#classical civilisation gcse

[greekmythcomix]

✨The LIFE of HERACLES: manhood - the Lion of Cithaeron✨

The story of Heracles’ first mission, to slay the Lion of Cithaeron for King Thespis of Thespia… and how Heracles came to be the father of almost fifty children 😳

From a collection of comix of the Life of Heracles (2018)

Did you know I have a whole collection of Heracles comix on the site? Great for lesson context!

Https://greekmythcomix.com/heracles-comix/

[whiskeysorrows]

GUESS WHO GOT A 9 (A**) IN CLASSICS!!

[tarttwannabe]

hello! i’m not new to studyblr + langblr, i’ve had a blog previously but i deleted it a few months ago to start fresh. this is my dark academia studyblr & langblr!

about me — 

you can call me c! she/her. i'm 19, & i’m studying undergrad as a stem student (computer science), and an aspiring classics major in uni (second undergrad & masters). i’m an intj 5w4 & i love making new friends, so feel free to reach out <3

i’m tracking #tarttwannabe so please tag me in posts!

why i started this blog —

to hold myself accountable and be more productive

to interact with a likeminded community as i work towards my goals

to keep myself motivated & to share my love of academia with the world

to meet new, wonderful people

because i miss the golden age of studyblr + need a way to force myself to make my life more beautiful

what content to expect —

study notes, journal spreads etc

masterposts and resources, study tips

aesthetics. a lot of aesthetics.

since i study both computer science (officially) and classics (unofficially), expect to see both!

my study aesthetic — chaotic/dark academia

currently studying — computer science at the undergrad level. learning french, and russian. i play the violin and the piano as well. i am also self-studying A levels for my second undergrad, in the subjects ancient history, classical civilisation, and latin.* 

i'm also a writer. my classics/writeblr blog is @iliadesque (although i suspect i won't be using it all that much)

things i like — the classics, the goldfinch, autumn, dark academia, gone girl,  thunderstorms, tarot, tennis, waif aesthetics, museums, earl grey, pilates, ballet, black coffee, reading, learning, and apples. i am a romantic at heart. i am also an olfactory enthusiast & have a modest but growing perfume collection.

my inspirations — @frenchiepal @studywithavalon @learnelle @lottiestudying @berlinsct @romanticize-until-you-drop @starrystvdy @caffeinatedstudies @alexistudies @woodlandhalls @studywithvictory @oneardentstudybuddy @shlrleystudies (hope none of you mind i tagged you <3)

*i'm studying (untested, mostly for personal satisfaction) gcses as well, in the subjects ancient history, classical civilisation, and latin.

[incrypted]

I start my first day of college (British college) tomorrow and I’m studying classic civilisations aswell as other things and I swear to god if some 6’ft handsome man in an English suit who loves Homer and didn’t take the SAT (GCSE) because they didn’t fit his aesthetic with a cold demeanour and expressionless eyes tries to invite me to a baccanal….IM FUCKING GOING.

[finnlongman]

Apologies if youve answered this before, but could you tell us a little about your academic journey? e.g. what were your a-levels, gcses, etc. :)))

Oof, that's going back a bit!

So, I'm currently doing a PhD in the Department of Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic in Cambridge, working specifically on friendship and affection in the later Ulster Cycle. I started in 2023.

Before that, I did an MA in Early and Medieval Irish at University College Cork. I finished that in 2021.

My undergraduate degree was again from Cambridge, in Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic, with a strong bias towards the "Celtic" parts of the course. I graduated in 2018 (having taken an extra year over undergrad due to health issues).

You'll notice there are some gaps between these! I took two years out between BA and MA and then between MA and PhD. The first one was because I was in denial about staying in academia and thought I wanted to leave forever and live in the real world. The second was because I knew I might want to do a PhD but I was waiting until I had a specific topic in mind to pursue, so I decided to work for a bit while figuring that out. I mostly worked in libraries during both of these periods, but also held a bunch of other short-term jobs, including as a bookseller, an exam invigilator, a digitisation officer (fancy word for taking pictures of documents), and assorted other things.

At A-Level, I did English Literature, Classical Civilisation, French, and Music. (Doing four was standard at my school.) I finished those in 2014.

And GCSEs... oof. Okay. Going back to 2012 here. Compulsory subjects: English Literature, English Language, Maths, Physics, Biology, Chemistry, Religious Studies. Languages (2 compulsory, but you got to choose which): French and Italian. Elective subjects: History*, Music, Art. (*Not quite elective as you had to do at least one of either History or Geography.)

You will notice I didn't take History A-Level; this is largely because my school only taught modern history (20th century) and I wasn't very interested in that. A lot of WW1 and WW2, which we'd already done ad nauseum in GCSE History. Class Civ suited me a lot better, especially as we did a Roman Britain module, which turned out to be invaluable for understanding early medieval Britain.

[cacaesar]

is it ok if i ask what a-levels you did to study classics at oxford? or what was your academic journey in general thx

Heya!! Of course it is! And thank you for the ask! I'll start with A-Levels and GCSEs (the ones I did, and the grades I got), and then I'll probably yap about how I came to studying classics/Oxford in the first place, and how school was for me (not easy, let's put it that way!) A-Levels: Biology - A Classical Civilisation - A Law - A Extended Project Qualification - A* (My EPQ was on Homosexuality in Ancient Greece and was 12,000 words... I really put everything into it lmao!) GCSEs: English Language - 8 English Literature - 8 Biology - 8 Chemistry - 8 Religious Studies - 8 Maths - 7 Geography - 7 History - 6 (first paper sat the day after a funeral lmao) Fine Art - 6 French - 6 Physics - 6 (we didn't really have a teacher for nearly 2 years...)

So...not the most impressive grades when you compare it to the straight 9's and A*s of people I got my place over! There are a couple of things to contextualise some of the grades - in that we unfortunately lost my grandad in the middle of GCSEs (and so my mum had to be away at hospital a lot, meaning I was cooking and caring for myself for the most part), and then for A-Levels I was in the Covid years (sat them in 2021). Our college decided it was a really good idea to make students sit full A-Level papers at the end of the year and have our entire grade depend on those, despite not having provided online lessons for a large part of the 10 or so months we were out of education; even when we were "back", the amount of absence through isolation etc was insane. Making us sit full papers when other colleges took grades over the whole year was, imo, deeply unfair...but anyway. I also unfortunately lost my nan and nearly lost my mum to Covid during the run up to those papers... all while working 20 hour minimum weeks - so it was more than a little stressful! On top. of that, I'm also AuDHD (Autistic and ADHD), but was undiagnosed until Uni... which meant I was flailing about desperately trying to succeed in a system very much not built for a brain like mine! The relief that came when Oxford finally gave me an answer to what was going on with me was immeasurable! But how and why did I get my spot in the first place? I've been obsessed with ancient cultures and history/mythology since I was tiny, and that basically just became a bigger and bigger obsession. My honest answer is that I got my place through a hell of a lot of hard work, a touch of luck, and blind unashamed confidence. If you sit in the interview thinking that you're supposed to be there, that these tutors will be the ones teaching you, and you're wanting to learn from them, there is not much you can do wrong! I did a LOT of research into my specific college - I wanted to study Homer's epics, so I chose the college with my favourite Homer and Hexameter Poetry specialist! And what would you know, genuinely loving that subject and yapping his ear off about my (informed and evidenced) opinions of Achilles and his characterisation (why he's actually a deeply sympathetic character, especially through the ancient lens, how he's the prime example of war trauma on a young person, etc) is what got me in!

I think I'll probably do a full post on education history at some point - and a series on applying to Oxford - but if you have any more questions, lmk! There should be a video on my TikTok covering some of the Oxford basics, though it might be quite the scroll down now! (gotta hit that 10k over there to make you guys playlists of the vids!) For now I'm on the way to london for a girlies getaway trip!

[cescinatudies]

today is gcse results day! i'm extremely lucky to have recieved the right grades to get into my college courses but it's a reminder that many didn't due to the flawed algorithm. if you were one of those people, best of luck to you.

[lyrical-lit]

If there's a prize for rotten judgement, I guess I've already won that

Odysseus, The Odyssey by Homer

[criminology-studies]

01.02.18 & 02.02.18 11-12/100 days of productivity

01.02.18- I did a lot of flashcards/index cards for re which I found surprisingly fun, like I literally went through my textbook and wrote every single key word down.

02.02.18- I did a mindmap of the booklet I got given. I missed some out though because of spacing and I didn’t really know how to set it out.

Sending out positive study vibes to everyone 💛💛

[foghlaim-study-blog]

Hi!

Currently studying maths, English language, English literature, short course r.e, chemistry, music, geography, classical civilisations and economics

I'm hoping to be able to help anyone who needs a bit more help understanding topics in these subjects.

My aim is to post once or twice weekly; however, if there is anything anyone really wants explained then feel free to leave it in the notes!

[greekmythcomix]

Today’s a Heracles teaching day, so of course it’s when I don my very own Nemean Lion Skin and club to teach*

*run into the class wearing it and shouting ‘RAHHH!’

[timoswerner]

did you actually get a degree in solely latin or was latin just part of your degree like classics? sorry if this is a bit weird in just really curious cause i've only heard of people studying latin at gcse or a level xxx

no its not weird at all!! so my degree was a dual honours in classical civilisation and latin so it was essentially greek and roman literature and latin. i actually started off just doing ancient history but then swapped to classical civilisation in my second year because i didnt like the history modules and preferred the literature ones and i started doing latin that year, and then because i was really good at it my personal tutor said i could change to a dual honours so that the latin part got recognised properly!! i hadn't done latin before, my secondary school didn't teach it. i really wish i'd done latin in my first year though and then picked up greek in my second year and then i could have just ended up with a classics degree and only had to so 1 literature/history module each year because i really struggled with those... hindsight is a wonderful thing though aha!! latin was a lot of hard work but i did really enjoy it and it does make me a bit sad that i feel like i've lost all my skills :(

[coffeeinthelibrary]

TAKE THE SUBJECTS YOU DONT KNOW IF YOURE QUALIFIED FOR

Im taking Classical Civilisation for A level, and every time I tell anyone that they ask "oh did you do the GCSE" and I say no they look really scornful like "oh she's gonna fail because she didn't do the GCSE"

BUT HEY GUESS WHAT

We study different shit at GCSE and A level and if I really needed the GCSE they wouldn't be letting me take the A level without the GCSE would they?

We're doing the Iliad currently and honestly out of my 4 subjects Classical Civilisation is going the best - I understand it and I enjoy it and its not too much work, and it's very similar to English Literature GCSE (which I got a Grade 9 (highest) in).

I chose it because I had a Percy Jackson phase and never grew out of it. DO THE SUBJECTS THAT WILL MAKE YOU HAPPY

[thessalian]

Thess vs Art Interpretation

A quick look at how my brain works:

Getting some fresh air on the balcony, I was thinking minotaur - because I have to be thinking minotaur because I invited one of my old friends to play D&D with us and he plays one so minotaur is a thing. Anyway, that got me onto Greek mythology in general and a comment from a Cinema Wins about Kingsman: The Secret Service occurred to me because of Eggsy referencing My Fair Lady and the Cinema Wins guy saying that Eggsy would probably have referenced Pygmalion instead.

Of course, I know the state school system here in the UK, and I know that Classical Civilisations - where we generally study the Greek mythology stuff - doesn’t actually happen until either GCSE or A-level, particularly not in state schools.

(Erm. Side note: ‘state’ school here is ‘public’ school to folks in, say, North America. Ironically, ‘public’ school here is what you call ‘private’ school. Look, it’s complicated, I don’t get it either, I just went to school here.)

Then I reasoned that he could probably be referring to the George Bernard Shaw play Pygmalion, but it still doesn’t make as much sense as My Fair Lady because again, drama is not something they teach in state schools unless you’re going for your GCSE or A-level in it.

Then I thought about My Fair Lady, and looked up when the movie came out. Turns out? 1964. Now, doing a little bit of digging for timeline cues and some basic maths, that movie would have been out or at least around and fairly popular when Eggsy’s father was a boy. Eggsy’s father was from fairly humble beginnings himself, or so said the argument between Galahad and Arthur about Arthur’s snobbery, so an Audrey Hepburn movie probably made more sense for him as a reference point than a George Bernard Shaw play. I would bet money that if we saw a Kingsman prequel, Eggsy’s father made that exact same reference to Galahad when he first joined up. After that, it probably became one of his favourite films, and something he shared with his family. Including his son, just when said son was about old enough to start remembering things.

Remember, this is a young man who, while never wearing it outright, carried every tiny scrap of his father he’d been allowed to keep - which were few. (I mean, hell; this kid remembered “Oxfords, not brogues”!) Eggsy holds what he loves closely, if brusquely. So if My Fair Lady was his dad’s favourite movie, he was going to hold it really close to him. But he wouldn’t tell anyone he hung out with, because it wouldn’t go over well with his usual crowd. But when the opportunity to bring it up came up, there was pleasure and a measure of relief. (Seriously, Taron Egerton is win for face acting.)

And then look at Galahad (Colin Firth is also win for face acting). Yeah, there’s a bit of surprise in both tone and expression, but the set of the mouth is amused and a little sad, and again, so is the tone. That’s the look of a man who sees the much-missed father in the son of whom he’s grown so fond. Which just supports my theory that the My Fair Lady reference is a holdover from Eggsy’s father.

And then so thinking, I had to go and a) watch the Cinema Wins again and b) write an abbreviated version of that in the comments.

This is how my brain normally works. It never, ever shuts up. I can seriously do this kind of thing all day. I mean, I do enjoy things when I watch them, I promise! It’s just that ... okay, there’s a part of my brain that’s just watching the thing and another part of my brain that runs in the background processing information for me to poke at either right then (if it’s a really intrusive detail) or later on. I guess it keeps me from getting bored, at least.

[classicallyfxcked-blog]

The Bad Beginning

I have decided to try something new.

As a Classics enthusiast, and one who has been through multiple exams, I thought that, both for my benefit and others, I would start putting up revision topics - and the good thing? Not just for Classics!

There are quite a number of things that I’d be happy to put up, and so below is a list of subjects that I can probably help you out with. Oh, and I will be taking requests, so just shoot me a DM.

Classical Civilisation (although only the Athens and Pompeii sections).

Latin

English Literature (any book, really, but my specialist books would have to be Romeo & Juliet and To Kill A Mockingbird).

English Language (with absolutely anything!)

Spanish

History (currently only International Relations 1919-1939, Britain 1890-1918, and USA: Land of Freedom?)

Chemistry

[illiterateopossum]

i don't really know what this is but thanks to @brisingr-iettauthr for the tag!!! im not tagging anyone except @manthastop because i don't wanna bug em but you all know who you are, so feel free to do this,,,,,, or not!!!!! no pressure!

are you named after anyone? - nope

when was the last time you cried? - almost last night but probably like two days ago. i cry a lot, sue me

do you have any kids? - i have friends that make jokes about my dad-ness but nope, just my pets

do you use sarcasm a lot? - not as much as i used to because it can come across as mean sometimes, but i do use it

what's the first thing you notice about someone? - probably outfit? face wise idk probably makeup if they're wearing it, or piercings. when it's not about looks, then the way they talk to people. cause ive met some pretty rude people at uni and you can always tell by how they address everyone else

what's your eye colour? - simply just v light blue. its the one thing i like about my appearance even tho it's p boring and common

scary movie or happy ending? - oooooo i l o v e a good scary movie (scary stories to tell in the dark is a good one if you haven't seen it yet) but overall id have to say a happy ending

special talents? - i wouldn't say i really have any? i can write pretty well apparently tho so ig that (my ao3 is schreibenzi, not to shamelessly plug it or anything lmao)

where were you born? - hull in england, live just outside of it in a small village now, (and huddersfield for uni lmao) but go back very regularly

what are your hobbies? - is it bad my first thought was video games and mobile games n stuff? i really miss dragon age inquisition rn so that'll be why. writing too of course, and sometimes digital art cause even tho i can't really draw all that well, im good at the painting bit

do you have any pets? - yup! a big ol poodle called pepe, he's huge and silly and i would die for him, and a chubby* cat called smokie who i would also die for even though he prefers grass to me. oh and two tortoises that live in my great grans room

*it's just fur, don't worry hes nice and healthy! just got a lot of fluff

what sports do you/have you played? - i mean ive played plenty of sports in highschool (hockey, baseball, netball, basketball, etc. rugby was the personal fave cause i wasn't too bad) but since then nothing ://// i don't feel comfortable with them lmao

how tall are you? - somewhere between 5'4 and 5'5. i both hate it and love it

favourite subject in school? - gcse was history for definite, idk what it was before then probably german or english, but i absolutely loved history and was really fucking good at it. a level at the time was sociology cause i was, once again, really good at it (even tho i seemingly bombed my exams which makes no sense. should have sent them to be remarked lmao) but looking back probably classical civilisations as a subject because it was a mix of history and english lit, two things i still love, even now as im doing a degree in a hhs subject

dream job? - i want to help people. i will say the same thing every time. i don't care what my job is so long as at the end of it, i can look back and see people thriving and know that i used whatever means i could to get them there. people who are doing no wrong don't deserve to be treated as though they are, just for existing.

well. that was a lot for only a few questions. im used to doing these things on my sideblog, but that's p much dead so hello guess im using this one more now.