1. Bronze Age: Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations
Sir Arthur Evans
Knossos
Palace Economy

2. Bronze Age: Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations
Review:
Sir Arthur Evans
Knossos
Palace Economy

3. Bronze Age: Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations
Review:
Sir Arthur Evans
Knossos
Palace Economy

4. Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations
Bronze Age
Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations

5. Bronze Age: Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations
Today:
The end of Minoan civilization: other sites and religion
Mycenaean civilization: graves, palaces, writing, and collapse

6. Bronze Age: Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations
Other sites include
-- Palace sites (Phaistos, Zakros, Mallia)
-- Towns (Gournia)
-- Burial sites

7. Bronze Age: Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations
Other sites include
-- Palace sites (Phaistos, Zakros, Mallia)
-- Towns (Gournia)
-- Burial sites

8. Bronze Age: Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations
Other sites include
-- Palace sites (Phaistos, Zakros, Mallia)
-- Towns (Gournia)
-- Burial sites

9. Bronze Age: Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations
Other sites include
-- Palace sites (Phaistos, Zakros, Mallia)
-- Towns (Gournia)
-- Burial sites

10. Bronze Age: Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations
Other sites include
-- Palace sites (Phaistos, Zakros, Mallia)
-- Towns (Gournia)
-- Burial sites
-- small palaces
-- sanctuaries (peak and cave sanctuaries)
-- temples

11. Bronze Age: Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations
Minoan religion
Places of worship
Aegean religion
The main purpose of Aegean religion (and very similar to later Greek and Roman religion): to secure the survival of the community
Raises the question of connections

12. Bronze Age: Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations
Early Minoan: 3000 – 2000 BC
Middle Minoan: 2000 – 1550 BC
 Late Minoan: 1559 – 1100 BC
Pre-palace Period: BC
Old Palace Period: BC
New Palace Period: BC
Post-palace Period: BC
Mycenaean civilization
1. Signs of progress on mainland prior to 1600 BC
2. Minoan influence on the mainland and Minoan collapse

13. Bronze Age: Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations
The megaron

14. Bronze Age: Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations
Writing: Linear B

15. Bronze Age: Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations
Shaft graves (and tholos tombs)

16. Bronze Age: Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations
The Palaces
Mycenae
Tiryns
Pylos
Thebes
Citadel at Gla

17. Bronze Age: Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations
The Palaces
The megaron has evolved to become the central focus

18. Bronze Age: Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations
The Palaces
The megaron has evolved to become the central focus

19. Bronze Age: Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations
The Palaces
The megaron has evolved to become the central focus

20. The end of Mycenaean civilization
Collapse of the Mycenaean Palaces Indications of trouble: -fortification walls extended and strengthened -fortified gates added, such as the postern gate at Tiryns -water supplies secured -wall built at the Isthmus of Corinth -fortress at Gla in Boeotia built

21. The end of Mycenaean civilization
The Destruction -nearly every Mycenaean site shows that a catastrophic destruction occurred around 1200 BC -some sites were destroyed, reoccupied and attacked again; others were destroyed and never reoccupied (e.g. Pylos) -all sites, except Athens, were all ultimately destroyed -this devastation was not limited to Greece: -Hittite Empire collapsed just after 1200 BC due to famine, unrest and rebellion -Troy was destroyed ca Egypt suffered from a series of invaders -Cyprus, parts of Palestine and Syria were also attacked

22. The end of Mycenaean civilization
Reasons for such widespread destruction:
-external causes (invasions, migration, raiding)?
-internal conditions due to stresses within the Mycenaean political and economic system?
-collapse of mainland palaces must be viewed in context of entire Mediterranean

23. The end of Mycenaean civilization
Possible Reasons:
- Dorian invasion?
- Sea Peoples?
- Climate change?
- War between Mycenaean kingdoms?
- System collapse?
- Multiple causation?