MINOANS

and
MYCENAEANS
Minoan Civilization
- Based on Island of Crete
- Peak c. 2000-1450 BC

Mycenean Civilization
- Based on the Greek mainland
- Peak c.1500-1250 BC
 HOMER

• c. 750 BC
• Greek Epic Poet

• The Iliad

• The Odyssey
 The
Homeric
World

By Dbachmann, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=512110

Sir Arthur Evans

• Discovered the site at

Cnossos

• Purchased entire site;

excavated in five seasons,
1900 to 1905

• Excavated Cnossus in 1900 -

1905

• Called the culture “Minoan” after

the legendary king Minos

• What the Minoans called

themselves is unknown
 Minoan Crete

By User:Bibi Saint-Pol - Own work (data from http://metamedia.stanford.edu/imagebin/minoan%20crete%20map.JPG, map background from Image:Map greek sanctuaries-fr.svg).,
CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1557035
 Minoan palace at Cnossus,
c. 1700-1375 BCE

• Complex, “labyrinthine”
palace designs
• Built around central courtyard
 Minoan
Crete
• Legendary Home of the
minotaur
• According to legend Minotaur
= monstrous offspring of Minos’
wife and a bull
• Labyrinth was built to house
the creature
• Eventually defeated by
Athenian Hero Theseus
• Complex palace designs +
Minoan artistic fascination with
bulls likely contributed to the
legend
Storeroom at
Cnossus with
storage
vessels
(pithoi) filled
with olive oil
and grain

• large storehouses
full of grain and
olive oil found at
Minoan sites

• Likely tax
payments and
stockpiles in times
of surplus
 Rhyton (a ritual pouring vessel)
in shape of a bull’s head

Art!
Dolphins fresco from the
“Queen’s chamber ”at
Cnossos

• Colourful fresco paintings of plant and animal

life prominent
• Particular emphasis on marine life and
bulls

• Scenes of human life and rituals give some idea

about Minoan clothing and other material goods

• Statuary and other sculpted items

• Architectural and artistic styles show evidence of

Egyptian influence
• Reflects the seafaring and trade based
economy
 • Writing adopted from Egyptian
hieroglyphics but made more linear (hence
the name!)
Linear A Script
• Untranslatable (so far)
 Thera (modern Santorini)

• Site of Minoan
culture

• Destroyed in c. 1630
BCE by an earthquake
& volcano eruption

•Ash from eruption

preserved some
material culture
The Mycenaean World
The Mycenaean World

Central Greece

Corinthian Isthmus

 Peloponnese
 Associations with Homeric Epic
• Agamemnon: Legendary king of Mycenae
• Menelaus: Legendary king of Sparta
• Nestor: Legendary king of Pylos
• Odysseus: Legendary king of Ithaca
• Iolcus: Legendary launching place for Jason
and the Argonauts
 Linear B
- Syllabic language
- Related to Greek
- Tablets contain inventories and administrative information
Wow!
A sign!
 Mycenae
There still remain, however, parts of the city wall, including the gate, upon which
stand lions. These, too, are said to be the work of the Cyclopes, who made for
Proteus the wall at Tiryns. In the ruins of Mycenae is a fountain called Persea;
there are also the underground chambers of Atreus and his children, in which were
stored their treasures. There is the grave of Atreus, along with the graves of such
as returned with Agamemnon from Troy, and were murdered by Aegisthus after
he had given them a banquet… Agamemnon has his tomb and so has Eurymedon
the charioteer, while another is shared by Teledamus and Pelops, twin sons, they
say, of Cassandra, whom while yet babies Aegisthus slew after their parents.
Electra has her tomb, for Orestes married her to Pylades… Clytemnestra and
Aegisthus were buried at some little distance from the wall. They were thought
unworthy of a place within it, where lay Agamemnon himself and those who were
murdered with him.
PAUSANIAS (2.16.5-7)
Mycenae was
excavated
by Heinrich &
Sophia Schliemann
in 1874
Mycenae – Excavation
• In this circle
Schliemann found:
- cist graves (similar to stone
coffins)

- shaft graves (very deep cist

graves)

- each shaft had 2-5 people

were buried (total of 19 )

- remains included men

women and children
Grave Goods
 Grave Goods included:
- rings, cups, boxes, jewellery, daggers in bronze silver and gold.

- Bronze weapons with inlaid decoration in gold and silver

- so called “Mask of Agamemnon” (pictured centre)
“Treasury of Atreus” (tholos tomb)
“Treasury of Atreus” (tholos tomb)

- Tholos or beehive tombs

found outside the walls
- Created by cutting into the
side of a hill to build corridor
and burial chamber
- Covered over with earth
- 9 tholos tombs found around
Mycenae
- Largest is known as the
“Treasury of Atreus (father of
Agamemnon)”
Plan of “Nestor’s Palace” at Pylos
Plan of “Nestor’s
Palace” at Pylos

• Mycenean palaces
have no large open
courtyards

• Centre around a
megaron (great hall)
Frescos from Nestor’s Palace
 Mycenean Pottery, c. 1200-1100 BC

• substantial amount of pottery

found
• Mycenean pottery decoration
typically repetitive patterns
and naturalistic motifs
 Features and Role
of the Palace
• Mycenean palaces were fortified
• Palace territories extended anywhere from 400-1250 square miles
• Many of communities close to one another
• We have no idea details of relations between communities
• Society was hierarchical.
• Wanax = leader a region
• Wanax resided in the palace.
• Other elite individuals (religious figures, war leaders, and other
palace officials) also inked to the palace
• The majority of Mycenean population comprised the lower classes
(damos)
• Did not reside within the palace complex
• Lived in surrounding region.
• Would pay taxes in the form of produce & material goods to the
palace
• The palace complexes served as centres for the collection and
redistribution of produce and other goods.
 Mycenaean Collapse
c. 1200 BC

• Mycenean civilization collapsed c. 1200 BCE

• Reasons not clear
• Archaeological record shows the destruction of the
palaces by fire
• Do not know who or what caused the destruction and
decline
• sudden or prolonges?
• one cause or several?
• Many theories including:
• Natural disasters (earthquake, climate
change, famine, etc.)
• Conflict internal to Mycenean Greece
• conflicts between major power centres
• uprisings of the lower classes
• Instability after the Trojan War → “Dorian
Invasion” from the north (view of some ancient
Greek writers)
• SEA PEOPLES!
 Bronze Age
Mediterranean Collapse

• Mycenean collapse = small part of substantial

upheavals in the 12th century throughout entire
Mediterranean.

• During same period other major powers (e.g.

Hittites) would also collapsed

• Mention in the Near Eastern sources of Invasion by

the ‘Sea Peoples’ from the North

• Egyptian texts mention coalitions of invaders that

they were able to repel

• Term ‘Sea Peoples’ coined in the 1850s

• Egyptians did not call them this
• names for ‘sea peoples’ in Egyptian sources
were may indicate that they were partially
composed of displaced Myceneans
themselves

• Bronze Age collapse great mystery of history

 IMAGE CREDITS

Theseus dragging the Minotaur from the Labyrinth. Tondo of an Attic red-figured kylix, ca. 440-430 BC. Said
to be from Vulcii
By Unknown artist - Marie-Lan Nguyen (User:Jastrow), 2007, CC BY 2.5,
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2529671

Arthur Evans portrait, 1907, by William Richmond. Initially at the Royal Academy in London, now displayed
at the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford.
By William Blake Richmond, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=57141533

The Palace of Knossos in Crete. Reconstitution.

By Mmoyaq - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=51334588

Pithoi in Knossos.jpg
CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=58783

Dolphin Mural Knossos.jpg

By Chris 73 / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0,
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=190668

By en:User:Securiger - Image:Linear A tablets filt.jpg, CC BY-SA 3.0,

https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4317176

By LBM1948 - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=79298157

By User:Alexikoua, User:Panthera tigris tigris, TL User:Reedside - Ιστορία του Ελληνικού Έθνους, Εκδοτική
Αθηνών, τ. Α' χάρτες σε σελ. 263-265, σελ. 290, 292-293 (επίσης [1], CC BY-SA 3.0,
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=61505445

By Unknown author -
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Linear_B_tablet_from_Nestor%27s_Palace.jpg, CC BY-SA 3.0,
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=57023538

By Martin Addison, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=13567276

By Qwqchris - This file has been extracted from another file: Mykene.JPG, CC BY-SA 3.0,
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=87276776

By Schuppi - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=32957313

By Schuppi - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=32869536

By Mathesis at Italian Wikipedia, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=28281195

CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=43766

By Janmad - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5063524

By Leporello78 - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=89795042

By Leporello78 - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=89795278

By Sharon Mollerus - Large Krater with Armored Men Departing for Battle, Mycenae acropolis, 12th century BC, CC BY
2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=70213372