Ancient Greek History, Discussions

LOA;

Civilization as we call it first arose in the Tigris/Euphrates Valley, The Fertile Crescent. Babylon was just one of many cities that rose to prominence and founded a civilization. There were older cities than Babylon such as Ur. The civilizations of the Valley spread outward by conquest and trade and were copied by those they came in contact with. Before Babylon there were the Sumerians, the Assyrians, and the Hittite, each in turn rose and fell to replaced by another.


Camac.

I have this huge book that's titled "Mythologica"...heavy book...

And as I read some of the Greek Myths, one line that I read was interesting.The gods fo the Greeks are the most human of the gods of myth,but with powers that often destroyed the humans with whom they mixed.

Another very interesting and this one made me wonder about the male gender and their "eternal" sense of power over women.It is believed by some that the mythological beheading of the Gorgon Medusa symbolizes the domination of patriarchal society.
"Medusa" which means "sovereign female wisdom" had been silenced, and her powers had been brought under the control of the male order.

Very intriguing and interesting at the same time, for one wonders from whence all the lines of the Bible really come from.

LOA

One of the things that I have always found interesting was the Greek influence all throughout the B.C.E. Middle East. For example Greek was the language of commerce in Palestine, (the Holy Land area) Greek was a common language on the streets right along side of Aramaic. Latin was not as common as most people would think and Hebrew was the language of the cultured and priests in the Temple.

The Greek culture moved along with the trade. Many of the early Christian converts were Greek, and their influence is still seen today in many of our prayers and forms of worship. Very often we see the Alpha ( A ) and Omega ( Ώ ) symbols in our churches. Their travels to Rome had a great influence on the early Roman Church.

Our own form of government was based by Jefferson on both the Greek ancient republican democracies and those of the Iroquois nations.

JIM

LOA & mainopsman;

I would answer you both to-gether if you don't mind. Mainopsman the use of Greek as the language of commerce is due to two things, first the fact that most of the Eastern Mediterranean from the Bosphorus to the Nile was colonized in part by the Greeks. They traded with the interior and with all the islands including Cyprus and Crete. The second reason is that of Alexanders' invasion and conquest of the Persian Empire for not only was he a great conqueror but a great exporter of Greek Culture as he took it with him where ever he went. Under the Romans one was not really educated unless one spoke, read, and wrote Greek. Although my knowlege of Theological History is very limited the early Christian Church amongst the Gentiles was mainly in Greek cities of Asia Minor and in Greece itself. The Christian St. Paul was in reality Saul of Tarsus. Tarsus being a Greek city in modern day Turkey.

LOA. Yes the Greeks preferred their Gods Human and gave them the personality, foibles, and vices of man. In Ancient Greece women were very subordinate to men. Even in Athens the Mother of Democracy they had no rights other than what their Husbands allowed them. As for Medussa I tend to agree with your description as the mere fact that for a man to look upon her he turned to stone. This definitely has an sexual undertone to it and most of the villians in Greek mythology were either women or men under a womans' control.

Camac.

There are important exceptions to this, though few. One was ancient Sparta, a matrilineal society where women ruled not only the household but owned the property. Men lived apart from the age of 7 onwards, trained to be warriors in the agogai (spelling?) system, and upon reaching adulthood and accepted as citizens, still lived amongst themselves.

Another ancient society, though not Greek but who allowed complete equality for women, were the Etruscans in what is now Tuscany Italy. The male dominated Athenians were actually appalled by their treatment of women who ate, conversed in mixed company and dined with their husbands. In Athens women could not vote and were relegated to domesticity exclusively.

The details of Etruscan life are deduced mainly from their art. The ancient Greeks not only founded city states on what is now the Turkish coast, but also colonized west along the lower Italian boot and Sicily, founding what is now Naples and several other Italian cities before Rome developed.

Antwn;

Your are right about Sparta but still the woman had no say in the governing of the city state except through influence. The Greeks also colonized Sicily and founded Marseille in France. They traded with Carthage and more than once were allied to them. The Greeks also traded in Spain and there is evidence that they passed through the Pillars of Herakles (Gibraltar) and traded up the west coast of Europe. The Greeks also had colonies on the Black Sea ie; the story of the Golden Fleece is said to have occurred in Georgia (Russia).


Camac.

As I continue to read that thousand pound book...

There is one paragraph that describes very well Greek mythology for I discovered while reading thrue it that their Myths are extremely violent.

The Fathers of the Gods:
There is no all-powerfull, all wise, and totally good father god in Greek myth.Instead, the story of the gods of Olympus is a complicated tale of crime,conspiracy, mutilation, and murder.

One can almost say that it's the perfect portrait of our world today.And one can also wonder if there is only one God or if there really is more then one super power playing us mortals....

LOA

LOA;

THE Gods of Olympus reflected the character of the world of the people who worshiped them.


Camac

The Greeks;

As previously mentioned there were two migration of Greeks roughly 1800 years apart the first the Ionians gave rise to the birth of Athens but more importantly in the early stage to Mycenae. the Myceanean Civilization was greatly influnced by an older more established one the Minoans of Crete. For a long time it was believed that the Myceaneans were a colony of the Minoans but archeological evidence shows that not to be the case. Mycenae developed separately and became the dominant state on mainland Greece around 1600 BCE. When the Island of Thera exploded in Volcanic eruption the Tsunami created rushed across the Aegean to devistate Crete and destroy Knossos the Minoan Capital severely weakening them. The Myceaneans took advantage of this and invaded overpowering and subjugating the Minoans. It was Mycenae that headed the Aechean Alliance that Homer talks of in his Epic The Illiad. Approximately 1200 BCE the Dorians (Doric) Greeks migrated into the Greek Penninsula and eventually settled in the area of the Peloponese subjugating the Mycenae. It is around this time that Greece falls into a Dark Age and did not emerge till around 800 BCE, the dawn of The Golden Age of Greece.

There are important exceptions to this, though few. One was ancient Sparta, a matrilineal society where women ruled not only the household but owned the property. Men lived apart from the age of 7 onwards, trained to be warriors in the agogai (spelling?) system, and upon reaching adulthood and accepted as citizens, still lived amongst themselves.

Another ancient society, though not Greek but who allowed complete equality for women, were the Etruscans in what is now Tuscany Italy. The male dominated Athenians were actually appalled by their treatment of women who ate, conversed in mixed company and dined with their husbands. In Athens women could not vote and were relegated to domesticity exclusively.

The details of Etruscan life are deduced mainly from their art. The ancient Greeks not only founded city states on what is now the Turkish coast, but also colonized west along the lower Italian boot and Sicily, founding what is now Naples and several other Italian cities before Rome developed.

Antwn,

Men and Christianity change all that, for them it was pagan.

Camac,

This is the civilization that I mistook with the Myceanean in a previous posts when I said there was a civilization that was newly discovered and little was known about them except the fact that they were living lavishly and disapearred quite suddenly and by the ruins discovered as well. Archeologist discovered the ruins of a palace and what they uncovered was unlike they ever discovered by the size of it.
I'll try and find more about this intriguing lost civilization.

LOA

LOA;

In the late 19th and early 20th century Sir Arthur Evans discovered and excavated the Minoan Civilization on Crete. Around the time the Greeks were migrating into the Greek Penninsula, 3000 BCE, The Minoans were developing their Civilization on Crete. We would have to open a new Forum in order to discuss them but for now I will only mention them in relation to the Mycenean Civilization and the effects on the Greeks.

Camac.

Social Structure

Greece in the Archaic Period was made up from independent states, called Polis, or city state. The polis of Athens included about 2,500 sq kilometres of territory, but other Polis with smaller areas of 250 sq kilometres.

Greek Society was mainly broken up between Free people and Slaves, who were owned by the free people. Slaves were used as servants and labourers, without any legal rights. Sometimes the slaves were prisoners of war or bought from foreign slave traders. Although many slaves lived closely with their owners, few were skilled craftsmen and even fewer were paid.

As Athenian society evolved, free men were divided between Citizens and Metics. A citizen was born with Athenian parents and were the most powerful group, that could take part in the government of the Polis. After compulsory service in the army they were expected to be government officials and take part in Jury Service. A metic was of foreign birth that had migrated to Athens, to either trade or practice a craft. A metic had to pay taxes and sometimes required to serve in the army. However, they could never achieve full right s of a Citizen, neither could they own houses or land and were not allowed to speak in law courts.

The social classes applied to men only, as women all took their social and legal status from their husband or their male partner. Women in ancient Greece were not permitted to take part in public life.

This is a very instructive paragraph that talks about the lives of the Greeks and there is no wonder why they had such big armies and so many in goverment.
As you read this the Greeks of today are still quite similar the Greeks of that time.
Especially the last paragraph.No offense to anyone.

LOA

LOA;

The description you have posted refers mainly to the Athenians and the system they used. To fully understand what it was like to be a slave in Greek times look to the Spartans and their Helots. The Helots were originally the Messenians which the Spartans conquered and made slaves for all time. In modern time they could be equated to the Black Slave of the Southern US. with the exception that periotically the Spartans would cull then in order to keep them submissive killing them by the thousands. Some estimates put the Helot population at seven times that of the Spartans.


Camac.

PS. Go to Wikipedia and look up "Helots".

Gees, those were really hard days.

I'll check this out on wilkipedia to learn more.

Thanks Camac,

LOA

THE TROJAN WAR.
Did it really happen? Yes. Archealogical excavation has shown that it did happen, in fact it happened twice. New finds and evidence shows that the Greeks (Myceaneans) and the Trojans went to war at least twice. The location of Troy at the entrance to the Hellespont ( modern day Dardenelles), which lead to the Black Sea, made it a strategically important city. Who controlled the Hellespont controlled the trade and Troy did just that. We know of the Trojan War through Homer, the Greek Poet and his Epics The Illiad and The Odysses which tells of the Great Heroes Achilles, Hector, Menelaus, Odysseus, Agamemnon, and the Trojan Horse. (This topic alone could be a Forum). Homer lived some 400 to 500 years after the events he wrote about. At the time of his writings Greece was emerging from its Dark Age and most of the story had been passed down orally with of course changes as it passed from generation to generation. The important thing to remember is that the story became a defining moment for the Greeks. It help set their culture and their religion. It was in a sense their Bible or Koran. It gave a common anchoring point around which the Greeks built their civilization.


Camac.

PS. The movie Troy is so far off base that the makers should hide their faces in shame.