Ancient Greece: From the Mycenaean Palaces to the Age of Homer

A new interpretation of the ‘Dark Age’ of Ancient Greece The period between the collapse of the Mycenaean civilisations around 1200 BC and the dawning of the classical era four and half centuries later is widely known as the Dark Age of Greece. This book will constitute the most fundamental reinterpretation of the period for 30 years. The authors take issue with the idea of a Greek Dark Age and everything it implies for the understanding of Greek history, culture and society. They argue that the period is characterised as much by continuity as disruption and that the evidence from every source shows a progression from Mycenaean kingship to the conception of aristocratic nobility in the Archaic period. The volume is divided into seven parts dealing with political and social structures; questions of continuity and transformation; architecture; international and inter-regional relations; religion and hero cult; Homeric epics and heroic poetry; and the archaeology of the Greek regions. Copiously illustrated and with a collated bibliography, itself a valuable resource, this book is likely to be the essential and basic source of reference on the Early Greek Iron Age for many years.