Great Ancient Greek / Roman Artists and
Scientists
(in chronological order)
Who were the ancient Greek and Roman artists and scientists that the authors of renaissance classics continuously harp on about? For your edification I present my glossary.
Homer
(8th C, BC.) Greek poet. Traditionally thought to be the author of
The Iliad (set in the final year of the Trojan War) and The
Odyssey (describing the return of the Greek hero Odysseus from the Trojan
War).
Aesop
620-560 BC. Greek writer. Author of the famous fables.
Pythagorus
582-500 BC. Greek mathematician and philosopher whose doctrines
strongly influenced Plato. He founded a movement with religious, political and
philosophical aims known as Pythagoreanism (which influenced Socrates). His
school also studied mathematics and astronomy. Pythagorus' Theorem states that
the square of the hypotenuse of a right-handed triangle is equal to the sum of
the squares of the other two sides.
Aeschylus
525-456 BC. Greek dramatist. The founder of Greek tragedy and thus the
predecessor of Sophocles and Euripides.
Heraclitus
c. 500 BC. Greek philosopher. He believed that fire was the primordial
source of matter and that the entire world was in a constant state of change.
Numerous fragments of his one work On Nature were preserved by later
writers and are available in collected editions.
Sophocles
496-406 BC. Greek dramatist. One of the three great tragedians; at the
age of 28 he defeated Aeschylus in dramatic competition. Seven of his 100
tragedies remain, and these include Oedipus Rex, Antigone and
Oedipus at Colunus.
Phidias
490-430 BC. Greek sculptor. Directed construction of the entrance to
the Acropolis and the Parthenon; and built the statue of Zeus at Olympia, one
of the seven wonders of the world.
Herodotus
484-425 BC. Greek historian. He travelled throughout Asia Minor,
Babylonia, Egypt and Greece. His Histories deal with the customs,
legends and histories of the people in the ancient world. The last three books
describe the Persian Wars between Greece and Persia in the early 5th century.
Euripides
484-407 BC. Greek dramatist. One of the three great tragic poets. He
wrote plays for the festivals of the god of wine, Dionysius, only winning the
prize four or five times. Of his 92 plays, 17 survive, and these include The
Bacchae, Medea and Electra.
Socrates
470-399 BC. Greek philosopher. Dedicated his life to talking in public
places in Athens and to prominent people, helping them understand their
ignorance. He believed that virtue was knowledge and that no-one does wrong
willingly, but by ignorance. Socrates was condemned to death for ignoring the
contemporary deities and proposing new ones, as well as for leading the youth
astray. He died by drinking hemlock.
Thucydides
460-400 BC. Greek soldier and historian. Born into an aristocratic Athenian family, He was an active participant in the Peloponnesian War between Athens and Sparta (457 - 404 BC.). He was a commander of the Athenian fleet in 424 BC, but was exiled for his failure to prevent the capture of Amphipolis. His account, the History of the Peloponnesian War, detailing the third stage of this war and marking the decline of Athens, is one of the great works of history writing.
Hippocrates
460-377 BC. Greek physician. Regarded as the father of modern
medicine. He regarded disease as a natural event, rather than something caused
by the gods.
Democritus
460-370 BC. Greek philosopher. He developed the atomic theory of the
universe that had been originated by his mentor, Leucippus. Also as a
philosopher promoted "cheerfulness" as the highest good.
Aristophanes
448-385 BC. Greek playwright. Athenian playwright - considered one of
the greatest writers of comedy. He wrote The Clouds, The
Wasps, The Birds and The Frogs.
Plato
428-347 BC. Greek philosopher. A pupil of Socrates, Plato founded the
Academy in Athens, 387 BC - described as the first European university. Among
his works, often in the form of dialogues with Socrates, is The
Republic - a political doctrine concerned with the question of justice.
Aristotle
384-322 BC. Greek philosopher. Studied in Plato's Academy for twenty
years until Plato's death. His works cover every branch of philosophy and
science known in his day. He defined rules for astronomy, zoology and logic.
Demosthenes
384-322 BC. Greek (Athenian) orator. Various speeches survive -
Against Androtion, On the Symmories, On the Liberty of the
Rhodians, First Philippic, 3 Olynthiacs, On the
Peace etc.
Epicurus
341-270 BC. Greek philosopher. Founder of the philosophical system of
Epicureanism - the belief that pleasure is the supreme good and main goal of
life. True happiness is the serenity resulting from the conquest of fear (i.e.
the gods, death and the afterlife). The soul cannot exist apart from the body,
and thus no afterlife is possible. Death has no meaning - for "when we
are, death is not; and when death is, we are not".
Lysippus
4th C. BC. Greek sculptor. Dominated 4th century Greek art and
developed a new system of human proportions (as described by Pliny) which made
heads smaller and bodies leaner, thus making figures appear taller.
Chares of Lindus
300 BC. Greek sculptor. Pupil of Lysippus. Created the Colossus of
Rhodes, one of the seven wonders of the world.
Euclid
300 BC. Greek mathematician. His chief work, Elements, is a
comprehensive treatise on mathematics in 13 volumes.
Archimedes
287-212 BC. Greek mathematician and inventor. He proved that the
volume of a sphere is two-thirds the volume of a cylinder that circumscribes
the sphere. He defined the principle of the lever and invented the compound
pulley. He developed a principle for the displacement of a fluid into which a
solid object is placed. He was killed by a Roman soldier during the second
Punic War.
Plautus
254-184 BC. Roman dramatist. He used comedy, song and dances to great
effect in his 100 farces, 20 of which survive.
Cato
234-148 BC. Roman statesman. Marcus Porcius Cato had risen to the
position of Censor by 184 BC and campaigned in Hither Spain. He was the father
of Latin prose. He published speeches, treatises on medicine, the art of war
and agriculture.
Terence
185-159 BC. Roman dramatist. His comic plays emphasise subtle handling
of both plot and character rather than the song, dance and extreme farce of
Plautus.
Cicero
106-43 BC. Roman orator and poet. Born Marcus Tullius Cicero, he
became an advocate in political trials. He rose to the position of consul in 63
BC. His works include On his Consulship and On his own Times.
His collected letters to Atticus, To his Friends, To Brother
Quintus Cicero and to Brutus have been published. 58 speeches survive, as
do philosophical works On the Republic and On the Laws.
Lucretius
99-55 BC. Roman poet. His prolix poem De Rerum Natura
presents the theories of philosophers Democritus and Epicurus and is the main
source for contemporary knowledge of Epicurus's thought.
Virgil
70-19 BC. Roman poet. Virgil (Publius Vergilius Maro) wrote ten
Eclogues (pastoral poems) The Georgics (a poem in four books
on the life of a farmer); and the Aeneid - a mythological epic to
which he devoted his last 11 years. It describes the 7 year wanderings of hero
Aeneas from the fall of Troy to his military victory in Italy.
Horace
65-8 BC. Roman lyric poet and satirist. Horace (Quintus Horatius
Flaccus) was born in Venosa, Italy, and educated in Rome. He befriended Virgil
who introduced Horace to the literary cognoscenti. His works fall into the
categories of satires, epodes, odes and
epistles. His works advocate Epicureanism, but always in moderation.
Livy
59 BC. - 17 AD. Roman historian. Born Titus Livius and brought up in
Padua. Spent most of his life working on one massive history Ab Urbe
Condita (From the Founding of the City) which at the time of his death
filled 142 books (35 have survived).
Ovid
43 BC. - 17 AD. Roman poet. Ovid (Publius Ovidius Naso) wrote works
that possessed narrative gifts, ingenuity, cleverness and gaiety that has
ensured his success with generations of readers. His Metamorphoses is
a collection of mythological stories or legends about metamorphosis.
Seneca
4 BC. - 65 AD. Roman philosopher, dramatist and statesman. Born Lucius
Annaeus Seneca in Spain, he went to Rome for training and was influenced by the
philosophy of the Stoics. Works include Apocolocyntosis Divi Claudi
"The Pumpkinification of the Divine Claudius", Quaestiones
Naturales (7 books) and Epistulae ad Lucilium (124 letters
addressed to a friend).
Pliny the Elder
23-79 AD. Roman writer. Foremost authority on science in Europe. Wrote
many historical and scientific works, but his encyclopaedia of nature and art
in 37 books, Historia Naturalis, is the only one to have been
preserved. He was suffocated by vapours from the eruption of Vesuvius, which he
was studying at the time.
Lucan
39-65 AD. Marcus Annaeus Lucanus was born at Cordoba in Spain and
brought to Rome as a child. He is most noted for his epic poem on the Civil
War (Bellum Civile, or Pharsalia).
Plutarch
46-120 AD. Greek biographer. His works are divided into
Moralia (dealing with ethical questions of contemporary society) and
Parallel Lives (a series of four single biographies and 23 pairs of
biographies).
Tacitus
56-120 AD. Roman historian. Cornelius Tacitus became a senator, rising
to consul under Nero (97 AD) and eventually governor of Asia. His early works
include Dialogues on Orators and the Agricola which contains
material about Britain. His principal works are the Histories (covering AD
68-96 of which only AD 69 and most of AD 70 survive) and the Annals,
which span AD 14-68.