Oliver Dickinson
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9781474417099
- eISBN:
- 9781474426688
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474417099.003.0001
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Ancient Greek, Roman, and Early Christian Philosophy
My title is deliberately chosen to reflect that of the comic account of British history 1066 and All That (Sellar and Yeatman 1930), for the same reason that I entitled a previous paper ‘The ...
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My title is deliberately chosen to reflect that of the comic account of British history 1066 and All That (Sellar and Yeatman 1930), for the same reason that I entitled a previous paper ‘The Catalogue of Ships and All That’ (Dickinson 1999a). In both cases I used it to indicate how an idea has become so embedded in the general consciousness of the educated as to be readily accepted as ‘what everyone thinks’ – or rather ‘remembers’, since, as the authors of 1066 and All That point out in their Compulsory Preface, ‘History is not what you thought. It is what you can remember’ (Sellar and Yeatman 1930: vii).Less
My title is deliberately chosen to reflect that of the comic account of British history 1066 and All That (Sellar and Yeatman 1930), for the same reason that I entitled a previous paper ‘The Catalogue of Ships and All That’ (Dickinson 1999a). In both cases I used it to indicate how an idea has become so embedded in the general consciousness of the educated as to be readily accepted as ‘what everyone thinks’ – or rather ‘remembers’, since, as the authors of 1066 and All That point out in their Compulsory Preface, ‘History is not what you thought. It is what you can remember’ (Sellar and Yeatman 1930: vii).
David Abulafia
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- November 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780195323344
- eISBN:
- 9780197562499
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780195323344.003.0010
- Subject:
- Earth Sciences and Geography, Cultural and Historical Geography
In the years around 1500 BC Crete experienced not just massive economic changes but very significant political changes. The arrival of a Greek dynasty on the island occurred around the time that ...
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In the years around 1500 BC Crete experienced not just massive economic changes but very significant political changes. The arrival of a Greek dynasty on the island occurred around the time that many settlements such as Arkhanes were abandoned; Knossos alone survived among the great palaces, and one Minoan site after another was destroyed. Earthquakes and fires have been blamed; so too have invaders from Greece. Since no one really knows who was to blame, clever attempts have been made to integrate the explanations with one another, and to argue that the Greeks took advantage of chaos within Crete to seize charge; or perhaps the Cretans were in need of strong leaders who would take charge, and turned to the Greeks. Unarguably, though, Minoan Crete was drawn into the developing world of the Mycenaean Greeks. An area which had been of relatively minor importance in the trade networks of the Early and Middle Bronze Age now became the focus of political and possibly commercial power in the Aegean: the great centres of Mycenaean culture and power were a line of settlements along the edges of eastern Greece, and a little way inland, from Iolkos (Volos) in the north, through Orchomenos, Thebes, Mycenae, Tiryns, and down to Pylos in the south-west. Early signs of success were already visible in the early fifteenth century, when the kings of Mycenae were laid to rest in Grave Circle A (as it has come to be known), their faces covered by masks of hammered gold that seem to copy their bearded features, and which suggest an attempt to imitate the infinitely grander gold masks of the buried Pharaohs. Still, Mycenae ‘rich in gold’ retained its special role and reputation. By the twelfth century BC, if we are to believe the evidence of Homer’s ‘Catalogue of Ships’ (an archaic text incorporated in the Iliad), these statelets generally recognized as their leader the wanax or ruler of Mycenae. Descriptions of the Minoans merge imperceptibly with accounts of the Mycenaeans.
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In the years around 1500 BC Crete experienced not just massive economic changes but very significant political changes. The arrival of a Greek dynasty on the island occurred around the time that many settlements such as Arkhanes were abandoned; Knossos alone survived among the great palaces, and one Minoan site after another was destroyed. Earthquakes and fires have been blamed; so too have invaders from Greece. Since no one really knows who was to blame, clever attempts have been made to integrate the explanations with one another, and to argue that the Greeks took advantage of chaos within Crete to seize charge; or perhaps the Cretans were in need of strong leaders who would take charge, and turned to the Greeks. Unarguably, though, Minoan Crete was drawn into the developing world of the Mycenaean Greeks. An area which had been of relatively minor importance in the trade networks of the Early and Middle Bronze Age now became the focus of political and possibly commercial power in the Aegean: the great centres of Mycenaean culture and power were a line of settlements along the edges of eastern Greece, and a little way inland, from Iolkos (Volos) in the north, through Orchomenos, Thebes, Mycenae, Tiryns, and down to Pylos in the south-west. Early signs of success were already visible in the early fifteenth century, when the kings of Mycenae were laid to rest in Grave Circle A (as it has come to be known), their faces covered by masks of hammered gold that seem to copy their bearded features, and which suggest an attempt to imitate the infinitely grander gold masks of the buried Pharaohs. Still, Mycenae ‘rich in gold’ retained its special role and reputation. By the twelfth century BC, if we are to believe the evidence of Homer’s ‘Catalogue of Ships’ (an archaic text incorporated in the Iliad), these statelets generally recognized as their leader the wanax or ruler of Mycenae. Descriptions of the Minoans merge imperceptibly with accounts of the Mycenaeans.
David Abulafia
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- November 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780195323344
- eISBN:
- 9780197562499
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780195323344.003.0011
- Subject:
- Earth Sciences and Geography, Cultural and Historical Geography
Both the fall of Troy and the Sea Peoples have been the subject of a vast literature. They were part of a common series of developments that affected the entire eastern Mediterranean and possibly ...
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Both the fall of Troy and the Sea Peoples have been the subject of a vast literature. They were part of a common series of developments that affected the entire eastern Mediterranean and possibly the western Mediterranean too. Troy had been transformed at the end of the eighteenth century BC with the building of the most magnificent of the cities to stand on the hill of Hisarlık: Troy VI , which lasted, with many minor reconstructions, into the thirteenth century BC . The citadel walls were nine metres thick, or more; there were great gates and a massive watchtower, a memory of which may have survived to inspire Homer; there were big houses on two floors, with courtyards. The citadel was the home of an elite that lived in some style, though without the lavish accoutrements of their contemporaries in Mycenae, Pylos or Knossos. Archaeological investigation of the plain beneath which then gave directly on to the seashore suggests the existence of a lower town about seven times the size of the citadel, or around 170,000 square metres, roughly the size of the Hyksos capital at Avaris. One source of wealth was horses, whose bones begin to appear at this stage; Homer’s Trojans were famous ‘horse-tamers’, hippodamoi, and even if he chose this word to fit his metre, it matches the archaeological evidence with some precision. In an age when great empires were investing in chariots, and sending hundreds of them to perdition at the battle of Kadesh (or, according to the Bible, in the depths of the Red Sea), horse-tamers were certainly in demand. Opinion divided early on the identity of the Trojans. Claiming descent from Troy, the ancient Romans knew for sure that they were not just a branch of the Greek people. Homer, though, made them speak Greek. The best chance of an answer comes from their pottery. The pottery of Troy is not just Trojan; it belongs to a wider culture that spread across parts of Anatolia.
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Both the fall of Troy and the Sea Peoples have been the subject of a vast literature. They were part of a common series of developments that affected the entire eastern Mediterranean and possibly the western Mediterranean too. Troy had been transformed at the end of the eighteenth century BC with the building of the most magnificent of the cities to stand on the hill of Hisarlık: Troy VI , which lasted, with many minor reconstructions, into the thirteenth century BC . The citadel walls were nine metres thick, or more; there were great gates and a massive watchtower, a memory of which may have survived to inspire Homer; there were big houses on two floors, with courtyards. The citadel was the home of an elite that lived in some style, though without the lavish accoutrements of their contemporaries in Mycenae, Pylos or Knossos. Archaeological investigation of the plain beneath which then gave directly on to the seashore suggests the existence of a lower town about seven times the size of the citadel, or around 170,000 square metres, roughly the size of the Hyksos capital at Avaris. One source of wealth was horses, whose bones begin to appear at this stage; Homer’s Trojans were famous ‘horse-tamers’, hippodamoi, and even if he chose this word to fit his metre, it matches the archaeological evidence with some precision. In an age when great empires were investing in chariots, and sending hundreds of them to perdition at the battle of Kadesh (or, according to the Bible, in the depths of the Red Sea), horse-tamers were certainly in demand. Opinion divided early on the identity of the Trojans. Claiming descent from Troy, the ancient Romans knew for sure that they were not just a branch of the Greek people. Homer, though, made them speak Greek. The best chance of an answer comes from their pottery. The pottery of Troy is not just Trojan; it belongs to a wider culture that spread across parts of Anatolia.