Great Ages of Man - Classical Greece (History Arts eBook)
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^$^
i
Classical Greece f DF78 .B6
/
12118
Bowra, C. M. NEW COLLEGE OF CALIFORNIA (SF)
DF 78 .B6 1898-1971 BoSra, C. M. Classical Greece f
#13161
1
BOBFIOWEH'SNAME_ DATE DUE
#13161
f
DF 178
B6
Bowraf C« M.
(Cecil Maarlce),
1898-
1971.
Classical Greece / by C. M. Bowra and the editors o± Time-Life Books* New York Timet inc«» cl965« 192 p» : ill* (some col») mapst plant ports. ; 28 cm. (Great ages of man) Bibliography: p. 186. Includes index. . • JV13161 Sec lass S :
——
Civilization To 146 B.C. 1. Greece Greece. I2. Art Pictorial works. Title ^^
—
21 APR 93
407 134
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GREAT AGES OF
MAN
A History of the World's Cultures
CMSSIOL GREECE by C.
M.
BOWRA and
The
Editors of
TIME-LIFE Books
TIME INCORPORATED, NEW YORK
C. M. Bowra is warden of Wadham College at Oxford, and a towUniverering figure in classical studies. He has held the vice-chancellorship of the academic post. Among his books are Tradition and Design in highest sity, Oxfords Experithe Iliad, Early Creek Elegists, Sophoclean Tragedy, as well as The Creek ence, which won him a wide audience. Sir Maurice has also translated Pindar's Pyth-
THE AUTHOR:
ian
Odes and been
The Oxford Book of Creek Verse
a co-editor of
in Translation.
Leonard Krieger, formerly Professor of History holds the post of University Professor at the University of Chicago. the author of The German Idea of Freedom and Politics of Discretion.
THE CONSULTING EDITOR: at Yale,
He
is
now
THE COVER:
This head
part of a statue of Poseidon that probably dates from It was found in the Aegean in the 1920s.
is
the middle of the Fifth Century B.C.
GREAT AGES OF MAN
BOOKS
TIME-LIFE
Harold C. Field
SERIES EDITOR:
Editorial Staff for Classical Greece:
Notman P Ross
Assistant to the Editor: Peter Meyerson
William ]av Cold
Text Editor: Betsy Frankel
Edward A Hamillo
Designer;
John Stanton
Chief Researcher: Carlotla Kerwin
Assistant Text Director: lerry Korn Assistaitt Art Director:
Norman Snyder
Staff Writer:
Beatrice T. Dobie
Researchers:
Arnold Holeywell
Assistant Chief of Research: Monica O.
Terry Drucker
Ho
Dori Watson,
Lilla
Zabriskie
Barbara Moir, Linda Wolfe
Rhett Austell
General Manager: Joseph C. Hazen Business Manager: John D.
Jr.
Color Director: Robert
McSweeney
Circulation Manager: Joan D.
L,
Young
Art Assistants: James D. Smith,
Manley
Wayne
R. Young,
David Wyland Picture Researchers: Margaret K. Goldsmith,
Joan T. Lynch
Copy
Staff;
Marian Gordon Goldman,
Rosalind Stubenberg, Dolores A.
Valuable aid
in
preparing this book was given by Doris
ham, Chief, Time
Inc.
O
Littles
Neil. Chief, Life Picture Library:
Bureau of Editorial Reference; Richard M. Clurman, Chief, Time-Life
Content Peck-
News
Service;
Ann Natanson and Joseph Pilcher (Rome), KatharineSachs (London), Elisabeth Kraemer (Bonn), Franz Spelman (Munich), Gertraud Lessing (Vienna) and Joseph Harriss (Paris).
Correspondents Helga Kohl (Athens),
Classical Greece
©
J965 by Time
Inc.
All rights reserved. Published simultaneously Library of Congress catalogue card
School and library distribution
(i.v
in
Canada.
number 65-17305.
Silver Burdetl
Company.
CONTENTS INTRODUCTION
CRADLE OF THE MODERN 1
2 3
4 5
Picture Essay:
SPIRIT
THE GREAT LEGACY
18
DARK AGE AND NEW DAWN Picture Essay:
OF
30
WAR AND A WANDERER
39
A CONFIDENT ARISTOCRACY Picture Essay:
48
THE GREEK HOMELAND
61
THE PERSIAN WARS Picture Essay:
Picture Essay:
68
A ZEST FOR LIVING
ATHENS
IN ITS
79
TIME OF GLORY
THE PERICLEAN EPOCH
105
GREEK AGAINST GREEK Picture Essay:
7 8
us
THE PANHELLENIC GAMES
A NEW TIME OF Picture Essay:
125
BRILLIANCE
i36
ENDURING THEATER
145
ALEXANDER THE GREAT Picture Essay:
i56
AFTERMATH OF EMPIRE
165
APPPENDIX
177
Chronologies, 177; The Olympian Family, 180; of Heroes, 182; Greeks Great and Famous, 184
BIBLIOGRAPHY,
INDEX and
lo
A
Gallery
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS AND CREDITS 186
Pronunciation Guide
188
NTRODUCTION Apart from
its
other claims to fame, the importance
assigned by Classical Greece to individual achieve-
ment assures
man. There were
among
place
a
it
the great ages of
earlier great ages,
but those peri-
human may be
interest.
For this reason, too, that study
salutary for our
to accept regimentation
own
society, all too prone
and nameless conformity.
The distinguished Commission on
Humani-
the
established in 1963 by three of the leading
ods were dominated for the most part by absolute
ties,
rulers of monolithic states; the truly creative indi-
scholarly organizations in the United States, has
viduals
who
Mesopota-
certainly existed in Egypt,
mia and Anatolia
are almost entirely
Classical Greece
was
different.
We know
names of more than 20,000 individuals ticipation
in
the heart of
civic
affairs.
or ph\^sicist, will not realize
name
each bearing the
of those
of
Each ostrakon
some outstanding
Cimon, offers
stage in their careers the their fellow citizens of
Pericles
and many
proof that
men were
aiming
at
at
some
who have gone
to
In other aspects of
we
new
must
live
generation of in
the individual stands out.
The
find that the begin-
all
fine pottery
made
in
and Fifth Centuries B.C. can be
assigned to some five hundred different masters,
history
signed their products.
emphasis on the individual man Greek
owes much of
its
past
the
men who
Man makes
to
'necessarily little
important contributions to the
achievement of these goals.
associated with individual men. Even in the crafts
this
the privilege
This book in the Time-Life series on the Great
Ages of
choice. Sir
sparkling and perpetual
His
Its
author
Greek
and
of Hellenism
following pages shows us Greece in freshness. In the picture essays that
ious aspects of the
his life to
literature, art
brilliant distillation
happy
a
is
Maurice Bowra has devoted
the contemplation of
To
.
one small corner for one
ety.
whom
.
stretch of time.'
nings of the various literary genres, of the schools
of
.
suspected by
maintain a balance between
life,
each
of philosophy, of the major artistic trends are
many
Human-
before him.
tyranny. These
personal ambition and the civic interest.
in the Sixth
his
to
been kin-
has
and obligation of interpreting
man—
ostraka remind us that the Athenians were ever
Athens
poten-
full
the institution of ostracism),
to
name
mindful of the need
his
contribution
fullest
scholars have therefore
ist
Aristides, Themistocles, others.
his
dled by the aspirations and accomplishments
ostraka (the potsherds, or pottery fragments, that
gave their
make
times unless his imagination
in
thousand
a
or
tial
their par-
Recent excavations
Athens have yielded over
Even the most gifted individual, whether poet
the
Athens
in
most of them recorded because of
alone,
stated:
anonymous.
all
soci-
on the
its
dewy
document
var-
Greek experience, even the most
assiduous reader of the current spate of books on
Greece
will discover
ing, imaginatively
much
that
deployed
to
is
new and
refresh-
bring out the essence
of Classical Greece.
HOMER Field Director,
American School of
A.
THOMPSON
Classical Studies at
Athens
*
1i
^b
At
ZACYNTHUS
ELIS
Olyrtipia.
CRETE
MEDITERRANEAN SEA
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Apollonia
BLACK SiA
Abdera
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SAMOTHRACE
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GREEKS
^^^^
For centuries Greece has exerted a peculiar enchant-
ment over the imaginations
who
men. The Romans,
of
incorporated Greece into their empire— and in
the process did not shrink from sacking
were deeply impressed by
it.
cities-
its
Young Romans were
sent to study at the university in Athens, and edu-
cated
Romans looked
to the
Greeks
as their masters
philosophy, science and the fine
in
the
Romans' confidence
in their
own
arts.
sion and their gift for government, they
was much
uneasily, that there
1
in
Despite
imperial misfelt, a little
thought which they could never hope
and
letters
art,
to
do as well
as the Greeks.
When
CRADLE OF THE
MODERN
the Italian Renaissance of the 15th Cen-
tury A.D. brought an intensified
ancient world,
SPIRIT
Rome
at first
behind the imposing poets ful
felt
Roman
and more
alluring.
Slowly past,
the
in
iaqade, scholars and
the presence of something
from the mists of the the
interest
held the attention. But
this
more power-
was disentangled
and the
full
majesty of
Greek performance was revealed. So great was
Greek prestige that Greek ideas on medicine,
as-
tronomy and geography were accepted with unquestioning faith birth of a
the
until
new
17th Century,
when
the
inaugurated the era
scientific spirit
of experiment and inquiry into
which we ourselves
have been born.
Even today, when we have discarded so many creeds and cosmologies, the Greek view of cites
and
exalts us.
life
ex-
Greek thought and Greek
as-
sumptions are closely woven into the fabric of our lives
almost without our knowing
reason alone
we
its
achievement.
own
origins,
No
and
for this
know
about
and the scope
the Greeks, to assess the value their
it,
are right to wish to
of
people can afford to neglect
and the modern world
is
far too
deeply indebted to Greece to accept in unthinking ingratitude
At
what
it
has inherited.
the center of the
Greek outlook
lay
an un-
shakable belief in the worth of the individual man. In centuries
when
large parts of the earth
east,
the Greeks were evolving their belief that a
man
must be respected not PALLAS ATHENA Was a goddess with of civilized
she
is
life
shown
in
and donor of
many
roles,
among
were
dominated by the absolute monarchies of the
as
the
omnipotent overlord, but for
instrument of an
his
own
sake.
They
others protectress
the indispensable olive tree. In this statue
her helmet, garbed as the defender of righteous causes.
sought
at all costs
to
be themselves, and in this
they were helped by the nature of their country.
EVOLVING STYLES Greek
in
art, are
male form, the central figure
in portraying the
shown
(1000-700 B.C.), on the
here. left,
They began with
the nearly abstract
went through the
monumental
stiff,
kind of figure (700-500 B.C.) in the center and finally reached the graceful naturalism of the statue (500-300 B.C.) at the right.
Geographically, Greece was in ancient times very
much what of the
it is
today: the southernmost extremity
A
huge Balkan mass.
land of hard limestone
mountains separated by deep
valleys,
is
it
cut
al-
two by the narrow divide of the Corinthian
most
in
Gulf.
To
the east the structure of the mainland
is
continued intermittently by islands, and the whole pattern
rounded
is
part of Crete,
south by the long ram-
off to the
which has been
called "the stepping-
stone of continents." Even including the islands,
Greece
a small country, smaller
is
Florida.
Moreover,
able to support
and yet
more than
in the history of
a
Yemen
than
this small area has
or
never been
few million inhabitants,
Western
civilization
it
has
played an enormous part.
The reason Mesopotamia,
is
GEOMETRIC PERIOD
partly geographical. In Egypt and
in the great
and the Euphrates,
it
riverlands of the Nile
was easy
large
to subject a
great Athenian statesman Pericles: "Each single one of our citizens, in all the manifold aspects of
population to a single ruler and to see that each
is
man performed an
of his
fied
allotted function in a vast, uni-
system. But in Greece, where every district was
men were
was impossible, and
forced to be not specialists in this or that
own
person, and do
This
own
in their
circles a
ize his full potential
The Greek
sibilities.
and
own
its
being, and within each
members were cognizant
its
gifted with the
climate, dry and exhilarating
most magical of
to action, while the sea,
skies, incited
which was always
developed
in its servants
hand and
eye.
an unusual
made them conscious
worth. Without this
both
human
honored
in a
hard school, but
of themselves
self-awareness
and
they
their
would
man must
be
worth and treated with
re-
experience: the belief that a
for his individual
spect just because he
in his
of
man
claimed for himself the
mind, to go his
The
own way
without
belief in
freedom
was sustained by
a
and nurtured by
a love for action,
This feeling as
to real-
within his society, to speak
interference from other men.
hand,
at
skill of
never have made their most important contribution to
what was
all
deep respect for personal honor,
among
the Greeks
something vague, but
it
may have
was deeply
felt,
started
and
matured into reasoned philosophy which long
Nature nursed the Greeks this
of their respon-
do
which he was capable,
and accomplishments. Each separate group was
to
liberty. Just
thought of being conquered, so
freedom
deeply aware of
moreover, with ex-
this,
what the Greeks meant by
is
as they detested the
profession but masters of a whole range of crafts
group
is
himself. In the words of the
life,
and owner
the rightful lord
ceptional grace and exceptional versatility."
separated from the next by mountains or the sea. central control of this kind
show himself
able to
shaped, and ethical
still
it
after
shapes, our own. Supported by
and psychological arguments,
was based
it
on convictions which we take so much
for granted
today that we can hardly imagine what efforts must
have been made
what
own
its
to establish
the
philosophy, or
absence meant outside Greece.
It
had
its
dangers, of course, especially the risk that in
regarded themselves as vastly superior in this respect to the Persians, who, utterly dependent on
whim, were
their king's
in the
Greek view no
better
than slaves.
From
the
first
Greek lawgivers stems the whole
majestic succession of the West's legal systems.
The Romans,
lawmakers
great
in their
own
right,
learned from the Greeks. In turn, the comprehensive codes of
modern
Gaius and Justinian gave
rise to
most
legal systems.
The belief in law emphasized and strengthened an ethnic pride which shaped the whole political
A Greek state consisted and of the lands around it which provided livelihood. Each state formed its own habits,
development of the Greeks. of a city ARCHAIC PERIOD
its
rules
asserting their owr\ claims tle
men would pay
too
lit-
attention to their neighbors' and reduce soci-
ety to anarchy.
And
indeed Greek states did suffer
gravely from internal dissensions. Nevertheless they survived as centers of order— because the Greek belief in
was inextricably associated with
liberty
the existence of law.
The Greeks notion of
when ages,
it.
consequence
as a
local loy-
were remarkably strong. But beyond this, the Greeks had a second loyalty, vaguer perhaps and not always paramount, but in the end irresistible.
Though they er,
they
felt
quarreled and fought with one anoth-
strongly that they were
who spoke some form
all
Greeks,
men
same language, wor-
of the
shiped the same gods and obeyed the same cus-
did not invent law or originate the
Codes of law existed
the Greeks were
and government;
alties
still
little
and the Mosaic Law of
in
Babylonia
better than sav-
Israel
is
also ancient.
toms—and
in all these respects they
saw themselves
as vastly superior to other races or nations.
they never created those of the
Though
truly national state such as
a
modern world, they presented
a strong
But Greek law, which emerged in the Seventh Cen-
contrast to the multinational empires of Babylonia
tury B.C., differed from these in several respects.
or Persia,
First,
was not intended
it
either of
to
carry out
the
an omnipotent monarch or of
Greek law aimed
entirely at
improving the
will
god;
a
lot
of
mortal humans. Second, while these earlier systems could be changed virtually at the will of a king or priesthood, Greek law
was usually based on some kind of popular consent and could be changed only by being referred to the people for their approval. a
Finally,
Greek law was expected
and property for a select
for
all
members
to
secure
life
of a society, not just
group of leaders or
priests.
The Greeks
which comprised
a large
number
of dif-
ferent peoples held together not because they shared a
common
culture or ideal but simply because they
were subjects of
despotic ruler.
a
Greeks were attacked by fought against him
to
Whenever
foreign
a
the
enemy, they
defend their Greek heritage
as well as their local liberties.
The Greeks' sense man's obligation gifts, led
the
them
to
of personal achievement, of a
make
the most of his natural
to give to the
same care and attention
structure of political
life.
works of
their
hands
that they gave to the
In the
Greek view, any-
thing worth doing was worth doing well, and the
remains of their humblest pots have
Even objects so
distinction.
masterpieces of
little
a
remarkable
utilitarian as coins are
relief
sculpture
gold or
in
silver.
We may
ask
why
so
much
of the Greeks' work,
which has survived the centuries by accident and therefore truly representative of
what they
The answer
so high a quality, so fine a design. partly that the
Greek
artisans
worked
is
did, has is
for specific
patrons instead of manufacturing wholesale for an
state)
ting
at
or grotesque
violent, gross
Instead
effects.
the
showed men
in the full strength of their lithe,
knew what they wanted and insisted on getThe Greeks wanted their arts and handi-
cular bodies,
women
anonymous
public.
The patrons (who included
it.
crafts to stand the acid tests of time
and
to
hoped
ion they
to
prolong their
own
influence into
drapery of their
finest clothes.
When
keep
their attraction for future generations; in this fash-
in the rippling
did,
it
Greek
art dealt
with animals, as
it
on
lions leaping
their
prey with savage mastery,
horses elegantly on the move. This art found
impose order on any disordered mass of material,
terial in
to leave things as
in its natural state.
Not content
they found them, they wished to
rearrange and shape them. But they employed restraint
in
this
process,
and the
result
has that
quality of balance and completeness which
we
call
justice to
was no
workmanship was
by something more meant
to
to
inspired and reinforced
exalted.
Greek sculpture was
be seen in public places, principally in
temples, and
had
What was
less true of
to perpetuate
The Greeks were
have
it
had
to
a nobility
be worthy of the gods.
and dignity, and yet
it
It
could
in
arts in
pected, they delighted in words.
able language,
and they made
the Greeks, as with
many
by
re-
it.
lacked inhibitions
They had
and
sight that
it
full
became almost
was created with
was accorded
use of
peoples, poetry
religion,
never aimed
who
that art
is
visible
at their
disposal a wonderfully subtle, expressive and adapt-
fore prose. Poetry, in fact,
art at its best
do
an or-
it
such as decorations
each case
something
a people
the gods were believed to be always at work. All
why Greek
to
speaking about themselves, and as might be ex-
not be too remote from everyday things, for in these
this explains
ma-
true of high sculpture
humbler
on pottery. The explanation
was intended
its
that to
felt
what he saw, he must impart
der and balance.
In the major arts, notably in sculpture, this sense of fine
the real world, but the artist
vealing what was most important in
classical.
often
displayed dogs alert to every scent and sound,
the future. In addition, they had a strong desire to
such as rock or clay
it
mus-
to
all
it.
With
came bea
second
the care and in-
the visual arts. Poets
SIGNATURE SEALS, used by wealthy men
of the Fifth
Century B.C.
endorsing documents, were tiny cari'ings, often of animals.
in
These
seals, originally
carved
impressions, represent (from
quartz but shoivn here in plaster
in
a charging bull, a resting heron,
left)
ewe
a race horse with broken reins, a stag on one knee, a
from the ground, and a leaping dolphin playing
The most
relevant today as
with which
cy.
We may
it
was when
it
was
it
to
it
it
for
is
its
were highly esteemed— a poet, said the philosopher
was "a
—and
light
and winged and holy thing"
they wrote about
sorts of subjects: farm-
all
man, any man, had
ing, local lore, the weather. If a
by arguing
technical
its
values.
something important
—which
in the early
song, for almost or
spoken
all
to say
he often said
it
in verse
days meant that he said
Greek poetry was
originally
it
in
sung
Poetry was the Greeks' immediate response to a
wide range of experience, and they invented or perfected
of exciting
and
is
to reflect this variety
many
we now know. They seem which
irresistible
of the poetic forms
have begun with the
to
objective storytelling in verse
tragic events.
They followed
this
home
its
ing force of people
who were
arts
and
tragedy and comedy, the er
and more
is
called lyric for this rea-
noon the Greeks invented both first
difficult relations
dealing with the dark-
between the gods and
men, the second viewing with derisive ribaldry
manner
of
continued
human to
foibles.
write
Even
in later years
charming poetry, though
strength had become diminished and less majestic.
its
all
they its
subjects
feel the liv-
fields in
of
the
which
physical
world excited their curiosity and led them to make spectacular scientific hypotheses. Before them, to
be sure,
much
complished
in
of a practical nature had been ac-
such
fields as
astronomy and engi-
neering by Egyptians and Babylonians.
unique contribution was
provide
to
eral principles,
to the lyre
we
and passion.
The nature
was sung
their high
it
were not the only creative
basis for these applied sciences.
At
pow-
immediacy and
eager to examine their
destinies with the utmost candor
The
gains our
it
imaginative thoughts with
with a more personal, more emotional poetry, which
son.
and
its
deals with
It
full, in all its
power, and behind
the Greeks excelled.
to music.
heroic epic,
but by presenting a situation in
an
but
skill,
for this side or for that
erful implications. Its extraordinary
directness drive
pow-
profound humanity,
precise issues in a universal way,
Socrates,
and
written.
first
to the extraordinary
human
wise appreciation of
attention not
literature,
as alive
is
it
presents issues of perennial urgen-
admire
what binds us
that
is
We cannot fail to respond er
Greek
striking quality of
poetry and prose alike,
arising
sea below.
in the
and
The Greeks' a
theoretical
They sought gen-
in the process
became not only
the founders of science but of philosophy (literally,
"love of knowledge").
fields
were closely
related,
which men could seek
To
the Greeks the
two
both being means by
to find out
more about the
nature of things, and both moving by argument
and proof from one hypothesis If
in
their
astronomy
practical
for navigation
way
to another.
the
Greeks
needed
and an understanding
of
THE OLYMPIAN GODS
this
in
processwn
from the
are,
left:
Persephone: Hermes; Aphrodite: Ares; Demeter with wheat sheaves: Hephaestus: Hera with scepter: Poseidon with his trident:
Athena with a spear: Zeus, chief of the gods, with Artemis with bow; and Apollo. The Creeks
his thunderbolt:
membership
revised the
this
of
list
pantheon
at
times.
weights and stresses for building, they strength-
ened and broadened
this technical
knowledge with
and general principles about the nature of
theories
matter and space and motion, which they expressed in
mathematics, especially in geometry. Then they
often reaped the benefits in other set a firm
would produce
a
it
and experiment. Fifth
saw
also
When
a theo-
the need for observation
medicine flowered in the
Century B.C. under the inspiration of the
great physician Hippocrates of Cos,
task the collection of data from
it
made
Greek doctor
mon among athletes, and head wounds— received in
set great store
to deal
The
spirit
made
wounds— especially
with war.
which inspired Greek researches
human
nature was also at work on
its first
end
the Greeks the
on the correct
to verifiable
first
actions,
into
and
it
true historians. Their ac-
Century
"What
fact;
Hecataeus of Miletus
write here," said
I
beginning of the Fifth
at the
what
B.C., "is the account of
I
thought
to
be true; for the stories of the Greeks [of other centuries] are
which deductions
could be drawn. Thus in the identification of diseases a
Greeks were able
with fractures and dislocations, which were com-
counts of past events gradually changed from leg-
seven-note scale.
While Greek science was developing on retical basis,
ciples of physiology, the
Pythagoras
fields:
foundation for music, for example, by
discovering the numerical ratios of the lengths of string that
on animals and learning something about the prin-
numerous, and
In pursuing truth for
were hampered by no were not
my opinion
in
own
its
theology. Since they
rigid
tied to creeds, they
scheme of
ridiculous."
sake the Greeks
were
free to ask ques-
Such
description of symptoms, and proceeded from that
tions about the
point to do what he could to effect a cure. Medicine
from being thought impious, were often regarded
much
was
of course very
tors
were much better
than
in
knowing what
had made illnesses
a great
at
to
in its infancy,
diagnosing
do
for
it,
but
a
and doccomplaint
at least
they
advance over the old days when
were thought
magic charms and the
to
be curable by amulets,
like.
In surgery the begin-
nings were primitive enough, but by experimenting
things.
inquiries, far
as a quasi-religious activity because they
the wonderful workings of the gods.
As
showed the phi-
losopher Xenophanes said, "The gods did not veal everything to
men
at the
as they seek in time, find a
something better." Thales,
thoroughly rational man,
tell
an eclipse
in
re-
beginning, but men,
who was
able to fore-
585 B.C., nevertheless insisted
> but equally on high occasions of festival and rejoic-
They thought
ing.
could ever hope
pect
them
to
more beautiful than
the gods far
men
to be,
and they did not ex-
human
follow the rules of
What counted was
their
behavior.
power.
men
Because the gods were the sources of power,
honored every kind of power and wished it
in their
own
This applied equally to war,
lives.
games and thought.
the arts, athletic
to display
and
of his divinely provided gifts
Greek did
If a
was making
well in any of these, he
a
proper use that extent
to
he was getting nearer to the gods. This
means when he
Aristotle
we can." Thus
mortal as far as that "all things are full of gods,"
and
this
was the
usual Greek attitude.
Thus Greek pily with to inspire
art
Greek
and Greek science
fitted in
religion; indeed, religion did
hap-
much
to
modern minds
below the standards demanded of
fall
vinity, they
had something impressive
They were
all
in
di-
common.
high degree embodiments of
to a
power, whether in the physical world or in the
mind
that
much like them as possible, humans must not attempt this
lest
they imagine that they were gods.
and sustain the poets and philosophers.
of man.
From them came
both visible and the mortals to
invisible,
make
everything,
literally
and
it
was the task of
the proper use of
what the
gods provided.
The Greeks took
all
the familiar steps to keep in
hymns and
sacrifices;
oracles; they
They
offered prayers and
they consulted
all
kinds of
had countless shrines containing im-
ages of the gods.
They hoped
that the gods
would
the characteristic
moderation, both in
Greeks zestfully
life
maxim "Nothing
in excess,"
Mean, the
Western Sea. They
felt
the gods' presence every-
where, especially in times of need such as battle.
not
attempting enough. Needless to say, they did not
always achieve the Mean, but
and
felt in
it
set its
mark on
it
to
was
themselves a driving strength
make
the
most
at
least
an
They which came
their civilization.
from the gods, and they knew that
it
was
their task
by seeking pleasure
of this, not
and sensation (though of course they enjoyed these as the
reward for
their efforts)
out to
an Elysium beyond the
much and
middle state between attempting too
be worthy of their
stantial ghosts to imagining
While the
arts.
desirability of the
it
to
varied from thinking that the dead were unsub-
and the
with the
tempered
set
death they
it
and they praised the
language of friendship. They had no very clear doclife after
eagerly,
every form of action, they
tried
lives to rational
Even on the subject of
knowing
too
Greek mixture of energy and
be kind to them, and they spoke of them in the
trines.
once eager
yet
This ambivalence proved of great value. From
came
ideal,
contact with their gods.
what
be im-
the Greeks stood in
to their gods, at
to be as
Though Greek gods might seem often to
an ambivalent relation
is
"We must
says:
make
the best of their natural gifts
human
cated themselves to noble thing fit
new and
to living in
toil,
and
nature, they dedito
creating some-
splendid, to keeping their bodies as
making order out of disorder, harmony with their fellow citizens.
as their minds, to
and
but by shaping their
and desirable ends. As the Greeks
THE GREAT LEGACY
"hiiure ages will wonder ai
us,
as the present age wonders at us now''
MNCiENT GREECE
/ M is
\ and
literary
left
Vanother. But
great.
It is,
some of the most magnificent works
monuments it is
of art
ever bequeathed by one civilization to
not mostly for these that the legacy of Greece
rather, because of the spirit they evoke, a spirit rooted in
the belief that
man is a free, indeed an
exalted, being. For thousands of
years older civilizations— Persian, Egyptian, Assyrian, Babylonian-
thought of
man
as a despised figure
despots. The Greeks picked is
full of
who
groveled before deities and
man up and set him on his
wonders," sang Sophocles, "but nothing
is
feet.
more wonderful
than man." The Greeks depicted their gods in idealized like the smiling
Apollo shown on the opposite page.
"The world
human
What
form,
the world
2,400 years later would think of the Greeks the Athenian statesman Pericles foretold (above) in his eloquent funeral oration
casualties of the Peloponnesian
on the
first
War. The picture essay beginning
here combines the proud affirmations of Pericles with photographs of
Greek masterpieces that sum up the everlasting Greek achievement.
THE SERENE SPIRIT OF GREECE shines from intellect.
It
was
this Apollo,
cast in bronze 2,400 years ago, lost
god of the
some 400
years later and found again under a Piraeus street only in 1959.
V
t
^
ORDER
IN
STONE
IS
shown
in the
columns of the temple at Lin-
das on the island of Rhodes. These columns, which grow narrower as they rise,
were designed by architects who knew the rules of
geometrical precision— and
"Our love of what is
when
to
change them
to please the eye.
beautiful does not lead to extravagance"
TO
ARCHITECTURE, as well as to the handcrafting of house-
hold utensils, classical Greece brought a great feeling for purity, elegance— and function.
These
qualities are clearly
stated in the strong Doric columns, the austerely
harmonious
steps and the delicately symmetrical vase shown on these pages.
An
unexpected lecturer on these matters was the old soldier
Xenophon, who, ment, wrote: .
.
in his delightful
"It is beautiful to see the footgear
garments sorted according
.
book on household manage-
to their use
.
.
.
ranged
in a
ranged with sense and symmetry." Beauty was above
When
the
King
of Bithynia offered to
poverished people of Cnidus les'
if
row
cooking pots arprice.
pay the debts of the im-
only they would sell him Praxite-
statue of Aphrodite, they spurned him. But a taste for beauty
must not be overindulged; the Greek rule must be enjoyed warned
that
in
that everything in life
moderation applied even here. Socrates
"when a man allows music
to play
upon him and
to
pour into his soul through the funnel of his ears those sweet and soft
WORKADAY
JUG, turned out
carry wine and olive oil to
world,
still
by endless thousands all
to
parts of the ancient
stands witness to the Creek love of beauty.
and melancholy
airs
... he becomes a feeble warrior.
'
"Where the rewards of valor are the greatest, there
you will find also
the best
and bravest spirits among
THE
GREEK regard for individual worth applied equally
and war— so
their
ganized on democratic
lines.
in peace
mand
men, explained
of 10,000
said, "If
anyone has
Athens elected
common
the people"
its
generals.
and
soldier
sidered the
a better
supreme
was
or-
army and then
his plans to his
plan to propose,
A
force
fighting
Xenophon, taking com-
let
man might walk
him do
to
so."
one war
a
War was conman— and not beneath the concern
ride to the next a general.
test of a
of the gods. Aeschylus, writing his
own
epitaph, ignored en-
during dramas and noted only the courage he displayed against the Persians.
Headlong bravery was the
of Greek fighters. But style in war
least that
was expected
was particularly admired. The
Greeks esteemed Dieneces the Spartan who, told that the enemy hosts at Thermopylae were so large their arrows would hide the sun, replied, "So
WARRIOR GODS march
much
into
the better,
we
shall fight in the shade."
combat against an enemy force composed
part of a frieze at Delphi telling
how
of giants.
This
is
imtnortal gods defeated mortals in a pitched battle.
jMPF'^^
'i
:
»;
^.
1
i;.
"^
•V.^J^^
^:--
'^^'^i^m..*-;
"V\le are free
but
and toleraut
in public affairs
to those
we
hi
our private
keep to the law.
.
.
.
lives;
We give our obedience
whom we put in positions of authority''
''Our love of the things of the
mind does
A
MAN
OF THE MIND,
exercise of all a
Ath-I.'llr .Irlinr.i
man's
,'/;-
,(.!/,
,i/
Ihll'iuiieas as
the
"vital p'owcrs n/oiii; the lines of excellence."
not
make us soft"
THE
GREEKS gave equal respect to mental and physical prow-
ess because they believed that the ideal life
would be one
spent in the pursuit of excellence in
The complete
man would or at
be equally active as
an
all
things.
athlete, philosopher, judge, poet
any other worthy pursuit. The philosopher Socrates once
worked
as an apprentice sculptor; the playwright Sophocles not only
served as a general but was also at different times imperial treasurer,
diplomat and
At
priest.
for the best poets
MEN OF ACTION, young
athletic festivals prizes
were also awarded
and the best rhapsodists, dancers and musicians.
riders easily
the Panathenaic procession in
keep their prartcing horses under control.
This frieze depicts
honor of the goddess Athena that took place once every four
'TT^'-^'m^^mm
^'^ar
C>" /In
w
);a ^.
*^^V
»,
..'^,
%
The Greeks
of historical times,
which date from
about 750 B.C., believed themselves to be descended from a legendary race of heroes.
Men
of prodi-
gious physique and energy, these heroes sailed to the end of the world for a golden sheepskin, warred
against the Trojans for 10 years over a beautiful
woman, and one
of
them singlehandedly cleaned
incredibly filthy stables in a day. For ries
2 AND NEW DAWN
fiction,
they had some basis in
that
many
centu-
and
that these heroes
adventures were pure
their
we now know
but fact.
For nearly a century archeologists have been uncovering evidence of a rich civilization, centered at
Mycenae, that flourished between 1600
the city of
DARK AGE
assumed
scholars
and 1200 B.C.— and Mycenae was the home of Aga-
memnon,
the
King who
name
(the ancient
in legend led the
Achaeans
War. This long-lost Mycenaean world was ly a
development of
Minoan
Aegean from about 1600 lively,
a
version
clothes. Their
colors, intricate
homes, sometimes
elegant
five stories high,
terraces. Their palaces
system of plumbing (they even had
a
flush toilets)
unmatched
Victorian times. all
games (they
backgammon) and
of
had light-wells and setback contained
not
which dominated the 1400 B.C. The Mino-
to
pleasure-loving and sensuous
people— fond of bright played a
original-
a still older world, the brilliant
civilization of Crete
ans were
Trojan
for the Greeks) into the
Some
nicety until
for sanitary
of their engineering skills,
their cultural refinements,
if
were taken over
their Mycenaean heirs. The Mycenaeans themselves were
by
builders. Their palaces
were
ble citadels with walls 10 feet thick,
made
and some of
tombs were enormous beehive struc-
their royal
tures
spectacular
built within formida-
much
of stones weighing, sometimes, as
as 120 tons.
They were
also
immensely wealthy,
pecially in metals,
and most especially
Mycenaean tombs,
diggers have found death
es-
in gold. In
masks
and breastplates of gold; bronze swords and daggers; gold and silver drinking cups; gold rings and diadems; and thin sheets of gold used as funeral
wrappings dren.
for the bodies of
The tombs
also
two small royal
disclose
physical characteristics of these people. NOBLE LADIES OF MYCENAEAN GREECE
set Out in a chariot to attend a hunt.
Their era, 13 centuries before Christ, gloried in mighty deeds of war and
hunting and adorned
its
palaces with pictures of expeditions like this one.
taller
chil-
something of the
They were
and broader-faced than the Minoans; the
men were mustachioed and sometimes
bearded.
One —a
corpse had apparently suffered from gallstones
And
then, less than a century later, this vigor-
other had a fractured skull which had been neatly
ous, splendid civilization
trepanned— thus giving us the
It
earliest record of this
surgical operation in Europe.
Decisions of
a
court
his
were carried out by an officialdom consisting, in diminishing order, of military leaders, administrative officials, charioteers
and mayors of the group
surrounded the
of villages that
Archeologists
city.
have discovered the actual records, kept by this bureaucracy,
efficient
holdings, agricultural slaves,
horses,
pair wheels
of
chariots
bound with bronze,
land
assessments,
tax
and inventories
stores,
and chariot
bound with
silver,
parts
phered, also
a
B.C.,
Dark Age from
which survived only scattered legends and some unrewarding
artifacts.
The Dorians attacked and destroyed Mycenaean cities when they were weakened by war. The conquerors lived as squatters in burned-out
decayed
crafts
arms
tablets in a script
in
Mycenaean
effective)
icent
at
weapons made
cremation.
The
tightly organized
longshoremen, oarsmen, saddlers, shepherds, dry
the
car-
of iron; burial in magnif-
tombs was largely superseded by perfunctory
tally disintegrated
foresters,
lamentable speed. Finely worked
bronze were replaced by crude (but more
masons, bakers, cooks, woodcutters, messengers,
potters,
between 1200 and 750
Greek world passed through
vanished, the art of writing disappeared. Handi-
are goldsmiths, shipwrights,
cleaners, doctors, heralds,
of far
("one
one pair wheels
B by scholars) only recently decilist more than 100 Mycenaean occu-
Among them
end.
terrible
palaces but did not rebuild them. Record-keeping
unfit for service").
These records, inscribed on clay
to a
Greeks from the north, called Dori-
ans. For 450 years,
the
came
by successive invasions
obliterated
of
(called Linear
pations.
was
less civilized
Mycenaean king and
and lasted 10 years.
Helen,
the stolen princess,
diagnosis which suggests a rich diet— and an-
Mycenaean
by the Dorian
society
assault.
was
to-
Many
of
Mycenaeans became dispossessed, purposeless
wanderers.
To
this
chaos of moving people was
penters,
bowmakers, weavers, bath attendants and
added the movement of the conquerors themselves,
unguent
boilers.
but their travels were purposeful. Not content with
In
sum, the Mycenaeans were an accomplished
and enterprising people, worthy successors
to the
Minoans. But they were unlike the peaceful Minoans in
one important aspect:
baldly, brigandage
principal
a
business seems to have been
war— or,
to
Mycenaean put
it
more
and piracy. Military enterprises
took the Mycenaeans far from
home on adventurous
ravaging the Mycenaean
cities,
the Dorians pressed
southward and seized the Laconian
Greek mainland they nean Crete
to Crete, it
subjugating
was only
a
plain.
From
the
sailed across the Mediterrait
completely.
short voyage to
And from
Rhodes and
neighboring islands, which suffered a similar
its
fate.
This was the Dark Age of Greece. Although
a
missions 1,300 years before the birth of Christ. Ac-
few remnants of the old Mycenaean culture remained
cording to Hittite records— the Hittites controlled a
here and there— on the island of Cyprus; in the
powerful empire in Asia Minor from a stronghold
mountains of Arcadia; and
east of present-day
Ankara— marauding bands
Achaeans were harassing the coast of Asia Minor the middle of the 13th
Century B.C.
drawn-out expedition they
Troy
in the
On
said
clustered
in
Achaean world
one long-
was fought
Attica,
around the small town of Athens— most of the old
laid siege to the city of
war which legend
in
of
for
bility
fell
apart. People lost their old sta-
and order. They
lived as best
they could.
Brother was pitted against brother, children against parents, friend against friend.
One
of Greece's ear-
A TIME OF CRUMBLING EMPIRES Pharaoh Ramses pylon
at a
depicted on a stone
III,
Nile temple,
seen repelling
is
Egypt's attackers early in the 12th Century
when Dorian
B.C. This period,
invaders
were overrunning Greece, was elsewhere
marked by
the eclipse of great empires.
Egypt, despite Ramses' victories, slowly lost
mastery
its
Mediterranean,
the
in
and the Hittites were overthrown
Among
Asia
in
numerous small nations to rise and flourish in the power vacuum were Phoenicia, whose aggressive traders Minor.
the
Hebrew
colonized Carthage, and the
dom, which reached
apogee
its
kingthe
in
David and Solomon from 1005 925 B.C. India remained a checkerboard
reigns of to
of warring city states
produced
its
through an era that
Mahab-
vast epic poems, the
harata and the Ramayana. Until the fierce warriors of Assyria reached the peak of their
power
Century
in the Eighth
B.C.,
China under the Chou Dynasty was the only extensive empire
liest
and best-known poets, Hesiod,
lived at
very close of this period and described
it
with the hope that he could induce the Greeks
change
their
embodied
all
the
in detail to
ways. To Hesiod the Mycenaean age that
was beautiful and good. His own
In the
naean
centuries after the
first
each
civilization,
hamlets and farms, became
isted
was usually military
in effect a garrison
and
his captains.
brother will claim from brother the love
once claimed,
And
of the
Myce-
surrounding
its
separate social unit.
a
in origin:
governed by
a
little
order ex-
the city
was
commander and
Gradually borders became fixed along
natural boundary lines, and
No
fall
with
city,
Borders shifted constantly, and what
time was full of violence and brutality, intolerance indifference, stealing, cheating, lying:
in the ancient world.
fensible, the city
and
its
if
the lines were de-
surrounding countryside
survived to become an independent community, a
parents will quickly age, dishonored
city-state. Military
governments became hereditary
and shamed.
And men
will scorn
them and
bitter
words
considered to be descended from gods.
they'll say.
Hard-hearted, no longer god-fearing. They'll
their nurture, but
might
their
ravaging
wall.
men
head.
will break
through a city
Nowhere
community in
Greece,
A
king was
as well as its
however, did
kings claim actually to be gods, as some Asian kings did.
right they'll call;
And
the religious leader of his
secular
not repay
The cost of
monarchies. Kings ruled by divine right and were
Nor
did they
ence or absolute
demand
authority
claimed as their right.
that
the abject obedi-
Oriental
rulers
Along with
developing sense of civic independ-
a
Greeks began
ence, the
to acquire certain
uniform
they had subdued the neighboring settlements in the Laconian plain. Then, for a period of time, Spar-
became one of the brightest centers of the
cultural patterns that transcended local boundaries
ta
and
ture that flowered at the close of the
local
styles
They became change
in
dress,
decoration and speech.
willing to learn
and
their ideas
their
from one another,
ways
Sometimes they shared technical
to
of doing things.
sometimes
skills,
The Greeks' own name for themselves, HelDark Age. Greek pottery be-
tastes.
lenes, originated in the
gan
to take
on
a
distinctively Hellenic character,
despite regional variations.
mon
And
they shared
a
com-
language, so that despite their different dialects
From
they were intelligible to one another. tentative beginnings sprang the
were eventually
main features
Hellenic
define
to
these that
civilization—
cul-
Dark Age.
produced exquisite pottery, and was noted for festivals of
It
its
song and dance. But when military con-
cerns again became uppermost, these disappeared,
and Sparta, by reverted to
its
this
time a major Greek city-state,
pawns
of the state, rigidly controlled
death.
From seven onward
its
and
hardship
Home
without question.
The men
to
weapons but
accept
was
life
ate at a
from birth
children were trained
for war, learning not only to use
endure physical
existent.
became
earlier attitudes. Its citizens
to
discipline
practically non-
common
mess, could
the intellectual and political freedom, the sense of
not marry before the age of 20, and could not live
cultural unity.
with their wives (except surreptitiously) until the
Not
all
same fashion
of Greece reacted in the
to
the Dorian onslaught or survived the subsequent
Dark Age
same manner. The
in the
two of the most
moment. Strangely,
was
of great
at the outset, the first
was not
very important and the other isted in
pened
Mycenaean
to
early history of
influential city-states
may
not even have ex-
times. Nevertheless,
Athens and Sparta
in the
what hap-
Dark Age
set the
age of 30. After 30 they were permitted to have
Even during periods when the austere in outlook, and
Athens was able because
it
cities,
was destined
village, in
what may have been to
remain essentially Dorian
outlook thereafter. Athens held
and was able
a tiny
off the
to give refuge to fellow
fleeing the invaders. In the
crowded
Dorians
Mycenaeans
city
were pre-
served elements of the splendid past on which a glorious future
would some day be
built.
Centuries later Athens and Sparta represented
opposing philosophies political
When it
in
freedom against
Greek life— intellectual and stern, military discipline.
the Dorians settled at Sparta they organized
as a military
camp.
It
kept that character until
no im-
made
a
virtue of extreme
to fight off the
was on
a
natural
Dorian invaders
fortress,
rocky
the
Then refugees from the other Mycenaean among them the royal family of Pylos,
Golden Age of Greece— and paradoxically insured
site of
in
simplicity.
Acropolis.
Dorians on the
was
state
mediate danger, Sparta remained conservative and
stage for the roles they were to play in the later
the end of that great Age. Sparta, settled by the
a
household, but their children belonged to the state.
flocked to Athens and the surrounding countryside of Attica.
Soon the population grew too
large
comparatively limited space available. But
for the
Attica had several superb Piraeus, only five miles
harbors,
among them
from Athens, and
in
about
1100 B.C., emigration began. Greeks sailed out into the
Aegean
to find
new homes on
the
Aegean
islands
and on the western coast of Asia Minor. These emigre colonies of Greeks in and around the Aegean
came
to
The
be called Ionia.
first
of the Ionian colonies
were on the
is-
lands of Naxos, Chios and Samos, but others soon
followed on the mainland.
The
soil
was
rich,
the
coastline well provided with
and
harbors,
rivers
winding Maeander offered passage inland
like the
be strong and brave and noble and capable of
to
prodigious achievements.
They were
also lessons in
and expansion. The Greek colonists were
noble and ignoble conduct, and repositories of tales
not always welcomed by the native population, and
on the ways of the gods. Thus the bard imparted
for trade
newcomers
so the
themselves
fortified
in
walled
towns. Eventually these precautions stood them in
good stead,
menaced by
for as the colonies prospered they
the
Cimmerians and
the Lydians,
instruction while
he
gave
The legends
delight.
themselves were only a framework to which he
were
added extemporaneous elaboration, designed
to
who
the needs and temper of a specific audience.
Over
fit
had, one after the other, supplanted the Hittites
the years, succeeding generations of bards evolved a
Asia Minor. Despite these harassments the loni-
technique which depended heavily on a very large
in
ans were
home.
at
old
much If
they could not hope to re-create the
Mycenaean world, they were
fashion a Like
all
new
in Attica.
and
to
expatriates the lonians were extremely ties
and they spoke
nies
free
social
number all,
with the homeland. Their
a modified
Mycenaean
They kept
form of the
line-
dialect
the gods and ceremo-
systems that they had brought with
of characters
—and
a central hearth
with geo-
their pottery, elegantly decorated
metric patterns, was copied from the pottery in
Athens. Most important of
all,
made
the lonians pre-
served the epic songs and stories that had been
passed
The
down from Greek
antiquity.
epics were crucial to
Greek
civilization.
Not
There was,
first
much
whose names and
of
a cast
personalities
were
the same. There were also set descrip-
tions for certain recurring places
and events,
in-
cluding conventionalized figures of speech. Bards
used
a
huge stock
cally into verse:
of
phrases that
fell
automati-
"wine-dark sea," "long-shadowing
spear," "death that lays at length," "rosy-fingered
dawn," "brazen sky," "windy Troy."
The
them. Their houses were built on the traditional
Greek plan— one room surrounding
of standardized forms.
an established outline for each legend and
always
leaders included princes of ancient
spoken
least
at
one.
conscious of their
age,
countrymen
better off than their
epic
drew upon
several kinds of legends or
myths: some concerned with gods, others with gods
and men, and others with men alone. In the Dark
when bards first began to perfect them, myths way of answering hard questions about human nature and the universe for audiences unable to consider these matters scientifically. The myths made abstract ideas comprehensible by
Age,
offered a
only were they the chief relaxation for the Greeks in
presenting the ideas as they affected real people
the early period, but they also performed for pre-
caught
literate
Greeks
a
number
were
sential to their survival. Later, they
as a strong element in the art
and
Western world. For these reasons to stop here to
the
examine
Greek epics and
bards
To
in
some
to live
on
literature of the it
is
appropriate
detail the nature of
to discuss the greatest of the
primarily to explain religious matters, such as the
changes that occurred when one
The gods on Mount Olympus displaced by another.
is
set
of gods
was
substitution of the Greek
Minoan gods myth which tells
for the old
explained, for instance, by the
who composed them— Homer.
of the brutal struggle between Zeus, ruler of the
the Greeks, struggling to regain a lost glory,
Olympian
the epic songs were entertainment, inspiring history,
in recognizable events.
The myths concerned with gods were intended
of functions that were es-
reminders of a time
when
to be a
Greek was
gods, and his father Cronos; Zeus finally
overcomes his father and throws him into Tartarus, the ancient Hell.
GREEK ALPHABET LETTER
NAME OF LETTER ENGLISH TRANSLITERATION '^H^^VIa9^vl
A
K
A
M
kappa
lambda
mu
c,
k
1
m
more than
One
His patrons probably wanted no
his characters.
tales of
heroism, but he gave them a
whole view of the world, of the gods
at
their ap-
men and women pursuing their every mood from grim vengeance to
development
final
Mycenaean
times, but
destinies, of
enough
making
Behind every story
lands and rocky shores.
imagination
work, seeing humans as they
at
is
understanding
really are,
is-
his
why
they act as they do,
when they are with warmth and
portraying them with insight even bad, and
when
they are good,
Homer was
fitted for literature.
ill
new
the culmination of the
that flowered in Ionia, but he
spirit
body
in
new
plement
was
a
of the its
use
Bay
and bronze began
home
to
jewelry and
trinkets
still
its
busy
communal
earliest of these
afield,
they
gold
and
of
to
copy and
was the
and tempering
lives
religious rites.
One
festival of song,
games on the island of Delos,
A
in
their
of the
dance and
honor of Apollo.
more famous event was the great games held Olympia every four years to honor Zeus. All
far
at
Greece participated
in the
Olympian games. Each
city sent its best athletes to
compete
in wrestling,
foot racing, boxing, leaping, discus throwing, javelin
at Ischia,
an island
am
at the
entrance to the
Nestor's cup.
He who would drink from
this
cup
With an alphabet, many matters which were
memory
viously entrusted to
hurling and chariot racing, and each
man
gave
within his to
down
as literary
own
lifetime.
and provided
set
down
Writing made
much more
a
set
up
the people to read, and
conduct trade negotiations
much more effective
in writing it
possible
efficiently
means
of re-
cording history.
The Greek alphabet took them leading
to the
turn inspired the
several forms, one of
Etruscan alphabet, which in
Roman
alphabet that the Western
world uses today. But despite minor variations,
remained essentially the same down through long career,
a
fine
and
flexible
instrument.
it
its
With
writing and literature, and a promising renaissance in arts
To
spread
of their shared culture.
all
Homer's poetry was probably
Age
Greek people the games were one more case
square for
in the public
pre-
or limited to itemized
record-keeping could be written
of his best to honor himself, his city and his gods.
the
verse about love incised on a drinking
a
Persuasion of beautifully crowned Aphrodite.
Ionian colonies. Although the city-
easily, living
parts
all
examples of
still
kept their petty kings and autonomous
activity with
earliest
Shall be assailed by the subtle seductive
governments, the people themselves mingled freely
and
Admirably
spread rapidly to
documents. Laws were incised on stone and
Soon the Greek homeland began states
it
hint
carved ivory.
compete with
needs,
consonants.
body underneath. Temples
and merchants ventured farther
brought
good
tool,
bookkeeping but
acquired vowels to sup-
it
Greek world. One of the is
clumsy
of Naples:
/
were adorned with wooden sculptures, and as Greek sailors
many
a
for
The new alphabet was based
Phoenician
the
adapted to
direc-
movement: the draperies were
stylized, but there
and
was not the only man-
metalsmiths and woodcarvers moved in tions. Figurines in clay
was
it
lists
on that of Phoenicia, but
ifestation of that spirit. In the plastic arts, potters,
at the
for
cup found
gentle affection.
stronger: the appear-
ance of a Greek alphabet. Writing had existed in
pointed tasks, of
uproarious farce, of palaces and gardens, remote
Dark
at the close of the
Age made Greek unity even
and
crafts,
Ionia
emerged from the Dark
into the sunlight of Hellenism its
and began
to
message of beauty and refinement through-
out the Greek world.
IN
GENERAL COMBAT helmeted Warriors
OF The
fight at Troy, where,
Homer
reported, "showers of big stones battered the shields of the fighting men.
WAR AND A WANDERER
picture above and most of the other photographs in this essay are taken from
a frieze in grayish
seum
in Vienna.
covered
a
pock-marked sandstone stored
The
frieze,
it is
superimposed rows of low-relief carvings
on request, and the
Mu-
century ago on the walls of a tomb in Gjolbaschi, on modern-day Tur-
key's Mediterranean coast. Because
It is
in the Kunsthistorisches
dating from the early Fourth Century B.C., was dis-
it
too large for convenient display— its total
600
feet in
length— it
has rarely been photographed and even
most monumental attempt
to depict the
is
two
shown only
rrtore rarely
published.
mighty deeds of the warriors
who fought at the siege of Troy, ancient Ilion that Homer sings of in the Iliad. Its many panels also contain a scene of the homecoming of Odysseus which Homer recounts in the Odyssey. Heightening the spell that Homer's poems these stories in stone give visual form to major episodes from the
still
two
weave, epics.
sj»«:
^^^M
P^
^i^.:^
THE CLANGOROUS SIEGE OF A PROUD CITY The fighting around Troy's walls lasted ing years. The Iliad's time span is weeks is
for 10 grind-
scarcely
of the last year of that war. But this
an exciting story, ringing with the clash of ar-
mored and embattled men. For the Greeks who heard
it, it
expressed the heroic ideals of their
aristocratic era, freshly
and served
as
a
characters of the
his pride
first
own
emerged from the Dark Age,
document
religious
Olympian
high tragedy— the story of
by
six
poem
family. For
a great
man
that set all
time
the it
is
brought low
and anger. Achilles, the Greek warrior
who was incomparable
in battle,
the central figure
is
of this poem. After a heated quarrel with
Agamem-
non, Achilles, furiously angry, sulks in his tent
while the Trojans under Hector, son of Troy's King Priam, drive the Greeks
when
comes forth
to lead
the
There he slays Hector. clus.
away from Troy's
his dearest friend, Patroclus,
Then
A
is
walls.
But
killed, Achilles
invaders back to Troy. funeral
is
the sorrowing Achilles,
held for Patro-
moved
to
com-
passion by the mediation of the gods, gives Hector's
body
to Priam, to be buried as befits a fallen hero.
1^
tr.;ii-^mB'
house, where
wily
suitors
hand have long been ensconced.
-^^-^'i^fc^i^l^^'igt
AN EXCITING The Greeks won military
their
war with
men and statesmen
other ways.
They gave Troy
a
TALE OF DARING DEEDS
famous ruse
that
tells
a
gift— a
wooden horse
with Greeks hidden inside. While the Trojans
soldiers
in the
slept,
who had
devised the
horse trick, found the route 10 years long.
IV
iufn&
«««
After the appearance of the Greek alphabet, sometime during the Eighth Century B.C., the Greeks
begin to speak to us in their
at last
own contem-
porary words. The evidence, after so long a time, is
naturally fragmentary and
lively, significant details
many
add
haphazard but
its
our knowledge in
to
areas.
The Greek economic
revival,
marked by
a
re-
surgence of fine craftsmanship and an expansion of foreign trade, soon introduced a
3
change
in the structure of
Greek
fundamental
life.
In almost
every state except Sparta and Thessaly the petty kings of tradition were deposed or reduced to ureheads. Sparta, with
A CONFIDENT
petuated
with
ARISTOCRACY
its
fig-
rigid conservatism, per-
ancient dual monarchy, and Thessaly,
its
agrarian society of widely separated land-
its
holders, kept
its
system of hereditary kings until
the Fifth Century B.C.
moved from
office for
er—even though,
Elsewhere, kings were re-
good reason— abuse of pow-
as sole repository of
custom and
bound
to
law, they had not been
to
conform
any
code.
Where
the kings were deprived of their power,
authority passed to the local aristocracy.
government by
a single ruler to
The new riors
rulers
who had
Thus
the
was made from government by
great step forward
group of men.
a
were the descendants of the warseized land and established estates
during the Dark Age.
Initially
only landowners
could be aristocrats; later some wealthy merchants
and manufacturers were admitted were
men
pursuits,
to the class.
They
of leisure, active in sports and outdoor if
only as part of their military training.
They were accustomed to country life, but not afraid to put to sea. They were versed in the social skills demanded by life in a small community. Taught from childhood
to take part in singing
dancing, they shared
common
and the
art of the
subscribed to a
them
to
a
interest in
and
music
spoken and sung word. And they
strict
code of conduct that required
be truthful, trustworthy, courteous (even
to enemies),
courageous, respectful of the rights of
others, generous with their possessions (as far as their A RUIN AT DELPHI magnificently evokes the search for splendor at the holy site.
Theodorus of Phocaea,
Built by the architect
round building, but what
it
was designed
for
this
was a
tholos,
or
has been tost to history.
means would
tion to cheat,
These
abundant
permit),
immune
and proud of the code
aristocrats
may have
to the
tempta-
itself.
lacked the super-
vitality of later Greeks,
but they never-
had a splendid energy. They excelled
theless
many like
members
enjoy
The
they did not
aristocracies,
secure enough to allow them to
a position
become
and geographical center of Greek
political
mean, and
of government.
its
came
polis
much more than merely of people
walls. In
it
who
total
of people
tradesmen and
men
sailors
mingled
now
like
was
small,
Corinth and
one
was
at
various kinds of
to
which the term
who governed
the polis regarded
themselves as superior beings, and associated mainly
with their
own
specially qualified
class.
They
believed themselves
by birth and breeding
to their
own
advantage
to
keep the city secure
and prosperous, they often showed great doing
so.
it
talent in
Nevertheless, there were repeated clashes
of interest
between the
aristocrats
and the common
commoners demanded and got a laws. The earliest of these codes
people. Finally the
written code of
date from the Seventh Century B.C., before the
word "democracy"
existed.
They
dealt mainly with
homicide, which had hitherto been settled by family
feud,
and with property ownership. They
dealt with contracts laid
down
and other
between two persons, and they
rules for the officials.
also
appointment of magistrates
Sometimes they even regulated
became
621 syn-
a
any
area.
of cabbage-stealing
person of his debtor— in effect enslaving the
to the
debtor. But Draco's code also introduced the idea of
and made
justifiable homicide,
distinction be-
a
tween premeditated and involuntary manslaughter.
Under
the aristocrats the polis acquired a
stable system of
came
government and the
Greek
differentiate the
to
Long
life
because of
Greeks from
their
after the aristocrats
its
man's existence ought ority
more
rich civic life
had
power, the polis remained the focus of
lost their
what
inspired view of
to be.
a
Because their superi-
supposedly came from the favor of the gods,
the aristocrats considered that they were "good"
men. But
them "good" was by no means an
for
exclusively or even predominantly ethical concept.
was an
Goodness, or
arete,
existed in
things.
all
A
intrinsic excellence that
good man, the poet Simoni-
des wrote, was "truly noble, in hands and feet and
mind, fashioned foursquare without blemish."
According
for the
task of looking after public affairs— and since
was
that "Draconian"
pre-
punishable by death, and gave a creditor the right
that
ac-
refers.
aristocrats
a
for extreme severity or cruelty in
foreign neighbors.
freely. Life
full of
civic activity, including that
"politics"
onym
and de-
as well. Farmers, craftsmen,
once varied and intimate,
The
rites
population included townsmen and coun-
trymen, and in maritime centers
Athens, seafaring
was so harsh
B.C.,
who
affairs discussed
tually lived within the walls of the polis its
pared for Athens by
business was transacted,
number
cided on. Although the
and
it,
lived inside
manufacturing was carried on, ceremonies and
were conducted, public
to
the seat
included the lands around
It
was the meeting-place and outside
The
polls, or city-state.
to be,
One of these codes, man named Draco in
the form of government.
Draco made the minor offense
overrefined.
was the
life
some
of
in
Un-
graces, but were not in the least effete.
or
to this ideal of
manhood, public hon-
and private honor were intimately
owed
related.
A man
to himself to display his best qualities
it
and
be recognized for them, and the praise he received for his actions
cess
was
was not only
a a
mark
of his success. But suc-
personal reward:
was an
it
owed his city. If a man died for his city's honor, he was a "good" man. And during his lifetime he was expected to keep its laws, do nothobligation he
ing to disgrace
havior
among
ancestry
and
it,
maintain a certain sobriety of be-
and be worthy
his
fellows,
his
upbringing.
"goodness," what are
now
In
this
of his
view
of
considered strictly moral
virtues were less important than the social ones,
and mattered only when moral
failure
brought
shame upon
man and
a
The
his class.
manhood was wide and
ideal of
not restrict "goodness" to a specific
man
havior, but simply expected a
aristocratic
generous.
did
It
of be-
field
every
to be in
The
this closely
were identified with per-
city's interests
sonal interests. This helps to explain
propensity for war. Although
because their
tially
cities'
men went
Greek
the
The
to display
in battle,
in itself.
war
of civic honor, they also
had economic causes. One
of the most persistent of the latter
and insoluble
nial
was the peren-
difficulty created
of land. In times of peace
by
shortage
population increased, this problem became acute.
to
was
essentially hand-to-
those qualities
man
it
and
no means
lavish.
were olive
oil,
most admired by
prowess not only gained him
his
their
was already being worked
And
could yield.
an opportunity
to his utmost, physically a
the available land
at best the
Then
fish,
Greek
now
as
diet
the
for all
was by
staple
foods
goat cheese, wine and bread.
Goats and sheep provided occasional meat, as well milk for cheese; and bees provided honey for
as
sweetening. There were also nuts and
was
in equal
and
his family.
figs,
as deli-
measure
a source of pride to himself
cacies.
Some
idea of the intensity of this
with such homely items as beans, peas, cabbage,
public pridefulness can be gotten from an epitaph a stone slab in a
It
honors
But otherwise the staples were rounded out
lettuce, lentils
A
tomb, dating from about 600
found on the island of Corcyra.
B.C.,
a
and prosperity, when the
admiration but also brought honor to his city and
on
but
was ennobling
rather because death in this form
Often, there was not enough food simply because
Thus war gave
fellows. His
any hope of
for
ini-
fighting
man
hand, taxing a mentally.
was not
reputations were at stake,
they also did so for personal gain and for personal satisfaction.
It
Although wars were ostensibly fought on points and personal honor were
civic
connected, an affront to one was an affront to the other.
existed.
heaven that they died so willingly
sense a man.
When
any
ful that
and
garlic.
possible solution to the need for
more land
was, of course, to seize a neighbor's. But this was
Whole populations might be
the courage in battle of a warrior felled by Ares,
not very satisfactory.
the god of war:
reduced to slavery, as the Spartans reduced their
Messenian neighbors, but they could not be wholly This
is
the
tomb of Arniadas. Him
eyed Ares destroyed as
he
obliterated— their labor was
flashing-
fought by
seized lands.
the
needed to farm
the
so they had to be fed. Because
war did not solve the problem of land and food,
ships at the streams of Aratthus, displaying the highest valor
And
the Greeks attempted an alternative. Capitalizing
amid the groans and shouts
on
of war.
their experience as
seamen and
their
knowl-
edge of trade, they organized parties of colonists
To
die in battle
to life, the right
when
a
was regarded
Greek died
as a fitting
end
and sent them abroad
to
settle
in distant
And
This relieved the drain on the Greek food supply,
in the defense of his city's
hon-
and also provided the homeland with new sources
name gained even greater dignity. He was mourned by his fellowmen, commemorated by a
The
public memorial and thenceforth held in the high-
continued unabated for two centuries.
or, his
est esteem.
about
Greeks
life after
lands.
to defy life's brevity.
way
in general
thought only vaguely
death, and most
men seemed doubt-
for the
produce and raw materials Greece lacked.
process,
begun
in
the Eighth Century
Greek colonization followed two main north and west.
To
B.C.,
directions,
the north, colonies were planted
first
along the northern Aegean
and
To
finally
then on the
littoral,
(now the Sea
shores of the Propontis
of Marmara),
on the Crimean shore of the Black Sea.
the west the Greeks
went
coast of Italy as far as the
and south-
into Sicily
up the western
ern Italy around 750 B.C., going
Bay
CAUL
of Naples. In about
BAY OF BISCAY
600 B.C., Ionian Greeks from the city of Phocaea in Asia Minor, seeing the advantages of the natural harbor at present-day Marseilles, founded a
ment
settle-
there called Massilia. East of Massilia, along
the coast
now famous
Heracles
Monoecus
as the French Riviera, ancient
Greek settlements were established
at
Adgssjlja
Nicaea, Her-
^^^^^ Nicaea
AphrodisiaJ'
Monoecus and Antipolis— present-day
acles
Monaco and
Nice,
BERIA
Antibes. Massilia conducted a flour-
"•tmporiae
raw
materials. Their business took
them up the Rhone River Gaul and
as far west as
proof of this exchange
found
at Vix,
;.;T5aguntum
to the inland regions of
One
Cornwall and Ireland. is
a
large
Tharrus*
•BALEARIC ISLANDS
bronze vessel,
SARDINIA
It is
a
famous and beauti-
example of archaic Greek craftsmanship, and „x--'-;:*«--
must have been ordered by some
local
high occasion, perhaps a wedding or
Compared
to the
king for a
relatively unimportant.
a funeral.
NUMIDIA
colonizing might
And
Greek
yet the
colonies were one of the most powerful
means of
spreading Greek civilization to other lands, though that
was not
their intention,
and though the
GREEK COLONIES
results ell-estahlished colonies of the older Phoenician domain, shoion
cities
boxed on the
on the
map
to
the
of the
north was blocked by the fortified
Etruscan people of
map founded most
Italy.
identify the parent city of each of the
new
"^'S^r
SCYTHIA
f.Olbia
Panticapaeum
W
.fTyras
p
..-.•iPhanagoria
icOiersonesus Heracleotica
p. ?il'strus .I^Tomi
BLACK
SEA Sir\ope (Sinop)
Mesembria'*;
ITALY
''V.
V
®Rome
Byzantiunij^^ Chafced'orV
Neapolis
Apolfonia,, .,'^P°"°'"I
(larinio)
..
Posidonia"
'
"^Methonea QAtjIon Potidapio
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