CLCV 1002 Study Guide - The Persians, Tyrant, Anatolia

• School: Carleton University
• Department: Classical Civilization
• Course: CLCV 1002
• Professor: all

Document Summary

Epics were aristocratic (great deeds done by great men) Formulized re-telling (told and re-told on special occasions) Used to affirm the position of the aristocracy and military casts, and to provide a history of the society. Originally in oral form (only written down later) In larger towns at least it could be assumed that there were a considerable amount of people who could read (because laws were written down and posted in public places for the people to see) Enables people other than bards to record ideas. Allows the spreading and mixing of ideas (translation+ fertilization) Information retrieval was difficult though (everything written in scrolls, so no index to tell you what page certain information was on, had to read through entire scroll until you found what you were looking for) Literacy in anything other than its basics was reserved for those with significant resources. Technical literature (just at beginning, was an explosion during the hellenistic period)