Fourth lecture for GNED 1202 (Texts and Ideas). It is a required general education course for all first-year students at Mount Royal University in Calgary, Canada. My version of the course is structured as a kind of Intro to Western Civilization style course.

1. Lecture 4
CLASSIC GREECE
INTRO TO WESTERN HUMANITIES

2. En route to the
Greek classic age
800 – 500 BCE

3. Evidence that the insularity of the Greek
Dark Ages began to change around 800 –
750 BCE, with increasing evidence of
trade.

7. http://www.utexas.edu/courses/greeksahoy!/greek_colonies_550.jpg

8. Why trade and colonization?
Greece is not a land rich in natural
resources. It has some lush valleys, but
much of it seems only suited for growing
rocks.

9. It does have some fertile valleys …

10. … but much of it seems only suited for growing rocks.

11. As a consequence, Greek
emigration has been a
constant feature of Greek
life: Greek graffiti in
Melbourne, Greektown in
Toronto

12. First Olympic Games in 776
BCE continued every four
years for over 1000+ years!
(776 BCE – 393 CE)
The Olympic Games were a way for the Greeks to enact the
individualistic virtues of Homeric heroes. Competition (agon) was at the
heart of Greek culture, and leads to both the best and worst in their
culture. On one hand there was a relentless striving to outdo one another
in any thing you can think of, whether it be farming, invention, math,
painting, sprinting, etc., which ultimately lead to a real flowering in the
arts and sciences. But on the other hand, it also lead to a fixation on
zero-sum games (if you gain something, that must mean I’m losing
something) that was expressed in constant inter-Greek warfare and
competition in politics.

13. Original Olympic Events: a variety of running races -- including
the Hoplitodromos (sprint + hurdle in full armour) --
boxing, wrestling, a very bloody pankration (regulated full-
contact fighting, similar to today's mixed martial arts), chariot
racing, as well as a pentathlon, consisting of
wrestling, sprinting, long jump, javelin throw, and discus throw.
Pankration scene: the
pankriatiast on the right
tries to gouge his
opponent's eye; the umpire
is about to strike him for
this foul.

14. They even had a strange
beauty contest which
combined physical looks
with dance and ability in
military drills. According to
the comedic Clouds of
Aristophanes, the
competitors were supposed
to have “a glowing tan, a
manly chest, broad
shoulders, beefy buttocks
and a dainty prick.”

15. In the 6th century BCE (599 to 500 BCE)
there was a remarkable
transformation in Greek life.
Art, politics, science, poetry,
drama, architecture becomes
strikingly more realistic,
innovative, …

16. Within a few generations, we
see, for instance, a
transformation from the
geometric representations of
horses to the realism of black
and red figure pottery.

17. Last quarter of 8th century BCE (775-800)

18. Geometric style, ca. 750 BCE

20. Second quarter of 7th century (625-650 BCE)

21. Second quarter of 7th century (625-650 BCE)

22. Black figure vase - black
silhouettes painted onto colored
background. Lines on the black
were then incised (with a pointed
stick) into the paint before firing. 3rd quarter of 6th century (550-575 BCE)

23. Notice the complexity of the composition of the two wrestlers
1st quarter of 6th century (500-525 BCE)

24. mid 6th century (550 BCE)

25. 700 BCE
550 BCE
While there doesn’t
appear to have been
any change
whatsoever in
military technology
during the 150 years
between these two
vases, a vast gulf in
both aesthetic taste
and skill separates
them.

26. Red figure vase – Figure silhouette
painted in red then black lines
sketched or painted on.
In the 5th century (499 – 400 BCE), the so-called classic
age, Greek pottery (especially Athenian) begin to show
more scenes of common life (in the above female slaves
entertain male guests at a drinking party).

27. Drinking bowl, with the bottom
containing this: a drunk men
vomiting, while a young slave is
holding is forehead.

28. The girl on the left
carries a pair of writing
tablets and a stylus. She
is obviously reluctant
but we don’t know why
ca. 460–450 B.C.

29. While the mythological past remained an important inspiration
of Greek art, we find many example of mythological scenes with
“lighter” less “heroic” subjects …

30. White ground Style – different colors drawn or painted onto white painted
ca. 470 B.C.
background. Because it was less hardy, typically used for funerary purposes. Many of
our examples show the deceased on the vessel.

31. The youth in the center, undoubtedly the
deceased, is seated on the steps of his
tomb
ca. 420–400 B.C.

32. Warrior by a Grave
(white-ground lekythos)
c. 410 BCE

34. Many of these white figure
pieces had naturalistic
painting “on top” of the
drafted lines.
ca. 440 B.C.

35. Picasso, perhaps inspired
by the display of white
ground pottery after the
war, used a similar
technique during his so-
called Classic Period.
Picasso,
Portrait of Olga
1923

36. A similar aesthetic transformation in
free-standing sculpture occurred
from the 650 to 450 BCE.

37. This kouros is one of the earliest marble statues of a
human figure carved in Attica. The statue marked the
grave of a young Athenian aristocrat.
The rigid stance, with the left leg forward and arms at
the side, was derived from Egyptian art.
The pose provided a clear, simple formula that was used
by Greek sculptors throughout the sixth century B.C.
New York kouros, early 6th
century (575-600 BCE)

38. When I took this photo in the
Metropolitan Museum in New
York, I was thrilled to see
afterwards that a tourist was
standing beside it in the
contrasting constrapposto
stance of the later Classic-era
sculpture.
Photo: Randy Connolly

39. New York kouros, early 6th century (575-600BCE)

40. Why is the figure nude?
The Greeks of the time most assuredly did not walk
around in public naked.

41. Greek statuary was inspired by
Egyptian aesthetics, but unlike
Egyptian sculpture, which is
clothed and which celebrates a
ruler, Greek statuary seems to
celebrate an ideal.
Egyptian statuary, early 6th century (575-600 BCE)

42. These kouroi are essentially an ordered simplification of
the human form: suggesting a general statement of
Greek heroic excellence, and not necessarily a specific
portrait.

43. Female sculpture (korai) about same time.

44. Modern reconstruction
Peplos kore,, mid 6th century (550 BCE)

45. Anavyssos kouros
mid 6th century (550 BCE)
“Stand and have pity at the
tomb of the dead Kroisos,
whom raging Ares slew as he
fought in the front line.”

46. “The statue … is a device for re-membering what is
gone: frozen in time, Kroisos is always in that state of
perfect beauty he attained on the battlefield.” Richard T. Neer
“In its own way, by the immutability of its material and
shape, and by the continuity of its presence, the
memorial conveys the paradox of the values of life,
youth, and beauty which one can ensure for oneself only
by losing them [by dying in battle].” Jean-Paul Vernant

47. kore 674
around 510/500 BCE
kore 670
520-510 BC

48. Kritios Kouros (480 BCE)

49. Original would have had bronze and marble eyes

50. With the Kritios, the Greek artist has mastered a
complete understanding of how the different parts of the
body act as a system (i.e., achieved naturalism).
The statue supports the body's weight on the left leg,
while the right one is bent at the knee in a relaxing
state. This stance, known as contrapposto, forces a
chain of anatomical events: as the pelvis is pushed
diagonally upwards on the left side, the right buttock
relaxes, the spine acquires an "S" curve, and the shoulder
line dips on the left to counteract the action of the
pelvis.

51. Modern scholars point to three key
changes in the transition from
archaic to classic Greek sculpture:

52. 1 pose
There is a change of pose from 2D static to 3D open and active

56. 2 anatomy
There is a change from relatively superficial marking of bones
and muscles to the realistic evocation of hypodermal structures
(that is, it looks like real muscles and bones are beneath the
skin of marble).

58. Torso of Miletus, c. 480-470 B.C.E

59. Note: most classical-era Greek statuary were in fact
made from bronze. Almost no bronze originals survived
antiquity (most were melted down).

60. Bronze Warrior from Riace, c. 450 BCE
Found in a shipwreck of the Italian coast in 1972

62. The number of surviving original statuary from the
classical Greek period (500 – 400 BCE) is quite small.
These works from the classical period are characterized
by a naturalism and elegant simplicity, which differs
from the later Greek Hellenistic works, which tend to
emphasize the technical virtuosity of the artist, and
from the even later Roman works, which tend to either
exaggerate the musculature or provide a hyper-realistic
account of the face.
Hellenistic Roman

63. Athena, Herakles and Atlas, the
Golden Apples of the Hesperides,
metope from the east side of the
temple of Zeus at Olympia.

64. Roman sculpture of Herakles

67. 3 psychology
There is a change from smiling exteriority of archaic sculpture
to the suggestion of an inner life in classical sculpture.

71. Unfortunately most of the “famous” examples of Greek
sculpture are in fact Roman copies of Greek (Bronze and
Marble) originals. Some were cheap knock-offs to sell to
Roman tourists, others were replicas made for students
to study from.

72. Discobolus (Discus Thrower).
Reconstructed Roman copy of a bronze
Greek original of ca. 450 BCE

73. Doryphoros (c. 450-440 BCE)
original bronze no longer
exists.
Roman patinated bronze replica Roman Marble Copy

74. Classic sculpture of the female form took a somewhat
different development path. During the archaic and
classic period, there appears to be either a prohibition
or reluctance to display the naked female form.
Artists initially thus had to use tight-fitting or wet
clothes/draperies to show the underlying form.

75. Birth of Aphrodite, c. 460 B.C.E.

76. Pythocritos of Rhodes. Winged Nike (Winged Victory),
from Samothrace, c. 190 BCE

77. Praxiteles, Aphrodite of Knidos
Roman copy of Greek original ca. 350 BCE
But by the late classical / early Hellenisitic time, we
start to see nude female figures as well.

78. Aphrodite of Melos (also
called Venus de Milo),
c. 150 B.C.E.

81. Louvre Hermaphrodite (2nd century BCE).

82. Not all Greek sculpture was free-standing. Important
sculptural works were also integrated into architecture.

83. The caryatid porch of the Erechtheum,
south side, Acropolis, Athens

84. http://www.utexas.edu/courses/ancientfilmCC304/lecture1/disney_1.html

85. Kerameikos: cemetery in Athens.
“Go to the Kerameikos to see the reliefs of those who were the
centre of a world and who tomorrow will be unknown and ignored.
See the transition between when short life finishes and eternal
death begins.”

86. Stele (i.e., grave monument) of Hegeso,
a wealthy Athenian female (c. 410-400
B.C.E.)
For the Greeks, immortality lay in the
continued remembrance of the dead by
the living.

87. Hegeso is looking at a piece of
jewellery and her pose and face
appear that she is saying goodbye
to worldly concerns and pleasures.

88. Here lies Aristylla, child of
Ariston and Rhodilla; how good
you were, dear daughter.

90. Seated woman leaving
her newborn child to a
nurse (Athens, ca.
425/400 BCE)

94. Young man killed in battle survived by his
father and son.
…It is shocking
when
an old man lies on the front line
before a youth: an old warrior whose head is white
and beard gray, exhaling his strong soul
into the dust, clutching his bloody genitals
in his hands: an abominable vision,
foul to see: his flesh naked.
But in a young man
all is beautiful when he still
possesses the shining flower of lovely youth.
Alive he is adored by men,
desired by women, and finest to look upon
when he falls dead in the forward clash....
—Tyrtaios of Sparta, seventh-century BCE poet

95. “Stele and my Sirens and
mournful pitcher that hold the little
ash of Hades, tell those who pass
by my tomb to greet me, whether
citizens or from another town, and
say that I was buried here, still a
bride, and that my father called
me Baucis, that I was born in
Tenos, that they may know. And
tell them too that my companion
Erinna engraved this word upon
my tomb.”

96. The Greek world of the archaic and classic eras was organized politically
into different poleis (city states). Each polis had its own political
organization and competed and traded with other poleis. As well many of
the larger poleis established colonies outside of Greece.

97. Acropolis of Athens

98. Acropolis of Corinth
Akros (high/top/edge)
Polis (city)

99. Acropolis of C

101. Acropolis of Athens

102. Almost every Greek polis shared similar
features:
Self governance
The idea of citizenship
Some type of legislative assembly, usually overseen by some
type of aristocratic council.
Relatively broad dispersal of economic wealth due to the
predominance of many landholders owning small farms.
An agora (social and financial marketplace).

103. Instead of a temple or a palace as the central feature of the
city, in the Greek Polis the central feature was an empty space,
the agora, which means “gathering place”.
Originally, the army would gather in the agora; later, it became the gathering place for
citizens to participate in the legislative assembly.

104. Agora of Ephesus
Agora of Thessaloniki
Agora of Xanthus Agora of Phillipi
Agora of Tyre

105. As well, most poleis were organized
socially around:
aristoi
Traditional rich warrior/leader class (aristocrats)
ideologically united via myths of heroic individual
conflict (such as in the Iliad).
citizen
Small landholders and merchants. Sometimes referred
to as the hoplite class, because these people in late
archaic and classical era, were expected to fight.
landless/poor
Wage earners. Were generally prohibited from serving
in the military.
slaves
Perhaps 20% to 40% of population.

106. “peace is merely a name; yet in truth an undeclared war
always exists by nature between every Greek polis”
-- Plato, Laws

107. Most men were liable to be called up to
fight every 2 out 3 summers from about 18
to 60 years of age.

108. Some historians have argued that the
unusual Greek polis developed as it did,
due to the peculiar nature of Greek
warfare.
Some historians argue the reverse, that
the peculiar nature of Greek warfare
developed out of the unusual Greek polis.

109. Hoplites
Greek panoply (helmet, greaves,
armour, shield, weapons) weighed
about 70 lbs (average weight of
males = 150 lbs)

110. A hoplite was a citizen-soldier of
the Ancient Greek city-states. Hoplites
were primarily armed as spearmen and
fought in a phalanx formation, a
rectangular formation of tightly packed
armored spearmen protected mainly by
shields.

111. Mardonois (a Greek émigré) talking to the Persian Emperor:
“these Greeks are accustomed to wage wars among each other
in the most senseless way. For as soon as they declare war on
each other, they seek out the fairest and most level ground, and
then go there to do battle on it. Consequently even the winners
suffer as much as the losers.”
He also told the Emperor that the Greeks want to kill “eye-to-
eye” without heroics, tactics, or strategy and that the main
virtue is “togetherness” not bravery or skill.

114. Sparta was one of the most important Greek
Poleis.
It was a rigidly hierarchical society focused
on the support and development of a small
core of communalized military elites.

115. Edgar Degas, Spartan Girls Challenging Boys (1860)

116. Athens, by contrast, was a multi-ethnic
trading city that eventually (508 BCE) was
run by a direct (not representative)
democracy.
monarchy
oligarchy
tyrant
democracy

117. Athens source of power was its navy

118. The city states of Greece eventually came
into conflict with the great power of the
Fifth Century, the Persian Empire, who
were the heirs of the old Assyrian Empire.

120. Battle of Marathon (490 BCE)
After the Athenians victory, the messenger Pheidippides ran the
26 miles/ 40 kilometers to Athens to announce the victory,
inspiring the modern athletic marathon.

121. Second Persian Invasion (480 BCE)

123. Naval battle of Salamis (victory mainly won by Athenians)

124. After the defeat of the Persians, Athens had its so-called
golden age, funded by the money raised from its naval-
based protection racket (The Athenian League).

125. The Persian invasion left Athens's acropolis in ruins. The
rebuilding of the Acropolis was expensive and a
reflection of its confidence and power.
The most famous of these building projects was the
Parthenon (completed in 438), a temple to Athens’s
patron deity Athena, goddess of Wisdom.

128. As it appears
As it is built,
i.e, with optical corrections (much exaggerated)
As it would have appeared,
i.e, if it didn’t have optical corrections

129. It appears as well that the design
of the Acropolis was based on so-
called Golden Ratios.
Biologists, artists, musicians,
historians, architects,
psychologists, and even mystics
have pondered and debated the
basis of its ubiquity and appeal. In
fact, it is probably fair to say that
the Golden Ratio has inspired
thinkers of all disciplines like no
other number in the history of
mathematics.
-- Mario Livy, The Golden Ratio:
The Story of Phi, the World's Most
Astonishing Number

130. The form of a Greek temple was not a space
inviting entry, but rather a sort of abstract
sculpture marking a place in the world.

131. The Acropolis was also a celebration of
civic identity. The generation that fought
in the Persian Wars was also the same
generation that experienced the transition
from tyrannical and/or oligarchic rule to
mass participatory democracy.

132. Note: I don’t
expect you to
remember this: I
just included it to
give you sense of
the participatory
nature of Athenian
democracy.

133. The sculpture on the Acropolis (now in British Museum),
celebrated the defeat of monstrous invaders by the gods
associated with Athens.
Three female figures form the right side of the east pediment of the
Parthenon.

134. Three Goddesses from east pediment of the
Parthenon, Athens, ca 437-432 BCE, with color added.

136. Phidias Showing the Frieze of the Parthenon to his Friends (1868)
by Lawrence Alma-Tadema

137. Parthenon Replica in Nashville, TN, the Athens of The South
(build in 1897, then rebuilt 1931, rebuilt again in 1988)

139. Temple of Hera at Paestum, c. 560-550 B.C.E..

140. Peloponnesian War
War fought between Athens and
Sparta from 341 – 404 BCE. Eventually
involved all of Greece.
Ended in Athens defeat, but both sides were
economically devastated and depopulated that
the Greek world of the polis never regained its
prewar level of prosperity and power.
As well, the limited and ritualized style of
Greek warfare was transformed into all-out
total war that lead to large scale atrocities.

141. In Athens, public art celebrated the public
activities of its citizens. Both architecture
and theatre were state-sponsored and
supported.

142. Theatre of Dionysus, Athens

143. Theatre at Epidauros, c. 350 B.C.E.

144. Theatre at Delphi

145. atre at Herodes Atticus, Athens

146. Greek Theatre/Drama
Two main forms:
Comedy
komos – literally drunken dance/party
Tragedy
tragoidos – literally goat song

147. Originally a
religious/participatory/
civic ritual.
Tragedies were performed
during the Festival of
Dionysus, god of
wine/madness/lust.
Dionysus mask

148. The etymology of tragedy (goat song), perhaps
suggests its basis in an archaic ritual involving the
sacrifice of a goat (scapegoat).
Such rituals appear to have once involved the
expulsion or even killing of a pharmakos, a cripple/
beggar/criminal who was supported at the city’s
expense, but who would be sacrificed by the polis
in response to a crisis.
Perhaps the symbolic killing in drama of the
pharmakos during the Festival of Dionysus is the
beginning of Greek drama.

149. Like most things in Greek life, the Festival was a
competition between multiple playwrights. Each
year three playwrights would present three
tragedies. One each day of the festival there would
be three tragedies, one comedy, and one satyr
play.
Thespis (mid 550s BCE) is credited for the
introduction of an actor and changed the role of
the chorus (a group of people who spoke together)
so that it interacted with the actor.

150. The plays contain actors and the chorus (anywhere
from 12 to 50 members). Everyone would be
wearing masks. The chorus typically represents the
general population of the city.
In comedies and satyr plays, the actors might also
wear other props, such as enlarged private parts.

153. Of the more than 1000 known Greek tragedies,
only 32 have survived antiquity.
For some we have papyrus fragments; for
others we have quoted fragments, that is,
other ancient authors quoting from a lost play
(e.g., “As Sophocles said in his Professorikos,
‘Students should listen carefully to their
professor and bring him a nice bottle of cold
beer to every class …’ ”).

154. The plots of these plays are almost always
from the heroic/mythological age. The plot is
known, but they comment on or are about
contemporary events.

155. The plots of these plays are also themselves
competitions: between the protagonist and
the antagonist, which is sometimes another
character, sometimes just fate.
agon = competition/struggle

156. Aeschylus
Aeschylus (525 – 455) is credited with the introduction of
a second actor. Only seven of his 70 to 90 plays survive.
Three of these are part of our only surviving trilogy (the
Oresteia).

157. The death of Agamemnon, at the hands of
his wife Clytemnestra, after his return from
the Fall of Troy, because of his earlier
sacrifice of their daughter
The revenge killing of Clytemnestra by her
son Orestes.
The hounding of Orestes by the Furies, who
attempt to kill Orestes for murdering his
mother. They are stopped by Athena, who
sets up a law court ordered according to the
principles of reason.
The play ends with the democratic legal
system of Athens being praised as a better
form of justice than the old tribal idea of
revenge (eye for an eye).

158. Sophocles
Sophocles (497 – 406) introduced a third actor. He wrote
123 plays, only seven of which survive.
Most well known for his Oedipus the King and Antigone,
two of the greatest works in western literature.

159. Euripides
Euripides (480 – 406) introduced an element of
psychological realism to his plays. He wrote 92 plays, 18
of which survive.
Shocked his Athenian audience with his sympathetic
portrayals of victims and the less powerful, especially
women and slaves.
Sooner would I stand
Three times to face their battles, shield in hand,
Than bear one child!
-- from Medea

160. Other than in Sparta, the lives of women in Greek poleia
appears rather unenviable.
They lacked political and economic status. Wives and
unmarried daughters were expected to remain indoors in
segregated women’s quarters. Unfortunately, we do not
have a lot of information about women’s lives in ancient
Greece.
From 4th century Athenian legal case:
“We keep hetairai (mistresses) for the sake of pleasure, pallake
(concubines) for the daily care of our bodies, but wives to bear us
legitimate children and be trustworthy guardians of our households.”

161. However, most Greek tragedies and comedies feature
very strong and independent female characters, so there
is some debate about what life was actually like for
females in the Greek polis.

162. Oedipus the King
and
Antigone
On blackboard in class

163. Greek Comedy
Was performed along with tragedies as part of the
Festival of Dionysus.
Developed out of Komos rituals, which were drunken
dances/sex/revelry associated with the God Dionysus.

164. Komos jar

165. Aristophanes
Aristophanes (446 – 386) wrote 40 comedies, 11 of which
survive.
Focused on satirizing real personalities and local
Athenian politics (which can make some of the humor hard to
understand for us without footnotes). Lots of sexual or
scatological humor.
Lysistrata
Females in Athens and Sparta go on sex strike in order to end the
Peloponnesian War.
Clouds
Satire about Socrates and the professional sophists.
The Frogs
Slaves shown to be smarter, wiser, more rational than their masters and the
gods.
The Wasps
Ridicules Athenians’ addiction to law courts and serving in juries.

166. “Man is the measure of all things”
Opening fragment to Truth by
Protagoras (490 – 420 BCE)
What does this really mean?
What are its consequences for
philosophy, politics, ethics?
Vitruvian Man
by Leonard do Vinci

167. Philosophy

168. Natural Philosophy
Thinking about the natural world.
Many of the most well known are sometimes called the
pre-Socratics (before Socrates)
Thales (623 – 547 BCE)
- argued that everything in nature is explainable via knowable
principles (that is, no need for gods/myths)
Pythagoras (570 – 495)
- Argued that mathematical relationships explain nature.
Discovered Pythagorean Theory and codified our musical octave system.
Hippocrates (460 – 370)
- Creator of the first formal school of clinical medicine.
Doctors today still swear the Hippocratic Oath.
Democritus (460 – 370)
- argued that everything in nature is composed of tiny
building blocks called atoms.
Heraclitus (535 – 475)
- argued that all of nature is defined by
flux/change/evolution.

169. Sophists
From sophia = wisdom.
Teachers who taught their students how to argue
persuasively (i.e., rhetoric).
Tended to argue that one shouldn’t bother trying to
figure out truth; indeed one should be able to argue
persuasively from both sides of an argument.
These were useful skills in the Athenian courts and the
sophists became an important part of democratic life in
the Athens of the 5th century.
Argued that religion/tradition/laws are just expressions
of human power (i.e., institutions created by individuals
and social groups for their own benefit).

170. Protagoras (490-420)
Influential Athenian sophist who Socrates considered a
dangerous relativist, who taught that good/evil,
truth/falsehood, etc are matters of community and
individual judgment and not universals.

171. Socrates (469-399)
Athenian thinker opposed to the Sophists.
Strongly believed that there is a higher moral and
intellectual truth that can be discovered by the correct
form/methodology of thinking.
His main concern is the perfection of human character
(moral excellence), achievable when individuals regulate
their life according to objective standards arrived at via
rational reflection.
His method is dialogue or logical discussion between
individuals. The aim is to examine one’s assumptions and
confront inconsistencies, opinions, illogical beliefs.

172. 1. What is courage? Socratic Dialectic at Work
2. Courage = brave in war
Socrates
Some Athenian Dude
3. Courage must be more
than just a virtue for
soldiers
4. Courage = endurance/steadfastness
5. Sometimes prudence tells
us that we should retreat
or withdrawal. 6. Courage = knowledge of future good/evil
7. Can pigs be courageous?
8. No
9. Then courage must be
related to knowledge of
virtue
10. Gosh, Socrates you’re right
11. I don’t know for sure, we all
have so much to learn

173. Socrates was eventually condemned to death after
Athens's defeat in the Peloponnesian War against Sparta.
He was accused of corrupting the youth, found guilty,
and then poisoned.
Socrates did not write. We know of him mainly via his
student Plato.

174. Plato (429 – 347 BCE)
Continued Socrates focus on reason and dialectic
method. Plato was from aristocratic class and was highly
critical of democratic institutions, who felt that
democracy is the rule of the mob, the rule of sweet-
talking ignorant demagogues.
Plato believed that a rational political order can be
discovered. The community must be organized so that
individuals can live the good and ethical life.
Unlike Socrates, wrote dialogues. Founded The Academy,
in Athens, sometimes thought of as the first university or
school for young men/adults which lasted for almost
1000 years (385 BCE – 529 CE).
1776 pages!

175. Plato is writing in the immediate aftermath of the
Athenian defeat in the Peloponnesian War, during which
Athenian democracy was disgraced, replaced with a
Spartan-supported oligarchy, and then restored, but in a
much weakened state.

176. Sparta’s (temporary) dominance over the Greek world
came to an end when they were defeated by Thebes in
the Battle of Leuctra (371). The victorious Thebans
freed the Spartan helots, permanently ending Spartan
power in the Greek world.
Thebes’ power was short-lived, however, as the
independence of the Greek polis was ended forever with
the rise of Macedon and the united Greeks defeat by
Philip II and his son Alexander the Great in 338 BCE.

177. In his most famous work, The Republic,
Plato devise an ideal state in which
different social classes/orders work
together for the good of the whole polis.
Each class performs its assigned task
according to how the soul of its individuals
are organized.
Argues that the soul has three capacities
(reason, spiritedness, desire) and the three
different classes (rulers, soldiers,
producers) are each ruled principally by
one of these capacities.
Rulers/Philosophers – ruled by reason
Warriors – ruled by spirit
Producers– ruled by desire
Rigorous education is required for each
individual to learn their “place”.

178. Our reading from the Republic is perhaps its most
famous section: the Simile of the Cave
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=69F7GhASOdM

180. Many movies have made use of
the epistemological (study of
knowledge) doubt of the cave
analogy.

181. 1300 years later, French philosopher Rene Descartes revisited
Plato’s analogy in his Meditations on First Philosophy, in which
he tried to lay a philosophical foundation of epistemological
certainty for future science.
In the second meditation, Descartes casts doubt on the
reliability of our senses, first in dreams, then in a thought
experiment: what if there is an “evil daemon,” “as clever and
deceitful as he is powerful, who has directed his entire effort to
misleading me,” and who is feeding him misleading sensory
data, giving him the illusion that he has a body that is
experiencing reality.

182. Aristotle (384 – 322 BCE)
Student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great.
Writings covered an incredible wide range of topics,
from zoology, poetry, ethics, politics, physics, and
philosophy.
His views on the natural world were exceptionally
influential later in medieval scholarship.

183. Like Plato, wrote dialogues, but none have survived.
Almost all of our writings by Aristotle are thought to be
teaching notes, either written by Aristotle or taken down
by his students.
There are references in antiquity by other authors complimenting
Aristotle’s writing for its grace and beauty; nothing that we have appears
to be at all “elegant” or pleasant to read (presumably because they are
just “notes”).