This course is a new version of our beginner’s introduction to the the origins of philosophy in Ancient Greece and to the basics of the Ancient Greek language.

Ancient Greek writings stand at the head of the disciplines of poetry, philosophy, literary criticism, history, mathematics, philology, political theory, theology and science, other among (most of these words derive from the Greek). Learning the Ancient Greek language opens up the broader horizons of the original sense of these terms that describe our own world.

We will trace the origin of the notion of “nature” (physis, φύσις) in Homer to its development by the first philosophers such as Thales, Anaximander, and Heraclitus.

We will use the words and sentences of the first philosophers in our introduction to the Ancient Greek language and for our discussion of the original meaning of philosophy (no prior study of Greek or grammar is presumed).