What are the real downsides with not starting with the greeks ?

well then give me some shit to read

the greeks are for gays

>Euthyphro was hilarious
>well then give me some shit to read

Start here, THEN start with the Greeks. You'll be alot better off. It's better to dive into something if it's not a complete unknown, you'll learn more that way.

Skipping The Philosopher.

Honestly I have no idea how someone could be the least bit interested in philosophy and not want to spend their time reading Aristotle. What the fuck is wrong with you? It's a sure sign they have no interest in the subject and are nothing but pseudos.

A lot of authors still allude to Greek myths and stories in their works. A narrator may compare a character to Actaeon, for example. The meaning or emphasis may elude the reader; in this example, of somebody committing a transgression unknowingly.

But you don't even have to read the source material. Wikipedia would be enough for a working understanding for a lot of things that appear by allusion.

The real downside is missing out on the mind bombs of Plato, the comfy adventures of Homer's Odyssey, or the opportunities to contemplate given by Aesop.

This is actually very interesting. Why should The Golden Bough be the beginning of all knowledge?

This will keep you busy for a year or so

Why not enter with the Egyptians?

does the reading order matter here or are these tiers

There's a small "Start here" in the top left. You start with A brief history of Ancient Greece and continue from there.

Go with the whole thing, it's all very fun and necessary. No reason to try to take a shortcut in something like learning philosophy and literature.

Only hopeless philistines start with a culture as banal and insipid as the Greeks. Truly cultured literati will always recommend that you start with Paleolithic cavepaintings, which are widely regarded to resemble humanity at its closest to its true, pristine nature, before its corruption of so called "social constructs" overtook the human mind and enslaved it.

Only cavepaintings accurately depict man as nature created him, and therefore, in his most naked and compelling form.

what is this flowchart after Herodotus what way do you go

After the histories you go down to Xenophon and once you have finished it you go to the left of the histories to early greek philosophy.

I agree, it's a bit weird but I guess Xenophon isn't necessary and if you don't care you could (shouldn't though) skip it

"Excepting machinery, there is hardly anything secular in our culture that does not come from Greece. Schools, gymnasiums, arithmetic, geometry, history, rhetoric, physics, biology, anatomy, hygiene, therapy, cosmetics, poetry, music, tragedy, comedy, philosophy, theology, agnosticism, skepticism, stoicism, epicureanism, ethics, politics, idealism, philanthropy, cynicism, tyranny, plutocracy, democracy: these are all Greek words for cultural forms seldom originated, but in many cases first matured for good or evil by the abounding energy of the Greeks. All the problems that disturb us today-the cutting down of forests and the erosion of the soil; the emancipation of women and the limitation of the family; the conservatism of the established, and the experimentalism of the unplaced, in morals, music, and government; the corruptions of politics and the perversions of conduct; the conflict of religion and science, and the weakening of the supernatural supports of morality; the war of the classes, the nations, and the continents, the revolutions of the poor against the economically powerful rich, and of the rich against the politically powerful poor; the struggle between democracy and dictatorship, between individualism and communism, between the East and the West- all these agitated, as if for our instruction, the brilliant and turbulent life of ancient Hellas. There is nothing in Greek civilization that does not illuminate our own."

-Ol' Billy D.
The Life of Greece

That's why you start with the greeks

Is the expanded flowchart necessary? I can't post pictures. The smaller one just starts with mythology, but the bigger one has Ancient Greek history before it.

Your condescension will ring hollow and your disdain will lack conviction.