Classics

Aegean Sea

Athens

Attica

Avaris

Crete

Cyprus

Hagia Triada (map)

located on Crete very close to Phaistos

Hattusha

Knossos

Mallia

- city in Crete

- right of Knossos on map

Mediterranean Sea (map)

Milawata (\= Miletus)

Mycenae

Sea-faring Greek kingdom. A major center of Greek Civilization in the 1000s BCE, centuries before Greek's "Golden Age" of Athenian influence. It's center was located about 90 km southwest of Athens.

Phaistos

Pylos

Samos

Thebes (Egypt)

Thera (Santorini)

Tiryns

Troy

Uluburun

Wilusa (\= Ilion/Troy?)

Zakros

Bronze Age

3000-1100 BCE

Early Bronze Age

3000-2100

Middle Bronze Age

2100-1600

Late Bronze Age

1600-1100

Dark Age

1100-750 BCE

Archaic Period

750-480 BCE

Classical Period

480-323 (or 479-323) BCE

Hellenistic Period

323-30 BCE

ca. 484-425 BCE

traditional dates for Halicarnassan historian Herodotu

ca. 460-ca. 395 BCE

approximate dates for Athenian historian Thucydide

first-second century CE

approximate dates for mythographer Apollodorus (Pseudo-Apollodorus)

ca. 530 BCE

Polycrates, tyrant of Samos

ca. 1800-1450 BCE

Minoan civilization on Crete; use of Linear A

ca. 1450-1400 BCE

dates for bull leaping fresco and for Bull's Head rhyton from Knossos

ca. 1400 BCE

date for sarcophagus from Hagia Triada

ca. 1479-25 BCE

reign of Egyptian king Thutmose III/ Rekhmire, Theban governor and vizier to Thutmose I

1967 CE

Spyridon Marinatos discovers Bronze Age settlement near Akrotiri on Santorini

ca. 1600-1500 BCE

volcanic eruption on Santorini (Thera) buries settlement/ Grave Circle A created at Mycena

1822-1890 CE

life of Heinrich Schliemann

1871

Schliemann excavates at Hisarlik

ca. 2500-2300 BCE

date of Troy II

ca. 1250 BCE

Troy VI destroyed/Grave Circle A enclosed in city wall at Mycena

ca. 1200 BCE

Pylos destroyed / Troy VIIa destroyed/ Linear B tablets from Pylos possibly reflecting a sense of danger to city

1876 CE:

Schliemann excavates at Mycenae

ca. 1600-1200 BCE

Mycenaean civilization

ca. 1450 BCE

Mycenaeans conquer Minoan Crete

up to 1450 BCE

Miletus is Minoan trading colony?

after 1450

Mycenaean pottery at Miletus

1450-1200 BCE

Mycenaeans at height

1450-1375 BCE

Linear B replaces Linear A at Knossos

1375 BCE

palace at Knossos destroyed

1939 CE

Blegen excavates at Pylos

1887-1971 CE

life of Carl Blegen

1922-1956 CE

life of Michael Ventris

1952 CE

Ventris deciphers Linear B

ca. 2300 BCE

Indo-European people known to us as "Hittites" enter Anatolia

ca. 1700-1200 BCE

Hittite Empire

1906 CE

excavations begin at Hittite capital Hattusha

1915 CE

Hittite language deciphered

ca. 3000 BCE

cuneiform writing system invented by Sumerians in Mesopotamia

ca. 1237-1209 BCE

reign of Hittite king Tudhaliya IV

ca. 1295-1272 BCE

reign of Hittite king Muwattalli II

Hellas

Greek word for "Greece".

Hellenes

- post Homeric \= after time of Homer [ca. 750-700 BCE]

- Greek word for "Greeks"

- for Homer \= Achaeans, Argives, Danaans

--\> Homer did not call them "Hellenes" since the term had not been coined yet, so calls them several different names.

Graeci

Roman name for "Greeks".

- No Greeks ever called themselves "greek".

Indo-European

- linguistic discovery in 1800s CE

- \= many European/ Iranian /Indian languages belong to same language family.

- A bunch of languages in Europe, and Iran/ India were alike, so they must belong to the same language family.

Proto-Indo-European

- hypothesized parent of all Indo-European languages (including Greek/Latin)

- homeland of Proto-Indo-Europeans \= Eastern Europe (somewhere in modern Ukraine? or eastern Russia)

- ca. 3500 BCE: Proto-Indo-Europeans begin migrating

--\> west into Europe

--\> east as far as India (Sanskrit - an indo-European language)

Indo-Iranian sub-family

\= (modern) Hindi, Urdu (Indo part), Persian (Farsi) (Iranian part)

European sub-family (includes sub-branches)

- Germanic (English, German)

- Slavic (Russian, Polish)

- Hellenic (included/includes ancient and modern Greek)

- Italic (included Latin)

- Romance languages

--\> derived from Latin

--\> \= French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian

ancient Greek

\= Indo-European language (ancient greek is an indo-European language)

- ca. 1900-1600: Indo-Europeans arrive in Greece (1st Greek speakers come to Greece in Middle to late Bronze Age)

- language blends with indigenous, pre-Greek language (There were people who lived there and had the own language prior to the Greeks. It is believed they blended their languages.)

- pre-Greek words (thalassa \= "sea" Indo-Europeans did not have a word for sea, but these pre-Greek inhabitants likely had a word for it since they were surrounded by the sea.)

- pre-Greek suffixes (-nth- \= Korinthos \= Corinth)

Suffixes seem to be non-Greek suffixes so could have been adopted by the pre-Greeks when they arrived.

living language

- language taught to children at home by parents

- a person's first language

- English, Spanish, Mandarin, Hindi, Arabic, Swahili, etc.

- living language \= always changing

- Go back 50 years, computer lingo that didn't exists, grammar changes, etc.