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There were two main styles (or "orders") of Greek architecture, the Doric and the Ionic. These names were used by the Greeks themselves, and reflected their belief that the styles descended from the Dorian and Ionian Greeks of the Dark Ages, but this is unlikely to be true. The Doric style was used in mainland Greece and spread from there to the Greek colonies in Italy. The Ionic style was used in the cities of Ionia (now the west coast of Turkey) and some of the Aegean islands. The Doric style was more formal and austere, the Ionic more relaxed and decorative. The more ornate Corinthian style was a later development of the Ionic. These styles are best known through the three orders of column capitals, but there are differences in most points of design and decoration between the orders. See the separate article on Classical orders.

In the Classical period for the first time we know the names of individual sculptors. Phidias was artistic director of the Parthenon project. Praxiteles made the female nude a respectable subject for the first time in the Late Classical period (mid 4th century); his Aphrodite of Cnidus, of which copies survive, was said by Pliny to be the greatest statue in the world.

The development of the modern Greek economy began in the late 19th and early 20th centuries with the adoption of social and industrial legislation and protective tariffs and the creation of the first industrial enterprises. Industry at the turn of the century consisted primarily of food processing, shipbuilding, and the manufacture of textiles and simple consumer products.

The earliest works in European literary tradition are the epic poems of Homer and Hesiod. Early Greek lyric poetry, as represented by poets like Sappho and Pindar, were responsible for defining the lyric genre as it is still understood in western literature. Aesop wrote his Fables in the 6th century BC.

Greek education is free and compulsory for children between the ages of 5 and 15. English language study is compulsory from 5th grade through high school. University education, including books, is also free, contingent upon the student's ability to meet stiff entrance requirements. Recent statistics indicate progressively poorer results in the annual entrance examinations. Low salaries and status of teachers; lack of books, supplies, labs, and computers; frequent strikes; and continuing reliance on rote memorization methods are all matters of concern for Greek educators.

However, when the Germans attempted to seize Crete in a massive attack by paratroops — with the aim of reducing the threat of a counter-offensive by Allied forces in Egypt — Allied forces, along with Cretan civilians, offered fierce resistance. Although Crete eventually fell, this delayed German plans significantly, with the result that the German invasion of the Soviet Union started fatally close to winter.

According to Iamblichus, the Pythagoreans followed a structured life of religious teaching, common meals, exercise, reading and philosophical study. We may infer from this that participants required some degree of wealth and leisure to join the inner circle. Music featured as an essential organizing factor of this life: the disciples would sing hymns to Apollo together regularly; they used the lyre to cure illness of the soul or body; poetry recitations occurred before and after sleep to aid the memory.

Difficulties often arise in pinning down the ideas of the Pre-Socratic philosophers, and in determining the actual line of argument they used in supporting their particular views. This problem arises not from some defect in the men themselves or in their ideas, but simply from their separation from us in history. While most of these men produced significant texts, we have no complete versions of any of those texts. We have only quotations by later philosophers and historians, along with the occasional textual fragment.

Due to the more stable macroeconomic framework and lower interest rates, growth has picked up significantly. In 2003 the Greek economy grew at an estimated rate of 4.7, the fastest in the EU. A part of this has been sustained by the investment in infrastructure in the run up to the Summer Olympic Games 2004 to be held in Athens.

Greece must realign its economy as part of an extended transition to full EU membership that began in 1981. Greek businesses are adjusting to competition from EU firms and the government has had to liberalize its economic and commercial regulations and practices. However, Greece has been granted waivers from certain aspects of the EU's 1992 single market program.

The country consists of a large mainland at the southern end of the Balkans; the Peloponnesus peninsula, -- separated from the mainland by the canal of the Isthmus of Corinth; and numerous islands, including Crete, Rhodes, Euboea and the Dodecanese and Cycladic groups of the Aegean Sea. Greece has more than 14,880 kilometres of coastline and a land boundary of 1,160 kilometres.

In 2001 Greece joined the Economic and Monetary Union (eurozone). Interest rate policy is now in the hands of the European Central Bank.

Greek written history extends far back into Ancient Greece, and was a major part of ancient Greek theater. Later, influences from the Roman Empire, Eastern Europe and the Byzantine Empire changed Greek music.

Greek pottery is frequently signed, sometimes by the potter or the master of the pottery, but only occasionally by the painter. Hundreds of painters are, however, identifiable by their artistic personalities: where their signatures haven't survived they are named for their subject choices, as "the Achilles Painter", by the potter they worked for, such as the Late Archaic "Kleophrades Painter", or even by their modern locations, such as the Late Archaic "Berlin Painter".

Later Pythagoreans divided into two camps. The akousmatikoi held to these sumbola as the whole of their master's teaching. The mathematikoi added research into geometry, musical theory, astronomy, mechanics and other sciences. The mathematikoi held that the akousmatikoi knew only the outer form of the doctrine, but they themselves claimed to know the inner as well. The akousmatikoi accused the mathematikoi of adding extraneous material to the original teaching. Even today, scholars cannot definitively identify the "real" Pythagoreans.