1 Classical Antiquity
<p><b>Classical antiquity</b> (also the <b>classical era</b>, <b>classical period</b> or <b>classical age</b>) is a broad term for a long period of cultural <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History" title="History">history</a> centered on the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mediterranean_Sea" title="Mediterranean Sea">Mediterranean Sea</a>, comprising the interlocking civilizations of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Greece" title="Ancient Greece">ancient Greece</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Rome" title="Ancient Rome">ancient Rome</a>, collectively known as the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greco-Roman_world" title="Greco-Roman world">Greco-Roman world</a>. It is the period in which Greek and Roman society flourished and wielded great influence throughout <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europe" title="Europe">Europe</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Africa" title="North Africa">North Africa</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southwestern_Asia" class="mw-redirect" title="Southwestern Asia">Southwestern Asia</a>.
Conventionally, it is taken to begin with the earliest-recorded <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epic_Greek" class="mw-redirect" title="Epic Greek">Epic Greek</a> poetry of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homer" title="Homer">Homer</a> (8th–7th century BC), and continues through the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origins_of_Christianity" title="Origins of Christianity">emergence of Christianity</a> and the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_of_the_Roman_Empire" class="mw-redirect" title="Decline of the Roman Empire">decline of the Roman Empire</a> (5th century AD). It ends with the dissolution of classical culture at the close of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Late_Antiquity" title="Late Antiquity">Late Antiquity</a> (300–600), blending into the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_Middle_Ages" title="Early Middle Ages">Early Middle Ages</a> (600–1000). Such a wide sampling of history and territory covers many disparate cultures and periods. "Classical antiquity" may refer also to an idealised vision among later people of what was, in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgar_Allan_Poe" title="Edgar Allan Poe">Edgar Allan Poe</a>'s words, "the glory that was <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greece" title="Greece">Greece</a>, and the grandeur that was Rome."<sup id="cite_ref-1" class="reference"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classical_antiquity#cite_note-1">[1]</a></sup>
The <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Culture" title="Culture">culture</a> of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient" class="mw-redirect" title="Ancient">ancient</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greeks" title="Greeks">Greeks</a>, together with some influences from the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Near_East" title="Ancient Near East">ancient Near East</a>, was the basis of art,<sup id="cite_ref-2" class="reference"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classical_antiquity#cite_note-2">[2]</a></sup> philosophy, society, and educational ideals, until the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Empire" title="Roman Empire">Roman imperial period</a>. The Romans preserved, imitated and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Campaign_history_of_the_Roman_military" title="Campaign history of the Roman military">spread over Europe</a> these ideals until they were able to competitively rival the Greek culture, as the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latin" title="Latin">Latin</a> language became widespread and the classical world became bilingual, Greek and Latin.<sup id="cite_ref-3" class="reference"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classical_antiquity#cite_note-3">[3]</a></sup><sup id="cite_ref-4" class="reference"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classical_antiquity#cite_note-4">[4]</a></sup> This Greco-Roman cultural foundation has been immensely influential on the language, politics, educational systems, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophy" title="Philosophy">philosophy</a>, science, art, and architecture of the modern world: From the surviving fragments of classical antiquity, a revival movement was gradually formed from the 14th century onwards which came to be known later in Europe as the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renaissance" title="Renaissance">Renaissance</a>, and again resurgent during various <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoclassicism" title="Neoclassicism">neo-classical</a> revivals in the 18th and 19th centuries.</p>