Here’s how the Ancient Greeks shaped our lives today with some of their inventions!
10 – Alphabets Did you know that we have the Ancient Greeks
to thank for the form of different alphabets we use today?
Even the word alphabet itself comes from the first two letters of their alphabet – alpha
and beta.
Although the ancient greeks derived their alphabet from the Phoenician one, theirs was
the first alphabet ever that had different letters for both vowels and consonants.
Before that, alphabets only had letters for consonants, which isn’t as fun as it might
sound to some.
The creation of the Greek alphabet inspired the creation of many other alphabets still
used today.
Of course, languages have evolved and will keep on evolving with time, but the original
idea of writing down vowels and consonants hasn’t changed much – which is exactly
how we write today.
Well, not everyone.
You should see how some of my friends text.
Sigh.
9 – The shower When I think about hygiene habits of ancient
civilizations, I think about soaking in a big tub or maybe a river once in a while or
hmm… maybe not soaking at all?!
However, it turns out that people in ancient times liked feeling clean as much as we do
today.
Apparently, standing under waterfalls and washing yourself that way was a major thing
back then, which inspired the Ancient Greeks to create showers.
Wanting to replicate that waterfall effect many enjoyed, the ancient Greeks came up with
this genius idea of using their aqueducts and sewage systems and making their own showers.
They first implemented the shower in common areas such as in Gymnasiums or public baths,
but later on, they started implementing showers in private houses as well!
Now if you’re thinking something along the lines of manually pouring water from big containers
or something, let me stop you right there.
They actually had real showers, with pumps to bring water in, shower heads mounted higher
on the walls, and sewage systems sophisticated enough to let the dirty water out.
I’m definitely happy that we have showers in our lifetime, or else things….pretty
much would suck big dirty balls…..!!!
8 – Maps Maps have come quite the long way today with
the help of GPS and satellite use, meaning that the chances of you getting lost somewhere
are minimal.
However, have you ever thought about who thought about using maps first?
Do I really even need to say this?
Yep, it was the ancient Greeks you can thank for coming up with the first maps.
Since they did like to make their lives simpler, it’s no wonder they were the first ones
to create detailed maps – Anaximander was the one who brought the latitude and longitude
into use.
He started drawing detailed maps based on latitude and longitude, which of course, meant
each thing was shown with its exact location.
Anaximander was the first ancient Greek to draw a map of the known world, thus he’s
considered by many to be the first mapmaker.
The creation of maps greatly influenced the development of astronomy and geography.
Before all that, maps were just a bunch of poorly drawn pictures or written instructions.
“turn left and keep going, then turn right when you see a large tree on the road” just
isn’t quite as helpful as actually seeing where you’ll be headed.
7 – The odometer An odometer is a digital instrument that measures
distance in any vehicle, such as in cars or bikes.
Did you think you have to thank modern technology for it?
Yeah, maybe for the digital ones – but the first odometers ever, which were mechanical,
were invented in Ancient Greece.
Apparently, Alexander the Great was so worried about measuring distance that he used bematists
pretty often.
Bematists were professionals specially trained to measure distance with their footsteps.
Quite the job they had, huh?
However, this whole thing probably seemed kind of inaccurate, since you know, no matter
how much they trained, each bematist probably had a different length of footstep.
And wouldn’t they get tired after a while?
So, Ancient Greeks came up with the idea of using a mechanical device to do all the measuring
in a more precise way – the odometer.
Evidence suggests that funny enough, bematists were the first ones to use the devices made
to replace them.
They carried them while walking to confirm their measurements but later on, they were
installed to horse carts.
Since I don’t see any bematists around, the rest is history.
6 – The Olympics The Olympics are one of the most popular worldwide
events when it comes to sports and they’re watched by millions of people.
So you can’t really mention Ancient Greece without saying something about the Olympic
Games, which were first held in honor of the god Zeus.
In case you’ve been living off the grid your entire life, The modern Olympic games
are held every four years, a tradition that was the same all the way back then.
Back in the day, they had people from different city-states compete and most of them were
amateurs – they competed mostly for fame and for that olive leaf crown, which I’m
sure it was something of a pretty big deal to win at the time.
The Olympic games were extremely important to the Ancient Greeks; they stopped wars so
people from different cities could travel safely and participate in them.
Annnnnd I’m gonna guess that not many things could stop wars at the time.
The opening and closing ceremony of the games have remained almost exactly the same – remember
that thing with the Olympic fire and how people run around with a flaming torch to light it?
Well, they did the same in Ancient Greece as well!
Nowadays, it’s still a huge honor to compete at the Olympics and only the best of the best
in the world get a chance to participate.
5 – The concept of citizenship Being a citizen of a country comes with certain
privileges and duties, which are more or less the same in modern countries nowadays.
But did you know that the whole concept of citizenship dates back to Ancient Greece?
Well, there’s actually some dispute who actually came up with the concept, as ancient
Israelites have thrown their hat in the ring as well, but let’s just say that the Greeks
were one of the first ones, if not THE first ones to create the concept of citizenship.
For the Ancient Greeks, citizenship was viewed as a way to create unbreakable bonds between
people and the state, or in their case, with their city-states.
In order to be considered a citizen back then, you had to fulfill certain criteria, such
as being born to parents of that city-state, pay taxes or participate in the army, which
isn’t that much different from today.
Greeks shaped the whole citizenship idea because they valued their freedom so much, they were
scared they might move in between classes of society.
For example, a Greek farmer might fall into debt and therefore might become a slave, at
almost any time.
Even though their perspective of an ideal society definitely had a few faults – such
as classifying people into citizens and non-citizens – the Greeks came up with the basic idea,
and the concept has evolved over time.
4 – Alarm clocks The importance of this is pretty much self-explanatory
since there are billions of people around the world who wake up with alarm clocks so
they can be on time to do whatever it is they need to do.
We probably have to thank the great philosopher Plato for this invention.
He was really smart and apparently really busy, so it’s only natural he wanted something
to signal him whenever it was time to start his lectures or wake up in the morning.
Ancient alarm clocks were nothing like the ones we use today – they were complex machines
that used different methods to measure time and go off at certain times of the day.
It’s thought that Plato had a massive alarm machine in his house that used water and made
delicate water sounds at certain hours.
Other types of alarms used pebbles that would drop and hit on a gong thus waking up everyone
in the house and probably the neighbors next door as well, but hey, at least no one was
late for anything.
You think they came up with the snooze button as well?
3 – Science and math Considering the technology they had available
at the time, the contributions of Ancient Greeks to science and math have been nothing
short of outstanding and largely influenced modern society as we know it.
They’ve done so much, it’s impossible to pick only a few to be honest with you!
Remember those weird letter symbols in math and science class that only the teachers knew
how to write – and calculate – correctly?
Well, they came from the Greek alphabet, which means, they were the ones who derived them
and knew how to apply them in everyday use!
Ancient Greeks influenced geometry a lot.
They had developed many of the theories and principles discovered back then, and obviously
many are still applicable today, such as the famous Pythagorean Theorem.
They insisted that deductive thinking MUST be applied when it comes to natural sciences
instead of just accepting facts as they are – I’d say people nowadays need to use
that thinking in a lot of different aspects of life, but hey, that’s just me.
Hey, how about the fact that the Earth is round?
Though the earliest written mention of a spherical Earth comes from ancient Greek sources, there
is no account of how the sphericity of the Earth was discovered.
Aristotle and Pythagoras were among the first ones to suggest that the Earth may actually
be round.
That idea was quite shocking at the time, to say the least; but fast forward thousands
of years later and we still have plenty of flat earthers out there.
Hey, sometimes, some people just need to see some things with their own eyes!
2 – The crane
A crane is a machine specially designed to lift and move heavy objects around.
You’ve seen it around quite, since building something without using the crane would be
pretty much impossible.
I mean, just pointing out the obvious, since not many of us can lift things that literally
weigh a ton.
If you’re thinking that the crane isn’t that special considering the development of
modern technology and everything, then you’re in for a big surprise.
It is!
Okay, there’s not really not much of a big reveal.
You can’t build any skyscrapers without using cranes.
Well…..actually you probably could, but good luck getting that done.
The crane was invented by the Ancient Greeks in the 6th century B.C.!
While it’s true that modern cranes are obviously much more sophisticated, they still use the
same mechanism developed by the Ancient Greeks.
Archaeologists doing research on Ancient Greek sites were able to confirm this, noting that
some of the stones had specific markings and holes in them, suggesting the huge blocks
were lifted and moved around.
The first cranes ever were just a bunch of ropes used to lift stones but over time, the
ancient Greeks implemented the whole winch and pulley thing as well.
It looks like they got the inspiration for a machine like this while building their temples.
In all fairness, the temples they built are one of the biggest construction achievements
in the history of mankind – they’re still considered marvels today, let alone thousands
of years ago!
The crane is so simple and yet so ingenius – how else would you be able to lift massive
stone blocks off the ground and arrange them that high in those Greek-style pillars?
1 – Democracy Modern societies wouldn’t be quite the same
without the concept of democracy, at least the societies where democracy is practiced.
Anyway, the word democracy can be roughly translated to “rule by the people” meaning
that each member of society gets to decide how the country he or she lives in is run.
The first ever system of democracy was founded in Athens in 507 B.C.
The main idea is that the people give ruling powers to the government so that the government
could serve its people, and not the other way around.
Wow, the ancient Greeks were pretty advanced back then…..I mean, there are still countries
that still don’t have democracy today!
Ancient Greeks used more what’s called a “direct democracy” meaning that anyone
who was considered a citizen could have been picked to participate in the government.
Their “elections” were held each year, although they weren’t quite like the elections
we’re used to seeing.
Theirs were more like a ballot thing – they’d just randomly pick 500 adult men, who were
thought capable of decision-making, and those random men would serve the government for
a year.
The use of a lottery to select officeholders was regarded as the most democratic means,
as the ancient greeks thought that elections would favour those who were rich, noble, eloquent
and well-known.
The lottery would spread the work of administration throughout the whole citizen body, engaging
them in the crucial democratic experience of, to use Aristotle's words, "ruling and
being ruled in turn".
Nowadays, modern countries use “representative democracies” but the idea is basically the
same – people choose who represents them in governing bodies.
When it came to bringing new laws into force, not a single law has been passed without each
present citizen voting; of course, the majority would win!
Obviously democracy is important because it restricts the ruling power of an individual
so no society falls under the mercy of a crazy dictator.
Here’s what’s next!