The Greek and Latin languages and the formative cultures of the ancient Greeks and Romans are vital areas of instruction and research at Washington University.

For over a millennium and a half, from the dawn of European literacy until the rise of Islam, the intellectual life of Europe was dominated by Greek thinkers.  It is among the Greeks that we find the earliest recoverable European ideas about the universe and the forces that rule it, about politics and society, and about what it is to be human.  Those thinkers mapped the world of the intellect, establishing a philosophical agenda that remains current today.  In literature, the visual arts, and architecture, archaic and classical Greece represent an explosion of imaginative and creative energy whose products have provided models and inspiration for hundreds of generations of writers and artists.  The Romans, in turn, whose conquests completed the hellenization of the Mediterranean world and much of Europe, making Greek culture into a world culture, exerted a greater influence over the European tradition than any other people.

Researchers at Washington University are currently exploring a variety of aspects of this rich cultural heritage, advancing and refining our knowledge of the Greek and Roman past. In the Department of Classics, continuing research addresses such issues as the nature of early Greek epic and the little-understood history of its interpretation in Antiquity, as well as Greco-Roman education and intellectual and political history.  In both the Department of Classics and the Department of Art History and Archaeology, researchers study the material culture of the Greeks and Romans, excavating the ancient remains of Ithaca, the island of Odysseus, and, at the other end of Greece, analyzing and publishing the monuments and pottery of the Athenian agora, the ancient civic center.  Classical archaeologists at Washington University have also worked at such major ancient sites as Thebes, Sardis in Asia Minor, and Carthage in North Africa.

The principal tools providing access to these riches are the Greek and Latin languages themselves, repositories of the lion's share of the formative works of the European tradition, and our principal windows into the history and cultures of Europe and the Mediterranean until the late Middle Ages.  At Washington University, Greek and Latin are taught in the most progressive manner, utilizing the latest innovations in textbooks and computer technology.  The beginning student masters the grammar in two semesters and goes on immediately, in the third semester, to read Plato and then Homer, or in Latin, Virgil and Cicero.  We maintain a strong program in both languages, from the textbook to graduate seminars, where our most advanced undergraduates are often working alongside graduate students in our vigorous and growing Master of Arts program.  It is a remarkable and dynamic environment, one that the students find both rewarding and stimulating.  The Department of Classics offers as well a variety of courses on Greek and Roman history, literature, archaeology, and culture, addressed both to the general undergraduate population and to those pursuing majors and minors within the department.

At Washington University, new light is being thrown on the Greco-Roman sources of Western civilization, and our students, both undergraduate and graduate, enjoy the opportunity to become part of that important work.