MODULE 3 - WIDER SPHERE LBA, IRON AGE

Somewhere around the 12:th century the Mycenaen empire met a violent and abrupt end. Many of their major city centers shows clear signs of violent destruction and fires. Other centers where abandoned. Tombs and pottery changed in shape, quality and appearance. People moved from previously habitated locations to higher grounds and a general decline in economy and habitation ensued.

Allthough many of the cities seemed to have been destroyed and pottery style and tomb style seems to have changed significantly there is still such a commonality among the artefacts found that a straight out invasion seems unlikely (allthough not impossable).

A more plausible explanation might quite simply be migration, allthough the old sea peoples theory in our view is a gross simplification. Instead of one homogenous people migrating from Anatolia to the Levant creating havoc in it's way it seems more likely that a larger number of smaller heterogenous migrations occurred. For some, largely unknown, reason, an inner insecurity and unrest seemed to arise in the region of Greece and Anatolia in the north, down to Libya and Israel in the south. An unrest that forced them to migrate from existing inhabitats to new ones. This migration in turn forced other peoples to migrate when their territories where compromised, and on it went.

The causes for this turmoil of events are hard to find but a number of possible explanations exists: climate changes, declining yield from farming due to washed out soils, nature catastrophes like earthquakes and epidemics. Unfortunatleour knowledge about this interesting period is scarce, written sources disappears and artefacts found from the period is also scarce and hard to interpret with no clear patterns.

There are evidence of famine at the time from other parts of this world. The Hettite empire had severe problems at the time, importing much of it's supplies from richer countries like Egypt.We also know that several of the major inhabitated areas in the area where devastated from earhtquakes rather than from human actions like war and conflicts.

In a wider scale the large Egyptian and Hettite empires went in to a decline, of many converging reasons (overcentralisation, over exploitation and expandings populations with conflicting political interests arising). This affected the surrounding area in a major way, disrupting old traderoutes for tin, grain and other important traded goods, instigating revolts against central powers and empires.

On the whole the accumulated effect of all these mishaps throw the whole region off its feet and in to a longlasting depressiona and decline. At least so goes the theory, a theory which can account for the fact that no greater destruction occurred even though a marked rescession in culture and craftmanship seems to have happened.

The loss of the central powers led to a more divided society with smaller 'states' trying to establish their own territorial rights. All in all there where new and more players on the arena, making wars more probable between them. The foundation for a long lasting instability before any given state won out over the others where laid out.

Whatever the reason, the aegean area went in to a downward spiral for a long time. Such things as writing seems to have been forgotten, pottery and other craftsmanship seems to have gotten cruder and no new large structures where built. Long distance trade seems to have more or less disapeared from the scene. Allthough it's hard to draw any specific conclusions it seems to be pretty safe to say that the aegean area more or less returned to local chieftains in regards of rule and organisation.

The economic downturn in the established Hettite and Egypt empires meant that these empires no longer could afford to keep their military powers that otherwise would have acted as a stabilizing component in the web of events. The armies consisted (to an large extent) of mercenaries, proffesionals that got paid for whate they where doing. Robbed of their income they may actually have helped to further the downfall as they in their fight to keep an income may have turned to robbing and forming frinedship with local rulers. There are written evidence from the 19 dyn describing great problems in the Levant area with local gangs of bandits that stole and murdered.

The City-States

The tribal or clan units slowly grew into larger political units; beginning around 800 BC, trade began to dramatically accelerate between the peoples of Greece. Marketplaces grew up in Greek villages and communities began to gather together into defensive units.The Greek-speaking people on the Greek peninsula, the mainland, and the coast of Asia Minor, developed political units that were centrally based on a single city. These city states were independent states that controlled a limited amount of territory surrounding the state. The largest of these city-states, for instance, was Sparta, which controlled more than 3000 square miles of surrounding territory.

Politically (notice that the word "political" is derived from the word polis), all the Greek city-states began as monarchies. In their earliest stages, they were ruled by a hereditary king. A variety of political alternatives were put in place of the king: the most common was an oligarchy, or "rule by a few." The oligarchs were almost always drawn from the wealthiest citizens of the state, but a variety of oligarchic forms were invented in the eighth century. The oligarchs most often ruled absolutely; they had many of the powers granted to a king. Even though these powers were diffused among a group (which could be surprisingly large). Some of the early oligarchic governments and a few of the kings were overthrown by "tyrants".

One of the most important part of the City-State was the akropolis, the citadel that concentrate the temples and was a place of refuge in times of trouble. But besides the physical parts, the citizenship was an important factor wich creates a belonging feel for the citizens.

Colonization

The the eigth century was a period of frenetic colonization. The Greeks, pressured by growing populations around the city-states, actively went looking for unpopulated or thinly populated areas to colonize in Greece, the Aegean Sea, and elsewhere. The Greek city-state began to appear on the Italian and Sicilian shores, and set up trading posts in the Middle East and Egypt. Greek culture was spreading across the Mediterranean, and Greek commerce was rapidly making the city-states wealthy and powerful. There was no military, political, or cultural center of the Greek world in the Archaic period. Different city-states developed separate cultures; these developments, however, spread across the Greek world. The city-state culture, then, was in many ways a national culture because of the dynamic interactions between the city states. The greatest flowering of culture occurred on the city-states of Asia Minor, and especially Miletus. Greek philosophy begins in these city-states and soon spreads around the Greek world. Corinth and later Argos became great centers of literature.

Questioning the Dark Age

There are not coincidence in the supposed big difference between the societies before and after the Dark Age. The "lost centuries" in Greece's past is far from resolved. Numerous questions and problems arose from the separation of Mycenaean and Ionian culture with such a lengthy and culturally vacuous gap.

One question about the written language

As stated in the answer in the our first group questions belonged to Module 2, the emerging of a written language was a direct need of palace societies - both the Minoan and the Mycenaean - were sophisticated civilizations with the need for advanced bureaucracy. A society that has social ranking and a system where not all people are involved in food production needs a system of redistribution. Redistribution means taxation and to keep track of people's income, society needs lists of inventories. Population growth, which almost always occur when there are wealthy times, demands a higher level of organization too.

Because when the Minoan palace culture disappeared in c. 1450 BC, Linear A disappeared with it. When the Mycenaean culture was destroyed in c. 1200 BC, Linear B also vanished.

The alphabet that arose after the Dark Ages in the 8th century, did not look anything like Linear B.

Related to Literature, our grupp mean that it is a mistake to assume that either the Minoan or the Mycenaean cultures did not have any literature. It could be that literature was written on material that has since vanished. At the same time, it is strange that archaeologists have not found a single example of literature or letters in the Aegean of the Bronze Age.

Otherwise how can the poet called Homer, who lived in the 7th or 8th century BCE, have written the amazing accounts of the Iliad and the Odyssey in sophisticated Greek prose, immediately following a period of Dark Age illiteracy? Some events surrounding the Trojan War at the end of the Bronze Age, is also surprising. Homer writes in great detail of elements such as metalworking that were exclusively part of Mycenaean culture, showing excellent knowledge of far-removed times.

Another fact that calls the Dark Age into doubt is that no Greeks from Ionian times forward made any mention of a Dark Age in their history. The numerous poets, playwrights, historians, writers, and philosophers of Classical times said nothing about it.

Other various archeological excavations seemed to show Mycenaean and much later Greek architecture existing without much of a gap in time between them. Mycenaean pottery and "Geometric" style pottery from the 8th century are also found together in some cases. This do not prove there no time passed between their creations, but it seems extrange an extremely long period between them.

Some historians and archeologists attempt to solve these problems by proving that the creation of a Dark Age in Greece's past was a mistake.

Lefkandi and its contents would fit with relative ease into a new view in which Greece did not suffer the cultural desolation of a Dark Age. Its active and fairly prosperous culture seems out of step with the Greece we imagined during this time.

Population growth results in social development?

One of the most remarkable changes under the eight-century in the Greek mainland is the increase of population. The scholars are not coincident about the factor that causes that population growth. Some of the most alluded causes are the larger number of villages (e.g. Attica), sanctuaries and graves (Athens and Argos) found in the archeological research.

The growth of population start many processes, like:

• Access to product and resources
• Progress of agricultural techniques
• Economical and social development
• Commerce relations with the outside world
• Social organization and hierarchy

These processes can contribute in social development.

Reflexion about burial practices

Others investigator do not have the same opinion, they did not find reasons to support the theory of increased population, and mean that these archeological evidences are not complete to support this affirmation. This group indicates that, as an example, the increase of burials is an evidence for social change, but do not provide a complete explanation for that change. They suggest that the population growth is continuous from 10th century.

Further this discussion, the archeological excavations found changes in the burials practices. These practices give us an explanation about the society this people belonged to and other thoughts about the after-live. But it is possible to found differences between regions that we want to illustrate in the following table, unfortunately with not complete information:

Practice	Athens	Argos	Corinth	Crete and other Aegean islands
Inhumation / cremation.	Cremation was the most used practice during the Dark Age Shortly after 800: Inhumation instead of cremation Around 700: cremation is used again	Inhumation in cist. Cremation replaces cist 700 BC	Never cremates	Diverse burial practices, with little change. Cremation is associated with chamber tombs
Using of gold in the graves.	Gold is limited to a few graves
Children and adult graves / cemeteries	Children inhumates in adult cemeteries in the last third of the century (Previously in separated cemeteries)	Children inhumates in adult cemeteries at all periods. In the 7-century some children were buried within the settlement. Increase proportion of child burials towards 700
Grave goods	Decrease in number and quality. Gradually disappeared from the graves	No sex-specific grave goods	Decline to the middle of the eight-century. For the next 200 years minimal differentiation between graves.
Using of pots as grave markers	Pots ceases to be used as grave markers	Pots not used as grave markers
Burials inside / outside the settled area	About 700 burials are found in cemeteries outside the settled area (Previously within the settlement)	About 700 burials are found in cemeteries outside the settled area (Previously within the settlement)	About 50 years earlier burials are found in cemeteries outside the settled area (Previously within the settlement)	Burials are never found within the community
Metal offering	Gradually disappeared after 750	Practice include arms and jewellery reached a height after 750 and decline towards 700

Despite the the different burial practices, some conclussions could we get from this comparation:

• A general burial move from within the settlements to areas outside the settlements.

  This is probably an indication of use of territorry inside the settlement to the community as a result of a more complex society. This indicates also a communal acceptance about wath to do and where, that buring can not placed anywhere, etc.

• Reduction in wealth of grave goods.

  A possible explanation is that "the terrenal life" assumes more relativ importance than the thoughts of "after-live".

Compare the society in the 8th c. on the Greek mainland with the mainland LBA

• A new Semite script from the Phoenicians instead of Linear B. Great literature instead of mere archives and lists (Illiad/Oddyssey etc.)
• City-states (polises) instead of palace economies: New concept of a state. Significant changes in political institutions occurred as well. Kingship was largely eliminated in Greece, with oligarchies ruling most cities by the middle of the Colonizing Period. This period also saw the emergence of tyrannies (extra-constitutional rulers). Though these regimes could--especially in succeeding generations--degenerate into oppressive governments, many encouraged important social and cultural developments. More and more power was given to the free citizens of society, which unfortunately excluded women and slaves. Nevertheless, this was the beginning of democracy.

  Two unusual cities in this regard were Athens and Sparta. Sparta avoided tyranny altogether and indeed became an opponent of tyrannies in other cities. Athens delayed the emergence of a tyranny until very late, well into the Archaic Age.

• Colonization over a vaster area (Spain, Africa, Sicily etc.)
• Use of iron became common.
• The dawn of Greek sculpture and temple architecture.
• Development of the hoplite (citizen) army.
• Greek victories over the Persians spurred the artistic, literary, and philosophical creations that represent much of Greece's legacy to the Western world.
• An important difference between 8th c. and LBA was the changed world around. Both the big kingdom Egypt and Hittites vanished and consequently affected the conditions to trade and cultural exchange for the whole Mediterranean.

What is money?

When we talk about money, we tend to think about bills, and, above all, coins. In ancient times other items could function as money: amber, ivory, leather, salt etc. During one part of their history, ancient Greeks used iron nails as coins. Money doesn't have to be valuable in and of itself (and who decides what is valuable anyway?), but the key word is agreement. As long as everyone agrees that the bills, coins or beads are worth a certain amount, then the system works. As soon as even just a slight number of people refuse to participate in the agreement, the whole monetary system of a society may fail.

How did the system of money develop?

The simplest and most natural way to get what one wants/needs must be to simply trade one or more commodities for another. It is a very concrete way of thinking ("if I give you this jug, you can give me that loaf of bread"). The system of barter is therefore easy to understand.

The concept of money, IOUs, credit and giro are more complicated, mainly because it is very abstract. One can eat the loaf of bread or use the jug for storing food, but coins are worthless if a person is alone.

In the early days of barter, there was also the concept of payment, i.e. when people willingly, or not so willingly, gave their products without gaining anything concrete in return. Some examples are:

1. People had to pay fines if they committed certain crimes. The English word "pay" can be derived from the Latin verb "pacare", which originally meant "to pacify" or "to make peace with".
2. In some societies people had to provide a dowry when getting married.
3. The rulers imposed taxes on people to support people who didn't work directly with the production of food.
4. Religion claimed tributes and sacrifices to the gods and the priests.

If someone had to pay a fine for a crime, there were probably rules for HOW MUCH that person had to pay. If he/she had to pay a cow, who would judge the value of the cow? Is a scrawny, old cow worth just as much as a young and healthy one? It was easier to agree on some sort of number and that is where money comes in. If everyone in society could agree that 10 pieces of a certain coin was the fine for a certain crime, punishment would be more fair (unless there was inflation, see our discussion on that below), and also easier to administrate.

Trade became more sophisticated though the extensive networks between the states of the Mediterranean. Greek bowls could be traded for ivory from Punt, but it was probably not the Greeks themselves that went all the way down to Punt to collect the ivory. Most likely, the Egyptians got the ivory in return for something else and then they in turn bartered the ivory for the Greek bowls. The more complicated this network got, the more tradespeople needed a system of money, where fortunes could be transferred more quickly (however, see commentary under Monetary uniformity/rivalry).

People started bartering with commodities that were one or more of the following:

1. Were conveniently/easily stored,
2. had high value,
3. were easy to transport and/or
4. were durable.

From the beginning these items were not seen as money in our sense (e.g. bills, which do not have any real value, at least not as long as paper is abundant), but as something that actually had a value in and of itself. To this very day many people find it safer to invest in gold rather than keeping their entire fortune in bills, or in bank accounts. Gold is not necessarily easy to transport, but it is extremely durable and considered valuable in most societies of the world.

These commodities (e.g. gold) that were once accepted for their own value (to make jewellery etc.), were soon used for payments like the above mentioned, where nothing "in natura" was expected in return. The fact that people generally agreed on their value made them useful for general trading, supplementing or even replacing barter.

Money's effect on society

Agreement and the necessity of a strong power

Money is nothing but an agreement between people. Coins and especially bills are IOUs that everyone in society believes and trusts has the promised value. This agreement is very fragile. If a country or society has deep financial troubles, people have a tendency to go back to the old barter system where they trade goods rather than money. The whole system depends on EVERYONE agreeing on the value of money. This requires a strong power; a king, aristocracy or some other leader etc. That authority must claim and maintain the value of the money.

The most amazing change here is that people actually accepted the abstract idea of money. The change wasn't that abrupt, of course, and people slowly adjusted to the abstract thinking of money, but it is a profound change in people's mentality.

Another important thing is the absolute connection between society and money. If one is alone on a desert island, one has no use for money. Money requires that people live in structured and centralized societies with functioning administration.

Security/sense of value

Cattle have always (or at least as long as people have kept domestic animals) been a capital asset to people. One important use of cattle was as sacrifice to the gods. For sacrifice purposes it was important that the animal was healthy and without major flaws. For monetary purposes this was less important. Cattle can be counted, just like money. The idea of coins introduced the importance of amount over quality. In the beginning the coins were weighed, but later they were counted. One could say that society went from quality to quantity, but that is not entirely correct the value of the money, counted or weighed, had to be trusted by society. The monetary system requires absolute trust, which meant that counterfeiting had to be punished, and that coins had to be stamped to guarantee their value.

The ancient Greeks used iron nails as coins, but they were easy to counterfeit, since they were made of base metals and had low value in and of themselves. That is why rulers started minting coins. Counterfeiting can increase inflation and there was a need for reliable devices for testing the purity of the money.

Monetary uniformity/ Rivalry

Coins were usually measured as part of a standard weight. This could have made trade a lot easier, but the problem was that the city-states could not agree on a monetary currency. There was a lot of prestige in having a widely accepted currency and the city-states constantly fought each other's currencies. The custom of stamping the coins to prevent counterfeiting also made it possible for the various city-states to show their power with their own seal.

Why did not the city-states agree on a monetary currency? Coins, minted in a certain city-state, could always be used in the very area where they were minted, i.e. the city-state in question could A) guarantee the coins' value and B) make sure that the money was re-invested in the city-state's economy. That is why mercenaries, e.g., were paid in local currency.

Banking

Banking preceded the invention of coins. Already in Ancient Mesopotamia there was a system of banking where people could keep their grain and other items in the safety of the palaces and the temples. In Egypt there was also a system of banking, where harvests were kept in central warehouses. Precious metals, carefully weighed, could also be stored. The idea of counting the money rather than weighing it came later.

This opened up for a new occupation. People could become professional bankers and even make a fortune in their new occupation. Money changing became a profession in all states of the Mediterranean, well known from the Bible where Jesus overturns the tables in the Temple of Jerusalem.

The banks could also lend people money. Investments in ship freights, construction of public buildings and mining expeditions were common, where the banks lent a sum of money to be repaid when the expidition came back (hopefully with profit). Of course people had been planning ahead before coins were introduced, but money made it possible to invest way into the future. In many ways money makes us live to a great extent in the future, probably because it is so abstract.

During Greek rule of Egypt (the reign of Ptolemeis 323-30 BC), the old system of warehouses was used again. The different "grain banks" had a central office in Alexandria and worked according to a kind of "giro" system. Transactions could be made from one "account" to another without the grain actually leaving the warehouses. That is taking the abstract thinking a step further.

Inflation

Coin production made society more prone to inflation. When Sparta in 407 BC occupied the silver mines at Laurion, which belonged to Athens, there was a severe shortage of silver coins. Athens tried to fight the inflation by issuing a new bronze coin with a thin layer of silver. People did not trust the new money and started collecting the old silver coins, which vanished from the city's financial circulation, which in turn only made the inflation worse.

Propaganda

Since the coins were tightly connected to the various city-stated, they also served as a means of propaganda. Philip, the father of Alexander the Great, issued coins to be spread as propaganda, celebrating his victory in a chariot race.

Cities that were defeated were often forced to use the currency of their conqueror (e.g. Aegina that, in 456 BC, was forced to use the coin with the Athenian owl).

Minting

Minting could be quite a profitable affair. By minting coins, whose real material value was less than the agreed value (i.e. if a coin cost 10 to produce, but was "worth" 15), rulers could earn money by producing coins. The other way around, rulers could lose money, if the true value was less than the given (one example is the Swedish 5-öre coin, which, in the end, cost 12 öre to produce).