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3000 BCE
Start of the Cyclades culture
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2500 BCE
Start of the Minoan civilisation
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1600 BCE
Mycenaean civilisation declining
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1500 BCE
Eruption of volcano on Thera
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776 BCE
First recorded Olympic Games
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750 BCE
Homer creditied with writing the Illiad and the Odyssey - two important and influential poems
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720 BCE
First Greek colonies established on the island now known as Sicily
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610 BCE
Female poet Sappho born on the Greek island of Lesbos
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508 BCE
Cleisthenes the 'father of democracy' reforms the constitution to create equal rights for all Greek citizens.
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490 BCE
Battle of Marathon (First Persian War)
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480 BCE
Battles of Thermopylae and Salamis (Second Persian War)
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447 BCE
Construction of the Parthenon on the Acropolis in Athens starts
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404 BCE
Sparta defeats Athens, ending the Peloponnesian War and becomes the supreme power in ancient Greece.
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323 BCE
Alexander the Great dies after defeating the Persians and setting up an empire that spread Greek culture
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197 BCE
Rome finally defeats Macedon, forcing it to give up the Greek city states it formerly controlled
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146 BCE
Rome conquers Corinth, the last resisting city state in Greece