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climate and geography: Greece 257 Because water has a specific 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 effect on temperature In territories around the Mediterranean, one consequence of this effect is to make latitude less significant in terms of climate and temperature than proximity to the sea Greek cities near the coast enjoyed similar climates, whether they were far to the south in Crete or far to the north in Thrace But inland areas might differ 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 different climate from Delphi, less than a hundred miles inland but farther from the water The 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 figs, especially) This climate probably accounts for the location of the earliest great civilizations of the Greek world, the Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations of the Bronze Age (the third and second millennia b.c.e.) The remains of these cultures show that they flourished 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 fishing The large, openair palaces of the Minoans suggest that those people took full advantage of the mild climate, spending their time largely outdoors Classical Greek architecture, too, reflects the climate The great temples of Athens and Olympia, for example, have very little room inside them; they were intended not to contain worshippers but to be the centerpiece for outdoor rituals Ancient culture profited from this climate and geography The sea provided easy travel, and closely spaced islands made navigation easy Thus, Greeks could mingle with each other and with the peoples of the civilizations to the east and south—Babylonians, Assyrians, Persians, and Egyptians The 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 Plato’s famous school of philosophy, the Academy, got its name from the park in which the philosophers met, the Akademe at Athens Corinth to form the highlands of Arcadia in the Peloponnese These mountainous regions have a climate similar to that of the more northerly parts of continental Europe—including regular snowfall in the winter months These mountain 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 The 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 people of ancient Greece The mountains, less prone to drought in winter, provided grazing for livestock, mostly smaller animals like sheep, pigs, and goats, but cattle as well Shepherds, goatherds, and swineherds would pasture their flocks in the mountains during the summer and bring them down to the plains, near the inhabited areas, during the winter The nomadic life of these pastoral workers led to their status as both “insiders,” important members of the community, and “outsiders,” 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 communities by virtue of the characters’ marginal status The 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 first half of the first 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 character 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 rafters from those felled there to roof the largest buildings are still sound.” This scarcity of timber affected the shipbuilding industry especially—the famous “cedars of Lebanon” became an important import during the Classical Period The 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 calories for the ancient Greeks but also a source of light when burned in lamps, hygiene when used as soap, and mechanical lubrication HIGHLANDS GEOGRAPHY 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 AND TRAVEL BY LAND There 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 travel and communication Those rivers that existed were narrow and shallow, and tended to swell to raging torrents during the
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