Greek and Roman

Tragedians
Masterpieces in World Literature
Prepared by: Iris Aireen J. Huerta, M.A.ED.
Getting to know the country
 Athens, the capital and
Athens, Greece
largest city of Greece, was
founded in the 9th century
BC. Many buildings from
antiquity still stand in the
modern city. The structure
pictured here, the Odeon
of Herodes Atticus, was
built in the 2nd century
BC by Greek scholar
Herodes Atticus. It lies on
the southwest slope of the
Acropolis.
Athenian Acropolis
The Acropolis is a
fortified limestone hill
overlooking the city of
Athens, Greece.
Beginning in the early
5th century BC the
Greeks built a series of
temples there, including
the Parthenon, a temple
dedicated to the Greek
goddess Athena.
 Agora of Athens

The Agora, or
marketplace, of ancient
Athens was a center of
community life. On the
hill behind the remnants
of the Agora stands the
Acropolis, considered by
many to be the most
brilliant architectural
achievement of ancient
Greece. The Acropolis
and its temples,
including the Parthenon,
stood guard over the
Agora and the rest of
ancient Athens.
 During the 5th century B.C., Athens presided as the
richest and most advanced of all the city-states. Its
army and navy dominated the Aegean after the defeat
of the Persians, and the tribute money offered to the
conquering Athenians built the Acropolis, site of the
Parthenon, as well as the public buildings that housed
and glorified Athenian democracy. The wealth of
Athens also assured regular public art and
entertainment, most notably the Festival of Dionysius,
where Sophocles produced his tragedies.
 In the 5th century, Athens had reached the height of its
development. Military skill and luck kept Athens
wealthy for a time, but the rival city-state Sparta,
pressed for dominance during the
PELOPONNESIAN WAR (431-404 B.C.).

 By the end of the 5th century, Sparta had starved

Athens into submission, and the power of the great
city-state ended.
 Greek Theater and Its Developments
 Sophocles’ “Oedipus the King” forms part of theater
tradition that encompasses much more than just
entertainment. In 5th century BC, Athens’ theater
represented an essential public experience – at once
social, political and religious.
 For Athenians, theater served as an expression of public
unity. The plays drew them together and helped them
experience a shared heritage to nurture and preserve a
cultural identity through times of hardship and war.
 Beyond its social and political importance, Greek
drama also held a religious significance that made it a
sacred art. Originally, the Greek theater tradition
emerged from along history of choral performance in
celebration of the god Dionysus.
 The FESTIVAL OF DIONYSUS – held for 5 days in
spring, whose high point was a dramatic competition,
served as a ritual to honor the god of wine and fertility
and to ask his blessing on the land. To attend the
theater therefore, was a religious duty and
responsibility of all pious citizens.
 It was Sophocles who introduced a painted scenery,
and he also changed the music for the chorus (12-15
members, actors increased from 2 to 3)
“Tragedy”  a branch of drama that
treats in a serious and
dignified style the sorrowful
or terrible events
encountered or caused by a
heroic individual. By
extension the term may be
applied to other literary
works, such as the novel.
(Encyclopaedia Britannica)
 1 AESCHYLUS
 Greek dramatist Aeschylus (525?-456 BC), is
considered the father of tragedy. His work
greatly influenced ancient Athenian
dramatists Sophocles and Euripides.
Although Aeschylus may have written more
than 90 plays, only seven survive. Aeschylus
introduced dramatic innovations such as
costumes and scenery. This bust is located in
the Capitoline Museum in Rome, Italy.
 Aeschylus introduced a second actor to Greek
tragedy.
 2
SOPHOCLES
Sophocles is one of the three great tragic
playwrights of ancient Greece, along with
Aeschylus and Euripides. Notable tragedies
by Sophocles include Oedipus Rex, Antigone,
and Electra.

Sophocles was born about 496 BC in Colonus Hippius (now part of Athens),

the son of Sophillus, reportedly a wealthy armor-maker. Sophocles was
provided with the best traditional aristocratic education. As a young man he
was chosen to lead a chorus of youths who celebrated the Greek naval
victory over the Persians at Salamís in 480 BC (see Persian Wars).
 In 468 BC, at the age of 28, he defeated Aeschylus, whose
preeminence as a tragic poet had long been undisputed, in a dramatic
competition. From 468 BC on, Sophocles was the most consistently
successful Athenian dramatist, winning first prize about 20 times and
many second prizes. He was also the most prolific dramatist; he
wrote more than 120 plays.
 Sophocles was not only a popular playwright but also a popular man.
His life, which ended about 406 BC when he was around 90,
coincided with the period of Athenian greatness. He numbered
among his friends the historian Herodotus, and he was an associate
of the statesman Pericles. He was not politically active or militarily
inclined, although he accepted several political offices and was twice
elected by the Athenians to high military office.
Sample tragedy:
ELECTRA
Orestes and Electra
 Orestes, in Greek mythology, was the
son of Agamemnon, king of Mycenae,
and Clytemnestra. Agamemnon was
killed by Aegisthus, his wife’s lover.
Spurred on by his sister Electra,
Orestes, on reaching manhood, avenged
his father by killing Aegisthus and
Clytemnestra. Afterward Orestes was
haunted by the Furies (Erinyes) for the
crime. This statue is in the collection of
the Archaeological Museum in Rome.
 EURIPIDES 3
 Euripides  (480?-406? BC), was a Greek
dramatist of the 5th century BC who wrote a
number of tragedies, including Medea,
Trojan Women, and Iphigenia in Tauris.
 wrote nearly 90 plays, of which 18 survive
today. His work had a great influence on
Roman drama, later English and German
drama, and especially 17th-century French
dramatic poets Pierre Corneille and Jean
Baptiste Racine.
Transfer of knowledge from Greece to Rome
 Background of the Country

ancient rome (model)

 Lifestyle of the Romans

For wealthy Romans, life was good. They lived in beautiful houses –
often on the hills outside Rome, away from the noise and the smell.
They enjoyed an extravagant lifestyle with luxurious furnishings,
surrounded by servants and slaves to cater to their every desire. Many
would hold exclusive dinner parties and serve their guests the exotic
dishes of the day.
Poorer Romans, however, could only dream of such a life. Sweating
it out in the city, they lived in shabby, squalid houses that could collapse
or burn at any moment. If times were hard, they might abandon newborn
babies to the streets, hoping that someone else would take them in as a
servant or slave. Poor in wealth but strong in numbers, they were the
 Roman Women
 Within the Roman family, women
played an important role in
childrearing and the management
of the household. Part of their
duties included control over
slaves who performed many
domestic tasks. This scene from a
Roman mural found in the
ancient city of Herculaneum
depicts several women with their
slave hairdressers. Roman
women were noted for their
strength and loyalty, but also for
their social independence.
Elections at the Ancient Roman Republic
 ROMAN LITERATURE
 It includes the essays, histories, poems, plays and other
writings written in the Latin language. Beginning around
the 3rd century BC, it took 2 centuries to become dominant
literature on Ancient Rome, with many educated Romans
still reading and writing in Ancient Greek. Latin literature
was in many ways a continuation of Greek literature, using
many of the same forms.
 Latin was the language of the ancient Romans, but it was
the lingua franca of Europe through the middle ages.
 Latin literature includes not only Roman authors like Cicero,
Vergil, Ovid and Lucretius, but also includes European writers
after the fall of the Roman empire, from religious writers like
St. Augustine (354-430AD) to secular writers like Francis
Bacon (1561-1626).
 The Literature of Rome formally began in 240 BC, when a
Roman audience saw a Latin version of a Greek play. The
adaptor was Livius Andronicus, a Greek prisoner in Rome. He
also translated Homer’s Greek epics the Odyssey into an old
type of Latin verse called Saturnian.
 The first Latin poet to write on a Roman theme was
Gnaeus Naevius during the 200 BC. He composed an
epic poem about the first Punic War where he had fought.
Naevius’ dramas were mainly reworkings of Greek
originals, but he also created tragedies based on Roman
myths and history.
 QUINTUS ENNIUS wrote a historical epic, the
Annals (soon after 200 BC), describing Roman history
from the founding of Rome to his own time. He adopted
Greek dactylic hexameter which became the standard
verse form for Roman epics. He also wrote tragic dramas.
1
OVID
The Roman poet Ovid, born in 43 BC,
composed the Metamorphoses, a series of
tales considered one of the most important
poems of all time. Notable for its smooth
transitions, Ovid’s epic composition charts
the history of the world from its creation to
the time of Julius Caesar. Thematically, Ovid
emphasized the instability inherent in the
world. Ovid’s poetry, known for its narrative
style, ingenuity, and wit, has served as an
influence and inspiration to many
generations of writers.
 2
VIRGIL
Considered the greatest poet of ancient Rome,
Virgil lived from 70 to 19 bc and composed the
mythological epic Aeneid during the last ten
years of his life. Modeled after the Iliad and the
Odyssey, the two major epics of Greek antiquity,
Virgil’s Aeneid stands as the first masterpiece of
the epic style in poetry. Subsequent artists were
greatly influenced by Virgil’s works and
technique and included him in their writings and
drawings. This 1469 painting depicts Virgil as
he drafts the poem Georgics (36-29 bc) before a
statue of the Greek goddess Artemis.
Acknowledged the greatest of all Latin poets, in his
own as well as in later times, was Virgil. Early in his
career he wrote the Eclogues, ten elegant and moving
pastoral poems that became lasting models of their
kind. These were followed by his graceful poem on
farm life, the Georgics. Virgil’s masterpiece, however,
was the Aeneid, an epic poem.
The lyric tradition was continued by a galaxy of poets
who are still read. Virgil’s friend Horace made
himself the master of the ode, skillfully adapting
Greek meters into Latin in the service of his own
 Corresponding to the 
Golden Age of Roman
poetry was an age of
equal achievement in
prose. The leading
figure was Cicero, a
statesman and orator
whose resonant and
sonorous rhetoric
became the model for
later European
oratory. The best
known of Cicero’s
speeches are the
 Roman politician Cataline, seated lower right, listens to the accusations of vehement orations
Cicero, standing left. Shortly after Cataline lost an election to Cicero in 63 BC, against the political
Cicero publicly exposed Cataline’s plot to seize power in an armed rebellion.
conspirator Catiline.