Ancient Greece

Siege of Troy (13th or 12th century BC – i.e. between 1300 and 1100 BC) lasted		10 years
The first Olympics were held		776 BC
School founded in Athens by Plato in 385 BC		The Academy
Killed by a Roman soldier, aged 75, after the fall of Syracuse (his home city) to the Romans, in 212 BC – either because he refused to leave the diagram that he was studying, or because he was carrying mathematical instruments and the soldier thought he was stealing (or hiding) valuable items		Archimedes
The Clouds (423 BC), The Wasps (422 BC), The Birds (414 BC), Lysistrata (411 BC), The Frogs (405 BC): playwright		Aristophanes
"Man is by nature a political animal"; proposed in the 4th century BC that the earth is not flat; pupil of Plato, teacher of Alexander the Great		Aristotle
The city of Ephesus was a major centre for the cult of (goddess)		Artemis
Utopian city in Aristophanes' The Birds		Cloud–cuckoo–land
City on the slopes of Mount Parnassus, believed to be the centre of the Earth: site of the Temple of Apollo, whose high priestess Pythia was one of ancient Greece's most important oracles		Delphi
4th century BC statesman and orator, put pebbles in his mouth (according to Plutarch) to overcome a speech defect		Demosthenes
The Parthenon was dedicated to (goddess)		Athena
4th century BC founder of the Cynics school; lived in a barrel; carried a lantern around "to look for an honest man"		Diogenes (of Sinope)
7th century BC lawgiver – punished all crimes by death		Draco
Sortition: method of selecting officials by		Drawing lots
Rhyton (pl. rhyta)		Drinking vessel
Defined by Aristotle as "one of those bodies into which other bodies can be decomposed and which itself is not capable of being divided into other"		Element
The mythical paradise, located (according to Homer) at the Western edge of the world, reserved originally for gods and heroes – later expanded to include those chosen by them		Elysium (a.k.a. the Elysian Fields or Plain)
City on the coast of Asia Minor: famous for its temple to Artemis, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World		Ephesus
First person known to have attempted to calculate the circumference of the earth; also its axial tilt; founder of scientific chronology (using Egyptian and Persian records to date the events of the Trojan War); devised an efficient method of identifying prime numbers, known even today as the sieve of ...		Eratosthenes (c. 276–194 BC)
"The Father of Geometry"; Elements (13 volumes – published around 300 BC) has been called "the most successful and influential textbook ever written"		Euclid
Ancient Greeks placed a coin in the hand or mouth of the dead, to pay for		Ferry over the Styx
Mountain believed to be the home of the Muses and the source of poetic inspiration		Helicon
Ancient name for the Dardanelles strait		Hellespont
Credited as the first person to believe that diseases were caused naturally, not because of superstition and gods, and traditionally referred to as "the father of medicine"; born on Kos, lived from c. 460 to c. 370 BC		Hippocrates
Legendary (possibly mythical) Greek poet to whom the Iliad and the Odyssey are attributed (both are derived from oral tradition)		Homer
His work is characterised by the use of epithets, such as "rosy–fingered Dawn", "swift–footed Achilles", and "wine–dark sea"		Homer
Heavy infantryman of ancient Greek armies – named after their armour		Hoplites
Epic poem, attributed to Homer (derived from oral tradition, 8th or 9th century BC); central character Achilles, centred on the siege of Troy – title means "about Troy" in Greek		Iliad
Subject of Plutarch's love poems		Laura
King of Sparta, killed at Thermopylae in 480 BC while leading the allied Greek army		Leonidas
Temple in Athens where Aristotle founded a school of philosophy (the Peripatetic school) around 335 BC		Lyceum
Spartan admiral: commanded the Spartan fleet in the Hellespont which defeated the Athenians at Aegospotami in 405 BC; forced the Athenians to capitulate in 404, bringing the Peloponnesian War to an end; subsequently organized the dominion of Sparta over Greece, dying in 395		Lysander
Sculptor famous for the Discobulus, or Discus Thrower (c. 450 BC); the original is lost, but it survives through numerous Roman copies		Myron
Epic poem, attributed to Homer (derived from oral tradition, 8th or 9th century BC); tells of the return of Odysseus and other Greek heroes from Troy to Ithaca		Odyssey
Site of the Temple of Zeus (including the statue of Zeus that was one of the seven wonders of the ancient world), and ruins of a gymnasium and baths		Olympia
Temple dedicated to all the gods		Pantheon
Caused the Trojan war by abducting Helen		Paris
Building on the Acropolis, in Athens: the original home of the Elgin Marbles		Parthenon
Athenian politician and general in the later stages of the city's so–called Golden Age (c. 461 to 429 BC): described by contemporary historian Thucydides as "the first citizen of Athens"		Pericles
Ran 115 miles to Athens after the Battle of Marathon		Pheidippedes
Ancient Greeks' name for the Lebanon / Israel / Syria region (the Levant)		Phoenicia
Teacher of Aristotle; founder of the Academy at Athens (4th century BC)		Plato
Biographer (46–120 AD): Thomas North's 1579 translation of his Parallel lives inspired Shakespeare's Roman plays		Plutarch
Ionian philosopher of the 6th century BC: established a school at Croton, in modern Italy; taught metempsychosis (transmigration of souls); often credited with having been the first to teach that the Earth was spherical, but these and other related ideas (also many in the field of mathematics) may be wrongly attributed; best known today for the geometrical theorem that bears his name, but even this may not have been his original idea		Pythagoras
Female lyric poet, born on the island of Lesbos and active around 600 BC: often described as 'the Tenth Muse' (most of her work has now been lost)		Sappho
The pelta, used in the armies of ancient Greece and Persia, was a type of		Shield
Athenian philosopher known only through the works of his pupils Plato (who used his voice in The Republic) and Xenophon		Socrates
Condemned to die by drinking hemlock, after being found guilty of impiety and corrupting the youth of Athens (because he questioned everything)
Taught that virtue was based on knowledge; summed up the basis of his philosophy as "I know I am intelligent, because I know that I know nothing"
At his trial, chose death over exile, summing up his attitude in the famous dictum "the unexamined life is not worth living"
Oedipus Rex, Antigone, Electra (the Theban plays): playwright		Sophocles
Opposed Athens in the Peloponnesian war (5th century BC)		Sparta
Pillars of Hercules: ancient Greeks' name for the		Straits of Gibraltar
Ascetics who lived on pillars		Stylites
The largest city in the kingdom of Boeotia (be–O–shia): founded by Cadmus (according to legend) and also the setting for the stories of Oedipus, Dionysus, Heracles and others; shares its name with an ancient Egyptian city, part of modern Luxor, across the Nile from the Valley of the Kings		Thebes
Famous battle of 480 BC: named after the narrow coastal pass where an allied Greek army of 7,000 Spartans, Thespians, Thebans and helots, led by the Spartan king Leonidas, was defeated by a huge Persian army (100,000+) led by Xerxes I		Thermopylae
Poet of the 6th century BC: said to have introduced the first actor into plays, speaking the words of individual characters (as opposed to choruses); credited with inventing tragedy and introducing the wearing of linen masks, winner of the first recorded acting competition (534 BC)		Thespis
Athenian general and historian: author of the History of the Peloponnesian War (c. 400 BC), widely regarded as one of the earliest scholarly works of history		Thucydides
Ilion (Greek) or Ilium (Latin): alternative name for		Troy
The first Olympics were held in honour of		Zeus

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Ancient Greece