LC Classical Studies cheat sheet

Athenian democracy (508/7 BCE, Cleisthenes) rested on demes, trittyes, and phylai; the Boule of 500 was chosen by lot, the Ekklesia had quorum 6,000, and ostracism required 6,000 votes.

Roman Republican offices (cursus honorum): quaestor, aedile, praetor, consul; dictators were appointed for six months; tribunes of the plebs were sacrosanct and could veto.

The Roman Senate had about 300 members in the Republic, increased to 600 by Sulla, and to 900 under Caesar; auctoritas rather than legal power defined its influence.

The Principate began in 27 BCE when Octavian received the title Augustus; the Pax Romana is conventionally dated 27 BCE–180 CE.

Greek colonization (8th–6th centuries BCE) spread poleis from Massalia to Cyrene; Rome's colonies and municipia integrated Italy after the Social War (91–88 BCE).

The Peloponnesian War (431–404 BCE) ended with Athens' defeat at Aegospotami; Thucydides wrote that the cause was Spartan fear of Athenian growth (1.23).

Roman citizenship was extended to all free inhabitants of the empire by the Constitutio Antoniniana in 212 CE under Caracalla.

Sparta's mixed constitution (Lycurgus) combined two kings, a gerousia of 28 elders plus kings, and an assembly of equals (homoioi).

The late Roman Empire's reforms under Diocletian (284–305 CE) included the tetrarchy and the division of provinces; Constantine founded Constantinople in 330 CE.

The twelve Olympians include Zeus, Hera, Poseidon, Demeter, Athena, Apollo, Artemis, Ares, Aphrodite, Hephaestus, Hermes, and Hestia (or Dionysus in some lists).

Hesiod's Theogony traces the succession Uranus–Cronus–Zeus; the Titanomachy and Typhonomachy establish Zeus' order.

Roman numen and lares: the paterfamilias led domestic cult; Vesta's flame was tended by the Vestal Virgins, and the pontifex maximus supervised state religion.

Greek sacrifice (thysia) followed a pattern: procession, purification, prayer, slaughter, burning of bones and fat for the gods, and shared meat for worshippers.

Mystery cults at Eleusis (Demeter and Persephone) and Samothrace promised a better afterlife; initiation was secret and involved a epopteia.

The Roman calendar was reformed by Julius Caesar in 46 BCE (Julian calendar); festivals such as Lupercalia (15 February) and Saturnalia (17 December) structured the year.

Ovid's Metamorphoses (8 CE) is a key source for myths of transformation; Virgil's Aeneid (19 BCE) links Roman origins to Troy and Venus.

The imperial cult: Julius Caesar was deified in 42 BCE; Augustus was styled divi filius, and provinces competed for neokoroi (temple-wardens) of the emperor.

Greek temple orders: Doric (no base, simple capital), Ionic (volute capital, frieze), Corinthian (acanthus capital); the Parthenon (447–432 BCE) is Doric with Ionic elements.

The Athenian Acropolis includes the Propylaea, Erechtheion (with Caryatids), Temple of Athena Nike, and Parthenon; Phidias supervised the sculptural program.

Roman concrete (opus caementicium) enabled vaults and domes; the Pantheon (c. 125 CE) has a 43.3 m dome with an oculus.

Pompeian wall-painting styles: First (incrustation), Second (architectural), Third (ornate), Fourth (fantastic); Vitruvius (7.5) describes them.

Greek sculpture periods: Archaic (kouros/kore), Classical (Polykleitos' Canon, Doryphoros), Hellenistic (Laocoön, Pergamene altar).

Roman building types: basilica, amphitheater (Colosseum, 80 CE), baths (Caracalla), aqueducts (Pont du Gard), and triumphal arches (Titus, 81 CE).

Archaeology: stratigraphy (law of superposition), seriation, and typology date finds; Pompeii and Herculaneum preserve Roman daily life under Vesuvius' 79 CE eruption.

Greek vases: black-figure (Athenian, 6th century BCE) and red-figure (invented c. 530 BCE) are key for iconography and chronology.

Homer's Iliad and Odyssey (c. 750–700 BCE) are oral-derived hexameter epics; the Iliad covers 51 days in the tenth year of the Trojan War.

Attic tragedy: Aeschylus (Persians, Oresteia), Sophocles (Oedipus Tyrannus, Antigone), Euripides (Medea, Bacchae); each playwright presented three tragedies and a satyr play.

Aristophanes' Old Comedy (Clouds, Lysistrata, Frogs) mixes political satire, parabasis, and obscenity; Menander represents New Comedy.

Virgil's Aeneid (12 books) imitates Homeric epic; Ovid's Metamorphoses (15 books) and Fasti treat myth and calendar.

Roman comedy: Plautus and Terence adapted Greek New Comedy; stock characters include the servus callidus, senex, and miles gloriosus.

Herodotus (Histories) and Thucydides (History of the Peloponnesian War) founded Greek historiography; Livy (Ab Urbe Condita) and Tacitus (Annals, Histories) wrote Roman history.

Lyric poetry: Sappho (Lesbos, 6th century BCE) and Pindar (epinician odes); Roman elegy: Catullus, Propertius, Tibullus, Ovid.

Rhetoric and oratory: Cicero's speeches (In Catilinam, Pro Caelio) and Quintilian's Institutio Oratoria define Roman rhetorical training.

Presocratics: Thales (water), Anaximander (apeiron), Heraclitus (flux), Parmenides (being), Democritus (atoms).

Socrates (469–399 BCE) wrote nothing; Plato's dialogues (Apology, Republic, Symposium) and Xenophon's Memorabilia are main sources; he was executed by hemlock.

Plato's theory of Forms: the allegory of the cave (Republic 7) distinguishes sensible and intelligible realms; the philosopher returns to educate others.

Aristotle (384–322 BCE) systematized logic (syllogism), ethics (Nicomachean Ethics: virtue as mean), politics, and biology; he founded the Lyceum.

Hellenistic schools: Epicurus (pleasure as absence of pain, atomism), Zeno of Citium (Stoicism: logos, virtue), Pyrrho (skepticism), Diogenes (Cynicism).

Roman philosophy: Lucretius' De Rerum Natura (Epicurean), Cicero's De Officiis and Tusculanae Disputationes (eclectic), Seneca's Letters (Stoic), Marcus Aurelius' Meditations.

Neoplatonism: Plotinus (Enneads) posits the One, Intellect, and Soul; it influenced Augustine and later Christian thought.

Key terms: arete (excellence), eudaimonia (flourishing), ataraxia (tranquility), phronesis (practical wisdom), and virtus (Roman courage/moral excellence).

The Renaissance (14th–16th centuries) revived classical texts; humanists such as Petrarch and Erasmus collected manuscripts and imitated Ciceronian Latin.

Neoclassicism in art and architecture (18th century) drew on Winckelmann's History of Ancient Art (1764) and excavations at Pompeii and Herculaneum.

Greek drama's reception: Aristotle's Poetics shaped French classical tragedy (Racine's Phèdre) and opera (Monteverdi, Gluck).

Political reception: the US Constitution and Federalist Papers invoke Roman models (mixed constitution, civic virtue); the French Revolution used Roman imagery.

Translation and transmission: the Arabic translations of Greek philosophy (via Baghdad) preserved Aristotle; Byzantine scribes copied Greek texts before the fall of Constantinople (1453).

Modern receptions: Freud's Oedipus complex, Nietzsche's The Birth of Tragedy, and films such as Gladiator (2000) reinterpret classical themes.

Classical education: the trivium (grammar, rhetoric, dialectic) and quadrivium structured medieval and early modern curricula; Greek and Latin remain examinable languages.

Postcolonial and reception studies (e.g., Black Athena debates) examine how classical antiquity has been claimed and contested in modern ideology.

Primary vs. secondary sources: inscriptions, papyri, coins, and archaeological finds are primary; ancient literary texts are also primary but mediated by manuscript transmission.

Source criticism: establish provenance, date, authorship, genre, audience, and bias; compare independent sources (e.g., Thucydides vs. Plutarch).

Inscriptions (epigraphy) use formulae (e.g., 'the people decreed') and abbreviations; the Res Gestae Divi Augusti is a first-person political testament.

Coins (numismatics) carry portraits, legends, and types that date and propagandize; Roman imperial coins often celebrate military victories and divine favor.

Visual analysis: identify subject, style, material, context, and function; compare with literary descriptions (e.g., Pausanias on Greek sanctuaries).

Material evidence: pottery seriation, stratigraphy, and dendrochronology provide relative and absolute dates; context (primary vs. secondary deposition) matters.

Textual transmission: manuscripts, papyri, and quotations in later authors reconstruct lost works; the apparatus criticus records variants.

Interpretation frameworks: positivism, relativism, and reception theory; beware anachronism when applying modern categories to ancient evidence.