> But what does it mean to say "the Greeks" disseminated their knowledge better when virtually all of what we have comes from Roman citizens living centuries la

> But what does it mean to say "the Greeks" disseminated their knowledge better when virtually all of what we have comes from Roman citizens living centuries later? That Greek knowledge and culture survived the collapse of their prominence? Similar to the Romans after them and Babylonians before them. Greek had been a lingua franca in the major ports of future empires for centuries [1], and Greek remained a spoken and written language in the Byzantine empire (the same was not true of ancient Egyptian or Babylonian – which were supplanted by Greek or other Aramaic languages during the hellenistic period). I think at least as much credit is owed to the inheritors of Greek culture (Romans, Byzantines, the various Arabic empires), for preserving source material and references. But I think Greece was seen as the original "filter" for civilization because it was both "successful" and comparatively extroverted to the great civilizations that came before. Basically, it's what you said in your middle paragraph – wide availability, accessibility of language and culture. In other words, "better dissemination". :) [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_colonisation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_colonisation