Ancient Greek Civilisation Essays - Racism, Abuse,

Ancient Greek Civilisation The earliest Greek civilization thrived around 4,000 years ago. Some of the things that they had that we still use today are the arts, science, math, literature, and politics. The Greeks were known for their great intelligence, military strategies, and their buildings. All Greek's spoke the same language. This made it easier to trade and to communicate between different parts of the country. All Greeks believed in the same gods and also shared some common heritage. The Greeks believed that there was a god for everything on earth. A few examples of these gods are Zeus, ruler of the gods. Posidon was the god of the ocean and Hades, god of the under world. The Greek government was not a monarchy with a king and queen. Instead the Greek government was a city-state. A city-state is when each city has its own separate political unit. The men were a very important part of the Greek civilization because they were the ones that ran the government. The men were also the ones who would plant and work the fields or would oversee them. They would also spend time sailing, hunting, or manufacturing things for trade. For fun, the men would attend drinking parties, would wrestle, and enjoyed horse back riding. When the men held drinking parties for his friends the wives and daughters were not aloud to attend. The women in the Greek civilization were very limited to what they were allowed to do. They were permitted to attend weddings, funerals, and visit female neighbors for brief periods. The main responsibility for the women were to bear children and to watch over the house and make sure it was cleaned by one of the slaves because women were rarely ever responsible for cleaning the house. Women slaves were the cooks, cleaners, and sometimes even worked in the fields. The male slaves would act as a guard and would stand at the door and protect the women when the man was away. Only other women were allowed to enter when the man was away. Women were not allowed to participate in the Olympic games except for the chariot racing, which they were only allowed to participate in if they owned a horse. There were several different ways in which a person could be made a slave. If you were captured in battle then you could be sold as a slave. If a child was abandoned and then was found he could be kept by the person as his slave or could be sold. Sometimes a poor family might sell their baby as a slave to earn some money and in hopes that the baby might have a better life as a slave than with them. The worse thing that could happen to someone that was then put into slavery was when the baby or child was kidnapped and sold for money. Many houses in Greece in the 5th and 6th century were made up of clay, stone, and wood. They usually had two to three rooms and were built around an open air courtyard. If you were richer you might have had a kitchen, men's drinking area, and maybe even a room for bathing. The Greek's used an irrigation system to get water to their crops which consisted of olives, grapes, and figs. They would also keep goat to get milk and cheese. Many Greek's made their own wine which was a very popular thing in Greece. Meat was very expensive and was rarely eaten but was often used for religious sacrifices. The types of clothing that the Greek's wore were wool in he winter and linen in the summer. Since Clothing was very expensive to buy most families made their own clothes and just bleached them white or a bright color. All cloths if made at home were made by the mother, daughter, or female slave. We use many of the things that the Greek's have discovered today in our modern society. We should be thankful that we have used merchant's to create cultural diffusion. If we hadn't done this than we wouldn't have many of the things that we considered important or even vital to our society. History Essays