Monday, March 14, 2011

Ancient Greece

  • crucible-a place time or situation coming together 

  • Geography
    • Mountainous peninsula
    • mountains cover 3/4
    • approximately 1400 island in the Aegean and Ionian Seas
    • Location shaped its culture
    • skilled sailors
    • poor natural resources 
    • difficult to unite the ancient Greeks because of the terrain; develop small, independent communities
    • app. 20% was suitable for farming
    • fertile valleys cover 1/4 of peninsula
    • because of geography the Geek diet consists of grains, grapes, and olives
    • Lack of resources most likely led to Greek colonization
    • Temperatures range from 48 in the winder to 80 in the summer
    • climate made them very active
  • Mycenaeans 
    • began around 2000 BC
    • Mycenae is located on a rocky ridge and protected by a 20  ft thick wall
    • Mycenaean kings dominated Greece from 1600-1200 BC
      • Controlled trade in the region
    • 1400 BC Mycenaean invaded Crete and absorbed Minoan culture and language
  • Culture Decline of Myceneans
    • Around 1200 BC sea people began to invade Mycenae and burnt palace after palace
    • The Dorians moved into the war-torn region
      • Far less advanced
      • Economy collapsed
      • writing disappeared for 400 years
  • Homer and Myths
    • Only stories were kept and passed on by word of mouth
    • Homer lived at the end of the "Greek Dark Ages"
    • Recorded stories of the Trojan War in the Iliad and The Odyssey (written 750-700 BC)
      • Tojan war was probably one of the last conquests of the Mycenaeans
  • Greek Concepts
    • Arete
      • virtue and excellence
    • Epics
      • narrative poems celebrating heroic deeds
    • Myths were created to explain creation
      • Zeus: leader of the gods
      • Hera: Zeus' wife
      • Athena: goddess of wisdom

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