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Question 1

iGEOGRAPHY AND TOPOGRAPHY

Answer 1

-While Greece is a unified
country today, the territory of the present-day country was not unified under one rule until the
rise of the Macedonians in the fourth century BCE.
-the basic unit of organization in the
period covered in this chapter was the polis, an independent city-state, which consisted of a
walled city that controlled and protected the farmland around it.
-Historians estimate that close to
1,500 of these city-states dotted the ancient Greek landscape.
-Each of these poleis (plural form of polis) possessed its own form of government, law-code,
army, cults of patron gods, and overall culture that set it apart from the other city-states. While
the two most famous poleis, Athens and Sparta, controlled vast territories of farmland, most
city-states were quite small, with a population of just a few thousand citizens.
-Furthermore, the
Greek world in antiquity encompassed much more than present-day Greece, extending as far as
Italy in the West and the territories of modern-day Turkey and Ukraine in the East.
-First, the
mountainous nature of mainland Greece, especially in the north, allowed different regions to remain
somewhat isolated. The most isolated of all, Thessaly and Macedon, were viewed as uncivilized
barbarians by the rest of the Greeks in the Archaic and Classical periods
-the story of the 300 Spartans who fought to the death at the Battle of Thermopylae addresses
the challenge of the Persian army trying to cross the mountains to the north of Attica in order to
invade Athens by land.
-Mainland
Greece was notoriously unsuitable for agriculture. Growing the grain staples wheat and barley in the
rocky and clay-filled soil of Athens was especially difficult, while the mountainous regions across the
entire mainland were optimal for herding, rather than agriculture.
-Olive trees a exception, they grew abundantly and used for many things
-Attica and Cornith profited from using clay in their soil for pot making
-the Greek colonization movement of the seventh and sixth centuries BCE resulted
in the foundation of numerous Greek city-states in Asia Minor (modern-day Turkey), Magna
Graecia (southern Italy), Sicily, and the Black Sea littoral.

Question 2

The Bronze Age (c. 3,300 – 1,150 BCE)

Answer 2

a period characterized by the use of bronze
tools and weapons. In addition, two particular periods during the Bronze Age are crucial in the
development of early Greece: the Minoan Age on the island of Crete (c. 2,000 – 1,450 BCE) and
the Mycenean period on mainland Greece (c. 1,600 – 1,100 BCE), both of them characterized
by massive palaces, remnants of which still proudly stand today. The Minoan and Mycenaean
civilizations had writing (dubbed Linear A and Linear B, respectively), which they used for
keeping lists and palace inventories.

Question 3

The Dark Ages (c. 1,100 – 700 BCE)

Answer 3

a period that is “dark” from the archaeological
perspective, which means that the monumental palaces of the Mycenean period disappear, and the
archaeological record reveals a general poverty and loss of culture throughout the Greek world. For
instance, the Linear A and Linear B writing systems disappear. The Greeks do not rediscover writing
until the invention of the Greek alphabet at the end of the Dark Ages or the early Archaic Period

Question 4

Archaic Period (c. 700 – 480 BCE)

Answer 4

the earliest period for which written evidence survives;
this is the age of the rise of the Greek city-states, colonization, and the Persian Wars.

Question 5

Classical Period (c. 480 – 323 BCE)

Answer 5

the period from the end of the Persian Wars to the
death of Alexander the Great. One of the most important events during this period is the
Peloponnesian War (431 – 404 BCE), which pitted Athens against Sparta, and forced all other Greek
city-states to choose to join one side or the other. This period ends with the death of Alexander the
Great, who had unified the Greek world into a large kingdom with himself at its helm.

Question 6

Hellenistic Period (323 – 146 BCE)

Answer 6

the period from the death of Alexander to the
Roman conquest of Greece; this is the age of the Hellenistic monarchies ruling over territories
previously conquered by Alexander and his generals. Some historians end this period in 30BCE, with the death of Cleopatra VII, the last surviving ruler of Egypt who was a descendant
of one of Alexander’s generals.

Question 7

METHODOLOGY: SOURCES AND PROBLEM

Answer 7

-Greek history requires
careful consideration of a wide range of sources, which fall into two broad categories: literary
sources (including both fiction and non-fiction), and material culture. The job of the historian,
then, is to reconstruct the story of the Greek people using these very different sources.
-Literary sources, such as epics, lyric poetry, and drama, may seem strange for historians to use,
as they do not necessarily describe specific historical events. Yet, as in the case of other early
civilizations, such sources are a crucial window into the culture and values of the people who
produced them. For instance, the Epic of Gilgamesh, discussed in Chapter 2, is a key text for the
study of early Mesopotamia.
-The earliest literary sources for Greek history are the Homeric epics, Iliad and Odyssey.Their value for historians,
as a result, rests more on their impact on subsequent Greek culture, rather than on their providing
information about Bronze Age Greeks. More than any other literary source, the Homeric Epics
influenced the mentality of the Greeks in thinking about war and what it means to be a hero.
-most surviving literature from Athens because Spartans valued military valor over all else, so they did not cultivate
arts and letters the way Athenians did.
-the excavations of the
sixth-century BCE colony Megara
Hyblaea in Sicily shows that
Greek colonists were interested
in city planning and in equality of
citizens, as demonstrated by the
equal size of the lots.

Question 8

Greece in the Bronze Age, and the Dark Ages

Answer 8

-historians
typically begin the study of the Greeks as a unique civilization in the Bronze Age, with the
Minoans.
-The first literate civilization in Europe, the Minoans were a palace civilization that
flourished on the island of Crete
-As befits island-dwellers, they were traders and seafarers; indeed, the Greek historian
Thucydides credits them with being the first Greeks to sail on ships.
-dubbed them Minoans, after the
mythical Cretan king Minos who was best known for building a labyrinth to house the Minotaur, a
monster that was half-man, half-bull. Bulls appear everywhere in surviving Minoan art, suggesting
that they indeed held a prominent place in Minoan mythology and religion.
-Historians hypothesize that the palaces were the homes of local rulers, who ruled and protected
the surrounding farmland. The palaces seem to have kept records in two different writing systems,
the earliest known in Europe: the
Cretan hieroglyphic and Linear A
scripts. Unfortunately, neither of
these systems has been deciphered,
but it is likely that these were palace
inventories and records pertaining
to trade.
-The palaces had no
surrounding walls, suggesting that
the Cretans maintained peace with
each other and felt safe from outside
attacks, since they lived on an island.
-This sense of security proved to be a
mistake as, around 1,450 BCE, the
palaces were violently destroyed by
invaders, possibly the Mycenaeans who arrived from mainland Greece. Recent
discoveries also suggest that at least some of
the destruction may have been the result of
tsunamis which accompanied the Santorini/
Thera volcanic eruption
-The Mycenaeans, similarly to the Minoans,
were a palace civilization.
-The archaeological excavations of graves in
Mycenae reveal a prosperous civilization that
produced elaborate pottery, bronze weapons
and tools, and extravagant jewelry and other
objects made of precious metals and gems.
-The Mycenaeans also kept palace records in a syllabic script, known as Linear B. Related to the
Cretan Linear A script, Linear B, however, has been deciphered, and identified as Greek.
-Archaeological evidence also shows that sometime in the 1,200s BCE, the Mycenaean palaces
suffered a series of attacks and were gradually
abandoned over the next century.
-The period
that begins around 1,000 BCE is known as the
“Dark Ages” because of the notable decline,
in contrast with the preceding period. The
Mycenaean Linear B script disappears, and
archaeological evidence shows a poorer
Greece with a decline in material wealth
and life expectancy. Some contact, however,
must have remained with the rest of the
Mediterranean, as shown by the emergence
of the Greek alphabet, adapted from the
Phoenician writing system towards the end of
the Dark Ages or early in the Archaic Period.

Question 9

ARCHAIC GREECE

Answer 9

-The story of the Greek world in the Dark
Ages could mostly be described as a story
of fragmentation.
-individual sites had limited contact with each other. The Archaic period, however, appears to have
been a time of growing contacts and connections between different parts of mainland Greece.
Furthermore, it was a time of expansion, as the establishment of overseas colonies and cities
brought the Greeks to Italy and Sicily in the West, and Asia Minor and the Black Sea littoral in the
East.
-Furthermore, while Greeks in the Archaic period saw themselves as citizens of individual
city-states, this period also witnessed the rise of a Pan-Hellenic identity, as all Greeks saw
themselves connected by virtue of their common language, religion, and Homeric values. This
Pan-Hellenic identity was ultimately cemented during the Persian Wars: two invasions of Greece
by the Persian Empire at the end of the Archaic period.

Question 10

Greek Religion

Answer 10

-One theory modern scholars have proposed for the rise of the polis connects the locations of
the city-states to known cult-sites.
-The theory argues that the Greeks of the Archaic period built
city-states around these precincts of various gods in order to live closer to them and protect them.
While impossible to know for sure if this theory or any other regarding the rise of the polis is true,
the building of temples in cities during the Archaic period shows the increasing emphasis that the
poleis were placing on religion.
-It is important to note that Greek religion seems to have been, at least to some extent, an
element of continuity from the Bronze Age to the Archaic period and beyond. The important
role that the gods play in the Homeric epics attests to their prominence in the oral tradition,
going back to the Dark Ages. Furthermore, names of the following major gods worshipped in the
Archaic period and beyond were found on the deciphered Linear B tablets:
-One of the most famous examples is the
cult of Asclepius at Epidaurus. Asclepius, son
of Apollo, was a healer god, and his shrine at
Epidaurus attracted the pilgrims from all over
the Greek world.
-Starting out as local cults, several religious
festivals that included athletic competitions as
part of the celebration also achieved Pan-Hellenic
prominence during the Archaic period. The most
influential of these were the Olympic Games.
-Finally, perhaps the most politically influential of the Pan-Hellenic cults was the oracle of
Apollo at Delphi, established sometime in the eighth century BCE. Available for consultation
only nine days a year, the oracle spoke responses to the questions asked by inquirers through
a priestess, named the Pythia. The Pythia’s responses came in the form of poetry and were
notoriously difficult to interpret. Nevertheless, city-states and major rulers throughout the Greek
world considered it essential to consult the oracle before embarking on any major endeavor, such
as war or founding a colony.

Question 11

Rise of the Hoplite Phalanx and the Polis

Answer 11

-hoplite
phalanx, a new way of fighting that spread around the Greek world in the early Archaic Age and
that coincided with the rise of another key institution for subsequent Greek history: the polis,
or city-state.
-the polis was the central unit of organization in the
Greek world.
-While warfare in the Iliad
consisted largely of duels between
individual heroes, the hoplite
phalanx was a new mode of fighting
that did not rely on the skill of
individuals. Rather, it required all
soldiers in the line to work together
as a whole. Armed in the same way
– with a helmet, spear, and the
round shield, the hoplon, which
gave the hoplites their name
-would execute the othismos (a mass shove) during battle, with the goal of shoving the enemy
phalanx off the battlefield.
-would execute the othismos (a mass shove) during battle, with the goal of shoving the enemy
phalanx off the battlefield.
-Historians do not know which came into existence first, the phalanx or the polis, but the two
clearly reflect a similar ideology. In fact, the phalanx could be seen as a microcosm of the polis,
exemplifying the chief values of the polis on a small scale. Each polis was a fully self-sufficient
unit of organization, with its own laws, definition of citizenship, government, army, economy,
and local cults. Regardless of the differences between the many poleis in matters of citizenship,
government, and law, one key similarity is clear: the survival of the polis depended on the
dedication of all its citizens to the collective well-being of the city-state. This dedication included
service in the phalanx.
-As a result, citizenship in most Greek city-states was closely connected to
military service, and women were excluded from citizenship. Furthermore, since hoplites had
to provide their own armor, these citizen-militias effectively consisted of landowners. This is
not to say, though, that the poorer citizens were entirely excluded from serving their city.
-One
example of a way in which they may have participated even in the phalanx appears on the Chigi
Vase. Marching between two lines of warriors is an unarmed man, playing a double-reed flute

Question 12

Maritime Trade and Colonization

Answer 12

-why did so many Greek city-
states of the Archaic period send out colonies to other parts of the
Greek world? Archaeology and foundation legends, such as those
recorded by Herodotus, suggest two chief reasons: population
pressures along with shortage of productive farmland in the cities
on mainland Greece, and increased ease of trade that colonies
abroad facilitated. In addition to resolving these two problems,
however, the colonies also had the unforeseen impact of increasing
interactions of the Greeks with the larger Mediterranean world and
the ancient Near East. These interactions are visible, for instance,
in the so-called Orientalizing style of art in the Archaic period, a
style the Greeks borrowed from the Middle East and Egypt.
-the presence of Greek
colonies in Asia Minor also played a major role in bringing about
the Greco-Persian Wars.

Question 13

Aristocracy, Democracy, and Tyranny in Archaic Greece

Answer 13

-a certain trend in the trajectory of the history of most Greek
poleis: most city-states started out with a monarchical or quasi-
monarchical government.
-Over time the people gained greater
representation, and an assembly of all citizens had at least some
degree of political power—although some degree of strife typically
materialized between the aristocrats and the poorer elements.
-Taking advantage of such civic
conflicts, tyrants came to power in most city-states for a brief period before the people banded
together and drove them out, thenceforth replacing them with a more popular form of government.
-Many modern historians are skeptical about some of the stories that the Greek historians tell
about origins of some poleis;Similarly, the stories about some of the Archaic tyrants seem to belong
more to the realm of legend than history. Nevertheless, the preservation of stories about tyrants in
early oral tradition suggests that city-states likely went through periods of turmoil and change in
their form of government before developing a more stable constitution. Furthermore, this line of
development accurately describes the early history of Athens, the best-documented polis.
-In the early Archaic period, Athens largely had an aristocratic constitution.
-Widespread debt-
slavery, however, caused significant civic strife in the city and led to the appointment of Solon as
lawgiver for the year 594/3 BCE, specifically for the purpose of reforming the laws. Solon created amore democratic constitution and also left poetry documenting justifications for his reforms—and
different citizens’ reactions to them. Most controversial of all, Solon instituted a one-time debt-
forgiveness, seisachtheia, which literally means “shaking off.” He proceeded to divide all citizens
into five classes based on income, assigning a level of political participation and responsibility
commensurate with each class.
-Shortly after Solon’s reforms, a tyrant, Peisistratus, illegally
seized control of Athens and remained in power off and on from 561 to 527 BCE. Peisistratus
seems to have been a reasonably popular ruler who had the support of a significant portion of the
Athenian population. His two sons, Hippias and Hipparchus, however, appear to have been less
well-liked. Two men, Harmodius and Aristogeiton, assassinated Hipparchus in 514 BCE; then
in 508 BCE, the Athenians, with the help of a Spartan army, permanently drove out Hippias.
In subsequent Athenian history, Harmodius and Aristogeiton were considered heroes of the
democracy and celebrated as tyrannicides.
-Immediately following the expulsion of Hippias, Athens underwent a second round of
democratic reforms, led by Cleisthenes. The Cleisthenic constitution remained in effect, with
few changes, until the Macedonian conquest of Athens in the fourth century BCE and is considered
to be the Classical Athenian democracy. Central to the democracy was the participation of all
citizens in two types of institutions: the ekklesia, an assembly of all citizens, which functioned as
the chief deliberative body of the city; and the law-courts, to which citizens were assigned by lot
as jurors.
-ekklesia elected people, were a group who did it
-While this notion of appointing the top political leaders
by lot may seem surprising, it exemplifies the Athenians’ pride in their democracy and their desire
to believe that, in theory at least, all Athenian citizens were equally valuable and capable of leading
their city-state.

Question 14

athens

Answer 14

-everything is up to city states, not really unified until alexander the great
-each city state had its own god it looked to, athen’s was athena
-athen’s their square: they valued knowledge, thinking, creativity =brain, beauty, logic.leanring, philosophy

Question 15

sparta

Answer 15

-urpose of women is to have soldiers, all about war, bravery, city over individual
Sparta was seen by other Greek poleis
as a very different sort of city from the rest. Ruled from an early period by two kings – one from
each of the two royal houses that ruled jointly – Sparta was a true oligarchy, in which the power
rested in its gerousia, a council
of thirty elders, whose number
included the two kings. While an
assembly of all citizens existed
as well, its powers were much
more limited than were those
of the Athenian assembly. Yet
because of much more restrictive
citizenship rules, Spartan
assembly of citizens would have
felt as a more selective body,
-The Spartans annexed the
Messenian territory to their
own and made the Messenians
helots. While the helots could
not be bought or sold, they were
permanently tied to the land
in a status akin to medieval
European serfs. The availability of helot labor allowed the Spartans from that point on to focus
their attention on military training. This focus transformed Sparta into the ultimate military state
in the Greek world, widely respected by the other Greek poleis for its military prowess. Other
Greeks were fascinated by such Spartan practices as the communal bringing up of all children
apart from their parents and the requirement that all Spartan girls and women, as well as boys
and men, maintain a strict regimen of exercise and training.

Question 16

Cup of Nestor

Answer 16

-is one of the earliest examples of writing in the Greek alphabet, as well as the earliest known
written reference to the Homeric epics. Overall, this cup and the inscription on it exemplify the
mobility of the Ancient Greeks and their borrowing of skills and culture from others around the
Mediterranean while, at the same time, cultivating a set of values specific to themselves. After all,
just like the very residents of Pithekoussai, the cup had originally made the journey all the way
from the island of Euboea, off the coast of Athens, to Pithekoussai, on the island of Ischia

Question 17

The Persian Wars

Answer 17

-Cyrus, an ambitious king of Persia, embarked
on a swift program of expansion, ultimately consolidating under his rule the largest empire of the
ancient world and earning for himself the title “Cyrus the Great.”
-Cyrus’ Achaemenid Empire bordered the area of Asia Minor that had been previously
colonized by the Greeks. This expansion of the Persian Empire brought the Persians into direct
conflict with the Greeks and became the origin of the Greco-Persian Wars, the greatest military
conflict the Greek world had known up until that point.
-Seeking revenge on Athens and Eretria, the Persian king Darius launched an expedition
-the
Athenians, with only a small force of
Plataeans helping, faced the much
larger Persian army in the Battle of
Marathon. The decisive Athenian
victory showed the superiority of the
Greek hoplite phalanx and marked theend of the first Persian invasion of Greece. Furthermore, the victory at Marathon, which remained
a point of pride for the Athenians for centuries after, demonstrated to the rest of the Greeks that
Sparta was not the only great military power in Greece.
-Darius died in 486 BCE, having never realized his dream of revenge against the Greeks. His
son, Xerxes, however, continued his father’s plans and launched in 480 BCE a second invasion
of Greece, with an army so large that,
-The Greek world reacted in a much more organized fashion to this second invasion
than it did to the first. Led by Athens and Sparta, some seventy Greek poleis formed a sworn
alliance to fight together against the Persians. This alliance, the first of its kind, proved to be the
key to defeating the Persians as it allowed the allies to split forces strategically in order to guard
against Persian attack by both land and sea. The
-the Persians first confronted the Spartans
at the Battle of Thermopylae, a narrow mountain pass that stood in the way of the Persians’
accessing any point south. In this now-legendary battle, 300 Spartans, led by their king Leonidas,
successfully defended the pass for two days before being betrayed by a local who showed a
roundabout route to the Persians. The Persians then were able to outflank the Spartans and kill
them to the last man.
-This battle, although a loss for the Greeks, bought crucial time for the rest
of the Greek forces in preparing to face the Persians. It
-The victory at Thermopylae fulfilled the old dream of Darius, as it allowed access to Athens
for the Persians. The Athenian statesman Themistocles, however, had ordered a full evacuation
of the city in advance of the Persian attack through an unusual interpretation of a Delphic oracle
stating that wooden walls will save Athens. Taking the oracle to mean that the wooden walls in
question were ships, Themistocles built a massive fleet which he used to send all of the city’s
inhabitants to safety. His gamble proved to be successful, and the Persians captured and burned
a mostly empty city.
=It is difficult to overestimate the impact of the Persian Wars on subsequent Greek history. Seen
by historians as the end-point of the Archaic Period, the Persian Wars cemented Pan-Hellenic
identity, as they saw cooperation on an unprecedented scale among the Greek city-states. In
addition, the Persian Wars showed the Greek military superiority over the Persians on both land
and sea. Finally, the wars showed Athens in a new light to the rest of the Greeks. As the winners of
Marathon in the first invasion and the leaders of the navy during the second invasion, the Athenians
emerged from the wars as the rivals of Sparta for military prestige among the Greeks. This last
point, in particular, proved to be the most influential for Greek history in the subsequent period.

Question 18

THE CLASSICAL PERIOD

Answer 18

First, Athens and Sparta spent
much of the fifth century BCE battling each other for control of the Greek world. Then, once both
were weakened, other states began attempting to fill the power vacuum. Ultimately, the ClassicalPeriod will end with the Greek world under the control of a power that was virtually unknown to
the Greeks at the beginning of the fifth century BCE: Macedon.

Question 19

From the Delian League to the Athenian Empire

Answer 19

-greek city states founded the
Delian League, with the aim of continuing to protect the Greeks in Ionia from Persian attacks.
-Over the next twenty years, the Delian League gradually transformed from a loose alliance of
states led by Athens to a more formal entity. The League’s Athenian leadership, in the meanwhile,
grew to be that of an imperial leader. The few members who tried to secede from the League, such
as the island of Naxos, quickly learned that doing so was not an option as the revolt was violently
subdued. Finally, in 454 BCE, the treasury of the Delian League moved to Athens. That moment
marked the transformation of the Delian League into the Athenian Empire.
-Since the Athenians publicly inscribed each year the one-sixtieth portion of the tribute that
they dedicated to Athena, records survive listing the contributing members for a number of years,
thereby allowing historians to see the magnitude of the Athenian operation.
-survives, it appears that the Athenians’ allies in the
Delian League were not happy with the transformation of the alliance into a full-fledged Athenian
Empire. Non-allies were affected a well, harsh punishments for not joining and used money for their own things too
-survives, it appears that the Athenians’ allies in the
Delian League were not happy with the transformation of the alliance into a full-fledged Athenian
Empire. Non-allies were affected a well. ((Shortly after moving
the treasury to Athens, Pericles
sponsored a Citizenship Decree in
451 BCE that restricted Athenian
citizenship from thence onwards

only to individuals who had two free-
born and legitimately-wed Athenianparents, both of whom were also born
of Athenian parents. Then c. 449 BCE,
Pericles successfully proposed a decree
allowing the Athenians to use Delian
League funds for Athenian building
projects, and, c. 447 BCE, he sponsored
the Athenian Coinage Decree, a decree
that imposed Athenian standards of
weights and measures on all states that
were members of the Delian League.
Later in his life, Pericles famously described Athens as “the school of Hellas;” this description
would certainly have fit Athens just as much in the mid-fifth century BCE as, in addition to the
flourishing of art and architecture, the city was a center of philosophy and drama.))
-The growing wealth and power of Athens in the twenty or so years since the Persian Wars
did not escape Sparta and led to increasingly tense relations between the two leading powers in
Greece. Sparta had steadily consolidated the Peloponnesian League in this same time-period, but
Sparta’s authority over this league was not quite as strict as was the Athenian control over the
Delian League.
-the Spartans and the Athenians engaged
in a series of battles, to which modern scholars refer as the First Peloponnesian War. In 445
BCE, the two sides swore to a Thirty Years Peace, a treaty that allowed both sides to return to their
pre-war holdings, with few exceptions. Still, Spartan unease in this period of Athenian expansion
and prosperity, which resulted in the First Peloponnesian War, was merely a sign of much more
serious conflict to come.

Question 20

The Peloponnesian War (431 – 404 BCE)

Answer 20

-inevitabable, bubbling under the surface for fifty years, the war finally
broke out over a seemingly minor affair.
-Corcyra, a colony of Corinth that no longer
wanted to be under the control of its mother-city, asked Athens for protection against Corinth.
The Corinthians claimed that the Athenian support of Corcyra was a violation of the Thirty Years
Peace. At a subsequent meeting of the Peloponnesian League in Sparta in 432 BCE, the allies,
along with Sparta, voted that the peace had been broken and so declared war against Athens.
-no one thought that it would last twenty-seven years and
would ultimately embroil the entire Greek-speaking world.
-The long duration of the war, however, was partly the result of the different strengths of the two
leading powers.
-Athens was a naval empire, with allies scattered all over the Ionian Sea.
-Sparta,
on the other hand, was a land-locked power with supporters chiefly in the Peloponnese and with
no navy to speak of at the outset of the war.
-Athens, in
particular, became more democratic because of increased need for manpower to row its fleet.
The lowest census bracket, the thetes, whose poverty and inability to buy their own armor had
previously excluded them from military service, became by the end of the war a full-fledged
part of the Athenian forces and required a correspondingly greater degree of political influence.
-In the case of Sparta, the war had ended the Spartan policy of relative isolationism from therest of the affairs of the Greek city-states.
-While
war was previously largely a seasonal affair,
with many conflicts being decided with a single
battle, the Peloponnesian War forced the Greek
city-states to support standing armies.
-while sieges of cities and attacks on civilians
were previously frowned upon, they became the
norm by the end of the Peloponnesian War.
-the war had a detrimental effect on human
nature, encouraging a previously unprecedented
degree of cruelty on both sides.
-It is important
to note, though, that as brutal as sieges could
be during the Peloponnesian War, Greek siege
warfare during the fifth century BCE was still
quite primitive,
-Modern historians divide the Peloponnesian

War into three distinct stages, based on the
tactics used in each:
the Archidamian War:
-named after the Spartan king
Archidamus, who proposed the strategy of annual invasions of Attica at the beginning of the
war.
-The Spartans thereby
hoped to provoke the Athenians to a battle. Pericles however, refused to enter into battle against
the Spartans, and instead ordered all inhabitants of Attica to retreat within the city. Wise decision, they most likely would have lost land
-though the crowded conditions within
Athens resulted in the outbreak of a virulent plague which by some estimates killed as much as
twenty-five percent of the city’s population over the following three years. Among the dead was
none other than Pericles himself.
-The plague had significant repercussions for Athens during the first phase of the war because
of not only the loss of fighting men to disease and the consequent lowered morale in the city, but
also the death of Pericles, the moderate leader.
-The subsequent leaders who emerged, such asCleon, were known as war-hawks.
the Peace of Nicias:
-spartans annually invaded until the athens finally beat them
-with the death of the most pro-war generals
on both sides, the Athenians with their allies signed a peace treaty with Spartans and their allies.
Named the “Peace of Nicias” after the Athenian general who brokered this treaty, it was supposed
to be a fifty years’ peace; it allowed both sides to return to their pre-war holdings, with a few
exceptions. As part of the peace terms, the Spartan hostages from Pylos were finally released.
-proved to be a short and
uneasy time filled with minor battles and skirmishes.
-One problem with the treaty was that while
Athens and all of its allies signed the peace, several key allies of Sparta, including Corinth and Thebes,
refused to do so. Furthermore, Athens made the disastrous decision during this stalemate to launch
the Sicilian Expedition, a venture that took much of the Athenian fleet to Sicily
-Syracuse, however, proved to be a difficult target, and the expedition ended in 413 BCE with a
complete destruction of the Athenian navy. That same year, the Spartans renewed the fighting,
the Decelean War: (third stage)
-the Spartans
took the war to Attic soil by occupying Decelea, a village in Attica proper, and transforming it into a
-military fort. This occupation allowed the Spartans to prevent the Athenians from farming their
land and cutting off Athens from most supply routes, effectively crippling the Athenian economy
for the remainder of the war. Losing the Sicilian Expedition and the challenge of the Decelean
War produced a high level of resentment towards the democratic leaders in Athens.
-Therefore in
411 BCE, an oligarchic coup briefly replaced the democracy with the rule of the Four Hundred.
While this oligarchy was quickly overthrown and the democracy restored, this internal instability
highlighted the presence of the aristocratic element in the city as well as the dissatisfaction of at
least the aristocratic citizens with the long war.
-athenians rebuilt their navy, won battles, but spartain leader Lysader eventually defeated them,the Athenian democracy was
overthrown, to be replaced this time by the Spartan-sanctioned oligarchy known as the Tyranny
of the Thirty. The rule of the Thirty proved to be a much more brutal oligarchy than that of the
Four Hundred, but then A year later, an army formed largely of Athenian democrats in exile marched on
the city and overthrew the Thirty. The democracy thus was restored in 403 BCE, and the painful
process of recovery from the war and the oligarchic rule could begin

Question 21

Athenian Culture during the Peloponnesian War

Answer 21

-Because it drained Athens of manpower and financial resources, the Peloponnesian War
proved to be an utter practical disaster for Athens.
-Nevertheless, the war period was also the
pinnacle of Athenian culture, most notably its tragedy, comedy, and philosophy. Tragedy and
comedy in Athens were very much popular entertainment, intended to appeal to all citizens. Thus
issues considered in these plays were often ones of paramount concern for the city
-Sophocles’ plays repeatedly showed the emotional and psychological challenges of war
for soldiers and civilians alike; they also emphasized the futility of war, as the heroes of his plays,just as in the original myths on which they were based, died tragic, untimely deaths.
-Sophocles’
younger contemporary, Euripides, had a similar interest in depicting the horrors of war and
wrote a number of tragedies on the impact of war on the defeated,
-Socrates, was dreaming of difficult questions. One of the most prominent
philosophers of the ancient world, Socrates has not left any writings of his own, but thoughts
attributed to him survive in dialogues penned by his student, the fourth-century philosopher
Plato.
-Socrates continued to probe further every definition and answer that his
conversation partners provided, guiding them to delve deeper in their reflections on the topics at
hand than they had before. As a result of his love of such debates, Socrates was seen as connected
to the Sophists, philosophical debate teachers,

Question 22

The Fourth Century BCE

Answer 22

-scrates speedily put to death the connections that Socrates previously
had to oligarchic leaders. In particular, Socrates had taught Critias, who became one of the Thirty
in 404 BCE. Fueled by their hatred of all enemies of the democracy and anyone who had associated
with the Thirty, the Athenians condemned Socrates to death.
-This trial shows how deeply the scars
went in the collective psyche and how difficult it was for the Athenians to forget the terrible end of
the Peloponnesian War.
-it is clear that for the rest of theGreek world, their life in the fourth
century BCE was very much the
result of the Peloponnesian War.
-Defeated in
the war, Athens was no longer an
Empire, while the winner, Sparta,
had suffered a catastrophic decline
in its population over the course
of the Peloponnesian War.
-The final key to the Theban military supremacy was the Theban Sacred
Band, formed in 378 BCE. An elite core of 300 warriors, the band consisted of 150 couples, based on
the assumption that the lovers would fight most bravely in order not to appear to be cowardly to their
beloved. In 371 BCE, the Thebans demonstrated the success of their military reforms by defeating
the Spartans at the Battle
of Leuctra. They continued
an aggressive program of
military expansion over the
next decade, a period known
as the Theban Hegemony.
-a young Macedonian
prince stayed for several
years in Thebes as a hostage.
While there, he caught the
eye of the military reformer,
Epaminondas, who took
the prince under his wing.
Circa 364 BCE, the prince
returned to Macedon, and,
in 359 BCE, he ascended to
the throne as king Philip II.
Up until that point in Greek
history, the Macedonians
had largely been known for
two things: drinking theirwine undiluted, which had marked them as complete and utter barbarians in the eyes of the rest
of the Greeks, and being excellent horsemen. With Philip at the helm, this estimation was about
to change. As soon as he came to the throne, Philip began transforming the Macedonian military
into a more successful image of what he had seen at Thebes. Philip further lengthened the already
longer spears used by the Thebans, creating the Macedonian sarissa, a spear of about eighteen
feet in length, double that of the traditional Greek hoplite spear.
-Philip’s final great victory, which he
shared with his teenage son Alexander, was at the Battle of Chaeronea (338 BCE), in which the
Macedonian armies defeated the combined forces of Athens and Thebes. Philip’s conquest of the
entire mainland was the end of an era, as for the first time, the entire territory was united under the
rule of a king.
-Continuing to move eastwards, Alexander invaded India in 327 BCE, planning to conquer
the known world and assuming that he was close to this achievement, since the Greeks of his
day were not aware of China’s existence. His war-weary troops, however, rebelled in 326 BCE
and demanded to return home (see Chapter 3). It appears that this mutiny was not the first that
occurred in Alexander’s army; indeed, over the course of his rule, Alexander had also been the
target of a number of failed assassinations. However, this mutiny forced Alexander to give in.
-A charismatic leader, albeit one prone to emotional
outbursts, Alexander redefined what it meant to be king and general. His coinage reflects this
reinvention. On one coin minted during his lifetime, for instance, appears Alexander dressed as
the hero Heracles, while Zeus, whom
Alexander alleged to be his real father,
appears on the other side.
-previously not
part of the Greek world, Alexander
spread Greek culture farther than had
anyone else before him. At the same
time, by marrying several non-Greek
princesses and encouraging such
marriages by his troops, Alexander also
encouraged the creation of a “melting-
pot” empire;
-Alexander’s generals divided his conquests into several kingdoms
that they and their descendants continued to rule until the Romans conquered these respective
areas. It appears that Alexander’s melting-pot empire, burning up as a phoenix upon his death,
actually allowed several new empires and kingdoms to arise from its ashes.

Question 23

HELLENISTIC PERIOD

Answer 23

Historians today consider the death of Alexander to be the end point of the Classical Period
and the beginning of the Hellenistic Period. That moment, for historians, also marks the end
of the polis as the main unit of organization in the Greek world. While city-states continued to
exist, the main unit of organization from that point on was the great Hellenistic kingdoms. These
kingdoms, encompassing much greater territory than the Greek world had before Alexander,
contributed to the thorough Hellenization of the Eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East.
The age of the Hellenistic kingdoms also coincided with the rise of Rome as a military power in the
West. Ultimately, the Hellenistic kingdoms were conquered and absorbed by Rome.

Question 24

Hellenistic Kingdoms

Answer 24

-Alexander’s most talented generals turned against each
other in a contest for the control of the empire that they had helped create.
-These Wars of the Diadochi, as they are known in modern scholarship, ended with a
partition of Alexander’s empire into a number of kingdoms, each ruled by dynasties., most influential being:
-Seleucus, who took control of Syria and the surrounding areas, thus creating
the Seleucid Empire;
-Antigonus Monophthalmos, the One-Eyed, who took over the territory of
Asia Minor and northern Syria, establishing the Antigonid Dynasty;
-the Attalid Dynasty, which
took power over the Kingdom of Pergamon, after the death of its initial ruler, Lysimachus, a
general of Alexander;
-and Ptolemy, Alexander’s most influential general, who took control over
Egypt, establishing the Ptolemaic Dynasty.
-These successors had difficulties holding on to Seleucus’ conquests.
-The empire’s story
for the remainder of its existence is one of almost constant civil wars and increasingly declining
territories.
-The Seleucids seem to have had a particularly antagonistic relationship with their
Jewish subjects, going so far as to outlaw Judaism
-hannuka celebrating victory of jews over seleucids so Seleucids had to allow autonomy
to the Jewish state; it achieved full independence from Seleucid rule
-Antigonus’ hopes of reuniting all of Alexander’s original empire under his own rule,
however, were never realized as Antigonus died in battle in 301 BCE. The greatest threat to the
Antigonids, however, came not from the Seleucid Empire, but from Rome with whom they waged
three Macedonian Wars between 214 and 168 BCE.
-The Roman defeat of king Perseus in 168 BCE
at the Battle of Pydna marked the end of the Third Macedonian War, and the end of an era, as
control over Greece was now in Roman hands.
-Lasting from the death of Alexander in 323 BCE to the death of Cleopatra VII in 30 BCE, the
Ptolemaic kingdom proved to be the longest lasting and most successful of the kingdoms carved
from Alexander’s initial empire. Its founder, Ptolemy I Soter, was a talented general,
-wanted to make alexandria the new mediterranean athens so put in place the great library and attracting scholars to his city
-while the Ptolemies brought with them Greek language and
culture to Egypt, they were also profoundly influenced by Egyptian customs.
-Portraying themselves
as the new Pharaohs, the Ptolemies even adopted the Egyptian royal custom of brother-sister
marriages,
-cleopatra cameo in bid for roman empire
-it is very likely that, had
he lived longer, Alexander would have seen his empire unravel, as no structure was really in
place to hold it together.
-At the same time, the clash of cultures that Alexander’s empire and
the successor states produced resulted in the spread of Greek culture and language further than
ever before; simultaneously, it also introduced the Greeks to other peoples, thus bringing foreign
customs—such as the brother-sister marriages in Egypt—into the lives of the Greeks living outside
the original Greek world.

Question 25

Hellenistic Culture

Answer 25

-The Hellenistic kingdoms spread Greek language, culture, and art all over the areas of
Alexander’s former conquests. Furthermore, many Hellenistic kings, especially the Ptolemies,
were patrons of art and ideas. Thus the Hellenistic era saw the flourishing of art and architecture,
philosophy, medical and scientific writing, and even translations of texts of other civilizations into
Greek. The undisputed center for these advances was Alexandria.
-pharos/lighthouse of alexandria:its function symbolized the ability of man
to subdue the sea, even by night.
-Similarly,
both the scientific and medical texts from the
Hellenistic Period reveal a fascination with an
ordered universe and an interest in discovering
how it worked. Herophilus of Chalcedon,
for instance, pioneered dissection
-Archimedes of
Syracuse specialized in applying mathematical
concepts to create such devices as a screw pump
and a variety of war machines, including the
heat ray.
-these things stemmed a lot from Arostatal
-considered to be the last Classical Greek
philosopher.
-specifically argued for empiricism, that is, the
belief that knowledge is acquired from sensory
experiences rather than from intuition. In the
sciences, for instance, this approach required
experiments and the careful gathering of data.
-lots of different philosophies, and many others
that co-existed with them, aimed to provide a coherent system that made sense of the world and
provided a purpose for human life.
-in a testament to the deep influence of the Hellenistic language culture on the conquered
regions, the Hellenistic Period saw the translation of texts of other civilizations into Greek.

Question 26

CONCLUSION

Answer 26

-the deep influence of Greek culture on the
Roman world,
-this spread of the Greeks and their civilization ultimately changed
what it meant to be Greek–or, rather, it created a more universal Greek identity, which largely
replaced the polis-specific view of citizenship and identity that existed before Philip’s conquest of
Greece. And yet, certain cultural constants persisted.
-Homer, whose epics continued to be as great an inspiration to the Greeks
of the Roman world as they were to their Archaic Age counterparts.
-homeric values were likely the reason for the minimal advances in military technology in the Greek world,
as honor was more important than military success at all cost.
-The second cultural constant was
the work of the philosophers Plato and Aristotle, in whose shadows all subsequent philosophers
of the Greco-Roman world labored. Even as the Greek-speaking portions of the Roman Empire
turned to Christianity, they could not abandon their philosophical roots, resulting, for instance,
in the Gnostic heresies.

Question 27

The works of three major
historians survive from Classical Athens

Answer 27

Herodotus, dubbed the Father of History, wrote the
Histories about the Persian Wars in mid-fifth century BCE. Thucydides, an Athenian general in
the Peloponnesian War, wrote a history of the Peloponnesian War over the course of the war (431
– 404 BCE). Finally, Xenophon wrote a history of the end of the Peloponnesian War, starting with
411 BCE, where Thucydides’ work ended, and into the fourth century. In addition to the works of the
historians, philosophical treatises – most notably, those of Plato and Aristotle – provide crucial
insight into the political thought, moral values, and perceptions of the world in late fifth and fourth
centuries BCE.
-First, virtually all of the literary sources were written by men and provide
very little evidence of the lives and perspectives of women in the Greek world, except as seen through
the eyes of men. Second, most of the authors were wealthy and socially prominent individuals; thus,
their perspective does not reflect that of less affluent citizens and slaves.

Question 28

Homer and the Trojan War

Answer 28

-Yet, while the Greeks saw mythology and history as related concepts and sometimes as two
sides of the same coin, one specific mythical event marked, in the eyes of the earliest known Greek
historians, the beginning of the story of Greek-speaking peoples. That event was the Trojan War.
-It is telling that the two earliest Greek historians, Herodotus, writing in the mid-fifth century
BCE, and Thucydides, writing in the last third of the fifth century BCE, began their respective
histories with the Trojan War, each treating it as a historical event.
-values. A major theme throughout
both epics is personal honor, which Homeric heroes value more than the collective cause.
-A related theme is competitive
excellence, with kleos (eternal glory) as its goal: all Greek heroes want to be the best; thus,
even while fighting in the same army, they see each other as competition.
-achilles inspriation to people such as alexander the great
-Greeks’ belief that the gods were everywhere, and acted in the lives of mortals.
-These gods could be powerful benefactors and patrons of individuals who respected them and
sought their favor, or vicious enemies, bent on destruction.
-the Homeric epics influenced Greek values from the Archaic
period on, they do not reflect the reality of the Greek world in any one period. Furthermore, they
were not composed by a single poet, Homer; indeed, it is possible that Homer never existed.
Because the epics were composed orally by multiple bards over the period of several hundred
years, they combine details about technological and other aspects of the Bronze Age with those
of the Dark Ages and even the early Archaic Age.