Ancient Greece - Readings

Reading: The Funeral Oration.
"Our government does not copy our neighbors', but is an example to them."

"And, if I am to speak of womanly virtues to those of you who will henceforth be widows, let me sum them up in one short admonition: To a woman not to show more weakness than is natural to her sex is a great glory, and not to be talked about for good or for evil among men."

Pericles' great speech to re-affirm why Athens is at war (from Thucydides' History of the Peloponnesian War).

Reading: The Melian Dialogue.
"... the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must."

The Athenian give the Melians a dose of harsh city-state politics. (from Thucydides' History of the Peloponnesian War).

Reading: Socrates' Proposal for his Sentence. (second last section)

"And so he proposes death as the penalty. And what shall I propose on my part, O men of Athens? Clearly that which is my due... I say that maintenance in the Prytaneum is the just return."

The jury expects Socrates to beg that his sentence be reduced from death to exile. Instead, he argues for "maintenance in the Prytaneum*". (from: Plato's Apology).

*The Prytaneum was a public hall where dinners would be held for diplomats and Olympic Champions at the state's expense. Essentially, with his life on the line, Socrates proposes his punishment should be free dinners for life for the service he provides to Athens by asking difficult questions.

Reading: Rhampsinitus and the Thief
"As he spoke, the princess caught at him, but the thief took advantage of the darkness to hold out to her the hand of the corpse. Imagining it to be his own hand, she seized and held it fast; while the thief, leaving it in her grasp, made his escape by the door."

This is the story that amused me. It's a longer tale found a little more than halfway through Book II of Herodotus' The Histories. Search the text for the name Rhampsinitus (from Herodotus: The Histories).

The Roman Empire Timeline - handout now available

Thanks to the incredible archive.org the handout for the Roman empire lecture is now available. It will also be available at the lecture.

Page 1
The timeline really shows how much popular Roman history is concentrated in the transition from Republic to rule of the Emperors. As a sidenote -I'm really pleased with this timeline (begun in Microsoft Excel and completed in OpenOffice's Calc spreadsheet program).

Page 2
The write-up is a brief summary of the most famous stories from Roman history. It also includes a list of suggested readings.

*I had to extrapolate (read: make up) dates for the lifespans of Tarquinius Superbus, Lucretia, and Marcus Junius Brutus.

"God is dead."

Have you not heard of that madman who lit a lantern in the bright morning hours, ran to the market-place, and cried incessantly: "I am looking for God! I am looking for God!"

As many of those who did not believe in God were standing together there, he excited considerable laughter. Have you lost him, then? said one. Did he lose his way like a child? said another. Or is he hiding? Is he afraid of us? Has he gone on a voyage? or emigrated? Thus they shouted and laughed. The madman sprang into their midst and pierced them with his glances.

"Where has God gone?" he cried. "I shall tell you. We have killed him - you and I. We are his murderers. But how have we done this? How were we able to drink up the sea? Who gave us the sponge to wipe away the entire horizon? What did we do when we unchained the earth from its sun? Whither is it moving now? Whither are we moving now? Away from all suns? Are we not perpetually falling? Backward, sideward, forward, in all directions? Is there any up or down left? Are we not straying as through an infinite nothing? Do we not feel the breath of empty space? Has it not become colder? Is it not more and more night coming on all the time? Must not lanterns be lit in the morning? Do we not hear anything yet of the noise of the gravediggers who are burying God? Do we not smell anything yet of God's decomposition? Gods too decompose. God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. How shall we, murderers of all murderers, console ourselves? That which was the holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet possessed has bled to death under our knives. Who will wipe this blood off us? With what water could we purify ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we need to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we not ourselves become gods simply to be worthy of it? There has never been a greater deed; and whosoever shall be born after us - for the sake of this deed he shall be part of a higher history than all history hitherto."

Here the madman fell silent and again regarded his listeners; and they too were silent and stared at him in astonishment. At last he threw his lantern to the ground, and it broke and went out. "I have come too early," he said then; "my time has not come yet. The tremendous event is still on its way, still travelling - it has not yet reached the ears of men. Lightning and thunder require time, the light of the stars requires time, deeds require time even after they are done, before they can be seen and heard. This deed is still more distant from them than the distant stars - and yet they have done it themselves."

It has been further related that on that same day the madman entered divers churches and there sang a requiem. Led out and quietened, he is said to have retorted each time: "what are these churches now if they are not the tombs and sepulchres of God?"

Friedrich Nietzsche
The Gay Science (1882)