The Greek Mainland, c. 1150 — c. 1000 B.C.

Abstract

In this article, an attempt will be made to review briefly the relative significance of surviving Mycenaean and intrusive elements on the Greek Mainland south of Macedonia during the late 12th and the 11th centuries B.C. Not all the area has been thoroughly investigated. Indeed there is no district that would not repay further exploration and excavation, but certain regions such as Arcadia, North Elis, the Megarid, Phocis and Locris, much of Boeotia, Phocis and Locris, and even parts of Attica, Corinthia and the Argolid need basic surveys. This irregularity of our knowledge should be borne in mind.The century immediately preceding the period under discussion appears to be characterized by extensive depopulation in many areas, and by the destruction of a number of major Mycenaean sites. Invasion would seem at least in part to have been responsible for the upheaval, though that upheaval was so great that the side effects of some climatic change are perhaps not to be ruled out as a contributory cause. So far as one can tell, an increase of population was registered only in Achaea, and in the relatively secluded Aegean-facing coasts of the Peloponnese and Attica. It would not be incorrect to say that the whole fabric of Mycenaean civilization on the Mainland, with the possible exception of Thessaly, had suffered a fatal blow in the period shortly before 1200 B.C. The course of Mycenaean history faltered and then (at different times in different areas) ceased, a phenomenon observable partly in the further abandonment of sites, but perhaps more in the discontinuation of the characteristic chamber tomb and tholos cemeteries.