Is ancient Greek history grand?

[John Harmonic]

Is ancient Greek history as grand as movies portray to be? The whole warrior culture thing, the Spartans and the Myrmidons from Homers Iliad as well as other stuff I have no idea about. There is a new game that came out called Assassins Creed: Odyssey and it has a lot of this warrior stuff and people wearing warrior clothing and all that stuff, lots of fighting lots of sailing. 

My question is really, is ancient Greece really "all that"?  

Also how comes Greeks now days are not not that good at sports if they had such a culture, Polynesians also had a warrior culture in the past and they are some of the most successful sports people.

Edited October 12, 2018 by John Harmonic

[Sensei]

1 hour ago, John Harmonic said:

Polynesians also had a warrior culture in the past and they are some of the most successful sports people.

Some Polynesians are successful sportsmen. Now they're infamous from having one of the largest obesity in the World..

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obesity_in_the_Pacific

 

Edited October 12, 2018 by Sensei

[John Harmonic]

Yeah I read that Polynesians have a gene that allows them to store lots of fat so when they go on ocean journey they don't starve.

[Silvestru]

1 hour ago, John Harmonic said:

Is ancient Greek history as grand as movies portray to be? The whole warrior culture thing, the Spartans and the Myrmidons from Homers Iliad as well as other stuff I have no idea about. There is a new game that came out called Assassins Creed: Odyssey and it has a lot of this warrior stuff and people wearing warrior clothing and all that stuff, lots of fighting lots of sailing. 

My question is really, is ancient Greece really "all that"?  

Also how comes Greeks now days are not not that good at sports if they had such a culture, Polynesians also had a warrior culture in the past and they are some of the most successful sports people.

No, in real life the Misthios was shorter and the animus was purple....
Don't learn ancient history from games but it's a good gateway to history.

Of course ancient Greece was all that and more but not in terms of game-play but in terms of the foundation of modern society and culture as we know it.... you know...stuff like that.

[John Harmonic]

I thought Christianity was the foundation of modern society and culture as we know it. Well for white man since it is through the Bible/Christianity that laws were established.

[Silvestru]

25 minutes ago, John Harmonic said:

I thought Christianity was the foundation of modern society and culture as we know it. Well for white man since it is through the Bible/Christianity that laws were established.

And where did you get this idea?  I mean if you would have said "religion" maybe I would not bring it up but what makes you think Christianity "established laws"?

The concept of "laws" was there far before Christianity. And what about let's say Japan, South Korea. Seem pretty evolved from many points of view. Would you say that they are not part of modern society because Christianity is as present there?

 

Quote

Ancient Egyptian law, dating as far back as 3000 BC, had a civil code that was probably broken into twelve books. It was based on the concept of Ma'at, characterised by tradition, rhetorical speech, social equality and impartiality.^[1] By the 22nd century BC, Ur-Nammu, an ancient Sumerian ruler, formulated the first extant law code, consisting of casuistic statements ("if... then..."). Around 1760 BC, King Hammurabi further developed Babylonian law, by codifying and inscribing it in stone. Hammurabi placed several copies of his law code throughout the kingdom of Babylon as stelae, for the entire public to see; this became known as the Codex Hammurabi. The most intact copy of these stelae was discovered in the 19th century by British Assyriologists, and has since been fully transliterated and translated into various languages, including English, German and French. Ancient Greek has no word for "law" as an abstract concept,^[2] retaining instead the distinction between divine law (thémis), human decree (nomos) and custom (díkē).^[3] Yet Ancient Greek law contained major constitutional innovations in the development of democracy.

 

Also I wanted to add that many see the Middle Ages (dark age especially) as a period of social regress dominated by religion. "Age of Faith"
Personally I think Christianity overall did slightly more bad than good but that is just my opinion.

19 minutes ago, Silvestru said:

Well for white man since it is through the Bible/Christianity that laws were established.

Also what do you mean "for white man"? You know where Christianity comes from right? It ain't from Wisconsin, Vermont, Amsterdam or Oslo, I'll tell you that.

I recommend you read more about ancient history and also stop using the phrase "white man". It's offensive.

Edited October 12, 2018 by Silvestru

[John Harmonic]

Ok you proven me wrong, thanks for the information.

[studiot]

Silvestru you know your history, good answers. +1

John

Not sure what you mean by 'grand' but Silvestru was right about one thing

The ancient Greeks did indeed lay the foundations of modern western society, even though they were still a slave owning culture.

Previous cultures, and many subsequent ones, were directed from the top down by some central authority - King, Emperor, general no good dictator whatever.

The bod at the top had well rewarded henchmen to keep order and extract the bulk of the wealth of his 'subjects', but usually the bod at the top in theory owned everything.

 

The ancient Greeks were the first rich culture to operate collective government, where the several bods at the top were only slightly better off than those they lead.
I won't say those under them since they were not secure and could be outvoted.

 

Another culture in History that successfully operated this system were the Vikings.

 

 

 

Edited October 12, 2018 by studiot