Classical Greek culture, especially philosophy, had a powerful influence on ancient Rome, which carried a version of it throughout the Mediterranean and much of Europe. For this reason, Classical Greece is generally considered the cradle of Western civilization, the seminal culture from which the modern West derives many of its founding archetypes and ideas in politics, philosophy, science, and art. (Full article...)
The Peloponnesian war alliances at 431 BC. Orange: Athenian Empire and Allies; green: Spartan Confederacy.
The Peloponnesian War (Ancient Greek: Πόλεμος τῶν Πελοποννησίων, romanized: Pólemos tō̃n Peloponnēsíōn) (431–404 BC) was an ancient Greek war fought between Athens and Sparta and their respective allies for the hegemony of the Greek world. The war remained undecided for a long time, until the decisive intervention of the Persian Empire in support of Sparta. Led by Lysander, the Spartan fleet, built with Persian subsidies, finally defeated Athens and started a period of Spartan hegemony over Greece.
Historians have traditionally divided the war into three phases. The first phase (431–421 BC) was named the Ten Years War, or the Archidamian War, after the Spartan king Archidamus II, who launched several invasions of Attica with the full hoplite army of the Peloponnesian League, the alliance network dominated by Sparta (then known as Lacedaemon). However, the Long Walls of Athens rendered this strategy ineffective, while the superior navy of the Delian League (Athens' alliance) raided the Peloponnesian coast to trigger rebellions within Sparta. The precarious Peace of Nicias was signed in 421 BC and lasted until 413 BC. Several proxy battles took place during this period, notably the battle of Mantinea in 418 BC, won by Sparta against an ad-hoc alliance of Elis, Mantinea (both former Spartan allies), Argos, and Athens. The main event was nevertheless the Sicilian Expedition, between 415 and 413 BC, during which Athens lost almost all its navy in the attempted capture of Syracuse, an ally of Sparta.
The Sicilian disaster prompted the third phase of the war (413–404 BC), named the Decelean War, or the Ionian War, when the Persian Empire supported Sparta in order to recover the suzerainty of the Greek cities of Asia Minor, incorporated into the Delian League at the end of the Persian Wars. With Persian money, Sparta built a massive fleet under the leadership of Lysander, who won a streak of decisive victories in the Aegean Sea, notably at Aegospotamos, in 405 BC. Athens capitulated the following year and lost all its empire. Lysander imposed puppet oligarchies on the former members of the Delian League, including Athens, where the regime was known as the Thirty Tyrants. The Peloponnesian War was followed ten years later by the Corinthian War (394–386 BC), which, although it ended inconclusively, helped Athens regain its independence from Sparta. (Full article...)
Olynthus (Ancient Greek: ὌλυνθοςOlynthos, named for the ὄλυνθος olunthos, "the fruit of the wild fig tree") is an ancient city in present-day Chalcidice, Greece. It was built mostly on two flat-topped hills 30–40m in height, in a fertile plain at the head of the Gulf of Torone, near the neck of the peninsula of Pallene, about 2.5 kilometers from the sea, and about 60 stadia (c. 9–10 kilometers) from Poteidaea.
The city flourished between 432 BC and its destruction by Phillip II of Macedon in 348 BCE. It was finally abandoned in 316 BCE. Excavations were conducted across four seasons, spanning from 1928 to 1938. Artefacts found during the excavations of the site are exhibited in the Archaeological Museum of Olynthos. (Full article...)
... that the economy of ancient Greece was characterized by the extreme importance of agriculture, all the more so because of the relative poverty of Greece's soil?
Plaster cast of a Hellenistic statue thought to depict Aesop; original in the Art Collection of the Villa Albani, Rome.
Aesop (/ˈiːsɒp/EE-sop or /ˈeɪsɒp/AY-sop; Greek: Αἴσωπος, Aísōpos; formerly rendered as Æsop) is an almost certainly legendary Greekfabulist and storyteller, said to have lived c. 620–564 BCE, and credited with a number of fables now collectively known as Aesop's Fables. Although his existence remains unclear and no writings by him survive, numerous tales credited to him were gathered across the centuries and in many languages in a storytelling tradition that continues to this day. Many of the tales associated with him are characterized by anthropomorphic animal characters.
Scattered details of Aesop's life can be found in ancient sources, including Aristotle, Herodotus, and Plutarch. An ancient literary work called The Aesop Romance tells an episodic, probably highly fictional version of his life, including the traditional description of him as a strikingly ugly slave (δοῦλος) who by his cleverness acquires freedom and becomes an adviser to kings and city-states. Older spellings of his name have included Esop(e) and Isope. Depictions of Aesop in popular culture over the last 2,500 years have included many works of art and his appearance as a character in numerous books, films, plays, and television programs. (Full article...)
Image 2Finds from an early geometric Cremation Burial of a pregnant wealthy woman, from the N.W. of the Areopagus, about 850 BC, Ancient Agora Museum (Athens); exhibit 14–16: broad gold finger rings; exhibit 17–19: gold finger rings; 20: pair of gold earrings with trapezoid endings (from Greek Dark Ages)
Image 15An Ancient Greek pair of terracotta boots. Early geometric period cremation burial of a woman, 900 BC. Ancient Agora Museum in Athens. (from Greek Dark Ages)
Image 18The Parthenon, a temple dedicated to Athena, located on the Acropolis in Athens, is one of the most representative symbols of the culture and sophistication of the ancient Greeks. (from Ancient Greece)
Image 22Dipylon Vase of the late Geometric period, or the beginning of the Archaic period, c. 750 BC. (from Ancient Greece)
Image 23Geometric-style box in the shape of a barn. On display in the Ancient Agora Museum in Athens, housed in the Stoa of Attalus. From early geometric cremation burial of a wealthy pregnant woman, 850 BC. (from Greek Dark Ages)
Image 24The lawgiver Solon reformed the Athenian constitution, which led to significant developments in Greece (from Archaic Greece)
Image 29Inheritance law, part of the Law Code of Gortyn, Crete, fragment of the 11th column. Limestone, 5th century BC (from Ancient Greece)
Image 30The gymnasium and palaestra at Olympia, the site of the ancient Olympic games. The archaic period conventionally dates from the first Olympiad. (from Archaic Greece)
The theater at Epidaurus.The prosperity brought by the Asklepieion enabled Epidauros to construct civic monuments too: the huge theater that delighted Pausanias for its symmetry and beauty, which is used once again for dramatic performances, the ceremonial Hestiatoreion (banqueting hall), baths and a palaestra.
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A scene from the Iliad: Hypnos and Thanatos carrying the body of Sarpedon from the battlefield of Troy; detail from an Attic white-ground lekythos, c. 440 BC (from Ancient Greece)
Finds from an early geometric Cremation Burial of a pregnant wealthy woman, from the N.W. of the Areopagus, about 850 BC, Ancient Agora Museum (Athens); exhibit 14–16: broad gold finger rings; exhibit 17–19: gold finger rings; 20: pair of gold earrings with trapezoid endings (from Greek Dark Ages)
Map showing events of the first phases of the Greco-Persian Wars. (from Ancient Greece)
Map of the Late Bronze Age collapse (c. 1200 BC) in the Eastern Mediterranean (from Greek Dark Ages)
Homer, author of the earliest surviving Greek literature (from Archaic Greece)
The major Hellenistic realms included the Diadochi kingdoms:Kingdom of Ptolemy I SoterKingdom of CassanderKingdom of LysimachusKingdom of Seleucus I NicatorAlso shown on the map:Carthage (non-Greek)Rome (non-Greek)
The ancient Theatre of Epidaurus, 4th century BC (from Ancient Greece)
The Vix Krater, an imported Greek wine-mixing bronze vessel found in the Hallstatt/La Tène grave of the "Lady of Vix", Burgundy, France, c. 500 BC (from Archaic Greece)
Greek hoplite and Persian warrior depicted fighting, on an ancient kylix, 5th century BC. (from Ancient Greece)
The Temple of Concordia, Valle dei Templi, Magna Graecia, in present-day Italy (from Ancient Greece)
The remains of the Temple of Apollo at Corinth, the first Greek temple to be built in stone. (from Archaic Greece)
Delian League ("Athenian Empire"), immediately before the Peloponnesian War in 431 BC. (from Ancient Greece)
An Ancient Greek pair of terracotta boots. Early geometric period cremation burial of a woman, 900 BC. Ancient Agora Museum in Athens. (from Greek Dark Ages)
The carved busts of four ancient Greek philosophers, on display in the British Museum. From left to right: Socrates, Antisthenes, Chrysippus, and Epicurus. (from Ancient Greece)
Alexander Mosaic, National Archaeological Museum, Naples. (from Ancient Greece)
The Parthenon, a temple dedicated to Athena, located on the Acropolis in Athens, is one of the most representative symbols of the culture and sophistication of the ancient Greeks. (from Ancient Greece)
Map showing the major regions of mainland ancient Greece and adjacent "barbarian" lands. (from Ancient Greece)
Dipylon Vase of the late Geometric period, or the beginning of the Archaic period, c. 750 BC. (from Ancient Greece)
Geometric-style box in the shape of a barn. On display in the Ancient Agora Museum in Athens, housed in the Stoa of Attalus. From early geometric cremation burial of a wealthy pregnant woman, 850 BC. (from Greek Dark Ages)
The lawgiver Solon reformed the Athenian constitution, which led to significant developments in Greece (from Archaic Greece)
The Victorious Youth (c. 310 BC) is a rare, water-preserved bronze sculpture from ancient Greece. (from Ancient Greece)
Marble bust of Pericles with a Corinthian helmet, Roman copy of a Greek original, Museo Chiaramonti, Vatican Museums; Pericles was a key populist political figure in the development of the radical Athenian democracy. (from Ancient Greece)
Inheritance law, part of the Law Code of Gortyn, Crete, fragment of the 11th column. Limestone, 5th century BC (from Ancient Greece)
The gymnasium and palaestra at Olympia, the site of the ancient Olympic games. The archaic period conventionally dates from the first Olympiad. (from Archaic Greece)
Ruins of the Temple of Apollo within the polis of Ancient Corinth, built c. 540 BC, with the Acrocorinth (the city's acropolis) seen in the background (from Archaic Greece)
The Antikythera mechanism was an analog computer from 150 to 100 BC designed to calculate the positions of astronomical objects. (from Ancient Greece)
Gravestone of a woman with her slave child-attendant, c. 100 BC (from Ancient Greece)
Early Athenian coin, depicting the head of Athena on the obverse and her owl on the reverse – 5th century BC. (from Ancient Greece)
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