Greek History

1. Greek History • Complex and sophisticated • motto: all things in moderation • they did nothing in moderation

2. Ancient Greece • importance to Western culture • fundamental ideas and categories • Individualism and Humanism • the rise of Reason • decline of superstition/religion

3. Important Precursors • Minoan Crete • Mycenaean Greece

4. The eastern Mediterranean area

5. Minoan Crete • ca. 2900 B.C. to 1450 B.C. • contemporary with Egypt • major, non-river valley culture • highly sophisticated • literate • Linear A and Linear B

9. Minoan Crete, con’t • surplus agriculture • industry • over-seas commercial trade

10. Minoan Culture • elaborate towns and villages • complex religious ideas • sophisticated art • sports and leisure • high status for women

11. an artist’s rendering of the main building of the Palace of Minos at Knossos

12. Another idea of Knossos

13. North entrance of the Palace of Knossos Iraklion Museum, Crete

14. Decorated storage jars Knossos

15. Storage cellars palace of Knossos

16. Palace of Knossos Room of the Double Axes

17. Palace of Knossos: the Throne Room of Minos

18. Palace, north entrance: the famous Bull fresco

19. Great Propylaea at the south entrance of the palace

20. A fresco with partridges from the Caravan seraglio of Knossos.

21. From the Palace of Knossos: The famous "bull leaping" fresco from the East wing of the palace

22. The Throne of King Minos

23. The Queen’s rooms, with blue dolphins

24. Rython bull’s head from Knossos

25. Poppy Goddess

26. Snake “goddess” -goddess? -priestess? -worshipper?

27. The Blue Ladies

28. Minoan Priestess

29. Religious procession

30. Labrys “double axe” Labyrinth = “the House of the Double Axe”

33. Temple entrance to a cave shrine

34. Minoan Culture, con’t • unwalled cities • no foreign invasions • few weapons • no civil conflict

35. Interpretation? • King Minos? • utopia? • matriarchy? • thalassocracy?

36. Contributions to Greeks • linguistic • olives, grapes, figs • place names • overseas movement

37. Mycenaeans • Bonze Age Greeks • 2000-1100 B.C. • small, warrior states • war, trade, piracy • literate (Linear B)

38. Mycenaeans, con’t • the Heroic Age • the Age of Myth • the development of Greek Religion • beginnings of a common culture

39. Mycenae, ca.1450 B.C.

40. The great megaron at Mycenae

41. The death mask of “King Agamemnon” Mycenae

42. The Dark Ages • the Dorian Invasion ? • loss of literacy • loss of political sophistication

43. The Archaic Period • ca. 850 B.C. • beginning of classical Greek history • foundations of Western culture

45. The Polis • the city-state • city and dependent territory • independence of each city • warfare and rivalry

46. The Ethnos • Greek tribal structures • villages • common cult centers • fringes of the Greek world

47. Rise of Literacy • the alphabet • Homer • the Iliad, the Odyssey • Hesiod • Works and Days, the Theogony • Lyric poetry • Sappho

48. Age of Colonization • ca. 750-650 B.C. • Spain to Russia • spread of Greek culture • contact with foreign peoples

49. Greek cities and colonies, 750-650 B.C.

50. Varieties of Constitutions • Plato, Aristotle, Polybius • based on observation of types in Greece • thought of organically • three Good types, three Bad types • the anacyclosis