Because water has a specifi c heat at least four times
greater than land—that is, it takes on heat and gives up heat
four times less readily—seas have a moderating eff ect on tem-
perature. In territories around the Mediterranean, one con-
sequence of this eff ect is to make latitude less signifi cant in
terms of climate and temperature than proximity to the sea.
Greek cities near the coast enjoyed similar climates, wheth-
er they were far to the south in Crete or far to the north in
Th race. But inland areas might diff er in climate greatly from
coastal areas at the same latitude. So the city of Corinth, close
to the sea both to its east and west, had a very diff erent cli-
mate from Delphi, less than a hundred miles inland but far-
ther from the water.
Th e Mediterranean world enjoys mild, wet winds from
the Atlantic Ocean to the west during the winter and dry,
relatively cool winds from the northeast during the summer;
the ancients called these latter winds the Etesian winds (the
Greek historian Herodotus, for example, in his discussion of
the climate of Egypt). Long, hot, and dry summers, followed
by mild, wet winters, provided long growing periods, which
suited grains, olives, and fruit (olives and fi gs, especially).
Th is climate probably accounts for the location of the ear-
liest great civilizations of the Greek world, the Minoan and
Mycenaean civilizations of the Bronze Age (the third and
second millennia b.c.e.). Th e remains of these cultures show
that they fl ourished in coastal areas of the mainland and on
the Greek islands. Food was plentiful there, both agricultural
produce and seafood—the wall paintings and pottery found
in Bronze Age settlements on Crete and in the Aegean islands
feature many scenes of sea life and fi shing. Th e large, open-
air palaces of the Minoans suggest that those people took full
advantage of the mild climate, spending their time largely out-
doors. Classical Greek architecture, too, refl ects the climate.
Th e great temples of Athens and Olympia, for example, have
very little room inside them; they were intended not to con-
tain worshippers but to be the centerpiece for outdoor rituals.
Ancient culture profi ted from this climate and geogra-
phy. Th e sea provided easy travel, and closely spaced islands
made navigation easy. Th us, Greeks could mingle with each
other and with the peoples of the civilizations to the east and
south—Babylonians, Assyrians, Persians, and Egyptians. Th e
mild weather encouraged public congregations outdoors, in
marketplaces and in parks. So the Stoic philosophers got their
name from meeting in public colonnades, or stoas, and Pla-
to’s famous school of philosophy, the Academy, got its name
from the park in which the philosophers met, the Akademe
at Athens.
HIGHLANDS AND LOWLANDS
A spine of mountains runs the length of the Greek peninsula,
from north to south, from the northern highlands between
Macedonia (in the northeast) and Epirus (in the northwest),
including Mount Olympus, down through Phocis (the site
of the famous sanctuary of Apollo at Delphi, on the slopes
of Mount Parnassus), and reemerges south of the Gulf of
Corinth to form the highlands of Arcadia in the Pelopon-
nese. Th ese mountainous regions have a climate similar to
that of the more northerly parts of continental Europe—in-
cluding regular snowfall in the winter months. Th ese moun-
tain ranges are the result of the intersection of tectonic plates,
whose regular shift ing makes the whole of the Greek world
subject to earthquakes, accounting for the volcanic activity
in the Aegean.
Th e majority of the population of Greece has always
lived in the lowlands, near the coast, but both mountains and
coastal plains played an important role in the lives of the peo-
ple of ancient Greece. Th e mountains, less prone to drought
in winter, provided grazing for livestock, mostly smaller ani-
mals like sheep, pigs, and goats, but cattle as well. Shepherds,
goatherds, and swineherds would pasture their fl ocks in the
mountains during the summer and bring them down to the
plains, near the inhabited areas, during the winter. Th e no-
madic life of these pastoral workers led to their status as both
“insiders,” important members of the community, and “out-
siders,” living at the margins of communities, a status that
plays an important role in the literature of ancient Greece.
Figures such as Eumaeus, the “noble swineherd” of Homer’s
Odyssey, and the shepherd of Sophocles’ Oedipus the King
provide insights into the workings of dysfunctional commu-
nities by virtue of the characters’ marginal status.
Th e mountains were forested, providing fuel for heat,
timber for building houses and ships, and other important
forest products, such as oak tannin, used for curing hides into
leather. As the population increased, though, during the fi rst
half of the fi rst millennium b.c.e., overuse of this resource led
to deforestation. By the fourth century b.c.e. ancient writers
were commenting on the relative scarcity of wood. A charac-
ter in Plato’s Critias says of Greece in the early fourth century
that “there are some mountains which now have nothing but
food for bees, but they had trees no very long time ago, and the
raft ers from those felled there to roof the largest buildings are
still sound.” Th is scarcity of timber aff ected the shipbuilding
industry especially—the famous “cedars of Lebanon” became
an important import during the Classical Period.
Th e coastal lowlands hosted most of the population and
most of the land for growing crops. While the mountains
provided animal products—meat, milk, and leather—the
lowlands provided grains, fruits and vegetables, and olives,
whose oil was not only an important source of fat and calo-
ries for the ancient Greeks but also a source of light when
burned in lamps, hygiene when used as soap, and mechani-
cal lubrication.GEOGRAPHY AND TRAVEL BY LAND
Th ere are no navigable rivers in Greece. In antiquity a few
rivers could convey boats a short distance from the sea, but
Greece had nothing equivalent to the Seine, the Danube, the
Volga, or the Mississippi, comfortable thoroughfares for trav-
el and communication. Th ose rivers that existed were narrow
and shallow, and tended to swell to raging torrents during theclimate and geography: Greece 257