Assignment
COMPARATIVE SOCIETIES: MAKING OF THE WEST (HIS 118)
Essay Study Guide for the Final
1. What do we know about the Minoan civilization? Discuss its discovery, chronology, character, political and social organization, as well as geography.
2. The Myth of Atlantis: Discuss its origins and give a brief overview. Which events do scholars believe that it was based on and why? Discuss the geological and archaeological evidence.
3. What do we know about the Mycenean civilization? Discuss its discovery, chronology, character, political and social organization, as well as geography.
4. Which writing systems do we find in Greece and the Aegean islands from the Bronze Age onward? Discuss their history, development, and significance.
5. Age of Homer and the Homeric epics. When did Homer live? What events does he narrate? What is the historicity of these events and when were they supposed to have taken place?
6. Discuss the political systems in Greece from the 8th to the late 6th centuries BCE.
7. Discuss the emergence of democracy in Greece. What were the reasons for the creation of this political system?