Introductory American History | Page 5

first two Greek letters, alpha and beta.
Many words about religion are borrowed from the Greeks, and this is not strange, for the New Testament was written in Greek. Some of these are Bible, church, bishop, choir, angel, devil, apostle, and martyr. The Greeks have handed down to us many words about government, including the word itself, which in the beginning meant "to steer." Politics meant having to do with a polis or city. Several of the words most recently made up of Greek words are telegraph, telephone, phonograph, and thermometer.
MANY WORDS BORROWED FROM THE ROMANS. Nearly ten times as many of our words are borrowed from the Romans as from the Greeks, and it is not strange, because at one time the Romans ruled over all the country now occupied by the Italians, the French, the Spaniards, a part of the Germans, and the English, so that these peoples naturally learned the words used by their conquerors and governors.
INTERESTING ANCIENT STORIES. In the poems and tales which we learn at home or at school are stories which Greek and Roman parents and teachers taught their children many hundred years ago. We learn them partly because they are interesting, and because they please or amuse us, and partly because they appear so often in our books that it is necessary to know them if we would understand our own books and language. Who has not heard of Hercules and his Labors, of the Search for the Golden Fleece, the Siege of Troy, or the Wanderings of Ulysses? We love modern fairy stories and tales of adventure, but they are not more pleasing than these ancient stories.
[Illustration: THE PLAIN OF MARATHON]
THE STORY OF THE GREEKS. Our language and our books are full of memories of Greek and Roman deeds of courage. The story of the Greeks comes before the story of the Romans, for the Greeks were living in beautiful cities, with temples and theaters, while the Romans were still an almost unknown people dwelling on the hills that border the river Tiber.
MEMORIES OF GREEK COURAGE. The most heroic deeds of the Greeks took place in a great war between the Greek cities and the kingdom of Persia about five hundred years before Christ. In those days there was no kingdom called Greece, such as the geographies now describe. Instead there were cities, a few of which were ruled by kings, others by the citizens themselves. These cities banded together when any danger threatened them. Sometimes one city turned traitor and helped the enemy against the others. The most dangerous enemy the Greeks had, until the Romans attacked them, was the kingdom of Persia, which stretched from the Aegean Sea far into Asia. In the war with the Persians the Greeks fought three famous battles, at Marathon, Thermopylae, and Salamis, the stories of which men have always liked to hear and remember.
PREPARING FOR MARATHON, 490 B.C. To the Athenians belong the glories of Marathon. They lived where the modern city of Athens now stands. The ruins of their temples and theaters still attract students and travelers to Greece. The plain of Marathon lay more than twenty miles to the northeast, and the roads to it led through mountain passes. When the Athenians heard that the hosts of the Great King of Persia were approaching, they sent a runner, Pheidippides by name, to ask aid of Sparta, a city one hundred and forty miles away, in the peninsula now called the Morea, where dwelt the sturdiest fighters of Greece. This runner reached Sparta on the second day, but the Spartans said it would be against their religious custom to march before the moon was full. The Athenians saw that they must meet the enemy alone--one small city against a mighty empire. They called their ten thousand men together and set out. On the way they were joined by a thousand more, the whole army of the brave little town of Plataea.
[Illustration: GREEK SOLDIERS IN ARMS From a Greek vase of about the time of the battle of Marathon]
HOW THE ATHENIANS WERE ARMED. Although the Persians had six times as many soldiers as the Athenians, they were not so well armed for hand to hand fighting. Their principal weapon was the bow and arrow, while the Greeks used the lance and a short sword. The Greek soldier was protected by his bronze helmet, solid across the forehead and over the nose; by his breastplate, a leathern or linen tunic covered with small metal scales, with flaps hanging below his hips; and by greaves or pieces of metal in front of his knees and shins. He was also protected by a shield, often long enough to reach from his face to his knees. According to a strange custom the Athenians were led by ten generals,