Ancient Greece

Gr 4-7‘While focusing on the Classical and Hellenistic periods, this overview spans from Cycladic and Minoan times through the fall of Greece to Rome. Through standard double-page topic treatments, various aspects of ancient history and culture are presented in direct, bite-sized portions. Bright and inviting original artwork and museum reproductions appear throughout the short chapters to illustrate such topics as livelihoods, dress, education, and war making. Similar in scope and content to Anne Pearson's Ancient Greece (Knopf, 1992) and Fiona Macdonald's How Would You Survive as an Ancient Greek! (Watts, 1996), Ancient Greece aims its briefer text and large main illustrations at a slightly younger audience. Flaws are few (e.g., though the Mycenaeans are featured, Mycenae is not identified on the map). While not an essential purchase, this well-produced, well-organized title should be a useful addition in libraries where the subject is popular.‘Coop Renner, Coldwell Elementary-Intermediate School, El Paso, TX (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Oversized volumes contain scattershot information on the cultures, history, and daily life of the two ancient societies. Each double-page spread features a paragraph of text surrounded by information boxes and photographs of artifacts. The color illustrations that dominate each layout are rendered by a variety of artists, resulting in a too-many-cooks approach to book design. Time lines are included. Glos., ind. From HORN BOOK 1997, (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

A collection of information organized into four sections: ``The Greek World,'' ``Living in Ancient Greece,'' ``Arts and Sciences,'' and ``Foreign Affairs.'' An entry in the Nature Company Discovery Series, the book is a visual feast, full of images and beautifully designed, and some of the clearest illustrations found in any book in a very crowded field. The text, on the other hand, suffers from oversimplification (stating as bald fact that Homer was an eighth-century b.c. poet who retold The Iliad and The Odyssey, or that the Greeks rebuilt Athens in 447 b.c.), and assumes knowledge on the part of readers they're unlikely to have. Little is covered in this volume that is not available in dozens of better books for this age group. (glossary, index) (Nonfiction. 8-13)