Greece and Iran, 1000-30 Bce

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- Why was Socrates put on trial? What was the ultimate result of his sentence on other intellectuals? “Socrates easily disposed of the charges of corrupting the youth and not believing in the gods of the city. He was being held responsible for the actions of several of his aristocratic students who had tried to overthrow the Athenian democracy. He was being blamed for the controversial teachings of the Sophists, which were widely believed to contradict traditional religious beliefs and undermine morality.” “…the jury to condemn him to death by drinking hemlock.”

- How did Plato foster literacy after the death of Socrates? Plato opened an academy where young men could pursue a course of higher education. As stated in the passage “He wrote dialogues—an oral form—in which his protagonist, Socrates, uses the “Socratic method” of question and answer to reach a deeper understanding of values such as justice, excellence, and wisdom.”

- Who was Aristotle? Aristotle was a philosopher who was a student a Plato’s academy. “Aristotle collected and categorized a vast array of knowledge. He lectured and wrote about politics, philosophy, ethics, logic, poetry, rhetoric, physics, astronomy, meteorology, zoology, and psychology, laying the foundations for many modern disciplines.”

Inequality in Classical Greece

- What was the status of slaves in Classical Greece? “The slave was a “living piece of property,” required to do any work, submit to any sexual acts, and receive any punishments the owner ordained.” Page 126

- How/why did Aristotle rationalize slavery? “Aristotle rationalized the institution of slavery by arguing that barbaroi (non-Greeks) lacked the capacity to reason and thus were better off under the direction of rational Greek owners.” Page 127

- Compare the treatment of women in Athens and Sparta. “The women of Sparta, who were expected to bear and raise strong children, were encouraged to exercise, and they enjoyed a level of public visibility and outspokenness that shocked other Greeks.” Whereas the in Athenian marriage “The woman stayed home to cook, clean, raise the children, and supervise the servants, going out only to attend funerals and religious rituals and to make discreet visits to female relatives.”

Failure of the City-State…

- What was the Peloponnesian War? What was the outcome? “. It was a war unlike any previous Greek war because the Athenians used their naval power to insulate themselves from the dangers of a siege by land.” “It sapped the morale of all Greece and ended only with the surrender of Athens after defeat in a naval battle in 404 b.c.e. The Persian Empire had bankrolled the construction of ships by the Spartan alliance, so Sparta finally was able to take the conflict into Athens’s own element, the sea.”

Philip and the Rise of Macedonia

- How did Philip of Macedonia create the “premier military power in the Greek world? “He increased the striking power and mobility of his force by equipping soldiers with longer thrusting spears and less armor. Because horses thrived in the broad plains of the north, he experimented with the coordinated use of infantry and cavalry. His engineers developed new kinds of siege equipment, including the first catapults—machines using the power of twisted cords to hurl arrows or stones great distances.”

- What was the Confederacy of Corinth? “Philip… established the Confederacy of Corinth as an instrument for controlling the Greek city-states.”

Alexander’s Conquest of Persia

- What lead to the fall of the Persian Empire? “He(Alexanders) defeated the Persian forces of King Darius III (r. 336–330 b.c.e.) in three pitched battles in Anatolia and Mesopotamia, and he ultimately campaigned as far as the Punjab region of modern Pakistan.”

- How did Alexander control his empire? “He replaced Persian officials with his own Macedonian and Greek comrades. To control strategic points in his expanding empire, he established a series of Greek-style cities, beginning with Alexandria in Egypt, and settled wounded and aged former soldiers in them. After his decisive victory in northern Mesopotamia (331 b.c.e.), he began to experiment with leaving cooperative Persian officials in place.” Page 130

The Hellenistic Synthesis, 323-30 BCE

- What happened to Alexander’s empire after his death? The empire was broken into three kingdoms each ruled by a Macedonian dynasty.

The Three Kingdoms

- Describe each of the three kingdoms.

- Seleucid was faced many challenges like the Persians before them. “Their sprawling territories were open to attack from many directions…. They also continued Alexander’s policy of founding Greek-style cities throughout their domains. These cities served as administrative centers and were also used to attract colonists from Greece, since the Seleucids needed Greek soldiers, engineers, and administrators.”

- “The dynasty of the Ptolemies ruled Egypt and sometimes laid claim to adjacent Syria-Palestine.”

- “The Antigonid dynasty ruled a compact and ethnically homogeneous kingdom in the Macedonian homeland and northern Greece.”

Alexandria

- How did Alexandria gain fame in the ancient world? Alexandria gain fame from having a population of nearly half a million. At its heart was the royal compound, containing the palace and administrative buildings, as well as the magnificent Mausoleum of Alexander. “Alexandria gained further luster from its famous Library, with several hundred thousand volumes, and from its Museum, or “House of the Muses”.

Environment + Technology: Ancient Astronomy

- Why was astronomy so important to ancient civilizations? “Long before the advent of writing, people studied the appearance and movement of objects in the sky and used this information for a variety of purposes. Ancient hunters, herders, and farmers all coordinated their activities with the cycle of seasons during the year so that they could follow the migrations of prey, find appropriate pastures for domestic animals, and perform vital agricultural tasks.”

- What astronomical discoveries were made by the Egyptians? Babylonians? Greeks? “The Egyptians discovered that a calendar based on lunar months could be