According to Greek mythology, humankind passed through a number of eras that were characterised by specific events, and were known in ancient Greece as the Ages of Man. According to Hesiod ( Hesiod was an ancient Greek poet generally thought to have been active between 750 and 650 BC, around the same time as Homer), there were five ages that mankind has lived through since the beginning of time. Each of these eras were characterized by certain events and the style and type of living the people witnessed.
The Golden Age
The race of the Golden Age lived on the earth in the days of Cronus, when he was reigning over the deathless gods. They lived like gods without sorrow and without toil, and were free from evils. For Cronus would not let any painful toil come upon them, but they lived in peace and plenty all their days. When they died, they were not laid in the house of Death, but were wafted away by the winds to the Elysian plain, which is at the end of the world. There they live in happiness and are free from all evils, and the life which they lead is the life of gods.
The Silver Age
After the Golden came the Silver Race, which was created of the same stock, and was not much inferior to the Golden. They lived in the time of Cronus, and were like the gods. They had a life of nine hundred years, and then they would die, and would be honored like the gods, and would live on in the Isles of the Blessed. But Zeus was angry with them, because they were wanting in respect to the gods, and he destroyed them utterly, and left not a remnant.
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