Greek Culture

Greek Culture

Greece has a history of thousands of years, and therefore, its culture developed and evolved throughout this period. Starting during the Ancient Era in Mycenae and Classical Greece, the culture further developed during the Byzantine Era, before falling under Ottoman and Venetian rule. Also influenced by the British Empire, the Greek culture was eventually renewed and revitalized after the Greek Revolution of 1821 and the slow and bumpy creation of the Modern Greek State.

Ancient Greece is considered the cradle of Western culture, democratic values and free speech. The Ancient Greeks made significant breakthroughs in many fields of science and philosophy, and they also developed important cultural means of expression, such as poetry, history, and drama. In architecture, buildings fall under one of three categories or orders, based on their aesthetics, the Doric, the Ionic and the Corinthian order. These orders were later adopted by the Romans and were adapted to their tastes, introducing new traits and ornaments and creating their own architectural orders. The Greek language, which is a member of the Indo – European family, emerged during the pre – historic Mycenaean civilization as the Linear B script and evolved to form the Attic Greek, which is very close to Modern Greek.

Greek literature is particularly rich and extends over almost three millennia. Its first recorded works, which are also the first in Western culture, are the epic poems of Homer and Hesiod during the 8th century BC. The Fables of Aesop were written two centuries later; theatrical plays were also first created in Ancient Greece, along with the development of the scientific means of recording history, as can be noted in the works of Herodotus and Thucydides. All of the above, along with many other literary works, had a remarkable contribution in the development of literature in Europe in general. Modern Greek literature was heavily influenced by the Greek Revolution of 1821, as well as the so – called acritic songs of Byzantium. During the 20th century, Greece was blessed with a number of key figures in literature, such as Cavafy, Seferis, Elytis and Kazantzakis.

During the antiquity, philosophical and scientific thinking developed considerably in Greece, by such important scholars as Thales, Democritus, Hippocrates, Thales of Miletus, Aristotle and Archimedes. The list is endless and the contribution of these personalities to the development of philosophy and science is immense. In modern times, there have also been many Greek scientists and scholars that have contributed significantly to science and technology, including Caratheodory, Kafatos, Papanikolaou and Issigonis.

Spanning over three millennia and receiving the influence of numerous other cultures and mentalities through the ages, the Greek culture is truly multi – faceted and unique in nature.