"The Greeks in 300 B.C. knew the distance to the moon with about 5 percent accuracy."

[Ref6: Lick Recollections 2009]

Intellectual history of Greece as an evolution from mythos to logos

ephebic • \ih-FEE-bik\ • adjective. : of, relating to, or characteristic of a youth of ancient Greece or a young man.

Ancient statuary wasn't white as we often see now in museums, but was brightly colored. Statuary that was outside would have been sun bleached over time as well as subject to other weathering to mute or entirely remove color.

https://www.npr.org/2022/07/12/1109995973/we-know-greek-statues-werent-white-now-you-can-see-them-in-color

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gMqZR3pqMjg

Worth digging into some of the papers mentioned here (@2022-06-03)

Color terms in The Odyssey by William Gladstone

Nelson, Sarah E. “Persephone’s Seeds: Abortifacients and Contraceptives in Ancient Greek Medicine and Their Recent Scientific Appraisal.” Pharmacy in History 51, no. 2 (2009): 57–69.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/41112420

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/an-ancient-greek-astronomical-calculation-machine-reveals-new-secrets/

Overview and history of the Antikythera mechanism and the current state of research surrounding it.

Antikythera mechanism found in diving expedition in 1900 by Elias Stadiatis. It was later dated between 60 and 70 BCE, but evidence suggests it may have been made around 205 BCE.

Functions

One of the primary purposes of the device was to predict the positions of the planets along the ecliptic, the plane of the solar system.

The device was also used to track the positions of the sun and moon. This included the moon's phase, position and age (the number of days from a new moon). It also included the predictions of eclipses.

Used to track the motions of the 5 known planets including 289 synodic cycles in 462 years for Venus and 427 synodic cycles in 442 years for Saturn.

Risings and settings of stars indexed to a zodiac dial

Definitions

metonic cycle, a 19-year period over which 235 moon phases recur; named after Greek astronomer Meton, but discovered much earlier by the Babylonians. The Greeks refined it to a 76 year period.

saros cycle, the 223 month lunar cycle which was used by the Babylonians to predict eclipses. A dial on the Antikythera mechanism was used to predict the dates of the solar and lunar eclipses using this cycle.

synodic events: conjunctions with the sun and its stationary points

People

Archimedes - potentially the designer of an early version of the Antikythera mechanism

Elias Stadiatis - diver who discovered the Antikythera mechanism

Albert Rehm - German philologist who the numbers 19, 76 and 223 inscribed on fragments of the device in the early 1900s

Derek J. de Solla Price, published Gears from the Greeks in 1974. Identified the gear train and developed a complete model of the gearing.

Michael Wright - 3D x-ray study in 1990 using linear tomography; identified tooth counts of the gears and understood the upper dial on the back of the device

Tony Freeth - author of article and researcher whose made recent discoveries.

In antiquity, the customary cosmological order of the celestial bodies was: moon, Mercury, Venus, sun, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn.

Parmenides of Elea developed a process reported by Plato for combining the known period relations of planets to get better ones.

Shelley probably means the great fifth-century Greek tragedies, such as Sophocles' Antigone, Oedipus the King and others.

Theseus was the mythical king and founder-hero of Athens. Plutarch's Life of Theseus makes use of varying accounts of the death of the Minotaur, Theseus' escape, and the love of Ariadne for Theseus.

Solon (c.  638 – c.  558 BC) was an Athenian poet, statesman, and lawmaker. In Plutarch's telling, he is particularly notable for his efforts to legislate against political, economic, and moral decline in pre-Socratic Athens.

Victor refers to the Greeks' long retreat from Armenia in Xenophon's Anabasis: "And when all had reached the summit [having made it], then indeed they fell to embracing one another, and generals and captains as well, with tears in their eyes" (4.7).

Lycurgus (c. 820 BC) was the legendary reformer of Sparta. He established the military-oriented reformation of Spartan society, and promoted the three Spartan virtues: equality (among citizens, at least), austerity, and military fitness.

In ancient Greece it was common practice to enslave entire populations of a conquered nation. Greece was conquered by the Romans in 146 CE.