|
MWF 9:00 AM-10:00, 180 Tappan Hall Art and Archaeology of
Greek Colonization
The 8th and 7th centuries saw Greeks migrating from their home cities and countrysides to new settlements in many corners of the Mediterranean world. They went south to Egypt and Libya, north to unoccupied tracts of Thrace, yet further north to explore the coasts of the Black Sea and its thoroughgoing of these new settlements were perhaps in Sicily and South Italy where new Greek cities came to rival the cities of their motherland in size, power, splendor and wealth. How accurate is it to describe such movements of peoples as "Greek colonization?" What were the motives which drove these Greeks to abandon their homes and settle overseas? What criteria governed their choice of a place to settle? How did they treat the indigenous peoples they encountered? What rituals tied them to their mother cities? What architectural manifestations came to characterize their cities and sanctuaries? What innovations in sculpture and vase painting may be attributed to them? What provisions were made for public nees in the urban plans, and how did sanctuaries function in the countryside in other than the obvious in religious terms? Sanctuaries as centers of exchange and communication, as expressions of community identity and social cohesion, and as symbols of cultural growth will be one of the topics to be pursued; cemeteries and burial rites as indexes of social status will be another. The morphology of colonies in North Africa will be compared with that of those in the West, and their contributions to cultural developments assessed. (Pedley, John) |
Back to Winter 1999 Course Listings