Ancient History – Greece

Introduction

Map of regions throughout the Mediterranean under Greek influence around 550 BCE.

The history of Greece is undoubtedly that of one of the most influential civilizations in
the history of mankind. This tiny region at the southern tip of the Balkan peninsula
produced or improved upon democracy, the alphabet, philosophy, theater, and the
sciences. Even the word history itself comes from the Ancient Greek word ιστορία.

The history of Greece begins long before our earliest written records. Archeology has
provided us with what little information we have about such civilizations as the Minoans,
Mycenaeans, and the world of the Greek Dark Ages. These civilizations were not even
believed to have existed until very recently, when archeologists began to think the epic
poetry of Homer's Iliad might contain more truth than previously thought. During the
Classical Period, Greek culture was reborn and flourished, and was spread throughout the
Mediterranean Sea by the Athenian Empire, as well as other Greek traders, colonists, and
conquerors.

A mosaic from Pompeii, of Alexander the Great at the Battle of Issus in 333 BCE.
The Peloponnesian War (431-404 BCE) between Athens and Sparta, and their respective
allies, greatly weakened Greece's collective power, and by 336 BCE, nearly every Greek
city-state was under the control of Macedon, and for the first time united into a single
political unit. Alexander III, the next king of Macedon, took this united Greece and with
it conquered the entire known world, spreading Greek culture (called Hellenism, or
ελληνισμος) from Egypt, through Persia, all the way to India. Upon the death of
Alexander the Great (as he would come to be known), the Empire split into fourths. A
united Greece was one of the four new kingdoms, which lasted until 168 BCE, when
Macedonia was absorbed into the growing Roman Republic. The entirety of Greece came
under Roman rule by 146 BCE.

Minoan Civilization

The location of the island of Crete within modern Greece.

The Minoan culture was a Bronze Age civilization that existed on the Greek Aegean
island of Crete from around 3000 to 1100 BCE. By around 1450, however, the Minoans
had been replaced by the Mycenaeans as the dominant culture of the area. The name
"Minoan" itself comes from the famous British archeologist Sir Arthur Evans, who from
1900 to 1906 excavated the palace at Knossos, which he believed to be the capital of the
empire of the mythical King Minos.

History

Greek archeologist Nikolaos Platon devised a loose chronology of the civilization based
on excavations of Minoan palaces. He divides the civilization into the following eras:

Prepalatial period (3000-1900)

Archeological evidence shows that Crete may have been inhabited as early as the seventh
millenium BCE. New settlers skilled in metallurgy arrived by the end of the fourth
millenium BCE, and replaced the earlier Neolithic peoples.
Protopalatial period (1900-1700)

The semi-restored ruins of the palace of Knossos.

The first large palaces (most notably at Knossos and Phaistos) were built during the
Protopalatial period, leading to more urbanized life and centralized political authority.
Around 1700, the major palaces were all destroyed (perhaps due to natural causes, such
as an earthquake, or perhaps an invasion from Anatolia).

Neopalatial period (1700-1450)

After their destruction, the palaces soon were rebuilt, giving rise to the Neopalatial
period. This period represents the apex of Minoan civilization. Population increased, new
settlements were built, and impressive art, architecture, and technologies (such as
plumbing) were developed. Despite these many advances, the Minoans suffered some
sort of catastrophe around 1450.

Final Palace period (1450-1380 BCE)

Many theories have been put forth to the cause of this sudden and rapid decline. Theories
include a massive volcanic eruption of Mt. Thera on the nearby island of Santorini,
internal strife, or an invasion from the Mycenean culture of mainland Greece. A
combination of these factors is likely the true culprit. Regardless of the reason, the
Minoan culture was effectively replaced by the Myceneans by 1420. Excavations reveal
that pottery and writings from Crete after 1450 resemble those of mainland Greece
moreso than those of pre-1450 Crete. Knossos then served as the administrative center of
Mycenean Crete, until it was destroyed by fire in 1380.

Postpalatial period (1380-1100 BCE)

After the destruction of Knossos, economic and political influence shifted to the town of
Khaniá. Despite this, Cretan civilization began to further decline, and many Minoan sites
were abandoned. Khondros is one of few new sites to be settled during this period. The
last Minoan site to fall was the isolated mountain town of Karfi, which was able to resist
assimilation into the Mycenean culture until the early Iron Age. The widespread use of
iron tools (brought by the Myceneans) rather than bronze ones (used by Minoans) is one
of the main indications archeologists used to determine the date of the final Minoan
collapse.

Culture

Bull-leaping, featured in this famous fresco from Knossos, was a religious ritual.

The Minoans had a culture very different from that of the later "ancient" Greeks. It
featured a very distinctive religion, art style, and language. The Minoans were also
pioneers in naval exploration, establishing several colonies on the Greek mainland and
other Aegean islands, such as Akrotiri on Thera. Minoan cultural influence spread
throughout the region, including over the Mycenean culture.

Religion

Much of what is known about the Minoan religion is based on oral tradition that was not
written down until long after the Myceneans had replaced their civilization. From these
records, as well as what archeologists have been able to piece together, historians have
generally agreed that the Minoan religion seems to have been based on the religion of the
Neolithic peoples they conquered in moving to Crete. It centered on the goddess Potnia,
but was polytheistic. Bulls were sacred to the Minoans, and bull-leaping (depicted in a
famous fresco unearthed in Knossos) was a religious ritual. The famous labyrinth at
Knossos is the best-known example of a Minoan temple. Religious symbols include the
serpent, bull, labrys (a double-headed axe, for which the labyrinth is named), sun, and
tree. There has also been evidence that the Minoans engaged in human sacrifice, though
this is inconclusive at best.
Art

An example of pottery from Knossos.

The Minoans are particularly well-known for their artistic developments. Excavations
have revealed frescoes, statues, and pottery. Pottery was the dominant art form of the
Minoans from their arrival on Crete up until the Neopalatial period, when pottery-making
technology allowed for a standardization of design. Fresco-painting soon rose in
prominence, and focused heavily on religious and naturalistic themes. Bulls and snakes,
both religious symbols, featured prominently in many works of art, as do other non-
religious animals. Perhaps the most famous of the Minoan frescoes is one depicting the
religious ritual of bull-leaping, which was found in the palace of Minos. Interestingly, no
frescoes depict any of the many gods.

Architecture

Minoans also pioneered many architectural methods. Cities featured roads paved with
stone, sewers, and plumbing. The most-recognized type of Minoan architecture is the
palace. The construction of the first palaces (the famous palace at Knossos was one of the
first) ended the Prepalatial period. Palaces were centers of government, allowing the
dozens of individual communities to come under centralized political authority. Palaces
also were used to store crop surpluses, and house shrines to goddesses.

Economy

The Minoan economy was very diverse. Several crops were cultivated, such as wheat,
barley, grapes, olives, and figs. They raised several animals, including cattle, goats, and
pigs. Also, bees were domesticated for honey production, as were donkeys and oxen for
plowing purposes. The Minoans also had a healthy shipping industry, as evidenced by the
many colonies they established throughout the eastern Mediterannean. They were
involved in the tin trade. As bronze tools and weapons (bronze is made from tin and
copper) were replaced by superior iron ones, the tin trade (and therefore the Minoan
economy) suffered. Their trade network extended from Mesopotamia and Egypt all the
way to Spain.

Language

A tablet with Minoan script.

Minoan civilization featured several written languages. During the Prepalatial period, a
primitive heiroglyphic script was used, but fell out of use by 1700. A writing system
called Linear A developed during the Protopalatial period, and continued to be used
through the Neopalatial period. Linear A featured many symbols, each of which
represented a syllable, word, or number. Linear A was used for record-keeping, and some
religious functions. Linear B was the script used for government records. After the
Mycenean conquest, Linear A was replaced by Linear B, which would eventually evolve
into what is now the modern Greek language. Linear B was deciphered in the 1950s, but
Linear A and the heiroglyphic texts have yet to have been completely translated.
Mycenaean Civilization

The location of many of the places mentioned in Homer's Iliad.

The Mycenaean civilization refers to a Bronze Age civilization on mainland Greece,

inhabiting the area from around 1600-1100 BCE. The name "Mycenaean" refers to the
city of Mycenae, which was excavated by Heinrich Schliemann beginning in 1876.
Schliemann is also well-known for discovering and excavating the city of Troy in Asia
Minor, which was at the time believed to be fictional. Mycenaean Greece is the period in
which the Iliad and Odyssey are set.

History

Mycenaean civilization begins with the arrival of many tribes to the Greek mainland
around 2000 BCE. These tribes began to establish themselves as political units sometime
around 1600. The Mycenaeans quite possibly lived under Minoan dominance until
around 1400, when they conquered Crete.

Conflicts with Minoans

The Mycenaeans are often cited as one of the contributing factors to the rapid decline of
Minoan civilization. The Minoans lived on the Aegean island of Crete, and had a naval
influence that likely subjugated the Mycenaeans. Around the year 1600 BCE, it is
believed that a volcanic eruption on the island of Santorini near Crete devastated the
Minoans. The resulting weakness is thought to have allowed the Mycenaeans to
overthrow the Minoans and replace them as the dominant culture of the region.
The Iliad

This golden mask, discovered at Mycenae by Schliemann, was named the Mask of
Agamemnon, after the character from the Iliad.

The Classical poet called Homer wrote the Iliad and Odyssey in the 8th or 7th century
BCE, long after the Mycenaeans had vanished as a recognizable civilization. Because of
this centuries-long gap in time, most scholars agree that Homer's epics cannot be viewed
as accurate accounts of Mycenaean culture. Homer's works would more likely reflect the
culture of his day instead. It has been verified, however, that many of the places referred
to in the Iliad and Odyssey were actual Mycenaean sites, including Troy. The individual
characters of these stories, such as Achilles, Hector, Priam, Diomedes, and Agamemnon,
should not be interpreted as historical figures.

Decline and collapse

Sometime around 1100, a tribe from the north known as the Dorians invaded the
Peloponnesus and destroyed the Mycenaean civilization. Greece was subsequently
thrown into a Dark Age, from which it took several centuries to recover. The written
Mycenaean language was completely forgotten, forcing the Greeks to reinvent their
writing system centuries later.

Culture

Religion

Not a great deal is known about the Mycenaean religion. It has been observed, however,
that it was influenced to some degree by that of the Minoans. Many of the Mycenaean
gods are recognizable to us as the well-known Classical gods, such as Zeus, Poseidon,
Hera, Ares, Athena, Dionysus, and Hermes. Apollo, Aphrodite, and Hades are notable
absences.

Art
Fresco of a Mycenaean woman.

Mycenaean artwork was influenced, like nearly all other aspects of their civilization, by
the Minoans. Pottery, statues, and paintings make up the majority of Mycenaean art.
Mycenaeans developed advanced bronzeworking techniques, creating swords, shields,
and suits of armor.

Architecture

In contrast to the Minoans, the Mycenaean leaders built fortresses — enormous walled
structures that contained a megaron like the Minoan palace, but were primarily
fortifications for defense. The walls of these structures often stood forty or fifty feet high,
and were composed of enormous blocks of stone weighing two to three tons, fitted
together without mortar. Fortresses at Tiryns and at Mycenae are considered the best
examples of these military structures.

The south gate of Gla, in Boeotia.

Unlike the Minoans, the Mycenaeans are not known to have built many religious shrines.
A sacrificial site on Mount Lykaon sacred to Zeus in the Classical period has recently
been found to pre-date Mycenaean occupation of the Greek peninsula or the Peloponnese,
but no substantial structures of a religious nature have been identified at Mycenaean sites.
Such buildings may have been incorporated into the palace-fortresses, but they are not
specifically identified as such.
A Mycenaean common house has been located and identified. Dating from late in the
Mycenaean period, it consists of a long, narrow building of posts with wattle-and-daub
curtain walls and likely a thatched roof. One end of the house held an entry porch, while
the opposite end was rounded and held the likely sleeping quarters. The interior was
divided into two rooms, the aforementioned sleeping area farthest from the entrance, and
a living area that contained a rudimentary hearth and a food-preparation area. The
presence of sheep feces and wool fibers in the porch area suggest that the front entrance
was used as a pen for holding animals.

Language

An example of Linear B script.

The language spoken by the Mycenaeans was an ancestor of modern Greek. The written
language of the Mycenaeans was known as Linear B (in contrast to the Minoan script,
Linear A). Linear B was deciphered in 1951, and proved to be an ancient form of the
modern Greek language. This language resembled modern Japanese, in that it was
syllabic instead of alphabetic. This form of writing, however, was forgotten during the
Dark Ages, leading the Greeks of the classical era to redevelop a system of writing from
a Phoenician model, allowing the alphabetic system to come into use.

Economy

A substantial number of Linear B texts, deal with matters of economic concern —

inventories of possessions and lists of goods being brought to the palaces or sent out from
the palaces. One of the most famous, used in the process of cracking Linear B as a
language, lists provisions for the coast guard: apparently the so-called "Palace of Nestor"
mounted a seaward watch on the approaches to its landfall, and paid the watchers in food
and goods. These records suggest that the palaces were the principal economic engines of
the era. They took in raw materials into workshops, where trained artisans produced
finished goods, that would then be exchanged with other palaces for the best products of
their local regions.
Greek Dark Ages

While somewhat inaccurate, this map drawn by H.G. Wells shows the migration patterns
of the ancient Greeks and other related tribes.

The Ancient Greeks divided themselves into three tribes; the Aeolians, Ionians, and
Dorians. The Mycenaeans (referred to as Argives, Achaeans, and Danaans by Homer in
the Iliad) were Aeolians and Ionians. Sometime around 1100 BCE, the Dorians, who
lived north of the other two tribes, began to raid the Mycenaeans. Entire cities were
destroyed, and Mycenae itself fell and was plundered by the invaders. Not only were the
citadels of Mycenaean Greece destroyed, but civilization itself would collapse in the
region.

Changes under the Dorians

Economics

Many theories exist about the cause of the Mycenaeans' collapse. Ecological disasters
may have undermined the economy of the agrarian-based Mycenaeans, allowing the
Dorians to supplant their society. The Dorians quickly developed trade relations
throughout the Mediterannean to replace the old economy. The region of Attica (which
included Athens) would rise to dominate the region due to its prominence as a trade
center. The change was not immediate, however, as Athens, like the rest of Greece,
would need a long recovery from the Mycenaean collapse. These new contacts with
outside civilizations would have drastic consequences for the future of Greece.

Language

Distribution of Ancient Greek dialects by around 400 BCE, closely corresponding to

ethnic divisions between tribes. The Dorians are represented by the brown regions, while
the Ionains are purple and Aeolians are yellow.

The most significant immediate change for Greece during this time period was the end of
writing. No written records exist for this time period, and writings from subsequent time
periods are completely different from those of the Mycenaeans, leading historians to
believe that writing was completely forgotten during the Dark Ages. The Dorians spoke a
dialect different from that of the Mycenaeans, and due to the absence of a writing system,
very few records remain of their language. All modern Greek dialects are descended from
Attic Greek ("Classical" Greek), with one exception: the endangered Tsakonian dialect,
which is a descendant of Doric, and therefore of considerable interest to linguists.

The Dorians would undoubtedly come into contact with the Phoenicians, a powerful
seafaring people from the nearby Levant. The Greeks adopted the Phoenecian concept of
an alphabet, and through trade would spread this throughout the Mediterannean. This
alphabet was the first to include vowels, replacing the syllabic script of Mycenaean
Linear B. The word alphabet itself comes from the names of the first two letters of this
new writing system: Alpha (Αα) and Beta (Ββ).

It is also extremely likely that Homer's epics were indeed not his own. Due to the lack of
a writing system, poets (also known as bards) would have recited the long stories orally
and passed them down over the years. Homer's epics could very well be versions of
stories first composed, but not written, during the Dark Ages.
Weaponry

A Greek hoplite.

The Dorians were a warlike people, and thrust Greece into the Iron Age. Weapons were
no longer made of bronze, but instead of iron. Weapons became cheaper to make, more
durable, and more effective in combat. This functionality replaced the ornate beauty of
the craftsmanship of the old Mycenaean weapons. Due to this innovation, warfare also
shifted from cavalry tactics to infantry. The hoplite was the name of the ancient Greek
infantryman.

Politics

During the Dark Ages, the polis (plural poleis), or city-state, would begin to develop.
Cities dominated the surrounding landscape, and became independent units. The Dorians
did not "conquer" the area in the sense of adding the territory to their domain, as the
mountains of the region prevented the continuous contact necessary for a single nation to
exist. Each city-state was naturally defended by the surrounding mountains, and each
constantly expanded at the expense of its neighbors.

Soon after the invasions, monarchies were established in most, if not all, of the poleis.
While the monarch held religious as well as political authority, he did not, however,
wield complete control of his government. Many city states came to be dominated by the
aristocracy. Tyrants first appeared during this time period. A tyrant was an aristocrat who
gained enough power and influence to control the polis. They were backed by a personal
hoplite army independent of the city-state, and set up autocratic (though not necessarily
"tyrannical", in the modern sense) governments.

Hellenic identity

Despite the mountains separating Greece from unification, the independent poleis did
develop commonalities in culture, language, religion, and government. It was during this
time period that Greeks began to identify themselves and each other as Hellenes. In spite
of the rivalries among the poleis, they shared the same language, the same style of dress,
and the same décor, and these traits served to unite them as one and the same: they were
all Hellenes.
Contributing to this sense of loose unity were the Olympic Games, begun in 776 BCE.
These featured athletes from the various poleis who competed against one another as a
religious ritual. Athletes may have competed for personal glory and fame, but the games
were first and foremost in honor of Zeus, king of the gods. Olympia featured a temple
which contained a 12-meter high statue of Zeus made of ivory and gold. This massive
sculpture, created by the famous Phidias, was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient
World. These games would cease in 393 CE, when they were banned under Roman
Emperor Theodosius I in an effort to stamp out paganism.

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