The Greek: Crucible of Civilization

Today in class we watched a video called The Greeks: Crucible of Civilization. It is narrated by Lain Neeson, but has many professors  and  scholars talk in it.  It talks about how in 508 BC in the Athens the ordinary people turned against their rulers. The ruler at the time was named Cleisthenes.  He was born around 570 BC and was brought up as a ruler and taught he was an aristocrat. When the people revolted he realized that ordinary people should have freedom, so he sent the Greeks on the road to civilization. In Athens in the 6th century BC the aristocrats ruled Athens. Athens had public places but was mostly village life. Athens was built around  an acropolis. In Athens reading and writing was not common and there was no science. The average life expectancy was 15 years and that is very low. Ancient Greek life was tough for ordinary people because the aristocrats had power of the citizens. 3/4 of Greece was covered in mountains, so it was not possible to have one ruler. There was alot of individual city states with different rulers. Argos was one of the very powerful city states. Corinthians was a city state that dominated Greek trade. Sparta was the city state that had military power. The boys of Sparta were brought up from birth to be soldiers and were brought up to put up with anything. They had very bad tasting food in Sparta. In battle they dyed their cloaks red in case blood got on them so it didnt show. Sparta conquered about 4000 miles of land around them.  To the Greeks the Spartans were always a threat. Homer was a man who would sing the stories, The Illiat and The Odyssey to the different city states. In the middle of the 6th century a man named Pisistratus seized control of Athens as a Tryanny. He rode in with a neighboring village girl and claimed she was the goddess, Athena. The Athens welcomed him as their leader because they believed he had a goddess to protect him. Pisistratus was an excellent politician and was extremely smart. he turned to the common Athenians for support. he reduced taxes and leaded them money. Now the people worked for themselves instead of Aristocratic and this was the beginning of free enterprise. The land around Athens produced the best olives. Athens first artistic legacy was the vase. The artisans live din the red light district.

Chapter 4

Today in class people that did not take the test on Monday took the Chapter 3 test. The rest of us were suppose to work on a worksheet online but the internet was not working at first. The rest of us started to read chapter 4 instead. Chapter 4 is called New Creations: Greek Religion,Arts, and Ideas. The rise of Greek civilization was accompanied by an outburst of artistic and intellectual creativity. Greek religion had a great deal in common with the beliefs of other polytheistic peoples and was directly influenced by the Greeks' southern and eastern neighbors  but the Greek gods and goddesses had a lifelike and human quality that helped inspire a lifelike and human art and literature. LO1 was about Greek Gods and Goddesses. The Greeks, like other polytheistic peoples, had no single set of beliefs about how the gods and goddesses were to be worshiped or about their plans for and demands on the human race. The Greeks worshiped countless deities, who they believed could wield their power for good or ill on individuals, families, and city states, so that it was vital to win their favor. Impiety was openly denying or insulting a deity. Zeus was the ruler of the sky,and he presided over a divine family. Zeus shared over lordship of the world with two of his brothers: Poseidon, ruler of the sea, and Hades, or Pluto, king of the underworld. The gods and goddesses displayed human frailties and emotions, including ambition, lust, pride, and vengefulness. Then the internet came back on so everyone could start the worksheet. We did not have alot of time so I only got done a couple of the questions.

Chapter 3 Test

Today in class we took our Chapter 3 test. We were aloud to use our books, which was very helpful.The night before when I was studying I highlighted some of the important information, so today I could find it better. Doing that helped me get down the multiple choice questions faster, so I had more time to write my essay. On the test there was about 30 multiple choice questions,some short answer questions, and then an essay. For the essay we were given two options, and I choose to write about essay B. For essay B I had to compare Athens and Sparta. I think I did pretty well on the Chapter 3 test today.

End of Chapter 3

Today in class we talked about our test on Monday. Mr. Schick will not be here on Monday so we can't use our blogs. we are allowed to use our texts books. After we talked about the test we finished up the Chapter 3 outline.  The last part of it was Athens: Freedom and Power.  In 800 BC many old established communities in the Attica Peninsula merged to form a single city-state that was known by the name of the most important community: Athens. Over the next 300 year, Athens grew to become the wealthiest and one of the most popular city-states, largely as a result of overseas trade.  Athens produced and exported wine and oil. There workshops  produced weapons, pottery, and articles of silver, lead, and marble. With a rising population and greater wealth came social and political conflicts. Usually between aristocrats, which were people who owned land, and increasingly numerous demos, which were regular people that worked for the aristocrats. In the conflicts with the aristocrats, the demos could generally find aristocrats to lead them whom they respected and who wanted their support. As a result, Athens passed through several stage of political government, beginning with monarchy and including both oligarchy and tryanny. Eventually politic power was extended to all adult male citizens, with aristocrats becoming leaders instead of rulers. After we finished going over the outline we watched the  video, The Persians and Greeks: Crash Course with John Green.

More of Chapter 3 Outline

Today  in class we talked about the outline for LO3.  The first part of the outline we talked about the City-States and Citizens. The Greeks soldiers were called hoplities. They were Greek infantry men equipped with bronze helmets and armor, round shields, long spears, and short swords.  Then we talked about the Greek governments, Monarchy, Oligarchy, Tyranny, and Democracy. In the earliest time communities were ruled by kings. Monarchy then gave way to new forms of government that distributed power more widely among male citizens. Oligarchy was a minority of citizens that dominated the government and the power of the majority was limited in various ways. Other city states gave more power to the majority, particularly those that developed into large commercial centers.In these city-states the common people were too numerous and active to ignore. In these cities social conflicts sometimes led to the emergence of Tyranny, which is a rule by a dictator. Tyranny was often only a passing phase on the way to democracy, which was all government decisions were made by the majority of male citizens. Although  Greek city-states had many features in common, each was individual in character. Then he outline talked about Sparta: The Military Ideal. Spartans were descendants of Greeks who had conquered part of the southern main land called the Laconia. By 800 BC they were a minority of landholders ruling over  a majority of helots, which are non citizens forced to work for landholders. Messiaen helots, however frequently rebelled. This forced Spartans to accept a governmental system that put them under almost total domination by a few among themselves. By 500 BC policy decisions had been taken over by a council of elders. The spartan government was a leading example of Oligarchy. Spartan male life was dedicated entirely to the service of the state. The relative freedom of Spartan woman aroused admiration and disapproval  among other Greeks. To protect this way of life, Spartans tried to seal off their city- state form outside influences. After this we had the rest off class to finish any homework tat we might have.

Outline of Chapter 3

Today in class we went over a Chapter 3 outline that Mr. Schick made. It started off by talking about LO1, The European Barbarians. In 4000 BC farming and village life spread through out Europe.By 3500 BC the increase in population and wealth lead to the building of religious structures. Then his outline  talked about the Barbarians Way of life. They had a common way of life as a result of the Indo-European nomads(2500 BC and onward) from the steppes that bordered Europe on the East. Their languages are the ancestor languages of Greek and Latin. The Elite people in their group were the warriors. They had a farming and village life. In this way, Europe came to be inhabited by peoples who spoke mostly Indo- European languages, who were skilled in farming, metalworking, trade, and warfare, and who were fairly well organized on the local level, but had no  cities,written records, or fixed structures of government.In 2000 BC to 1000 Ad these barbarians came into contact with civilization. The first such European barbarian people to make contact with civilization were the Greeks. Their civilization, the first to emerge in Europe, was the first to definitively be labeled " Western".  Then his outline talked about LO2, The Aegean Encounter. In LO2 it talked about the  Minoan Civilization. In 2200 BC a distinct civilization known as the Minoan arose on the Aegean island of Crete.  Minoans drew wealth from control of the seas and trade with eastern Mediterranean lands, especially Egypt. Then it talks about The Arrival of the Greeks: Mycenaean Civilization. When the Greeks made their way to the Aegean, they seem to have been  a European barbarian people much like any other. Eventually they came under the influence of nearby Crete. By 1600 BC Greek chieftains had established settlements along the mainland's southern shore and some islands. The struggles between Mycenaean and Minoans for control of the commerce of the eastern Mediterranean lasted until 1400 BC with the destruction of Minoan towns, perhaps as a result of Mycenaean conquest.   Then the outline talked about the Dark Ages.  The Mycenaean Civilization lasted until shortly after 1200 BC due to the conquest of the Sea peoples. In 1150 BC Mycenaean was sacked and all settlements deserted in addition, the population dropped, and writings fell out of use. This led to the eclipse of civilization for almost 400 years known as the Dark Ages( 1150-750). The Greeks themselves survived and even expanded their territory. The Renewal of the Greek Civilization was the next topic talked about in the outline. In 800 BC the Aegean region was recovered. The population expansion led to founding of colonies in 800- 600 BC. The Greeks joined the Phoenicians as the leading commercial and seafaring nation of the Mediterranean  They had a common religion. They also had new developments in the use of iron tools and weapons,coined money,borrowing of Phoenician shipbuilding and warfare techniques, and writing and the alphabet formed the Greek language. Then the outline talked about Citizens and Communities: The Greek City States(LO3). Notion of citizenship seems to have originated partly in geography.

Presenting Chapter 3 Powerpoints

Today in class we started going over our powerpoints. The first powerpoint was very good. I liked how they had alot of pictures and colorful backgrounds to make the presentation more interesting. In their powerpoint they talked about how the Greeks had a distinct way of life based on farming and warfare. The "Classical" Greece started around 800 B.C. The people of Greece got alot of eastern influence. The Greeks thought that the Mediterranean Sea was the middle of the world. The land mass with Sparta on it was called the Peloponnese. The Greeks had a huge sea navy. Then their powerpoint talked about LO2. In their LO2 section they talked about the Minoans and the Mycenaeans. The name Minoan came from a King named Minus. The Minoan's civilization was devoted to bullfighting. In their society when a boy became a man they had to catipulet  over a bull. The Mycenaeans protected their settlement with massive walls. The nest powerpoint also talked about the Minoans. The Minoan civilization arose on the Aegean island of Crete. It drew its wealth from surrounding seas and from trade between many lands, especially Egypt. The Minoan civilization was very wealthy becuase of trade. The second powerpoint also talked about the Dark Ages. The Dark Ages lasted from 1150 B.C to 750. The Mycenaean civilization lasted until about 1200B.C where it fell to attacks of warlike Greeks and sea people. It is also possible that Mycenaean civilization could have been corrupted by overpopulation and war. I think both of the powerpoints that presented today did a very good job.