Greek civ extras

Minoan civilization

• Situated on Crete

• 3100 - 1000 BC

• Capital was Knossos

• Non-Indo European

• Linear A (undeciphered + non-Greek)

• 4 chronological phases:

  ➢ Pre-palaces; Old palaces; Newpalaces; Post-palaces

• Mycenaeans took control and rebuilt the palace at
  Knossos. Hence the presence of linear B (Greek)
  tablets there in addition to linear A

• Lack of evidence of external manifestations of
  war (no walls surrounding cities)

• Lack of evidence for monumental religion (seen only through wall frescoes)

• Complex society

• Most powerful 1600-1200 BCE

Knossos

• Begun around 1700 BCE

• Final destruction around 1375 BCE

• Political and administrative center

• “Redistributive” system: Archival records written on clay (taxes + general workings)

• “Maze?” from the Minos tale?

• Not surrounded by walls!

• The palace excavated by Sir Arthur Evans in 1900 that may be what the “Labyrinth” is based on in the Minotaur myth was located at

Indo-Europeans

• May have originally came from the steppes around the Black and Caspian Seas

• Beginning in the 4th millennium BC they began to
  migrate east and west

• They arrived in Greece ca. 2000 BC and asserted
  control over the native inhabitants

• Languages today include most
  European languages and Indo-Iranian languages
  (Persian, Hindi, Bengali, Urdu)

• Patriarchal organization

• Tripartite organization of society
  – Kings and priests
  – Warriors
  – farmers

• Agriculture is practiced, but pasturage of
  horses and cattle is more important

• Originally nomadic or semi-nomadic

• highly warlike

Myceneans

• Greek-speaking Indo-Europeans

• Took over Crete 1490 and Knossos 1375

• Linear B writing system

• Flourished on mainland Greece between 1400 BC and 1200 BC.

• Characterized by a warrior aristocracy

• Petty kings dominated the Greek countryside from
  walled fortresses.

• 1200 a catastrophe befell the palaces; Crete, Cyprus, and the Hittite Empire all experienced similar upheaval.

• Various explanations have been proposed: the Dorian
  Invasions, the Sea People, environmental degradation,
  earthquakes.

• Took over

Mycenae

• 1876: First excavated by Heinrich Schliemann

• Visible walls and tholos tombs, a large circular tomb (grave circle A and the gold funerary mask)

• Surrounded by walls, unlike Minoans, meaning they meant to defend themselves

Features of Epic Poetry

• Invocation of the Muses: “Goddess, sing of the cataclysmic wrath of great Achilles…

• Epithets - Warlord Agamemnon, Swift-footed Achilles, White-armed Hera…

• Repetition: how is meaning created through repetition? - Chryses’ prayer - Achilles recounting the story to Thetis (vv. 379-431)

Greek prayer

1. Cleansing

2. Prayer

a. Direct Address

b. Reminder of established Relationship

c. Request

3. Sacrifice

4. Libation (drink poured as an offering)

How they try to persuade Achilles in book 9

Odysseus

• You get to kill Hector! Agamemnon will reward you

lavishly!

Phoenix

• I did not raise you for this! & Meleager’s story – FEEL for

us

Ajax

• This is not how civilized people act

Agamemnon’s offerings from book 9

• Tripods, ten pounds of gold, cauldrons, twelve racehorses

• Seven women

• Briseis (untouched – why does this matter? Counterargument?)

• Future spoils

  • An additional twenty Trojan women (the most attractive)

  • One of his own daughters (how is this ambivalent?)

  • Lavish wedding gifts

  • Seven towns

Concerns of the gods

Gods are selective about what they care about

• Pollution – incest or homicide

• Minor taboos like touching a corpse

• Stealing, adultery, rape – not the concerns of the gods

• Main concerns are oaths and violation of xenia, killing of suppliants and beggars

• Zeus – the upholder of justice, dikē

Ideas about the afterlife are vague

• Only those who insult or try to deceive the gods receive terrible punishments

• “insult” means... competing, essentially. Exs: Arachne. Marsyas. Minos.

No priestly class

• Priests and priestesses came from upper class society

Epic poems were composed

• orally (not written down until many centuries later)

• Sung at public occasions (festivals, parties)

Achilles won’t let the Greeks leave until

they sacrifice the youngest daughter of Priam and Hecuba,
Polyxena, to him. The Greeks are forced to kill her over
Achilleus’ tomb.

Herodotus’ histories

• the first “history book”

• focus on causation (first causes, responsible agents)

• Treatment of myth and legend (Troy)

• Role of the gods, accident and Fate

• Greeks and Barbarians

Evidence of the rise of the polis

• Population increase (discernible in the archaeological record) and resulting social change/tension

• The shift from petty kings to aristocratic governments

• Synoecism (combining) and abandonment of rural settlements

• Construction of centralized religious shrines and temples

• Colonization (which proves that the mother cities had sophisticated political systems)

• Written law codes kept in a central location

Focus of Herodotus’ Histories

• Written as a single work, directed towards a single goal

(1.1): to preserve the achievements of the Greeks and

Persians and explain why they fought each other.

• His work is

• A celebration of human achievement

• A coherent narrative

• A movement from cause to effect

First Principles of Greek Ethnography

1. Individuals and individual behavior reflect customs (nomoi).

2. Rather than common origins, human beings, their bodies and customs reflect their environment (cf. hot, cold, wet, dry in Greek medical literature).

3. Human customs must be understood in their own terms, and, on those terms, are mostly equally valid, says Herodotus

4. Differences matter yet the world has a center. Distance from the center is evident in geographical, cultural, physiological terms.

5. Greek ethnography has a strong moral dimension: understanding the customs of others and one’s own are interrelated. (Role of fate.). CAMBYSES

Herodotus’ methods

• Herodotus’ method:

• Eye witness

• Accounts he heard

• Critical evaluation

• ὕβρις (hubris) =arrogance, defiance of the gods/the natural order

• Self determinism/ gods

– Sad destiny of mankind

Persians

• Language: Indo-European

• Achaemenid Capital: Persepolis (518 BCE)

• Religion: polytheists, worshipped natural phenomena, used animal sacrifices

– Zoroastrianism: struggle between good and evil (Zoroaster).

• Not just one religion or language etc.: Strength and weakness was its tolerance

• Not cohesive enough for strong military and lasting

Cause of the Persian wars

Ionian Revolt: Greek cities of Asia minor. Revolt is quelled. But Athens had come to help

Battle of Marathon

Greeks were heavily outnumbered by Persians but still managed to win

What killed Achilles

Briseis is taken

Achilles doesn’t want to go into battle

Patroclus goes into battle in his place

Hector kills Achilles

Achilles kills Hector

The Illiad ends

with the extinguish of Achilles’ rage by grief

Illiad themes

- Honor - Kleos (honor gained from fighting on the battlefield, immortalized)

- Anger - Fury, grief, and everything in between. What ends it? Grief

- Status - Anger, status, and self-destruction

- Grief - Connections with anger, loss

- Ritual - Burial (athletic games, the burial process, burial mounds, etc.), lament gestures (tearing hair, prolonged mourning, etc.)

- Reparation - What does it look like? Who gets it right?

- Persuasion - How do you persuade someone to do something? Embassy scene, Thetis, Priam

- Remembrance

- Fate, Death, Gods - Sarpedon and Zeus’ sadness

Nobody expected the Greeks to win because

1) they hated each other, especially the two biggest states, Athens and Sparta

2) they were way smaller and had way fewer people than the Persians

What were the differences between history and myth for the Greeks

The story of the Minotaur. Tells us that myths are stories that people tell to try to organize and make sense of the world around them. Always gives insight into how people try to see the world around them

Herodotus’ sources included tour guides, priests, and translators

Who makes history (if not gods)? Individuals, peoples, fates, circumstances?

The Industrial Revolution. What changes how people evolve, means of production, revolutions in transportation, etc. There’s a way in which cultures have it coming because you will fall if you can’t listen to good advisers/oracles. The divine understand, but mortals can misunderstand

In what ways are people alike and different?

See his descriptions of the Greeks vs the Indian tribe, the Egyptians, and the Persians and how he seems so intrigued by how different they are

 For Herodotus, transgressing against the customs of others is a form of

insanity. unchecked pursuit of wealth and power

Emotions in Homer vs Herodotus

- Destructive emotions in particular: anger, envy

- how are they portrayed - who are they

- what function does that portrayal fulfill

- The hero in the aristocratic homeric world vs the hero in Athenian Democracy