Hellenistic period
In classical antiquity, the Hellenistic period covers the time in Greek, Eastern Mediterranean and Middle Eastern history following Classical Greece, between the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC and the death of Cleopatra VII in 30 BC, in which all these regions were under the influence of Greek leadership, culture, and language as a result of Alexander's conquests. The Hellenistic period was followed by the ascendancy of the Roman Empire in the Mediterranean, the Battle of Actium in 31 BC, and the Roman conquest of Ptolemaic Egypt the following year, which eliminated the last major Hellenistic kingdom. Its name stems from the Ancient Greek word Hellas, which was gradually recognized as the name for Greece, from which the modern historiographical term Hellenistic was derived. The term "Hellenistic" is to be distinguished from "Hellenic" in that the latter refers to Greece itself, while the former encompasses all the ancient territories of the period that had come under significant Greek influence, particularly the Hellenized Ancient Near East, after the conquests of Alexander the Great.
After the Macedonian conquest of the Achaemenid Empire in 330 BC and its disintegration shortly thereafter in the Partition of Babylon and subsequent Wars of the Diadochi, Hellenistic kingdoms were established throughout West Asia, Northeast Africa and South Asia. This resulted in an influx of Greek colonists and the export of Greek culture and language to these new realms, a breadth spanning as far as modern-day India. These new Greek kingdoms were also influenced by regional indigenous cultures, adopting local practices which were deemed beneficial, necessary, or convenient. Hellenistic culture thus represents a fusion of the ancient Greek world with that of the Western Asian, Northeastern African, and Southwestern Asian worlds. The consequence of this mixture gave rise to a common Attic-based Greek dialect, known as Koine Greek, which became the lingua franca throughout the ancient world.
During the Hellenistic period, Greek cultural influence reached its peak in the Mediterranean and beyond. Prosperity and progress in the arts, literature, theatre, architecture, music, mathematics, philosophy, and science characterize the era. The Hellenistic period saw the rise of New Comedy, Alexandrian poetry, translation efforts such as the Septuagint, and the philosophies of Stoicism, Epicureanism, and Pyrrhonism. In science, the works of the mathematician Euclid and the polymath Archimedes are exemplary. Sculpture during this period was characterized by intense emotion and dynamic movement, as seen in sculptural works like the Dying Gaul and the Venus de Milo. A form of Hellenistic architecture arose which especially emphasized the building of grand monuments and ornate decorations, as exemplified by structures such as the Pergamon Altar. The religious sphere of Greek religion expanded through syncretic facets to include new gods such as the Greco-Egyptian Serapis, eastern deities such as Attis and Cybele, and a syncretism between Hellenistic culture and Buddhism in Bactria and Northwest India.
Scholars and historians are divided as to which event signals the end of the Hellenistic era. There is a wide chronological range of proposed dates that have included the final conquest of the Greek heartlands by the expansionist Roman Republic in 146 BC following the Achaean War, the final defeat of the Ptolemaic Kingdom at the Battle of Actium in 31 BC, the end of the reign of the Roman emperor Hadrian in AD 138, and the move by the emperor Constantine the Great of the capital of the Roman Empire to Constantinople in AD 330. Though this scope of suggested dates demonstrates a range of academic opinion, a generally accepted date by most of scholarship has been that of 31/30 BC.
Etymology
The word originated from Ancient Greek Ἑλληνιστής, from Ἑλλάς ; as if "Hellenist" + "ic".The idea of a Hellenistic period is a 19th-century concept, and did not exist in ancient Greece. Although words related in form or meaning, e.g. Hellenist, have been attested since ancient times, it has been attributed to the 19th-century German historian Johann Gustav Droysen, who in his classic work Geschichte des Hellenismus, coined the term Hellenistic to refer to and define the period when Greek culture spread in the non-Greek world after Alexander's conquest. Following Droysen, Hellenistic and related terms, e.g. Hellenism, have been widely used in various contexts; a notable such use is in Culture and Anarchy by Matthew Arnold, where Hellenism is used in contrast with Hebraism.
The major issue with the term Hellenistic lies in its convenience, as the spread of Greek culture was not the generalized phenomenon that the term implies. Some areas of the conquered world were more affected by Greek influences than others. The term Hellenistic also implies that the Greek populations were of majority in the areas in which they settled, but in many cases, the Greek settlers were actually the minority among the native populations. The Greek population and the native population did not always mix; the Greeks moved and brought their own culture, but interaction did not always occur.
Literary works
While a few fragments exist, there are no complete surviving historical works that date to the hundred years following Alexander's death. The works of the major Hellenistic historians Hieronymus of Cardia, Duris of Samos and Phylarchus, which were used by surviving sources, are all lost. The earliest and most credible surviving source for the Hellenistic period is Polybius of Megalopolis, a statesman of the Achaean League until 168 BC when he was forced to go to Rome as a hostage. His Histories eventually grew to a length of forty books, covering the years 220 to 167 BC.The most important source after Polybius is Diodorus Siculus who wrote his Bibliotheca historica between 60 and 30 BC and reproduced some important earlier sources such as Hieronymus, but his account of the Hellenistic period breaks off after the battle of Ipsus. Another important source, Plutarch's Parallel Lives although more preoccupied with issues of personal character and morality, outlines the history of important Hellenistic figures. Appian of Alexandria wrote a history of the Roman Empire that includes information of some Hellenistic kingdoms.
Other sources include Justin's epitome of Pompeius Trogus' Historiae Philipicae and a summary of Arrian's Events after Alexander, by Photios I of Constantinople. Lesser supplementary sources include Curtius Rufus, Pausanias, Pliny, and the Byzantine encyclopedia the Suda. In the field of philosophy, Diogenes Laërtius' Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers is the main source; works such as Cicero's De Natura Deorum also provide some further detail of philosophical schools in the Hellenistic period.
Inscriptions
on stone or metal were commonly erected throughout the Greek world for public display, a practice which originated well before the time of Alexander the Great, but saw substantial expansion during the Hellenistic Period. The majority of these inscriptions are located on the Greek mainland, the Greek islands, and western Asia Minor. While they become increasingly rare towards the eastern regions, they are not entirely absent there, and they are most notably featured in public buildings and sanctuaries. The content of these inscriptions is diverse, encompassing royal correspondence addressed to cities or individuals, municipal and legal edicts, decrees commemorating rulers, officials, and individuals for their contributions, as well as laws, treaties, religious rulings, and dedications. Despite challenges in their interpretation, inscriptions are often the only source available for understanding numerous events in Greek history.p:7-8Papyri
served as the predominant medium for handwritten documents across the Hellenistic world, though its production was confined to Egypt. Due to Egypt's arid climate, papyrus manuscripts were almost exclusively preserved there as well. That being said, the different historical periods are not represented equally in the papyrological documents. Texts from the reign of Ptolemy I are notably scarce, while those from the reign of Ptolemy II are more frequently encountered, this is owing in part to the large quantities of papyri which were stuffed into human and animal mummies during his rule. Papyri have been classified into public and private documents, including literary texts, laws and regulations, official correspondence, petitions, records, and archives or collections of documents belonging to individuals of position and authority. Significant information about the Ptolemaic Kingdom, which might otherwise have been lost, has been preserved in papyrological documents. This is particularly noteworthy given the limited documentation available for their Seleucid counterparts.p:8-9Background
Ancient Greece was a patchwork of independent city-states and kingdoms. After the Peloponnesian War, Sparta held a hegemony that was later displaced by Thebes following the Battle of Leuctra. The indecisive outcome at the Battle of Mantinea left the Greek world fragmented, creating conditions in which the northern Greek kingdom of Macedon rose to predominance under king Philip II. Macedon lay on the geographical periphery of the Greek world. Some contemporaries in the southern poleis disparaged it as less urbanised, although the royal Argead dynasty traced Greek descent. The kingdom controlled a large territory and possessed a comparatively strong centralised monarchy, unlike most poleis.Philip II pursued expansion wherever opportunity allowed. In 352 BC he annexed Thessaly and Magnesia. In 338 BC he defeated a combined Theban and Athenian army at the Battle of Chaeronea after a decade of intermittent conflict. In the aftermath Philip formed the League of Corinth, bringing most of Greece under his leadership. He was elected Hegemon of the League, and a campaign against the Achaemenid Empire was planned. In 336 BC, while preparations were under way, he was assassinated.
Succeeding his father, Alexander took command of the Persian war. Over a decade of campaigning he overthrew the Achaemenid Empire and the king Darius III. The conquered lands included Asia Minor, Assyria, the Levant, Egypt, Mesopotamia, Media, Persia, and parts of modern Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the central Asian steppes. The strain of continuous campaigning was severe, and Alexander died in 323 BC.
After his death, the territories he had conquered experienced sustained Greek cultural influence for the next two or three centuries, until the rise of the Roman Empire in the west and the Parthian Empire in the east. As Greek and Levantine cultures interacted, a hybrid Hellenistic culture developed and persisted even when far from the principal Greek centres, for example in the Greco-Bactrian kingdom.
Scholars note that not all changes across the former empire can be attributed solely to Greek rule. As Peter Green observes, diverse phenomena of conquest are often grouped under the term Hellenistic period. In several regions, including Egypt and parts of Asia Minor and Mesopotamia, Alexander was sometimes received as a liberator rather than as a mere conqueror.
In the subsequent era, much of the area continued under the Diadochi, Alexander’s generals and successors. The empire was initially divided among them, though some territories were quickly lost or only nominally acknowledged Macedonian authority. After about two centuries, the remaining successor states were much reduced, culminating in the Roman conquest of Ptolemaic Egypt.