IT’S ALL GREEK TO ME!A brief history of Ancient Greece and an introduction to mythology

WHERE IS GREECE?

• capital: Athens

• strategic location in the Mediterranean sea

CLIMATE OF GREECE

Mediterranean climate = Hot and dry summers, cool and wet winters

AGRICULTURE

• Olives • olive oil• Wine (grapes)• Animal husbandry• Grains• supplemented with vegetable and herb gardens

AGRICULTURE

• The type of soil determines what and where people could grow crops.• In Greece, the soil is not very fertile! Why? Rocky soil, specifically limestone.• Only 30% percent of the land is farmable today.*

*http://projects.cbe.ab.ca/senatorpatrickburns/agriculture.html

The soil has determined Greece's agriculture since the ancient world.

BRONZE AGE GREECE - CRETE

Crete an island society existing between 2200 and 1400 b.c.

The “Minoans” and king minos

Main palace at knossos

Arthur evans excavated the remains of a palace from 1900-1905

BRONZE AGE GREECE- CRETE

•Minoan religion honored bulls, snakes, and birds.

• Few tablets containing Linear A, the term for the Minoan language, have been found on the island.

BRONZE AGE GREECE

BRONZE AGE GREECE- CRETE

What happened to the Minoan civilization?-Previously thought: natural disaster such as an earthquake-Now, it is thought by some historians that the Mycenaean civilization invaded Crete.

BRONZE AGE GREECE- MYCENAE

Early Mycenae/the Shaft Grave Era (1600-1500 BC)

Discovery: heinrich schliemann found in 1876

29 mass graves filled with treasures including war gear and gold-plated death masks

also, elaborate “Tholos” graves: bee-hive shaped

BRONZE AGE GREECE- MYCENAE

Period of the Palaces (1500-1200 BC) Mycenae Tiryns Athens Orchomeus Thebes Pylos

GREEK DARK AGES

End of the palace era; no evidence of kings ruling and palaces not rebuilt

Loss of the art of writing as seen in linear a and b tablets

Few bronze items are found, while more iron items date back to the dark ages which indicates a lack of foreign trade

GREEK DARK AGES

There were advancements though… Protogeometric pottery faster potter’s wheel New shapes and designs Glazing techniques

Smelting and iron work Lack of trade caused the Greeks to begin to mineIron ores

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MzixJJQpkEE

EIGHTH-CENTURY GREEK RENAISSANCE

around 900 bc, greece began conducting trade outside of the homeland again.

This caused an increase in:1. Production of luxury items2. Population growth3. Greek colonies in southern italy and sicily

EIGHTH-CENTURY GREEK RENAISSANCE

Religious revival panhellenismOracles: people went to seek advice from people through whom a god could speak through Shrines to Zeus and Hera at Olympia

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGfh6ZFmvto

EIGHTH-CENTURY GREEK RENAISSANCE

Literacy In 700 b.c., a new writing emerges which

would become the greek alphabet Began in phrases and scratched onto

vases “I am the drinking cup of nestor, good to

drink from. Whoever drinks this cup, immediately will seize him of beautiful-crowned aphrodite”

ANCIENT GREECE

SOCIAL HIERARCHY OF ANCIENT GREECE

Freedmen

Slaves

Those who were free-born males of greece who held

land

More independent than slaves, but do not have wealth

THE FORMATION OF THE POLISSynoecism – the process of households being united to form a political governing body

CITY STATES OF ANCIENT GREECE