Zulick Home | COM300 | Chronology
Ancient Rhetoric:
An Annotated Chronology
Links in these pages are mostly to Thomas Martin's Overview of Archaic and Classical Greek History
Ca. 1780 BCE | Hammurabi's law, the first known written law code. |
Ca. 1700 |
Invention of alphabet by Canaanites, proto-Phoenicians/Israelites, inhabiting Sinai and Palestine |
12th c. |
Israelites occupy hill country of Palestine |
1050–950 |
Ionians colonize coast of Asia Minor (present-day Albania, Turkey, Syria) |
Ca. 926 |
Israelites divide into two kingdoms, Israel and Judah. Book of J. |
776 |
First Olympic Games |
753 |
Traditional date for founding of Rome |
By 750 |
Greek alphabet developed from Phoenician-Hebrew prototype |
722/21 |
Kingdom of Israel destroyed by Shalmaneser V of Assyria and his successor Sargon II. 8th c. prophets Isaiah, Amos, Hosea, Micah. |
By 700 |
Homeric Epics, Iliad, Odyssey |
639-609 |
Reign of Josiah king of Judah. Book of Deuteronomy and Deuteronomistic History. |
6th c. |
Milesian
Presocratic
philosophers (Thales,
Anaximander, Anaximenes) |
594 |
Solon archon of Athens; law code of Solon |
586 |
Kingdom of Judah destroyed by Nebuchadrezzar of Babylon. Prophet Jeremiah. |
561 |
Reign of Pisistratos in Athens, first tyrant |
538 |
Cyrus of Persia conquers Babylon: beginning of Persian empire. Prophet Second Isaiah. |
525 |
Cleisthenes archon of Athens |
525 |
Cambyses of Persia conquers Egypt |
507 |
Cleisthenes introduces democratic reforms in Athens |
509 |
Rise of Roman republic |
Late 6th c. |
Presocratics: Theognis of Megara, Xenophanes, Pythagoras |
499–494 |
Ionian revolt against the Persians |
494 |
Roman office of tribune established, wielding the veto to protect the interests of the plebeians against the patrician magistrates |
490–479 |
Persian Wars |
487 |
Athenian archons chosen by lot |
478 |
Delian league of Greek city states against Persia, Athenian leadership. Origins of Athenian empire. |
476 |
Thrasybulus, tyrant of Syracuse, overthrown. Corax and Tisias. The first techne. |
Ca.470 |
Great tragedians Aeschylus and Sophocles begin their careers |
467–466 |
Athenians defeat Persians |
465–464 |
Delian league breaks up when Spartans refuse Athenian assistance |
463 |
Pericles begins public career in Athens. Beginning of Athenian Golden Age |
461 |
Athenians institute radical democracy; First Peloponnesian War. |
451 | Recording of Twelve Tables of Roman law, perhaps as a result of Greek influence. |
Ca.450 |
Periclean citizenship law; truce with Sparta; Early sophists Protagoras of Abdera; Empedocles; Zeno of Elea (the "Eleatic stranger") |
447 |
Parthenon begun |
443 |
Pericles general of Athenian forces |
440s–430s |
Herodotus active, writes History of the Persian War |
441-439 |
Ionian island of Samos revolts against Athens |
Ca.441 |
Euripides, tragedian, begins career |
Fl.440 |
Protagoras, Prodicus, Hippias of Elea, sophists |
431 |
Second Peloponnesian War begins; Thucydides begins his History. See guide to Thucydides. Phase One: Archidamian War |
430 |
Pericles' Funeral Oration |
429 | Death of Pericles; Cleon leads Athens |
428–427 |
Revolt of Lesbos; Athenian expedition to Sicily |
427 |
Gorgias of Leontini, sophist, arrives with embassy to Athens. |
Ca.427 |
Birth of Plato |
425 |
Aristophanes, comedian, begins career; Death of Herodotus |
424 |
Boiotians defeat Athenians at Battle of Delion; Thucydides exiled |
422 | Nicias leads Athens |
421 |
Peace of Nicias with Sparta ends Archidamian War (Peloponnesian War Phase One) |
420 | Alcibiades, student of Socrates, becomes general |
423 |
Aristophanes writes The Clouds, a play lampooning sophists, including Socrates |
416 |
Athenian expedition to Melos (The Melian dialogue) |
415 |
Expedition to Sicily. Peloponnesian War, Phase Two. Alcibiades discredited over mutilation of Hermae at Athens. |
412 |
War resumes with Sparta;
Spartans deal with Persians |
411 |
Oligarchic coup at Athens |
410 |
Democracy restored, Alcibiades recalled |
410–400 |
Athenian laws revised |
407 |
Plato joins the circle of Socrates |
404 |
Athens falls to Sparta |
404–403 |
Oligarchic coup of Thirty Tyrants, led by Critias, a student of Socrates |
403 |
Democracy restored |
401–399 |
Combined Greek forces under Cyrus mount new expedition against Persia |
Ca.400 |
Other rhetoricians flourishing about this time: Evenus of Paros, Callippus, Pamphilus, Lycophron, Polus, Licymnius, author of Dissoi Logoi. |
399 |
Trial
and
death
of Socrates |
397 |
Isocrates xvi (Isocrates active 390s-338). |
395-387 |
|
394 |
Persians defeat Spartan fleet at Cnidus |
393 |
Isocrates opens his school at Athens |
391 |
Isocrates xiii, Against the Sophists |
ca. 387 | Lysias, Funeral Oration (commemorates Athenian casualties in Corinth)ian war) |
386 |
Truce with Persia |
385 |
Plato, Menexenus |
384 |
Births of Demosthenes and Aristotle |
380 |
Isocrates iv,
Panegyricus |
378–377 |
Second Athenian League |
371–362 |
War between Thebes and Sparta; Sparta defeated |
367 |
Aristotle
joins Plato's
Academy |
Ca. 360 |
Plato, Phaedrus. Introduction of the Roman praetorship, a civil and juridical office that freed the consuls for military affairs. |
359 |
Philip II king of Macedon |
357–356 |
Social War between Athens
and its allies; war with Philip II over Amphipolis |
354 |
Athens defeated in Social War |
353 |
Isocrates iv, Antidosis |
349 | Demosthenes, Second Olynthiac |
347 |
Death of Plato |
346 |
Peace of Philocrates
between Philip and Athens. |
343 |
Trial and acquittal
of Aeschines: Demosthenes
xix and
Aeschines
ii
(On
the Embassy) |
341 | Demosthenes, Third Philippic |
340 | Letter of Philip to Athens |
339 |
Isocrates xii, Panathenaicus |
338 |
Philip defeats Athenians
and Thebans at Chaeronea. Conventional end of Greek "liberty." |
337 |
Philip's Corinthian
League declares war with Persia |
336 |
Philip assassinated, Alexander becomes emperor |
335 |
Alexander destroys Thebes. |
334 |
Alexander begins expedition to Persia |
331 |
Alexandria founded in Egypt |
330 |
Demosthenes xviii, On the Crown; Aeschines iii, Against Ctesiphon; Lycurgus i, Against Leocrates Anaximenes, Rhetorica ad Alexandrum. |
325–324 |
Death of Lycurgus; Demosthenes exiled |
323–322 |
Death of Alexander sets
off Lamian War; |
322 |
Athenian constitution
altered; oligarchy imposed, enforced by Macedonian garrison |
ca. 300 | Theophrastus; On Characters. |
264-241 |
First Punic War with Carthage, a Phoenician colony in Tunisia that developed a trans-Mediterranean empire |
ca. 250 | Demetrius, On Style. Translation of Hebrew Bible into Greek (Septuagint) in progress or complete? in Alexandria, Egypt. |
253 | Titus Coruncanius, first plebeian chief priest, begins teaching jurisprudence to lay students, initiating tradition of Roman jurists. The jurists did not practice law but were teachers and advisers to those who did. By recording, enlarging and interpreting traditional statutes they developed Roman legal precedent. |
218 |
Second Punic War |
ca. 150 | Hermagoras of Temnos. Credited with introduction of stasis system of invention. Treatise does not survive. |
149-146 |
Third Punic War results in destruction of Carthage. Roman aristocrats benefit while plebeians suffer cost of war. Prisoners of war increased the slave population. |
133-123 |
Tiberius and Gaius Gracchus, elected consuls, attempted agrarian reforms to grant land to citizens uprooted by war and to give equal citizenship to Italics (Italians not born in Rome). Reform fails. |
106 | Birth of Cicero |
102 | Caius Marius professionalizes army, defeats Germans in France and northern Italy. |
91 | Setting of Cicero's dialogue De Oratore: Crassus' villa in Tusculum. |
88 |
Civil War breaks out between Sulla and Marius. Sulla occupies Rome; Marius recruits indigent citizens as mercenaries, irreversibly altering the relationship between civil and military power. Catilina participates in murder of Cicero's cousin and Marius' nephew, Praetor Marcus Marius Gratidianus (Everitt 89). |
86 | Cicero, De inventione. |
81 | Dictatorship of Sulla |
79 | Cicero leaves for tour of eastern Mediterranean: begins rhetorical studies at Rhodes. |
73-71 | Slave revolt of Spartacus |
70 | Consulship of Pompey and Crassus |
63 top |
Consulship of Cicero. Catilinarian conspiracy. |
60 | First triumvirate of Pompey, Crassus and Julius Caesar. |
59 | Consulship of Caesar |
55 | Cicero, De oratore |
53 | Death of Crassus |
49-45 | Civil War |
46 | Cicero, Brutus, Orator |
45 | Cicero, De partitiones oratoriae |
44 | Dictatorship and assassination of J. Caesar. Cicero, Topica. |
43 | Second triumvirate of Antony, Octavian, and Lepidus. Death of Cicero. |
30-8 | Dionysius of Halicarnassus teaches in Rome. Critical Essays. |
27 | Octavian becomes Augustus Caesar. End of the Roman Republic. |
14CE | Emperor Tiberius. Traditional beginning of "second sophistic." |
ca. 50 | Longinus, On the Sublime. |
54 | Emperor Nero. |
69 | Emperor Vespasian. |
70 | Destruction of Second Jerusalem Temple by Romans. Gospel of Mark. |
80-90 | Gospel of Luke-Acts |
87CE | Quintilian appointed head of state school of oratory in Rome. |
ca. 90 | Gospel of Matthew |
92-95 | Quintilian, Institutio oratoria. Tacitus, Dialogue on Oratory. |
ca. 100 | Council of Jamnia fixes Jewish canon of Hebrew Bible, separating Christians from Judaism. Gospel of John. |
ca. 175 | Hermogenes of Tarsus, Techne, including On Staseis and On Qualities of Style. |
330 | Founding of Constantinople. |
382 | Jerome begins Latin Vulgate translation of the Bible, effectively fixing the Latin canon. |
390 | Gregory of Nazianzus, Orations (d. 390) |
395 | Division of Roman Empire into East (Constantinople = Byzantium) and West (Rome) |
395-430 |
Augustine bishop of Hippo |
ca. 400 | Apthonius, Progymnasmata. |
407 | John Chrysostom, Orations (d. 407) |
410 | Fall of Rome to Vandals. |