Greek

Civilization
 The Minoans (3000BC-1450BC)
The Birth of Greek Civilization;
 Minoan Civilization in Crete Island.

- King Minos,
- influential civilization with extensive trade routes
- Minoans had 3 great palaces; Knossos, Kato Sakro, Mallia.

KNOSSOS
 The Minoans (3000BC-1450BC)
 The palace of Knossos;
- was a multi-stories building,
- covered five and a half acres of land,
- housed not only the Kings of the Minoan State, but also his
advisors and several craftspeople.
- had a central court yard, many rooms and corridors, a throne
room, large baths, storerooms, craft workshops, administrative
rooms and a plumbing system.
- had not city walls for protection.

 destroyed two times in history;

- fire and a wall collapse, in 1700 BC
- destruction from a major earthquake.
 The End of The Minoans

 1450 BC was the end of Minoan Civilization.

- final collapse of the Minoan state remained as a mystery.

 Two factors contributed to the end of the Minoan:

- the eruption of the volcano Thera,
- the rise of the Mycenaean civilization upon Crete.

 Greek mythology immortalized Crete and Knossos with

legends.
 The Remains of the Minoan Civilization

-Minoans had the exceptional art, architecture, and tool

artifacts.

- Minoan life was ruled by a King and nobles who governed all
aspects of Minoan life, including trade, art, and religion.

- Religion was matriarchal and they worshipped to the several

goddesses took part in many ritual acts.

- Stratification were minimal.

- Women worked along side the men.

- Slaves had been treated fairly by their masters.

 The Rise of the Myceneans
 After Myceneans occupation;
- City of Mycenea, eventually became a major trading center in
the Aegean.
- Trade and commerce with the Minoans was initially peaceful.

 1450 BC, Myceneans invaded Crete;

- took many of its palaces as well as Knossos.
- Crete was ruled for 50 years by the Myceneans, until a
natural disaster left the Palace of Knossos in ashes.

 Myceneans were the first Greek speaking people in Greece.

 Mycenean artifacts were integrated to the Minoan artistic

elements. Although they have many elements in common, there
are also many differences dividing two civilizations.
 The Rise of the Myceneans

 Political and economic power;

- was retained through the palace of the king,

- scribes kept detailed records of the king's possessions, taxes

and other inventories.

- Mycenean trade expanded to Cyprus, Egypt and Asia Minor.

- Myceneans expanded to form cities in Athens, Thebes and

Pylos.

- Fine citadels were created along with strong city walls.

 The Fall of the Myceneans

 The fall of the Mycenean Civilization, (1300 and 1000 BC);

- internecine wars between kingdoms (Trojan Wars)
- Dorians invasion from north (1200BC),
- Civil war.

Greek Dark Ages; from 1100 BC until 800 BC (Hellenic era)

Rivalry between kingdoms was told by Homer, in his famous

epic poems of Iliad and Odyssey.
 The Dorians
 Dorians originated from north Greece, Macedonia and
Epirus.
- began to invade toward the south.
- then to the Peloponnesian, Crete and southern Aegean
islands

With the growth of classical Greece;

- Dorians created strong centers in Laconia (with its capital
Sparta), Messenia, Argolis, and the Isthmus of Corinth.
- Dorian settlements also continued in the southern Agean
islands of Melos, Thera, Rhodes, Cos, and Crete.
- Their influence reached Halicarnas and Cnidos in Turkey.
- By the 8th century BC, Dorian influence had spread to many
parts of the Aegean, Italy and Crimea along the Black Sea.
 The Dorians
 Dorians generally mixed with the indigenous people of
Corinth, Rhodes and Argos.
- But, they kept power entirely on Sparta and Crete, by
creating a ruling military class,
- Such a political state, in order to dominate the population as
serfdom, froze the old archaic cultures of Ancient Greece,

Sparta remained the main city of the Dorians until the age of
classical Greece.
- Doric language was a dialect spoken in Ancient Greece,
- Many Doric architectural element used by the Greeks, was
originated from the cities of southern Aegean.
 The Ionians
The Ionians;
- migrated from western Anatolia, to Attica and other Greek
territories, following Dorian immigration (1000 BC).
- were thought as the creators of Mycenaean Culture.

The Ionians ruled;

- Euboea, Attica, Aegean islands, western coast of Asia Minor.

- many of its cities were on the trade routes.

From a cultural perspective, the language Ionian-Attic,

- was an exclusive written language used by historians,
writers, scientists and philosophers in the 6th century BC.
- They had entered architecture, biology, history, philosophy
and other areas of Greek culture.
 Greek Cities
Athens;
- after the Mycenean rule (1,400-1,200 BC), began to create the
buildings commonly associated with it.
- ooriginally situated on the rocky mount known as Acropolis,
- as expanded physically, its political effect increased.
- with the Dark Ages, aristocratic families had lost most of their
power,

 Election of a statesman;
- representing the city for one year,
- carried on to create a democratic tradition within Greece,
- still serves as a model within the present.
 The City of Athens

- 600 BC, beautiful works of sculpture and architecture filled

the Acropolis.

- 480 BC, Persians ransacked the city, burning temples and

homes.

- 449 BC, peace with Persia was attained and the destroyed
temples and buildings were reconstructed.
 Golden Age of Greece

 After 400 BC, Athens began to experience of classical

Golden Age of Greece.

- Agora, below the citadel, became the center of civic life.

- Agora was the marketplace and meeting place where the

Athenians could speak of civic and public affairs.

 On both sides of Agora, were important centers of

Athenian life;
- Areopagus was where the high court sat,
- Pnyx was where the Athenian Assembly convened.
Acropolis;
- had a marble Parthenon held several temples to the goddess
Athena, including temples to Artemis, Brauronia and Zeus.
- area surrounding the Acropolis was host to many events
including, theater, ritual acts and sacrifices, as well as many
other traditions of the Athenians.
 The City of Athens
 Society;
- Athens was a city of maritime trade and commerce,
- but it was devoted mainly to agriculture.
- enjoyed peace and prosperity.
- in the 600s, with success in agriculture, Athens began to
rise.

Athens was ruled by an oligarchy.

- Power was distributed among local families of wealth, within
Athens and its surrounding countryside.
- Land was divided into smaller plots.
 Athens before Solon
- small farmers were working on the lands of their debtor,
giving up a sixth of their crop to their debtor, or they were
being sold as slaves abroad.

- in 621 BC, Tyrans-aristocracy which were fighting each

other.

- unrest was rising among the poor of Athens,

 Draco;
- He had existing laws put into writing,
- He made a legal distinction between intentionally killing
someone and accidental homicide,
- He asserted state power in intervening in blood-feuds.
 Solon, the Law Maker

594 BC, the elite class chose Solon as their leader.

- a fellow aristocrat, interested in philosophy and religiously
devout.
- He believed in the innate superiority of his own class but he
also believed in a justice that was decreed by Zeus for all
Athenian citizens.

- Solon prohibited enslavement of the poor and rescued many

Athenians who had been sold and sent abroad.
- He forbade Athenians to sell their children into slavery, except
for girls who had committed fornication before marriage.
- He made a master responsible for protecting his slaves and
liable for his slave's actions.
 Solon Laws
 Solon wished to protect the poor from the rich and the rich
from the poor,
- by using dictatorial powers given him by fellow aristocrats,
he overturned Draco's death penalties, except for murder.

 In order to preserve the justice;

- increased state intervention in society.
- had the state give aid to the poor.
- canceled mortgages.
- put an end to tenant farming by returning farms to those
who had lost them through debt.
- limited the size of land that any one person could own.
- left the aristocracy with top government jobs and seats on
ruling bodies was a step in the direction of democracy.
(Athenian citizen would be given a voice in the assembly)
 Solon Laws

- gave common people a greater role in Athens' system of

justice positions on the city's courts.
- Judges were chosen by lot so that the poorest people would
have a seat on the panel of judges to decide cases.
- maintained a control system on judges, to be accused of
wrongdoing after their service as judges.
- reduced the penalty for idleness to a small fine.
- enacted laws to care for widows and orphans.
- it was illegal to strike another person,
- parents could be punished for mistreating their children,
- it was illegal to slander others, to use abusive language or to
engage in other forms of offensive conduct.
- outlawed pimping and male prostitution,
- had the city remove the dead from its streets.
 Pisistratus
- when Solon's military aggressions resulted in defeat, unrest
at home brought violent uprising that elite had long feared.
- after Solon and his aristocratic allies had ruled for 35 years,
the uprising was led by a man named Pisistratus,

Pisistratus;
- was an aristocrat who had driven into exile by the ruling elite
of Athens.
- while abroad, Pisistratus had gained wealth in mining and
timber ventures.
- with his own wealth he had hired an army.
- in 560 BC, with this army he marched toward Athens and
defeated a force that the ruling elite of Athens had sent out
against him.
 Pisistratus

- Pisistratus took power and became popular among the

Athenians,
- to consolidate his power, his army disarmed the people.
- for added security his army took as hostages, the sons of
leading families, while the head of some families fled into
exile.
-But he left their property unconfiscated, just as the former
rulers had left his property unconfiscated after driving him into
exile.
 Pisistratus

 Pisistratus increased state involvement in social matters;

- sponsored religious festivals and public games,
- taxed everyone equally,
- tried to protect the common farmer from wealthy farmers by
providing them with the loans,
- With an aggressive foreign policy he supported trade and
industry and helped trade by building roads.
- He improved the city's fresh water system.
- He beautified the city by sponsoring sculpture for public places
and by improving the city's temples.

 His policies and interventions gave Athenians full employment

and brought renewed prosperity, where Solon had failed.
The Greek Achievement: Reason, Freedom, Humanism
Western thought begins with Greeks:
-they defined the individual by capacity to reason.
It was great achievement of Greek to rise above magic, miracles, mystery,
authority and custom and to discover the procedures and terminology that
permit a rational understanding of nature and society.
Every aspect of Greek civilization –science, philosophy, art, drama, literature,
politics, historical writings – showed a growing reliance on humane reason and
diminishing dependence on the gods and the mythical thinking.
Unlike Mesopotamia and Egypt where people had no clear conception of their
individual worth and no understanding of political liberty (they were no
citizens, but subjects marching to the command of a ruler whose power
originated with gods), the Greek created both civic politics and political
freedom.
They sow the state as a community of free citizens who made laws in their own
interest.
The citizens had no masters than themselves.
The Greek held that the man are capable of governing , and they valued active
citizenship.
The Greek Achievement: Reason, Freedom, Humanism

The heroes of Greek tragedy suffered not because of they were puppets
being manipulated by higher powers, but because they posses the freedom
of decision.
The idea of ethical freedom reached its highest point with Socrates, who
shifted the focus of thought from cosmology to the human being and moral
life.
To shape oneself according to ideals known to the mind - to develop into an
autonomous and self directed person – became for the Greek the highest
form of freedom.
During the Hellenic Age, the Greeks, like the Hebrews earlier, arrived at the
idea of universalism, the oneness of humanity.
Stoic philosophers taught that people, because of their ability to reason,
are fundamentally alike and can be governed by the same law.
This idea is at the root of the modern principle of natural, or human, rights,
which are the birthright of each individual.
The Greek Achievement: Reason, Freedom, Humanism

Despite their lauding of the human beings creative capacities, the Greek
were not naïve about human nature.
Rather, intensely aware of the individuals inherent capacity for evil, Greek
thinkers repeatedly warned that without the restraining forces of law, civic
institutions, moral norms, and character training, society would be torn
apart by the savage elements within human nature.
But, fundamental to the Greek humanist outlook was the belief that humane
beings could master themselves.
Although people could not alter the course of nature, for there was an order
to the universe over which neither they nor the gods had control, the
humanist believed that people could control their own lives.
Contemporary humanists continue to derive inspiration and guidelines of
the ancient Greek.