What was ancient Greece?

Greece is a land of mountains and islands, so towns grew up separately, each with its own laws. These were city-states, called poleis. The best known were Athens and Sparta. They spoke the same language and shared gods, festivals and games, but they often disagreed and sometimes fought.

Around 508 BCE, Athens began to use democracy, from the Greek words for "people" and "power". Citizens gathered to debate and vote. But only free adult men born in Athens counted as citizens; women, enslaved people and foreigners could not vote. It was a start, not the democracy we have today.

The Greeks worshipped many gods who lived on Mount Olympus, such as Zeus, Athena, Poseidon and Apollo. They held the first Olympic Games at Olympia, traditionally in 776 BCE, in honour of Zeus, and these took place every four years. They built temples, such as the Parthenon in Athens, finished around 432 BCE.

Greek thinkers asked big questions. Socrates, Plato and Aristotle were philosophers. Others, like Pythagoras and Archimedes, worked in maths and science (you can read about Pythagoras' theorem). Poets such as Homer told epic tales, the Iliad and Odyssey. Greeks invented theatre, with tragedies and comedies. Our word alphabet comes from alpha and beta, the first two letters of the Greek alphabet.

Alexander the Great, a king from Macedonia, spread Greek culture from Egypt to India in the 300s BCE. Later the Romans took over Greece in 146 BCE but admired and copied much of what they found; see ancient Rome.

Map and history activities for kids