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The Hellenistic Age
Alexander the Great
Hellenistic Intellectual Advances
Decline of the City-States
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Sparta and their allies felt threatened by Athenian
imperialism
They go to war
Athens is struck by a plague in 430 which killed about
1/3 of their population including Pericles
Also at that time, Athens was involved with a bitter
battle with Sicily
Athens was the only city that might have unified the
Greek world but it lost its chance
Culturally stagnated Sparta had taken control
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Their rule was short-lived and city-states gained
independence
The Macedonians
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As the Greeks battled each other groups of
Greek-dialect speaking mountain people were
growing strong in the north
At the age of 23 Philip II became king of
Macedonia
He converted them into a world-class military
power and made Greece his target
In 338 he defeated the Greeks and the city-states
lost their independence
Alexander the Great
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Alexander was the son of Phillip of Macedon
Phillip organized the Greek states into a powerful
league under his command
He planned to launch an attack on the Persians
Alexander carried out his father’s plan
The attack on Persia was revenge for the Persian
invasion of Greece in 480 BC.
Alexander’s Empire
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Won some major battles in Asia minor and made his way into
Egypt
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He marched into western Asia and defeated the Persians
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Seized the land, honored the priestly class and was declared pharaoh
As an act of retribution he burned all the buildings of Xerxes
He continued on his war path and pursued the Persian king to his
death
He set out to conquer the rest of Asia and made it as far as
India when his men refused to go any further
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He headed south to the Arabian Sea waging bloody, unnecessary war
Alexander’s War Path
The Political Legacy
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Alex died at the age of 32 in 323 BC while he awaited
replacement troops because his army refused to march
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Causes of death?
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Named his lover Hephaestion the heir
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Drinking binge
Syphilis
Typhoid Fever
Poison
He was killed too
Had an infant son that was murdered
His most powerful generals then fought for control but the empire
was divided into large monarchies
Hellenistic Intellectual Advances
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Widespread conquest brought not only a spread
of Hellenism but Hellenistic exposure to foreign
ideas
This cultural and intellectual dispersion went on
to influence the Roman, Jews and Christians
Religion in the Hellenistic World
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When kings founded cities they built temples and
priesthoods that honored the traditional Olympic
gods- see Paestum
These new cults received public money and were
attractive because of their rituals and festivities
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Literary, musical and athletic competitions
The civic cults never addressed sin and redemption
which was becoming a concern after exposure to
other cultures
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Zoroastrianism
Mystery Religions
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Emerged to fill the void
Attracted both Greeks and easterners with a
promise of immortality
Required initiation processes
Devotees become one with god, who had himself died
and risen from the dead
 The sacrifice of the god and his triumph over death
saved the devotee from the power of eternal death
 Initiation represented birth into a new life
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The cult of Isis, the wife of Osiris who conquered
Tyche
Epicureanism
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Epicurus based his philosophy on scientific theories and
taught that the gods had no impact on the lives of humans
The principal good of human life is pleasure
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The absence of pain
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Violent emotions are undesirable
Mild self-discipline is necessary
Epicureans basically ignored the political arena
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Three kinds of desires: natural and necessary desires, natural but non-necessary
desires, and "vain and empty" desires
Static vs. moving pleasures
It was disturbing to the soul
Modern Hedonism
Stoicism
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The philosophy of Zeno
Based on moral obligation
Saw nature as an expression of divine will
Happiness would result from living life in accord
with nature
Created the concept of natural law
Lived like actors in play, not changing the script
Men are brothers and are obliged to help one
another
Science
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Aristarchus- astronomer who argued against
Aristotle's heliocentric theory
Euclid- The Elements of Geometry
Archimedes- catapults, grappling devices, compound
pulleys, the Archimedean screw
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Founded hydrostatics
Eratosthenes- declared that a ship could sail westward
to India
Dogmatic school of medicine- speculation and
anatomy
Empiric school of medicine- observation and the
curing of illness with drugs
The Archimedean Screw