Ancient Greece for school, connected to the Greek of today
51 topics from school history and Classics: the polis, Sparta, the Persian Wars, daily life, temples and theatre. Each is explained simply and tied to a word, a place or a custom that is still alive in Greek today, with audio.
City and politics
Greek text A2The Greek polis: what was a city-state?What was a Greek polis? Discover the acropolis, the agora and the citizens of the ancient city-states, and the words Greeks still use today.Greek text B1How Athenian democracy workedAssembly, council, lot and ostracism: how the citizens of Athens ruled themselves, and why Greece is still called Ελληνική Δημοκρατία.Greek text A2Athens and Sparta comparedTwo Greek cities, two ways of life: who ruled, how children grew up, who was strong on land or at sea, and where Attica and Laconia are today.Greek text A2Sparta: life in the warrior cityHow Spartan children were trained, who the helots were, how the phalanx fought, and why Greeks still say «λακωνικά» and «σπαρτιάτικα».Greek text B2Cleisthenes and the birth of democracy (508 BC)Ten tribes, thirty trittyes, about 140 demes and a Council of 500: how Cleisthenes rebuilt Athens in 508/7 BC, and why every Greek town hall still says Δήμος.Greek text A2Ostracism: voting someone out of AthensHow did the Athenians send a man away for ten years with a piece of broken pot? Discover ostracism, and the Greek words that still come from it.Greek text B1Citizens, metics and slaves in ancient AthensWho could vote, who paid the foreigners’ tax and who was owned by others: the three groups of people in classical Athens, and the words still used today.Greek text B1Women in ancient GreeceHome, guardians, dowries and priestesses: how women lived in Athens, Sparta and Lesbos, and why a church gallery is still a γυναικωνίτης.Greek text A2Greek colonies around the Mediterranean and the Black SeaWhy did ancient Greeks sail away to build new cities from Spain to the Black Sea? Meet the colonies, their mother cities and the words Greeks still use.Greek text A2Massalia: how Greeks founded MarseilleHow did Greeks found Marseille? Meet the sailors of Phocaea, the legend of Gyptis and Protis, and the Olympic flame that sailed back to Massalia.Greek text B1Magna Graecia: the Greeks of southern Italy and SicilyNaples, Syracuse, Taranto: how Greek settlers filled southern Italy and Sicily with cities, and why a Greek dialect, Griko, is still spoken there.
Wars and turning points
Greek text A2The Minoans of CretePalaces, painted bulls, a script nobody can read and a famous labyrinth: meet the Minoans of Crete, and see why Greeks still say «μινωικός».Greek text B1The Mycenaeans: the world of AgamemnonPalaces, gold masks, Linear B and the giant walls of Mycenae: who the Mycenaeans were, and why Greeks call a huge job «κυκλώπειο έργο».Greek text B2Linear B: the oldest Greek writingClay tablets from Knossos and Pylos, read by Michael Ventris in 1952, show Greek written over 3,200 years ago, with words like χαλκός still in use.Greek text B1Was the Trojan War real? Myth and archaeologyHelen, Achilles and the wooden horse: what Homer tells, what archaeologists found at Troy, and why Greeks still fear «Δαναών δώρα».Greek text B1The Persian Wars (490–479 BC)Marathon, Thermopylae, Salamis, Plataea: how the Greek cities stopped the Persian Empire, and how the word βάρβαρος changed meaning.Greek text A2The Battle of Marathon and the first marathonIn 490 BC a small Athenian army beat the Persians at Marathon. Find out what really happened, and how a legend gave the world the marathon race.Greek text A2Thermopylae: the 300 at the pass (480 BC)Leonidas, the 300 Spartans and a narrow pass: what really happened at Thermopylae in 480 BC, and why Greeks still say «μολών λαβέ» today.Greek text B1The Battle of Salamis: the sea battle that saved GreeceIn 480 BC the Greek fleet trapped the huge Persian navy in the narrow straits of Salamis. How Themistocles won, and what the battle left in today’s Greek.Greek text B1The age of Pericles: Athens in its golden agePericles, the general the Athenians elected year after year: jury pay, the Parthenon, the allies' money, the war with Sparta and the plague.Greek text B1The Peloponnesian War (431–404 BC)Athens against Sparta for 27 years: plague, sieges, Sicily and defeat, and the word δημαγωγός that Greek politics still uses today.Greek text A2Alexander's conquests, on a mapFollow Alexander the Great from Macedonia to Egypt and India on a map, and find out why Thessaloniki carries the name of his sister.
Daily life
Greek text A2Daily life in ancient Athens: a day in the cityBread dipped in wine for breakfast, school with a slave guide, shopping in the agora, water from the fountain: follow one day in ancient Athens.Greek text A2School and education in ancient GreeceHow Athenian boys learned letters, music and sport, who walked them to school, and why σχολή, “free time”, became today’s Greek σχολείο.Greek text A2The gymnasium and palaestra in ancient GreeceWhere Greek athletes trained with oil and a strigil, where philosophers came to talk, and why a Greek pupil of 13 goes to the Γυμνάσιο.Greek text A2What did ancient Greeks eat?Barley bread, olives, cheese, fish and lentil soup: what was on an ancient Greek table, and why Greeks still cook a pot of φακές today.Greek text B1The symposium: the Greek drinking partyCouches, a mixing bowl, songs and games: how Greek men met to drink and talk, and why the modern word for wine, κρασί, means mixing.Greek text A2Clothing in ancient Greece: chiton, himation, peplosChiton, peplos and himation: how ancient Greeks made clothes from one piece of cloth, a few pins and a belt, and why Greeks still say ιματιοθήκη.Greek text A2The house and family in ancient GreeceRooms around a sunny courtyard, a hearth, a dining room for men: how a Greek family lived, and why οἶκος, the household, gave us the economy.Greek text A2Childhood, toys and games in ancient GreeceBalls, spinning tops, hoops, dolls and knucklebones: how children played in ancient Greece, and how the bone game lived on in Greece as κότσια.Greek text A2Money and coins in ancient Greece: the drachma and the owlObols, drachmas and the silver owl of Athens: how the ancient Greeks paid for things, and why the same owl is on Greece’s 1-euro coin today.Greek text B1Slavery in ancient GreeceWho the slaves of ancient Greece were, where they came from, the helots of Sparta, and why δουλειά, work, sounds almost like δουλεία, slavery.Greek text B1Greek medicine and the Hippocratic OathAsklepios, Hippocrates and the Oath: how Greek doctors looked for natural causes, and why new doctors in Greece still swear the όρκος του Ιπποκράτη.Greek text A2The hoplite: a Greek soldier's equipmentHelmet, shield, spear and greaves: what a Greek hoplite carried, how the phalanx fought, and why Greek soldiers are still called «οπλίτες».
Religion and festivals
Greek text A2The ancient Olympic GamesHow the ancient Olympic Games worked at Olympia: Zeus, the races, the olive wreath and the truce, with the Greek sport words still used today.Greek text A2Greek religion: temples, priests and sacrificesHow the ancient Greeks honoured their gods: temples, altars, sacrifices, priests and priestesses, and the temple words still used in Greek churches.Greek text A2Greek and Roman gods: the names comparedZeus or Jupiter? Aphrodite or Venus? Compare the Greek and Roman names of the gods, and see why Greeks still use the Greek names for the planets.Greek text A2The Oracle of Delphi and the PythiaHow the Oracle of Delphi worked: the Pythia on her tripod, answers with two meanings, «know yourself», and the Greek words still used today.
Places and monuments
Greek text A2The Acropolis of AthensDiscover the Acropolis of Athens: Athena's high city, the Parthenon and the Caryatids, and the Greek flag that still flies over the famous rock.Greek text B1The Parthenon: building, sculptures and storyHow the Athenians built the Parthenon for Athena Parthenos, what its pediments, metopes and frieze show, and how a ruin became a symbol.Greek text B1The Parthenon Marbles debate: London or Athens?Why about half of the Parthenon's surviving sculptures are in London, what the British Museum and Greece each argue, and how Athens shows the gaps.Greek text A2The Agora of AthensVisit the Agora of Athens: the market, the council house, the stoas where Socrates and Zeno talked, and why Greeks still say αγοράζω.Greek text A2Delphi: the navel of the worldWalk through ancient Delphi, the navel of the world: the Sacred Way, the treasuries, Apollo's temple, the stadium, the Charioteer and the word ομφαλός.Greek text A2Olympia: the sanctuary of ZeusVisit ancient Olympia: the holy grove of Zeus, his great temple, the gold and ivory statue by Pheidias, the museum, and the Greek word άγαλμα.Greek text A2Knossos: the palace of MinosA throne room, painted griffins, Evans's red concrete columns and the story of the Minotaur: explore Knossos and the Greek word «λαβύρινθος».Greek text B1The Theatre of Epidaurus: the theatre that carries a whisperA 4th-century BC stone theatre in a healing sanctuary, famous for its sound, where ancient plays still fill the seats every summer.
Art, science and ideas
Greek text A2Doric, Ionic and Corinthian columns: the Greek ordersHow to tell a Doric, an Ionic and a Corinthian column apart, where each style came from, and why Athens still builds with them today.Greek text A2Greek pottery: black-figure and red-figureHow Greek potters made black-figure and red-figure vases, what their pictures show, and which pottery words Greeks still use every day.Greek text B1Greek theatre: tragedy, comedy and masksHow Greek theatre worked: the theatron, the orchestra and the skene, masks and chorus, tragedy and comedy, and the stage words Greeks still use today.
From Ancient to Modern Greek
Greek text B2Erasmian vs modern pronunciation of Ancient GreekWhy school says bēta and Greeks say víta: how Ancient Greek sounded, how and when it changed, and the same words heard in both pronunciations.Greek text B2I study Ancient Greek: how hard is Modern Greek?From Plato and Xenophon to everyday speech: what carries over, what changed in sounds, grammar and words, and why classicists start ahead.