The Mycenaean World: mid-2M B.C.E.
Mycenae Citadel & Reconstuction
Approach to the Lion’s Gate
Mycenaean Writing System: “Linear B”
Bronze Age Enemies: The Trojan War
What were the
real & mythical
causes of the
Trojan War??
Helen of Troy:
“The Face That Launched 1000 Ships”
What
did she
look
like?
Trojan War
The Myth
Judgment of Paris
Elopement of Paris and Helen
Achaean Revenge
10 years of War
Achilles and Agamemnon
Patroclus
Achilles Heel
Trojan War
The Myth
Continued
•Trojan Horse
•Aftermath
–Agamemnon
–Aeneas
–Odysseus
Trojan War
The Reality
• Geopolitical
– Greece: Mycenaean
– Asia Minor: Hittite
– Troy major city on key
trade routes
– City of Troy destroyed C
1200 BCE
Plan of the City of Troy
Wall of Troy Recreated
Original Wall of the City of Troy
Migrations in the Aegean Region
(DORIANS}
Greek Culture
Declined
Aegean Dark Age
• Every Major City from Greece to
Gaza Falls
• Multiple Possible Causes
• Lasted for 400 years: 1200-800
BCE
• No Cities, Writing, Little Commerce
Homer, the Blind Poet
Homer’s Great Epics
The Heroic Age
•Troy was conquered around 1200 CE just before
the start of the Mediterranean Dark Age
•The Homeric epics about the Trojan War and its
aftermath were passed down by oral tradition for
hundreds of years before being transcribed and
many more before being reaching their present
form
•Little is known about Homer himself, except that if
he existed, he lived in what is today Turkey and
was blind
•The Iliad and the Odyssey represent the
culmination of a long tradition of oral history
•The two epics represent a national symbol of
present-day Greece
Invention of the Alphabet
• Phoenician’s Early
Phonemic Script C
1050 BCE
• Greeks added
Vowels C 800 BCE
Greek Alphabet
Journey of Odysseus??
Thanks to Susan Pojer
pptpalooza.com