 Introduction of Hellenic History. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Beth Thomas. Hellenic History by George Willis Botford. Introductory note. The purpose of this volume is to present in brief scope the evolution of Greek civilisation, a culture simple in its essential unity, although seemingly complex in its many and wide ramifications. In the conviction that the chief aim of history is to explain the present, the author has centred his attention on those phases of Greek life which have influenced to a marked degree the civilisation of today. In the case of the Greeks perhaps more than of any other people in the world's history, the state was the highest embodiment of social and cultural life. In the free air of the city-state, the liberty-loving Greek found not alone his inspiration, but untrammeled opportunity for expression and development. In the Athenian democracy of Pericles, the city-state reached its logical consummation. For the first time the citizen could give free reign to his individualism. The successful struggle with the placid yet insidious civilisation of the Orient gave self-confidence, purpose and solidarity to Greek life. To embryonic genius, the wealth and broadening influence of empire furnished boundless opportunity and inspiration. In coping with the burdens of imperialism however, this very spirit of individualism proved a serious weakness. Political control passed, though not without long and bitter struggle, first to militaristic sparta and then in turn to more efficient masters, Thebes, Macedon, Rome. It is tragedy in its highest form that the Greeks reached a solution of their political problems too late for rescue from foreign domination. And yet it redounds to the glory of Greece that in spite of political and economic vicissitudes, the artist and the philosopher continued to create products of even greater refinement and broader humanism. The narrative has been based, therefore, on the story of political evolution. However, the reader will note many striking omissions particularly in regard to petty squabbles among politicians and states and the idealisation of military leaders. In accordance with the broadening scope of history, due emphasis has been placed on economic factors, which then, as now, were signposts to political or military policy. Wherever possible, economic and political events have been combined in a continuous narrative. In other instances, the reader is guided by cross-reference to separate treatments of important agricultural, industrial and commercial changes. In the sections devoted to social life, there is painted an intimate picture of the everyday life of the leisure class and of the toilet in town and country at work and at play. Cultural achievement, wherein we modern see the chief justification for our study of Greek history, has been treated not only as to growth and development, but as an integral part of the Greek life and character. In short, this book represents an effort to combine political, economic, social and cultural history in one synthesis, centering attention on those factors which have contributed essentially to modern civilisation. The Hellenic history is intended to serve primarily as a textbook for college courses in Greek history and as a guide to the reader who is interested in one or more phases of Greek achievement. For more detailed treatment, the reader is referred to the list of books at the end of each chapter. Full bibliographies have been provided for the first seven chapters. For later chapters, the list of additional readings are selective. Those readers who desire a parallel study of the sources or a more extensive bibliography are advised to consult the companion volume, Hellenic Civilisation. In the preparation of the manuscript of the Hellenic history for publication, the editor has sought to maintain the author's high standard of scholarship and accuracy. Insofar as he has been successful in this endeavour, he is obligated largely to the assistance of many friends. In particular, he gratefully acknowledges his debt of gratitude to two former students of the author, Professor Wallace E. Caldwell of the University of North Carolina for his preparation of the bibliographies and for his assistance in the arduous task of proofreading, and to Miss Margaret D. Bancroft, Instructor of History in Wellesley College, for her painstaking work in the selection and preparation of illustrative material for this volume, and to his mother, whose constant encouragement, advice and practical assistance have made possible the publication of Dr. Botsford's last work. For the use of a considerable part of the illustrative material, the editor is indebted to the authorities of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, to Mrs. Elder Marcus of Englewood, New Jersey, and Mrs. A. C. McGifford in New York City, to Professors Alice Watson and Catherine M. Edwards of Wellesley College, and to Professor A. V. Williams Jackson of Columbia University. The editor desires furthermore to express his thanks to Mr. Edward A. Bryant of Yonkers, New York, for his compilation of the index, to Mr. Frederick W. Erb, Ms. Adele M. Erb, and Ms. Isidore G. Mudge of the Columbia University Library for their Friendly Spirit of Cooperation, and finally to his colleague, Professor Francis G. Allanson of Brown University for many friendly suggestions and criticisms. J. Barrett Botsford, Brown University, Providence, RI, February 10, 1922. End of introduction. In the East Coast of the Mediterranean Sea, the coasts and islands of the Aegean Sea, which collectively formed the very heart of Hellas, it was not till today had passed the zenith of their development that the interior and north of the mainland came into prominence. For their beginnings it is instructive to take note of their situation in the great cultural area which borders the eastern half of the Mediterranean Sea. In this area, mankind first emerged from barbarism. It is a region which at the dawn of history was especially subject to immigration. We may infer then that from concentration added to natural growth, the population became too dense to find support in hunting, fishing and gathering wild fruits and nuts. The productive valleys of the Nile and the Euphrates and to a less degree the small alluvial plains at the mouths of the rivers on both Aegean coasts, invited to agriculture, from tilling the soil however rudely to the higher stages of civilization, the way was comparatively easy. This development was favoured by the mild sub-tropical climate, less innervating than the equatorial heat. It yet rendered life far easier than is possible in the temperate zones. On the Mediterranean shores, men need less food, clothing and shelter. They live more in the open air, in social contact with one another. Thus their struggle for existence is not all absorbing. They have more leisure, to devote to thought and to the creation of the Adormance of Life and more opportunity for discussion for the interchange and clarification of ideas. Communication between the Aegean region and the Orient was easy. The ships of Crete sailed south, but a short way to Libya and then scrapped along the coast to the Delta. The Aegean shores are lined with harbours, well adapted to the small vessels of early time. In fact, the sea between these coasts is itself, so to speak, a great harbour opening to the Orient. These conditions brought south-eastern Europe and the adjacent Anatolian coast into closest historical relations with the east. Broadly then, the Aegean region was one with the great valleys of the Nile and Euphrates, all were included in the home of the oldest civilisation. Within this wide area, however, were striking contrasts of geography, hence of historical growth. The Aegean region on the highway of migration and traffic between two continents attracted strangers of diverse race and genius, and these immigrant particularities combined to make the Greeks extremely versatile. The interaction, too, of strangers upon one another, their rivalries and efforts at Mitchell adjustment provided a most powerful stimulus to progress. In Babylonia, on the other hand, this force was less operative, while in Egypt it existed only at certain crises. Great political contrast, too, arose. The necessity of regulating the waters of the Nile and Euphrates called into existence vast systems of cooperative labour enforced by an absolute king. Whereas in the Aegean world, the division of the country into little islands or on the mainland's diminutive plains separated by high mountain ranges encouraged the gripping of the population in small independent communities. The conditions of life within these little states, together with the reciprocal relations among them, contributed enormously to the development of individuality and intelligence. The genius of the people in these directions was further determined by the mountainous character of their country. In this rugged environment, a man could readily make a living for himself and his family in independence by hunting birds and beasts, pasturing a few domestic animals and tilling a small patch of ground. He had little need of neighbours, still less of kings. His courage he exercised in battle with the wild boar, the bear, leopard and lion. Against any force likely to menace his home he could depend on his strong arm or at the worst on flight to some hidden or guarded refuge. Hence arose his fearlessness, the foundation of his character. On the sole basis of courage rested liberty to do and think. On liberty rested intelligence and individuality. In a large degree to the nature of the people was determined by the products of their country. Although Greece could never compare in fertility with Central Europe, England or America, it was far more productive anciently than now. There was then a smaller area of bear-rock. The soil was thicker, richer and better supplied with moisture, yet even in earliest times it was but a lean country with its thin, less barely covering the bones which here and there protruded nakedly. High mountain tops were crowned with bald rocks bordered with a fringe of all pine plants. Below the snow-line grew forests of pine, fir, cedar, oaks of several kinds, beech, bay and some wild fruits as the apple, pear and grapes. The plain and cypress are thought to be importations and the chestnut, walnut and almond do not appear to lay it in history. The thin woods permitted the growth of brush and grass which pastured domestic animals. The mountaineer gave his chief attention to rearing pigs, fattening them on the abundant egg-horns which afforded to a substantial element of the family diet. On the mountain side below the forest zone lay the drier, thinner soiled scrub land covered with the animon, asphodel, myrtle, juniper and other plants. There was a lack of berries but the many flowers gave food to bees that supplied the inhabitants with their sole material sweetness. Over this zone of scrub ruled the shepherds with their herds of sheep and goats that perpetually nibbled their dry, prickly food and furnished the more refined people of the villages with leather, wool, milk and meat for the protection of their flocks and pasture rights. The shepherds became warlords, each surrounded by an army of savage dogs. The winter cold drove them to encroach on the neighbouring plains where often on questions of trespassing damage they waged battle with the tillers of the soil. These plains lay either wholly surrounded by mountains or between mountain range and sea. Here the soil, none too good, produced wheat when at its best, otherwise barley, spelt and millet. Among the vegetables were peas, beans, onions, leeks and garlic. The fruits were apples, pears, quinces, pomegranates, figs, grapes and chief of all, olives. The date palm grew in southern Pilipines and the neighbouring islands. Olive oil was used for food for anointing the body and for burning in lamps. Flags provided oil and linen. In addition to files and the smaller domestic animals the farmers reared donkeys, mules and occasionally cows. There were few horses except in Beota and Thessaly and everywhere they were the ornament of luxurious wealth used by the Calvary in war and in time of peace for riding and driving but never as beasts of burden. Similarly the animal and vegetable products far from affecting a surplus of riches were too scant to support meagerly a moderately dense population. If a leisurely class was to exist and a high degree of refinement to be attained the Greeks would have to find other sources of wealth. Turning from farming and grazing to minerals we discover an almost equal lack of resources. Ubia produced copper though not nearly enough to supply the demand and for tin a necessary ingredient of much used bronze. The Greeks had to depend wholly on importations. It was not till near the end of the second millennium BC that they began to use iron in the industries. They found it in Ubia and the island of Syrophus and far more abundantly in the mountain range of Tegitus Laconia. In spite of this restrictive mining area the yield allowed a surplus for export. Of the two precious metals gold must have been relatively abundant and easily obtained in the Minoan age though we do not know where was the source of supply. In the historical period it was found in the islands of Syphus and Thassus and the opposite Thracian coast. Doubtless however some of the gold used by the Greeks came from foreign lands. Silver was mined along with the gold and in Attica Llorium produced it with lead. In building stone alone is all Greece rich and the best of marbles come from Mount Pentelechus Attica and the island of Paris. In the fourth century the Athenians began to derive profit from its exportation. Last but not least in importance were the clay fields distributed over all Greece which made possible the potters trade. No coal was mined and even now within the Mediterranean basin little has been mined and that of inferior quality. Wood and charcoal supplied the heat necessary for cooking and the industries. The natural economic resources however were varied were all limited in quantity. A Greek therefore had to make the best use of his gantt means to study economy. Next to fearlessness and love of liberty moderation was the greatest quality of the race. This principle holds not only for eating, drinking, shelter and the other material things of life but equally for literature and the fine arts. The simple self-restraint of Hellenism the product of a long severe training contrasts with the redundance of means. Employed by all other European artists ancient and modern. Another feature of Greece which bore powerfully on character is to be sought in the lack of unity between coast and interior. We have seen that the nature of the country its division by waters and by high mountain ranges into islands and little plains prevented the inhabitants from massing together in large social and political groups. Exploitation of the interior and the north which formed their back country would have demanded a united effort like that which brought the North American colonies under a single government but this region was crowded with mountains inaccessible and repellent which forced the plain and coast people to the sea as their sphere of life to colonization and commerce. This course of action still further stimulate their intelligence and enterprise but tended even more to decentralization. Whereas great continental undertakings call for unity a single city whether Athens or Venice has found it easier unhampered by political dependence to create a great naval power and an extensive commerce. The factors that mould character thus far considered are in whole or part economic. It is possible however to find in the country physical features which act directly on the mind. First of all is the endless variety contrasting with the monotony of Egypt the ever changing landscapes which made for versatility whereas the Egyptians seem to us like so many slices from the same cheese we find among the ancient Greeks as great differences among civilized men of the whole world today. There was no typical Greek the landscapes too are always suggestive beyond the nearer range is another higher and the one still further away presents an opening through which are revealed more distant heights. Thus the imagination is tempted forth beyond its immediate surroundings to embark on voyages of mental exploration. The beauty it meets on the way is not sensuous inviting to eat, drink or and sleep rather it is intellectual appealing to the noblest faculties of man these naked jagged mountain heights be it noticed have no economic value they do their part in awakening a love of beauty for its own sake which has created for all time the absolute ideal of art a kin is the love of truth for its own sake that noble intellectual ideal unmasked by thought of worldly gain which made the Greeks the discoverers of the principles of knowledge the creators of science and philosophy. End of chapter 1 Chapter 2 of Hellenic History This is a LibriVox recording All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Mike Botez July 2019 Hellenic History by George Willis Botsford Chapter 2 The Minoan Age Neolithic Age to 3000 BC Our earliest glimpse of the Aegean area reveals the people in possession of the Neolithic culture as yet they were ignorant of the metals but had learned to polish their stone implements with a view to increasing the cutting power A good opportunity for the study of progress during the Neolithic Age is afforded by Knossos Crete The deposits left by the people of this culture on the site of the palace there measuring in places 20 feet in depth were doubtless accumulating through several thousand years During this long age we can trace the slow evolution of mankind by the fragments of pottery which still survive In the lowest stratum they are of crude clay roughly fashioned by hand Gradually the potter learned to purify his material to mold it in somewhat more pleasing forms and to fire it in an oven Meanwhile he was making the earliest attempts at ornamentation The first step was to scratch the surface with angular lines whence developed the style described as geometric The next was to fill the incisions with a white chalky substance the beginning of vase painting Other varieties of Neolithic earthenware need not be considered here Neolithic life from material found at Knossos and in deposits of the same age elsewhere we learn that the people of the time used stone axes, hammers and knives besides many utensils of bone and horn Undoubtedly their chief material for weapons and implements was wood all of which however has perished At first they clothed themselves in skins and this material continued down into historical Greece in the dress of the country folk But before the end of the age the chiefs and their families were in a position to array themselves in woven garments a waist cloth for men and a skirt for women In earlier times they lived in round, rarely oval huts of wattle, dobb'dooth clay Only in course of centuries and in favorable conditions did the abode become a rectangle divided into several rooms and protected with walls of small rough stones In their light boats they rode freely from isle to isle to exchange their simple wares The occurrence of a similar style of pottery not only over the Aegean isles but as far distant as Cyprus and Egypt proves the existence of commerce throughout this extended area It is the connection with Egypt whose chronology in broad outline is known even for this remote time which enables us to fix the date for the close of the Neolithic age at about 3000 Minoan age 3000 to 1200 The bronze or more strictly copper bronze age which developed from the Neolithic is now widely known as Minoan after Minos, a legendary king or perhaps a god of creed Dr. Evans, the explorer of Gnosis divides the Minoan age into three periods early, middle and late In the present volume the term Mycenaean will be treated as equivalent to late Minoan Early Minoan Copper Age 3000 to 2200 In the beginning of the early Minoan age the porter invented a black glaze for washing his wares through surface thus produced he painted white bands in white or rarely red Sometimes he left to the surface its natural buff whereon he placed black glaze stripes These elements of art continued down to historical Greece Gradually the molding and painting attained freedom and variety The painted instruments yielded to the brush zigzags naturally developed into curvilinear and simple spiral designs Here too appears the first evidence of the potter's will Slowly followed the effort to express the forms of living things all in geometric style The human body was represented by two triangles the points coming together at the girdle the legs and arms were little more than lines Equally crude are the statuettes presumably idols of the same age In the carving of stone vessels however the artist reached perfection Melos The leading center of culture in this period was the island of Melos Here were quarries of obsidian a hard volcanic rock which splits readily into thin blades and was therefore especially serviceable for knives, razors and all-sharp bladed or sharp pointed instruments By exporting wares of this kind in great quantities to neighboring lands the millions grew relatively prosperous Hence they were able to make progress in the comforts of life Next after them followed the inhabitants of the neighboring Kiklades and in fact their influence was felt from the coast of Argolis, Greece to Troy in Asia Minor Dwellings and tombs In this period the rectangular house became larger more substantial and better furnished Many a chieftain must have had his palace but the one at Troy is best known to us This site had been occupied in the transition to the Bronze Age and the settlement of which now speak is the second The essential element of the palace is a great hall, Megaron with a central hearth From this room we pass through a door into a vestibule formed by the projecting walls and from there into a large open court This type of dwelling originated in Central Europe The same plan is afterward found on a more complex scale in the palace at Tirins In exposed places from the beginning of the age men were wont to fortify their settlements with rude walls of uncut stones whereas other cities like those of Crete remained unprotected Copper, pictographs The great innovation of the age was the introduction of copper most probably from Egypt and Cyprus It was used for tools and weapons Silver and gold became known in the same period Copper was followed at an interval of centuries by bronze For a long time however stone maintained its place in the useful arts Equally important was the adoption of a system of picture writing pictographs They were found in Crete on seals of ivory, stone and other material in the form of cylinders, buttons and prisms Their near resemblance to Egyptian types proves an intercourse between these two countries in the age of their production Other wares were exchanged in this period and the Egyptian records mention the Aegean folk by name It is this commerce which enables us to set the closing date of the early Minoan age at about 2200 Area of the culture In this period the Aegean civilization extended from the Qiclades to Troy and Cyprus and in the opposite direction to the coasts of Greece There were many local varieties of culture Although early in the age Troy and the Qiclades had the lead Trojan progress was checked by the destruction of the city whereas the islands continued their advance In Crete the eastern towns were the most progressive Meanwhile the Aegean folk were carrying their products to Egypt as stated above and in other directions to the valley of the Danube and to Sicily and southern Italy Middle Minoan first bronze age 2200 to 1600 Toward the close of the 3rd millennium BC central Crete came decidedly to the front This change marks the beginning of the Middle Minoan period The chief seeds of culture worked Nossos and Festus Near Festus the modern village of Hagia Triada marks a third important site The east was occupied by lesser cities whereas in the west of the island no remains of the age have as yet been unearthed The Minoan civilization now entered upon its most brilliant period The invention of the wheel enabled the potter to develop his trade into a fine art The most beautiful specimens are of the Kamaris type so named after the cave on Mount Ida where they were first discovered The clay reduced to the utmost purity was molded in artistic forms In the actual thinness of their walls they may be compared with the best heavy land China of today The painted designs on them are in various shades of white, orange, crimson and yellow developing from the two main color classes of the preceding age The aim was not the representation of nature but the creation of a brilliant harmony of colors In time however the polychrome ornamentation gave way to the simpler principles of the earlier age while there developed a close imitation of natural objects Equally naturalistic are the patterns in finance for which the close of the middle Minoan period is famous Places, writing Early in the age the kings of Knossos and Festus built great palaces After two or three centuries they were destroyed or felt ruined whereupon the kings proceeded to erect new dwellings on a grander scale The interior walls they decorated with frescoes from human life and nature Within the Knossian palace the art of writing reached a high stage of development From the original pictographs arose a linear script in which some characters are doubtless ideographs denoting things rather than sounds or groups of sounds whereas others seem to represent syllables Royal archives of clay tablets indicate its use for governmental business The old system of writing continued by the side of the new In the deposits which closed the age the excavator of Festus found a clay disk covered on both sides with pictographs evidently stamped on the clay while still soft and representing therefore the first known printing with movable types As the characters are quite different from the Minoan the disk evidently came from some outlying region perhaps Asia Minor late Minoan, Mycenaean age 1600 to 1200 In the beginning of the late Minoan age, Cretan civilization having achieved its utmost began to stagnate it no longer created new forms but merely repeated stereotyped conventions For a time, however, we find a political advance Knossos and Festus still flourished while other cities declined and disappeared It would perhaps accord best with the facts to suppose that the king of Knossos now ruled the whole island and made use of Festus as a secondary capital The Knossium palace attained to the acme of its grandeur about 1500 To this period belong most of the mural frescoes still preserved In vase ornamentation the characteristic development was the palace style which sacrificed the natural to a desire for decorative unity The age attained great skill in bronze work and in inlaying metals with other substances In writing, linear script superseded the pictographs and the new and improved linear style developed from the old Throughout the early and middle Minoan ages the Greek peninsula lagged far behind the Aegean Isles in culture During nearly all this time Thessaly and Biosia remained Neolithic and farther south the peninsula made but little progress beyond this condition A great change came with the beginning of the late Minoan time In fact, this age had not advanced far when the leadership in culture shifted to Troy and still more to Greece where Therans, Mycenae and Orcomenus were entering upon an era of artistic and political splendor Life in Crete and Mycenae, 2000 to 1400 The abundance of material that reached us from the middle Minoan and early Mycenaean ages affords a clear and comprehensive view of the life of those times The dominant racial type was a long skull, oval face, brown complexion, black hair and short stature The physique of the south Italian were Sicilian of today These people were thin and wiry with wasp wasps, lively inaction, dependent on agility rather than bulk A keenly competitive folk gifted with a delicate aesthetic taste and an intuitive mind Dress Usually a man wore simply a cloth fastened at the girdle and covering the hips Sometimes the dress was so modified as to form short trousers With a cloth fitting belt he accentuated the smallness of his waist The priestly and holiday attire was an ample cloak which reached from neck to ankles The Cretan's black hair fell over his shoulders in long curls His face was beardless whereas at Mycenae it was fashionable to allow the free growth of whiskers The woman wore a low bodice and a bell shaped skirt abundantly adorned with ruffles or flounces Favorite colors were yellow, purple and blue Her black hair she dressed elaborately in twists and curls While the whiteness of her face she intensified by artificial means She either left her head bare or surmounted it with a hat Some of whose designs closely resemble those of today In addition to these essentials of dress she profusely adorned herself with jewels of gold and precious stones Altogether her attire was extremely conventional and modish Her pictures in ancient art find their counterpart in modern fashion plates The foot gear of both sexes was elaborated with embroidery and delicate colored bindings Dwellings like the feminine garb of the age, the private dwellings of the wealthy were surprisingly modern They were built on no fixed plan but followed the necessities of the sight and the taste of the owner They were of stone, wood or brick and their windows seem to have been protected by oiled and tinted parchment Some were three or four stories high and comprised a multitude of rooms The owners furnished them comfortably and developed cooking to a high degree of perfection Palace Naturally the palace was incomparably larger and more magnificent than the richest private dwelling The residence of the King of Knossos occupied more than five acres and stood at least four stories high Its irregularity of plan may be due to additions and modifications by successive rulers The essential feature of any large criton dwelling, private or royal, is the grouping of rooms about a court The Knossium Palace comprised an immense central court, smaller courts, long corridors, a theatrical space, audience rooms, sanctuaries, an industrial quarter And a system of drainage not equaled in Europe between that day and the 19th century We may notice more particularly the room in which the throne of Gypsum stands against the wall And is flanked on both sides with long benches of the same material Here in the midst of his noble councilors sat the King on the oldest throne in Europe Presumably to receive embassies and to transact business with his subjects The industrial quarter swarmed with artists and artisans, whose labors extended over a wide range of activities From the preparation and storage of wine and olive oil in huge earthenware jars To the finest goldwork and elaborate murial frescoes One chamber fitted up with benches and a seat for the master is thought to be a schoolroom In which the young learned to mold clay into little tablets and inscribed them with linear writing Elsewhere were the archives in which these tablets were stored by the thousands Although the script has not yet been deciphered, the inscriptions thus far discovered seem to be accounts of stores and of receipts and dues A larger tablet from the Dictaean Cave has the appearance of a list of offerings If the critons possessed a literature of songs, epics and chronicles, as is not unlikely It must have been written on perishable material, for nothing of the kind has been discovered It is known, however, that they had the decimal notation and perhaps as many as four systems of weights Including the two most used in historical Greece By dropping a definite weight of silver or gold upon a striated surface, they took the first step in the coinage of these metals Bronze ingots, too, of definite weight were stamped that they might serve as currency Workmen and their products Many laborers visit themselves with tilling the soil and with rearing cattle, sheep, goats and swine They ground their barley or wheat in querns or crushed it in stone mortars still preserved Among their fruits were the fig and the olive, whose oil entered into the preparation of food Trades were specialized, as in the Orient Among the craftsmen were potters, brickmakers and carpenters, whose bronze saws, axes, files and other tools resemble in pattern those of today Naturally, in an age of bronze, the workers in that metal filled a large place Stone, while still serving the lesser arts, had become the essential of architecture And throughout all history wood has furnished a convenient material for building and for a great variety of furniture Among the most remarkable of skilled industries was the cutting and engraving of precious stones Which included practically all known to the moderns except the diamond On these gems the engraver skillfully wrought varied scenes from nature and human life The highest development of art is found in the work of the goldsmith, an achievement of the painstaking experience of centuries This metal was then more common than silver Among his products were beads adorned with scents in intaglio and rings with similarly decorated bezels used as seals He could inlay gold as well as ivory and other material on bodies of different substance so as to produce a polychrome effect He wrought bracelets, diverse artistic patterns in repoussé on thin plate and graceful drinking cups Famed for beauty are the two gold cups from a beehive tomb at Vafio, Laconia The scenes which adorn them are bold, spirited and lifelike Warfare In war the rank and file were without defensive armor and carried the sling and bow In the latter art the cretins were especially strong as we infer from the magazine of bronze arrowheads in the Knossium Palace In fact throughout ancient history they kept the lead in archery A warrior of the better class protected himself with a huge shield which reached from neck to ankles It was made of leather stretched on a wooden frame in form of semi-cylinder or an oval with notched sides A helmet and greaves completed the defensive armor whereas he assailed his foe with a short dagger, a sword for thrusting and a lance, the metal parts of bronze Unable to carry far the great weight of the shield he rode to battle in a two-wheeled chariot drawn by a pair of horses With him as charioteer rode his squire who sometimes carried the sword Using his chariot merely for conveyance the warrior descended in battle to engage in close combat with his foe Not only many weapons have survived but also pictures of military life We see warriors engaged in hand-to-hand combat while fragments of a silver vase present a living view of a siege On the large piece illustrated in the text we see outside the walls slingers and bowmen in action Behind them stand two men probably elders like those described by Hesiod on the shield of Heracles 246 F To the blessed gods their hands uplifted for their fighting sons on the tower above excited women shriek Smaller fragments show fallen warriors outstretched others carrying the dead and others hurling lances, city walls, the Cretan cities were unwalled As a defense against strangers they had their navy and like the later Spartans they must have reposed confidence in their bulwarks of brave warriors In more exposed positions however as at Troy men were accustomed from the beginning of the Minoan Age to protect their settlements with walls Gradually the crude wall of unshaped stones was superseded by massive masonry such as we find at Tirins There the defenses are of huge slightly dressed stones arranged roughly in layers and held together by mortar The interstices are filled with smaller stones. This is the so-called Cyclopean masonry Originally the Tirithian wall must have risen to a height of 60 feet the upper part of brick In the present ruins on the south and southeast are two great galleries covered by a pointed arch formed by the gradual overlapping of successive layers of stone This mode of forming arches and domes is characteristic of the age Connected with the southeast gallery is a series of chambers. Undoubtedly in these well-protected spaces provisions and war material were stored against the siege At Mycenae we find more advanced masonry In one kind termed Ashlar the stones are cut in oblong shape and arranged in horizontal layers Still more developed is the polygonal style composed of large many-faced stones so carefully fitted as to leave no space for rubble The cruder forms continued by the side of the more highly developed Religion Deities The chief deity was a nature power the mother of all living things Rhea in Crete Sibli in Asia Minor A patroness of Filden Mountain She stands conspicuous on a lofty rock between her two attendant lions In her relation with civilized life she arms herself with a double axe to battle for her city Or in times of quiet presides over multifarious social and political functions Her son the youthful Zeus a god who is born and ultimately dies Likewise wields the battle axe or when duly invoked by the young men curates in a martial dance Vouch saves full jars, fleecy flocks, prosperous seaborn ships and goodly law Another great deity was possibly Minos worshipped in the form of a bull Among the deities of less prominence we recognize Aphrodite The nude were lightly clad idol her hands brought together on her breast Sometimes accompanied by doves and Artemis deity of wood and animals of hunting and fishing The serpent attributes of another goddess connect her with the earth or underworld With the spirits of the tomb or of the house Throughout the age were fashioned small images of these gods And of others whose character eludes our study In addition to divinity's inhuman form they adored or venerated a sacred Symbols, trees, pillars, the cross, the double axe and various other objects They built no temples but conducted their worship in the open air In caves or in chapels within their dwellings Worship of the dead Another aspect of religion was the worship of the dead which included the customs of burial A type of inhumation is represented in the circular cemetery on the acropolis of Mycenae The six graves found here were the burial place of a long dynasty Who used it for all the members of their family, men, women and children Each contained several bodies In death they were elegantly apparel'd and loaded with jewels and gold ornaments With them further were buried articles of toilet, cooking utensils and table furniture Tools, military equipment, in brief everything civilized men and women needed in daily life A gold mask found in one tomb undoubtedly imitated the face of the living They covered the grave with stone slabs and mounted it over, reopening it for new burials To the dead they offered sacrifices of wild and domestic animals Probably also of human beings as the scattered bones of men and animals suggest Evidently the Minoans believed that the spirits of the dead lived in the tombs and enjoyed these sacrifices and this rich equipment In submitting to such expensive services the living must have been actuated not only by respect for the dead But by a superstitious dread of ghosts, who when neglected, forsook their abode to do mischief to their kin's folk Beehive tombs, later kings of vastly greater power, built in their lower city, their dome shaped beehive tombs The masonry is ashlar, the stones are smoothed and fitted together with nice precision The entire structure is underground, approach from the side of the hill by a long horizontal passage The largest building at this class at Mycenae has been popularly known as the Treasury of Atreus More recently as the Tomb of Atreus, father of Agamemnon Its corridor of approach is 115 feet in length, the dome 48 feet high and the same in diameter The kings who erected these immense lasting structures, like the Egyptian pyramid builders, must have wielded enormous power to command the necessary labor They must have cherished too a vast conception of their own importance in the hope of immortality dependent on the preservation of the body With its splendid furnishings of useful and luxurious objects Similar tombs, though generally smaller, exist in various parts of Greece and in Crete Those at Mycenae were plundered in ancient times, but elsewhere have been found in them remains of the dead and of rich offerings Whose character places this class of tombs immediately subsequent to those of the Mycenaean citadel Character of the religion Briefly it may be said that the Mycenaean religion was an exceedingly complex system Which involved the worship of gods and of disembodied spirits A laboratory rituals performed by a specialized priesthood The wearing of amulets suggestive of charms and magic Bloody sacrifices with their concomitant ideas of guilt and its purification Mysteries, divination and oracles It was a weird religion, well calculated as an instrument in the hands of a sacerdotal aristocracy Forholding the masses in check through supernatural terrors Boxing, bull lepping Among the ancients recreations connected closely with religion The combative instinct of the Mynoans is seen in their love of pugilism Boxers were the sestas and assailed their opponents with hands and feet Far more dangerous and exciting however was bull lepping The trick of the Torador seems to have been to meet the charging beast face to face Seize his horns and turning a somersault over his back Leap to the ground in the rear Girls and youths appropriately costumed took part in the perilous sport Vividly pictured on the Knossian palace walls The gay lords and ladies must have witnessed many a bloody scene In brutality comparable with a gladiatorial shows at Rome Or with a bull baiting of modern Spain Doubtless these Torradors were forced to their dangerous vocation Many may have been exacted as tribute from subject states The myth that Athens had every nine years to send seven youths and seven girls To be devoured by the Minotaur may accordingly contain this kernel of truth And these youths who killed the monster may have been in fact the liberator of his country Chess, music and dancing From the excitement of this sport we may turn to watch the king playing with his court Favourite a game resembling chess or checkers One an elaborate board still preserved Or we may imagine an audience of courtiers listening to the musicians We see a man playing a double pipe Another with a seven stringed lyre in hand The tradition therefore which represents Crete as the teacher of music to hell us is true To the accompaniment of such music to ankle the dancer's feet The long crimped tresses of the dancing girl float out in air As she whirls around in the orchestra of the palace theater Where Daedalus once wrote a dancing place for Ariadne of the lovely tresses In our review of Minoan life we have caught glimpses of a society clearly differentiated Into poor and rich, commons and nobles, subjects and rulers Labour specialized into diverse crafts Among the wealthy a love of peaceful ease, luxury and beauty Coupled with a passion for brutal shows And a religion uniting cheerful with gloomy features The social organization evidently reveals the antecedents of the Dorian system The field labourers were serfs or serf-like dependents As were the hellots of later time Many towns were politically subject to knossos Like the later peri-oci of Lassediman They remained a class of nobles who possessed wealth And lived independently in private dwellings The priest king, however, or perhaps we should say God-king Aimed to concentrate life within his stupendous palace To engage as many as possible of the inhabitants in the service of the state And to measure out food to them at public tables Thus the artist and the artisan class were brought into the palace An effort was made also to create a military caste dependent on the state And equipped from the palace arsenal It was a unique experiment in despotic socialism But the system, devised by the king and his favorites Robbed the citizens of individuality and personal freedom It compelled the masses to toil for the few Who exhausted the resources of the nation in art and extravagant luxury The militarism of the late Minoan kings added to the waste The archive records, though we cannot read them Point to complex bureaucracy Like that of Egypt Which crushed the people by its weight Robbed them of the fruits of their toil Hence finally of their interest in life Thus in various ways government and civilization By sapping the energy of the governed In Crete and later on the Greek mainland In gendered internal decay The artist lost his inventive power Stagnation was inevitably followed By slow deterioration in every activity of life Ethnology It need not be supposed that in the long period Extending from the early Neolithic age To the end of the Middle Minoan era The population of the Aegean world remain the same Uninterrupted development is not in itself Evidence of continuity of race And on the other hand There may be changes of civilization Which do not involve the substitution of one people for another As to the language of this early time There are only the slightest indications Pre-Hellenic place names in Greece Have their kin on the islands and in Asia Minor This circumstance points to the diffusion of a single language By migration from east to west or the reverse This tongue is certainly not Indo-European But seems to be related to the Carian and Lycian In the extensive Aegean area There was room for more than one form of speech And from time to time new peoples And tongues were introduced by immigration The original home and early wanderings of the Indo-Europeans Need not be considered in this volume And in treating of their arrival in Greece We can only deal in probabilities The opening of the late Minoan era, 1600 As we may reasonably believe Saw them in possession of all or nearly all Greece The process of migration and settlement, however Continually modified their racial character In fact, history knows no people of unmixed blood Doubtless the Indo-Europeans in their common home Were of various stocks Their several tribes, as they journeyed gradually To their respective historical countries Absorbed all manner of alien peoples on the way As usually happens with wandering hordes Few, if any, who came into Greece Were unmixed descendants of those Who had left the Indo-European homeland Then the newcomers in Greece began to blend with the natives And were continually joined by many strangers from the islands From Asia Minor, from Crete and elsewhere The mingling of these diverse stocks through centuries Ultimately produced the Greek race Although many place names remained undisturbed The language of the Northerners, rich in myths, strong Flexible and high capable of artistic treatment prevailed At the opening of the late Minoan era, 1600 Thessaly and Biosia, still Neolithic Were held by the Aeolians Attica, Euboea, and the east coast of Peloponnes By the Old Ionians Central and southern Peloponnes By the Arcadians, an offshoot of the Aeolian group West of the Aeolians was an area occupied Either at that time or somewhat later By a people described simply as Northwestern Greeks All these racial names, however Properly apply neither to the Northern immigrants Nor to the natives But to the ultimate blend of the two races And are here used anticipatively for convenience The immigrants from the North Were evidently a minority of the population But superior virility gave their leaders A dominant place in their respective districts It was not simply the mainland That began in this way to fall under Indo-European control Evidently individual adventurers With their attendance crossed to the islands Were by cleverness and personal superiority They attained to a place in the ruling classes And mingled their speech with that of the natives Owing to such long continued migratory disturbances The peninsula had made but little progress in civilization Though appreciably more in the south than in the north Before the close of the Middle Minoan age, however As the movements in Greece temporarily subsided Civilization began to develop there with surprising rapidity On favorable sites along the coast But a varying distance from the shore as at Tyrians and Mycenae But Athens and Orcomenus At Vafio, Laconia, and Old Pelos, Messinia Hellenic chieftains built their fortress cities In these mainland settlements The most powerful civilizing influence was Comers of Crete And yet we may well believe that throngs of Minoan architects And artisans came to seek employment In the new and stirring centers of political power The king's abode, however, was not a copy of the Knossium palace But a development from a simpler European type Like that found in the second settlement at Troy Its essential characteristic was a great hall with a central hearth Features unknown to contemporary Crete To win his Minoan subjects and to centralize his power The Hellenic king adopted the native religion Including the deification of the deceased sovereign And the building of a gigantic tomb for himself The mighty walls around his city were a protection From the barbarous tribes that assailed him And still more from the Cretan king Hardly had the sovereign of Knossos United all Crete under his sway Then he began to extend his dominion To the more distant Aegean islands Though he gained no foothold in Asia Minor He threatened the coasts of Peloponnese And probably made temporary conquests in Attica With a political advance of Greece, however His power receded The kings of the Hellenic peninsula Were gradually colonizing the islands First sailed forth great piratical armadas Doubtless made up from several maritime kingdoms In the 15th century Melos was taken by one of these armaments And its palace sucked and burned In the new settlement which followed The palace was of the whole type And the culture in general was continental rather than Cretan Evidently a colony from Greece Established itself in the midst of the native population About 1400 Knossos experienced the same fate The palace had attained to its utmost size and magnificence But the mind of the race was stagnant Quartz society, never more brilliant in appearance Or more luxurious, was held in the thralldom of fashion In brief the whole life of Crete was fossilizing Like that of the contemporary Egypt These conditions were suddenly brought to an end By the destruction of the palace The blackened walls, the charred ends of beams The almost complete absence of golden bronze Seen to proclaim the suck and burning of the city As the same thing happened at Festus, at Hagia Triada And elsewhere in Crete We may infer that the catastrophe was due to no accident Or a dynastic revolution, or uprising of the masses We can explain the event best by supposing it To have been the work of raiders Who swept over the wealthy cities of the island In their career of plunder It may well be that the fleets of coast cities Were joined in this enterprise By squadrons of barbarians from the interior of Europe For desolating the fairest habitations thus far created by man Succeeding to this devastation A colony like that, on Melos Introduced mainland culture Amid the devitalized native population The extreme poverty of the settlement Is evidence that others must have enjoyed The movable wealth of the former city From the beginning of the late Minoan age Disturbances in the Aegean Sea Had turned the commercial enterprise of Crete In other directions Minoans of this age accordingly Planted colonies in the islands of the west coast of Greece In southern Italy and in Sicily Through these settlements and through commerce The Minoan system of life Gained a foothold in all these regions After the destruction of Knossos A remnant of the population Colonized Spain While others found homes at Miletus and in Cyprus A century afterward Greek and Minoan tribes Migrating by sea and land Extended their piracies to the east Mediterranean waters And coasts Early in the 13th century They joined Libyans In ravaging the Egyptian delta A few generations later The palisade moved from the Minoan area Through Asia Minor into Syria With their families in Curious Heavy two-willed ox cards And by sea in a fleet that skirted the Syrian coast Occupying a strip of shore country south of Phoenicia They became known to history Under the name of Philistines Although far superior to the Aegean civilization They adopted the Semitic language And it was from them most probably That the Phoenicians derived the elements of their alphabet These extensive migrations may be traced in part To a movement of European tribes Southward into Thrace and the Balkan Peninsula One of these tribes, the Phrygians Crossed the Hellespond And occupying the central part of western Asia Minor Dislodged some of the natives of that region Who necessarily had recourse to migrations Under the same southward pressure Northwestern Hellenies filtered into other parts of Greece Some crossed into Thessaly and Biosia Yet not insufficient numbers To overwhelm the Aeolian dialect of these two countries It remained purer in the former than in the latter Meanwhile, other emigrants from the northwest Were crossing into Peloponnes Where, too, they mingled with the earlier inhabitants Thus arose Achaea Whose language was akin to that north of the Corinthian Gulf And of more distantly related speech The Dorians of Argolis and Laconia From Argolis the Dorian dialect Passed to Corinth and Megara And from Laconia to Messenia The dialect of Elis, likewise Points to a migration from across the Gulf This movement of population from the northwest Represented in story as the Dorian migration Affected nearly the whole of the Greek Peninsula The people of Attica, however, had no tradition Of a tribal migration into their country They knew only of a peacefully filtration of families Many of whom became noble Arcadia, too, remained untouched Its people had once extended over the coast region To the south And in the late Minoan Age Many went off as colonists to Cyprus Those who remained in Laconia were merged In the Dorian race Whereas the people of the interior highlands Under the name of Arcadians Maintained their original language And their racial character Having adopted but little of the higher Minoan culture They had little to lose by its downfall End of chapter 2