Mycenaens and Minoans

Describe each civilization:

Water pipes at Minoan Palace

Minoans

The Minoan culture started on Crete, an island between mainland Greece and the Asia Minor, around 3000 B.C.E. Being first developed on an island the Minoans were masters of the sea, and from the art we can see that their culture included fishing, farming and arts. Also being people of the sea they were able to establish distant trading locations such as Spain, Egypt and the Asia Minor. They were a very peaceful culture, they had equal rights for both men and women, so that both gender could do the same things and the lack of protection within fortresses or war equipment also within their art there were no depictions of battle. During free time Minoans would do all sorts of things from dancing, music, singing or bull-leaping. Linear A was the early form of writing for the Minoans, and it was written in a linear fashion, and made up of pictographs. This language has yet to be deciphered. Minoans also amazed archaeologists with their complex water management systems; there was even evidence of flushing toilets in some Minoan bathrooms. The reason the Minoans were so important in the ancient Greek culture, was the influence they had on the Mycenaen Civilization.

Mycenaean Sword

Mycenaenas

Mycenaeans were established around 2700 B.C.E, in contrast to the fun and peace loving Minoans, Mycenaeans revolved a lot around battle, a majority of their myths are about Greek heroes and a lot of famous battles we hear of come from this culture. Another difference between this culture and the Minoans is that they had a style of writing named, Linear B, and unlike Linear A from the Minoans it was been translated and is the earliest known form of Greek. It was made up of a simple mixture of symbols and characters. There developed economy of agriculture was based on grains, grapes and olives, all the locally grown produce. Unlike the Minoans they weren’t expert sea farers but still did trade by sea with Egypt and Asia Minor, most of the Mycenaean energy was devoted to military and war. They took pride in their decorated uniforms, helmets, chariots and all the weapons. Also horses, as they were used as modes of transport during war. This is what the Mycenaeans thrived mostly in, often their palaces were surrounded by wall 23 feet thick and 60 feet high!  Unlike the Minoans the “lower people” or “non-royalty” were not allowed inside palaces, and did not have as many rights, if many, as the Minoan people. Even though we know this information there were not many object left behind that showed us that the Mycenaeans had festivals for religious reasons or musical performances.

What aspects of both civilizations would you expect to survive in later periods of Greek history?

From the Minoan culture I expect the complex drainage system to continue on through later periods because there is also evidence that the Mycenaens had a more sophisticated water management system, meaning that they would have obtained this knowledge through the Minoans and that this was already beginning to spread. From the Mycaneans, being so revolved around war, I think their achievements in this area would survive, such as architectural aspects from their fortresses, or ways they crafted their weapons, or tactics used in war depicted by a painting.