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Mycenaean Greece
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Mycenaean Greece is a cultural period of ancient Greece taking its name from the archaeological site of Mycenae in northeastern Argolis, in the Peloponnese of southern Greece. Athens, Pylos, Thebes, and Tiryns are also important Mycenaean sites. The last phase of the Bronze Age in ancient Greece is the historical setting of much Ancient Greek literature and myth, including the epics of Homer.
Quite unlike the Minoans whose society benefited from trade, the Mycenaeans advanced through conquest.
Mycenaean civilization flourished between 1600 BC, when Helladic culture was transformed under influences from Minoan Crete, and ca.
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Mycenaean Greece is a cultural period of ancient Greece taking its name from the archaeological site of Mycenae in northeastern Argolis, in the Peloponnese of southern Greece. Athens, Pylos, Thebes, and Tiryns are also important Mycenaean sites. The last phase of the Bronze Age in ancient Greece is the historical setting of much Ancient Greek literature and myth, including the epics of Homer.
Quite unlike the Minoans whose society benefited from trade, the Mycenaeans advanced through conquest.
Mycenaean civilization
The Mycenaean civilization flourished between 1600 BC, when Helladic culture was transformed under influences from Minoan Crete, and ca. 1100 BC, when it perished with the collapse of Bronze-Age civilization in the eastern Mediterranean. The collapse is commonly attributed to the Dorian invasion, although other theories describing natural disasters and climate change have been advanced as well. The major Mycenaean cites were Mycenae and Tiryns in Argolis, Pylos in Messenia, Athens in Attica, Thebes and Orchomenus in Boeotia, and Iolkos in Thessaly. In Crete, the Mycenaeans occupied Knossos. In addition there were some sites of importance for cults, such as Lerna, typically in the form of house sanctuaries, for the Mycenaeans did not build free-standing temples of the familiar kind. Mycenaean settlement sites also appeared in Epirus, Macedon, on islands in the Aegean, on the coast of Asia Minor, and then in Cyprus. Mycenaean artifacts with Linear B inscriptions have been also found as far away as Germany and Mycenaean swords as far away as Georgia.
Mycenaean civilization was dominated by a warrior aristocracy. Around 1400 BC, the Mycenaeans extended their control to Crete, center of the Minoan civilization, and adopted a form of the Minoan script (called Linear A) to write their early form of Greek in Linear B.
Not only did the Mycenaeans defeat the Minoans, but according to later Hellenic legend they twice defeated Troy, a powerful city-state that rivaled Mycenae in power. Because the only evidence for the conquests is Homer's Iliad and other texts steeped in mythology, the existence of Troy and the Trojan War is uncertain. In 1876, the German archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann uncovered ruins at Hissarlik in western Asia Minor (modern-day Turkey) that he claimed were those of Troy. Some sources claim these ruins do not match well with Homer's account of Troy, but others disagree.
The Mycenaeans buried their nobles in beehive tombs (tholoi), large circular burial chambers with a high vaulted roof and a straight entry passage lined with stone. They often buried daggers or some other form of military equipment with the deceased. The nobility were frequently buried with gold masks, tiaras, armor, and jeweled weapons. Mycenaeans were buried in a sitting position, and some of the nobility underwent mummification, whereas Homer's Achilles and Patroclus were not buried but cremated, in Iron-Age fashion, and honoured with gold urns instead of gold masks.
No priestly class has yet been identified. Worshiper and worshiped are identified in seals, rings and votive figures through their gestures: worshipers fold their arms, or raise the right arm in greeting, or place a hand on the forehead. Deities lift both arms in the "epiphany gesture" or reach forward to give or receive. The pantheon of Mycenaean deities has been reassembled from inscriptions in Linear B found at Pylos and at post-palatial Mycenaean Knossos in Crete. Some of the deities' names are recognizably present in the Olympic pantheon of written myth. Others are not: Ares, for example, is represented only as "Enyalios" which was retained as an epithet. Apollo may be recognized at Knossos as PA-JA-WO ("Paian"). Far more prominent are A-TA-NA PO-TI-NI-JA (Athena Potnia, "Athena the Mistress"), E-RE-U-TI-JA (Eileithyia, later merely invoked during childbirth), Dionysus, and Poseidon, already the "Earth-Shaker", either with his consort Poseida, who was not retained in the transition to Classical Greece, or, at Pylos, with the "Two Goddesses", apparently Demeter and Persephone. The Erinyes or Furies are already present, as are the Winds.
Mycenaean frescoes have been discovered in palace contexts, notably at Pylos, Mycenae, Orchomenos, Thebes, and Tiryns, and in a few non-palatial, perhaps privately-owned contexts. The earliest fresco decorations are of the LH IIA period (ca. 1500 BC). The subjects hold tenaciously to Minoan traditions, whether directly derived or through Cycladic intervention, and have in some cases been reduced to decorative formulas, embodying themes appropriate to their locations: lions and wingless griffins in audience chambers, processional figures in corridors, etc. In a change from the Minoan delight in the life of animals, the Mycenaean relation to nature is reflected in their depictions of animals which are shown only in relation to man or as victims of the hunt. Bull-jumping fresco panels appear at Mycenae and at Tiryns.
Around 1100 BC, the Mycenaean civilization collapsed. Numerous cities were sacked, and the region entered what historians describe as a dark age with some Mycenaeans fleeing to Cyprus as well as other Greek islands and parts of Anatolia. During this period Greece experienced decreasing population and the limited literacy, connected with palace culture, disappeared. Historians have traditionally blamed this decline on an invasion or uprising by another wave of Greek people, the Dorians, who may have been a subjugated local people. Alternate theories for the decline also include natural disasters such as a series of earthquakes or large-scale drought, although these recent theories are more controversial.
Historical summary
From a chronological perspective, the Late Helladic (1550-1060 BC), is the time when Mycenaean Greece flourished, under new influences from Minoan Crete and the Cyclades. Those who made LH pottery sometimes inscribed their work in Linear B, a syllabic script recognizable as a form of Greek. LH is divided into I, II, and III; of which I and II overlap Late Minoan ware and III overtakes it. LH III is further subdivided into IIIA, IIIB, and IIIC.
LH pottery typically stored such goods as olive oil and wine. LHI ware had reached Santorini just before the Thera eruption. LHIIB began during LMIB, and has been found in Egypt during the reign of Tuthmosis III. LHIIB spanned the LMIB/LMII destruction on Crete, which is associated with the Greek takeover of the island.
LHIIIA:1 corresponds with the reign of Amenhotep III, who recorded as part of tj-n3-jj the apparently-equal cities d-y-q-e-i-s (*Thegwas, Thebes) and m-w-k-i-n-u (*Mukana, Mycenae). LHIIIA:1 also corresponds with the time of Attarsiya, the Man of Ahhiya, who alternately attacked and aided the rebel Madduwatta of Zippasla. "Ahhiya" and its LHIIIA:2-B derivative, "Ahhiyawa", can be linked to Greece only indirectly. The Hittites did not use any term approximating tj-n3-jj; and they did not link "Ahhiya[wa]" to *Thegwas, *Mukana, or any other projected LBA names of known Greek cities. Also, no "Attarsiyas layer" of LHIIIA:1 has yet been found in western Anatolia. Still, Ahhiya must refer to a powerful people off the coast of Miletus, and Greece is the best available option at this time.
LHIIIA:1-period tj-n3-jj / "Ahhiya" (and for that matter LHIIIA:1 Greece) did not feature otherwise in the inscriptions of the great kings of the Bronze Age, and certainly not as a coherent state.
LHIIIA:2 ware was in the Uluburun shipwreck, and was in use at Miletus before Mursili II burned it ca 1320 BC. At this time, actual maritime trade was the specialty of the Cypriots and Phoenicians (so the presence of LH ware does not necessarily mean the presence of Mycenaeans).
During the LHIIIA:2 period, kings of "Ahhiyawa" began to come to the attention of the Hittites, possibly as rulers of the "Achaean" states. In LHIIIB, they rose almost to the status of the Great Kings in Egypt and Assyria. LHIIIB is also the period of Linear B script at the mainland palaces; prior to then, Linear B was in use primarily in the Cyclades and Crete.
Submycenean
The submycenean pottery (called LHIIIC:2 by Arne Furumark) already belongs to the early Iron age. It is best known from the cemeteries of Kerameikos in Athens, Salamis the island located in the Saronic Gulf off of Attica and Skoubris in Lefkandi (Euboea) and the Market of Athens (Agora), Tiryns and Mycenae. The term was introduced in 1934 by T. C. Skeat.
Identity
Since the decipherment of the somewhat younger Linear B tablets, it is thought that the people called Mycenaeans might have been Achaeans or later subjected by them. No written source found at a Mycenaean site reveals what they called themselves. Upon a reading of the Iliad, where the residents of the Peloponnesus and adjacant islands are often called Achaeans, and taking into account mention of the Ahhiyawa in Hittite sources from the Late Bronze Age, the theory suggests itself that the Mycenaeans could possibly even be Achaeans. But the second argument is far from being widely accepted, and, as for the first, the term Achaean can have several meanings in Homer's writings, that is above all just a literary work of myths and legends and as such can not be accepted as serious historical source.
Political organization
Mycenaean world
In the absence of direct sources, the general political organization of the Mycenaean world cannot be known with certainty. In the tradition recorded centuries later in Homer, there were several states, the cities of the Iliad: Mycenae, Pylos, Orchomenos— which are known to archeology— and perhaps also unconfirmed Sparta or Ithaca. Only the states of Pylos and Knossos are clearly attested in the Linear B texts. Even so, it is impossible to know which was the dominant political center in Argolis, if there indeed was one: Mycenae, Tiryns, or Argos? And what of Athens, the fortified location at Gla, and Iolcos?
Mention of a King of the Ahhiyawa in Hittite sources has been connected with the King of the Achaeans, the Mycenaean king Agamemnon of the Iliad, but there is nothing to prove that these Ahhiyawa were in reality the Achaeans (though that is the most logical interpretation), and the location of their kingdom remains a matter for debate: Asia Minor, Rhodes, Peloponesus? Although some researchers, basing their theories upon Hittite and Homeric sources, would like to make of the Mycenaean Greeks a confederation of states ruled by a king, primus inter pares (first among equals), as yet this cannot be confirmed.
States of Pylos and Knossos
On a smaller scale, some uncertain information about the internal organization of the best-known kingdoms, Pylos and Knossos, can be gleaned from sources in Linear B.
The state appears to have been ruled by a king, the wa-na-ka (???a? / wánax), whose role was no doubt military, judicial, and religious. He is identifiable in the Homeric anax (??a?) ("divine lord, sovereign, host"). Nine occurrences of the word in texts having to do with offerings suggest that the sovereigns of Pylos and Knossos were worshiped. However, in Homer the word can also designate a deity.
The king was assisted by the ra-wa-ke-ta (lawagetas), no doubt the leader of the army. He and the king each possessed a landed estate, the te-me-no (t?µe??? / témenos). Other dignitaries were the te-re-ta (telestai), who appear in the texts as landowners. They perhaps exercised a religious function. The e-qe-ta (equetai), literally, the companions (the knights), formed the entourage of the king. These were the warriors.
Besides the members of the court, there were other dignitaries in charge of local territorial administration. The kingdom of Pylos was divided into two great provinces, the de-we-ra ka-ra-i-ja, the near province, and the pe-ra-ko-ra-i-ja, the far province, around the town of re-u-ko-to-ro. The kingdom was further subdivided into seven districts, then into a number of communes. To manage these districts, the king named a ko-re-te (koreter, governor) and a po-ro-ko-re-te (prokoreter, vice governor). A da-mo-ko-ro (damokoros, one who takes care of a damos), in charge of the commune, the da-mo (literally, people, cf. d?µ?? / d?mos), and a qa-si-re-u (cf. ßas??e?? / basileús) shared responsibility at the communal level. Their roles are not precisely known; it seems they chaired a council of elders, the ke-ro-si-ja (cf. ?e???s?a / gerousía). It is, incidentally, interesting to note that in Classical Greece, the basileus is the king, the monarch, as if between the disintegration of Mycenaean society and the Classical Age no higher authority survived — de facto, and then, over the generations, de jure — than the communal official.
Society
Mycenaean society appears to have been divided into two groups of free men: the king's entourage, who conducted administrative duties at the palace, and the people, da-mo (demos), who lived at the commune level; these last were watched over by royal agents and were obliged to perform duties for and pay taxes to the palace.
Among those who evolved in the palace setting could be found well-to-do high officials who probably lived in the vast residences found in proximity to Mycenaean palaces, but also others, tied by their work to the palace and not necessarily better off than the members of the da-mo: craftsmen, farmers, and perhaps merchants, to name a few. On a lower rung of the social ladder were found the slaves, do-e-ro (masculine) and do-e-ra (feminine) (cf. d????? / doúlos). These are recorded in the texts as working either for the palace or for specific deities.
Mycenaean contacts
By the close of the Bronze Age (up to Late Helladic IIIC) contacts between the Aegean and its neighbours were well established. The circulation of goods and produce between centres are attested in Linear B records, though evidence of direct exchange is not. Evidence of Mycenaean cultural contacts with other societies of the era are demonstrated by the recovery of fresco fragments and relief painting at Avaris in the Nile Delta, whilst, at the settlement of Milawatta (modern Miletus), high-quality Palace style and Mycenaean ceramics have been recovered.
Economy
The economic organization of the Mycenaean kingdoms known from the texts seems to have been bipartite: a first group worked in the orbit of the palace, while another was self-employed. This reflects the societal structure seen above. But there was nothing to prevent a person working for the palace from running his own business.
The economy was supervised by scribes, who made note of incoming and outgoing products, assigned work, and were in charge of the distribution of rations. The du-ma-te seems to have been a sort of supervising quartermaster.
Agriculture
The territory of the Mycenaean kingdoms of Pylos and Knossos was divided into two parts: the ki-ti-me-na, the palace land, and the ke-ke-me-na, the communal land, cultivated by those the texts call ka-ma-na-e-we, undoubtedly the da-mo. The palace lands are those attested in the texts. One part makes up the te-me-no of the wa-ka-na and of the ra-wa-ge-ta, as seen above. The other part was granted as a perquisite to members of the palace administration. These lands might be worked by slaves or by free men to whom the land had been leased.
Agricultural production in these kingdoms reflected the traditional "Mediterranean trilogy": grain, olives, and grapes. The grains cultivated were wheat and barley. Olive orchards were planted for the production of olive oil. This was not only a foodstuff, it was much used as a body oil and in perfume. Grapes were also cultivated, and several varieties of wine were produced. Besides these, flax was grown for linen clothing and sesame for its oil, and trees were planted, such as the fig.
Livestock consisted primarily of sheep and goats. Cows and pigs were less common. Horses were kept chiefly for the pulling of chariots in battle.
Industry
The organization of artisanal labor is especially well known in the case of the palace. The archives of Pylos show a specialized workforce, each worker belonging to a precise category and assigned to a specific place in the stages of production, notably in textiles.
The textile industry was one of the principal sectors of the Mycenaean economy. The tablets of Knossos reveal the entire chain of production, from the flocks of sheep to the stocking of the palace storerooms with the finished product, through the shearing and the sorting of the wool in the workshops, as well as working conditions in those workshops. The palace of Pylos employed around 550 textile workers. At Knossos there were some 900. Fifteen different textile specialties have been identified. Next to wool, flax was the fiber most used.
The metallurgical industry is well attested at Pylos, where 400 workers were employed. It is known from the sources that metal was distributed to them, that they might carry out the required work: on average, 3.5 kilograms (7.7 lb) of bronze per smith. On the other hand, it is not known how they were paid — they are mysteriously absent in the ration distribution lists. At Knossos, several tablets testify to the making of swords, but with no mention of the true industry of metallurgy.
The industry of perfumery is attested as well. Tablets describe the making of perfumed oil. It is known, too, from the archaeology that the workers attached to the palace included other kinds of artisans: goldsmiths, ivory-carvers, stonecarvers, and potters, for example. Olive oil was also made there. Certain areas of endeavor were turned toward export.
Commerce
Commerce remains curiously absent from the written sources. Thus, once the perfumed oil of Pylos has been stored in its little jars, the inscriptions do not reveal what became of it. Large stirrup jars that once contained oil have been found at Thebes, in Boeotia. They carry inscriptions in Linear B indicating their place of origin, western Crete. However, Cretan tablets breathe not a word about the exportation of oil. There is little information about the distribution route of textiles. It is known that the Minoans exported fine fabrics to Egypt; the Mycenaeans no doubt did the same. Indeed, it is probable that they borrowed knowledge of navigational matters from the Minoans, as is evidenced by the fact that their maritime commerce did not take off until after the founding of the Minoan civilization. Despite the lack of sources, it is probable that certain products, notably fabrics and oil, even metal objects, were meant to be sold outside the kingdom, for they were made in quantities too great to be consumed solely at home.
Archaeology can, however, shed some light on the matter of the exportation of Mycenaean products outside of Greece. A number of vases have been found in the Aegean, in Anatolia, the Levant, Egypt and also farther west in Sicily, even in Central Europe and as far away as Great Britain. In a general way, the circulation of Mycenaean goods is traceable thanks to nodules, ancestors of the modern label. They consisted of small balls of clay, molded with the fingers around a lanyard (probably of leather) with which they were attached to the object. The nodule displayed the imprint of a seal and an ideogram representing the object. Other information was sometimes added: quality, origin, destination, etc.
Fifty-six nodules found at Thebes in 1982 carry an ideogram representing an ox. Thanks to them, the itinerary of these bovines can be reconstructed. From all over Boeotia, even from Euboea, they were taken to Thebes to be sacrificed. The nodules served to prove that they were not stolen animals and to prove their origin. Once the animals arrived at their destination, the nodules were removed and gathered to create a book-keeping tablet. The nodules were used for all sorts of objects and explain how Mycenaean book-keeping could have been so rigorous. The scribe did not have to count the objects themselves, he could base his tables upon the nodules.
Religion
The religious element is difficult to identify in Mycenaean civilization, especially as regards archaeological sites, where it remains problematic to pick out a place of worship with certainty. As for the texts, the few lists of offerings that give names of gods reveal nothing about religious practices. The Mycenaean pantheon already included numerous divinities that can be found in Classical Greece. Poseidon seems to have occupied a place of privilege, notably in the texts of Knossos. He was probably at this period a chthonic deity, connected with earthquakes. Also to be found are a collection of "Ladies" or "Madonnas", like one Lady of the Labyrinth in Crete, who calls to mind the myth of the Minoan labyrinth, in keeping with the presence of a figure named Daedalus. There is also a "Sea Goddess" named Diwia. Other divinities who can be found in later periods have been identified, such as the couple Zeus–Hera, Ares, Hermes, Athena, Artemis, Dionysus and Erinya. Notably absent are Apollo, Aphrodite, Demeter (divinities of Eastern origin), Hephaestus, and Herakles.
No great temple has been identified for the Mycenaean epoch: the familiar free-standing temple containing a cult image in its cella with an open-air altar before it, was a later development. Certain buildings found in citadels having a central room, the megaron, of oblong shape surrounded by small rooms may have served as places of worship. Aside from that, the existence of a domestic cult may be supposed. Some shrines have been located, as at Phylakopi, where have been found a considerable number of statuettes undoubtedly fashioned to serve as offerings, and it can be supposed that sites such as Delphi, Dodona, Delos, and Eleusis were already important shrines. However, this remains difficult to prove.
Architecture
Fortresses
The principal Mycenaean towns were well fortified. The town could be situated on an acropolis as in Athens or Tiryns, against a large hill as in Mycenae, or on the coastal plain, like Gla or Pylos. Besides the citadels, there are also isolated forts that undoubtedly served to militarily control territory. Mycenaean walls were often made in a fashion called cyclopean, which means that they were constructed of large, unworked boulders up to eight meters (26 ft) thick, loosely fitted without the clay mortar of the day. Different types of entrances or exits can be seen: monumental gates, access ramps, hidden doors, and vaulted galleries for escaping in case of a siege. Fear of attack meant that the chosen site must have a cistern or well at its disposal.
Habitations
The Mycenaean sites are composed of different types of residences. The smallest are rectangular in form and measure between 5 and 20 metres (16–66 ft) on a side. These were the houses of the lowest classes. They could have one or several rooms; the latter become more widespread in more recent periods. On a more developed level are found larger residences, measuring about 20 to 35 meters (66 to 115 ft) on a side, made up of many rooms and central courtyards. Their layout resembles that of a palace. It is not, however, certain that these were indeed the residences of the Mycenaean aristocrats; another theory is that they were palace annexes, being often situated next to them.
Palaces
The best examples of the Mycenaean palace are seen in the excavations at Mycenae, Tiryns and Pylos. That these were administrative centers is shown by the records found there. From an architectural point of view, they were the heirs of the Minoan palaces and also of other palaces built on the Greek mainland during the Middle Age. They were ranged around a group of courtyards each opening upon several rooms of different dimensions, such as storerooms and workshops, as well as reception halls and living quarters. The heart of the palace was the megaron. This was the throne room, laid out around a circular hearth surrounded by four columns, the throne generally being found on the right-hand side upon entering the room. The staircases found in the palace of Pylos indicate palaces had had two stories. Located on the top floor were probably the private quarters of the royal family and some storerooms. These palaces have yielded a wealth of artifacts and fragmentary frescoes.
Architectural elements
Roof tiles
Contrary to an often held view, some Mycenaean representative buildings already featured roofs made of fired tiles, as in Gla and Midea.
Mycenaean Revival architecture
In 1930, a building for the National Bank was built at Nafplio in Mycenaean Revival style.
Art and craftwork
Vessels
Mycenaeans made a great deal of pottery. Archaeologists have found a great quantity of pottery from the Mycenaean age, of widely diverse styles—stirrup jars, pitchers, kraters, chalices sometimes called "champagne coupes" after their shape, etc. The vessels vary in size. Their conformations remained quite consistent throughout the Mycenaean period, up through LHIIIB, when production increased considerably, notably in Argolis whence came great numbers exported outside Greece. The products destined for export were generally more luxurious and featured heavily worked painted decorations incorporating mythic, warrior, or animal motifs. Another type of vessel, in metal (normally bronze), has been found in sizeable quantities at Mycenaean sites. The forms of these were rather tripods, basins, or lamps. A few examples of vessels in faiance and ivory are also known.
Statuary
The Mycenaean period has not yielded sculpture of any great size. The statuary of the period consists for the most part of delicate terra cotta statuettes, found mostly at the Phylokopi site, but also at Mycenae, Tiryns, and Asine. The majority of these statuettes are anthropomorphic figurines (but there are also some zoomorphic), male and female. They display various postures: arms outstretched, raised to the sky; hands on hips; seated. They are painted, monochrome or polychrome. Their purpose is uncertain, but it seems quite probable that they were votive objects, having been found in the context of what appear to have been places of worship.
Frescoes
The painting of the Mycenaean age was much influenced by that of the Minoan age. Several frescoes have been found in Mycenaean palaces. Various themes are represented: the hunt (tauromachy), battle, processions, mythological narrative. Other frescoes are made up of geometric motifs. Some pottery was also painted (see above) with identical themes.
Arms
Military items have been found among the treasures of the Mycenaean age. The most impressive work is that of the Dendra panoply, a complete suit of Mycenaean armor. The cuirass is made up of bronze plates sewn to a leather garment. The weight of this armor must have hindered the mobility of a warrior, and it is for this reason it is supposed that it was worn by a warrior riding in a chariot. The defensive armament found at Mycenaean sites consists of several helmets, particularly an example in the shape of a wild boar's head, which is absent in the last stages of the Late Helladic. Two types of shields were used: the "figure eight" or "fiddle" shield and a rectangular type, the "tower" shield, rounded on the top. They were made of wood and leather.
Offensive arms were made of bronze. Spears and javelins have been found, and also an assortment of swords of different sizes, designed for striking with the point and with the edge. Daggers and arrows, attesting to the existence of archery, compose the remainder of the armament found from this period.
Funerary practices
The usual form of burial in the Late Helladic was inhumation. The dead were buried beneath their own houses or outside the residential zones in cemeteries, sometimes in a tumulus (????? / thólos). This form dates back to the oldest periods of Indo-European settlement in Greece, and its roots are to be found in the Balkan cultures of the third millennium BC, and even the Kurgan culture. Individual tombs were in the form of a cist, with a stone facing. Grave goods appear in LH I, whereas they were absent in preceding periods. Beginning also in the Late Helladic are to be seen communal tombs of rectangular form. It is difficult to establish whether the different forms of burial represent a social hierarchization, as was formerly thought, with the tholoi being the tombs of the elite rulers, the individual tombs those of the leisure class, and the communal tombs those of the people. Cremations increased in number over the course of the period, becoming quite numerous in LH III C. This is perhaps proof of the arrival of a new population in Greece. The most impressive tombs of the Mycenaean era are the monumental royal tombs of Mycenae, undoubtedly intended for the royal family of the city. The most famous is the Tomb of Agamemnon (the Treasury of Atreus), which is in the form of a tholos. Nearby are other tombs (known as "Circle A"), popularly identified with Clytemnestra and Aigisthos. All contained impressive treasures, exhumed by Schliemann during the excavation of Mycenae. A second grave circle at Mycenae, known as grave circle B, predates grave circle A and is abandoned in MH III. In comparison with the later grave circle (A), 'B' represents the early crystallization of an elite burial assemblage. It has been argued that different dynasties or factions may have competed through conspicuous burial, whereby grave circle A represents a new faction in the ascendancy (at this time, LH I, the relative wealth and consistency of 'B' burials declines). The Mycenaean "tholoi" may, again, represent another factional grouping, or a further formalization in burial practices by the faction previously buried in A. Nevertheless, there is a demonstrably apparent expansion in relative size, wealth/cost expenditure, and visibility in the construction of these graves over this period, coinciding with increased foreign/trading contacts and the further entrenchment of the palatial economy.
Destruction
The timing and interpretation of the end Mycenaean period poses an array of questions that have yet to be answered.
The end of LH III B1 was marked by some destruction, in particular at Mycenae. By LH III B2, an augmentation of the Mycenaean systems of defense can be seen, a sign of increasing insecurity. But this does not seem to have been a period of crisis, because these levels have yielded archaeological material that bespeaks a degree of wealth in no way inferior to that of previous periods. The end of this period is nevertheless marked by a number of destructions in the greater part of the Mycenaean sites on mainland Greece.
LH III C saw a decrease in the number of sites in Greece, which might have been considerable in certain regions (nine-tenths of the sites in Boeotia disappeared, and two-thirds in Argolis). Yet certain sites such as Mycenae and Tirynth continued to be inhabited, and the material culture found there continues to exhibit Mycenaean traits, such that LH III C is considered to be a level of Mycenaean civilization. However, a new type of ceramic appeared, called "barbarian" because it was formerly attributed to foreign invaders, and there was also a continuing increase in the practice of cremation.
What were the causes of the decline of Mycenaean civilization in this period? Several explanations have been advanced. Those concerning natural factors (climate change, earthquakes) are considered more controversial. The two most common theories are: population movement and internal conflict. The first attributes the destruction of Mycenaean sites to invaders. Sometimes the Dorians are invoked, sometimes the Sea People.
The movements of people occurring from the Balkans to the Middle East at this period, mentioned in Egyptian inscriptions calling the invaders by the name of the "Sea People", are quite real. It is known that these people were responsible for numerous destructions in Anatolia and the Levant. Mention of a people called Eqwesh (which recalls the term Achaean) in an Egyptian text of the 12th century BC has caused specialists to suppose that the Mycenaeans had taken part in these invasions (this is not certain). There is little else to tell us what happened in the Greek world.
There is the second theory, which has the Mycenaean civilization falling in the course of internal societal conflicts brought on by a rejection of the palatial system by the most underprivileged strata of society, who were impoverished at the end of the Late Helladic. This hypothesis is sometimes joined with the preceding one, mingling social divisions with ethnic divisions.
In this context it has to be stressed, that the beginning Iron Age made large numbers of comparatively cheap weapons accessible. An economic factor, that is also seen as a root cause of the apparition of the "sea peoples" in Egypt and the destruction of Ugarit and the Hittite Empire.
Whatever were the causes, the Mycenaean civilization had definitely disappeared after LH III C, when the sites of Mycenae and Tirynth were again destroyed and lost their importance. This end, during the last years of the 12th century BC, occurs after a slow decline of the Mycenaean civilization, which lasted many years before dying out. The beginning of the 11th century BC opens a new context, that of the protogeometric, the beginning of the geometric period, the Greek Dark Ages of traditional historiography.
See also
Sources
- Castleden, Rodney. The Mycenaeans. Routledge, 2005. ISBN 0415363365
- Shear, Ione Mylonas. "Excavations on the Acropolis of Midea: Results of the Greek–Swedish Excavations under the Direction of Katie Demakopoulou and Paul Åström". American Journal of Archaeology, January 2000, 104(1):133–134.
- Tandy, David W. Prehistory and History: Ethnicity, Class and Political Economy. Black Rose Books Ltd., 2001. ISBN 1551641887
- Wikander, Orjan. "Archaic Roof Tiles the First Generations". Hesperia, 59(1):285–290, January-March, 1990.
Further reading
- Podzuweit, Christian (1982). "Die mykenische Welt und Troja". In: B. Hänsel (ed.), Südosteuropa zwischen 1600 und 1000 v. Chr., 65–88.
- Nur, Amos and Cline, Eric; (2000) "Poseidon's Horses: Plate Tectonics and Earthquake Storms in the Late Bronze Age Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean". Journ. of Archaeol. Sc., No. 27, pp. 43-63.
- Robbins, Manuel (2001) Collapse of the Bronze Age: the story of Greece, Troy, Israel, Egypt and Peoples of the Sea" (Authors Choice Press)*Weiss, Barry: (1982) "The decline of Late Bronze Age civilization as a possible response to climatic change" in Climatic Change ISSN 0165-0009 (Paper) 1573-1480 (Online), Volume 4, Number 2, June 1982, pp. 173-198.
External links
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- , a table drawn up from Michael Ventris and John Chadwick, Documents in Mycenaean Greek second edition (Cambridge 1973)
, , Pascal Darcque, Director of Research, CNRS, in charge of excavations at Malia, February 2001
, Louis Godart, University of Naples
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