Below is a list of basic topics in the classics. -- topics which will help the beginner become familiar with the classical world. For a comprehensive list, see List of classical topics.

Forebears of the Classical World

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The Classical civilisation did not develop in isolation; the ancient Greeks were indebted to their geographical proximity to the much older, intellectually and technologically sophisticated cultures of the East.

• Babylonia
• Egypt
• Phoenicia

Greece

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History of Greece

• The Minoan civilization
• The Mycenaean civilization
• The Dark Ages
• Classical Greece
• Alexander the Great
• The Hellenistic period
• Roman conquest of Greece
• The Byzantine (Roman) Empire

Greek philosophy

• The Prescocratics. These are philosophers who worked before Plato.
  • The Milesians. These are the earliest Greek philosophers of whom we know. They worked in Miletus in Ionia in the 6th century BCE.
    • Thales
    • Anaximander
    • Anaximenes
  • Heraclitus
  • The Eleatics. These philosophers worked in Elea in Magna Graecia.
    • Parmenides
    • Zeno
  • The Atomists
    • Leucippus
    • Democritus
• Pythagoras
• Socrates
• Plato
• Aristotle
• Epicureanism
• Stoicism

Greek science

• Greek astronomy and geography
  • Ptolemy
• Greek mathematics
  • Euclid
• Greek medicine
  • Hippocrates
  • Galen

Greek language

• Greek alphabet
• Ancient Greek
  • Attic dialect
  • Aeolic dialect
  • Doric dialect
  • Ionic dialect
  • Homeric Greek
• Koine

Greek art

Greek literature

• Greek literature
• Poets
  • Homer
    • The Iliad
    • The Odyssey
  • Hesiod
    • Theogony
    • Works and Days
• Playwrights
  • Tragedians
    • Aeschylus
    • Euripides
    • Sophocles
  • Comic playwrights
    • Aristophanes
• The New Testament

Greek architecture

• The Classical orders
  • Doric order
  • Ionic order
  • Corinthian order
• The Parthenon

Greek sculpture

• Phidias

Greek mythology and religion

• Greek mythology
• Greek religion

Rome

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History of Rome

• The founding of Rome
• Roman Kingdom
• Roman Republic
• Roman Empire
• The fall of Rome

Latin language

• Latin
  • Classical Latin
  • Vulgar Latin

Roman literature

• Poets
  • Virgil
    • The Aeneid
    • The Eclogues
    • The Georgics
  • Ovid
    • Metamorphoses
  • Lucretius
    • On the Nature of Things
• Prose writers
  • Cicero
• The Vulgate

Roman mythology and religion

• Roman mythology
• Roman religion
• Mystery religions
• Early Christianity

Legacy of the Classical World

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Languages

The Classical languages have been immensely influential on all western European languages, bestowing on them an international learned vocabulary. Until the 17th century, the Latin language itself was used as the international medium of communication in diplomatic, scientific, philosophical and religious matters.

• The Romance languages
• The Modern Greek and Griko languages
• Latin influence on English
• Greek influence on English
• Ecclesiastical Latin

Occidental literature

• The Divine Comedy
• Paradise Lost

Religion

• Christianity

Philosophy

• Western philosophy

Politics

• Democracy

Classical studies | Culture-related lists