Aegean to Golden Age Culture

The Foundations of Classical Style

Minoan Art Fresco

Painting on a moist, plaster surface

Minoan Art

Priestess with Snakes1500 BCE

Mycenaean Architecture

Lion GateCitadel at Mycenae1250 BCE

Aegean Sculpture

Sounion KourosMarble590 BCE

Peplos KoreMarble525 BCE

Music

Instruments Aulos Lyre Kitharode

Terms Mousikê

(music) Melos

(melody) Harmonia

(harmony)

Pythagoras Monochord

2:1 Octave

3:2 Fifth

4:3 Fourth

The mathematical foundation for all music Western 12 tone Japanese 5 tone Arabic 17 tone

Stasimon Chorus from OrestesEuripides c. 408 BCE

Who was Orestes? Stasimon

An ode sung by the chorus

Context The women of

Argos are pleading for Orestes’ life.

Emotions Voices

“You wild goddesses who dart across the skies seeking vengeance for murder, we beg you to free Agamemnon’s son from his raging fury… We grieve for this boy. Happiness is brief among mortals. Sorrow and anguish sweep down on it like a swift gust of wind on a sail boat, and it sinks under the tossing seas.”

Stasimon Chorus from OrestesEuripides c. 408 BCE

Classical Style Order

If music was mathematical, then why not art? Proportion

Calculated body measurements Symmetry

Humanism Focus on human beings

Realism Faithful to nature

Idealism Perfection that surpasses nature

Classic Sculpture

Kritios BoyMarble480 BCE

Sounion KourosMarble590 BCE

Columns in Chicago

Doric Columns

Ionic Columns

Corinthian Columns