Ancient Greece: Mycenaeans and the Trojan War
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| Map Sam drew freehand using instructions from Mapping the World with Art. November 2009 |
From about 1600 BC mainland Greece was dominated by the Mycenaeans.
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| Make Ancient History Models, November 2009 |
The Mycenaeans' important buildings were built high on a hill called an acropolis ("high City"), but most people lived in the lower town outside the walls.
Quentin might have remembered the paper model I made of the Mycenean Acropolis the last time we studied ancient history...
...because after reading about the Myceneans this time, he immediately made a paper Myceanean town and populated it with paper soldiers from Junior General.
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| November 2009 |
The Mycenaeans were great traders with trading posts all along the eastern Mediterranean coast and as far away as Scandinavia and Africa.
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| from James' History Notebook. Illustrations from Ancient History Portfolio. |
In the second half of the 13th century BC there was a long run of poor harvests and subsequent food shortages. This led to the various groups of Myceneans attacking each other to steal food. This led to the building of defensive walls around their cities.
Most of what we know about the Mycenaeans are from the excavations by Heinrich Schliemann in 1876.
Most of what we know about the Mycenaeans are from the excavations by Heinrich Schliemann in 1876.
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| November 2009 |
The Iliad is an epic poem by Homer about a war between Greece and Troy, which probably took place around 1250 BC. We read about the story in Famous Men of Greece and D'Aulaires' Book of Greek Myths.
Our older students could reenact the Trojan war using the board game, Iliad, (but I could not find a copy of this game for you to purchase anywhere.)
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| Paper Trojan Horse and soldiers from Vertias Press' New Testament, Greece and Rome November 2009 |
Or, an origami horse with figures from Junior General.
Using the Iliad game as the basic idea, Quentin made his own version. He made a proto-type, resolved problems in the game and then made his final version.
He made up his own rules and his own cards for the game. (A post about the game coming up.)
sources and suggested reading:
- Mapping the World with Art
- Paper soldiers at Junior General
- Ancient History Portfolio
- Famous Men of Greece
- D'Aulaires' Book of Greek Myths
- Vertias Press' New Testament, Greece and Rome
- Heritage History: The Story of Greece - Mary Macgregor,The Story of the Greeks - Helene Guerber, Story of the Greek People - E. M. Tappan, Historical Tales - Greek - Charles Morris
- Black Ships Before Troy: The Story of 'The Iliad', Rosemary Sutcliff
- The Children's Homer (the Adventures of Odysseus and the Tale of Troy), Padraic Colum
- Instructions for origami horse.
- Great Mask of Agamemnon craft at Highhill Homeschool.
