Notes - Greece

Greece

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

12:49 PM

• Greeks had a lot of music
• There is areas like states almost
• In between Athens and Sparta there is
• The Iliad is the best thing to understand very early Greek History
• You need to know the Trojan War o understand early Greece
• Modern day Turkey was Anatolia
• Paris came to Greece from to Try to meet with Greek kings
• They met at a wedding where everyone mortal and gods were invited
• One wasn't and she sent a golden apple that was meant to be the most beautiful
• Paris was chosen to choose which one was to get it
  
• Anatolia - ancient Turkey
• Isthmus Corus - thin strip of land connecting Athens and Sparta

Persian Wars (Quick Version)

• Herodotus - first serious history of the western hemisphere
• Writes mostly about the wars between Greece and Persia
• Persia was the largest empire during the 6th century bc
• Greeks had colonized some areas around the medittereanian
• Persians told these Greeks to join them
• Most refused - Persians killed them and destroyed their towns
• Others give in - Persians gain access to ports
• Decide to invade Greece
• Lead an invasion force by land and sea
• They go north to the baspherous
• They come over land north of Greece
• Sea fleet attacks Greek outposts
• Land comes down from north to eventually punch through and capture Athens - the largest city
• Greeks find out the plan
• Plan to meet them at Thermopylae
• Premiere units were from Sparta - best fighters in Greece (300 is a commercialized depiction of this battle)
• In Sparta children were taken away to train as soldiers
• Lycurgus was the first Spartan that made laws
• By 650 B.C. Sparta is the dominant military power
• Both in Sparta and Athens - Hoplite warfare has developed
• They held off thousands of Persians
• Every soldier that went to that battle died
• Athens was evacuated and the people went into hiding
• Persian fleet comes down to the area around Athens
• Rest of Greek military that was in hiding
• Caught the fleet in a pinscher and won the battle

Classical Period

• 480 B.C. Persian war ends and Greece is the victor
• There is no nation just city states
• Athens becomes the strongest
• Theatre started in honor of the gods
• Pericles - suggested they need a navy
• Built a huge navy

Peloponnesian Wars

• Sparta get jealous of Athens success because they are who made it possible
• Athens and Sparta go to war
• Sparta attacked Athens
• Athens fought them on land, sea and tried to keep their trade routes open
• Athens isn't a port there was a port a 6 miles away from the actual cities
• The long walls protected the route
• Sparta besieged Athens and cut off the entrance of the long walls
• The plague hits and Athenians take great losses

• Greek colonies were on Sicily that were friendly with Sparta
• Athens decides to attack those colonies to get back at Sparta
• Alcibiades come up with the plan to attack Sicily
• On the eve of the ships leaving there is a huge act of violence
• Alcibiades was framed for it and was left behind

Alexander the Great

• Macedonia is very mountainous
• Alexander was born in Macedon in the shadow of Mt. Olympic
• Born to King Phillip of Macedon
• He was a rough old guy been in a lot of wars only had one eye that he lost in a war
• When he was 19 his father was assassinated and Alexander takes the throne
• Alex decides that he is going to take revenge on the Persians
• He wants to invade Persia
• By the end of the journey conquers the entire known war
• First goes to troy
• Wins his first battle
• Lands up in a little village called Gordian
• The Gordian knot was on an ox cart and legend said that if you can untie the knot you will conquer the world
• Alexander goes and looks at it after partying with the locals and cuts it in half with his sword
• He then heads down along the coast not facing any real existence
• Goes down through Israel and goes into Egypt
• Egyptians loved him and hailed him as the king
• He founds Alexandria
• Takes a road trip with his friends out to the desert on camels
• Goes to oasis call Siwa that really far out away from everything
• There's an oracle there and Alexander want to go see it
• They greet him as the son of the god Aomon is the equivalent of Zeus
• Then he heads out of Egypt and is ready for war
• Persepolis was the capital of the Persian Empire
• The Persian empire was the most powerful and biggest in the world
• Heads into Mesopotamia - modern day Iraq
• Here meets Persians on battlefield
• 333 B.C. Battle of Issus Alex meets king of the Persian Empire

Herodotus - writes the histories of the Persian Wars

Thucydides - histories of the Peloponnesian war

Xenophon Anabasis

Plutarch - Lives

Pausanias - Tourist Guide book ( Descriptions of Greece Part 1 and 2)