ANCIENT GREECE

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ANCIENT GREECE

• Prepared by Anita Billeter
• Palmdale School District
• with funding from
• Jordan Fundamentals Grant
• Keeping History Alive Grant

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THE EARLY GREEKS
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GEOGRAPHY
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THE LAND AROUND THE SEA

• The area in which the ancient Greeks lived
  centered on the Aegean Sea.
• Greece was ideally located for sea trade, and the
  sea became the Greeks link to other peoples,
  products, and ideas.
• Most people in ancient Greece were farmers,
  growing grapes, olives, wheat and barley.

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EARLY CIVILIZATIONS

• The Minoans developed a system of writing,
  carried on rich trade, and were master builders.
• The Mycenaeans learned from the Minoans and
  became the dominant civilization in the Aegean
  region.
• From about 1100 B.C. to 800 B.C. Greece was in a
  decline called the Dark Age, when trade stopped
  and written language disappeared.

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THE RISE OF THE CITY STATES

• During the Dark Age, Greeces population
  increased and isolated villages grew into cities.
• City-states were independent, self-governing
  units that included the territory around the
  city.
• As the city-states grew, they began to fight over
  boundaries and other things, and some Greeks left
  to found new city-states.

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ATHENS A CITY-STATE
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THE EVOLUTION OF DEMOCRACY

• The Athenians developed a form of government that
  enabled citizens to make decisions, called a
  democracy.
• Tyrants taught citizens that by uniting behind a
  leader, they could gain the power to make
  changes.
• Citizens in Athens proposed new laws, voted on
  laws, and served on juries.
• Several other city-states in Greece also
  developed democracies, but Athens version was
  the most successful.

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CITIZENSHIP IN ATHENS

• Citizenship was limited to men over the age of
  18, and usually to those men whose fathers had
  been citizens.
• Wives, children, unmarried women, foreigners, and
  slaves were not citizens, though they were
  protected by Athenian law.

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THE ECONOMY OF ATHENS

• Most Athenians were farmers, with just enough
  land to support their families.
• As Athens became an international trading center,
  the barter system changed to the use of coins.
• Wealthy Athenians were expected to contribute
  large amounts of money to government projects,
  and this kept money flowing throughout the
  city-state.

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ANCIENT GREEK CULTURE
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THE FAMILY OF GREEK GODS

• The Greeks believed their gods controlled both
  the natural and human world.
• All Greeks worshipped Zeus and his family of
  gods, each of whom had a specific role with
  particular duties and powers.
• The Greeks built sacred places called sanctuaries
  to honor their gods.

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SANCTUARIES TO THE GODS

• The Greeks used sanctuaries to make sacrifices to
  specific gods.
• Some sanctuaries were also places where oracles,
  or predictions of the future, were told.
• The Greeks also honored their gods and goddesses
  by holding religious festivals.

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GREEK DRAMA

• Greek Plays were written and performed twice a
  year at festivals in Athens honoring Dionysus.
• Most of the plays were about Greek gods or
  heroes, combining religion and history with
  entertainment.
• Plays were either tragedies, in which the hero
  was ruined by a character flaw, or comedies,
  which made fun of a variety of topics.

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A TALE OF TWO CITY-STATES
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SPARTA AND ATHENS

• The Spartans built a strong army because they
  feared slave uprisings from the many slaves they
  owned.
• Unlike Athens, Spartas government was an
  oligarchy, with power remaining in the hands of a
  few families.
• Spartas emphasis on maintaining a strong army
  shaped its economy.

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EDUCATION IN SPARTA AND ATHENS

• Spartan education focuses on physical skills and
  military training and began at an early age.
• Wealthy Athenian education included reading,
  writing, arithmetic, poetry, music, and dance, as
  well as athletics.
• In both city-states, formal education was
  reserved for boys.

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ALLIES AGAINST PERSIA

• Although quite different, Athens and Sparta
  joined to fight against Persia.
• After several losses, the Greeks finally defeated
  the Persians at sea, and a year later, on land.

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THE GOLDEN AGE OF ATHENS
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THE AGE OF PERICLES

• Pericles was Athens most outstanding leader
  during its Golden Age.
• Pericles worked to protect Athens, to make it
  beautiful, and to strengthen democracy.
• During the Golden Age, Athens was a center for
  art, literature, and ideas.

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LIFE IN A CITIZEN FAMILY

• Men spent time debating issues, selling wares,
  serving as jurors in the Assembly, and exercising
  in outdoor gymnasiums.
• Women spent time weaving clothes, preparing food,
  and caring for children.
• In the evenings, men either socialized with each
  other, or attended plays or religious festivals
  with their wives.

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LIFE FOR NONCITIZENS

• Metics were foreigners who were allowed to attend
  theater and religious festivals, and use the law
  courts.
• Slaves had no legal rights in Athens, but some
  were paid for their work and a few bought their
  freedom.
• In contrast to other slaves in Athens, those who
  worked in the silver mines labored under terrible
  conditions.

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THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR
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ATHENS AND SPARTA

• Concerned about an increasingly powerful Athens,
  Sparta declared war in 431B.C.
• A plague which killed many in Athens, including
  Pericles, and Spartas yearly destruction of food
  supplies, greatly weakened Athens.
• Still, it took 27 years of yearly battles, before
  Athens surrendered to Sparta in 404B.C.

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END OF THE GOLDEN AGE

• After their defeat by Sparta, Athenian democracy
  was weakened.
• Socrates was an important teacher and philosopher
  challenged his students to examine their own
  beliefs by asking questions.
• Athenian leaders believed Socrates was
  encouraging students to challenge government
  authority, so they tried him and sentenced him to
  die.

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ALEXANDER THE GREAT AND HIS INFLUENCE
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THE RISE OF MACEDONIA

• King Philip turned Macedonia into a military
  power by creating a full-time professional army
  and developing new weapons and battle plans.
• Philip defeated the Greek armies and became ruler
  of Greece in 338B.C.
• Philip reorganized the Greek army, combined it
  with his Macedonian troops, and set out to
  conquer Persia.

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ALEXANDERS CONQUESTS

• Though only 20, Alexander took firm control of
  his fathers kingdom.
• With his troops, Alexander began a 20,000-mile
  journey of conquest.

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THE SPREAD OF GREEK CULTURE

• As Alexander conquered lands, he established
  colonies and cities modeled after Greek cities,
  and left Greeks to rule the conquered lands.
• During the Hellenistic Age, the center of Greek
  culture shifted from Athens to Alexandria.
• Alexandrias library became the largest in the
  western world, lasting seven centuries.

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AFTER ALEXANDER

• After Alexanders death in 323B.C., Greek culture
  still united the empire, but politically it broke
  apart.
• Alexanders generals divided the empire and
  fought each other for control.
• Eventually three generals and regions emerged as
  the strongest.

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CONTRIBUTIONS OF THE GREEKS
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GREEK ARTS

• The Greeks are known for their lyric poetry, epic
  poetry, and plays both tragedies and comedies.
• Painters and sculptors throughout history have
  learned from Greek art and sculpture.
• The Greeks examined and wrote about the past
  critically and our word history comes from a
  Greek word.

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GREEK IDEAS

• Greek philosophers developed ways of seeking
  knowledge and asking questions that are still
  used today.
• Greek scientists believed they could understand
  the workings of the world, and made important
  discoveries in astronomy, medicine, and
  mathematics.
• In addition to achievements in the arts and
  sciences, the Greeks ideas about democracy and
  government have also influenced Western
  civilization.