Syllabus for Eng 231, Foundations Stones of the West: The Literature and Culture of Babylon, Athens, Jerusalem, and Rome. Literature--Art--Music--History—Philosophy

• Introduction

• Powerpoint lecture: Images, culture, and mythology of Stone-Age “Old” Europe.
• Powerpoint lecture: History and geography of Neolithic and Bronze-Age Europe and the Middle East.
• Video lecture: The nature of mythology, Tina Passman, Classics.
• Powerpoint lecture: The archeology and mythology of Babylon and Mesopotamia.
• Reading: Gilgamesh.
• Powerpoint lecture: The historical and archeological context of the Hebrew Bible ( the “Old” Testament.)
• Reading: Genesis, Exodus, Job, Samuel.
• Powerpoint lecture: The world of Homer.
• Reading: from Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey.
• Powerpoint lecture: The world of 5th century Athens.
• Video lecture: The visual arts of ancient Greece, Michael Grillo, Art.
• Viewing: Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex and Aristophanes’ Lysistrata.
• Video lecture: Reading the Greek Philosophers, Michael Howard, Philosophy.
• Reading: Plato.
• Powerpoint lecture: The historical and archeological context of the Christian Bible.
• Reading: the Christian gospels.
• Video lecture: The shape of late antiquity, the world of Rome, Jay Bregman, history.
• Video lecture: Reading Virgil’s Aeneid.
• Reading: from Virgil’s Aeneid.
• A visual tour of Ephesis, Hierapolis, and Afrodisa, three Hellenistic-Roman cities in present day Turkey and among the best preserved .
• Reading: from St Augustine’s Confessions.
• Powerpoint lecture: Dante’s Florence.
• Reading: from Dante’s Divine Comedy.
• Powerpoint lecture: The medieval cathedral.

.Video lecture:Giotto, Michael Grillo, Art.
• Powerpoint lecture: Into the modern age: Giotto and the early Renaissance.