The Age of Alexander and the Hellenistic Period

King Phillip II of Macedon dies

336 BCE

Alexander the Great Succeeds

Rules over 70 cities, dies 325 BCE

Alexander’s land splits into three main kingdoms

275 BCE

Vitruvius

Roman architect who wrote of Doric and Ionic “orders”

Architects and date of Temple of Apollo at Didyma, Turkey

Paionios of Ephesos and Daphnis of Miletos 313 BCE

Grid Planning

Laying out city streets in intersecting horizontals and verticals, advocated by Hippodamos of Miletos. Used in Priene and Pergamon

Hellenistic Sculpture

Characterized by deep expression and more movement, and theatricality. 4th century portraiture became a major branch of Greek sculpture

Great Altar of Zeus at Pergamon. 165 BCE dramatic victory monument with a Frieze on its base that depicts Gigantomachy

Gigantomachy

Battle of gods and giants in Greek Mythology

Reign of Alexander the Great

336-323 BCE

Construction begins on Temple of Apollo, Didyma

300 BCE

First Punic War

264-241 BCE

Sack of Athens

86 BCE

Baroque

A style of Hellenistic Greek sculpture, characterized by extreme emotions and extravagant gestures, as seen on the Great Altar of Zeus at Pergamon. The term is usually used to describe a style of 17th-century CE art, and scholars of ancient art coin it in recognition of similarities of style.

Hellenistic Realism

Sculptures were made to depict the unidealised realistic moments of everyday life, for example the Drunken Old Women in the late 3rd or late 2nd century BCE

Abduction of Persephone painting. 340-333 BCE

Skiagraphia

Modulation of volume by means of contrasting light and shade

Spatial Perspective

The exploration of the spatial relationships between objects. Painters were especially interested in spatial perspective in the Hellenistic period in Greece