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2/8/2013
Greco-Roman
Civilization
"had Greek civilization never
existed we would never have
become fully conscious, which is
to say that we would never have
become, for better or worse, fully
human.“
- W. H Auden
Distinct eras in Greek history
Archaic Greece
3000-1600 B.C.
Mycenaen Greece
1600-1200 B.C.
Dark Ages
1200-800 B.C.
Greek Renaissance
800-600 B.C.
Classical or Hellenic Greece
600-323 B.C.
Hellenistic Greece
323-31 B.C.
Role of geography
Mycenaean Civilization
• Geography is an important factor –
mountains, valleys, and large coastlines
• A number of cultures flourished on the islands
of the Cyclades, in Crete and on the Greek
mainland.
• Greeks were encouraged to settle the land in
independent political communities. These
communities would soon come to be known
as city-states.
• Each city state or polis had its own political
organization and thus was truly independent
• The largest and most powerful of all the
city-states in the period 1600-1100 was
that of Mycenae.
• Mycenae was completely destroyed after
numerous attacks from Asia Minor.
• This event is known as the Dorian
Invasion
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Dark Ages
Greek Renaissance
• Following the Dorian Invasion, Greece fell
into its own period of the Dark Ages.
• Greek culture began to go into decline –
pottery became less elegant, burials were
less ornate and the building of large
structures and public buildings came to an
abrupt halt.
• But some technological skills survived and
the Greek language was preserved by those
people who settled in areas unaffected by the
Dorian Invasion
• After 800 B.C. a new spirit of optimism and
adventure began to appear in Greece.
• Historians have called the period from
800-600 the Greek Renaissance.
• In literature, this is the age of the great
epic poets, poets who wrote of the deeds
of mortal men as well as of immortal gods.
• It is also the period of the first Olympic
games, held in 776 B.C.
The Classical Age
• By around 500 BC ‘rule by the people’, or
democracy, had emerged in the city of Athens.
• Following the defeat of a Persian invasion in 480479 BC, mainland Greece and Athens in particular
entered into a golden age.
• In drama and philosophy, literature, art and
architecture Athens was second to none.
• The city’s empire stretched from the western
Mediterranean to the Black Sea, creating
enormous wealth. This paid for one of the biggest
public building projects ever seen in Greece,
which included the Parthenon.
The Classical Age
• Between 490 and 479 B.C., Greece was invaded
by the army and naval fleet of the Persian Empire.
• By 479 B.C., the Greek forces had all conquered
the Persian army and navy.
• After the Persian Wars, Athens emerged as the
most dominant political and economic force in the
Greek world.
• The Athenian polis, buttressed by the strength of
its Council of Five Hundred and Assembly of
citizens, managed to gain control of a
confederation of city-states which gradually
became the Athenian Empire.
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Sparta and Athens
Sparta and Athens
• Two city-states were indicative of Greek city-states
as a whole: Sparta and Athens.
• At Sparta, located on the Peloponnesus, five
Dorian villages combined to form the Spartan
state.
• The Spartan state arranged for a basic equality in
land holding and provided the citizens with
laborers, called helots (conquered people).
• The economy was based on the idea that slaves
would labor to supply the Spartan armies with
food, drink and clothing
• While Sparta developed their control over the
Peloponnesus, the city-state of Athens
controlled the area of the Attic Peninsula, to
the east and northeast of Sparta.
• Athens was similar to other city-states of the
period of the Greek Renaissance with two
important differences: (1) it was larger both
geographically and in terms of its population
and (2) those people it conquered were not
reduced to servitude.
Athenian Democracy
Peloponnesian Wars 431-404 B.C
• Democracy (demokratia) was introduced by
Cleisthenes in 507 B.C and by the time of
Pericles (495-429 B.C) the Assembly was
supreme.
• A Council of Five Hundred planned the business
of the public assemblies.
• All male citizens over the age of thirty could
serve for a term of one year on the Council and
no one could serve more than two terms in a
lifetime.
• Such an organization was necessary so that
every citizen would learn from direct political
experience.
• The Peloponnesian War fought between Athens
and Sparta was a catastrophe for Athens.
• The chief result of the War was that the Athenian
Empire was divided, the subject states of the
Delian league were liberated, and direct
democracy failed.
• The Athenians also suffered a loss of nerve as
their democracy gave way to the Reign of the
Thirty Tyrants.
• The major result, however, was that the
destruction of Athenian power made it possible for
the Macedonian conquest of Greece
Socrates, Plato and Aristotle
Origins of Western Thought
• The teachings of Socrates, Plato, and
Aristotle form the bedrock of Western
philosophical enquiry.
• This is responsible for the respective
traditions of rationalism and empiricism.
• The former relies on a priori knowledge
whereas the latter relies on a posteriori
knowledge.
• Greek achievements in the areas of art,
architecture, poetry, tragedy, science,
mathematics, history, philosophy and
government were of the highest order and
worthy of emulation by the Romans and
others.
• Western thought begins with the Greeks,
who first defined man as an individual with
the capacity to use his reason.
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Origins of Western Thought
• Greeks had discovered the means to give
rational order to nature and to human society.
• The Greeks also created the concept (if not
quite the reality) of political freedom; the
notion that man (the citizen) is capable of
governing himself was a profound one.
• Underlying the Greek achievement was
humanism - a belief in the worth, significance,
and dignity of the individual.
Alexander the Great (356-323 B.C)
End of the City State
• Alexander III succeeded his father Philip of
Macedon in 336 B.C to become ruler of the
Macedonian kingdom.
• Within 15 months he quelled rebellions, subdued
various Greek cities, sent his armies as far north
as the Danube River, and destroyed the city of
Thebes.
• In 334 B.C with 37,000 men under his command,
he marched into Asia, still conquering lands for his
empire.
• By 327 B.C Alexander's armies had moved as far
east as India
• Following the death of Alexander and the
division of his empire, the Hellenistic period
(323-31 BC) saw Greek power and culture
extended across the Middle East and as far
as the Indus Valley.
• After a century of warfare the city-state could
no longer supply a tolerable way of life for its
citizens.
• Many reasons; financial burden of military,
loss of sense of community, shift of
responsibility etc.
Ancient Rome – 3 episodes
Early Rome and the Republic
Early Rome
753-509 B.C
Roman Republic
509 – 32 B.C
Roman Empire
31 B.C. to A.D. 476
• In legend Rome was founded in 753 BC
by Romulus, its first king.
• In 509 BC Rome became a republic ruled
by the Senate (wealthy landowners and
elders) and the Roman people.
• During the 450 years of the republic Rome
conquered the rest of Italy and then
expanded into France, Spain, Turkey,
North Africa and Greece.
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Roman Republic
• A series of documents were drawn up which
together make up the Roman constitution.
• The constitution outlined the legal rights of
citizens and in Rome, everyone with the
exception of women, slaves and resident aliens,
qualified as a citizen.
• Instead, the Roman Republic was more like a
confederation of states under the control of a
representative, central authority.
Roman Republic
• The Romans also embarked on a
path which would soon culminate in
the establishment of the Roman
Empire.
• Around 493 B.C., the Romans
established the Latin League to
protect
themselves
from
rival
neighbors such as the Etruscans.
• Rome was also an aggressive and
imperialistic power.
Roman Republic
• Unlike the Greeks who, under Alexander and
those who followed him, forced conquered
lands into slavery or submission, the Romans
took the conquered and made them partners.
• In other words, they assimilated them into the
Roman cosmopolis.
• This policy of compromise and assimilation
continually built up the strength of the Roman
Republic.
Roman Empire
• Rome became very Greek influenced or
“Hellenised”, filled with Greek architecture,
literature, statues, wall-paintings, mosaics,
pottery and glass.
• Several events marked the transition from
Republic to Empire
• Julius Caesar's appointment as perpetual
dictator (44 BC)
• Battle of Actium (2 September 31 BC)
• Granting of the honorific Augustus to Octavian
by the Roman Senate (16 January 27 BC).
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Roman Empire
• Starting with Augustus in 27 BC, the
emperors ruled for five hundred years.
• They expanded Rome’s territory and by
about AD 200, their vast empire stretched
from Syria to Spain and from Britain to Egypt.
• Networks of roads connected rich and vibrant
cities, filled with beautiful public buildings.
• A shared Greco-Roman culture linked people,
goods and ideas.
Decline of the Roman Empire
• There is no single explanation that
accounts for Rome's decline and fall.
• Although Rome ultimately fell in A.D. 476,
its decline was a process that had been
going on for centuries
- 753 BC Roman Kingdom begins
- 509 BC Roman Republic begins
- 264 BC to 146 BC Punic Wars (Rome vs. Carthage)
- 2nd century BC dominance in Mediterranean
- 44 BC Julius Caesar's appointment as perpetual dictator
- 31 BC Battle of Actium
- 27 BC Octavian is sole Roman leader – Empire begins
- 117 BC height of Empire under Trajan
Sources
www.historyguide.org
http://en.wikipedia.org/
Watson, Peter. Ideas: A History of Thought and Invention,
from Fire to Freud. Harper Perennial. 2006
- 3rd century crisis (internal strife, external invasions, etc.)
- early 4th century Christianization of Empire
- late 4th century visible deterioration of Empire
- 5th century Western Empire sees huge territory
reduction
- AD 476 rule of Rome in the West regarded as finished
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