might
 Hubris
“Man is the measure
of all things, of the
existence of those
that exist, and the
nonexistence of
those that do not”
Protagoras
First culture to be
human-centered.
Pre-Socratic Philosophy
 Materialists
 Elemental properties to life
 Thales – water
 Anaxagoras – reason
Pythagoranism
 Mathematics - underlying principle
of the universe / moral life
Pre-Socratic Philosophy
 Dualists
 One World of
perfection – (unseen)
 One World of change –
(temporal)
 Atomists
 Unchanging Reality
consists of small
unseen particles (atoms)
in the void