Part 17 (1/2)

These discoveries in the Aegean enable us to place another venerable center of civilized life by the side of Babylonia and Egypt. As early as 3000 B.C. the primitive inhabitants of the Aegean were giving up the use of stone tools and weapons for those of metal. Bronze soon came into general use, as is shown by the excavations. The five centuries between 1600 and 1100 B.C. appear to have been the time when the civilization of the Aegean Age reached its highest development.

THE FINE ARTS

Remarkable progress took place during Aegean times in some of the fine arts. We find imposing palaces, often splendidly adorned and arranged for a life of comfort. Wall paintings, plaster reliefs, and fine carvings in stone excite our admiration. Aegean artists made beautiful pottery of many shapes and cleverly decorated it with plant and animal forms. They carved ivory, engraved gems, and excelled in the working of metals. Some of their productions in gold, silver, and bronze were scarcely surpa.s.sed by Greek artists a thousand years later. [6]

COMMERCE

There was much intercourse throughout the Mediterranean during this period. Products of Aegean art have been found as far west as Sicily, Italy, and Spain, Aegean pottery has frequently been discovered in Egyptian tombs. Some objects unearthed in Babylonia are apparently of Aegean workmans.h.i.+p. In those ancient days Crete was mistress of the seas.

Cretan merchants preceded the Phoenicians as carriers between Asia and Europe. [7] Trade and commerce thus opened up the Mediterranean world to all the cultural influences of the Orient.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A CRETAN GIRL (Museum of Candia, Crete) A fresco painting from the palace of Gnossus. The girl's face is so astonis.h.i.+ngly modern in treatment that one can scarcely believe that the picture belongs to the sixteenth century B.C.]

DOWNFALL OF AEGEAN CIVILIZATION

Aegean civilization did not penetrate beyond the sh.o.r.es of Asia Minor, the islands, and the coasts of Continental Greece. The interior regions of the Greek peninsula remained the home of barbarous tribes, which had not yet learned to build cities, to create beautiful objects of art, or to traffic on the seas. By 1100 B.C. their destructive inroads brought the Aegean Age to an end.

23. THE HOMERIC AGE (ABOUT 1100-750 B.C.)

COMING OF THE NORTHERN BARBARIANS

The barbarians who overthrew Aegean civilization seem to have entered Greece from the north, perhaps from the region the Danube River. They pushed gradually southward, sometimes exterminating or enslaving the earlier inhabitants of the country, but more often settling peaceably in their new homes. Conquerors and conquered slowly intermingled and so produced the one Greek people which is found at the dawn of history. These Greeks, as we shall call them henceforth, also occupied the islands of the Aegean Sea and the coast of Asia Minor. The entire basin of the Aegean thus became a Greek world.

[Ill.u.s.tration: AEGEAN SNAKE G.o.dDESS (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston) A gold and ivory statuette found in Crete. Dates from the sixteenth century B.C. The G.o.ddess wears the characteristic Cretan dress, with low- cut jacket and full skirt with five plaited flounces. On her head is an elaborate crown.]

THE HOMERIC EPICS

The period between the end of the Aegean Age and the opening of historic times in Greece is usually called the Homeric Age, because many features of its civilization are reflected in two epic poems called the _Iliad_ and the _Odyssey_. The former deals with the story of a Greek expedition against Troy; the latter describes the wanderings of the hero Odysseus on his return from Troy. The two epics were probably composed in Ionia, and by the Greeks were attributed to a blind bard named Homer. Many modern scholars, however, consider them the work of several generations of poets.

The references in the _Iliad_ and the _Odyssey_ to industry, social life, law, government, and religion give us some idea of the culture which the historic Greeks received as their inheritance.

INDUSTRY

The Greeks as described in the Homeric epics were in a transitional stage between the life of shepherds and that of farmers. Wealth consisted chiefly of flocks and herds, though nearly every freeman owned a little plot of land on which he cultivated grain and cared for his orchard and vineyard. There were few skilled workmen, for almost everything was made at home. A separate cla.s.s of traders had not yet arisen. Commerce was little followed. The Greeks depended on Phoenician sailors to bring to their sh.o.r.es the commodities which they could not produce themselves. Iron was known and used, for instance, in the manufacture of farm tools. During Homeric times, however, that metal had not yet displaced copper and bronze. [8]

SOCIAL LIFE

Social life was very simple. Princes tended flocks and built houses; princesses carried water and washed clothes. Agamemnon, Odysseus, and other heroes were not ashamed to be their own butchers and cooks. The Homeric knights did not ride on horseback, but fought from chariots. They sat at table instead of reclining at meals, as did the later Greeks.

Coined money was unknown. Trade was by barter, values being reckoned in oxen or in lumps of gold and silver. Men bought their wives by making gifts of cattle to the parents. The art of writing is mentioned only once in the Homeric poems, and doubtless was little used.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A CRETAN CUPBEARER (Museum of Candia, Crete) A fresco painting from the palace of Gnossus. The youth carries a silver cup ornamented with gold. His waist is tightly drawn in by a girdle, his hair is dark and curly, his profile is almost cla.s.sically Greek.]

LAW AND MORALITY

The times were rude. Wars, though petty, were numerous and cruel. The vanquished suffered death or slavery. Piracy, flouris.h.i.+ng upon the unprotected seas, ranked as an honorable occupation. It was no insult to inquire of a seafaring stranger whether he was pirate or merchant. Murders were frequent. The murderer had to dread, not a public trial and punishment, but rather the personal vengeance of the kinsmen of his victim. The Homeric Greeks, in fact, exhibited the usual defects and vices of barbarous peoples.

HOMERIC GEOGRAPHY

The _Iliad_ and _Odyssey_ disclose a considerable acquaintance with peninsular Greece and the coasts of Asia Minor. Cyprus, Egypt, and Sicily are also known in part. The poet imagines the earth as a sort of flat s.h.i.+eld, with Greece lying in the center. [9] The Mediterranean, ”The Sea,”