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Greece. Greek Life. By 750 BC. The Polis (City-State) had become the center of Greek Life The Polis is a city, town or village where people would meet for political, economic, social and religious activity The modern term Politics comes from this Greek root word. . Acropolis.
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Greek Life • By 750 BC. The Polis (City-State) had become the center of Greek Life • The Polis is a city, town or village where people would meet for political, economic, social and religious activity • The modern term Politics comes from this Greek root word.
Acropolis • The main gathering place, usually on a hill. Topped with a fortified area • This place was a refuge in times of war • Often where the Patron god or Goddesses temple was placed in the town.
Daily Life • Athens had the larges population of any Greek Polis by the end of the fifth century. With around 285,000 including slaves and foreigners. • Economy: largely based on farming and trade. • Grapes and Olives were the primary exports of the Greeks. • Imported 50-80% of their grain however, which was a staple of the Greek diet.
Women in Classical Athens • Women were citizens without voting rights • They could participate in festivals, but not in other public life.
Women in Classical Athens • Women could not own property beyond personal items • Always had a male guardian, that must accompany her if she left the house. • They were expected to be a good wife, bear children, and keep up the household. • They were rarely educated and married at around 14 or 15.
Greek Religion • Homer described the Greek Pantheon in his works, explaining the Greek belief structure. • The Twelve most important gods lived on Mt. Olympus • Primarily the Greek religion was focused on making the gods look favorably on the people • Created complex rituals to please the gods • When a Greek died, their spirit (most of the time) passed into the gloomy Underworld ruled by Zeus’ eldest brother Hades.
Greek Creation • In the beginning only Chaos existed, which spontaneously created the first beings, Gaea (the Earth) and Tartarus (the Underworld). • Gaea then gave birth to the sky and called him Uranus. • When Earth and Sky mated (yes with her own son) they gave birth to the Titans.
Greek Creation • The Titans Hyperion and Theia produced children of there own (yes, they are brother and sister). • These children became known as Helios (the Sun), Selene (the Moon) and Eos (the Dawn)
Greek Creation • The Titans were only some of the offspring from Gaea and Uranus. The Cyclops and the Hecatoncheires (The Hundred Handed Giants) • Uranus did not these abominations born and refused to allow Gaea to give birth to them. • Gaea asked Cronus, the youngest of the Titans to Castrate his father to “rob him of his ability to rule”. • Upon doing so, Cronus seized control of the Greek cosmology
Greek Creation • Bitter from his defeat, Uranus warned the new ruler of the Titans that one day his children would defeat him. • In response Cronus ordered his wife/sister, Rhea, to hand over any children she produced, whom he then devoured. • To stop this madness Rhea hatched a plan when her sixth child, Zeus, was born. • Instead of handing Cronus the infant Zeus, she wrapped a stone in blankets and presented the stone to Cronus. • Zeus was hidden on Earth (Gaea) on the island of Crete.
Greek Creation • When Zeus became a man, he acquired a potion that caused Cronus to vomit up Zeus’ trapped siblings • Celestial war broke out between the Titans and the Olympians • Eventually the mythology says once the Titans were defeated they were imprisoned in Tartarus, under Mt. Olympus.
Olympian Gods • Being the leader that freed his siblings Zeus was selected as the new king of the Gods. • His brothers assumed the roles of the most important aspects of Greek Life
Olympian Gods • Hades, Zeus’ eldest brother, became lord of the dead and king of the underworld. • All Greek souls would pass through his realm, whether good or bad.
Olympian Gods • Poseidon, Zeus’ older brother, assumed the mantle of Lord of the Sea as well as the god of horses. • Thus when the Trojans thought the Greeks had left the Trojan Horse as a gift to Poseidon for a safe journey home, the Trojans took the Trojan Horse into the city as a Trojan offering to Poseidon. • Troy was latter sacked by this ruse.
Olympian Gods • Hera was Zeus’ wife and Queen of the gods. • She became the Goddess of Marriage and Women. • She had to put up with Zeus’ cheating heart. • In other myths Hera used her abilities to torment the many illegitimate children, including Hercules.
Olympian Gods • Apollo assumed the responsibility of guiding the sun across the sky in his fiery chariot. • His sister Artemis assumed control of the moon, also is goddess of the hunt. • This is after the fall of the Titans Helios and Selene
Olympian Gods • The bloody God of War. • It is said that Ares lined his bed with the skins of all the humans he has killed. • An important God, due to the almost constant warfare the Greeks suffered in there history
Olympian Gods • Demeter became the Goddess of Agriculture • Another important Grecian Goddess, because of the heavy farming community that developed in Greece.
Olympian Gods • Goddess of Wisdom, patron Goddess of the Athenians, whom Athens is named after. • It is said she developed as a headache in Zeus’ head. When his head was opened, Athena leapt out of his head fully grown and decked out in metal armor.
Olympian Gods • Because of the Greek love of wine and it being a chief export for the Greek Polis, the Greeks established Dionysus as the God of Wine and Jollity.
Olympian Gods • Messenger of the Gods, Hermes also was established as the god of travelers, merchants and theives • His winged sandals allowed him to return to Zeus within a day whenever something happened in the cosmos.
Olympian Gods • Smith of the Gods, Hephaestus, hammered out the thunderbolts for Zeus to defend Olympus with, or to strike down those who displeased him. • Also became the God of Metallurgy, the art of working metal.
Olympian Gods • Aphrodite: Goddess of Beauty • The Greeks were obsessed with perfection and idealized what men and women should look like in there art • Therefore all Greek art has these perfect looking people in them. Even if they were not a god. • It wouldn’t be until the Romans took control of the Mediterranean that blemishes could be found in art.
Oracles • Greeks always wanted to know the will of the gods/goddesses • Oracles at these sites often times had responses that could be taken two ways
Oracles • King of Lydia, Croesus: “Should I go to war with the Persians?” • Oracle: “If you war with the Persians you will destroy a great empire.” • Taking the response as a yes, Croesus attacked Persia and was soundly defeated. Destroying his own “great empire”
Greek Tragedies • Examine universal themes as: • The nature of good and evil • The rights of the individual • The role of the Gods in life • The nature of Human Beings
Greek Comedies • Developed later but, criticized society to get a reaction • Modern Comedians follow this style of entertainment even today.
Oedipus Rex • Written by Sophocles • Centers around an Oracle’s Prophecy stating that one day Oedipus would kill his father and marry his mother. • The king and queen chose to abandon the child on a hillside to prevent this from coming to pass.
Oedipus Rex • The infant Oedipus is found by a neighboring kingdoms’ royal family, adopted and raise as their own • As a adult Oedipus conquers his True homeland, slays their king (his real father) and marries their Queen (his real mother) • When all is revealed Oedipus scratches out his own eyes from this horror. • In Psychology when a male patient has an unnatural attachment to his mother it is called the Oedipus Complex. Named after the lead in this play.
