Democracy+and+Greeks+Golden+Age

Democracy and Greeks Golden Age

Bold:
 * Direct Democracy- A form of government in which citizens rule directly and not through represenatives.
 * Classical Art- Values of harmony, order, balance, and proportion.
 * Tragedy- A serious drama about common themes such as love, hate, war, and betrayal.
 * Comedy- Scenes fill with slapstick situations adn rude humor, playwrights often made fun of politics and respected people and ideas of the time.
 * Penoponnesian War- A war between two city-states, Athens and Sparta. Athens had the stronger Navy, while Sparta had the stronger Army. Sparta won.
 * Philosophers- Thinkers meaning lovers of wisdom.
 * Socrates- A critic of the Sophists, He believed that absolute standards did exsist for truth and justice.
 * Plato- A student of Socrates, he wrote down the conversations of Socrates "as a means of philosophical investigation.
 * Aristotle- A philosopher who questioned the nature of the world and of human belief, thought, and knowledge.

Key People:
 * Pericles
 * Aristotle
 * Phidias
 * Socrates
 * Plato
 * Aeschylus
 * Euripides
 * Sophocles
 * Aristophanes
 * Herodotus
 * Thucydides

Ideas/Events:

PERICLES' PLAN FOR ATHENS
 * Pericles held onto popularity for 32 years, because he was honest, fair, a skillful politian, a inspiring speaker, and a respected general.
 * He lead Athens from 461 to 429 BC.
 * Pericles had three goals:
 * Strengthen the Athenian Democracy
 * Hold and Strengthen the Empire
 * To glorify Athens
 * In early Athens most positions in public office were unpaid, so only the wealthier Athens citizens would beable to hold a job in public office.
 * Under Pericles rule, even the poorest citizen could serve in punlic office.
 * Introducing Direct Democracy was an important legacy for Periclean Athens.
 * After defeat of the Persians Athens helped to organize the Delian League. In time Athens took over the leadership and dominated every city-state in the league.
 * Pericles took the money from the league treasury and made sure that the Athenian Navy was the strongest Navy in the Medditeraenian.
 * Sparta was at odds with Athens about many things.
 * Pericles also used the league's treasury money to beautify Athens.

GLORIOUS ART AND ARCHITECTURE:
 * Pericles goal was to have the greatest Greek artists and architects to create magnificent sulptures and buildings.
 * The Parthenon a masterpiece of architectual design and craftmenship wasn't unique in style. It was built to honer Athena, the Godess of wisdom and to protect Athens. It contained examples of Greek art that set standards for future generatrionsof artists around the world.
 * Phidias cinstruced the Parthenon out of precious materials like gold and ivory. It stood 30 feet tall.
 * Phidias and other sculptures of his time aimed to createfigures that were graceful, strong, and perfectly formed. Their faces showed neither joy nor anger, only serenity.

DRAMA AND HISTORY:
 * The Greeks invented drama as an art form and built the first theater in the West.
 * As a part of their civil duty wealthy citizens bore cost of producting the plays.
 * Actors used colorful costumes, maks, and sets dramatize stories.
 * The plays were about leadership, justice, and duties owed to the gods.
 * The Greek only worte two kinds of drama tragedy and comedy.
 * Aeschylus wrote more than 80 plays, he most famous work was Oresteia it is about the Greeks at Troy.
 * Sophocles wrote more than 100 plays including Antigone.
 * Euripides ofter featured strong women characters in his work, he worte Medea.
 * Aristophanes wrote the first great comedies for the stage like The Birds, and Lysistrata which portayed women of Athens forcing theri husbands to go to war.
 * Herodotus was a Greek who lived in Athens at the time pioneered the acurate reportings of events. His book gave information on the Persian war.
 * Thucydides believed that certain types of events and political situations recured over time.

ATHENIANS AND SPARTANS GO TO WAR:
 * As Athens grew wealth, prestege, and power other city-states began to view it with hosility.
 * Both leaders in Athen and in Sparta pressed for war because both thought that they had the adventage, in the end Sparta declared war on Athens in 431 BC.
 * Pericles strategy was to avoid fighting Sparta in land, and wait to fight them and their allies at sea.
 * The Spartans marched into Athens and they swept the countryside, burning all of the food supplies.
 * Pericles responded by getting food from the sea.
 * In the second year of war the plague hit Athens and killed nearly one-third of the population.
 * Athens continued to fight after the plague for severalmre years.
 * Since both countries were war torn, they signed a short living truce in 421 BC.
 * In 415 BC Athens sent a huge fleet of 20,000 soldiers to the island of Sicily, to destory the state of Syrecuse Sparta's wealthiest ally.
 * The Athenians fended off Spartan atacks for another 9 years, but in 404 BC they surrendured losing its empire, its power, and its wealth.

PHILOSOPHERS SEARCH FOR THE TRUTH:
 * After the war many Athenians started to question their values.
 * In time of uncertainty great thinkers appeared. The group of philosphers was called Sophists they questioned people's unexamined belifs.
 * Other pilosophers were Socrates, and Plato.
 * In 399 BC Socrates was taken to court for "corrupting Athens youth". In his own defense he said that his teachings were good for Athens because they forced people to think about their actions and values. The jury disagreed and he died drinking hemlock, a slow acting poison.
 * Arisotle came close to summarizing the knowlegde up to his time, he invented a method of argueing according to rules of logic.
 * One of Arisotle's most famous pupils was Alexander of Macedonia, Arisotle tutored him for three years.