11th PRIMARY SCHOOL PTOLEMAIDA

GREAT MINDS FROM GREECE

THE WORLD AND BEYOND
Greek pupils have worked on some famous astronomers, geographers, travelers and biologists and prepared some posters.

Ptolemy the astronomer

Claudius Ptolemy was a famous Greek physician and philosopher who was born in Alexandria of Egypt during 127-151 A.D. He considered that the earth is global and still and the biggest of all the other celestial bodies. He introduced the geocentric model which was accepted until the appearance of the heliocentric model. His best known work is Almagest.

Strabo the geographer

Strabo was a Greek geographer, philosopher and historian. He was born in Amaseia, Pontus in 64 BC and died in 24 AD. He travelled all around the world and in his work Geographica he presented a descriptive history of people and places from different regions of the world known to his era.

Aris Patrinos
Aris Patrinos was born in Alexandria of Egypt in 1947. He is the president of Synthetic Genomics (a company founded by Craig Venter). With his team he managed to chemically create a synthetic chromosome and use it to activate a cell, in other words, breathe life into a cell. This discovery can be used in the production of biofuels, new living vaccines, food and clean water.

Anaximander
Anaximander (610-546 BC) was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher who lived in Miletus, a city in Ionia. In Astronomy, he described the celestial bodies in relation to the Earth. In Physics, he claimed that the indefinite (or apeiron) was the source of all things. In Geometry, he introduced the gnomon in Greece. In Geography, he created a map of the world.

Archimedes

Archimedes was born in the city Syracuse on the island of Sicily in 287 BC. He is believed to be one of the three greatest mathematicians along with Newton and Gauss. His greatest contributions to mathematics were in the area of geometry. He was also an engineer and inventor.

Panayiotis Potagos
Panayiotis Potagos (1839-1903) was a Greek physician and explorer from Arcadian Vytina. He began his travels in 1867, visiting Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Gobi Desert and India. He was the first to reach Mbomy and Uele rivers from the north. He published an account of his travels, which was translated in French.

Aristarchus of Samos

Aristarchus of Samos (310 B.C.-230 B.C.) was a Greek astronomer and mathematician who claimed that the Earth rotates on its axis and revolves around the Sun. He believed in the heliocentric or Suncentered model of the solar system.