Hoplites were citizen-soldiers of Ancient Greek city-states who were primarily armed with spears and shields. Hoplite soldiers used the phalanx formation to be effective in war with fewer soldiers. The formation discouraged the soldiers from acting alone, for this would compromise the formation and minimize its strengths. The hoplites were primarily represented by free citizens – propertied farmers and artisans – who were able to afford a linen armour or a bronze armour suit and weapons. Most hoplites were not professional soldiers and often lacked sufficient military training. Some states maintained a small elite professional unit, known as the epilektoi ("chosen") since they were picked from the regular citizen infantry. These existed at times in Athens, Argos, Thebes, and Syracuse, among others. Hoplite soldiers made up the bulk of ancient Greek armies.
In Greek mythology, Amazonomachy was one of various mythical battles between the ancient Greeks and the Amazons, a nation of all-female warriors. Many of the myths portrayed were that of Heracles' ninth labor, which was the retrieval of the girdle of Hippolyta, Queen of the Amazons; and of Theseus' abduction of Hippolyta, whom he claimed as his wife, sparking the Attic War. Another famous scene portrayed is that of Achilles' victorious battle against Penthesilea during the Trojan war.
An aulos or tibia (Latin) was an ancient Greek wind instrument, depicted often in art and also attested by archaeology.
A peltast was a type of light infantryman, originating in Thrace and Paeonia, and named after the kind of shield he carried. Thucydides mentions the Thracian peltasts, while Xenophon in the Anabasis distinguishes the Thracian and Greek peltast troops. The peltast often served as a skirmisher in Hellenic and Hellenistic armies. In the Medieval period, the same term was used for a type of Byzantine infantryman.
Ancient Greek pottery, due to its relative durability, comprises a large part of the archaeological record of ancient Greece, and since there is so much of it, it has exerted a disproportionately large influence on our understanding of Greek society. The shards of pots discarded or buried in the 1st millennium BC are still the best guide available to understand the customary life and mind of the ancient Greeks. There were several vessels produced locally for everyday and kitchen use, yet finer pottery from regions such as Attica was imported by other civilizations throughout the Mediterranean, such as the Etruscans in Italy. There were a multitude of specific regional varieties, such as the South Italian ancient Greek pottery.
The phalanx was a rectangular mass military formation, usually composed entirely of heavy infantry armed with spears, pikes, sarissas, or similar pole weapons. The term is particularly used to describe the use of this formation in ancient Greek warfare, although the ancient Greek writers used it to also describe any massed infantry formation, regardless of its equipment. Arrian uses the term in his Array against the Alans when he refers to his legions. In Greek texts, the phalanx may be deployed for battle, on the march, or even camped, thus describing the mass of infantry or cavalry that would deploy in line during battle. They marched forward as one entity.
The sculpture of ancient Greece is the main surviving type of fine ancient Greek art as, with the exception of painted ancient Greek pottery, almost no ancient Greek painting survives. Modern scholarship identifies three major stages in monumental sculpture in bronze and stone: the Archaic, Classical (480–323) and Hellenistic. At all periods there were great numbers of Greek terracotta figurines and small sculptures in metal and other materials.
Warfare occurred throughout the history of Ancient Greece, from the Greek Dark Ages onward. The Greek 'Dark Ages' drew to an end as a significant increase in population allowed urbanized culture to be restored, which led to the rise of the city-states (Poleis). These developments ushered in the period of Archaic Greece. They also restored the capability of organized warfare between these Poleis. The fractious nature of Ancient Greek society seems to have made continuous conflict on this larger scale inevitable.
A salpinx was a trumpet-like instrument of the ancient Greeks.
Classical reenactment tends to focus on portrayals of the Greco-Roman world, and especially on modern recreations of Roman legions and ancient Greek hoplites.
The Chigi vase is a Proto-Corinthian olpe, or pitcher, that is the name vase of the Chigi Painter. It was found in an Etruscan tomb at Monte Aguzzo, near Veio, on Prince Mario Chigi’s estate in 1881. The vase has been variously assigned to the middle and late Proto-Corinthian periods and given a date of ca. 650–640 BC; it is now in the National Etruscan Museum, Villa Giulia, Rome. The vase stands 26 cm tall, which is modest compared to other Greek vases. Some three-quarters of the vase is preserved. It was found amidst a large number of potsherds of mixed provenance, including one bucchero vessel inscribed with five lines in two early Etruscan alphabets announcing the ownership of Atianai, perhaps also the original owner of the Chigi vase.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to ancient Greece:
The Painter of the Berlin Dancing Girl was an Apulian red-figure vase painter, who was active between 430–410 BC. He was named after a calyx krater in the collection of the Antikensammlung Berlin, which depicts a girl dancing to the aulos played by a seated woman.
Ancient Greek art stands out among that of other ancient cultures for its development of naturalistic but idealized depictions of the human body, in which largely nude male figures were generally the focus of innovation. The rate of stylistic development between about 750 and 300 BC was remarkable by ancient standards, and in surviving works is best seen in sculpture. There were important innovations in painting, which have to be essentially reconstructed due to the lack of original survivals of quality, other than the distinct field of painted pottery.
The theme of death within ancient Greek art has continued from the Early Bronze Age all the way through to the Hellenistic period. The Greeks used architecture, pottery, and funerary objects as different mediums through which to portray death. These depictions include mythical deaths, deaths of historical figures, and commemorations of those who died in war. This page includes various examples of the different types of mediums in which death is presented in Greek art.
The Arezzo 1465 vase is an Attic volute krater attributed to Euphronios, that dates to the Late Archaic period. It is a red-figure style vase, which became popular during the time of its making, and it was found in Arezzo, Italy in the Etruria region in 1465 due to the vast trade network stemming from Athens. The vase is currently housed in Arezzo, in the Museo Archeologico Nazionale.
The hoplites were soldiers from Ancient Greece who were usually free citizens. They had a very uniform and distinct appearance; specifically they were armed with a spear (dory) in their right hand and a heavy round shield in their left.
The calyx-krater by the artist called the "Painter of the Berlin Hydria" depicting an Amazonomachy is an ancient Greek painted vase in the red figure style, now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. It is a krater, a bowl made for mixing wine and water, and specifically a calyx-krater, where the bowl resembles the calyx of a flower. Vessels such as these were often used at a symposion, which was an elite party for drinking.
The gigantomachy by the Suessula Painter is a painting on a red-figure amphora from the Classical period of Greece. It is the work of the Suessula Painter, an Athenian vase-painter whose name is unknown. He worked in both Corinth and Athens and is recognizable by his style, with great freedom of posture and a unique shading of figures. Created around 410–400 BCE, this notable example of red-figure pottery stands 69.5 cm tall, 32 cm wide.
The Macmillan aryballos is a Protocorinthian pottery aryballos in the collection of the British Museum. Dating to about 640 BC, it is 6.9 cm high and 3.9 cm in diameter, and weighs 65 grams.
