KELVIN WINATA

3858

Ancient History Influenced Nowadays Media

When we talked about Ancient Greece,it is always fascinating as it has a lot of values and thing that we can learn from there. There are several period in the Greece. According to historians and archeological findings,this period in Greece lasted from 6800 to 3200 BC. They traveled mainly due to overpopulation. They may have traveled via the route of Black sea into Thrace, which then further leads to Macedonia, Thessaly, Boeotia etc. The second way of traveling into Greece is from one island to another and such type of colonies has been found in Knossos and Kythnos. This is called the Neolithic Period. The main characteristics of this era are the climate stabilization and the settlements of people. They domesticated animals like sheep and goats and grew plants and crops. The Neolithic Greece people can be said as the first farmers and their lives were less complex and simple. A small village was also found at an area called Nea Nikomedia, where people resided around 5800 BC. The houses were made of sticks and mud surrounded by fences. Crops and plants that were domesticated by the colonies in Neolithic era have been ancestors of plants such as barley and animals such as goats, dogs and pigs. At a settlement in Argissa, findings suggest that domestication of animals took place as early as 8300 BC. Even in the Sesklo area, cattle bone fragments have been found. During the last two decades, the settlements of Neolithic era found have gone up to one thousand; research is going on how the people of that Era communicated their economy, technology and the environment they lived in.

The second one that we going to talk about is the Early Bronze Age.It is started from around 2800 BC till 1050 BC in Crete so it is quite long. The information that is available today on the Bronze Age in Greece is from the architecture, burial styles and lifestyle. The colonies were made of 300 to 1000 people. The richer class could afford the metals and this was proved by the excavations found wherein people where buried with metal jewelry. The houses roofs were made with clay tiles and wall with stones. The Bronze Age was also characterized by the burial systems. They were simple pits or graves carved into rocks. they give us an insight on the peoples minds on their beliefs on human behavior and after life. The settlements of the Early Bronze Age lived on hills or on low plains, which were close to water. Such regions may have been more fertile for agricultural and settling purposes. The houses were made of stone foundations and mud walls. Goods were stored in containers made of wood or reed or simply dug into the ground. The economy of the villages relied on production of tools, weapons, agriculture and art and architecture. In animal section they grazed sheeps and goats. The demand for more metals and goods went to introduction of different colonies and barter creating set-up for trade. Major production that maked up to the economy included pottery, stone carving, textile and metal carving. Arts and crafts included ceramic pottery, which were painted in earthy colors. Manufacture of tools was from bone, metals and stones using advanced technology. Sculptures reflected the social and lifestyle habits. Weaving also taked part an important part, but the abides were lost in time because they were of transient nature. The Early Bronze Age paved the way for Minoans and the Mycenaean Greeks, which was described by its prosperity and the rich empires.

Now we moved on the the next one which is The Archaic Period. In the 8th century BC, Greece began to emerge from the Dark Ages which followed the fall of the Mycenaean civilization. The Archaic Period in Greece refers to the years between 750 and 480 B.C., more particularly from 620 to 480 B.C. The age is defined through the development of art at this time, specifically through the style of pottery and sculpture, showing the specific characteristics that would later be developed into the more naturalistic style of the Classical period. Greek people developed to have strong city-states as their political centers. Cities on the Greek mainland, peninsula and the coast of Asia Minor had close interaction with one another, however each city still established its own unique culture and political structure. The growth of the the traditional Greek city state, coupled with a relative population explosion, forced the city states to look abroad for places to settle. This led to a period of frenetic colonization. A variety of settlement began appearing across the Mediterranean, including Ionia (the coast of Asia Minor) southern Italy Sicily and North Africa. A growing population and shortage of land also seems to have created internal strife between the poor and the rich in many citystates. In Sparta, the Messenian Wars resulted in the conquest of Messenia and enserfment of the Messenians, beginning in the latter half of the 8th century BC, an act without precedent or antecedent in ancient Greece.

This practice allowed a social revolution to occur. The subjugated population, thenceforth known as helots, farmed and laboured for Sparta, whilst every Spartan male citizen became a soldier of the Spartan Army in a permanently militarized state. Even the elite were obliged to live and train as soldiers; this equality between rich and poor served to defuse the social conflict. These reforms, attributed to the shadowy Lycurgus of Sparta, were probably complete by 650 BC. In the Archaic period, the growth of culture was not coherent, but fragmented across the peninsula, depending on the city-state, they developed separate cultures. The birth of Western philosophy occurred in Miletus with the philosopher and thinker Thales, and early literary output, such as the Homeric epics and the poetry of Hesiod, began in Ionia. Sculpture almost began to emerge in the Archaic period. Sculptural forms such as the kouros, a statue of a male youth , and its female equivalent the kore, originated in this period. These kouroi were inspired by Egyptian sculpture of the time, following a set pattern of artistic devices, the figures were formulaic and although admirable, they were unrealistic and severe. It was development of these original statues that lead to the artistic peak of classical sculpture.

And then we go to the next part of the Greece period which is the Classical Period. Classical period of ancient Greek history, is fixed between about 500 B. C. When the Greeks began to come into conflict with the kingdom of Persia to the east. Greece thus entered the 4th century under a Spartan hegemony, but it was clear from the start that this was weak. A demographic crisis meant Sparta was overstretched, and by 395 BC Athens, Argos, Thebes, and Corinth felt able to challenge Spartan dominance, resulting in the Corinthian War (395387 BC). Another war of stalemates, it ended with the status quo restored, after the threat of Persian intervention on behalf of the Spartans. The Spartan hegemony lasted another 16 years, until, when attempting to impose their will on the Thebans, the Spartans suffered a decisive defeat at Leuctra in 371 BC. The Theban general Epaminondas then led Theban troops into the Peloponnese, whereupon other city-states defected from the Spartan cause. The Thebans were thus able to march into Messenia and free the population. Alexander, son and successor of Philip, continued the war.

Alexander defeated Darius III of Persia and completely destroyed the Achaemenid Empire, annexing it to Macedon and earning himself the epithet the Great. When Alexander died in 323 BC, Greek power and influence was at its zenith. However, there had been a fundamental shift away from the fierce independence and classical culture of the poleis and instead towards the developing Hellenistic culture. And last but not least is the Hellenistic Period. The Hellenistic period lasted from 323 BC, which marked the end of the Wars of Alexander the Great, to the annexation of Greece by the Roman Republic in 146 BC. Although the establishment of Roman rule did not break the continuity of Hellenistic society and culture, which remained essentially unchanged until the advent of Christianity, it did mark the end of Greek political independence. So from all the period that already mentioned on aboved, we can summarize that from the very first time all the culture is started with the simple one and as time goes on, The culture, social life is getting more complex and complicated.This is because people will always developed to be more modern which is the value of the life itself is not as simple as they were.

And now I am going to talked briefly about the history of the ancient Rome. It is all started with the Athenians saw the symbol of their city-states democracy and culture in the rock-jutting Acropolis, so the Romans viewed the Forum as the symbol of imperial grandeur. Temples were to be found there, but in contrast to the Acropolis, the Forum was dominated by secular buildings basilicas used for judicial and other public business, the nearby Coliseum, used for gladiatorial shows and the great palaces of the emperors rising on the neighboring Palatine Hill. While the Acropolis was crowned with statues to Athena, the Forum gloried in triumphal arches and columns commemorating military conquests. Rome was the capital of a world-state, extending from Britain to the Euphrates, and its citizens were proud of their imperial mission.Although the buildings in the Forum appear fundamentally Greek in style, they are more monumental and sumptuous. Here, then, are two clues to an understanding of the Romans: they borrowed much from the Greeks and others, and they modified what they took. Yet Rome was more than an intermediary, for it made many important and original contributions to our Western culture. Throughout a history that led from a simple farming community in the plain of Latium to a strong state that became the master of the Mediterranean world as well as Gaul, Britain, and part of Germany, the Romans met one challenge after another with practicality and efficiency.

The history of Rome extends from 753 B.C. According to ancient legend, Rome was founded in 753 B.C. by the twin brothers Romulus and Remus, who were saved from death in their infancy by a she-wolf who sheltered and suckled them.According to Virgils Aeneid Romulus ancestor was Aeneas, a Trojan who after the fall of Troy founded a settlement in Latium. The Aeneas story, invented by Greek mythmakers, pleased the Romans because it linked their history with that of the Greeks. omes political growth followed a line of development similar to that of the Greek city-states: limited monarchy of the sort described by Homer, oligarchy, democracy, and, finally, the permanent dictatorship of the Roman emperors. We shall see that in moving from oligarchy to democracy, the Romans, unlike the Greeks, succeeded in avoiding the intermediate stage of tyranny. Although the imperium was conferred by a popular assembly made up of all armsbearing citizens, the king turned for advice to a council of nobles called the Senate. Senators had lifelong tenure, and they and their families belonged to the patrician class. The other class of Romans, the plebeians, or commoners, included small farmers, artisans, and many clients, or dependents, of patrician landowners. In return for a livelihood, the clients gave their patrician patrons political support in the assembly.

And the last one that im going to talked about before im compared it to the nowadays media is the ancient Egypt history. So basically the changes period in the Egypt is when the leader is also changed. That is why different King and Queen means differ rules, system, social life and all the artwork ass well. More than 3000 year long history of Ancient Egypt has been divided into 8 or 9 periods, sometimes called Kingdoms. This modern-day division is somewhat arbitrarily based on the countrys unity and wealth and the power of the central government. The Ancient Egyptians themselves did not group their rulers according to such criteria. They rather seem to have developed the notion of dynasties throughout their history. So we go back to the very first question, Is all that history of the three ancient country have some relevance with nowadays media at all? I could say yes. Why? Because no matter how it is all the present arworks are inspired direct and indirectly by that. We can see like some sculpture that the main idea and concept is simillar to that in the Greek History. So i could make this statement that all the arts that we can find nowadays, it is all built upon what it is found in the past. It has passed down from generation to generation so that the value of the art is still in immaculate condition.

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