western civ

Today in western civilization we continued to learn about ancient Greece from the power point that was made. We talked about the rule of Cleisthenes today in class. We found out that he was a very rich man and that he was insulated from the “hoi polloi” which is the common people. He was also a very crafty politician. He was one of the fist leaders of Greece that saw the value of the common people’s talents, intelligence, and energies of the non-aristocrats, but he failed to see the value of women. He ran the government by asking what the non-aristocrats need/want from the government. They allowed citizens to participate in the government, but to keep in mind that only one-third of the population was classified as citizens. If you lived in Athens and you were a rich, male, landowning, born in Athens, adult.    

Today in human geo we continue to learn about ancient Greece with the power point that was made. Today we talked about some of the leaders that lead ancient Greece. we talked about Draco, who was a tyrant and is classified as a modern-day tyrant, who was a harsh and crude leader. In his command, almost all crimes punishment was death, and it was okay to have slaves that owned debt. Then Solon came along in 594 BCE and he outlawed debt slavery and also ruled that all Athenian citizens can speak at the assembly’s that were held to talk about politics and the problems the Athenians face. We learned that Arete is the Greek saying and it means do you thing that you do to the best you can do it. We also talked about the Agora which is a meeting place for the government.

Today in class we continued to talk about ancient Greece, today we talked about their structure of government and how they run things in ancient Greece. We talk about how women, slaves, or people from the middle or lower class were allowed to participate in early ancient Greece. We also talked about essential terms that we need to know in order to understand ancient Greece’s government such as, polis which is a fundamental political unit made up of a city and the surrounding countryside we also learned about Oligarchy which is a wealth group, dissatisfied with the aristocratic rule, who seize power, and many more. We learned that politics was an exclusive club in ancient Greece. We talked about how rich people wielded much more influence in society and that they help more governmental power than the middle class or lower class.