Why was Ancient Greek society as influential as it was, on the rest of the world - Essay Example

?Why was Ancient Greek society as influential as it was, on the rest of the world? Greece is one of the oldest civilizations on earth. The ancient Greek civilization dates back to the Geometric period stretched from 900 to 700 B.C. It was the period when many seminal elements like big sanctuaries, Pan-Hellenic festivals and city states belonging to ancient Greek society were established. The classical Greek was mostly rocky and mountainous and colonized with many new states across the Mediterranean Sea (Ancient Greek Colonization, 2012). Greece as a society was a male dominated patriarchal society in nature where women did not had many rights. Their ranks were established in accordance of their husbands’ and fathers’. Most of the women in Athens were not entitled to reading, writing, ownership of property and right to politics. They were under the protection of their male counterparts, fathers and relatives. As we see in many states today those women have not been entitled to many rights, the influence seems to come from ancient Greece. The Greek society was actually divided between two types i.e. Citizens and Slaves. Citizens enjoyed all rights while slaves did not have right to property or families of their own while citizenship was only entitled to males of the city states who had freeborn parents (Ancient Greece and Rome, 2012). The Greeks has great influence on the intellectual history. They not only produced many philosophers but invented alphabets that led the foundations of modern day language. The alphabet was invented by the Semites of the Mediterranean coast, including the Hebrews and the Phoenicians, who did not used words to represent consonants instead they used simple drawings. The Phoenicians apparently passed it on to the Greeks.  The Greeks improved on the idea by inventing vowels, using some extra letters their language had no use for. The word alphabet is believed to be taken from two Greek words Alpha and Beta (Boeree, 2012). Classical Greek philosophy is the most important factor that strengthened the footings of modern day intellectual work. Greece produced the world famous philosophers like Socrates and Plato and Aristotle etc. Socrates revolutionized many areas of western thought introducing the fields of democracy, epistemology and ethics. Then his student Plato introduced the idea of spiritualism and the existence of God by understanding the manifestations of the material world. Aristotle then produced a new philosophy where he demonstrated that the world is what we can sense through our five senses (Rise of Western Culture & Philosophy, 2012). The ancient philosophy gave us the basis for modern day philosophy by providing metaphysics. Meta physics is a branch of philosophy that is concerned with the questions of what this world is made of and what is the substance of this reality named as world. Greek philosophy provides us with the ancient concepts that provide the basis for modern day knowledge of ethics, cynicism and hedonism, empiricism and epistemology. That’s why Ancient society has been so influential in its era to other societies but it also provides the basis for modern day knowledge to excel and intellectualism to prevail (Boeree, 2012). Greece is one of the most powerful societies ever that impacted rest of the world in the most influential way. Especially Greece influenced the west in the past and today the ideas of political systems working in United Nations of America are profoundly influenced by the Greek and Romans. The Ancient Greek umpire practiced the citizen based political participation. In an Assembly, all male citizens of the time used to gather to discuss about the issues and vote. As the participation in Assembly was paid and full democratic in nature so every citizen could have participated in the affairs of government. The modern day representative democratic style of government has been derived from Greece too where the Greek had a council and each tribe used to send about 50 citizens to the council from which a representative was chosen. The council had obligatory duty to set agendas for the Assembly and was also eligible to issue decrees on some of the issues. The idea of direct democracy is not only applicable today but shows the political vision of the Greek society and determine that why Greece has been so influential to the rest of the world. The modern day judicial system is also influenced from Greek. The People’s court had a jury formed from citizens to determine if the citizens were law breakers. The court had the right to punish or award a citizen with reference to special laws (Ancient Greece and Rome, 2012). The economic system of the ancient Greece was not as stretched as it is today. Agriculture was the basic means of bread and butter and as it was not possible for the Greek city-states to fulfill their needs from agriculture because they were unable to produce many of the items. The peninsulas were mountainous and could not produce enough wheat for satisfaction of their needs so they employed barter system to exchange goods with other states. Later on, the Greek introduced the minted coins that led the basis of trade of goods in exchange for money instead goods for goods. The city-states of Greece minted their own silver, bronze and gold coins for trading with other Mediterranean traders. Initially the coins were used for some large scale transactions, later on, it started to use on all levels. So, it was the Greek who led the basis for modern day economic system by introducing coins for exchanging and trading. The modern day taxation system has actually been credited to Greece. The taxation system although was not as systematic as it is today but the governments of the time levied taxes to slaves, livestock, houses and to the rich in the high need times specially financial crisis and war times (Ancient Greece and Rome, 2012). Olympics is the game that depicts that how influential has been Greece in the world history and how it has impacts on the world. It was a game played by different city states of Greece as a symbol to get united. As the wars were going on within different city states, they thought the common people should get united against the outer enemy. So, they organized the Olympic Games where all city states could have participated (Hill, 1823). They were held every four year in honor of Zeus, the king god. Today the world still celebrates this event and it is considered one of the biggest events in the world where all nations participate. Many things are still same e.g. opening and closing ceremonies and olive leaf crowns etc. It is a fact that despite great services and exemplary work that Greece produced for the world, the Greek are represented in classics departments as brutal who stole their work from black Egyptians and whatever they produced in philosophical terms was not their own. They were oppressors who suppressed women and slaves but claimed for a free and democratic society. But Bruce Thornton puts detailed analysis in the book “Greek Ways: How the Greeks Created Western Civilization” of how Greece produced such core ideas about human fate and purpose that today’s world still uses to understand the world in its true sense. It is Greece that contributed to the philosophical foundations to form the modern world of the day. The Greek does realized the horrors of war for which it has been criticized today and how it affected the lives of the people but alongside they realized how important war is and its frequent necessity to the greater good. Thornton discussed in detail about the sexual roles, politics, philosophy, war and slavery in Greece to overcome the speculations raised by some critics of the modern world (2000). Fletcher believes that Greece and Rome has contributed a lot to the welfare of humanity and dissemination of philosophical knowledge and every nation has been given some purpose by the creator on earth so they did theirs. If the thinkers and statesmen do the things for fulfilling the great plan of the God, they can exemplify themselves in the world as did Rome and Britain. Money and power can not alone exemplify a superior place in the world rather thinking is important that should be used for greater human welfare (1929). Greece has inspired the world because of its stupendous work in the field of philosophy, invention of alphabets that laid foundations of modern day languages and gave the political structure that the world exercise today as direct and representative democracy. It was the Greek who laid foundations for the modern world. This was the reason that the world was so influenced from the work of Greece and still today, its work is being used as a philosophical guideline all over the world and they are inspiration for rest of the world. Works Cited: Ancient Greek Colonization and Trade and their Influence on Greek Art. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Web. 30 Apr. 2012. Ancient Greece and Rome and Their Influence on Modern Western Civilization.Web. 19 Apr. 2012. . Boeree, Dr. George C. Ancient Greek Philosophy. My Webspace Files.Web. 30 Apr. 2012. . Fletcher, Robert Virgil. The Influence of Greece upon Our Modern Life; Read before the American Classical League at Atlanta, Ga., July 2, 1929. NY: Classical Association of the Middle West and South, 1930. Print Hill, Henry David. Essays on the Institutions, Government and Manners, of the States of Ancient Greece. London: Printed for Baldwin, Cradock and Joy, 1823. Print. Rise of Western Culture & Philosophy - Classical Greece. Worldology.Web. 20 Apr. 2012. . Thornton, Bruce S. Greek Ways: How the Greeks Created Western Civilization. San Francisco: Encounter, 2000. Print. Read More