Hello there! Welcome to this lesson.

I'm Ms. Roberts, and I'll be guiding you through this history lesson today, which is all about Ancient Greece.

Together, we are going to find out about the city-states of Ancient Greece and what they were like.

You are going to hear a lot of new words in this lesson, including some words that come from Greek.

Don't worry if you're not sure of anything at first, because I'll be guiding you through the lesson step by step.

By the end of the lesson today, you'll be able to name some of the city-states of Greece and you'll be able to describe how they were similar as well as how they were different.

I'm going to start today by sharing with you four keywords that we'll be using a lot in this lesson.

You'll soon be able to use these words yourself to talk about Ancient Greece.

You've already heard the first word for today, and that word is city-state.

Can you repeat city-state? Lovely.

The next is a word from Ancient Greek, and that word is polis.

Can you try that one? Polis.

Yes, well done.

Okay.

The next is the word culture.

Can you say culture? Good job.

And finally, the last keyword is temple.

Can you say temple? Well done.

Now, I'll go through the meanings of these with you, and when we meet them in the lesson, I'll be explaining them again.

A city-state in Ancient Greece was a city that rules over itself and a large area of land surrounding it.

Polis was the word that the Ancient Greeks used for city-state.

The culture.

And in this lesson, we are talking about the culture of Ancient Greece.

We're referring to their language, their customs, their ideas, and maybe their art.

That's what we refer to as the culture of any group of people.

A temple is a building, and in that building, it's where people go to worship their god or their gods.

Okay, so you will hear those again in the lesson and I'll highlight them when we come to them.

There are going to be two parts to today's lesson, and we're going to begin by exploring the question, how was Ancient Greece organised? Later, we'll be looking at what life was like in those major cities of Ancient Greece.

So let's begin then by exploring this question about the organisation of Ancient Greece.

Look at the map.

This is a map of Ancient Greece, and it has the locations of three important cities labelled on it.

The cities are Athens, Corinth, and Sparta.

Those three cities were cities that were found in major city-states.

The Ancient Greek civilization was divided into areas ruled by cities called city-states.

One main city would rule over itself and a fairly large area of land surrounding it.

There were actually hundreds of city-states in Ancient Greece, but the most important of them were Athens, Corinth, and Sparta.

Athens became the most important of the city-states because it was a major centre for trade.

At the peak of the Greek empire, they also had control over some lands that were in parts of North Africa, Southwest Europe, and some parts of Asia.

But these were called colonies.

They were not classed as city-states themselves, but they were still ruled by the Ancient Greek city-states, like Athens.

The physical geography of Ancient Greece can help us to understand why and how the city-states emerged.

This is because Greece has lots and lots of mountains, so there are many areas that are very rugged and rocky.

There are lots of high peaks.

It's also made up of thousands of small islands, and islands are of course separated from the mainland by water like seas and oceans.

So, the mountains and seas meant that they formed natural barriers, which made communication difficult and slowed the growth of settlements in Ancient Greece.

This geography and those natural barriers also meant that it would be difficult for just one person to rule over all of Ancient Greece.

So, around and between all of those mountains and islands, these separated areas known as city-states began to develop and each of those city-states had some similarities and differences.

As you know, these states were called polises in Ancient Greek, and they were all sorts of different sizes.

The polises each had their own different individual weather conditions, different types of landscapes, and they were able to carry out different activities, especially different types of trade.

And that again was mainly due to the physical geography.

All of the differences, in the city-states, affected the type of society that lived there.

City-states with a coast, like Athens for example, could carry out trade by seafaring, whereas other states, like Messenia, had very flat land and nice weather, which made those states very good for farming.

Whilst places like Laconia, where Sparta was, were very rocky and mountainous.

This meant that they had very harsh weather conditions, especially in winter, and that made farming in city-states like that very difficult.

However, the Spartans weren't very interested in farming anyway because they were more interested in fighting and going to war.

Let's have a quick check on what we know so far about city-states of Ancient Greece.

I'm going to show you four statements and I'd like you to identify which one of them is correct.

So there are three incorrect statements and there is one correct statement that I want you to identify.

Listen carefully.

Statement A.

Ancient Greek city-states all had the same landscape.

Statement B.

Ancient Greek city-states all had the same weather.

Statement C.

Ancient Greek city-states were many different sizes.

Statement D.

Ancient Greek city-states were all seafaring societies.

Have a think and decide which of those you think is the only statement that is correct.

Have you made a choice? Okay.

Hands up, anyone, for option A, Ancient Greek city-states all had the same landscape.

I don't think that's correct.

How about statement B? Ancient Greek city-states all had the same weather.

I don't think that's correct either.

How about option C? Ancient Greek city-states were many different sizes.

I think that is correct because we've seen the map, haven't we? And we saw all the different colours of some of the city-states.

We could see that some on the map were much larger than others, which were very small.

So that means that statement D here, Ancient Greek city-states were all seafaring societies, that's incorrect as well.

Hmm.

So, if you know which statements are incorrect, what I would like you to do now is correct the incorrect statements.

So, here are the statements again for you.

A, Ancient Greek city-states had the same landscape.

Statement B, Ancient Greek city-states all had the same weather.

C, Ancient Greek city-states were many different sizes.

You don't need to do anything to that one because we know that is correct.

Statement D, Ancient Greek city-states were all seafaring societies.

Change the incorrect statements to make them correct.

Pause the video now whilst you do this.

All finished? Great.

Let's look at the answers together.

I have changed statement A so that it now says, Ancient Greek city-states all had different landscapes.

We've spoken about how some were on the coast and some were mountainous and some were much flatter.

I have changed statement B to say that all Ancient Greek city-states had different weather, which they did.

The mountainous states had very harsh weather conditions compared to other states that had a lot more sunshine.

Statement C was already correct.

And statement D, I have changed to say that Ancient Greek city-states were not all seafaring societies, but Athens was.

I have added that one there on the end.

Okay.

Great work! So, we've seen how the city states had lots of differences.

Let's move along now and look at their similarities.

This is the same map you saw earlier, but you can see now that we are looking at the one civilization of Ancient Greece.

Although the city-states were separate and different in many ways, there were also important characteristics that they shared.

Every city-state was part of the same civilization and culture.

They were all part of Ancient Greece.

So, no matter what city-state anyone was in, they would always be able to communicate with each other because they all spoke the same language, Ancient Greek.

Another similarity across all the polises was that everyone had the same religious beliefs and they all worshipped the same gods and goddesses in the same way.

You've heard quite a bit about the city-states there, so let's see if you can name some city-states to match these descriptions.

Can you name a city-state that did a lot of trade by seafaring? Athens was the city-state that did a lot of trade by seafaring.

Well done.

Now, can you name a city-state that had a very mountainous landscape? Sparta had a very mountainous landscape.

Well done.

Can you remember the names of any other city-states that you have heard so far in this lesson? Good job.

We have also mentioned the city-states of Corinth and Messenia.

Messenia was the state where a lot of farming happened.

Now, this task is a sorting activity.

Here are some characteristics of city-states in Ancient Greece.

You need to decide if these are characteristics that the city-states shared, in other words, their similarities, or if they were characteristics that were different between the city-states.

Pause the video now while you complete the activity.

All done? Good job! Let's look at the answers together.

So, let's start with the differences.

They had different landscapes.

They had different weather.

They were different sizes.

Now, the similarities.

They spoke the same language, they shared the same culture, and they shared the same religious beliefs.

So although the city-states of Ancient Greece were very different from each other in many ways, they also shared a lot of the same things.

They shared a lot of similarities in their way of life, in their beliefs and their culture.

We're going to move on to the second part of our lesson now and we're going to think about what life was like in those big cities in the city-states of Ancient Greece.

Each polis had one major city in it.

For example, Athens, Sparta, and Corinth were three of the biggest cities in Ancient Greece.

In all cities across Ancient Greece, no matter what city-state they were in, there were aspects of city life that were always the same.

This is because cities contained many of the same buildings and they had many of the same features, and thanks to their shared culture, people used those places in the same ways.

When tourists visit Greece today, they can still find the ruins of many ancient buildings in Greek cities.

The photograph here shows some of the ancient ruins that can still be found in the city of Athens.

So let's see now what some of these buildings were that each city-state had in Ancient Greece.

Every major city had a place called an agora.

The agora was usually located in the centre of the city.

The agora was an important gathering place for the people.

Mainly, it was used as a marketplace where people could buy things or sell things and sometimes offer services.

Because the agora was such a busy place, other important buildings were often built close by to the agora.

This photograph here is the ruins of an agora that is found in Athens.

Another important building in all major cities were temples.

Now, temples were actually found all over Ancient Greece.

They were found in the smallest villages as well as in those big cities.

Temples could be dedicated to one specific god or goddess, or several.

And actually, the Ancient Greek people believed that those temples provided a home on earth for when the gods or goddesses visited.

They were seen as one of the most important places in any Ancient Greek city.

Ancient Greeks would spend a lot of time in temples, worshipping their gods and goddesses.

In the major cities, like Athens, one very large temple was always built at the highest point in the city.

The highest point in the city was called the acropolis.

On the acropolis, in the major cities, you would always find a large and important temple.

The most famous example of a temple built on an acropolis is found in Athens, and it is called the Parthenon temple.

The Parthenon temple was dedicated to the goddess Athena.

Every year, thousands of tourists visit Athens just to go to see the remains of this amazing ancient ruin.

The photograph shows the Parthenon temple in Athens from a distance, and you can see plenty of tourists there who are there to look at it.

Let's stop for a quick check on what we have heard so far about the types of buildings in city-states.

Here's a true or false question.

Listen and decide if you think this statement is true or false.

In Ancient Greece, people gathered together for worship in an agora.

Is that true or is that false? Have a think and make a decision now.

Did you choose true? No, true is not the right answer here because this statement is, indeed, false.

Now, as a historian, we can't just make declarations about things being true or false unless we have some evidence or an explanation to back up what we are saying.

So I'm going to read you two statements now, and I would like you to select which one of those two statements is the best way to explain how we know that that sentence is false.

Statement A.

Temples were places where people gathered for worship in Ancient Greece.

Statement B.

An agora was a market and a gathering place in the centre of an Ancient Greek city.

Have you chosen one of those sentences? Good job.

The best sentence is A.

Sentence A explains that temples were the places where people gathered for worship in Ancient Greece.

So, if we know that people gathered in temples, we know that an agora was not where people went to worship.

Statement B explains what an agora is.

It doesn't explain how we know it wasn't a place of worship.

Well done.

You are doing really well so far.

Let's carry on now and look at another building that was commonly found in major cities in Ancient Greece.

Each city in Ancient Greece also had at least one gymnasium.

Gymnasiums were places where men went to exercise, but the women were not allowed.

As well as exercising, the men would use gymnasiums as places to have discussions and debates.

Some gymnasiums were very large buildings and could hold lots and lots of people.

Other gymnasiums were very small, as small as one room, in fact, in some cases.

Sam is here and she's noticed something, that the modern word we use, gym, is short for gymnasium.

And that's right, Sam.

We actually use the same Greek word today, gymnasium.

There are lots of other words that we have in English that come from Greek too.

Now, it wasn't just exercising that people did in Ancient Greece.

They also did other things for fun as well.

Cities in Ancient Greece had at least one theatre.

A theatre was a place where people would go for entertainment.

Here, actors, who were always men, would put on plays.

They would dress up and they would wear masks to show the emotions of the characters they were playing.

The most popular plays that people watched in Ancient Greece were called tragedies and comedies.

The theatres didn't look like the theatres that we have today, though.

There were no rows of comfortable seats and no big stages.

Instead, they were outdoor theatres and they used stone benches for seating.

In Athens, there was a very large theatre on the hillside on the way up to the acropolis where the Parthenon was.

You can see the ruins of that theatre in the photograph.

This theatre was called the Herodeon.

Have a look at these photographs.

I would like you to choose from these images which of them is the place where people went to watch plays in Ancient Greece? Did people go to watch plays in a temple? Did they go to watch plays in an agora? Or did they go to watch plays in a theatre? Have a think now, and make your choice.

Have you decided? Did people watch plays in place A, a temple? No.

A temple was a place of worship.

How about an agora? Could you see a play there? No.

An agora was a marketplace.

You could buy things there.

So that means option C is a theatre.

That picture is the Herodeon in Athens, and if you look carefully, you'll be able to see the rows and rows of stone benches where people would sit.

Well done.

Okay, let's try an activity now to bring together everything you've learned today about buildings in cities in Ancient Greece.

This is a note-making activity.

Your task is now to provide some information about each of the places listed in the table.

Those places are the agora, the temple, the gymnasium, and the theatre.

Think about how each place was used, who used them, and what they did there to help you to make some notes.

Pause the video now while you complete the activity.

Ready? Excellent work.

Let's have a look through some notes that I've made together.

You may have included notes like these yourself.

The agora was a large busy marketplace.

It had a central location.

And in there, goods were bought or sold, and services were offered.

For the temple, I have written that temples were a place of worship, that temples were built on the acropolis, which is the highest point in a city, and I've made a note that the Parthenon is a big temple that was in Athens.

For the gymnasium, I have written that a gymnasium was a place for exercising, for men only, that they can be big or small, and that men also met there for talking.

The last place is the theatre, and for the theatre, I have written that it was a place of entertainment where people could go to watch plays like tragedies and comedies, that the actors were men and that they wore masks.

You may have included notes like these in your work, and you may have added some extra facts too.

This brings us to the end of today's lesson, and we have covered a lot.

So let's review what we have explored today.

We now know that Ancient Greece was made up of many city-states, called polises, like Athens, Sparta, and Corinth.

We know that all the city-states spoke the same language and that the people worshipped the same gods and goddesses, and they had a shared culture.

Although all the polises were different, their cities had some similarities.

For example, they all had the agora.

They all had temples, gymnasiums, and theatres.

In each polis, there was always a temple built at the highest point in the city, called the acropolis.

There was always a gymnasium for men to exercise and hold debates in, and there were theatres where the Greeks would go to watch plays.

What a lot we have discovered today about the city-states! It was so interesting seeing the photographs of the ruins of those amazing places that still exist today.

I hope you enjoyed learning about the city-states as well, and I do look forward to seeing you again for another lesson to find out more about the Ancient Greek civilization.

Goodbye for now.

Bye!.