CC 301 1st Edition Lecture 20 Outline of Last Lecture I. A cover of Antigone as a work and its summary. Outline of Current Lecture II. Athens – A LeaderIII. Sophists – PhilosophersIV. EuripidesV. The Story of TheseusVI. Roles of Gods and GoddessesCurrent LectureAthens – A LeaderEuripedes 480 – 406; about a generation later than Sophocles. All of his plays are from thesecond half of the fifth century. Most of them are from the time of the Peloponnesian War. This was a time of great soul searching, self-reevaluation etc. for Athens. Athens believed itselfto be chosen by the Gods for its position of leadership. Had many myths surrounding the nationalhero, Theseus – doing things to rescue other Greeks. The Athenians also evolved this myth thatthey were autochthonous – that they were born out of the Earth itself – they had never migratedfrom any place else, but were always there from the beginnings of time. Historically, this wasnonsense but this lent some special authority to the Athenians as being the original population ofGreece. There was this ideology of Athenian invincibility that came crashing down during thePeloponnesian War that led to Athens ultimate defeat (plague, terrible losses of population). Itwas a kind of internal loss of determination and a spread of doubt regarding Athens’ naturalleadership and invincibility. Athens was a place of personal freedom, tolerance, diverse points ofview. It was just a unique entity politically. Sophists - PhilosophersDuring this period of the last three decades of the fifth century, philosophy was important.Protagoras, Prodicus, Gorgias, Antiphon were all philosophers that were collectively known asthe Sophists. Protagorus – “Man is the measure of all things.” This was a doctrine of the relativity of senseperceptions. This is in the sense that every individual has a different point of view based on histime, position and he is going to perceive phenomena according to his human capacity formeasuring. We have seen a little bit of this already in Herodotus’ work and this type of culturalThese notes represent a detailed interpretation of the professor’s lecture. GradeBuddy is best used as a supplement to your own notes, not as a substitute.relativism that is portrayed by Herodotus explaining to us different value systems of differentcultures. Prodicus – Was interested in anthropology of religion. Said that the way that religious conceptsand notions of the Gods evolved was out of human beings perceptions of what was useful tothem. The familiar Greek gods would be symbols of either natural forces in the world or socialforces. We see some of this in Aprodite – force of love which is active in social and naturalworld. Ares – war, Demeter – harvest, food, agriculture, Zeus – rain, sky, Artemis – wildlife,Apollo – sun. The idea is that everything that is potent in human existence we dedicate to a God.This kind of anthropological thinking about why we worship the particular divine entities that wedo could be characterized as a kind of skeptical questioning of the validity of truth of whetherthese really are Gods. Although Prodicus didn’t go as far as to deny the Gods existed (Diagorusof Melos did).Gorgias – He was as much a public speaker as a philosopher. From Sicily and early on in thePeloponnesian War, he led a delegation from Western Sicily seeking Athens’ assistance andintervention in Sicilian affairs. What was so notable was in 427 was how everybody was reallywowed by his style of speaking which was not just ordinary prose, but very artful with rhymeand assonance and carefully balanced causes that were parallel to one another. This so impressedpeople that a lot of people wanted to be like him and learn how to speak and write in the same way that he did. Essense was that “language is all powerful.”Antiphon – Was also an orator and a philosopher. Was known for articulating the oppositionbetween nature and law. (Physis and Nomos). In his view, Nomos is nearly arbitrary custom;ambiguous, not just used formally but of anything that was customary. The argument thatAntiphon and some others made were that all laws were basically customs. Since they vary fromculture to culture and city to city, they are merely arbitrary human constructions. They are notsomething that is essential or inherited from the Gods. EX. When Antigone talks about theseunwritten laws (proper funeral rites), Antiphon would have laughed and said that these are justcustoms. This elevates Physis as the primary because natural impulses should be given freedomand not contained by laws – this could be used as a superman doctrine – might makes right. Wehave seen this in some of the debates of Thucydides. EuripidesEuripides, in contrast to Sophocles, was not very successful in his own time. He had relativelyfew first place victories in the dramatic competitions. Sophocles won first place prizes for about96/100 plays. Euripides had far fewer victories and was often made fun of in comedy. He waspopularly characterized in comedy as a man isolated from others – a misanthrope. Idea thatEuripides lived in a cave; his first wife had cheated on him and for that reason he hated womenand that’s why he banned them within his tragedies. He’s also ridiculed in comedy for being lowborn. These things aren’t necessarily true, but comedy based.The Story of TheseusTheseus’ first wife was an Amazon – warrior women who supposedly killed all men so thatwomen could be dominant. The reason that they are called Amazons was because mazon (Greekword for breast) – To be an amazon would be to be one without a breast (A would meanwithout). Theory that would cut off one breast so they could mount their bow better. TheAmazon, Antiope was Theseus’ first wife. By marrying her, he was domesticating her and puttingwomen in their right place so to speak. Their son was Hippolytus, but Theseus grew tired ofAntiope and killed her and then married Phaedra – Laius king of Crete’s daughter. Theseus spenttime in Crete slaying the minotaur. Citizens rule he is not a citizen. (Troezen? – one of the placeswhere Athens would send its women and children when the city was under attack.) Alsolegendarily, the grandfather of Theseus was Pithius the king of Troezen. Febbra tried to seduceHippolytus but he refused so Phaedra