| title | Hocbigg - Classics |
|---|---|
| description | Path to a free self-taught education in Classics! |
The Classics curriculum is a complete education in Classics using online materials. This curriculum aims to cover the history, literature, languages, and culture of ancient Greece and Rome.
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An introduction to the scope, evidentiary methods, and modern reception of ancient Greek and Roman civilizations.
Classics: A Very Short Introduction (Mary Beard and John Henderson) - An engaging primer exploring how classicists investigate the ancient world through material evidence, literature, and modern cultural reception.
The Classical World: An Epic History from Homer to Hadrian (Robin Lane Fox) - A sweeping single-volume overview that synthesizes the interconnected political and cultural histories of Greece and Rome.
A survey of Greek political, military, and social institutions from the Bronze Age through the Classical polis and the Hellenistic kingdoms.
Introduction to Ancient Greek History (Open Yale Courses/Donald Kagan) - A comprehensive 24-lecture university course covering Greek civilization from the Mycenaean era through the fourth-century poleis.
Ancient Greece: A Political, Social, and Cultural History (Sarah B. Pomeroy et al.) - The standard university textbook detailing archaic developments, classical Athenian democracy, Spartan society, and Hellenistic culture.
Ancient Greece: From Prehistoric to Hellenistic Times (Thomas R. Martin) - An accessible, narrative-driven introductory history designed for beginners.
The development of the Roman state from central Italian settlements through the Republic, the Augustan Principate, and Late Antiquity.
The Ancient World: Rome (MIT OpenCourseWare/Will Broadhead) - An undergraduate course providing complete lecture slides, thematic syllabi, and guided readings on Roman political and social structures.
The Romans: From Village to Empire (Mary T. Boatwright et al.) - The premier academic textbook surveying Roman history from early central Italian cultures to Constantine.
SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome (Mary Beard) - An analytical narrative exploring Roman citizenship, political administration, and daily life using primary literary and material evidence.
An examination of the pantheon, myth cycles, ritual practices, and civic religious structures of ancient Greece and Rome.
Greek and Roman Mythology (Coursera/University of Pennsylvania/Peter Struck) - A structured online course analyzing foundational Greco-Roman myth cycles alongside ancient and modern interpretive frameworks.
Classical Mythology (Mark P. O. Morford, Robert J. Lenardon, and Michael Sham) - A comprehensive textbook combining literary translations, historical commentary, and art historical analysis of classical myths.
Theogony and Works and Days (Hesiod, trans. M. L. West) - Foundational archaic primary poems presenting the Greek cosmogony, divine succession, and early moral worldviews.
Greek Religion (Walter Burkert) - The canonical scholarly synthesis of ancient Greek sanctuaries, ritual sacrifice, hero cults, and mystery religions.
Roman Religion (J. A. North) - A concise survey of Roman civic rituals, priestly colleges, divination, and foreign cult adaptations.
A survey of canonical ancient Greek literary genres, including epic poetry, dramatic tragedy, and classical historiography.
The Ancient Greek Hero in 24 Hours (Harvard University/Center for Hellenic Studies/Gregory Nagy) - An open-access coursebook offering close readings of Homeric epic, lyric song, Attic tragedy, and Platonic dialogues through the lens of ancient hero cults.
The Ancient Greek Hero in 24 Hours: Sourcebook (Center for Hellenic Studies/Gregory Nagy, ed.) - A free primary source anthology providing glossed, enhanced translations of Greek literary masterpieces.
The Iliad (Homer, trans. Richmond Lattimore) - The foundational epic of ancient Greek literature, presenting the wrath of Achilles and heroic aristocratic values.
Classical Literature: A Concise History (Richard Rutherford) - An authoritative critical overview tracing genre developments, performance contexts, and intellectual history across Greece and Rome.
The Complete Greek Tragedies (David Grene and Richmond Lattimore, eds.) - The definitive English translation series containing the surviving dramatic works of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides.
The Landmark Thucydides: A Comprehensive Guide to the Peloponnesian War (Robert B. Strassler, ed.) - An extensively annotated student edition of classical Greek historiography featuring marginal summaries, maps, and thematic appendices.
Major literary works and genres of ancient Rome, encompassing Republican oratory, Augustan epic and elegiac poetry, and imperial historiography.
Latin Literature: A History (Gian Biagio Conte) - The canonical single-volume critical survey of Latin authors from early Republican drama through late antiquity.
Literature in the Roman World (Oliver Taplin, ed.) - An accessible handbook examining the social environments, patronage networks, and performance contexts of Roman literature.
The Aeneid (Virgil, trans. Robert Fagles, notes by Bernard Knox) - Rome's national epic, tracing Trojan exile, Augustan destiny, and the moral cost of empire.
Metamorphoses (Ovid, trans. A. D. Melville) - The seminal Roman poetic encyclopedia of classical transformation myths from the creation of the world to Julius Caesar.
Selected Political Speeches (Cicero, trans. Michael Grant) - A guided selection of Roman Republican forensic and senatorial rhetoric, including the Catilinarian orations.
The Annals: The Reigns of Tiberius, Claudius, and Nero (Tacitus, trans. J. C. Yardley) - The foremost Roman historical critique of the early Principate, accompanied by explanatory notes and historical commentary.
The study of physical artifacts, architecture, sculpture, and urban topography across the Mediterranean basin.
Roman Architecture (Open Yale Courses/Diana E. E. Kleiner) - A complete 24-lecture course examining Roman urban design, concrete vaulting technology, and monumental civic infrastructure.
Roman Art and Archaeology (Coursera/University of Arizona/David Soren) - An introductory online course surveying the physical remains, pottery, domestic spaces, and excavation sites of the Roman world.
The Archaeology of Greece: An Introduction (William R. Biers) - A foundational guide to Greek ceramics, architectural orders, and sculpture from the Bronze Age through the Hellenistic period.
Roman Art (Paul Zanker) - A focused handbook analyzing Roman portraiture, state reliefs, and decorative visual culture within its socio-political context.
Sequential instruction in Classical Latin morphology, syntax, and progressive reading skills.
Lingua Latina per se Illustrata: Pars I: Familia Romana (Hans H. Ørberg) - An inductive reading course teaching Latin grammar and extensive vocabulary directly through contextual Latin prose without English translation.
Lingua Latina per se Illustrata: Pars II: Roma Aeterna (Hans H. Ørberg) - The intermediate continuation of Ørberg's method, guiding learners through adapted and unadapted texts from Livy, Virgil, and Horace.
Wheelock's Latin (Frederic M. Wheelock and Richard A. LaFleur) - The standard systematic grammar-translation textbook featuring clear paradigm charts, grammar explanations, exercises, and adapted readings.
Latin Pronunciation and Spoken Latin Tutorials (YouTube/Luke Ranieri/ScorpioMartianus) - Audio and video guides covering Classical Latin phonology, vowel quantity, macron usage, and natural phrasing.
College Latin Commentaries (Geoffrey Steadman) - Free downloadable intermediate guided readers covering unadapted texts by Caesar, Cicero, and Catullus with facing vocabulary and syntactical explanations.
Sequential instruction in Attic Greek alphabetics, phonology, nominal and verbal morphology, and intermediate prose reading.
Athenaze: An Introduction to Ancient Greek (Maurice Balme, Gilbert Lawall, and James Morwood) - A leading narrative-driven reading textbook that builds Attic Greek vocabulary and syntactic understanding through continuous reading passages.
Introduction to Attic Greek (Donald J. Mastronarde) - A thorough grammar textbook providing clear explanations of Greek verbal systems, nominal declensions, and complex clause syntax.
Ancient Greek Tutorials (AtticGreek.org/Donald J. Mastronarde) - Free interactive digital drills featuring native pronunciation recordings, accent rules, and paradigm tests keyed to introductory Attic Greek.
College Greek Commentaries (Geoffrey Steadman) - Free downloadable student readers providing unadapted Greek texts by Plato, Lysias, and Xenophon with facing-page vocabulary and grammatical notes.