Mycenaean

The Trojan War is the foundation of Greek history. If Greek historians had little doubt of its existence they remained extremely skeptical regarding its mythological origin. Archaeology has confirmed one essential point: there was indeed a general conflagration in the Greek world around 1200 BCE, the assumed period of that war, which caused the disappearance of two powerful empires: Mycenaean on one hand and Hittite with its vassals on the other hand. The inscriptions of Ramses III's year 8 describe actually a general invasion of the Mediterranean by the "Sea Peoples", but without giving any reason. A precise chronological reconstruction, based on few absolute dates, shows that the annexation of the kingdom of Cyprus (Ala!ia), closely linked to the Mycenaean world, by Hittite King Tudhaliya IV (1241-1209) played a role of detonator in the confrontation between a Greek heterogeneous confederation, consisting of pirates and privateers on one side and a set of vassal kingdoms of the Hittite empire, as Troy and Ugarit, on the other. This struggle to control a vital sea path, from Crete to Egypt, via Cyprus, which ended with a complete mutual destruction in 1185 BCE, the climax of the famous Trojan War, had begun 10 years earlier. Surprisingly, this conclusion was already that of Eratosthenes (276-193). Historical and epigraphic context shows that Homer wrote his epic shortly after Queen Elissa founded Carthage (c. 870 BCE).
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The appearance of the brailed rig and loose–footed sail at the end of the Late Bronze Age revolutionized seafaring in the eastern Mediterranean. The most famous early appearance of this new technology is found in history’s first visual representation of a naval battle, on the walls of Ramesses III’s mortuary temple at Medinet Habu. In this monumental combat scene, both Egyptian and Sea Peoples ships are depicted with this new rig, as well as top–mounted crow’s nests and decking upon which shipborne warriors do battle. The identical employment of these innovative components of maritime technology by opposing forces in this battle suggests either some level of previous contact between the invaders and those responsible for designing and constructing Egypt’s ships of war, or shared interaction with a third party, perhaps on the Syro–Canaanite coast. This article examines the evidence for the development of the brailed rig in the eastern Mediterranean, and explores the possibility that at least one group of Sea Peoples, who may have comprised a key part of the international economy of the Late Bronze Age in their role as “pirates, raiders, and traders” (Georgiou 2012: 527) – Artzy’s “nomads of the sea” (1997) – played a similarly integral role in the transference of maritime technology between the Levant, Egypt, and the Aegean.

In this paper we treat changes in weaponry and armament, which occurred in the Aegean and Levantine regions between the late 14th and the early 12th century BC. We aim at reconstructing these changes in a sequence as fine-phased as possible and try to identify the regions in which they originated. As a case study we use a sword of Naue II type found at Ugarit. As it has no clearly stratified context, we try to fix its chronology on one hand by reference to the overall stratigraphy of the site, and on the other by discussing better datable archaeological evidence from the Aegean and Cyprus. Swords of the Naue II group belong to new weapon types introduced to the eastern Mediterranean a few decades before the breakdown of many palace states around 1200 BC. There are different reasons that lead us to believe that these new weapon types arrived together with their users and producers from the central Mediterranean and cannot be seen as a result of goods exchange.

The tumultuous transition from the Late Bronze to the Early Iron Age in the Eastern Mediterranean was marked by a change in the iconography of warriors and warfare, particularly in Egypt and in the Aegean world. It is also at this time that the Helladic oared galley makes its first appearance, where it is used as an instrument of naval warfare in the first true sea battles in recorded history. This paper investigates these earliest representations of naval combat, with a special emphasis on the appearance and employment of new maritime technology and its effect on maritime operations and naval warfare. Also considered are what modes of fighting were utilized in, and what changes had to be made to adapt to, this earliest form of ship-based combat.

The Late Minoan (LM) II period at Knossos, c. 1470-1420 BC, represented a pivotal point in the history of the Aegean Bronze Age, but the full extent to which it shaped the following centuries has yet to be fully appreciated or studied. During this period, Mycenaeans from the mainland gained control of the palace of Knossos, an administrative centre hitherto unparalleled in their world. From the necessity of maintaining political control over an often hostile island, these Mycenaean dynasts were thrust into new roles, rulers of a palatial administration for the first time. Thus LM II Knossos can be viewed in its neglected aspect as a period of Mycenaean history, and the foundational phenomenon of the florescent Late Helladic III period – the birth of the Mycenaean palaces – can be placed within its proper historical context. The first Mycenaean experiment in palatial administration at LM II Knossos provided the model followed shortly after by the mainland polities, who in following this path to power dominated the Aegean for the next 200 years.

The co-occurrence of the ethnic designations Cherethite and Pelethite and the association of the Philistines with Caphtor in the Old Testament point to a specifically Cretan origin or affiliation for at least some of the Philistines in literary tradition. This identification, although bolstered by the discovery that the Philistines produced their own version of Mycenaean IIIC pottery, has rightly come under criticism from those reluctant to simplistically associate pots with peoples. However, additional categories of archaeological evidence indicating an Aegean origin for the Philistines are well-rehearsed and include the reel-style of loom weights, drinking habits, consumption of pork, Aegean-style cooking pots, use of hearths and bathtubs, temple architecture, and megaron-style buildings. Yet, in contrast to the strong identification of the Philistines with Crete in the literary tradition, these Aegean characteristics of Philistine culture point to Mycenaean Greece.

Much new information has come to light since an earlier version of this paper was presented at Cretological
Congress in 2011. However, particular reference to the author’s excavations at Tell es-Safi/Gath and study of other Philistine material in Israel. Among the categories of evidence examined in this paper are architectural features, particularly hearths, but also spatial syntax, plaster, and tool use; the spatial manipulation of artifacts such as the practice of curating animal head cups and seal use, ritual action, and recently discovered inscriptional evidence.  It is argued that key features of Minoan culture survived in Philistine culture, embedded among other cultural practices that can be associated with the Mycenaeans, Cypriots, and Canaanites, and that they form an important record of the Cretan and Minoan contribution to human civilization.

Recent excavations in Motya by Sapienza University of Rome carried on in fruitful cooperation with the Superintendence of Trapani brought about new data on the early stages of the history of the island, during
the prehistory. A stable occupation was detected up to Middle Bronze and four periods were distinguished on the ground of stratigraphy, ranging from 1650 to 900 BC until the Phoenician settlement, which occurred in the first decades of the 8th century BC. Across the different periods of prehistory, several finds attest to the full inclusion of the island, a favourable landing place overlooking the Sicilian Canal, into the exchange networks on the main east-west sea-route through the Mediterranean as shown by Levantine, Cypriot, and Mycenean imports. Two Mycenean bronze daggers are possibly the most meaningful witnesses of such an early role played by the island. This, of course, has also an interpretive impact on the re-evaluation of Phoenician
colonization

"Mycenaean Greece and Bronze Age Italy: cooperation, trade or war?
The interactions between Italy and Greece from the late 14th to the 11th century BC are the subject of this paper. During that particular period, new bronze types such as Naue II swords, spearheads with cast socket, different implements and dress accessories belonging to the metallurgical koine spread to the Mediterranean world. Available typological research explains little and thus leaves the processes leading to the distribution of koine goods only insufficiently understood. We therefore pursue an integrated approach combining archaeometallurgical analyses with the technological and typological classification of artefacts found in different Aegean and Italian regions in order to solve the problem. As a result, a number of bronzes from late Mycenaean contexts can be identified as imports from Italy. Furthermore, our research supports the theory that the local production of Italian-type impasto pottery and the introduction of bronze types of the metallurgical koine were two related phenomena in the Late Palatial and Post-palatial Aegean societies.

key words: Naue II sword, Bronze Age, Archaeometallurgy

Kontakte zwischen dem mykenischen Griechenland und dem bronzezeitlichen Italien: Kooperation, Handel oder Krieg?
Die Interaktionen zwischen Italien und Griechenland vom 14. bis zum 11. Jahrhundert v. Chr. sind der Gegenstand des vorliegenden Beitrags. Während dieses Zeitraumes können wir die Ausbreitung spezifischer archäologischer Typen, wie etwa der Naue II-Schwerter, der Lanzenspitzen mit gegossener Tülle, verschiedener Gerätschaften oder spezieller Kleidungsaccessoires, die zur metallurgischen Koine gehören, in den Mittelmeerraum beobachten. Die Prozesse, die zur Ausbreitung dieser Urnenfelderbronzen fuhrten, können zurzeit nur teilweise erklärt werden, da die zur Verfugung stehenden typologischen Studien nur von begrenzter Aussagekraft sind. Daher wird ein interdisziplinärer Lösungsansatz vorgestellt, bei dem archäometallurgische Analysen mit der technischen und typologischen Klassifikation von Objekten, die in verschiedenen Regionen der Ägäis sowie Italiens gefunden wurden, kombiniert werden. Als ein wichtiges Ergebnis dieser Studie kann eine Reihe von Bronzeartefakten aus spatmykenischen Kontexten als Importstucke aus Italien angesprochen werden. Darüber hinaus liefern diese Forschungserkenntnisse Argumente dafür, dass die Phänomene der lokalen Produktion von Impastokeramik italienischen Typs und der Übernahme von Bronzeformen der metallurgischen Koine in den spatpalastzeitlichen und nachpalastzeitlichen Gesellschaften der Ägäis miteinander in Beziehung standen.
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This extensive book chapter offers a comprehensive study of the major monuments of Minoan, Cycladic and Mycenaean painting of the Aegean Bronze Age. It also offers a critical review of the scholarly debates and controversies that shape the field today.

One of the most noteworthy, and most discussed, groups of material finds from Beth-Shean comes from the site’s Northern Cemetery, where the remains of at least 50 clay anthropoid coffins were uncovered in eleven tombs dating mainly to the 13th and 12th centuries BC. Five of these in particular, from Tombs 66 and 90, are unlike anything known from the corpus of anthropoid coffins in Canaan or the greater Egyptian world.

While the view of these coffins as representations of Sea Peoples has fallen out of favour in recent years, this paper argues that this specific coffin group—and site—should be separated from the larger phenomenon of anthropoid coffin burials in Canaan as well as in Egypt and Nubia, and that this iconographic and chronological connection adds to the evidence for a presence of individuals connected to the Sea Peoples’ tradition in the Egyptian garrison at Beth-Shean in the 12th century BC.

Mycenae culture became due to its own merits, the most important one in continental Greece for more than four centuries all along the II Millennium B.C. Its commercial importance due to the fact they took advantage of the minoans exchange routes and their own economic interests made them reach far regions even in Central Mediterranean and the Near East. But all of that must’ve been difficult if they hadn’t encountered a powerful army who support their colonial and commercial adventures. Numerous Lineal B writings, pictorial and archaeological remains are witness to the importance the military world provides to those former Mycenaean. Therefore, in this article we will try to show the diverse aspects related to the Mycenaean army who supported its power in continental Greece in spite of this, neither the reforms taken in 13th century B.C. got that mycenaeans culture survival, when their settlements were destroyed.

The question of whether the ritual of burnt animal sacrifice (θυσία or ‘Brandopfer’), involving the ritual burning of bare bones wrapped in fat and covered with small pieces of meat representing the god’s portion, was practiced in Mycenaean Greece has been the subject of some discussion. Recently, possible evidence for burnt animal sacrifice was reported for several Mycenaean sites by the means of observation of heavily burnt and carbonized animal bones taken as indication for this kind of offering (as distinguished from unburnt or lightly charred osteological material taken to represent the refuse left from ritual meals). In addition, the entry di-wo-nu-so-jo e-ka-ra, the hearth (ἐσχάρα) of Dionysus, documented on tablet Ea 102+107 from Pylos, seems to provide textual evidence for the existence of a sacrificial hearth or altar serving as a structure where the fire was lit and the offering burnt. As a consequence, I will argue for a Late Bronze Age date of the ritual practice of burning certain parts of the victim. Another kind of ritual involving the use of fire seems to be indicated by the term tu-wo. Of particular interest is tablet Fq 126 from Thebes, which starts with the temporal clause o-te tu-wo-te-to (ὅτε θύος θέτο). It will be suggested that this entry is likely to refer to aromatic substances placed on an altar in order to be burnt as an offering. Thus, there is probable textual evidence for two rituals based on fire. Both rituals may have served as a kind of communication between the human celebrants and divinities by means of the smoke rising above from the fire. This paper seeks to investigate the symbolic meaning of these rituals and tries to provide some insight into underlying belief systems.

ABSTRACT: Lecture 21 ("Sea Peoples") appears in a variety of shorter, longer, and different forms in other courses I teach (e.g., Syria-Palestine; Ancient Mesopotamia; Imperial and Post-Imperial Egypt), and includes a summary of the 13th century BC decline, a ca. "1200 BCE" (1177 BC) "collapse," and the 12th century BC aftermath of the Late Bronze Age in the Aegean, Anatolia, Levant (mainly Syria-Palestine), and Egypt. It includes a summary and selected bibliography at the end, extracted from a recent overview article I wrote on the Sea Peoples (published in Fall 2018). REVISED: Adding some new text, slides, edits, and new formatting (April, 2024).

This paper examines the representations of the objects brought by the Aegean emissaries depicted in the foreigners’ procession scene in the tomb of Senenmut (TT 71). Through comparison of the depicted objects with the ones found in the Aegean it is argued that not only is it possible to find close analogies for single objects but also for the whole assemblage. The assemblage depicted in the tomb of Senenmut is found in elite burials of the Late Bronze Age I Aegean, and it can be interpreted as a diplomatic gift. The very fact that the same assemblage is found both in the Aegean princely burials and depicted in Senenmut’s tomb, as a gift to the Egyptian king, is of great importance for the discussion on historicity behind this scene. The paper also discusses the transformation of the Aegean gift assemblage after its arrival in Egypt.

When we look into western Anatolia in the LH IIIC Period, an increase in Mycenaean pottery is observed in comparison with the preceding periods along the coast in settlements like Panaztepe, Liman Tepe, Bademgediği Tepe, Kadıkalesi, Miletos, and Çine-Tepecik. In this article, I argue that the relative increase in Mycenaean artifacts on the Anatolian west coast relates to Mycenaean immigrants, rather than merchants making use of the political gap in western Anatolia. The distribution pattern of Mycenaean artifacts on the Anatolian west coast was, however, not uniform, and various sites and regions, most notably Troy, experienced an influx of Balkan influence, whilst Mycenaean cultural influence apparently dwindled. When the process preparing the end of the Bronze Age is analyzed chronologically , it can be learned that the Mycenaean palaces were destroyed and lots of settlements in Mainland Greece were evacuated 1. Arzawa in Western Anatolia and Hittite country, which had been a major regional power, was destroyed (Woudhuizen 2006, 51), various coastal cities in the Eastern Mediterranean were damaged 2 .The Postpalatial world, emerging after the destruction of Mycenaean palaces at the end of Late Helladic IIIB, is described as the LH IIIC Period. When we look into Anatolia in the LH IIIC Period, we see that a considerable amount of LH IIIC ceramics were obtained after the destruction of the palaces 7 TALANTA XLVI-XLVII (2014-2015), 7-26

Mortuary practices in southern Greece undergo a radical transformation at the beginning of the Mycenaean era (or Late Bronze Age, around 1700 BCE). This period sees the introduction of formal cemeteries, larger tombs, richer burials and a more complex ritual sequence involving multiple interments, tomb re-use and the 'secondary treatment' of earlier burials. 'Secondary treatment' is a rather vague, all-inclusive term, which includes various practices, such as disarticulating skeletons, mingling the bones and relocating them in piles or scatters either inside or outside the tomb (completely or selectively). Two questions arise: Why is this practice introduced? Why does it take different forms? The recent excavation of Ayios Vasilios North Cemetery in Laconia was designed on the basis of an integrated bioarchaeological strategy in order to provide the opportunity to fully explore these issues. While our ultimate goal is to understand the causes and consequences of the wider transformations in fu-nerary practices, the focus of this paper is on one aspect: the re-use of graves and the secondary treatment of earlier burials. Through an integrated approach which aims to reconcile archaeological theory with current meth-odological advances in bioarchaeology and funerary taphonomy, we seek to reconstruct the funerary activities in great detail, in order to fully observe variation and change, and, ultimately, understand how this considerable variation may inform us on the re-definition of social relations at death, or shifting notions of the self. Beyond the specifics of the Mycenaean case-study, our aim is also to address broader methodological and theoretical questions, stressing the need for a true integration in the study of mortuary assemblages. To this end, we propose a taphonomy-oriented, methodological approach for the field recording and lab analysis of the human remains, drawing on current advances in archaeothanatology, forensic science, and analysis of commingled remains. This approach works best if placed within a clear theoretical framework, which recognises the manipulation of the dead body as closely associated with notions of personhood, and at the same time respects the historical specificity of the mortuary context and engages with the full complexity of contextual empirical data. Using the case of Ayios Vasilios in order to illustrate this process, our specific questions include: the formation characteristics of funerary assemblages, frequency and sequence of tomb use, diversity of secondary treatment , and age and sex differences in funerary treatment. Our results demonstrate a considerable extent of variation in funerary disposal and secondary treatment during this transitional period. Shifts of emphasis within this diverse treatment, especially regarding bodily fragmentation and modes of dispersal, suggest that, in Ayios Vasilios, a) age, but not sex, differences in funerary treatment were at play, b) mortuary transformation embodies the transformation from narrower (possibly household-based) associations to increasingly wider concepts of lineage and descent, c) tensions between tradition and innovation , as well as integration and differentiation, are evident in the variation of secondary treatment and coexistence of different forms (as already attested in other funerary and daily practices).

This study investigates the identity of the female Adorant depicted before two female deities in the “Room of the Fresco” (Room 31) of the Cult Center Mycenae. It is argued that the Adorant is accompanied not by a griffin, but a guardian lion (or a lioness), traditional symbol of power at Mycenae. Certain Egyptianising features of artistic style (symbolic size, registers) are combined with an Egyptianising formula for royal offerings to the gods to create an internationalizing iconography of elite social status and sacred communion with the divine. It is suggested that the Adorant represents a female member of the royal family at Mycenae (perhaps even a queen) acting as priestess. Yet the painted platform of Room 31, which includes a low step and the three ash-filled disks, imply that the Adorant, like the two deities above, also received offerings. This apparent contradiction is resolved when the Adorant is understood as a priestess of elite (royal?) social status who honoured the gods and was herself also the object of veneration. Such a reading explains the size disparity among the painted figures (the Adorant, as elite human, is smaller and less important than the deities) and, intriguingly, hints at ruler cult at Mycenae.

Archery had a dominant role in Bronze Age, especially in later period. The technological evolution from the self bows to the composites was a significant factor that affected the Warfare in several ways. Composite’s critical advantage was that they can be made smaller because they retain their strength through the correlation of different materials (wood, sinew, horn). They had more strength, far more range and their small
size results in more mobility than the self bows1. The first depiction of a probable composite bow lays in the victory stele of Naram-Sin of Akkad (23rd century BC)2. It was introduced into Egypt by the Hyksos in the 18th Century. The earliest example of a composite bow was found in the tomb of Ahmose Penhant (16th century BC)3 while thirty-two more have been found in the tomb of Tutankhamen4. However we do not have any archaeological examples from the Aegean Bronze Age world. This brief study will try to approach the issue of the use of composite bows in the Minoan and Mycenaean Warfare attempting to include all the possible archaeological iconographical and textual evidence that could support this argument.