Watch What America’s Founders Learned from Antiquity

2025
1 Season

In this course, you'll explore the ethos of classicism that permeated the founders' era and how the American revolutionaries identified with the ancient Roman republic. You'll dig deeply into the classical thought of five of the iconic founders, and you'll learn how the Founding Fathers created a radically new political model based in the conception of equality.

What America’s Founders Learned from Antiquity is a series that is currently running and has 1 seasons (24 episodes). The series first aired on February 20, 2025.

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Seasons

24. The Afterlives of Antiquity in America

February 20, 2025

The story of classicism in America did not end with the founders. Observe how Greek democracy rose as a model for the country after the Civil War, and how classicism in American education declined, replaced by the study of

23. Classical Strokes in American Painting

February 20, 2025

Portraits and landscape paintings of the early American nation created an image for the United States as a new Rome. Learn to decode the classical symbols, imagery, and political import in the work of four major painters of the era: Benjamin West, John Singleton Copley, Gilbert Stuart, and Thomas Cole.

22. America

February 20, 2025

In the new republic, Neoclassicism flourished not only in architecture, but also within American homes and gardens. Study the elements of Neoclassical interior design and decoration, as practiced by major design figures of the era, as well as Neoclassical trends in women

21. The Classical City in America

February 20, 2025

In the aftermath of the Revolution, Americans changed the face of their major cities. Learn how classical cityscapes expressed the republican ideals of the new nation. Examples include Boston, an old city that received a major classical facelift, and Washington, DC, a completely invented city that was the first in the world to be built from nothing, into the image of ancient Rome.

20. Native Americans and the Classical World

February 20, 2025

Founding-era thinkers used the lens of classical antiquity to comprehend the Native peoples of the Americas. Study the colonists

19. How Greece and Rome Shaped American Slavery

February 20, 2025

The classical world affected even the enslaved in the Americas. See how slaveholders viewed Greco-Roman slavery in relation to their own practice of enslavement, with both pro- and anti-slavery activists invoking classical sources to argue their beliefs. Witness Black people

18. How American Women Used the Classical World

February 20, 2025

Track the inspiration American women found in classicism, in challenging both British and male authority. Follow women

17. How the Aeneid Became America

February 20, 2025

Virgil

16. The Ancient Roots of the US Constitution

February 20, 2025

The US Constitution has deep roots in Greek and Roman political thought. Note the influence of Aristotle

15. Classicism and the Christianity of the Founders

February 20, 2025

In fundamental ways, the education of the founders

14. Classical Ideas in an Enlightenment Age

February 20, 2025

Grasp how Enlightenment thinkers built on the Renaissance recovery of classicism, by adding new emphasis on knowledge, reason, and the conception of progress. Then learn about two historians who exemplify the Enlightenment approach to classical history, Montesquieu and Gibbon, and their influence on the American founders

13. Revolutionary Lessons from Roman Histories

February 20, 2025

America

12. Benjamin Franklin

February 20, 2025

Learn how Benjamin Franklin

11. James Madison

February 20, 2025

Delve into the fertile mind of James Madison, and his rich contribution to the US Constitution. Assess his view of the classical world, and his faith that history could guide the present. In approaching the writing of the Constitution, track the lessons Madison took from ancient Greek political confederacies, and how he went beyond their history to propose something totally new.

10. Thomas Jefferson

February 20, 2025

Classicism infused Thomas Jefferson

9. John Adams: The American Cicero

February 20, 2025

John Adams

8. George Washington: The American Cincinnatus

February 20, 2025

Of all the founders, Washington

7. The Lure of Ancient Egypt for a New America

February 20, 2025

Uncover America

6. The Founders on Carthage and Germania

February 20, 2025

Beyond Rome and Greece, the founders took inspiration from ancient Carthage. Learn about their view of Carthage as a break-away Phoenician colony with admirable government, whose major threats from Rome mirrored America

5. American Ambivalence toward Ancient Greece

February 20, 2025

Investigate Americans

4. Are We Rome? America

February 20, 2025

Assess America

3. The Dangers of Empire: Rome and Britain

February 20, 2025

As of 1763, harsh taxation gradually eroded American colonists

2. A Republic of Farmers: America and Early Rome

February 20, 2025

In the 1760s, ancient Rome became politically relevant to Colonial Americans. Grasp how colonists, predominantly farmers, drew upon Roman thinkers

1. Antiquity Erupts in 18th-Century America

February 20, 2025

Relive the discovery of ancient Pompeii and Herculaneum, which brought the classical world vividly alive for 18th-century Europeans. Learn how founding-era Americans were steeped in classical antiquity through their education and culture, and why they looked to ancient Rome and Greece to understand their own turbulent times and to create a new republic based in representation and equality.

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Where to Watch What America’s Founders Learned from Antiquity

What America’s Founders Learned from Antiquity is available for streaming on the The Great Courses website, both individual episodes and full seasons. You can also watch What America’s Founders Learned from Antiquity on demand at Apple TV Channels, Prime Video and Amazon.