An agora is the market-place of a Greek town, corresponding to the Roman forum. The Agora of Athens is situated in a valley partially enclosed by the Acropolis, Areopagus, Payx, and Museum. Research Agora
Areopagus was the oldest of the Athenian courts of justice, an assembly having a position indeed more august than an ordinary court, and in its best days exercising a general supervision over public morals. It obtained its name from its place of meeting, on the Hill of Ares, near the Acropolis or citadel of Athens. It existed from very remote times, and the crimes tried before it were wilful murder, poisoning, robbery, and arson, while it had under its control also dissoluteness of morals, and innovations in the state and in religion. Its meetings were held in the open air, and its members were selected from those who had held the office of archon. The tribunal latterly lost much of its powers, but it continued to exist in name at least as late as the time of Cicero or later, having had an existence of seven or eight hundred years. Research Areopagus
Aristocracy (from the Greek meaning best rule) is a form of government in which the sovereign power is vested in a small number of citizens who are theoretically the best qualified to rule, as opposed to monarchy, in which the supreme authority is vested in one person, and to democracy, in which the ultimate authority is exercised by the entire body of citizens or their representatives. In an aristocracy, although the power of government is wielded by a few, theoretically the administration of government is carried on for the welfare of the many. Whenever the interests of the people as a whole are made subservient to the selfish interests of the rulers, aristocracy becomes a form of government known as oligarchy. Athens, before the period of the Persian wars of the 5th century BC, and Sparta, during practically its entirehistory, were aristocracies. The same was true of Rome during the period of the Republic, lasting from the 6th to the 1st century BC.
During the Middle Ages no true aristocracy existed, for although political power reposed in the hands of a few, each feudallord was sole master in his own domain. In England, the government from the accession of the house of Hanover in 1714 through the 19th century, although parliamentary in form, was in fact an aristocracy, since king and Parliament alike were under the control of a few great Whig families. Research Aristocracy
The Athenaeum was the temple of Athena or Minerva, at Athens. It was frequented by poets, learned men, and orators. The same name was given at Rome to the school which Hadrian established on the Capitoline Mount for the promotion of literary and scientific studies. In modern times the same name is given to literary clubs and establishments connected with the sciences. Research Athenaeum
Bath is the immersion of the body in water, or an apparatus for this purpose. The use of the bath as an institution apart from occasional immersion in rivers or the sea, is, as might be anticipated, an exceedingly old custom. Homer mentions the bath as one of the first refreshments offered to a guest; thus, when Ulysses enters the palace of Circe, a bath is prepared for him, and he is anointed after it with costly perfumes. No representation, however, of a bath as we understand it is given upon the Greek vases, bathers being represented either simply washing at an elevated basin, or having water poured over them from above. In later times, rooms, both public and private, were built expressly for bathing, the public baths of the Greeks being mostly connected with the gymnasia. Apparently, by an inversion of the later practice, it was customary in the Homeric epoch to take first a cold and then a hot bath; but the Lacedemonians substituted the hot-air sudorific bath, as less enervating than warm water, and in Athens at the time of Demosthenes and Socrates the warm bath was considered by the more rigorous as an effeminate custom.
The fullest details we have with respect to the bathing of the ancients apply to its luxurious development under the Romans. Their bathing establishments consisted of four main sections: the undressing room, with an adjoining chamber in which the bathers were anointed; a cold room with provision for a cold bath; a room heated moderately to serve as a preparation for the highest and lowest temperatures; and the sweating-room, at one extremity of which was a vapour-bath and at the other an ordinary hot bath. After going through the entire course both the Greeks and Romans made use of strigils or scrapers, either of horn or metal, to remove perspiration, oil, and impurities from the skin. Connected with the bath were walks, covered race-grounds, tennis-courts, and gardens, the whole, both in the external and internal decorations, being frequently on a palatial scale. The group of the Laocoon and the Parnese Hercules were both found in the ruins of Roman baths.
With respect to modern baths, that commonly in use in Russia consists of a single hall, built of wood, in the midst of which is a powerful metal oven, covered with heated stones, and surrounded with broad benches, on which the bathers take their places. Cold water is then poured upon the heated stones, and a thick, hot steam rises, which causes the sweat to issue from the whole body. The bather is then gently whipped with wet birch rods, rubbed with soap, and washed with lukewarm and cold water; of the latter, some pailfuls are poured over his head; or else he leaps, immediately after this sweating-bath, into a river or pond, or rolls in the snow.
The Turks, by their religion, are obliged to make repeated ablutions daily, and for this purpose there is, in every city, a public bath connected with a mosque. A favourite bath among them, however, is a modification of the hot-air sudorific-bath of the ancients introduced under the name of Turkish Bath into other than Islamic countries. A regular accompaniment of this bath, when properly given, is the operation known as 'kneading,' or massage, generally performed at the close of the sweating process, after the final rubbing of the bather with soap, and consisting in a systematic pressing and squeezing of the whole body, stretching the limbs, and manipulating all the joints as well as the fleshy and muscular parts.
Public baths were common in Europe during the late 19th century, but the first English public baths and wash-houses of the kind common in all cities during the late 19th century were established in Liverpool and near the London docks in 1844. In 1846 an act was passed for their encouragement, and a Baths and Wash-houses Act of 1878 authorized the establishment of cheap swimming-baths.
The principal natural warm baths in England are at Bath in Somersetshire (the hottest), and Brixton and Matlock in Derbyshire. The temperature of the Bath springs ranges from 109 to 117 degrees, while that of the Buxton and Matlockwaters scarcely exceeds 82 degrees. The baths of Harrogate, which are strongly impregnated with sulphuretted hydrogen gas, are also of great repute for the cure of obstinate cutaneous diseases, indurations of the glands, etc. The most celebrated natural hot baths in Europe are those of Aix-la-Chapelle, and the various Baden in Germany; Toeplitz, in Bohemia; Bagnieres, Bareges, and Dax, in the south of France; and Spa, in Belgium. Besides the various kinds of water-bath with or without medication or natural mineral ingredients, there are also milk, oil, wine, earth, sand, mud, and electric baths, smoke-baths and gas-baths; but these are as a rule only indulged after specific prescription.
The practice of bathing as a method of cure in cases of disease falls under the head of hydrotherapathy; in the 19th century it was advised that even when bathing was employed simply for pleasure or purification due regard should be paid to the physiological condition of the bather. During the Victorian era in Britain writers were concerned about the potential dangers of bathing, and one warned:
'in many cases cold bathing should be avoided altogether, especially by those who have any tendency to spitting of blood or consumption, by gouty people, or by those who have any latent visceral disease or apoplectic tendency. Wherever the bath is followed by shivering instead of by a healthy reactionary glow, it is undesirable; and a cold bath in the morning after any debauchery or excess in eating or drinking on the previous evening is exceedingly imprudent. Delicate persons and children ought not to bathe in the sea before ten or eleven o'clock in the morning, and in no case should bathing be indulged after a long fast. In cold streams and rivers additional precautions should be taken, the cold plunge, when heated or fatigued, being frequently attended with fatal results. Even warm baths are not wholly free from danger; apoplexy and death having been known to follow a hot bath when entered with a full stomach. As a rule the temperature should not exceed 105 degrees, and they should not be too long continued. Frequent indulgence in them has an enervating effect, though the majority of people need as yet no renewal of Hadrian's prohibitive legislation in this matter.'
The eminent author, George Black, in 1892, while generally encouraging bathing, and describing bathing as 'likely to be of excellent use and efficacy both in the prevention and cure of disease.' Also went on to warn:
'Baths should never be taken immediately after a meal, nor when the body is very much exhausted by fatigue or excitement of any kind, nor during nor just before menstruation; and they should be sparingly and guardedly used by pregnant women.' Research Bath
Byzantine art is the symbolic system which was developed by the early Greek or Byzantine artists out of the Christian symbolism. Byzantine Art arose in South-eastern Europe after Constantine the Great had made Byzantium the capital of the Roman Empire in 330 AD and ornamented that city, which was called after him, with all the treasures of Grecian art.
One of the chief influences in Byzantine art was Christianity, and to a certain extent Byzantine art may be recognized as the endeavour to give expression to the new elements which Christianity had brought into the life of men. The tendency towards Oriental luxuriance and splendour of ornament now quite supplanted the simplicity of ancient taste. Richness of material and decoration was the aim of the artist rather than purity of conception. Yet the classical ideals of art, and in particular the traditions of technical processes and methods carried to Byzantium by the artists of the Western Empire, held their ground long enough, and produced work pure and powerful enough, to kindle the new artistic life which began in Italy with Cimabue and Giotto.
With regard to sculpture the statues no longer displayed the freedom and dignity of ancient art. The true proportion of parts, the correctness of the outlines, and in general
the severe beauty of the naked figure, or of simple drapery in Greek art, were neglected for extravagant costume and ornamentation and petty details. Yet in the best period of Byzantine art, from the 6th to the 11th century, there is considerable spiritual dignity in the general conception of the figures. But sculpture was of second-rate importance at Byzantium, the taste of those times inclining more to mosaic work with the costliness and brilliant colours of its stones.
The first germ of a Christian style of art was developed in the Byzantine pictures. The artists, who appear to have seldom employed the living model, and had nothing real and material before them, but were obliged to find, in their own imaginations, conceptions of the external appearance of sacred persons, such as the mother of Christ or the apostles, could give but feeble renderings of their ideas. As they cared but little for a faithful imitation of nature, but were
satisfied with repeating what was once acknowledged as successful, it is not strange that certain forms, approved by the taste of the time, should be made, by convention, and without regard to truth and beauty, general models of the human figure, and be transmitted as such to succeeding times. In this way the artists in the later periods did not even aim at accuracy of representation, but were contented with stiff general outlines, lavishing their labour on ornamental parts.
Byzantine architecture may be said to have assumed its distinctive features in the church of St Sophia built by Justinian in the 6th century, and still existing as the chief mosque in Constantinople. It is more especially the style associated with the Greek Church as distinguished from the Roman.
The leading forms of the Byzantine style are the round arch, the circle, and in particular the dome. The last is the most conspicuous and characteristic object in Byzantine buildings, and the free and full employment of it was arrived at when by the use of pendentives the architects were enabled to place it on a square apartment instead of a circular or polygonal. In this style of building incrustation, the incrustation of brick with more precious materials, was largely in use. It depended much on colour and surface ornament for its effect, and with this intent mosaics wrought on grounds of gold or of positive colour are profusely introduced, while coloured marbles. and stones of various kinds are greatly made use of. The capitals are of peculiar and original design, the most characteristic being square and tapering downwards, and they are very varied in their decorations.
Byzantine architecture may be divided into an older and a newer (or Neo-Byzantine) style. The most distinctive feature of the latter ia that the dome is raised on a perpendicular circular or polygonal piece of masonry (technically the drum) containing windows for lighting the interior, while in the older style the light was admitted by openings in the dome itself. The Cathedral of Athens is an example of the Neo-Byzantine style.
In painting, a cartoon is a drawing on stout paper or other material, intended to be used as a model for a large picture in fresco, a process in which it is necessary to complete the picture portion by portion and in which a fault cannot afterwards be easily corrected. The cartoon is made exactly the size of the picture intended, and the design is transferred to the surface to be ornamented by tracing or other processes. Cartoons executed in colour, like paintings, are used for designs in tapestries, mosaics, etc. The most famous are those painted by Raphael for the Vatican tapestries, seven of which are still preserved in the South KensingtonMuseum, London. The subjects of the seven are: 1, Paul Preaching at Athens; 2, The Death of Ananias; 3, Elymas the Sorcerer Struck with Blindness; 4, Christ's Charge to Peter; 5, The Sacrifice at Lystra; 6, Peter and John Healing the Cripple at the Beautiful Gate of the Temple; 7, The Miraculous Draught of Fishes. In modern times the term is also applied to a pictorial sketch relating to some notable character or events of the day, and erroneously to an animated film. Research Cartoon
The Eleusinian Mysteries were sacredrites anciently observed in Greece at the annual festival of Demeter or Ceres, so named from their original seat Eleusis. As a preparation for the greater mysteries celebrated at Athens and Eleusis, lesser Eleusinia were celebrated at Agras on the Ilissus. The greater Eleusinia were celebrated in the month Boedromion (September-October), beginning on the 15th of the month and lasting nine days. The celebrations, which were varied each day, consisted in processions between Athens and Eleusis, torch-bearing and mystic ceremonies attended with oaths of secrecy. They appear to have symbolized the old conceptions of death and reproduction, and to have been allied to the orgiastic worship of Dionysus (Bacchus). They are supposed to have continued down to the time of Theodosius I. Research Eleusinian Mysteries
The Elgin marbles are a splendid collection of ancient Greek sculptures assembled by the 7th earl of Elgin and brought to England in 1812. The sculptures are chiefly from the Parthenon of Athens. Shortly after being brought to England they were cheaply purchased by parliament for the British Museum at the cost of 35,000 pounds. They consist of figures in low and high relief and in the round, representing gods, goddesses, and heroes; the combats of the Centaurs and Lapithaa; the Panathenaic procession, etc. They exhibit Greek sculpture at its highest stage, and were partly the work of Phidias. Research Elgin marbles
Stoicism is an ancient Greek philosophy that developed from Cynicism. Stoicism was founded at Athens by Zeno of Citium in Cyprus around 300 BC and is essentially a practical philosophy, the source of its ethics being the ideal of the wise man after the pattern of Socrates, who perceives that the true good of man lies not in outward objects, but in the state of the soul itself. A follower of
Stoicism is known as a Stoic. Research Stoicism
The Probert Encyclopaedia was designed, edited and programed by
Matt and Leela Probert
Abbreviations
Research Agora
