With all of the media coverage of the Republican and Democratic conventions the past few weeks, I’ve felt highly patriotic.
Ok, well, we aren’t exactly Romans though.
But..I have had Romans on my mind. And Greeks for that matter – ancient greeks. In the course of my homeschool method studies earlier this year, I realized that I knew next to little about the subjects I want to teach Jack-Evan when we begin to homeschool in a few years. For instance, I’ve decided that I enjoy the “classical” approach to history, in that we’ll start with the “beginning” of history and then travel through time up to modern days – retracing our course every 4 years. Thinking through all this is what got me started on my most recent obsession…. studying ancient greek and roman culture.
What I’ve learned is really interesting. Take this, for instance…. Our alphabet is based on the ancient greek alphabet, which, in turn, was taken from the Phonecians. But that wasn’t the only written language system they had used. Earlier greek civilizations (the Minoans and Myceaneans) had other forms of written script. When the Myceanean culture disenigrated around 1200 BC, the Greek language lost it’s written form and the peoples became illiterate. The age from 1200 BC till approximately 700 BC was known as the greek’s “Dark Age” because of the lack of societal progression, illiteracy, and failure to produce any major advancements in the arts. I never knew that we had a “dark age” before the middle ages of Europe!
After the 8th century BC, society and literacy once again picked itself up and the city-states began to rise to power (Athens, Sparta). There are many surviving pieces of literature, plays, and historical accounts from the last few centuries BC. It’s also really interesting to trace the lives of these people by reading bits from their own personal accounts and ideas, such as in Hesiod’s “Works and Days”.
It’s for sure that the feminists of our day wouldn’t like ancient Athens very much though. It was assumed that a woman’s role was indoors. They even had a “woman’s quarters” in their houses to go to when male visitors came over (so he would not view any female residents). They believed a woman’s place was to do household chores, household management, and child rearing. One ancient author even said that the greatest tribute to a woman was to not be talked about ever – whether good or bad. There’s even a “Household Management” book that was written, describing the various duties and ideal ways of home life. It kind of reminded me of the movement towards traditional home/family values of many blog authors today. 
The one odd thing, however, was that women (at least, the upper class women) did not do the shopping! The men did the shopping, because the “good” women were the ones who stayed indoors. The funny part about it is, just like in today’s time, men didn’t always “bring home” what was on their grocery list – as one comedy writer of that time indicates.
With the goings on of the political conventions of McCain and Obama, it was also interesting to parallel today’s world with what I have been learning about the roots of democracy and various political systems. It is believed that democracy (rule by the citizens) started in it’s infancy during the end of the 6th century BC. The type of democracy employed by the city-states was a bit different from our own, however, partly due to the smaller size and localization of the main politics. All land owning male citizens (note: this excluded slaves and women) were allowed to participate and vote on issues. Many of our checks and balances in our own political culture were also first begun in this time – such as the senate and legislature. In their criminal system, I found it especially interesting that the jurors were numbered in the thousands! This provided a check system to remove the chance of bribery occuring – but it also made it more likely that crowds would get swept up in emotions and provoke others along.
Reading about this ancient culture and their views of life really get me thinking about our own mortality as well. These were humans, with thoughts, feelings, needs, wants, and memories just like we have. They weren’t barbarians (“barbarian” is a greek-invented word!) or unintelligent cave men. They weren’t ignorant. They lived life much like we did (with the notable absense of the internet though!). One piece of translation of an ancient work that I read has one man writing about his wife – in it he states how she just gave birth to their first child and chose to nurse the baby herself. So that the child would not cry during the night, he also states that she chose to sleep with their child. This account, written well over 2,000 years ago, sounds so much like today’s modern holistic movement approach that it really “hit home” within me. Here I was, reading about the life of a real man and women – and of their baby. That particular baby probably spend many hours at the breat of his mother. Then he endured childhood, education, induction into the military, adulthood, (probably) parenthood, old age, and finally death. The time his mother spent nursing him may have seemed long and endless. I wonder how often she sat down in her home to feed that particular baby? Ten times a day for a few months? Four times a day for a year? Each of those moments….each of those days…each of those seconds lasted as long for her as it does for us modern mothers. Yet here she is now, long dead…. and her first baby, dead some two millenia since. What was her life about? What did she wish for her child? What did she think about during the intimate moments she spent gazing into her nursing child’s eyes? Did she think about the future – present or distant?
Today, if we estimate 4 generations in a century, nearly 100 generations have walked this earth since those moments between that one woman and child. Inventions and technology have waxed and waned. Knowledge has come and gone…and come again. Different ways of life, different political systems, different kings, different leaders, different cultures, different societies…and thousands of wards…have all appeared on earth since her time. Yet the earth keeps marching on.
I wonder if she believed her culture, city-state, and way of life would last forever? Most likely she did. Humans in general seem to have a hard time viewing their world in the context of historical advancement. Nations are thought to be never-ending. Emperialism is thought to be dead in the modern world. But how do we know? What will life be like 2,000 year from now if the earth is still standing? Will someone one day read part of a home-life blog printed out from today’s world and speculate about our ancient “American” society??? Our nation is only 233 years old! In reading about those ancient “world power” cultures that lasted for hundreds of years – and then died out – really hone in our our own mortality.
It’s quite humbling, and really makes one think, hard, about human existance and what is truly important in life.
So reader, what is important to you? Do your daily activities reflect what is most important to you in life? If not, what can you do to change that?
