Friday, February 10, 2012

Thucydides: On the Early History of the Hellenes

The theme of "Thucydides: On the Early History of the Hellenes" was undoubtedly the history of Greece and the Grecians. You might also refer to the Greek civilization and the Hellenistic civilization. I found on the website, http://mars.wnec.edu/~grempel/courses/wc1/lectures/10hellenism.html that in the history of the Hellenistic civilization, in Athens, Greece democracy was developed and it became very prevalent within the city. The surrounding civilizations noticed the advancements of the Greek societies and reacted to them accordingly. In turn, spreading the Hellenistic lifestyle throughout the ancient world.






One phrase that stood out to me was towards the end of the reading. It stated, " It is said that the Corinthians were the first to approach the modern style of naval architecture, and that Corinth was the first place in Hellas where galleys were built....They were the means by which the islands were reached and reduced, those of the smallest area falling the easiest prey." The reason that this really stood out to me was because I used to be interested in the navy. It is astonishing to think that some of the very first navies were created around this time and by the Corinthians. Not only did they create some of the first navies, but they were the first to create the first modern style of naval architecture. In my opinion, this was very important because in that time, and it stills holds true to this day, that whoever has the strongest military and navy is usually a superpower to the rest of the world and therefore most of the time they control a lot of the rest of different societies. 






One of the new ideas that came to my mind is that it's crazy to me to think of how the leaders and military leaders had to come up with ways that they could overthrow the opposition. I'm sure that the Corinthian navy was a very well thought out plan in order to take down the opposition and become a superpower in the ancient world.

This is very relevant to the United States Navy. According to the U.S. Navy website, http://www.navy.mil/navydata/navy_legacy_hr.asp?id=146, there are currently 323,773 active members of the navy. There are 103, 805 members on reserve. The United States is like that of the Corinth navy in which they had the biggest and best navy of the day, and the U.S. has the biggest and best navy of the modern world.


No comments:

Post a Comment