- Cleisthenes gave more power to other people
- He was inspired by Greek stories
Ancient Greece-
- Geography of Greece
- Mountainous Peninsula
- Mountains cover 3/4 of Greece
- Approximately 1400 Islands in the Aegean and Ionian Seas
- Location shaped its culture
- Skilled sailors
- Poor natural Resources
- Difficult to unite the ancient Greeks because of the terrain; developed small, independent communities
- Geography (Continued)
- Approximately 20% of Greece was suitable for farming
- Fertile valleys covered 1/4 of peninsula
- Because of geography the Greek diet consists of grains, grapes, olives
- Lack of recourses most likely led to Greek colonization
- Temperature range from 48 in the winter to 80 in the summers
- Mycenaeans
- Began around 200 BC
- Mycenae is located on a rocky ridge and protected by a 20 ft. thick wall
- Mycenaean kings dominated Greece from 1600- 1200 BC
- controlled trade in the region
- 1400 BC Mycenaeans invaded Crete and absorbed Minoan culture and language
- Culture in Decline
- Around 1200 BC sea people began to invade Mycenae and burnt palace after palace
- The Dorians moved into the war torn region
- far less advanced
- Economy collapsed
- Writing disappeared for 400 years
- Homer and Myths
- Only stories were kept and passed on by word of mouth
- Homer lived at the end of the "Greek dark ages"
- Recorded stories of the Trojan War in the Iliad The odyssey
- (Written 750-700 BC)
- Trojan war was probably one of the last conquests of the Mycenaeans
- Arete
- Virture and excellence
- Epics
- Narrative poems clebrating heroic deeds
- Myths were created to explain creation
- Zeus: Leader of the gods
- Hera: Zeus' wife
- Athena: Goddess of wisdom
