Classical Greece: Accomplishments

Megan Carty

Small Beginnings

• The Greeks were an Indo-European people who had completely taken over the peninsula of Crete by 1700 BCE.

• Strong city-states were formed and each one had its own government.

• This worked well for Greece because the peninsula was divided by harsh geographical features.

Small Beginnings cont.

• The Phoenician alphabet was derived.

• The Greeks were very polytheistic in their religion and had many gods.

• Sparta and Athens became the 2 leading city-states.

The Phoenician Alphabet

Sparta and Athens

• Sparta had a strong military aristocracy by dominating a large slave population.

• Athens had a diverse commercial state, including the use of slaves.

• Pericles dominated Athenian politics during the 5th century BCE, who ruled through wise influence.

Cleisthenes

• Cleisthenes was a Grecian aristocrat in Athens who invented the

idea of democracy and decided that he would give more power to poorer people. • The framers of the US Constitution followed Greek precedents, as did designers of public buildings.

Differences in Mediterranean Civilizations

• Rome mastered in engineering, while Greece mastered in scientific thought.

• Greek had city-states, as opposed to Rome’s great empire.

• While there were many differences, similarities were also evident.

• For example: common religion, economic structure, and artistic styles.

Aristotle, Socrates, and Plato

• Aristotle stressed the importance of moderation and the balance of human behavior.

• Socrates encouraged his pupils to question conventional wisdom, on the belief that the primary human duty was improvement of the soul.

• Plato believed that a person who knows that moral virtue leads to happiness should act accordingly.

Sources

• Stearns, Peter. Adas, Michael. Schwartz, Stuart and Gilbert, Marc. World

Civilizations: The Global Experience. 4th ed. Von Hoffmann Corporation, 2003. Print.

• Osborne, Robin. Greek History. Routledge, 2004. Print