Download Early Bronze Age

The Mediterranean, the world’s largest inland sea, a land-locked body of
salt-water with one natural outlet to Atlantic, linked many different cultures
through contact and exchange
The Bronze Age
• Bronze metallurgy spread rapidly through
Europe, but only in the Aegean did state
societies emerge in the Bronze Age
• Major Palace Civilizations of Bronze Age:
– Minoan (Island of Crete)
– Mycenaen (mainland Greece)
Cyclades
Cyclades, Greek islands known for their white marble and
Early Bronze Age (3-2,000 BC) anthropomorphic marble
figurines, which show artistic and everyday features
that continue in later Aegean civilizations
Minoan Civilization
• Label “Minoan” for the Cretan Bronze Age, coined by
Arthur Evans who first excavated at palace of Knossos,
was inspired by legendary King Minos
• Early Minoan or “Pre-palatial” period, ca. 3500-2000 BC,
with little evidence of social complexity in domestic and
mortuary contexts
• Later Minoan broken into First palace period (2000-1700
BC) that saw the emergence of palace complexes at
Knossos, Mallia, and Phaistos, which were reconstructed
after destructive earthquakes, initiating the Second
Palace period (1700-1490 BC).
Palace at Knossos
Typical palace contained:
- large, open-air central court
- ritual and entertainment spaces
-painted frescoes
Religious imagery in Minoan Crete included double axes and “horns of consecration,”
women grasping snakes, and representations of bulls and bull leaping
Palace of Knossos
At the end of the Second Palace period on Crete, all but one of the palaces (Knossos)
were destroyed; Knossos survived but was inhabited by new administration; Linear B
replaced earlier writing on the island
Linear B Script
• Last of three Minoan
scripts (hieroglyphic,
Linear A, and Linear
B), Linear B was used
to record early Greek
language, used at the
end of the Second
Palace Period
Early-Middle Helladic Period, precedes
Mycenae palace civilization in mainland
Greece, ca. 3200-2600 BC
• Lerna, ca.
2300 BC
Palace of Mycenae - associated
since the time of Homer’s Iliad to
Agamemnon, king of the combined
Greek forces that waged war on Trojans
Mask of Agamemnon, excavated
from Grave circle A by Heinrich
Schliemann in 1876
Sociopolitical stratification of Mycenaean society is highly visible
in mortuary architecture and monumental residences
The Lion Gate, Mycenae
Royal grave circle
Royal tomb
Reconstruction of palace at Mycenae
During the 13th century BC,
Mycenaean citadels were
destroyed or abandoned,
likely due to internal unrest and
siege warfare, indicated by enhanced
fortifications and defended
underground cisterns
Ancient Greece
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The “Dark Age”: 1000-750 BC
The Archaic Period: 750-480 BC
The Classical Period: 480-338 BC
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The polis or Greek city-state: an autonomous political unit that incorporated
a central, urban area (polis, or astu), part or all of which was enclosed by a
city wall, and its rural hinterland (chora, or agros),
Polis emerged in Archaic period; during classical period tied to idea of
citizenry and civil society (from Latin civitas)
Over 1,000 poleis which ranged in size from very small (<1000 people;
centers of < 10 ha) to large urban populations, such as Athens, at over
40,000
Most were small, and some of more powerful, such as Sparta, a major rival
of Athens, were “network of villages”
Warfare between poleis and political and military alliances, led by one or
another powerful polis, were common, but Greeks generally shared a
common culture, including shared language and gods
Anyone outside that cultural circle, a broad peer-polity, was considered
“barbarian,” which originally meant someone incapable of speaking Greek
properly
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•
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Pan-Hellenic sanctuaries (“for all Greeks”)
at Delphi, Olympia, Nemea, and Isthmia
Classical Greece
Greek polis (referring here to the city center, or
astu) were typically composed of an acropolis
(“high city” on an eminence), dominated by one
or more temples (unlike Mycanean palaces), an
agora (marketplace), several stoas (open public,
columned buildings), and other common features
Athens, the best known and largest of the Greek
poleis, became especially rich and luxurious, due
to its control of silver mines and marble quarries
Classical Greek poleis of Athens,
which had grown to include other smaller poleis
Acropolis
Agora
stoa
The acropolis (“high city”) of Athens
The Parthenon (447-432 BC), religious
sanctuary and cult temple of goddess Athena,
protector of Athens
Monarchies (Kings), Oligarchies
(Aristocrats), and Democracies (Citizens)
• In 510 BC, Athens created first democratic government,
soon followed by some other Greek city-states
• Non-Greek city-states, like Carthage and Rome (after
overthrow of Roman monarchy in 509 BC),
experimented with giving the poor people more power
• Athenian democracy did not really give power to
everyone and most people, including women, slaves,
and men from other city-states, could not vote.
• Also, Athens at this time was a small empire, ruling over
many other Greek city-states, and none of those people
living in the other city-states could vote either.
From the 8th to the 5th century BC, some Greek city-states sent out parties
of men to establish colonies throughout the Mediterranean, including
colonies in Sicily and southern Italy, the south of France, and the North
African coast
Uluburun shipwreck =
Phoenicians
• Phoenicians, who originated in Lebanon, had
established colonies in Spain, North Africa, and
Sicily by the 8th century BC, among the most
important of which was Carthage in North Africa
• Carthage and its western empire , which may
have practiced child sacrifice, was renowned for
trade, including exported carpets, dyes, jewelry,
timber, and hides spread all over the
Mediterranean world
Etruscan Civilization
• Etruscans resided in
independent city-states in
Etruria in west-central Italy
during much of the 1st
millennium BC
• Twelve of the city-states,
often located on well
fortified hilltops, formed an
Etruscan League, which
sometimes had an
expansionist policy,
creating tension with
Greek colonies, which
dominated in southern Italy
Macedon and Alexander the Great
• City-states of Greece mocked their northern neighbors in Macedonia
as rustic and uncivilized, if not barbarians
• Phillip II of Macedon (383-336 BC) persuaded his subjects to settle
in cities and change cultural practices (stop wearing sheepskin),
engaged in politics of southern Greece, and participated in
panhellenic games; his chariot won at Olympia the day his son,
Alexander, was born (Greek Olympiad, held every 4 years;
beginning in 776 BC, based on inscriptions at Olympia);
• Alexander (356-323 BC) assumed power in 336 BC and, after
defeating the Persian army, annexed domains from Mediterranean
to Afghanistan;
• After his death, Alexander’s empire was broken up by his generals,
when three major successors emerged centered on Macedonia,
Syria, and Egypt (Ptolemaic kingdom) during the Hellenistic age
(323-31 BC), which ended with the establishment of the Roman
empire)
Copyright © 2000, The Applied History Research Group
Imperial Rome
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Overthrow of monarchy in 509 BC,
Roman Republic
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Historians have variously proposed
the appointment of Julius Caesar as
perpetual dictator in 44 BC, the
defeat of Mark Antony at the Battle
of Actium in 31 BC, and the Roman
Senate's grant of extraordinary
powers to Octavian (Augustus) in 27
BC, as candidates for the end of the
Republic.
•
Livia Drusilla (later called Julia
Augusta); third (final) wife of
Augustus, mother of Tiberius,
paternal great-grandmother of
Caligula, paternal grandmother of
Claudius, and maternal great-great
grandmother of Nero, last emperor
of the Julio-Claudian dynasty.
Roman forum, established ca. 600 BC contained open spaces,
basilicas, libraries, and imperial statuary, serving a
similar function to the Greek agora, and
was mimicked as a focal point in most imperial towns
Colosseum, given by Vespasian
to people of Rome in AD 80
In the early imperial period, Rome’s urban
population may have reached one million
inhabitants, a size not generally achieved
again until after 1750
In addition to architectural achievements, such as the Forum, Colosseum,
other feats of engineering included aqueducts, roads, heated baths, as well
as advances in military technology, such as major siege equipment and
Hadrian’s wall to control the northwest frontier in northern Britain
Hadrian’s wall (AD 122-128),
extends over 80 miles
In the Edict of Milan, Constantine made Christianity the official
religion of the Roman empire in AD 312
Hunnic empire (Attila, AD 434-453)