Great Texts: The Intellectual Tradition of the Ancient World

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Introduction

Key terms and topics

Categories for the readings

Historical, mythological, and biblical timeline

Greek and Roman gods

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Reading Selection

Homer, Iliad OR Homer, Odyssey

Aeschylus, Oresteia OR Euripides, Bacchae

Plato, Republic

Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics (selections) AND/OR Lucretius, De Rerum Natura

Virgil, Aeneid

Bible (selections)

Augustine, Confessions (Books 1-9) OR Augustine, City of God (selections)

Sample reading schedule

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Homer, Iliad

Homer, The Iliad, trans. Robert Fagles (Penguin). ISBN: 978-0140275360

Timeline

Characters

Terms

Excerpt from the Odyssey, Book 11

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Homer, Odyssey

Homer, The Odyssey, trans. Robert Fagles (Penguin, 1996). ISBN: 0140268863

Timeline

Characters

Terms

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Aeschylus, Oresteia

Aeschylus, Oresteia, trans. Peter Meineck (Hackett Publishing Company, 1998). ISBN: 978-0872203907

Characters

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Euripides, Bacchae

Euripides, Medea, Hippolytus, Heracles, Bacchae, ed. Stephen Esposito (Focus). ISBN: 978-1585100484

Terms

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Plato, Republic

Plato, The Republic, trans. C.D.C. Reeve (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 2004). ISBN: 978-0872207363

Outline

Terms

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Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics

Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, trans. Martin Ostwald (Prentice Hall, 1999). ISBN: 978-0023895302

Outline

Terms

Parts of the soul

Virtues and vices

Types of government

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Lucretius, De Rerum Natura
(About the Nature of Things or The Way Things Are)

Lucretius, The Way Things Are: the De Rerum Natura of Titus Lucretius Carus, trans. Rolfe Humphries (Indiana University Press). ISBN: 978-0253201256

Terms

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Virgil, Aeneid

Virgil, The Aeneid, trans. Robert Fagles (Penguin, 2010). ISBN: 978-0143106296

Historical context

Literary context

Characters

Aeneas’s genealogy

Opening lines of the Aeneid, Iliad, and Odyssey

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Bible

English Standard Version

Approximate biblical chronology

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Augustine, Confessions

Augustine, Confessions, trans. Henry Chadwick (Oxford University Press, 1992). ISBN: 978-0199537822

Philosophies and religions

Manichaeism compared to Christianity

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Augustine, City of God

Augustine, City of God, trans. Henry Bettenson (Penguin Classics, 2004). ISBN: 978-0140448948

Terms

Outline of City of God

Outline of Book 1

Outline of Book 5

Outline of Book 10

Outline of Book 14

Outline of Book 19