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The History of the Greeks: Hellenic and Hellenistic
The History of the Greeks: Hellenic and Hellenistic
Comparing classical greek culture and hellenistic culture
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The Hellenistic period and the Hellenic period have many differences and many similarities in their culture. The Hellenistic and Hellenic periods are some major parts of the Greek civilization. Around the Hellenistic time cultural influence and power were at their highest point, And them having such great experiences in; arts, exploring, literature, theatre, architecture, music, mathematics, philosophy, and science brought major benefits to the Hellenistic period. However, the Hellenic period marks the highest points in the remarkable civilization it's also known as the golden age. The Hellenic period is also known for its cultural achievements along with its art and philosophy. The Hellenic and Hellenistic culture had different views and ways in how they did their art, science, along with how they treated their women. First the Hellenic and Hellenistic period's art where both beautiful by focusing on two different things. In the Hellenic periods society wanted to show the moral goodness of the apperception and spirit that one's outer beauty reflects. The sculptures are usually relaxed, but balanced. The body is slightly turned to one side and the weight is rested mainly on one leg with the hip raised on that one side. The Hellenistic …show more content…
During the Hellenistic period science was given major attention. During that period they were focused mainly on astronomy, physics, mathematics, medicine, and geography. With all that they focused on they were able to create force pumps, catapults operated by compressed air, steam engines, and thermoscopes. The Hellenic periods science was remarkable for its discovery of natural philosophy and the philosophy of nature. During the Hellenic period they focused a lot on the cosmos, and how it was culturally important to the Greeks. The cosmos were important because it provided excellent eclecticism and
Throughout the history of Ancient Greece thousands of great works of art were produced. Works were created in many different media, ranging from life-size statues to larger than life architectural structures. One type of art that can sometimes be overlooked, though, is pottery. There are many examples of great Greek pottery, but the two that will be used as a sample are Artemis Slaying Actaeon and Woman and Maid. By considering the backgrounds of these works, and comparing them directly we are able get a taste not only of the artistic styles of the time, but also a taste of ancient Greek culture.
The ancient Greek civilization has left a rich cultural footprint on modern Western civilization. Especially during the ancient Classical and Hellenistic eras of Greece, ancient Greeks have left behind a plethora of ideas and concepts that have played a crucial role in forming the foundations to Western civilization. Although the Classical era was a time of war and conflict, it was the Golden Age of Greece that was the home to many achievements in art, philosophy, architecture, politics, and literature such as the birth of democracy. The Hellenistic era was a period of social and economic prosperity that was defined by the spread of Greek culture across the entire eastern Mediterranean and Southwest Asia. During this era, countless of advancements
Ridgway, Brunilde S. Hellenistic Sculpture II: The Styles of ca. 200-100 B.C. Madison, Wisc.: The University of Wisconsin Press, 2000.
Throughout the centuries, civilizations have prospered and fallen with only their effects left on the world as their evidence of their existence. Ancient Greece is widely accepted as the most influential civilization ever, with the Golden Age of ancient Athens being its pinnacle. The Golden Age of Athens began when Athens became the most powerful Greek city-state, centralizing their power following their victory of the Greco-Persian wars.
The Ancient Greece era played a big role on how we still live today. It contributed its religion, technology, important events, and even its theater to us. Gods and goddesses also played a big role in ancient Greece, which is evidence in the play The Curmudgeon by Meander.
Greek mythology is thought to be very fascinating to many people; I personally wanted to learn more about it and the Hellenistic period. A new cultural age was led by Alexander the Great when he took over Egypt and the Near East, historians refer to this period as Hellenistic.
Hellenistic art, let alone architecture, was a period of dramatic transformations that deterred greatly from the Greek Classical period. While the Classical Greek concepts were not entirely abandoned, the Hellenistic period expanded the formal horizons with dramatic posing, sweeping lines, and high contrast of light, shadow and emotion, something greatly different from the Classical artists ideas. The conventions and rules of the Classical period gave way to experimentation and a sense of freedom that allowed the artists of the Hellenistic period to explore their subjects from unique points of view that they had not previously done. The Altar to Zeus in Pergamon is the perfect representation of the Hellenistic period. Pergamon contained the Altar to Zeus in the same way that the Athenian Acropolis contained the Parthenon and is considered by the Greek art historian Gisela Richter to be “the most famous altar of Hellenistic times” (Handbook 32). The Altar of Pergamon is uniquely suited as an ideal example of 2nd century Greek culture that is tied to the ideals of the people, and shows off Hellenistic characteristics that define the time just as the Parthenon is a staple in the Classical period. [Stokstad]
These sculptures would be placed in the temples to be used for worshipped or decoration. During the Archaic age, kouros and kore were prominent. These were freestanding sculptures of young male and female children. Later in Classical Greece, there were three phases, which the sculptures went through: The Severe style, the high classical style, and the fourth-century style. One sculptural stance called the contrapposto, was used in Classical Greece, although the stance was categorized with some Archaic impressions such as, tilting of the head and upper
The Greek believed the human body was the measure of all things, therefore the artists created sculptures in a very detailed fashion which made them very life-like although the size of
Therefore, the Greeks contributed to Western Civilization in many ways. They contributed with great minds like Archimedes and Euclid with math and physics. They also influenced the United States’s government and Western Civilization’s architecture. Thirdly, they were the beginning of philosophy. The Greeks did unimaginable things and influenced many common things such as theater. They even started one of the biggest events known world-wide, the Olympic
The term Hellenistic is defined as "Greek-like". The Hellenistic period, which historians date as stretching from 323 B.C until 31 B.C, marks the widespread influence of Greek culture to other parts of the world, due to the country's growing power. The influence it had on the Roman people was not limited to artistic disciplines- it also affected the academic studies of the time with the Greek's knowledge of and developments in subjects such as philosophy, mathematics, and literature. It is possible that the integration of these academic developments into other cultures is what caused the trend of social realism to appear in art; as people were learning more about themselves and the world around them, it made sense for their focus of their art to be on that world as well. The social realism is the biggest identifying factor of this sculpture, 'Old Drunken Woman,' as a true replica of that time period.
The primary focus of ancient Greek sculptures was that of the human body. Almost all Greek sculptures are of nude subjects. As the first society to focus on nude subjects, Greek sculptors attempted to "depict man in what they believed was the image of the gods and so would come to celebrate the body by striving for verisimilitude or true – likeness (realism and naturalism!)."(Riffert) Not only did the Greeks celebrate the human form in their art but also in everyday life. (Riffert) One of the favorite topics for sculptors was that of the athlete. In Greek culture athletes were described as "hero–athletes". (Riffert) This shows that athletes were revered and looked upon as heroes. The influence of athleticism is evident in many famous sculptures. I will attempt to show how the human form influenced Greek art. It is important to note that many of the Greek sculptures discussed do not exist in their original form but rather in Roman copies of the original bronze sculptures. (Riffert)
The Romans have adopted many features from the Greek style of art and architecture during the third and second centuries B.C. During that time period the Romans discovered that they have taking a liking to Greek statues, which they placed in many different places. The Roman sculptors then decided to also start making statues alongside the Greeks. The statues that the Romans created were realistic looking with, sometime, unpleasant details of the body. The Greeks made statues with, what they thought of, ideal appearances in the statues figure. Sculpture was possibly considered the highest form of art by the Romans, but figure painting was very high considered as well. Very little of Roman painting has survived the tests of time.
The Classical Greece era dates back to 500-323 BCE and was considered to be the period of maturity, discovery and achievement. During this era Athens was governed by a democratic government, there came a more rational approach to exploring and explaining the world and the Greeks took art to a more realistic and humanistic approach for the first time. (Sakoulas, 2002) During the Classical era the culture was based on a blend of their old culture and the new. The old is based upon religious beliefs while the new happens largely in part due to trade routes.
Even the few sculptor’s names known to us, usually by chance, from the imperial period are Greek names and seem to confirm the assumption that these artists’ work should be regarded simply as a late phase of Greek art” (Hanfmann, 12). The Greeks were the first western culture to figure out how to accurately depict the human form which they did through the use of geometric ratios. It is also widely accepted that it was even Greek artists who first made marble portraits for the Romans as the Romans originally had no skill with the stone. “It was certainly at first Greek artists who were entrusted by eminent Romans with the execution of portraits of themselves and of important personalities in the Roman state, just as it was Greeks who depicted Aemilius Paulus victory at Pydna and later were largely responsible for the portraits of the emperors” (Kahler 16). The Romans mainly used terracotta for their sculptures and it was only when Augustus reigned that the marble quarries at Carrara were opened and marble was used on a large scale. The Romans inherited the use of realistic proportions, the sense of movement (contrapposto), and the overall beauty of Greek sculptures. A great example of Roman sculpture that was clearly carved by a Greek artist who was familiar with the Hellenistic styles of Greece, is the Relief of the Wedding of Amphitrite and Neptune. It “shows a mythological