• Est. 2015 in Grand Rapids, MI, USA
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Stick Shifts, Tongue Twisters, and Hellenistic Primary School (Ad Navseam Ep. 166)

Meta Description: Join Dr. Jeff Winkle and Dr. David Noe in Ad Navseam Episode 166 as they explore Hellenistic primary education, ancient tongue twisters, and resources to master the Latin language.

Introduction: The Clutch and the Vauxhall

Welcome back, classical gourmands, to Episode 166 of the Ad Navseam Podcast! Broadcasting from Vomitorium South—the hermetically sealed bunker deep in the basement of the RHB bookstore and coffee shop—your hosts, Dr. David Noe and Dr. Jeff Winkle, return to the microphones.

The episode kicks off with an examination of middle initials, with Dave declaring that his “C” stands for “clutch,” a nostalgic nod to the dying art of driving a manual transmission vehicle. Dave laments that the disappearance of the stick shift is a small piece of evidence that modern civilization is slowly fragmenting, though Jeff notes that manual transmissions are reportedly enjoying a minor renaissance among younger drivers who want something to do with their right hand while driving.

This prompts Dave to recall a disturbing automotive experience during his first visit to the United Kingdom. After renting a manual Vauxhall to explore the British countryside, Dave realized he had absolutely no idea how to put the car into reverse. For three days, he was forced to park highly creatively—or physically push the car backward by hand—until he finally realized the gear stick featured a hidden knob that needed to be depressed. Navigating the winding roads of the Lake District while shifting with his left hand proved so stressful that Dave concluded he would rather go back to graduate school to parse irregular Greek verbs than drive that car again.

Marrou and the State of the Classics

The primary academic focus of Episode 166 marks a return to Henri-Irénée Marrou’s massive tome, A History of Education in Antiquity. Jumping into Part Two, the hosts tackle chapters five and six, which cover the Hellenistic primary school.

Jeff admits he approaches these particular chapters with some trepidation, noting his frustration with the somewhat dry mid-20th-century English translation of Marrou’s original French text. However, both hosts agree that Marrou’s true genius lies in his role as a popularizer. Writing in the 1950s, Marrou frequently broke from the ancient narrative to make direct, often critical comparisons to the educational systems of his own day, providing room for modern intellectual growth.

This leads to a broader discussion regarding the current state of classical academia. Jeff shares that he has been invited to participate in a panel at the upcoming Society for Classical Studies (SCS) conference in Philadelphia. The panel aims to address the floundering state of the discipline by asking scholars how to keep the classics alive and relevant in the modern world. Dave argues that true relevance isn’t found by constantly updating the classics through hyper-modern political lenses or by instrumentalizing them for moral renewal; rather, the classics endure because they tap into the unchanging, universal realities of human nature.

Mormo and Montessori

Diving into Marrou’s text, the hosts examine the ancient Greek approach to early childhood. Unlike modern parents who obsess over infant schools and educational toys, the ancient Greeks believed that true education (paideia) did not officially begin until a child turned seven.

Before that age, children were simply reared at home by women—primarily their mothers and a dedicated nurse or nanny (trophos). During these early years, children played with rattles, jointed dolls, little carts, and knuckle-bones for games of skill. Their earliest introduction to literature consisted of Aesop’s fables and terrifying nursery tales featuring demonic, child-eating monsters like Mormo, Lamia, Empusa, and Gorgo.

Marrou notes that the ancients would have laughed their heads off at modern kindergarten specialists, like Maria Montessori, who gravely assign deep educational value to elementary games. However, certain ancient philosophers couldn’t resist theorizing about early childhood development. Plato argued that children’s games should serve as an introduction to their future professions and suggested schooling should begin at age six. Aristotle pushed the starting age down to five, while Chrysippus demanded children begin formal education at age three. Fortunately, the average Hellenistic family ignored these overeager philosophers and let their children simply be children until age seven.

The Pedagogue and the Uncomfortable Classroom

Once a child turned seven, they were handed over to a paidagogos (pedagogue). Originally serving as a slave companion who merely escorted the child to school, the pedagogue’s role evolved during the Hellenistic era into a kind of moral monitor and tutor. Dave compares the ancient pedagogue to his childhood school bus driver, a figure who didn’t strictly teach him academics but maintained order and broke up fights among the older kids.

The actual school building was remarkably modest. Marrou notes there was no specific architecture dedicated to education; any old room with a roof would suffice. Inside, the master (didaskalos) sat elevated in an armchair with slanting legs, while the students were forced to sit on entirely backless wooden stools (bathra). Because there were no tables or desks, students balanced stiff writing tablets directly on their knees. The hosts note that the ancient Greeks prioritized artistic decoration—adorning the walls with masks of the Muses—over any semblance of physical comfort, a stark contrast to modern classrooms filled with giant beanbags.

Despite ruling the classroom, the teaching profession was widely despised. A teacher was often viewed as a man of good family who had tragically gone down in the world due to poverty or political exile. The pay was accordingly abysmal. In Miletus, a teacher earned roughly 40 drachmae a month—only slightly more than a manual laborer digging ditches. Furthermore, there were absolutely no professional qualifications required; technically, anyone who could read was permitted to set themselves up as a schoolmaster, providing they simply remembered what they had learned in school.

The Brutal Reading Lesson: Knoxbix and Phlegmadropes

The Hellenistic method of teaching reading and writing was entirely devoid of psychological sensitivity. Marrou notes there was no effort to arouse a child’s interest with cute, accessible sentences or sight words. Instead, the system relied on a rigid, rational progression from the simple to the complex, completely indifferent to the learner’s struggles.

Students first memorized the 24 letters of the Greek alphabet strictly by their names (Alpha, Beta, Gamma) rather than their phonetic sounds, often chanting them in a chorus. Next, they were forced to recite endless, mind-numbing combinations of syllables: ba-be-bi-bo-bu, up to psa-pse-psi-pso-psu.

Once they mastered syllables, students moved on to single words. Bizarrely, teachers often assigned incredibly rare or entirely nonsensical words chosen exclusively for their difficulty of pronunciation, acting as ancient tongue twisters. Students were forced to read and write words like knoxbix (an obscure illness) and phlegmadropes (a completely unknown medical term). The ultimate challenge was a massive, 24-letter gibberish word containing every single letter of the Greek alphabet exactly once: berozapskthomplektronsphinx. Quintilian noted these exercises were designed to act as a “bridle” for the tongue, forcing students to perfect their articulation and conquer speech impediments.

The Million-Finger Count and the Leather Strap

Mathematics was equally rigid. Before learning written numerals, children were taught an incredibly complex system of counting on their fingers. By articulating specific fingers and placing their hands in relation to their chest, navel, or thigh bone, a trained student could manually indicate any whole number from one to 1,000,000. The hosts are entirely baffled by this lost art, noting their own attempts to pantomime the system resulted in utter failure around the number 600,000.

If a student failed to memorize these endless syllables or numerical hand gestures, the master fell back on a single, universal pedagogical tool: brutal corporal punishment. The ancients did not share the modern illusion of “teaching without tears”. Their philosophy was explicitly no pain, no gain. Reading from the poet Herondas, Dave shares a terrifying sketch of a schoolmaster demanding his hard leather strap—made from a bullock’s tail—to beat a lazy, truant boy who has been hoisted onto the back of a classmate.

Sponsors: Fueling the Classical Renaissance

Before the hosts can process the brutality of the ancient classroom, they hear banging on the bunker doors. Fearing an invasion by the “Union of Ungame Enthusiasts”—a group dedicated to playing the most depressing, non-competitive board game ever invented—they hastily wrap up the episode by thanking their sponsors.

The Gustatory Parting Shot

To officially close out Episode 166, the hosts extend their gratitude to Mishka the sound engineer, and to the talented musicians Ken Tamplin, Scott Van Zen, and Jeff Scheetz for providing the screaming, bluesy guitar tracks and bumper music.

Dave then delivers the Gustatory Parting Shot, courtesy of the inimitable American polymath, Benjamin Franklin.

Regarding the true priorities of human discovery, Franklin offers this bold, slightly cynical observation:

“The discovery of a wine is of greater moment than the discovery of a constellation. The universe is too full of stars.”

Jeff jokes that Franklin must have been exhausted by the lack of light pollution in colonial Philadelphia, deciding that a good glass of wine was far more useful than yet another twinkling light in the sky.Check out the “Lurch with Merch” section on the website to grab a QVAE NOCENT DOCENT t-shirt, beware of terrifying nursery monsters, and keep taking in the classics. Valete!

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