Greece

GeographyGreece is an archipelago, a series of small islands. Greece is also very mountainous. Because of these islands and mountains, there is very little cultural diffusion in Greece.

PolisGreece is made up of polis’, or city-states. Each of the city states are very different because there is no cultural diffusion. Two main polis’ are Athens and Sparta.

Athens

In Athens, the people focused on direct democracy, which was founded by Pericles. In direct democracy every adult male would vote. This took a long time, because a decision was not made until everyone voted. Women could not vote. In Athens, they focused on the individual, and education was important.

SpartaIn Sparta, everything was focused on the military and fighting. Men trained to go to war. Women has more rights in Sparta, because they gave birth to the soldiers. Babies that were weak or disabled were killed.

ReligionIn Greece, they practiced polytheism. This means they believed in many Gods. Some of the Gods they worshiped were Zeus, Posiedon, Athena, and Nike.

Alexander the GreatAlexander the Great was a great conqueror from Greece. He conquered the lands of Persia, Egypt, and India. As he conquered each land, he blended and spread the cultures of the others. The culture that Alexander the Great created was called Hellenistic culture. Hellenistic culture is a great example of cultural diffusion.

PhilosophersGreece has many philosophers such as Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. These philosophers encourages people to think and often asked the question, “Why?”.