I. Minoan Civilization
a. Minoans based on trade, not conquest.
b. Lived on the island of Crete.
c. Minoan civilization vanished in 1400 B.C. for an unknown cause.
II. Rulers of Mycenae
a. Indo-European people and conquered the Greek mainland before overrunning Crete.
b. They dominated the Aegean world from about 1400 B.C. to 1200 B.C.
c. They fought against Troy in the Trojan War and beat them using the �Trojan Horse.�
III. The Age of Homer
a. The Mycenaean people fell due to the fact of sea raiders.
b. The Dorians came into power.
c. Homer was a famous poet that traveled from village to village singing and playing his harp.
IV. Geography: The Greek Homeland
a. Greece is part of the Balkan Peninsula.
b. The Greeks farmed the valleys or settled on the scattered islands.
c. The Mediterranean and Aegean seas were as central to the Greek world as the Nile to Egypt.
V. The Polis
a. An acropolis sat at the tip of the hill, made of marble and used for worshiping gods or goddesses.
b. Greece became an aristocracy, or rule by a landholding elite.
c. Farmers and merchants challenged nobles and the result was the government becoming an oligarchy.
VI. Sparta A Nation of Soldiers
a. Children were raised as soldiers at a very young age.
b. Women were trained to produce healthy sons for the army.
c. Sparta shrank because it had no ability to change.
VII. Athens: A Limited Democracy
a. Around 700 B.C. noble landowners held the power.
b. Farmers, artisans, and merchants wanted a change in the government and they moved towards democracy.
c. Solon was appointed as leader, he outlawed debt slavery, and freed those who had already been sold into slavery for debt, he opened high offices to more citizens and granted citizenship to some foreigners, and gave the Athenian assembly more say in important decisions.
VIII. Forces for Unity
a. The Greeks were polytheistic; they believed that the gods lived on Mount Olympus in northern Greece.
b. The most powerful god was Zeus.
c. Greeks viewed non-Greeks as barbarians.
IX. The Persian Wars
a. The Persians crushed the rebel cities and moved on to Athens, landing in Marathon, the Greeks pushed back the Persians and won.
b. The Persians came back with a larger fleet and beat the Greeks, but the Greeks sunk their ships, then the Greeks killed the Persians on land.
c. The Athenians became the most powerful and made alliances with other Greek city-states known as the Delian League.
X. Athens in the Age of Pericles
a. Pericles ruled in this time, 469 B.C. to 429 B.C.
b. Athenians had a direct democracy, where 6,000 men had to group together to decide important decisions.
c. Athens prospered during the Age of Pericles, they rebuilt the acropolis which gave jobs to artisans and workers.
XI. Greek against Greek
a. Athens, practicing democracy, and Sparta, practicing oligarchy butted heads.
b. In 431 B.C. war broke out between the Athens and Sparta, it lasted 27 years and engulfed all of Greece.
c. A plague broke out and killed at least a third of the population including Pericles, the lack for power undermined the city�s democratic government; it ended Athernian greatness and democracy in Greece came to a halting stop.
XII. Lovers of Wisdom
a. In Athens a group of philosophers named the Sophists questioned ideas of truth and would rather thrive, encouraging people to develop skills in rhetoric, the art of skillful speaking.
b. Many young Athenians followed the Sophists.
c. A critic of the Sophists was Socrates, an Athenian stonemason and philosopher, who lived from 469. B.C. to 399 B.C.
XIII. Death of a Philosopher
a. Socrates urged his friends to question themselves and what they do.
b. Socrates was sentenced to death because they accused him of questioning the gods and corrupting the city�s youth.
c. Socrates died from drinking a cup of deadly poison, his sentence.
XIV. Ideas about Government
a. Plato, Socrates� follower returned to Athens after 10 years of Socrates� death, he opened a school that lasted almost 900 years and taught his own ideas.
b. He rejected Athenian democracy because it condemned Socrates.
c. He divided society into 3 groups: workers to produce the necessities of life, soldiers to defend the state, and philosophers to rule.
XV. The Search for Beauty and Order
a. The Parthenon is the most famous Greek temple, dedicated to the goddess Athena.
b. Sculptures of gods were made in the temples dedicated to each kind.
c. The only types of painting that survived were on pottery and vases, that portrayed everyday Greek life.
XVI. Poetry and Drama
a. Greek literature began with the epics of Homer.
b. The most important Greek contribution to literature, was in the field of drama.
c. The greatest Athenian playwrights were Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides; they wrote �tragedies� plays of human suffering that usually ended in disaster.
XVII. The Writing of History
a. Herodotus is often called the �Father of History.�
b. Thucydides wrote about the Peloponnesian War.
c. They set the standard for future historians.
XVIII. Macedonian Ambitions
a. Philip gained the Macedonian throne in 359 B.C. and he dreamed of conquering the prosperous, warring city-states to the south.
b. He built superb armies and hired foreign captains to train his troops.
c. Philip brought all of Greece under control.
XVIV. A Mighty Conqueror
a. Alexander was a soldier, but loved learning and arts.
b. Alexander planned to invade Persia, by 334 B.C. he had enough ships to cross the Dardanelles, the strait that separates Europe from Asia Minor.
c. Alexander died and the land was split up between 3 generals, Macedonia and Greece, Egypt, and most of Persia.
XX. The Legacy of Alexander
a. The cities Alexander had found had been settled in by other people.
b. A blending of cultures occurred in the East and West.
c. Hellenistic civilization emerged, a blend of Greek, Persian, Egyptian, and Indian influences.
XXI. Hellenistic Civilization
a. The cities employed architects and artists, temples, palaces, and other public buildings were much larger and grander than the buildings of classical Greece.
b. During the Hellenistic age the rise of new schools and philosophy occurred.
c. They came up with the method to solving the lengths of a right triangle.
XXII. Looking Ahead
a. Rome came in to dominate the Mediterranean world, by then Greeks had already made their greatest contributions.
b. Greek ideas about law, freedom, justice, and government have influenced political thinking to the present day.
c. Achievements are great for the Greeks because it was produced by a scattering of tiny city-states whose rivalries cost them their freedom.