Division One: Greek Culture and Roman Culture

(European culture is made up of many elements.Two of these elements are considered to be more enduring and they they are: the Greco-Roman element, and the Judeo-Christian element.)

I. Greek Culture

1.The Historical Context

1). In a more remote period of Greek history, probably around 1200B.C. , a war was fought between Greece（希腊）and Troy(特洛伊）

2). Greek culture reached a high point of development in the 5^th century B.C.

What marked the high point of development in Greek culture in the 5^th century B.C.?

1). The high point of development in Greek culture was marked by (a) the successful repulse of the Persian invasion early in the 5^th century B.C., (b) the establishment of democracy and (c) the flourishing of science, philosophy, literature, art and historical writing in Athens（雅典）.

2). The 5^th century B.C. closed with civil war between Athens and Sparta（斯巴达） in Greece.

3). In the second half of the 4^th century B.C., all Greece was brought under the rule of Alexander, King of Macedon（马其顿王国）.

4). In 146 B.C. the Romans conquered the Greece.

2. Social and Political Structure

What were the main features of ancient Greek society?

1). Athens was a democracy, where only the adult male citizens had the rights.

2). The economy of Athens rested on an immense amount of slave labor.

3). The Greeks loved sports. Once every four years, they had a big festival on Olympus Mount which included contests of sports.

4). Revised in 1896, the Games have become the world’s foremost amateur sports competition.

3. Homer (about 700 B. C.)（荷马）

What did Homer do?

1). Ancient Greeks considered Homer to be the author of their epics: the Iliad 《伊利亚特》and the Odyssey《奥德赛》.

2). Homer probably lived around 700 B.C.

3). The Iliad and the Odyssey are not about events of Homer’s own time, but about great men and wars about a remoter age, probably in the period of 1200—1100 B.C.

Iliad

1). The Iliad deals with the alliance of the states of the southern mainland of Greece, led by Agamemnon（阿伽门农） in their war against the city of Troy.

2). The heroes are Hector（赫克托耳） on the Trojan side and Achilles（阿喀琉斯） and Odysseus（奥德修斯） on the Greek.

3). In the final battle, Hector was killed by Achilles and Troy was sacked and burned by the Greeks.

Odyssey

1). The Odyssey deals with the return of Odysseus after the Trojan war to his home land Ithaca（伊萨卡岛）.

2). The Odyssey describes many adventures Odysseus ran into on his long voyage and how he was reunited with his faithful wife Penelope（珀涅罗珀）.

Why is Homer important in European literature?

1). Countless writers have quoted, adapted, and borrowed from and otherwise used Homers epics.

2). In the early part of the 19^th century, in England alone, three Romantic poets(Byron, Shelley and Keats) expressed their admiration of Greek culture in works which have themselves become classics.

3). In the 20^th century, there are Homeric parallels in the Irishman James Joyce’s modernist masterpiece Ulysses.

1. Lyric Poetry

1). Of many of the lyric poets of the (Greek) time, two are still admired by readers today: Sappho（萨福） and Pindar（品达）.

2). Sappho was a woman poet noted for her love poems of passionate intensity.

3). Pindar is best known for his odes celebrating the victories at the athletic games, such as the 14 Olympian odes.

2. Drama

1). Early in their remote past, the Greeks started to perform plays at religious festivals.

2). Out of these religions a powerful drama developed in the 5^th century B.C.

3). Performances were given in open-air theatres, with the audience sitting on stone benches and looking down at the stage from three sides.

Outstanding dramatists

1). The outstanding dramatists of ancient Greece were Aeschylus（埃斯库罗斯）, Sophocles（索福克勒斯）, Euripides（欧里庇得斯） and Aristophanes（阿里斯托芬）.

A. Aeschylus (525—456B.C.)

a. Aeschylus is noted for his vivid character portrayal and majestic poetry.

b. Aeschylus wrote plays such as Prometheus Bound《被缚的普罗米修斯》, Persians《波斯人》 and Agamemnon《阿伽门农》.

B. Sophocles (496—406B.C.)

a. Sophocles was the author of plays like Oedipus the King《奥狄普斯王》, Electra《伊莱克特拉》 and Antigone《安提戈涅》.

b. Oedipus the King is the story of a man who unknowingly committed a terrible sin by killing his father and marrying his mother.

c. The Austrian psychiatrist Sigmund Freud’s term “the Oedipus complex”（奥狄普斯情结） was also derived from Sophocles’s play.

C. Euripides(484—406B.C.)

a. Euripides wrote mainly about women in such plays as Andromache Medea and Trojan Women.

b. Euripides may be called the first writer of “problem plays”.

D. Comedy

Aristophanes(about 450—380B.C.)

1). Aristophanes wrote such plays as Frogs《蛙》, Clouds《云》, Wasps《黄蜂》 and Birds《鸟》.

6. History

A. Herodotus (484—430B.C.)希罗多德

a. Herodotus is often called “Father of History”.

b. Herodotus wrote about the wars between Greeks and Persians.

B. Thucydides (about460—404B.C.)修昔底德

a. Thucydides told about the war between Athens and Sparta and between Athens and Syracuse, a Greek state on the island of Sicily（西西里岛）.

7. Philosophy and Science

Scientists

A. Pythagoras (about 500 B.C.--?)毕达哥拉斯

a. Pythagoras was the founder of scientific mathematics.

b. To Pythagoras and his school we owe the abstract conceptions underlying mathematics—point, line, magnitude, surface, body—and the first theory of proportion.

B. Heracleitus (about 540—480 B.C.)赫拉克利特

a. Heracleitus believed fire to be the primary element of universe, out of which everything else has arisen.

b. Heracleitus held the theory of the mingling of opposites and believed it was the strife between the opposites that produced harmony.

c. To him, "all is flux, nothing is stationary." He also said: "You cannot step twice into the same river; for fresh waters are ever flowing in upon you. The sun is new everyday."

C. Democritus (about 460—370 B . C.)德谟克利特

a. Democritus speculated about the atomic structure of matter. He was one of the earliest exponents of atomic theory.

b. He was one of the earlist philosophical materialists and Marx's first published work was a study of Democritus.

D. Euclid (3^rd century B.C.)欧几里得

a. Euclid is even now well-known for his Elements《几何原本》, a textbook of geometry, perhaps the most successful textbook ever written, because it was in use in English schools until the early years of the 20^th century.

E. Archimedes (287—212 B.C.)阿基米德

a. Archimedes did important work not only in geometry, but also in arithmetic, machanics, and hydrostatics.

b. He discovered that when a body is immensed in water its loss of weight is equal to the weight of the water displaced.

c. To illustrate the principle of the lever, Archimedes is said to have told the king: “Give me a place to stand, and I will move the world.”

Philosophers

A. Socrates (about 470—399 B.C.)苏格拉底

a. We known Socrates chiefly through what Plato recorded of him in his famous Dialogues.

b. The method of argument Socrates used in exposing fallacies has come to be known as the dialectical method（ie the method of argument, by questions and answers.).

c. In 399BC, at the age of seventy Socrates was put on trial on a charge of “injuring the city” by not acknowledging its gods and corrupting the young. This trial was recorded by Plato in the dialogue “The Apology of Socrates”.

B. Plato (about 428—348 B. C.)柏拉图

a. Plato’s Dialogues《对话录》 are important not only as philosophical writing but also as imaginative literature.

b. Of the Dialogues Plato wrote, 27 have survived, including the Apology《申辩》, Symposium《会饮篇》或译为《飨宴篇》, and the Republic《理想国》.

c. Plato’s Apology was about Socrates’ defense of himself at the trial.

d. Plato’s Symposium dealt with beauty and love.

e. Plato’s Republic was about the idea state ruled by a philosopher but barring poets.

f. Plato’s comprehensive system of philosophy dealt with, among other things, the problem of how, in the complex, ever-changing world, men were to obtain knowledge.

g. The reply Plato gave (to the problem of how men were to obtain knowledge) was: men have knowledge because of the existence of certain general “ideas”, like beauty, truth, goodness.

h. According to Plato, only such “ideas” as beauty, truth, goodness are completely real, while the physical world is only relatively real.

i. Plato’s philosophy is called Idealism because in his system of philosophy only such “ideas” as beauty, truth and goodness are regarded as completely real while the physical world is regarded as only relatively real.

C. Aristotle (384—322B. C.)亚里士多德

a. Of Aristotle’s numerous works, the following are perhaps still important to scholars and general readers alike: Ethics《伦理学》, Politics《政治学》, Poetics《诗学》, and Rhetoric《修辞学》.

b. Aristotle’s Ethics was an introduction to moral philosophy.

c. Aristotle’s Poetics was a treatise on literary theory.

d. Aristotle’s Rhetoric dealt with the art of persuading an audience.

In what way or ways did Aristotle differ from his teacher Plato?

1). For one thing, Aristotle emphasized direct observation of nature and insisted that theory should follow fact. This is different from Plato’s reliance on subjective thinking.

2). Also, Aristotle thought that “form” (=idea) and matter together made up concrete individual realities. Here, too, he differed from Plato who held that ideas had a higher reality than the physical world.

What is Aristotle’s most influential writing to students of literature?

1). To students of literature, Aristotle’s most influential of writing is Poetics.

D. Contending Schools of Thought

a. The Sophists 诡辩派

1). The most eminent of the Sophists was Protagoras（普罗塔格拉）, born about 500 B. C. He is chiefly noted for his doctrine “man is the measure of all things”.

b. The Cynics犬儒派

1). The word “cynic” means “dog” in Greek.

2). The Cynics got their name because Diogenes（第欧根尼 ）(about 412—323 B.C.), one of their leaders, decided to live like a dog.

3). Diogenes rejected all conventions.

4). Diogenes advocated self-sufficiency and extreme simplicity in life.

5). Diogenes proclaimed his brotherhood not only with the whole human race, but also with animals.

6). On the other hand, Diogenes had no patience with the rich and powerful.

7). A story has it that Alexander the Great visited him and asking if he wanted any favor, Diogenes replied: “Only stand out of my light”.

c. The Sceptics怀疑派

1). The Sceptics followed Pyrrhon（皮朗）, who held that not all knowledge was attainable.

d. The Epicureans伊壁鸠鲁派

1). The Epicureans were disciples of Epicurus (about 341—270 B.C.), who believed pleasure to the highest good in life, but by pleasure he meant, not sensual enjoyment, but freedom from pain and emotional upheaval, which he thought could be attained by the practice of virtue.

e. The Stoics斯多葛派

1). To the Stoics, the most important thing in life was not “pleasure”, but “duty”.

2). The chief Stoic was Zeno（齐诺）.

3). Zeno believed that there is no such thing as chance, and that the cause of nature is rigidly determined by natural laws.

4). In the life of an individual man, Zeno believed that virtue is the sole good.

8. Art, Architecture, Sculpture and Pottery

A. Art

a. Greek art is a visual proof of Greek civilization.

b. As we follow the advances of Greek civilization, we find how art evolved from the archaic period to the classical period which marked its maturity.

B. Architecture

Parthenon 帕台农神庙

a. The most important of the temples the ancient Greeks left us is Parthenon, which has always been a great tourist attraction for people all around the world.

b. Parthenon is the most perfect of all the Greeks temples, 240 feet long and 110 feet wide. It is a rectangular structure with evenly spaced lines of columns around.

The three styles of Greek architecture

a. Greek architecture can be grouped into three styles: the Doric style, Ionic style and Corinthian style.

C. Sculpture

a. Discus Thrower

b. Venus de Milo《断臂维纳斯》，也称《米洛的维纳斯》

c. Laocoon group

1). Venus de Milo is the most famous of all the sculptures of Venus, discovered in the island of Milo in 1820. Its broken arms have long been the focus of discussion in artistic circles. This ancient Greek sculpture has been looked upon as a symbol of beauty, grace and health, a personification of vitality and dignity.

2). Laocoon was a priest of Troy who warmed the Trojans against Greek attack. He was made to suffer a slow death and killed by serpents with his sons because of this. This sculpture is known for its successful depiction of the expressions of Laocoon’s face—fear, sympathy and terror.

D. Pottery

a. The flouring of the Greek pottery was a result of domestic needs and needs for foreign trade.

9. Impact

1). Rediscovery of Greek culture played a vital part in the Renaissance in Italy and other European countries.

2). Karl Marx, once wrote about the Greeks: “Why shouldn’t the childhood of human society…exercise an eternal charm, as an age that will never return?”

A. Spirit of Innovation

a. The Greeks invented mathematics and science and philosophy; they first wrote history as opposed to mere annals; they speculated freely about the nature of the world and the ends of life, without being bound in fetters of any inherited orthodoxy.

B. Supreme Achievement

a. The Greeks achieved supreme achievements in nearly all fields of human endeavor.

C. Lasting Effect

a. The Greeks set an example by the bold effort they made to understand the world by the use of human reason.

II. Roman Culture

1. Romans and Greeks

a. The burning of Corinth in 146 B.C. marked the Roman conquest of Greece, which was then reduced to a province of Roman Empire.

b. Latin was the official language of the west half of the Roman Empire, Greek that of the eastern half.

What did the Romans have in common with the Greeks? And what was the chief difference between them?

a. The Romans had a lot in common with the Greeks.

b. Both the Romans and Greeks had traditions rooted in the idea of the citizen-assembly, hostile to monarchy and to servility.

c. Their religious are alike enough for most of their deities to be readily identified—Greek Zeus with Roman Jupiter, Greek Aphrodite with roman Venus, and so on—and their myths to be fused.

d. Their languages worked in similar ways, and were ultimately related, both being members of the Indo-European language family which stretches from Bangladesh to Iceland.

e. There were one big difference. The Romans built up a vast empire; the Greeks didn’t, except for the brief moment of Alexander’s conquests, which soon disintegrated.

2. Roman history

1). The year 27 B.C. divided the history of Rome into two periods.

2). Before 27 B.C. Rome had been a republic.

The two important contributions made by the Romans to European culture

i. The Pax Romana

ii. Roman Law

1) The emperors relied on a strong army—the famous Roman legions—and an efficient bureaucracy to exert their rule, which was facilitated by a well-developed system of roads. Thus the Romans enjoyed a long period of peace lasting two hundred years, a remarkable phenomenon in history known as the Pax Romana.

2). Another important contribution made by the Romans to European culture was Roman Law.

The decline of the Roman empire

1). The empire began to decline in the 3^rd century, increasingly troubled by the inroads of northern tribes such as the Goths.

2). In the fourth century the emperor Constantine moved the capital from Rome to Byzantium, and renamed it Constantinople (modern Istanbul).

3). After 395, the (Roman) empire was permanently divided into East (the Byzantium Empire) and West.

4). In 476 the last emperor of the West was deposed by the Goths and this marked the end of the West Roman Empire.

5). The East Roman Empire collapsed when Constantinople fell to the Turks in 1453.

3. Latin Literature

A. Prose

a. Marcus Tullius Cicero马库斯·图留斯·西塞罗

b. Julius Caesar 尤利乌斯 凯撒

Cicero

1). Marcus Tullius Cicero was noted for oratory and fine writing style.

2). Cicero’s legal and political speeches are models of Latin diction.

3). Cicero’s eloquent, oratorical manner of writing, described as Ciceronian, has had an enormous influence on the development of European prose

4). In his private letters, however, Cicero appears as a different style, far less rhetorical, but colloquial and intimate.

Caesar

1). Julius Caesar was another and more successful general who became dictator in Rome for a few years until