Thursday, Sept. 20

We talked about Macedonia.

Macedonia-

Geography-
North of Athens.
Had a rough terrain and a cold climate.
People lived mostly in mountain villages instead of the city-states like Athens had.

Most of the Macedonians nobles referred to themselves as Greeks.
Once again the Geek thought that the Macedonians were barbaric and not as civilized as the Greeks.
Greeks treated Spartans like this.

Changes-
After Peloponnesian War several Greek city-states were very weak- economically and militaristically.
When there is weakness or a struggle there is usually a predator or someone else to take advantage of the opportunity. In this case it was Macedonia.
Peloponnesian War- Delian League vs. Sparta.

Philip II was the king of Macedonia around 306 B.C.
Only 23 when he became king.
Brilliant general.
Was able to train peasants into warriors.
His dream was to take over Greece and avenge the Persian Invasion of Greece in 480 B.C.
Invade Persia.

Philip’s tactics-
Organized his army into phalanxes of 16 men across the 16 men deep.
All 256 men had to work together for this formation to work correctly.
After the phalanx had broken through the enemy’s line, he would then send in cavalry to crush the disorganized or retreating opponents.

Conquest for Greece-
An Athenian orator named Demosthenes tried to warn the Greek of the threat of Phillip and told them to prepare and army.
However, the city-states of Greece couldn’t come up with united response.
Finally Athens and Thebes decided to standup to Phillip but it was too late.
Greek independence was lost to King Phillip of Macedonia.

New leader-
Next Phillip wanted to invade Persia.
However, he was never able to do this.
At his daughter’s wedding he was stabbed to death by one of his former guardsmen.
His son immediately proclaimed himself the King of Macedonia.
His name was Alexander later known as Alexander the Great.

Alexander the Great-
Taught by Aristotle.
Spread Hellenistic.
Very intellectual kept a copy of the Iliad under his pillow to remind him of the heroic Achilles in the Trojan War.
Alex wanted to show his power early and when the people of Thebes rebelled he destroyed their city and took 6,000 lives.

Invasion of Persia-
Alex was now ready to invade Persia now that Greece was secure.
Alex marched with 35,000 men to attack Persia.
Persian rushed 40,000 men to meet Alex at Anatolia.
Alex decided to attack first and with his cavalry very effective and defeated the Persians.
That victory alarmed the Persian King, Darius III.
His response was to raise a huge army ranging between 50,000-75,000 men.
Alex knew he was outnumbered so he called for a surprise attack with his best troops and ordered them to go straight to the Persian King.
The Persian King fled and so did his army.

Peace?-
After 2 major battles lost, Darius III was ready to give up, so land in hopes that Alex would stop his conquest.
The Macedonian advisors to Alex told him to take the offer but Alex refused.
Alex’s goal was to conquer all of the Persian Empire.

Alex in Egypt-
Alex was welcomed into Egypt as a liberator even though Egypt was a Persian territory.
Was crowned a pharaoh.
Alex named a city, Alexandria after himself, very common for him to do.

Continuing the Conquest-
Alex still wanted to kill King Darius III of Persia so he pursued him.
This pursuit made him a great conquer but bad at governing the land he conquered.
He eventually found King Darius III dead; one of his own men had killed him.

Many thought that once Darius was dead Alex might stop the conquest, they were wrong.
He invaded certain areas of India and successfully defeated them there as well.
Only problem Alex struggled with was the low morale of his army.

Governor-
When Alex had reached Babylon, he announced that he wanted to unite his empire by building new cities, roads, and harbors, and conquer Arabia.
He became seriously ill with a fever and died at age 32.

Legacy-
Married a Persian princess.
He even wore a Persian dress and presided over a mass marriage of 80 of his men to Persian women.
Very interesting cultural impact- spreading Hellenistic culture.
At the time of his death, Alex had conquered a vast amount of land.
Generals fought over who got the power of the empire.

Eventually these 3 generals of Alex got control of his conquered land.
Antigonus became King of Macedonia and took control of the Greek city states.
Ptolemy- seized Egypt took the title of pharaoh and began a dynasty.
Seleucid- got control over the Old Persian Empire didn’t take the democratic approach with him the rulers had all the power not people.

Hellenistic Culture-
Greek culture blended with Egyptian, Persian, and Indian influences.
Language that was used was called Koine meaning common in Greek.
The common language was very important as it allowed for people throughout all of Macedonian Empire to communicate in some fashion.

Alexandria-
Center of Hellenistic culture.
Located on western edge of Nile delta
Easy for people throughout the Macedonian Empire to get to by ship.
Booming economy due to all the different customs and items that came to Alexandria.
Some similarities to Ellis Island.

Alexandria’s Appearance-
Rulers spent a lot of money and time into making the city of Alex attractive.
2 greatest attractions were museum and library.
Said that Alexander founded those buildings because Aristotle had given him a love for learning.
Library was the first true research library, it was used for a gifted group of scholars to do their work.

Science and Technology-
Much of scientific research that was done in Alexandria was very influential.
Until the turn of the 16^th and 17^th century, Alexandrian scholars provided most of the scientific info to the west.

Astronomy-
Museum contained a small observatory where astronomers could study starts and planets.
Astronomer named Aristarchus made 2 very important conclusions.
Sun was bigger than Greece saying it was 300 times bigger than earth- actually 1.3 million times bigger.
Planets revolve around sun- no on supported this; another astronomer said earth was at center- that theory was supported for the next 14 centuries.

Math and Physics-
Euclid- well known mathematician wrote a book, known for writing proofs.
Archimedes- came up with value of pi and also explained the law of lever, created a pulley to pull heavy objects.

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