Natural conditions and population of Ancient Greece. Sources on the history of Ancient Greece. Periodization of Greek history. Sources on the history of ancient Greece Features of sources on the history of ancient Greece

Everything that directly reflects the historical process and on the basis of which an idea of ​​the past of human society, of its material and spiritual life is created, be it a tool, a weapon, the ruins of a building, an inscription - all this is historical sources.

Sources, as is known, are divided into written and material.

1. Material sources .

On the territory of Greece, the Aegean Sea and a number of other Mediterranean countries, remains of ancient Greek settlements have been preserved. They attract the attention of researchers. Scientists and archaeologists carried out excavations in many places. As a result, many tools, weapons, jewelry, and works of art were collected. These material monuments play a very important role in the study of other Greece.

Many ruins of ancient Greek buildings have been preserved: fortress walls, temples, public buildings, residential buildings, etc.

Archival monuments are valuable because they allow one to obtain information about agriculture and crafts of antiquity.

Archival research 19th – 20th centuries discovered for historical science the most ancient Cretan period in the history of ancient Greece. Until the 70s of the 19th century. only the history from the 8th to the 4th centuries BC was known. Archaeologist Heinrich Schliemen carried out excavations where, according to legend, the city of Troy was located.

Research was continued in English. Archaeologist Evans, who carried out excavations on the island of Crete. He discovered the culture of the population of Crete, existing in the 3rd - 2nd thousand BC.

WITH 30 years Greek and America archaeologists discovered and studied the ruins of a large palace on the southwestern coast of the Peloponnese, on the site of the ancient city of Pylos.

IN 70s Zh.I. Cousteau examined the ruins of ancient settlements located on the seabed, near the coast of Crete and Santoria (another Fera).

Consequences of archaeological excavations:

Thanks to the use of archival material, it became possible to write a detailed history of the Greek colonization of the Northern Black Sea region and the Bosporan kingdom;

A new branch of archiology has also developed - underwater archeology;

A part of the Greek city of Phanagoria that settled in the sea was explored.

2. Inscriptions, ostraca and papyri .

The vast majority of inscriptions are in ancient Greek, but during excavations on the island of Crete, as well as Mycenae and Pylos, inscriptions were discovered in a special script, which was called linear. Upon closer examination, it turned out that there are 2 types. Apparently, it is written in 2 different languages. The more ancient one, found in Crete, is called Linear A. It is written in the language of the most ancient inhabitants of Crete. The second letter, found not only in Crete, but also in Mycenae and Pylos, Linear B, is written in one of the ancient dialects of the Greek language.

Sometimes valuable materials are provided by short inscriptions (notes) on clay pots - sharps.

In addition to inscriptions on stones, wood, and metal, papyri are an important source. They were preserved in dry places and date back to the Hellenistic era and later times. These are financial reports, promissory notes, private letters, government letters, etc. In addition, papyri were found on which artistic and historical works were written. The most famous of the works is Aristotle's work "The Athenian Polity", which was considered lost.

Resolutions of Hellenistic rulers, financial reporting documents, decrees are a valuable source for studying the economy of Hellenistic states, and also contain information about their political system and life in the 3rd - 1st centuries. BC.

3.Coins.

The study of coins provides a large amount of information both on economics, culture and ideology.

4. Written sources .

These sources are varied - these are the works of Greek historians, playwrights, poets, speeches of orators, poems and myths.

Ch. written sources on the history of Greece are the works of ancient historians.

At the beginning, works considered historical combined several genres: historical, geographical, ethnographic; they also included myths. These first works contained descriptions of the then known circle of lands, individual regions of the Greek world, genealogies and very briefly covered the events of the time close to them or did not touch upon them at all. The authors of these works were called lotographers (in Greek “logos” - word and “grapho” - write). They lived in the 6th-5th centuries. BC. In their writings there is no scientifically critical assessment of the material, but there is already a rational approach to explaining individual events of mythological time. Representatives of lotographers:

A) Hecataeus, who wrote "Earth Description" and "Genealogy" and

B) Hellanicus, who wrote an essay on the history of Athens and several “Genealogies”

A work of historical character:

IN) Herodotus“History” is dedicated to the Greco-Persian wars. Herodotus also described those countries and peoples that he visited himself or about which he learned something, in his opinion, worthy of mention.

G) Thucydides"History" is dedicated to the Peloponnesian War. But it was not possible to finish the work, because... the author died.

The genre of historical prose became widespread in the 4th century. BC e.

D) Xenophon left several historical works, one of them - “Greek History”, continues the work of Thucydides. But unlike the latter, Xenophon was not a supporter of Athenian democracy. This work is dedicated to the latest events of the Peloponnesian War. But the essay was weak, because... imbued with the desire to describe the superiority of Sparta and its political system over Athens. Other works of Xenophon - “Memoirs of Socrates”, “Domostroy”, “On Income”, etc. contain important information on the foreign policy history of Greece, its economy, social political and cultural life. These works are easy and simple.

E) Filisov Aristotle, the work "The Athenian Polity". He studied the political structure of states of that time. He wrote 158 polities, i.e. descriptions of the political structure of individual states. Only the Athenian Polity has reached us.

G) historian Polybius wrote “General History”, of which only 1/3 has reached us. He studied the events, established the causal relationship of the phenomena and was accurate in his descriptions. He depicted the era when Rome captured the Mediterranean, the struggle of the Hellenistic states with Rome.

AND) Diodorus Siculica."Historical Library"

TO) Plutarch“Comparative Life Descriptions,” where he first described the biography of a famous Greek figure, then the biography of a Roman figure similar to him. At the end, he compared these individuals and talked about their similarities and differences.

K) In addition to the works of famous historians, some historical works have been preserved, whose authors are unknown. These include pseudo-Xenophon's "Athenian Polity". This book provides a critical analysis of the system of Athenian slave-owning democracy. The author of Politia is an opponent of Athenian democracy. He criticizes it from the point of view of an aristocrat or oligarch. Nevertheless, he quite rightly points out a number of dark sides of the Athenian state, such as its attitude towards its allies.

M) Homer"Iliad" and "Odyssey"

N) the speeches of the speakers played a big role. The speeches were judicial and political. Judicial speeches are very important Lisia, which characterize trade, especially bread, and describe the activities of merchants of that time.

O) works of ancient geographers. Especially a lot of information is contained in the works of the geographer Strabo. In his work “Geography” he talks about the life and history of various countries, their nature.

P) Pausanias in the “Description of Hellas” he depicts ancient monuments, while producing various legends and reporting events unknown from other sources.

Related information.

The data from written sources is largely supplemented by numerous material monuments that have survived to this day from all periods of the history of Ancient Greece. The discovery of physical monuments through excavations, their preservation, restoration and study constitute the subject of archaeology. Studying archaeological sites provides historians with numerous information on the history of crafts, art, trade and political relations, the history of everyday life and religion. For the most part, we do not find this information in written sources.

Archaeological sites are the remains of ancient cultures that are found during excavations. These include the ruins of ancient cities and settlements, the tools and household items found in them, as well as ancient graves, where, in addition to the dead, various objects were placed.

Archaeological studies have shown that in most cases the ancient Greek city consisted of an acropolis (kremlin) with temples and public buildings, and a lower city, which, along with residential and craft quarters, included a main square (agora), which served as a place of public meetings and a market .

Excavations of residential areas of Greek cities have yielded interesting information about the social and economic status of their inhabitants. The study of the agora in many cities brought especially significant results: usually in this square the Greeks placed statues of honored citizens and steles with the texts of laws and regulations. During excavations, many remains of these steles and statues were found.

Very interesting are the tools of the ancient Greeks discovered during excavations of cities and villages, usually quite primitive, which was due to the use of slave labor. Archaeological research also introduced us to the development of various crafts among the Greeks. Now many details of ancient metallurgy are clear - mining of ore, smelting of metal, manufacturing of metal products by forging and casting. Ceramic production is also known in detail thanks to the excavations of numerous large and small ceramic kilns and the finds of a mass of various pottery products: vessels, tiles, water pipes, terracotta figurines and other clay products.

Drawings on expensive dishes and on clay tablets introduce us to other Greek crafts (weaving, leatherworking, etc.), as well as to the labor of Greek peasants. Some vase paintings indicate the plight of the slave in Greek society. Lead weights and images of scales on vases that have survived to this day enrich our understanding of Greek trade, the significant development of which is evidenced by numerous finds of handicrafts and coins in various areas of the ancient world.

The history of many wars that took place in ancient times was vividly described by ancient historians. The weapons of Greek hoplites found by archaeologists - helmets, armor, shields, leggings, remains of swords and spears - allow the modern reader to more clearly understand the events that took place.

The monuments of art, sculpture and architecture are especially diverse, testifying to the significant cultural level of ancient society.

A large number of archaeological sites were found during excavations of ancient cemeteries - necropolises. Since the ancient Greeks believed in afterlife, then they put the things they needed in the graves of the dead: a child - his toys, a warrior - his weapons, a woman - her jewelry. Particularly interesting are the tombstones, which often featured relief portraits of the deceased and carved out the names of the deceased, sometimes with poetic epitaphs.

The peculiarity of archaeological sites is that they are silent sources, they are things, not stories. The archaeologist is therefore in a more difficult position than the historian working with the text of ancient authors or inscriptions. But at the same time, archaeological sources have a great advantage: they are objective witnesses of ancient life, while every story of an ancient historian more or less bears the stamp of subjective assessments, bias, and class limitations.

Due to the great importance of material monuments, without which a correct understanding of Greek history is impossible, we consider it absolutely necessary to acquaint the reader with the results of excavations of the most important Greek centers, as well as ancient cities of the Northern Black Sea region.

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Sources on the history of Ancient Greece

Plan

Introduction

1. Sources on the history of Crete and Achaean Greece of the 2nd millennium BC. e.

2. Sources on the history of archaic and classical Greece

3. Sources on the history of Greece during the Hellenistic period

Introduction

Modern researchers have at their disposal numerous sources of various categories. These are primarily written materials (historical works, works of fiction and scientific literature, journalism, speeches of speakers, legal documents, letters, business documents and many more etc.), monuments of material culture, mainly obtained during archaeological excavations (city ruins, remains of fortifications, public buildings, residential buildings, tombs, temples, tools, weapons, everyday items, etc.), material from ethnographic observations (study of ancient customs, institutions, rituals), a large number of different inscriptions, coins. Information about the distant past can be gleaned by analyzing the structure of the vocabulary of the ancient Greek language and oral traditions folk art(recorded folklore materials).

1. Sources on the history of Crete and Achaean GreeceIImillennium BC e.

The few sources of this time are divided into three main categories: written monuments written in syllabary B, data from archaeological excavations of cities and settlements, and information on the history of the 2nd millennium BC. e., preserved in the works of Greek authors of later times.

Tablets written in letter B were found during excavations in Crete by A. Evans in 1901, but only in 1953 did the English scientist M. Ventris decipher the incomprehensible language of the inscriptions. Currently, several thousand tablets written in letter B are known. They were found in the ruins of Knossos on Crete, during excavations in the cities of Pylos, Mycenae, Thebes, Tiryns, but most of all (over 90% of all texts) were discovered in the archives of Knossos and Pylos. The vast majority of tablets date from the 14th to 12th centuries. BC e. The inscriptions are very brief and represent mainly business reporting documents. They contain information about the leasing of land, the number of heads of livestock, the distribution of food to workers and service personnel; often these are lists of slaves and slaves employed in certain services of the palace, lists of artisans and a list of raw materials with them; lists of soldiers and sailors subject to mobilization, as well as an inventory of confiscated property. The tablets provide information about the functioning of the palace economy, about the relationship between the palace and lower administrative units, about the administration of the state as a whole, which allows us to present the main features of the management and economy of the Achaean kingdoms of the second half of the 2nd millennium BC. e.

In addition to the tablets found in the palace archives, inscriptions consisting of abbreviations of individual words, painted or scratched on the walls of clay vessels, and individual letters on seals placed on clay stoppers and tags have been preserved.

Archaeological excavations provide a wide variety of information about material culture. The most important finds were discovered during excavations of extensive palace complexes: in Knossos and Phaistos on the island. Crete, Mycenae and Pylos in the Peloponnese. Numerous rooms, a complex layout of the palaces, including luxurious apartments, reception halls, temple rooms, craft workshops, storerooms, a huge number of different everyday items and a variety of weapons give an idea of ​​the rich and intense life of these centers of the largest monarchies of the 2nd millennium BC. e.

Of great interest is the discovery of enlarged settlements at the end of the 3rd millennium BC. e. in Lerna (in the northern Peloponnese) and in Rafina (in Attica), where a bronze foundry was discovered. In the second half of the 2nd millennium BC. e. Around the palaces in Mycenae, Pylos, Athens, Thebes, settlements appeared in which artisans and merchants lived.

Examples of rural settlements where the bulk of the Achaean population lived are the settlements/excavated at Koraku (near Corinth), at Zigouries (near Mycenae), and the necropolis of one of the rural settlements in Attica in Sparta. The remains of modest dwellings, complex public buildings, and megaron-type premises were found here. The impressive size of individual buildings, the finds of a large amount of ceramics, including painted ones, as well as bronze and gold items, indicate a process of property stratification among the rural population of the second half of the 2nd millennium BC. e.

Some information about the history of the Achaean and Cretan kingdoms is contained in the late Greek tradition. In Homer's poems "Iliad" and "Odyssey", compiled in the 9th-8th centuries. BC e., not only living memories of the recent past, in particular about the events of the Trojan War, have been preserved, but also entire songs and tales composed in the Achaean era. The poems correctly reflect the political situation in Greece on the eve of the Trojan War, in particular the predominance of Mycenae, the main allies and opponents of the Greeks, the very course of the Trojan War and its results. Homer’s poems convey many realities of the Achaean time: descriptions of a number of household items (for example, the Cup of Nestor), types of weapons, the design of war chariots, fighting techniques, etc.

In the works of Greek authors of the V--IV centuries. BC e. (Herodotus, Thucydides, Aristotle) ​​and subsequent centuries (Strabo, Plutarch, Pausanias), some vague memories of the glorious past of the Greeks, the power of the Cretan king Minos, his creation of a vast power, high culture that time. Quite diverse, although very difficult to study, material about the history and culture, customs and religion of the Greeks of the 2nd millennium BC. e. contained in numerous legends and myths of the Greeks about gods and heroes: about the glorious Athenian hero Theseus, who freed Athens from the cruel power of the Cretan king Minos, about the great Hercules, who served the cowardly king of Tiryns Eurystheus, about the voyage of the Greek heroes led by Jason on the ship "Argo" "to the distant shores of Colchis, etc. A thorough critical study of the content of these legends and myths allows us to separate real facts from fiction and expand our knowledge about the history of Greece in the 2nd millennium BC. e.

A small amount of data, mainly about the foreign policy situation of the Cretan and Achaean kingdoms, is contained in ancient Eastern monuments. In particular, some Hittite inscriptions of the XIV-XIII centuries. BC e. mention the alliance of the Hittites with the state of Ahhiyawa, located in the western part of Asia Minor. Some Egyptian things from the middle of the 2nd millennium BC. e. (scarabs, amulets, beads, even a diorite figurine of an Egyptian with the inscription of his name User) was found in Crete. Crete (Keftiu) is mentioned in some inscriptions of Pharaoh Thutmose III as an equal ally of the powerful Egyptian kingdom.

2. Sources on the history of archaic and classical Greece

crete greece excavation archaeological

The total number and variety of sources for studying the history of Greece VIII-IV centuries. BC e. increases sharply. Written sources of various genres are presented with particular completeness.

The earliest written sources were the epic poems attributed to the blind storyteller Homer - the Iliad and the Odyssey. These works, considered the best examples of the epic genre of world literature, were compiled on the basis of numerous tales, legends, songs, and oral folk traditions dating back to Achaean times. However, the processing and reduction of these disparate parts into a single work of art occurred in the 9th-8th centuries. BC e. It is possible that this work could have belonged to some brilliant storyteller, known to us under the name of Homer. Poems were transmitted orally for a long time, but in the 7th-6th centuries. BC e. were written down, and the final editing and recording of the poems was carried out in Athens under the tyrant Pisistratus in the middle of the 6th century. BC e.

Each poem consists of 24 books. The plot of the Iliad is one of the episodes of the tenth year of the Trojan War, namely a quarrel in the Greek camp between the commander of the Greek army, King Agamemnon of Mycenae, and Achilles, the leader of one of the Thessalian tribes. Against this background, Homer gives a detailed description of the military actions of the Greeks and Trojans, the structure of the military camp and weapons, the control system, the appearance of cities, the religious views of the Greeks and Trojans, and everyday life.

The poem "Odyssey" tells about the adventures of the king of Ithaca, Odysseus, who was returning to his native Ithaca after the destruction of Troy. The gods subject Odysseus to numerous trials: he falls to the ferocious Cyclops, guides the ship past the monsters Scylla and Charybdis, escapes from the cannibals of the Laestrygonians, rejects the spell of the sorceress Kirka, who turns people into pigs, etc. Homer shows his hero in different situations of peaceful life, which allows him to characterize its most diverse aspects: economic activities, everyday life royal palace and estates, relationships between those in power and the poor, customs, particulars of everyday life. However, in order to use the data from Homer’s poems to reconstruct the historical reality reflected in them, the most careful and painstaking analysis is required. After all, each of the poems is, first of all, a work of art in which poetic fiction and historical truth are mixed in the most bizarre way. In addition, the poems were created and edited over several centuries, and therefore they reflected different chronological layers: the life and customs of the Achaean kingdoms, social relations of the so-called Homeric time (XI-IX centuries BC) and, finally, the time of compilation of the poems (IX--VIII centuries BC).

Valuable information about agriculture, hard peasant labor and rural life can be obtained from the poem “Works and Days” by the Boeotian poet Hesiod (the turn of the 8th-7th centuries BC). He also owns another poem - “Theogony”, which describes in detail the religious views of the Greeks, the origin of the gods, their genealogy and relationships.

To study the socio-political struggle that unfolded in Greek society in the 7th-6th centuries. BC e., important data are given in the political elegies of Greek poets - Archilochus from Paros, Solon from Athens, Theognis from Megara. They realistically describe the plight of the poor, the acute hatred of the demos for the aristocracy, talk about expulsions and confiscations, and the miserable life of wanderers far from their hometown.

One of the most important sources is the writings of ancient Greek historians. Unlike poets, in whose works it is difficult to separate artistic fiction from reality, historians strive to give a true story and select actual facts. The first Greek historians were the so-called logographers, of whom the most famous are Hecataeus from Miletus (540-478 BC) and Hellanicus from Mytilene (480-400 BC). Logographers described the ancient history of their native cities. Due to the lack of data, they turned to myths, trying to rationalistically interpret the information contained there. The critical analysis of the mythological tradition carried out by logographers was rather superficial, and therefore many of the facts they cited should not be trusted.

Logographers were not limited to just interpreting mythological tradition. In their works they included completely reliable information of a geographical and ethnographic nature, obtained during their travels to various Greek cities and countries of the Eastern Mediterranean. In the works of logographers, myth and reality differed little and this determined the limited significance of their works. The writings of the logographers survive only in small fragments.

The first actual historical research was the work of Herodotus of Halicarnassus (485-425 BC), who was called in ancient times the “father of history.” Herodotus was born into a wealthy family, received a good education, took part in the political struggle in his city, and was expelled by his victorious opponents. While in exile, Herodotus traveled a lot, visited almost all the countries of the withdrawn colonies; the so-called stele of the founders of the Greek colony of Cyrene about their relationship with the metropolis of Feroi, inscriptions about the division of lands and the allocation of them to colonists in two Locridian policies (end of VI - beginning of V) can serve as reference. century BC).

There are many lengthy inscriptions regulating the relations between Athens and its allies, for example the resolution of the Athenian National Assembly on the status of the city of Erythra in the union (60s of the 5th century BC) and the city of Chalkis (445 BC). ). The inscriptions about the legally established contributions of various cities of the First Athenian Maritime League from 454 to 425 BC are very informative. e. By the end of the 4th century. BC e. refers to a very important inscription from Chersonese (modern Sevastopol), the so-called Chersonese oath about the state structure of Chersonese.

Thanks to the successes of numismatics, the importance of coins as a historical source is currently increasing. Found in very large quantities (several thousand coins are found every year), they represent mass material that can be subjected to statistical processing. Studying the weight of coins, the symbols and signs on them, inscriptions, the composition of coin hoards, the distribution of coins allows us to obtain information of a very diverse nature (about monetary circulation, commodity production, trade and political relations of cities, religious views, cultural events, etc. ). The most complete publications of available coin collections are the catalogs of the British Museum, as well as a summary of all Greek coin hoards, which was undertaken by the American Numismatic Society in 1973.

The enormous material from archaeological excavations, which is growing year by year, is the most important source of knowledge about the most diverse aspects of the life of Greek society. Hundreds of archaeological expeditions work annually on the territory of Greece, other countries of the Mediterranean and the Black Sea region, carrying out large-scale work. The archaeological material is very diverse: entire cities have been discovered (excavations of Olynthos, Chersonese Tauride, Corinth), pan-Greek sanctuaries (temple complexes in honor of Apollo in Delphi and Delos), the famous religious and sports complex in Olympia (discovered during excavations in 1876-1881). 130 sculptures, 1000 inscriptions, 6000 coins, several thousand bronze objects, not counting the foundations of many buildings).

Interesting data were obtained from the study of individual complexes, for example, during excavations of the potters' quarter in Athens and the Athenian central square - the agora, the study of the Athenian Acropolis, the theater in Epidaurus, the necropolis in Tanagra and other similar complexes. Hundreds of thousands of things for various purposes were discovered here - tools, weapons, everyday items.

Constant archaeological research is carried out in the Greek cities of the Northern Black Sea region, in the cities of Olbia (including Berezan), Chersonese Tauride, Panticapaeum, Phanagoria and many others.

3. Sources on the history of Greece during the Hellenistic period

The number of sources dating to this time increases compared to the previous period, and new categories of sources appear, for example, documents written on papyri that were discovered during excavations in Egypt.

From historical works that provide a coherent account of the events of Hellenistic history with a certain author’s concept, with verification of facts, as far as it was possible then, highest value have the works of Polybius and Diodorus. Polybius (200-118 BC) is one of the outstanding Greek historians. In his youth, he was involved in active political activities in the Achaean League, after the defeat of Macedonia at Pydna in 168 BC. e. he was transferred to Rome as a hostage and lived there until his death. In Rome, Polybius became close to a number of major political figures, in particular with Scipio Aemilian, and was aware of all government affairs of the Roman Republic, i.e., the entire Mediterranean. Polybius traveled a lot. He was in Egypt, Asia Minor, Roman Africa, Spain, and traveled around the entire Atlantic coast of Africa and Spain. Polybius was a well-informed historian, had access to state archives, and met with many eyewitnesses of historical events. His work details the history of the Greek and Roman world from 220 to 146 BC. e., contains valuable information about public finances, military affairs, socio-political clashes, and the structure of many states. The author developed in his work a well-thought-out theory of historical development in the form of repeating cycles in which there is a natural and logical degeneration of the main state forms(monarchies into aristocracies, aristocracies into democracies).

In the “Historical Library” of Diodorus Siculus (1st century BC), consisting of 40 books, books I - V, XVIII - XX are fully preserved, in which, in addition to the history of classical Greece (V - IV centuries BC BC) describes in detail the struggle of the Diadochi, the history of the reign of the tyrant Agathocles in Sicily and other events of early Hellenistic history (before 30 BC). Diodorus used reliable sources, and his factual material is of great value. Along with military-political events, Diodorus also covers the economic situation of the warring parties, for example Egypt and Rhodes, and briefly reports on social clashes.

The richest information of the most varied content is given in Strabo’s “Geography” (64/63 BC - 23/24 AD). Strabo's work is not so much geography in the generally accepted sense as an encyclopedic guide to practical needs government controlled. Therefore, Strabo most carefully describes not only geographical position, climate, natural resources, but also the peculiarities of the economic life of each region, government structure, the most significant political events, cultural attractions. Most of Strabo's voluminous work (12 books out of 17) is devoted to a description of the Greek world. In Strabo's books there is quite a lot of information relating to archaic and classical times, but the most information is given precisely on the Hellenistic period of Greek history.

The works of Plutarch, especially his biographies of the largest Greek and Roman political figures of the 3rd-1st centuries, are of great value for early Hellenistic history. BC e. In total, Plutarch describes the biographies of 9 prominent Greeks, including Alexander and Pyrrhus. Plutarch gives a biography of both Hellenistic kings and political figures of various Greek city states. Biographies of Plutarch are compiled on the basis of numerous, carefully selected sources, many of which have not reached our time, and contain a wealth of material on the political history, religion and culture of the early Hellenistic era. In general, the biographies of Hellenistic figures were written by Plutarch with greater care and accuracy than the biographies of the Greeks of the archaic and classical periods.

Unique in its wealth of material for reconstructing the cultural history of Greece of all eras, including archaic, classical and Hellenistic, is the work of Pausanias (2nd century AD) “Description of Hellas.” Pausanias's work consists of 10 books, historical inscriptions edited by Toda, also a collection of historical inscriptions edited by Moretti (in 1967-1975) and a number of other publications. Collections of inscriptions from some regions have been published, for example, a collection of Greek and Latin inscriptions from the Northern Black Sea region, prepared by V.V. Latyshev in 1885-1916, vol. I, II, IV. Numismatic material is constantly being replenished, numbering up to several hundred thousand different coins. Hundreds of archaeological expeditions from many countries around the world are conducting intensive and fruitful excavations of various centers of Hellenistic societies.

Different categories of sources complement each other. For example, the history of the Greco-Bactrian kingdom is largely known on the basis of numismatic materials and archaeological excavations. The discovery of such interesting and rich cities as Dura-Europos on the Euphrates and Ai-Khanum in Northern Afghanistan (the ancient name of this city is unknown) has expanded our information on the history of urban planning, military fortification, urban life and economy, social and political relations," culture Seleucid state, although there is practically no evidence of these cities in literary sources.

A new category of sources for the study of Hellenistic history, especially the Egyptian Ptolemaic kingdom, are numerous texts on papyri. To date, over 250 thousand different papyrus finds from Egypt are known, and their processing is carried out by a special scientific discipline - papyrology. Among the papyrological documents, entire historical and artistic works were discovered, for example, Aristotle’s treatise “The Athenian Polity”; a historical work describing Greek history of the first half of the 4th century. BC e. (the so-called Oxyrhynchian historian), many comedies of Menander, texts of Homer, etc. The contents of this huge collection of papyri are extremely diverse: royal orders, laws, literary works, accounts, economic contracts, marriage contracts, correspondence, student exercises, petitions, religious texts, resolutions of various assemblies, etc. The papyri characterize the internal life of Ptolemaic Egypt with such completeness that we do not have for any Hellenistic society. Currently, Egyptian papyri have been collected and published in multi-volume series. The largest are multi-volume collections of papyri from Tebtyunis, Oxyrhynchus, Ghibelen, the publication of Zeno's archive and many others.

In general, numerous and varied sources on the history of various periods of Greek history make it possible to show the main directions of development of ancient Greek society - from initial stages the formation of a class slave-owning society and state before the conquest of the Greek city-states and Hellenistic states by Rome.

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The main features of the city-states of Ancient Greece, the formation of a slave society in the middle of the first millennium BC. Studying the history of Ancient Athens in the 5th century BC, features of political and cultural life, crisis of religious consciousness.

abstract, added 11/28/2010


The origin of the main centers of civilization. Creto-Mycenaean, Homeric, Archaic and Classical periods of the economic history of Ancient Greece. Periods in development Ancient Rome. Economic structure of the Italian village. Domestic trade throughout Italy.

abstract, added 02/22/2016


The emergence of class society, state and civilization on Greek soil. The division of the history of Ancient Greece into two large eras: the Mycenaean (Crito-Mycenaean) palace and ancient polis civilization. The culture of Hellas, the "dark ages" and the ancient period.

abstract, added 12/21/2010


Acquaintance with the features of the emergence of new spectacular competitions. The Olympic Games of Ancient Greece as the largest sports competitions of antiquity, analysis of the history of creation. General characteristics of modern Olympic Games, analysis of the stages of formation.

Sources on the history of Ancient Greece