The Mycenaeans were a dynasty that ruled over mainland Greece from 1600 to 1150 BC. They conquered the Minoans in 1450 BC, destroying much of Crete, but they were themselves conquered by Dorians in 1150.
History[]
Speakers of an Indo-European language migrated into Greece around 2000 BC, and through intermarriage, blending of languages, and melding of cultures, the indigenous population and newcomers created the first Greek culture. Farmers and shepherds wringed a bare living from the land, but in 1600 BC life changed relatively suddenly. The Mycenaeans, named by German businessman Heinrich Schliemann when he discovered a circle of graves at Mycenae in southern Greece in 1876, rose to power suddenly. They adopted Minoan architecture, pottery, and fresco and vase painting, were influenced by Minoan palaces, centralized economy, administrative bureaucracy, and their writing system, and accumulated wealth and power through trade and piracy in addition to booty brought back by mercenaries.
The Mycenaeans wrote in a script called Linear B, a set of syllabic symbols derived from the Minoan Cretans, and it was used mainly for palace records. The civilization's kings are unrecorded, although the legendary Agamemnon was one of the rulers according to the Iliad. This legendary account of the Trojan War has been partially corroborated when the ruins of Troy, dated to 1200 BC, were found. The Mycenaeans were tough, warlike, and acquisitive, trading with those who were strong and taking from the weak. In the 14th and 13th centuries BC they were led into conflict with the Hittites, with the king and land of Ahhijawa (a Hittite rendering of "Achaean", Homer's term for "Greeks") having sometimes friendly and sometimes strained relations with the Hittites. They took advantage of Hittite preoccupation or weakness, and they were a strong country.
Around 1150 BC, the Mycenaeans fell. The Mycenaeans saw trouble coming, building extensive fortifications and guaranteeing the water supply of the citadels. However, in the first half of the 12th century BC, all of the palaces were destroyed by the Dorians. The demise of the Mycenaean civilization occurred at roughly the same time as the fall of the other great civilizations in the region, such as the Hittite Empire and New Kingdom Egypt.
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