Classical Greece
Mrs. Cox
Paisley IB
World History 5
Vocabulary
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
polis
acropolis
agora
helots
hoplites
hubris
democracy
solon
Vocabulary
9. tyrant
10. Cleisthenes
11. direct democracy
12. archon
13. phalanx
14. Pericles
15. Socrates
16. Plato
Vocabulary
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
Aristotle
reason
reason
logic
Homer
lyric poetry
Herodotus
Thucydides
Vocabulary
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
Alexander the Great
Hellenistic
Euclid
Eratosthenes
Archimedes
Questions
1.Name three known aspects about
Minoan civilization?
2.How were the Minoans and Mycenae
similar? How are they difference?
3. Why do you think each polis followed
the layout described here?
4. Do you think the Spartans’ focus on
readiness for war was worthwhile? Why or
why not?
Questions
5. How did Solon change law and
government in Athens?
6. Name three different groups that
helped govern Athens at the height of
democracy.
7. The Persians invaded Greece twice
looking for revenge. What made them
seek revenge each time?
8. What were the elements that
contributed to Athens’s Golden Age.
Questions
9. Why do you think that Sparta could not
maintain control over Greece?
10. What is the Socratic method?
11. Why do you think Plato believed that
political leaders should be philosophers?
Do you agree? Why or why not?
12. Why do you think Homer’s epics
influenced Greek culture for centuries?
13. How are the histories written by
Herodotus similar to the Iliad? How are
they different?
Questions
14. What features did the ancient Greeks
use in their art and architecture?
15. Why was Philip II able to conquer
Greece so easily?
16. What places did Alexander the Great
conquered.
17. Why do you think Alexander made
such a strong effort to blend the cultures
in his empire?
18. How did life change in cities in the
Hellenistic world?
Questions
19. What was the focus of each of
the three new schools of philosophy?
Minoans and Mycenaeans
Much of early Greek history is still
unknown. We do know that two
cultures developed in early Greece.
Minoan civilization developed on the
island of Crete around 2100 BC and
lasted at least 700 years. Minoans
settled on many Aegean islands and
traded among these colonies and
Crete.
Minoans and Mycenaeans
We know about Minoans from
excavations at Knossos on Crete,
particularly from the artwork;
Minoans had writing, but historians
have not been able to translate it.
Minoan life was tied deeply to the
sea. Women had important roles in
society, and warfare did not seem to
be a part of life.
Minoans and Mycenaeans
We know their civilization fell apart
quickly. The eruption of the volcano
on There, near Crete, may have
weakened society. The Mycenaeans
from the Greek mainland conquered
the Minoans.
The Mycenaeans built city-states that
often fought one another.
Minoans and Mycenaeans
Because they spoke an early form of
Greek, they are considered the first
Greek civilization. They traded with
the Minoans, then expanded their
own trade after conquering Crete.
Mycenaean civilization was
dominated by war, competition, and
powerful kings who built palaces and
monuments.
Minoans and Mycenaeans
One legend tied to the Mycenaeans is
about the Trojan War, in which
Greeks, led by Mycaenae, fought
against the city of Troy. It is unclear
whether the Trojan War really
happened. But it is known that war,
along with drought, famine, the
collapse of trade, and invasion from
outside, helped to end Mycenaean
civilization.
Minoans and Mycenaeans
Their cities were mostly in ruins by
1100 BC, and a dark age followed.
As people struggled to feed and
protect themselves, the use of
writing was lost for several centuries.
Greek civilization almost
disappeared.
Greek City-States
By the 800s BC, a new type of
society emerged in Greece, centered
around the polis, or city-state. The
polis was the basic political unit and
center of daily life and culture.
People were very loyal to their polis.
The typical polis was built around a
high area called an acropolis, which
held temples to the gods and space
for ceremonies.
Greek City-States
Below the acropolis was the agora or
marketplace, surrounded by shops,
houses, more temples, and a
gymnasium. Around the polis was a
wall for defense, and outside the wall
were fields for crops. Each polis
developed its own political system.
Corinth was an oligarchy, Athens a
democracy, and Thebes an
aristocracy.
Greek City-States
Sparta was a mighty city-state, but unlike
the others. It conquered nearby towns
and made the people helots or state
slaves. Helots were given to Spartans to
do their manual labor so that the citizens
could spend all their time training for war.
This was believed to be the only way to
keep order because the helots
outnumbered the Spartans and might
rebel at any time.
Greek City-State
So Spartans demanded that their
citizens be tough from birth. Babies
who were not healthy were left in the
wild to die. Boys entered a school for
combat at age 7. At 20, they became
hoplites or foot soldiers, and served
in the army for 10 years. Women
were also expected to be physically
fit and helped to run the city when
men were away at war.
Greek City-State
Sparta was led by two military
commander kings but eventually, an
elected council of elders made many
decisions.
Gods and Heroes
Ancient Greeks believed in hundreds
of gods and goddesses. Each ruled
over one part of nature or life. The
Greeks believed the gods would
protect them in exchange for
sacrifices. About 12 of the gods were
especially important and were
thought to live on Mount Olympus,
the highest mountain in Greece.
Gods and Heroes
The gods were powerful, but they were
not perfect. They often got jealous or
made mistakes.
Most Greeks worshipped the same gods,
but each polis also claimed one god or
goddess as its protector. In addition, all
Greeks considered some locations sacred,
such as Delphi, where priestesses were
thought to receive visions of the future,
and Olympus, where games were held
every four years.
Gods and Heroes
Athletes from different city-states
competed in honor of the gods.
Greeks also had myths about heroes
that could inspire people to live
virtuously but without hubris, great
pride that often led heroes to tragic
ends.
Athenian Democracy
The government of Athens was the
world’s first democracy, run by the
people. But Athens had not always
been democratic. First it was ruled
by kings, then aristocrats. Most
Athenians were poor and had little
power. This led to conflict between
rich and poor.
Athenian Democracy
Harsh laws made the dispute
between rich and poor worse, so in
the 590s BC, a lawmaker named
Solon got rid of the harshest laws,
introduced trial by jury, and created
a council of 400 elected men to help
govern. Men from any social class
could be elected.
Athenian Democracy
This was the first real step toward
democracy. But tensions in Athens
flared again, so Peisistratus, a tyrant,
seized power by force. After he died,
Cleisthenes took over. He increased
the council to 500 and gave men
from every class the same rights.
Athenian Democracy
However, only free male Athenians
over age 20 who owned property and
had military training were allowed to
vote. In the 300s BC, that was about
10 percent of the population. Those
who could were expected to vote in
all elections, to serve if elected, and
to serve on juries and in the military
if needed.
Athenian Democracy
At its height, Athenian democracy.
The Council of 500 wrote the laws
that would be voted on by the
assembly. The third part was the
courts. Members of the courts came
from the assembly. One elected
official was the archon, who acted as
the head of both the assembly and
the Council of 500.
The Persian Wars
In the 500s BC, Persia had
conquered Greek cities in Ionia, in
what is now Turkey. When the
Ionians rebelled, they asked their
fellow Greeks for help. The Persians
quickly put down the revolt, then
attacked the Greek mainland,
especially Athens, in revenge.
The Persian Wars
In 490 BC, thousands of Persians
landed near a town called Marathon.
The Athenians surprised the Persians
and defeated them. The Athenians
fought in a phalanx, a tight rectangle
formation in which soldiers held long
spears out ahead of their shields.
The Persian Wars
The Persians planned revenge. In 480 BC,
a huge army entered Greece. The citystates worked together. The Persians
burned Athens, but the entire Greek fleet
was in the nearby Bay of Salamis. The
Greeks destroyed Persian supply ships
that tried to reach the mainland, stranding
the Persian army. In 479, Sparta led the
Greek army to victory in the Persian Wars.
The Golden Age of Athens
Eventually, Athens became the
leading city-state in Greece. It led
the Delian League, an alliance of
several city-states for defense. Those
who resented Athens’ power and
rebelled were attacked. The league
was basically an Athenian empire.
The Golden Age of Athens
Athens had been burned and had to
be rebuilt after the Persian Wars.
Several temples including the
Parthenon, roads, and walls were
built, and the port was expanded.
Much of the rebuilding was due to
Pericles, a military and political
leader in the 460s BC.
The Golden Age of Athens
Although he had a lot of power, he
supported democracy. He also supported
the arts, wanting Athens to be the most
glorious city in Greece. During this Golden
Age, trade brought wealth to Athens, and
merchants brought new food and customs,
making the city very cosmopolitan. There
were also festivals, religious games, and
great dramas.
The Peloponnesian War
Sparta wanted to end the Delian
League’s dominance, so they formed
the Peloponnesian League with allies.
Athens and Sparta declared war on
each other in 431 BC. At first, Sparta
dominated on land. Athens at sea.
After a few years, they agreed to a
truce. This lasted six years, then
Athens attacked one of Sparta’s
allies.
The Peloponnesian War
This time, Sparta destroyed the Athenian
fleet. Athens had to surrender. The war
nearly destroyed Athens, and also
damaged Sparta. Sparta tried to dominate
Greece, but is was worn down. In 371 BC
Thebes defeated Sparta but could not
maintain control either. In the 350s BC,
Macedonia, a Greek-speaking kingdom to
the north, took control of all of Greece.
Greek Philosophy
The people of ancient Greece were great
believers in philosophy. The golden age of
Greek philosophy was the 400s-300s BC,
when the three greatest Greek
philosophers lived: Socrates, Plato, and
Aristotle.
What we know about Socrates comes form
his students. He was interested in
concepts like truth, justice, and virtue.
Greek Philosophy
He asked questions like, “What is
truth?” When someone answered, he
challenged the answer with more
questions. This is known as the
Socratic method.
Plato was Socrates’ student and a
great philosopher also. He wrote on
topics like truth and government.
Greek Philosophy
To spread philosophical ideas, he
founded the Academy. It became the
most important philosophy school in
Greece.
Aristotle became another great
philosopher. He was more concerned
with the nature of the world than
with human nature, which had been
Socrates’ and Plato’s focus.
Greek Philosophy
He emphasized the importance of
reason, or clear and ordered
thinking, and logic. This is the
process of making inferences, using
what we already know to learn
something new.
Greek Literature
The ancient Greek’s development of
poetry, drama, and history still
influence European culture. Around
800 BC, heroic stories began to take
form. The legendary blind poet
Homer, who may or may not have
been a real person, told a mixture of
history and legend about the Trojan
War in two epics, the Iliad and
Odyssey.
Greek Philosophy
The people of ancient Greece were
great believers in philosophy. The
golden age of Greek philosophy was
the 400s-300s BCE, when the three
greatest Greek philosophers lived:
Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle.
Greek Philosophy
What we know about Socrates comes
form his students. He was interested
in concepts like truth, justice, and
virtue. He asked questions like,
“What is truth?” When someone
answered, he challenged with more
questions. This is known as the
Socratic method.
Greek Philosophy
Plato was Socrates’ student and a
great philosopher also. He believed
governments should be led by
philosophers. To spread philosophical
ideas, he founded the Academy. It
became the most important
philosophy school in Greece.
Greek Philosophy
Aristotle became another great
philosopher. He was more concerned with
the nature of the world than with human
nature, which had been Socrates’ and
Plato’s focus. He emphasized the
importance of reason, or clear and
ordered thinking, and logic. This is the
process of making inferences, using what
we already know to learn something new.
Greek Literature
The ancient Greek’s development of
poetry, drama, and history still
influence European culture. Around
800 BCE, heroic stories began to
take form. The legendary blind poet
Homer, who may or may not have
been a real person, told a mixture of
history and legend about the Trojan
War in two epics, the Iliad and the
Odyssey.
Greek Literature
The Iliad describes the long conflict
of the Trojan War. The Odyssey
describes the efforts of Odysseus to
get home after the war. In both
stories, the gods argue and take
sides, and there are human heroes
and villains. These stories influenced
Greek culture for centuries.
Greek Literature
The earliest examples of Greek poetry are
epics like the Iliad and Odyssey. Literature
started when these oral stories were
written down. At about the same time, the
poet Hesiod wrote poems about everyday
Greek life, and also about the gods. By the
600s BCE, Greeks such as Sappho and
Pindar were composing lyric poetry, which
was sung with the accompaniment of an
instrument called a lyre.
Greek Literature
At first, drama was much like poetry;
a chorus of singers told a story. Over
time the stories became more
complicated. At the festival of
Dionysus, playwrights competed for
prizes. Aeschylus (ees-ky-luss)
created drama based on myths.
Greek Literature
Sophocles specialized in tragedy, the
destruction of noble characters by
their fatal flaws. Euripides also wrote
tragedies, many of them about
women. Comedy also developed,
usually in the form of satire. The
greatest Athenian comic writer was
Aristophanes.
Greek Literature
Around the same time that drama
was being developed, Athenians
were also writing history. The first
major historian was Herodotus, who
lived during the wars with Persia and
wrote about them. He use prose, an
tried to describe major events as
they actually happened.
Greek Literature
Thucydides lived during the
Peloponnesian War and used primary
sources like speeches to write about
it in detail. Bothe historians tried to
understand why events happened as
they did. Xenophon picked up when
Thucydides left off, but concentrated
more on describing famous men.
Greek Architecture and Art
The Greeks appreciated the natural
world, and tried to understand it
using math and science. They
wanted art and architecture to
represent the world as they saw it,
and to create balance, proportion,
and harmony.
Greek Architecture and Art
Painting and sculpture portrayed real
human beings as ideals. Architecture
used clean, simple geometry
arranged for balance.
The Greeks developed methods for
exploring scientific subjects that last
to this day, such as the use of reason
and logic.
Greek Architecture and Art
Pythagoras, who believed that the
universe was held together by
mathematics, helped discover the
rules of geometry in the 500s BCE.
In the 300s BCE, Euclid wrote books
on geometry and math that formed
the basis for later European studies.
Greek Architecture and Art
In the late 400s, Hippocrates studied
human illnesses, trying to cure them.
Today, doctors swear a “Hippocratic
oath” naming their ethical duties and
the methods they will use.
Alexander the Great
In 359 BCE, King Philip II took power in
Macedonia, the country just north of
Greece. He reorganized the army. Then he
set out to conquer Greece. Most citystates did not realize the danger, so he
faced little opposition. The Macedonians
quickly crushed the armies that stood
against them, and conquered every major
Greek city-state except Sparta. King
Philip was assassinated in 336 BCE, so his
20 year old son took over. We know him
as Alexander the Great.
Alexander the Great
Alexander had been trained to rule
from birth, so was ready to lead. As
soon as he took over, there were
rebellions in Greece. He used harsh
measures to reestablish his rule:
when Thebes rebelled, he crushed its
army and burned the city. After
getting Greece under control, he
went into Asia to fight the large but
disorganized Persian army.
Alexander the Great
Alexander’s army was smaller but
well-trained and loyal. He won
several major victories in Asia Minor,
then went into Phoenicia and Egypt,
which were also ruled by Persia. He
was greeted as a liberator; the
Egyptians even made him pharaoh.
He then marched into what is now
Iraq, where he destroyed the Persian
army.
Alexander the Great
But he was not yet satisfied. He led his
army deeper into Central Asia, to the
Indus river. At that point his soldiers had
had enough, so Alexander turned back.
Alexander built a huge empire, but in 323
he fell ill and died at age 33. He had not
named an heir, so his generals fought
among themselves for power. In the end,
the empire was divided among three of
them: Antigonus rule Macedonia and
Greece, Seleucis took over the former
Persian Empire, and Ptolemy ruled Egypt.
The Hellenistic World
By creating a huge new empire, Alexander
brought about a new culture, blending
elements form Greece, Persia, Egypt,
Central Asia and other regions. Historians
call this culture Hellenistic, or Greek like.
Alexander worked to bring people and
ideas together. He appointed officials from
various cultures to help rule. He also built
dozens of new cities (most named
Alexandra) throughout the empire an
encouraged Greeks to move to them.
The Hellenistic World
The most famous of these was in
Egypt at the mouth of the Nile. It
became Egypt’s capital and at one
time had the busiest harbor in the
world. Palaces and monuments were
built, such as the Pharos lighthouse
and the great library. It became a
center for culture and learning.
The Hellenistic World
Many other cities throughout the
empire also became trading centers.
Traders went to East Africa, Arabia,
India, and even China. Traders
helped spread not only goods but
ideas like the teachings of Judaism.
The shift to a Hellenistic world
brought drastic changes to people’s
lives.
The Hellenistic World
Perhaps most importantly, the citystate was no longer the main political
unit. Traditional forms of government
such as democracy were replaced
with monarchy. Women’s lives also
changed: for the first time, they
were given the rights to be educated
and to own property.
Hellenistic Achievements
The blending of cultures in the Hellenistic
world led to an exchange of ideas, which
then led to advances in philosophy,
literature, and science.
Interest in philosophy spread, and new
schools of philosophy developed. One was
the Cynics. They rejected pleasure,
wealth, and social responsibility, believing
people should live according to nature.
Hellenistic Achievements
The Epicureans, on the other hand,
thought people should seek out
pleasure and try to avoid pain. Stoics
emphasized reason, self-discipline,
emotional control and personal
morality.
Artists in this period learned to
convey emotion and movement in
their works.
Hellenistic Achievements
Women became much more common
subjects of art. This was also true in
literature, where love stories became
popular for the first time. There were
also important advances in science,
especially in Egypt. Euclid formulated
many ideas about geometry, while
Eratosthenes calculated the
circumference of the globe.
Hellenistic Achievements
Others studied the movement of the
stars and the workings of the human
body. Archimedes, one of the
greatest inventors of the ancient
world, used math and physics to
design machines such as pulleys to
lift heavy loads and a mechanical
screw for drawing water out of a
well.