Domestic and Foreign Affairs: War, Peace, and the Triumph of Macedonia
The nature of Greek political and economic alliances
The Delian League
A mutual defense organization
The central role of Athens
Wars in Greece and with Persia and the Thirty Years' Peace
Instability in Greece
The Hellenic Age of Athens
The connection of Athenian imperialism and cultural exuberance
The Age of Pericles
a) Cultural zenith
b) Fear of Athens among other city-states
The Peloponnesian War
Its origins
The death of Pericles
The Sicilian expedition
The defeat of Athens by Sparta
Spartan and Theban hegemony and the triumph of Macedonia
Shifting fortunes in Greece
Conquest of Greece by Philip of Macedonia
The reign of Alexander the Great
a) Alexander's dream
b) Alexander's sudden death
The Arts of Hellenic Greece: The Quest for Perfection
Brief overview of Athens in the Hellenic Age
Theater: Tragedy
Its origins
Features of the Tragic Theater
a) The actors and chorus
b) The physical theater
c) The staging of the plays
d) The structure of the Great Dionysia
Tragic Drama
a) Essence of Greek tragedy
(1) The moral nature of tragedy
(2) The source of the plots
(3) The issues treated in the plays
(4) The plays as civic spectacles
(5) Aristotle's theory of tragedy
b) Aeschylus and the Oresteia
c) Sophocles
(1) Antigone
(2) Oedipus the King
(3) Oedipus at Colonus
d) Euripides
(1) The Trojan Women
(2) The Bacchae
Theater: Comedy
Nature of Greek comedy
a) Characteristics
b) Comedy and democratic values
Aristophanes
a) Old Comedy
b) Lysistrata
Music
Role in Greek society
a) Music as one of the humanities
b) A partially reconstructed legacy
(1) The diatonic system of Pythagoras
(2) The series of scales, called modes
Music's dependent status
History, Philosophy, Science, and Medicine
History
Herodotus, the founder of secular history
a) The Histories
b) The methodology
Thucydides, the founder of scientific history
a) History of the Peloponnesian War
b) The methodology
Natural philosophy
Historic overview
The Pre-Socratics
a) The School of Elea
(1) Parmenides
(2) Empedocles
b) Atomism
c) Anaxagoras
The Sophists
a) Source of the name
b) Their teachings
c) Their influence
The Socratic revolution
a) Comparison with Sophists
b) The life and teachings of Socrates
(1) The Socratic method
(2) The teaching that "Virtue is Knowledge"
(3) The revolutionary nature of his thinking
(4) The death of Socrates
(5) Socrates' life, the subject of four works by Plato
Plato
a) The influence of Socrates
b) The author of Western idealism
c) Platonism
(1) The doctrine of the Forms, or Ideas
(2) Platonic dualism
(3) The Form (Idea) of the Good
d) The originator of political philosophy—the Republic
Aristotle
a) The influence of Plato
b) Emphasis on empiricism
c) Aristotelianism
(1) The indivisibility of Form and Matter
(2) Focus on purpose
(3) The First Cause
(4) The ethical ideal of moderation: a sound mind in a sound body
(5) Political theory based on research
d) His enduring influence
Medicine
Hippocrates
Nature of ancient Greek medical science
The Visual Arts
Architecture
Sanctuaries
a) Apollo's shrine at Delphi
b) The effect of the rise of the polis
The temple: The perfection of the form
a) The style of western Greece
(1) Characteristics
(2) The Second Temple of Hera at Poseidonia
b) The style of eastern Greece
(1) Characteristics
(2) The Parthenon
c) The Ionic temple
(1) Characteristics
(2) The Erechtheum
Sculpture
The Severe style
a) Characteristics
b) Kritios Boy
c) Torso of Miletus
d) Birth of Aphrodite
The High Classical style
a) Characteristics
b) Poseidon, or Zeus
c) The Doryphoros
d) The Parthenon sculptures
(1) Metope sculpture: Centaur versus Lapith
(2) Panathenaeic frieze
(3) Grave stele of Hegeso
Fourth Century style
a) Characteristics
b) Hermes with the Infant Dionysus
