Assyrians

Egyptians

Hittites

Lydians

Persians

2200-1600 BCE (Middle Bronze Age)

- Island of Crete

- Palaces not strongly protected: no walls --> labyrinth

- Sacrificial rituals with bulls --> Minotaur

- Worship of fertility goddesses

- According to Greek tradition, great naval power --> myth of Athenian attribute

- all writing was indecipherable, so we do not know too much about them

- Mino --> came from king Minos of Conossus; controlled island of Crete; was nucleus of vast empire; collected tribute from Athens

- capital of Minoan Crete

- people are doing acrobatics

- women are projected with fair lighter skin while men with darker skin

both men and women participate in this ritual

- lots o symbols of doube headed axe; would've been used to decapitate bull

- labrys was the name of the ae and coined the term labyrinth 

• reasons why all languages in Europe are all related to one another because it was once one group of people that migrated to others
• trying to figure out dates of peoples' movement is tricky
• people did not have a writing system; so it is hard
• seminomatic; have horses and starting to push out people who were indegenous in Europe
• group of people who were the ancestors of the Greeks; foundation 

• 1600-1150 BCE (late Brone Age)
• Indo-European speakers of Greek
• Linear B writing system --> cannot read Linear B; a lot of economic records; writing suddenly becomes comprehensible
• important fortified cities: Mycenae, Sparta, Athens, Thebes, Troy
• Do not know too much about Troy (if it was Greek or Hithite speaking)
• Powerful Monarchs --> Centralized powerful ruler; more fear of competition
• many Greek myths originated or were set in this period eg. Trojan War
• different from Minoans such that there were bigger walls; afraid of attack

main entrance of the Bronze Age of Mycenae 

named after relief sculpture of wo lionesses in a heraldic post

King of Mycenae

Brother of Melenaus

• when people found artifacts, they associated them with myths of the Greek world
• death mask; made out of pure gold
• assumes this refers to High King of the Greeks that lead them against Troy
• don't really know who it is; could have been legendary
• city so bound with myths of Trojan War

1150-800 BCE

• Collapse of Mycenaean civilization: Dorian invasion? Sea peoples (pirates)? natural disaster?
• Many Greeks flee to Asia Minor -> Ionia
• society divided into small tribes and families, which left Greece without centralized systems of government
• loss of Linear B writing system
• Scant archaeological record
• set up now in Asia Minor; no longer single king
• famly legions were more important

800-400 BCE

• rise of polis (city state) vs family ties
• Greek colonization across Mediterranean
• Adoption of writing from Phoenicians, who were somatic speaking people that were great with trade and we start to see alphabets instead of sounds
• Homer and Hesiod (do not know when it happened, but know it happened when Homer and Hesiod started writing)
• stories of Zeus from Hesiod were spoken and memorized
• trade resume; adoption of coinage
• Old aristocracy v newly wealthy merchants
• growth of Persian empire

Persian Empire will become chief enemy of theGreeks

more centralized

Greeks, as they become more centralized, colonize other parts

Huge part of Italy was actually more Greek than Roman

Roman influenced by Greeks THROUGH Italy not Greece mainland

• 480-323 BCE
• At the beginning of Classical Period, Persians tried to conquer Greece
• Athens: democracy, centre of culture
• playrights: Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides
• Persian defeats: 490 Marathon, 479 Salamis
• Conflicts among poleis
• athenian naval power, Spartan land power
• Hellenic identity: language, religion myth
• panhellenic religous and athletic festivals

Aphrodite swung in and saved him because Menelaus was going to win

Aphrodite forces Helen to stay with Paris

• 323-30 BCE
• 338 BCE Philip of Macedon conquers Greece
• Alexander the Great conquers Persia and into India, dies 323 BCE, generals take empire
• Greek world divided into kingdoms (still in monarchs, but not SOLE monarchies)
• Greek culture spread across East
• Alexandria in Egypt centre of culture
• 146 BCE Romans conquer Greece

Italy was much more culturally diverse than Greece, so Romans were Endoeuropean speakers

It was one city state

• 760s-264 BCE
• Non-IE, indigenous to italy?
• Language unknown
• Influenced by Greeks in Italy (Magna Graecia)
• Influenced on Romans and other Italic peoples
• Adapted Greek alphabet, god, myths
• Conuqered by Romans and absorbed into their culture and society 

• Greeks are victorious, but ghost of Achilles demands to be appeased
• so many Trojans are sacrificed to him
• interesting because Greeks and Romans were not used to sacrfice let alont HUMAN sacrifice 

• 753-509 BCE
• traditionally founded by Romulus, descendent of Aeneas, Trojan prince and refugee
• People of all classes from Latins and other Italic neighbors flock to city
• City of 7 hills beside Tiber River
• 7 legendary kings; descended from Romulus
• king Numa establishes religious practices
• Last king Tarquin (terrible king) the Proud overthrown

• 509-27 BCE
• Brutus and Valerius Publicola first consuls
• Government: senate, magistrates, assemblies
• frequently at war with neighbours --> conquest of Italy and Mediterranean
• Always influenced by heavy after 146 BCE: poets like Ennius, Catullus
• not really democracy like Athens...more like body of elite

• Julius is dictator for life
• symbol of ultimate role of Romaness --> Duty to parents, God etc.
• shows that they are descended form the Gods

27BCE-476CE

• Imperial dynasties rise and fall
• augustan "Golden Age" of literature
• 27 BCE-14CE: Vergil, Horace, Ovid
• Roman armies, trade spread Greek and Roman culture throughout conquered lands
• 4th cent. CE: Christianity diplaced traditional polytheistic religions

• Roman emperor
• shows that leaders can become Gods (think of ordinary men vs leaders)
• mortal can become God

• Romans had no way of imagining their Gods
• myths about Roman myths?
• Romans had myths
• Anthropormorphism (anything other than human fomr) and Roman gods?
• Rome under Greek influence from beginning
• no "pure, native" religious or myth traditions
• Romans associated Greek deities with their own --> new myths or new depictions of characters in old myths

Collection of dieties --> parthenon

depicts birth of Athena

all Gods are in awe

Roman

partictuarly siginifacant cluster of deities

goose association with Juno

Minerva has an owl: goddess of wisdom

Women had to be kept underground

Hippolytus devoted to Artemis

he pledged allegiance to Artemis instead of Aphrodite and this cause dhis grief

was over extensive with his views of women

• Diana initiates his resurrection and they call on Esclipeus (son o Apollo associatetd with more mortrals) who is a great healer and comes and rescues Hippolytus
• conceals himself with a different name (Virbius) (angers Zeus because you cannot be completely resurrected a yourself; especially a human)
• him being made a God makes it seem like mortals can be deified and not only emperors