Wars of Ancient Greece

1. Wars of Ancient Greece

2. Video Clips • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nBTeLJUlOlg • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iks6lkzPb9g

3. Question Of The Day • How Long did the Trojan war last? 10 years. • What Was Helens husband name? Menelaus • Trojan Horse ..Who was the mastermind behind it and helped make it? Odysseus

4. Questions Of The Day • How long was the Trojan war fought? 10 years • Who was Helen’s husband? King Menelaus • Who was the mastermind behind the design and use of the Trojan Horse? Odysseus

5. Introduction There are three major wars in the history of Ancient Greece: • The Trojan War, 1250 BCE • The Persian War, 497-479 BCE • The Peloponnesian War, 461-445 BCE

6. The Trojan War, 1250 BCE • The Trojan War is considered one of the most important events in Greek history and mythology • The Trojan War began when Helen fled her husband, King Menelaus of Sparta, with Paris of Troy • Menelaus deployed a large fleet of ships to bring Helen back from Troy. • It is said that the Trojan War lasted 10 years, with some believing that it would never end. • Some theories suggest that the Trojans were victorious. • To enter the city of Troy the Greeks constructed a large wooden horse, able to contain 30 Greek soldiers, and presented it to the gates of Troy • The horse was accepted by the Trojans and brought inside the city’s walls. The Greek soldiers exited the horse and opened the gates of Troy to the remaining soldiers during the following night, conquering the city and bringing about the fall of Troy.

7. The Trojan Horse • The Trojan Horse is a creation of the Ancient Greeks. It was a large, hollow, wooden construction that resembled a horse. • Odysseus helped design and construct the Trojan Horse • The Trojans assumed the horse was a gift or peace offering to end the war and readily accepted it past their gates and into the city. • The Trojan Horse was the key warfare weapon used by the Greeks to defeat the Trojans.

8. Military Ships There were two main types of boats that played a role in everyday life during the times of Ancient Greece: Military  Cargo

9. Trireme • Propelled by manpower • The trireme was a single tier ship with two tiers of oars per side. There were 25 rowers on each side of the ship, one man to an oar. • Trireme’s were approximately 115 feet long and 8.5 feet tall. • In good weather conditions Trireme’s could travel up to14 knots per hour. • The downside of Trireme’s was that they were rather light and could be blown off course in high wind conditions.

11. Quinqueremes • Quinqueremes had three to four tiers of oars with two men to an oar. • The boats were significantly heavier than Trireme’s and were not as easily affected by high wind conditions. • Quinqueremes were constructed of wood with metal spikes to hold the wood together. The most common wood used was fir, cedar, and pine.

13. Hoplites • Hoplites were citizen-soldiers of the Ancient Greek city-states. • They were protected with bronze chest plates, helmet with cheek guards, and greaves. • A hoplite was expected to buy his own protective armor. • The armor could weigh between 50-70 pounds.

14. Phalanx • The phalanx is a Greek fighting formation (organized battle line) that focused on soldiers fighting as a closely ranked unit • The first few ranks of soldiers would project their spears over the first rank of shields. • The phalanx was essentially a formation of a shield wall and a mass of spears pointing toward the oncoming enemy. • Frontal assaults were very difficult against a phalanx formation and it also allowed a higher proportion of the soldiers to be actively engaged in combat at a given time.

15. Phalanx formation: standing in a battle line, awaiting the clash with enemy troops.

16. The Persian War • The Persian War is considered a defining moment in Greek history, with the Persians conquering everyone in their war path. • The Persians attempted to conquer Greece by land in 514 BC by attacking the Scythians. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHVWF4Hl9wE&feature=related

17. The Persian War During 500 BCE onward the Persian Empire expanded to the borders of Greece.

18. Battle of Thermopylae • The Persian army marched into Greece under the leadership of King Xerxes. They encountered a small Greek force led by the Spartan commander Leonidas at a narrow mountain pass at Thermopylae. The Greeks were able to defend the pass against the much larger Persian forces until they were betrayed. A Greek traitor showed the Persians a secret passage around the pass. The Persians were able to attack from two sides. Realizing the battle was lost, Leonidas stayed back with 300 other Spartans to give time to the bulk of the Greek force to retreat safely. It was a tremendous act of sacrifice on the part of Leonidas and his fellow Spartans.

19. Battle of Thermopylae

21. A "Golden Age" is a period of peace, harmony, stability, and prosperity.

23. The Peloponnesian War 431-404 BCE • The Peloponnesian War was a major Ancient Greek military conflict. • The Athenian leader Pericles transformed Athens into the cultural center of Greece. • The Spartan strategy to conquer Athens was to invade yearly. • To combat the damages of Spartan invasions Pericles hired the best architects and had the Acropolis rebuilt.

24. The Peloponnesian War • The Athenian soldiers faced a serious geographic disadvantage from the start because Sparta was located inland, rendering the power of the Athenian navy useless in the battle. • During Spartan invasions Pericles allowed Athenians from the countryside to move inside the city. • Overcrowding led to a plague that killed a one-third of the people and internal struggles undermined the democratic government of Athens. • Sparta allied with Persia, a former enemy, against the Delian League. • In 404 BCE, with the assistance of the Persian navy, the Spartans captured Athens and conquered its entire fleet and empire. • The Peloponnesian War is the longest and most bitter and costly war in the history of Greek conflicts.

25. The Peloponnesian War • Harmony among the Greeks dwindled after the Persian Wars. • Athenians, under the direction of Pericles, were subjected to conflict with Corinth, a Spartan ally. • Sparta assisted in defending Corinth, to which Pericles responded with war against the Spartans. • Athenian soldiers thought they could defend against Spartan forces indefinitely. • The war was essentially a deadlock until the 404 BCE attack on Athens by allied Spartan and Persian forces. • All forces involved in the Peloponnesian War suffered great casualties and losses

26. The Aftermath of War • The Peloponnesian War was effective in ending the dominance of Athenian’s in Greece. • Democratic government suffered in Athens, with corruption and selfish interests replacing previous orderly ways. • Following these three major wars fighting still continued to disrupt life in the Ancient Greek world.