BOOKS
Beard, Mary. The Parthenon. 2010. A cultural history of Athens’s most famous building, including the many controversies that surround it.
Cartledge, Paul. The Spartans: The World of the Warrior Heroes of Ancient Greece. 2002. A solid general book on the history and legacy of Sparta.
Davidson, James. Courtesans and Fishcakes: The Consuming Passions of Classical Athens. 1999. A witty examination of sex, wine, food, and other objects of desire, based on plays, poems, speeches, and philosophical treatises.
Fantham, Elaine, et al. Women in the Classical World. 1994. Uses written sources and visual materials to present women of all classes in the cultural context of their times.
Fisher, N. R. E. Slavery in Classical Greece. 2001. A brief study that puts slavery into its social, political, and intellectual contexts.
Hansen, Mogens Herman. Polis: An Introduction to the Ancient Greek City-
Hanson, Victor Davis. The Other Greeks: The Family Farm and the Agrarian Roots of Western Civilization. 1999. Argues that it was Greek rural residents rather than city dwellers who really created Greek culture.
Holland, Tom. Persian Fire: The First World Empire and the Battle for the West. 2007. Designed for general audiences, a dramatic retelling of conflict between the Greeks and the Persians.
Kagan, Donald. The Peloponnesian War. 2003. A comprehensive yet accessible study that focuses on leaders and battles, but also the human costs.
Osborne, Robin. Greece in the Making, 1200–479 B.C. 2003. Traces the evolution of Greek communities from villages to cities and the development of their civic institutions.
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Roochnik, David. Retrieving the Ancients: An Introduction to Greek Philosophy. 2004. A sophisticated and well-
Shelmerdine, Cynthia. The Cambridge Companion to the Aegean Bronze Age. 2008. A collection of essays by leading scholars on the history and the material culture of Crete, Greece, and the Aegean Islands from ca. 3000 B.C.E. to 1100 B.C.E.
Thomas, Carol G. Myth Becomes History. 1993. An excellent treatment of early Greece and modern historical attitudes toward it.
Worthington, Ian. Philip II of Macedonia. 2010. Examines Philip’s life and legacy, based on literary and archaeological sources.
DOCUMENTARIES
Ancient Apocalypse: Mystery of the Minoans (BBC, 2008). Explores the role of the volcanic eruption on the nearby island of Thera in ending Minoan civilization; shot on location in Crete.
Athens: The Truth About Democracy (BBC, 2007). Historian Bettany Hughes takes a critical look at classical Athens, with attention to slavery, imperialism, the flow of money, and restrictions on women.
The Rise and Fall of the Spartans (History Channel, 2003). Examines the creation, maintenance, and end of Sparta’s distinctive military/political system.
FEATURE FILMS
The Odyssey (Andrey Konchalovskiy, 1997). Originally made as a television miniseries, this film portrays many of Odysseus’s adventures much as Homer wrote them, as they need no enhancing. Shot on location in the Mediterranean and with an international cast.
Troy (Wolfgang Petersen, 2004). A fairly decent Hollywood film that focuses, as did Homer in his epic, on the personalities and motivations of the characters as well as on the Trojan War itself.
WEB SITES
Diotima: Materials for the Study of Women and Gender in the Ancient World. Contains an extensive anthology of translated Greek, Latin, Egyptian, and Coptic texts, along with articles, book reviews, databases, and images. www.stoa.org/diotima/
Metropolitan Museum Timeline of Art History, Ancient Greece. The Metropolitan Museum’s timeline of art history is excellent for every era, but especially for the classical world; the site includes specialized essays on many topics, all linked to items in the museum’s collection. www.metmuseum.org/toah/ht/?period=04®ion=eusb
Perseus Digital Library. The premier site for accessing the literature and archaeology of ancient Greek culture and now Roman as well, with hundreds of primary texts in Greek, Latin, and English translation, and thousands of images from museum collections and archaeological sites. www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/