Curriculum and Subjects Taught in Ancient Greek Schools | Early European History And Religion

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CURRICULUM IN ANCIENT GREEK SCHOOLS

from a gymnasium library

In the 7th and 6th century B.C. education was thought of as preparation for war and membership in the upper classes. Sports and athletic were taught to prepare boys for war and music and dance was learned by both boys and girls for acceptance among the elite. A typical upper class education included instruction in poetry, music, oratory and gymnastics. The emphasis was more on the spoken word than the written word. At the gymnasiums, men taught boys about their duties to the community, proper behavior and how to carry oneself as a man.

At about six years of age Greek boys were sent to school, while the girls remained at home to learn from their mothers how to spin and weave, and to read a little and keep accounts. The first school to which a boy went was that of the letter-teacher, who taught reading, writing, and simple arithmetic.After three or four years in the letter-school the boys went to the music teacher, who taught them to sing and to play the lyre, and in connection with the music they learned many selections from the great poets. Training in the palaistra or wrestling-school was begun very early. The sports were in general the same as those of the men’s gymnasium. In addition to the subjects already mentioned, many boys, during the fifth century and later B.C., studied geometry, rhetoric, and philosophy. [Source: “The Daily Life of the Greeks and Romans”, Helen McClees Ph.D, Gilliss Press, 1924]

In Athens, boys attended school until the age of adolescence: that is, about their sixteenth year; though it is not probable that there was a definite limit of age; those who wished to extend their education had opportunities for doing so, even in the fifth century, by attending the sophists’ lectures. However, compared with the cheap fees of the elementary schools, the honorarium paid to these by their pupils was very high. There was no question of organised school instruction. [Source “The Home Life of the Ancient Greeks” by Hugo Blümner, translated by Alice Zimmern, 1895]

In the fourth and the third centuries B.C. some other subjects of instruction were added to the ones mentioned below. After the time of Alexander the Great, drawing was also taught to boys; probably this was due to the influence of Pamphilus, who was the Principal of the Painting School of Sicyon. The pupils learnt to draw with a style, or brush, on boxwood tablets, specially prepared for the purpose. As the school of Sicyon laid especial stress on correct drawing, and appears to have been rather behind the others in coloring, we may assume that the instruction in drawing was chiefly confined to outline, but we have few exact details concerning it.

Teaching Writing in Ancient Greece

Elementary knowledge of reading and writing was very common, at any rate in Attica, and people who were unacquainted with either were even rarer in ancient Greece than in our own day. In the school of the teacher who had charge of the boys’ elementary grammatical instruction, the boy was probably first taught his letters, their names and shapes, and very likely some external helps were used for this purpose; at any rate, these were common in later periods. [Source “The Home Life of the Ancient Greeks” by Hugo Blümner, translated by Alice Zimmern, 1895]

wax tablet and Roman stylus

The next process was combining the letters in syllables; and thus gradually they advanced to reading whole words. At the same time, probably, instruction in writing began. The master made single letters and words for the pupils to copy in the space left free under his lines, and probably helped them a little by guiding their hands. The place of our slate was taken by a wax tablet. This was a wooden tablet covered with a thin coating of wax, in which the letters were scratched with a pointed style, made of bone, ivory, or metal; the broad end was used for flattening the wax when the slate was full, and then it could be used again. There were generally two, three, or more of these tablets connected by hinges, and these were called diptych, triptych, etc.

It was only more advanced pupils who were allowed to use such expensive material as papyrus and reeds for writing, and even then, on account of the expense, they were not provided with new paper, but wrote on the back of what had already been used. Chance has preserved to us, in a discovery dating from the age of the Ptolemies, some very interesting specimens of Greek instruction in writing — several wax tablets, six inches long and four inches broad, all containing the same Greek trimeter verses, probably by Menander. The writing on one of these tablets, which was probably the master’s copy, is good and careful; that on the others, the pupils’ copies, is inferior. Under one the word “industrious” has been written by the master’s hand. But slight demands seem to have been made on the pupils in the matter of writing, and more stress was laid on clearness than beauty or speed, since there were always experienced slaves ready to do work of this kind.

Reading and Literature in Ancient Greek Education

For reading lessons the poets were chiefly used, and their writings were inscribed in manuscripts which were either rolled or folded. Homer was used as the school book of the Greeks, from the earliest periods to the fall of the Byzantine Empire, and his writings were read and expounded, as well as other poems in various meters, chiefly of a lyrical character. The master then either gave the boys copies, which he had probably made himself, or else, if they were already able to write, dictated longish passages to them; the pupils also had to learn a good deal by heart. Many teachers prepared anthologies of various writers for reading purposes; those especially were chosen which by their contents were well adapted for the reading of youth, such as Hesiod, Theognis, Phocylides, etc. The boys thus, by their reading and learning, acquired a knowledge of mythology, while at the same time the most important ethical principles were impressed on them. [Source “The Home Life of the Ancient Greeks” by Hugo Blümner, translated by Alice Zimmern, 1895]

We must be careful not to rate too low the results of this instruction, however little we may think of the Athenian acquirements in the mechanical arts of reading and writing. A people who knew how to appreciate the tragedies of Aeschylus, who could understand the comedies of Aristophanes, with their fulness of mythological, literary, and political allusions, must have possessed a degree of culture which in many respects was far above the average of the present day. It was, of course, easier for the pupils to acquire a large amount of mythological and literary knowledge when there were so few subjects to study; since natural science, geography, history, and foreign languages were all disregarded. In reading, the elements of prosody were also learnt, and these were more fully treated in the musical instruction.

Math, Geometry and Science in Ancient Greek Education

Roman tablet used for math

We are not totally sure how arithmetic, with whose practical uses the ancients were naturally well acquainted, was taught; but it is probable that — at any rate at Athens — this instruction was given at home and not at school, and was acquired by children in play by means of concrete objects, which enabled them to learn the principal notions and relations. [Source “The Home Life of the Ancient Greeks” by Hugo Blümner, translated by Alice Zimmern, 1895]

As regards method, counting on the fingers was very common in Greece. The left hand was used to represent all the units and tens, and with the addition of the right hand all the hundreds and thousands; the mode in which a finger was placed on the open palm and the number of the fingers, which were either bent or stretched out, determined the number required. More complicated calculations were performed by help of an abacus with little stones, an ancient invention long known to the Egyptians, in which the arrangement of the stones in the parallel lines on the board determined their value as units, tens, hundreds, etc. We do not, however, know anything further about the arrangement of the Greek abacus.

Later, the elements of geometry was added to the teaching in arithmetic, but only the older boys appear to have learnt it. This seems to have begun as early as the fifth century, but Socrates thought it ought to be limited to what was absolutely necessary. The philosophers of the fourth century, however, recommended geometry as an excellent means for developing and sharpening the intellect and logical powers. Plato even suggests teaching boys in play not only arithmetic and geometry, but also the first principles of astronomy, and afterwards continuing the study more seriously till about their eighteenth year. [Source “The Home Life of the Ancient Greeks” by Hugo Blümner, translated by Alice Zimmern, 1895]

Astronomy, however, would only signify to them what we now include in mathematical geography. Less educated people had a decided prejudice against geometry and other such abstract studies, on the ground that they were quite superfluous, since they were of no practical use in after years, either for the purposes of private or public life; and the opinion so often heard at the present day prevailed even then, that these subjects, since they could not be practically applied in after life, were only learnt for the purpose of being forgotten as soon as possible.

Music Instruction in Ancient Greek Schools

The instruction in these elementary subjects occupied the first years of school life. In the twelfth or thirteenth year the instruction in music began, and was given by a special master called the harpist, the Greeks regarding music not from the standpoint of the modern amateur, as only a pleasant distraction for hours of recreation, but rather as an essential means of ethical development. The main object of the instruction was not the attainment of facility in execution on any instrument, but rather ability to render as well as possible the productions of the poets, especially the lyrists, and at the same time to accompany themselves suitably on a seven-stringed instrument. [Source “The Home Life of the Ancient Greeks” by Hugo Blümner, translated by Alice Zimmern, 1895]

Accordingly, most weight was given to the instruction in the lyre (which we see in one image in the hand of both teacher and pupil), while the kithara, on account of its louder sounding-board, as well as the phorminx, which was connected with it, if not, in fact, identical, were reserved for the use of professionals, and were regarded as a kind of concert instrument, and therefore learned specially by those who desired to attain something more than average proficiency in music. No doubt there was opportunity given in the ordinary schools for learning both kinds of stringed instrument. The flute, which, when used for purposes of accompaniment, could naturally not be played by the singer, was on this account less popular at Athens; at Thebes, on the other hand, it was universally popular, and it has been supposed that the neglect of the flute at Athens was due to the ancient antagonism between Attica and Boeotia; moreover, the flute, which originally belonged to the Bacchic worship of Asia Minor, with its sharp, shrill tone, was regarded as an exciting instrument, hostile to a calm state of mind, and therefore the philosophers all agreed in considering it unsuitable from a pedagogic point of view. We must not forget that the Greek flute was very different from that to which we give the name at the present day, which is regarded as a somewhat sentimental, effeminate instrument.

There was, however, a time when flute-playing was popular at Athens among amateurs; according to Aristotle, the flute was introduced into Attic schools after the time of the Persian Wars, and soon became so popular that almost all the youths of the better classes learnt to play on it. Afterwards, however, apparently about the time of the Peloponnesian War, they recognised how very unsuitable this instrument was for intellectual and musical development, and it was again discarded by people of culture, probably in consequence of the example set by Alcibiades, who was regarded as a leader of fashion. Afterwards the flute was still learnt, and on vase pictures we see flutists and hetaerae playing it, as well as youths, but it was no longer a subject of instruction in the ordinary schools — at any rate, not at Athens. Naturally Sparta carefully avoided an instrument which was regarded as absolutely dangerous in its ethical effect. No musical instruction, besides the elementary subjects and playing on stringed instruments and singing, was given at school during the best period of Athens.

Physical Education in Ancient Greece

The buildings in which the boys received their athletic training were not, as was formerly supposed, the gymnasia, but the wrestling schools — a name given to these establishments because wrestling and running were regarded as the most important exercises in elementary athletic training. No doubt other athletic exercises were practised at the wrestling school. Of course, many changes took place in the course of centuries till the time of the Roman Empire, and therefore it is but natural that very various opinions should prevail about the wrestling school and the gymnasium. [Source “The Home Life of the Ancient Greeks” by Hugo Blümner, translated by Alice Zimmern, 1895]

The most probable theory is, that, at any rate at Athens in its best period, the instruction in exercises was given at the wrestling school, while the gymnasium was used for the further training and development of the youths. The wrestling school was not a public institute, but a private undertaking conducted by a teacher of exercises, who received a fee for the use of the building and the instruction given by him. These schools were under directors and managers ; the institutes usually bore their names, but they were sometimes called after the founder. Like other masters, they had a full disciplinary right over their pupils but they were also subject to the supervision of the inspectors mentioned above, whose duty it was to see that nothing which offended against morality took place in the gymnastic institutes, and also that the instruction was methodical and suited to the different ages. Besides these inspectors, no one else, except the paidagogoi who accompanied their charges, was allowed to be present at the instruction in the wrestling school; an ordinance of Solon’s forbade admission to grown men, but in later times this rule seems to have fallen into disuse.

The athletic training had a double purpose; in the first place to teach the boys a modest and dignified bearing (much as dancing is taught in the present day), and in the second, which, of course, was most important, to train them in the chief athletic exercises. These were jumping, which included both the high and long jump, for which purpose dumb-bells were generally used; racing, throwing the discus and the spear, and wrestling. Boxing was not included in the instruction given to boys, nor yet the pancratium, a combination of wrestling and boxing, nor the pentathlum, a combination of five exercises specially used in athletic contests, and therefore not generally practised at the wrestling unless boys were to take part in some public contest, in which case they might, of course, be prepared here beforehand. We shall deal later on in greater detail with the separate exercises, and must therefore content ourselves for the present with merely enumerating them, since the exercises of the boys only differed in degree, but not in kind, from those of the youths and men.

Plutarch on What Should Be Taught

Plutarch was born of a wealthy family in Boeotia at Chaeronea in Greece about 50 A.D. Part of his life seems to have been spent at Rome, but he seems to have returned to Greece and died there about 120 A.D. But little further is know of his life. He was one of the greatest biographers the world has ever known, while his moral essays show wide learning and considerable depth of contemplation. [Source: Oliver J. Thatcher, ed., “The Library of Original Sources” (Milwaukee: University Research Extension Co., 1907), Vol. III: The Roman World, pp. 370-391]

Plutarch wrote in “The Training of Children” (c. A.D. 110): “8. In brief therefore I say (and what I say may justly challenge the repute of an oracle rather than of advice), that the one chief thing in that matter---which comprises the beginning, middle and end of all---is good education and regular instruction; and that these two afford great help and assistance toward the attainment of virtue and felicity. For all other good things are but human and of small value, such as will hardly recompense the industry required to the getting of them. It is, indeed, a desirable thing to be well-descended; but the glory belongs to our ancestors. Riches are valuable; but they are the goods of Fortune, who frequently takes them from those that have them, and carries them to those that never so much as hoped for them. Yes, the greater they are, the fairer mark they are for those to aim at who design to make our bags their prize; I mean evil servants and accusers. But the weightiest consideration of all is, that riches may be enjoyed by the worst as well as the best of men. Glory is a thing deserving respect, but unstable; beauty is a prize that men fight to obtain, but, when obtained, it is of little continuance; health is a precious enjoyment, but easily impaired; strength is a thing desirable, but apt to be the prey of disease and old age. [Source: Oliver J. Thatcher, ed., “The Library of Original Sources” (Milwaukee: University Research Extension Co., 1907), Vol. III: The Roman World, pp. 370-391]

“And, in general, let any man who values himself upon strength of body know that he makes a great mistake; for what indeed is any proportion of human strength, if compared to that of other animals, such as elephants and bulls and lions? But learning alone, of all things in our possession, is immortal and divine. And two things there are that are most peculiar to human nature, reason and speech; of which two, reason is the master of speech, and speech is the servant of reason, impregnable against all assaults of fortune, not to be taken away by false accusation, nor impaired by sickness, nor enfeebled by old age.

For reason alone grows youthful by age; and time, which decays all other things before it carries them away with it, leaves learning alone behind. Whence the answer seems to me very remarkable, which Stilpo, a philosopher of Megara, gave to Demetrius, who, when he leveled that city to the ground and made the citizens slaves, asked Stilpo whether he had lost anything. Nothing, he said, for war cannot plunder virtue. To this saying that of Socrates also is very agreeable; who, when Gorgias (as I take it) asked him what his opinion was of the king of Persia, and whether he judged him happy, returned answer, that he could not tell what to think of him, because he knew not how he was furnished with virtue and learning---as judging human felicity to consist in those endowments, and not in those which are subject to fortune.”

“10. Wherefore, though we ought not to permit an ingenious child entirely to neglect any of the common sorts of learning, so far as they may be gotten by lectures or from public shows; yet I would have him to salute these only as in his passage, taking a bare taste of each of them (seeing no man can possibly attain to perfection in all), and to give philosophy the pre-eminence of them all. I can illustrate my meaning by an example. It is a fine thing to sail around and visit many cities, but it is profitable to fix our dwelling in the best. Witty also was the saying of Bias, the philosopher, that, as the wooers of Penelope, when they could not have their desire of the mistress, contented themselves to have to do with her maids, so commonly those students who are not capable of understanding philosophy waste themselves in the study of those sciences that are of no value. Whence it follows, that we ought to make philosophy the chief of all our learning. For though, in order to the welfare of the body, the industry of men has found out two arts---medicine, which assists to the recovery of lost health, and gymnastics, which help us to attain a sound constitution---yet there is but one remedy for the distempers and diseases of the mind, and that is philosophy. For by the advice and assistance thereof it is that we come to understand what is honest, and what dishonest; what is just, and what unjust; in a word, what we are to seek, and what to avoid.

Pericles giving a speech

“We learn by it how we are to demean ourselves towards the gods, towards our parents, our elders, the laws, strangers, governors, friends, wives, children, and servants. That is, we are to worship the gods, to honor our parents, to reverence our elders, to be subject to the laws, to obey our governors, to love our friends, to use sobriety towards our wives, to be affectionate to our children, and not to treat our servants insolently; and (which is the chief lesson of all) not to be overjoyed in prosperity nor too much dejected in adversity; not to be dissolute in our pleasures, nor in our anger to be transported with brutish rage and fury. These things I account the principal advantages which we gain by philosophy. For to use prosperity generously is the part of a man: to manage it so as to decline envy, of a well-governed man; to master our pleasures by reason is the property of wise men; and to moderate anger is the attainment only of extraordinary men. But those of all men I count most complete, who know how to mix and temper the management of civil affairs with philosophy; seeing they are thereby masters of two of the greatest good things that are---a life of public usefulness as statesmen, and a life of calm tranquility as students of philosophy. For, whereas there are three sorts of lives---the life of action, the life of contemplation, and the life of pleasure---the man who is utterly abandoned and a slave to pleasure is brutish and mean-spirited; he that spends his time in contemplation without action is an unprofitable man; and he that lives in action and is destitute of philosophy is a rustical man, and commits many absurdities. Wherefore we are to apply our utmost endeavor to enable ourselves for both; that is, to manage public employments, and withal, at convenient seasons, to give ourselves to philosophical studies. Such statesmen were Pericles and Archytas the Tarentine; such were Dion the Syracusan and Epaminondas the Theban, both of whom were of Plato's familiar acquaintance.

Rhetoric and Oratory

Harold Whetstone Johnston wrote in “The Private Life of the Romans”: The Roman "Schools of Rhetoric were formed on Greek lines and conducted by Greek teachers. They were not a part of the regular system of education, but corresponded more nearly to our colleges, since they were frequented by persons beyond the age of boyhood and, usually, of the higher classes only. In these schools the study of prose authors was begun, and philosophy might be studied, but the main work was the practice of composition. This was begun in its simplest form, the narrative (narratio), and continued step by step until the end in view was reached, the practice of public speaking (declamatio). One of the intermediate forms was the suasoria, in which a student assumed the character of some famous historical personage at the point of making a decision, and discussed the possible courses of action. A favorite exercise also was the writing of a speech to be put in the mouth of some person famous in legend or history. How effective these could be made is seen in the speeches inserted in their histories by Sallust, Livy, and Tacitus. [Source: “The Private Life of the Romans” by Harold Whetstone Johnston, Revised by Mary Johnston, Scott, Foresman and Company (1903, 1932) forumromanum.org |+|]

Oliver Thatcher wrote: “ To understand the position of oratory and of an instructor in it at Athens or Rome the reader must consider how little there was to learn then as compared with today. The ordinary education of a boy was supposed to include music, gymnastics, and geometry. Under music was included Greek and Latin literature, under geometry what little was known in science. The subjects for education above what might be called the grammar school were oratory and the philosophers. A Roman's fields for action were politics and war. He learned to command in the field, and usually won the right to command through politics. The open highway through politics was oratory, and hence oratory was considered practically the only subject worthy to be the end of a youth's education.” [Source: Oliver J. Thatcher, ed., “The Library of Original Sources” (Milwaukee: University Research Extension Co., 1907), Vol. III: The Roman World, pp. 370-391]

The famous Roman-era orator and teacher Quintilian wrote in “The Institutes,” Book 1: 1-26 (c. 90 A.D.): “We are giving small instructions, while professing to educate an orator; but even studies have their infancy; and as the rearing of the very strongest bodies commenced with milk and the cradle, so he, who was to be the most eloquent of men, once uttered cries, tried to speak at first with a stuttering voice, and hesitated at the shapes of the letters. Nor, if it is impossible to learn a thing completely, is it therefore unnecessary to learn it at all. [Source: Quintilian (b.30/35-A.D. c.100), The Ideal Education, “The Institutes,” Book 1: 1-26 (c. 90 A.D.), Oliver J. Thatcher, ed., “The Library of Original Sources” (Milwaukee: University Research Extension Co., 1907), Vol. III: The Roman World, pp. 370-391]

“If no one blames a father, who thinks that these matters are not to be neglected in regard to his son, why should he be blamed who communicates to the public what he would practice to advantage in his own house? And this is so much the more the case, as younger minds more easily take in small things; and as bodies cannot be formed to certain flexures of the limbs unless while they are tender, so even strength itself makes our minds likewise more unyielding to most things.”

Plutarch on the Importance of Being a Good Speaker

Pindar hailing Olympic heros

Plutarch wrote in “The Training of Children” (c. A.D. 110): “Still, before a person arrives at complete manhood, I would not permit him to speak upon any sudden incident occasion; though, after he has attained a radicated faculty of speaking, he may allow himself a greater liberty, as opportunity is offered. For as they who have been a long time in chains, when they are at last set at liberty, are unable to walk, on account of their former continual restraint, and are very apt to trip, so they who have been used to a fettered way of speaking a great while, if upon any occasion they be enforced to speak on a sudden, will hardly be able to express themselves without some tokens of their former confinement. But to permit those that are yet children to speak extemporally is to give them occasion for extremely idle talk. A wretched painter, they say, showing Apelles a picture, told him withal that he had taken a very little time to paint it. If you had not told me so, said Apelles, I see cause enough to believe it was a hasty draft; but I wonder that in that space of time you have not painted many more such pictures. [Source: Oliver J. Thatcher, ed., “The Library of Original Sources” (Milwaukee: University Research Extension Co., 1907), Vol. III: The Roman World, pp. 370-391]

“I advise therefore (for I return now to the subject that I have digressed from) the shunning and avoiding, not merely of a starched, theatrical, and over-tragedial form of speaking, but also of that which is too low and mean. For that which is too swelling is not fit for the management of public affairs; and that, on the other side, which is too thin is very inapt to work any notable impression upon the hearers. For as it is not only requisite that a man's body be healthy, but also that it be of a firm constitution, so ought a discourse to be not only sound, but nervous also. For though such as is composed cautiously may be commended, yet that is all it can arrive at; whereas that which has some adventurous passages in it is admired also. And my opinion is the same concerning the affections of the speaker's mind. For he must be neither of a too confident nor of a too mean and dejected spirit; for the one is apt to lead to impudence, the other to servility; and much of the orator's art, as well as great circumspection, is required to direct his course skillfully betwixt the two.

“And now (whilst I am handling this point concerning the instruction of children) I will also give you my judgment concerning the frame of a discourse; which is this, that to compose it in all parts uniformly not only is a great argument of a defect in learning, but also is apt, I think, to nauseate the auditory when it is practiced; and in no case can it give lasting pleasure. For to sing the same tune, as the saying is, is in everything cloying and offensive; but men are generally pleased with variety, as in speeches and pageants, so in all other entertainments.

Image Sources: Wikimedia Commons

Text Sources: Internet Ancient History Sourcebook: Greece sourcebooks.fordham.edu ; Internet Ancient History Sourcebook: Hellenistic World sourcebooks.fordham.edu ; BBC Ancient Greeks bbc.co.uk/history/; Canadian Museum of History, Perseus Project - Tufts University; perseus.tufts.edu ; MIT Classics Online classics.mit.edu ; Gutenberg.org, Metropolitan Museum of Art, National Geographic, Smithsonian magazine, New York Times, Washington Post, Live Science, Discover magazine, Archaeology magazine, The New Yorker, Encyclopædia Britannica, Wikipedia, Reuters, Associated Press, The Guardian, AFP and various books and other publications.

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