Gods and Goddesses - Greek Mythology One of the six Olympians, the daughter of Kronos and Rheia, Hera is the beautiful and powerful wife of Zeus. She is the most beautiful of the immortals, even more beautiful than Aphrodite. Her beauty is renewed each spring as she magically washes away the ware and worry of her immortal lifestyle. Her name appears in many stories and she is often regarded as petty and unforgiving. The story of Zeus and Io is the sad story of infidelity and revenge. Zeus...

The city’s first major engineering achievement was the Coaqula Maxima, an extensive sewer system that still operate today. It was used to flush the street runoff and drain the marshlands that would become the Roman Forum. Because of Rome’s great influence on its neighbors, its engineers were called on to create an infrastructure that would connect the expanding empire. Rome’s main transportation routes were to walk, horse riding, or cart through the countryside or travel by...

Analysis of Important Themes in Greek Architecture Greek architecture begins with the simple houses of the Dark Age and culminates in the monumental temples of the Classical period and the elaborately planned cities and sanctuaries of the Hellenistic period. As in any time or place, the raw materials available and the technologies developed to utilize them largely determined the nature of the architecture. The principal materials of Greek architecture were wood, used for supports and roof...

Analysis of Akhenaten The way this article is written, its almost as a story is being told with commentary of Egyptian scholars. This format makes it more interesting, and gives the article a larger scale. The whole idea that Akhenaten would go against the old Egyptian customs is intriguing. The article says that it is quite possible that he may have been the first person to attempt monotheism. I can imagine how angry the populous and high members of society were. It was a great idea,...

Historic Overview of the Roman Empire and Culture Throughout world history, countless civilizations have risen up in attempts to challenge others with world domination as their ultimate goal. One such civilization, the Roman Empire, would rise to greater power than had ever been witnessed in the course of human history. Because it was so glorious, modern cultures have modeled themselves on the Roman Empire, so that the legacy of the Romans pervades even today. Like many ancient...

Roman Legions Each century in a cohort had a signum or battle standard. It was carried by the signifer, who wore a bear or wolf pelt over his helmet and hanging down his back. Just what the various discs and crescents indicated is unknown; there is a theory that the number of discs corresponds to the century's number in the cohort, but this is contradicted by a signum shown on Trajan's Column with seven discs. There is also a scene of two signa standing side by side, each with five...

Roman Republican politicians were drawn largely from an ancient elite of wealthy families. These families, known as the nobility, dominated access to the consulships; between them they held over 80% of the consulships in the last century of the Republic. Active politics took place within this framework, and was characterised largely by personal and political feuds between individual members of the elite. Because this elite was defined by office holding (the nobility consisted of those...

Study of the Ancient Egyptian Pyramids During the Old Kingdom, Egypt’s greatest period of glory and power, massive pyramids were created. Though believed to be “astronomical observations” because of an uncanny alignment to the stars, the pyramids were built to house a pharaoh's remains, while protecting his body and possessions from weather and thieves. These impressive structures ensured the pharaohs union with the gods in the afterlife since the rulers were both kings and...

History of the Tomb of Tutankhamen During the winter of 1906 Theodore Davis, who was excavating in the Valley of the Kings, discovered in a hidden reserve near Howard Carter’s future working site a blue varnished pitcher with the name of Tutankhamen imprinted on it. The following year he entered an underground chamber, more than seven yards below the ground, also in the Valley of the Kings and location to the north of Horemheb’s tomb. Torrential floods had filled the room that he...

The Egyptian Goddess Bastet The country of Egypt consisted of two narrow strips of arable land lining either bank of the river Nile, from Aswan to the northern Delta. Ancient Egyptian society treated men and women equally. Women participated in the political, economic, and judicial world of ancient Egypt on the same terms as men. This social system reflects Egyptian mythology, where Goddesses played an equal, if not chief, role. Egyptian goddesses were creators of deities, and the protectors...