Unit 1 Flashcards
Timeline
Prehistory Mesopotamia -Sumerian (C.3500-2350 BC) -Semitic (C.2350-612 BC) Ancient Egypt (c. 10,000-2696 BC) Bronze age Agean (2500-1200 BC) Dark Age (c. 1200–750 BCE) Archaic Period (c. 8th c./ 750–500/480 BC) Classical Period (480–323 BC)
Paleolithic
Old Stone Age
Portable tools that they could take with them when gathering food.
Representational Art
Woolly Mammoth Hut
Neolithic
New Stone Age
Neolithic Revolution
Jericho
Newgrange and Stonehedge showed there was organized religion, astrological significance, settlement, working together to build structures, and increasing order
Neolithic Revolution
Agricultural Revolution, allows civilization to arise, the development os social hierarchy, and defense within settled communities (trade, economic system, save food for later)
Sumerian vs. Semitic
Sumeria: earliest bronze age culture, warring city states pop up (URUK). Ziggurat
Semitic:
Sargon 1 is the first to unify Mesopotamia, people are inspired by him to become imperial forces.
Babylonian Empire, Hammurabi’s Code, Mathematics, Assyrians, Astronomy
Mesopotamia
River valley civilizations during the Bronze Age. Means “Land between two rivers.” It was unstable, but writing, laws, religion, and city states began. The river didn’t flood easily and it was hard to defend.
Polytheistic
Enuma Elish
They believed that in the beginning water was the only thing that existed, from it came the gods and the universe.. Marduk was created, he disagreed with Tiamat and tore her apart, creating the earth and mankind.
Hammurabi’s Code
Babylonian code that created a united empire under more stable conditions.
Semitic Mathematics
Babylonians decided on 60 seconds in a min, 60 min in an hour.
Originated the Pythagorean thoerum.
Dozen
Assyrians
Brutal, efficient conquering. Profound influence in Biblical history. Massive libraries in royal palaces. Actively collecting stories from Mesopotamia, like the Epic of Gilgamesh (would’ve been lost without the Assyrians)
Epic of Gilgamesh
World’s first Epic
Inspired Illiad & Odssey
Semitic Astronomy
Star catalogues in cuneiform
Ancient Egypt
Longer and more stable than Mesopotamia. Dependent on the Nile. Dependable, stable culture -> less developments than Mesopotamia.
Ancient Egyptian Religion
Amun-Ra, Origin god.
Isis - becomes an important deity in Greco-Roman culture
Many Egyptian myths were passed down into Greek culture. Tried to answer, “What is the purpose of life? What happens when we die? Where does the sun go when it sets?”
Ancient Egyptian Afterlife
Once your body dies, your soul will continue to live on. Pharaoh is buried with materials to help them in the afterlife. Pyramids are burial sites for pharoahs, King Tut is the most famous, but not the most wealthy. Normal people weren’t buried this way.
Canon of Proportions
Egyptians mad all artwork look the same, they wanted uniformity. Abstracted the body, made the poses very stiff and rigid.
Monumental Structure
The Egyptian buildings were unified and symmetrical, with long pathways and staircases.
Egyptian Writing
Hieroglyphs: primary form of writing. Eventually they wrote on papyrus.
Bronze Age Aegean
The time period of the Minoans, who were peaceful and invented Linear A, and the Mycenaeans, who were warlike and invented Linear B.
Minoans
Crete, Knossos -> cities by the water
Peaceful people -> no fortified structures
Linear A -> writing system for trading goods that can’t be deciphered
Massive Volcano eruption & bad fortification led to the fall of the Minoans (the Mycenaeans might also have had something to do with it)
Mycenaeans
MYCENAE- Athens was here
Warlike culture -> strategic citadels on hilltops so they could see enemies from afar
Mask of Agamamnon -> thinly hammered gold
Linear B -> their writing talks about preparations for war (“King’s List”: gives supplies the king needed for war)
Dark Age
Time of cultural collapse where the “sea people” lived. There was evidence of great conflict.
Sea People
A group of people who wreaked havoc on the mediterranean during the dark age.
Why was power hard to acquire during the dark age?
Bones showed malnutrition -> signs of crops failing
Called the “Dark Age” because writing disappears.
Huge population decline, reduced by 90%
Loss of artistic skills and cultural achievements
Skilled artists, engineers disappear
Trade routes are disrupted, creating isolated societies.
Polis (pl. poleis)
Began in the Dark Age - City States/self governing towns.
“Frogs around the pond”
Where we get the word “politics”
Greek City States
Athens, Corinth, Olympia, Delphi, Sparta, Knossos
Archaic Period
Terracotta Krater Homer Hesiod Panhellenism Hellas Panathenaea Dionysia Olympic Games Hoplite Pre-Socratics Kouros Parthenon Democracy Persian Wars
Terracotta Krater
750 BC, from Kerameikos Cemetery in Athens Vase with drawings on it. Gravemarker that shows a dead man’s procession.
Homer
Wrote the Illiad, capturing the events of the Trojan war
Arete
excellence and virtue
Illiad
The Aehaean hero Achilles is moved to anger by an affront to his honor. Agamemnon, the King of Mycenae, took Achilles’ war trophy woman, so he refuses to join the battle against Troy alongside his comrades. Only after his friend Patroclus dies wearing his armor does he finally go to war. There, he strips Hector of his armor and drags his naked corpse around in a dishonoring way. Hector’s father Priam begs for his son’s body back. Both Achilles and Priam are feminine to beg and grieve.
Hesiod’s Theogony
5th c.
About the 12 olympians
Theogony means, “birth of the gods”
He was the first to establish a cohesive mythology.
“In the beginning there was chaos, which gave birth to Nyx, Erebus, Gaia, and Eros. Gaia and Eros gave birth to Uranus. Uranus and Gaia gave birth to the Titans (one is Cronus) and 3 cyclopes. Cronus gives birth to the gods- one is Zeus. Cronos kills his father and eats his kid. Zeus and his mother defeat Cronos.
Prometheus
Titan who brings fire to men, Zeus punishes him by chaining him to a rock and having a crow eat his innards every day. Punishes man by creating the first woman, Pandora, to tempt them.
Panhellenic Festival
“All-Greek” festival in honor of the Greek Gods that was one of the great religious centers of Greece. Located in Olympia