PART I GREEK EDUCATION I. OLD GREEK EDUCATION The Periods of Greek Education may be characterized at that of the Old Greek Education and that of the New Greek Education. The Periclean Age, or the middle of the fifth century B.C., forms the dividing line. However, the characteristic changes marking the transition from the old to the new are not simply political, but are manifold, and can be understood in respect to education only by a study of such sources as those presented in the third section of this book. Each of these general periods may be subdivided. The earlier one includes, first, the Homeric period, and second, the historic period down to the middle of the fifth century. The second general period includes, first, the period of transition in educational, religious, and moral ideas, this being the time of philosophical activity and of development of formal education. The second of these special periods may be dated from the Macedonian conquest toward the close of the fourth century B.C. By the opening of this last period the philosophical schools have become definitely formulated, and during the period are organized into the University of Athens. In her intellectual life Greece now becomes cosmopolitan, and ceases to have distinctive characteristics aside from the philosophical schools. The Education of the Homeric Period was that of a primitive people. It was an education that had little or no place for definite instruction of a literary character, but was essentially a training process in definite practical activities. Though noble youths are spoken of as having been given a course of instruction in arms and martial exercises, and Achilles as having had instruction in music, the healing art, and even in rhetoric (Iliad, IX. 414), this instruction amounted to little more than a direct training by imitation, into which entered little or no instruction, as later distinguished by the Greeks. The education of this period, as with all primitive peoples, consisted in that practical training which prepared for the immediate duties of life. Such training was given in the home for the humbler needs of life, those connected with the securing of food, clothing, and shelter. The remainder of their education was the training received in council, wars, and marauding expeditions, for the more general public services demanded. This constituted the higher aspect of their education. The Homeric poems are a fertile source of information on this topic, though only in a very general way. In the Homeric period educational institutions were not distinct; the council and the camp furnished all higher education. The ideal of education was twofold: the man of valor, typified by Achilles; the man of wisdom, by Odysseus. The characteristics of these ideals are found throughout the narratives of the Iliad and the Odyssey, though these passages are so general and so remote in character from education, as technically understood, that it is impossible to make brief selections that would be to the present purpose. The following selections, giving descriptions of council, or battle, or of the man of bravery, or man of wisdom, may, nevertheless, be found helpful as an introduction to the further study of the historic type of Old Greek education: the Iliad, I. 52-302; II. 35-380, 445-482; IX. 50-180; X. 335-579; XI. 617-804; XVIII. 245-318; XIX. 40–275. The Character and Organization of Old Greek Education is determined by the city state. This institution furnished the basis and ideals of education, as did the family with the Chinese and the theocracy with the Hebrews. Even in the Homeric period there were evidences of the fundamental importance of the city state, though it had not completely taken shape at that time (Iliad, XVIII. 490). In the historic period, on the other hand, it furnished the key to the understanding of the educational development of the Hellenic people. The city state grew up by the successive amalgamation of patriarchal families into village communities, of village communities into phratries or brotherhoods, of phratries into tribes, and of tribes into cities. The bond which held the family together was dominantly that of blood relationship. The village depended more on economic interests; the phratry, upon religious ties; the tribe, upon the communal ownership of land. So too the city state in its beginning as a union of tribes was held together by this descent from the old families and by possession of land. This "ancient wealth and worth" constituted the nobility of the Grecian citizen. Citizenship was confined at first to the heads of these noble families, but in time expanded until inclusive of all freemen. Though economic independence and free birth were always essential, this ideal of nobility came in time to consist less and less of wealth and noble birth, and more and more of certain traits of character that could be |