History Summarized: Minoan Greece
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- čas přidán 16. 12. 2021
- The classical Greeks weren't the first kids on the Aegean block. Long before Athens' golden age, before Homer, and even before the Trojan War, there was a civilization on the island of Krete. The land of King Minos was home to beautiful palaces, a fascinatingly-complex economy, and something approximating Bull-Cthulu. It's a fun time, let's jump in.
SOURCES & Further Reading: "The Greeks: An Illustrated History" by Diane Cline for National Geographic, "The Greeks: A Global History" by Roderick Beaton, Lectures from The Great Courses Plus - "Being Minoan and Mycenaean" from "The Other Side of History: Daily Life in the Ancient World" by Robert Garland, and "Minoan Crete" & "Schliemann & Mycenae" from "Ancient Greek Civilization" by Jeremy McInerney. And I have a university degree in Classical Studies.
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"Guys, I found remnants of this Ancient Greek culture!"
"Oh, that's a lot of bull."
"Well, you're not wrong..."
To the top you go
WOAH WOAH WOAH!!! Let me get this perfectly straight: You comment something that is completely unrelated to the fact that I have two HAZARDOUSLY HANDSOME girlfriends? Considering that I am the unprettiest CZcamsr worldwide, it is really incredible. Yet you did not mention it at all. I am VERY disappointed, dear mike
@@AxxLAfriku do they smoke weed?
How is this spammer not banned from this platform already? I'm growing tired of reporting him.
@@toprak3479 Susan's one of his girlfriends.
It's just fascinating that the story of Theseus and the Minotaur is part of a long cultural memory of Minoan Crete even after it collapsed
To quote Robert Jordan "History fades to legend, legend to myth..."
@@mjbull5156 the wheel weaves as the wheel wills
Exactly! How what was probably an important event in a war/rebellion was mutated by tellings and re-tellings over centuries and centuries, changing ever so slightly every generation, became this her-prince myth, is fascinating and I'd love to hear about other instances of this.
The Exodus is like that too; a memory of when Canaan was under Egyptian rule.
I'd even half bet the bull monster could very well been because some Minoan wore a big bull shaped helmet into battle. :P
If the Minotaur was meant to represent the Minoans tendency towards human sacrifice and cannibalism I wonder if Ariadne as the one who is most attached to the minotaur is meant to represent women's roles as the ones performing the sacrifice? It would line up nicely with the myriad of frescos depicting women engaging in ceremonial duties and could explain why she was abandoned by Theseus afterward
Yeah, we even have evidence of a priestess sacrificing a young man.
The thing is that many ancient greeks also practiced ritual human killing, so Minoan rituals wouldn't be very shocking to them.
@@ahmicqui9396 If it's the one I'm thinking about there's more to it than that. A young man was sacrificed (or about to be) by a group of priestesses positioned in a circle and a man inside a cave before it collapsed on them, preserving the ritual quite well. It is believed that the young man was of noble blood and the man was someone of great importance, either of noble blood himself or a high-ranking religious figure. We know this because he wore a golden ring that was coated in silver- and apparently gold was abundant and less valuable to the Minoans than silver so this is how you know this guy was hot shit. The site is unfortunately not open to the public so I've never seen it myself, but knowing an archaeologist who actually worked there this is what I remember.
There is indeed some archaeological evidence that human sacrifice may have occurred in Minoan Crete but there’s no real suggestion that the myth of the Minotaur were to represent the society’s sacrificial and cannibalistic tendencies? Considering that the ancient Greeks knew even less about the Minoans than we do, I doubt that the myth would be a reflection on Minoan society. Considering how the myth is an origin story of Athen’s glorious hero Theseus, the myth may not represent reality at all. It could be that the myth has some roots in rumours that has been passed down for centuries about Cretan society but I wouldn’t claim it’s a direct representation of the practice of human sacrifices.
@@chiefpurrfect8389 Yup, the cave collapsed on them. I wonder if this was just a coincidence or maybe done on purpose as some grand sacrifice? Like a renaactment of some religious story. Probably a far-fetched interpretation but it's pretty interesting to think about.
Also, the other man was huge, over six feet tall IIRC
@@elektrakomplexet It's not beyond reasoning that a small and culturally insular civilization might have taken hostages (short-term slaves, really) from other areas as a hedge against inbreeding, much as certain Native American and Irish Gaelic tribes were known to do.
There is actually a more accepted theory that the palaces weren't actually the houses of the kings but only an economic/religious centre. The reason why it is called a palace is because Evans thought it was, seeing as it was a big structure. His theories, for instance, why some rooms where for royalty are flimsy at best
It almost sounded like the 'palaces' were the ancient equivalent to a supermarket.
That may be true but if they are modeled at all on Egyptian and Mesopotamian settlements they likely were the residences of the ruling class. Otherwise there would have been separate settlements for this purpose likely in defensible areas nearby. It is fascinating how functional their society was. Imo the most interesting part is when Blu stated they didn’t appear to be threats to each other. That to me indicates that women did indeed play a larger role within the Minoan society at large.
Ancient Amazon workers regretted unionizing. "Yeah, after they outsourced to Mycenae everything went to crap."
Also, I could imagine the acquisition rules of Crete. "When acquiring the other persons business leave as much as possible intact. Money doesn't make itself, it takes people and stuff. Killing people prevents them from ever making money again and destroying stuff stops them until it's replaced. Also, if you take their stuff w/o nonviolently they're less inclined to kill you or destroy it in spite."
Ick, need to make that shorter.
They might well have been both, or rather something in between. The greek city-states of classical times sprang as independent political entities out of the communities surrounding these palaces - much in the same way that medieval cities often were built around the towers, castles and fortified residences of the local noblemen.
The theory goes something like this: in the beginning, we have these palaces/granaries/storehouses/administrative centers, housing the ruling class as well as the administration (bureaucrats, clerks, scribes, bean-counters - and bear in mind these were *vast* bureaucracies by the standards of their time, and even more so by the standards of *later* greek city-states). They are surrounded by rural communities - the countryside, as well as some villages and towns. The ruling class depends on the communities for supplying them with food, commodities and raw materials; and the communities people depend on the rulers and administration in order to buy, sell and exchange their products (because these are specialized crafters and producers, much like us today, and unlike classical times Greeks - they're not autonomous). And so, the communities recognize the legitimacy of the rulers, but also hold some local councils, where they make local decisions and bestow some privileges upon the rulers (e.g. the use of this or that forest, or the religious use of a place of worship). These are formalities, for the most part, since the ruling class already have the power to take these things, but there is some kind of consensus that it's in their right to take them.
At some point, for whatever reason, the bureaucracy collapses, and the people of the countryside are left to fend for themselves. These are the so called "Greek Dark Ages" ('dark' refers to the scarcity of contemporary textual sources); the communities become more autonomous. They keep the old councils, but now they make decisions about managing their own affairs. Villages and towns grow into the city-states, and the councils become the assemblies of their citizens - first the noblemen, then gradually (in some cases) the richer land-owners and merchants, and finally (as in Athens), all that have citizenship (excluding women, foreigners and slaves).
I find this a fascinating story.
@@aaronharkins4331 The palaces on Crete had limited living spaces, some had zero to none. There is no indication based on the archeological excavation that the palaces would’ve been used as permanent living spaces. It could’ve been use as temporary residence for workers or guests travellers. It seems like it was only the constructions themselves that were inspired by the Egyptians and Near Eastern palaces.
Yeah everybody likes a good mystery that's why I Scooby-Doo is still going strong after 50 years.
Scooby-Doo is eternal!
Damn right
@@danubeisreallypeculiarrive7944 Doom is temporarily temporary, *scoob is eternal*
The relation between real history and mythology makes me so happpy, so thank you for featuring it so heavily here! :D
hi stoney
It reminds me of Red's interpretation of the Orion myth where he goes to the Underworld for a bit actually talking about his movement in the sky from season to season.
Ayo stoney here
Makes you think that a lot of our myths have a true history, just covered in the game of whispers and time. Gives even a older age to our combined history of civilizations
Hey stoney!
I knew about the labyrinth being based on Minoan architecture from a history channel show that was trying to find THE labyrinth. There were a lot of promising caves, but nothing like what the myth describes. Then it went into this theory that, since the Greeks were all about that symmetry in their buildings, the intricate and frequent turns in Minoan hallways would be arcane and unsettling to the Greeks, maybe SO unsettling, that it turned into the myth of the labyrinth.
I'm sure i got some details wrong, but i always found that theory fascinating!!!!! I was super into ancient Greece as a kid, and i miss when the history channel actually covered historical things....
Tell me about it! I miss when the History Channel used to actually have history on it. Not just... Ancient Aliens and other dumb stuff.
Yeah, me too. I used to love the History Channel as a kid.
There was also a thingy on Atlantis that went into the thera eruption, but also took the idea of Atlantis a bit more literally than it deserves. And the Disney Atlantis had come out around that time, so i was really enamored with the idea of sunken Atlantis surviving under the sea.
Btw i have no memory of the show mentioning the war with Athens, and first learned about that from Red's video. A bit lax on the historical accuracy for a channel dedicated to history, but it was very fascinating and got my little writer imagination going, so personally it was a net gain 😁
Ok, the idea that the Mycenaeans came up with the myth of the labyrinth because they found the minoan architecture confusing compared to their own has big "Non-Euclidean Geometry based cities" vibes and I LOVE IT. XD
I think the Atticans at that time would have lived in farming villages with single story huts and a few hundred people. There wouldn't have been anything comparable to what might effectively be a big office building where they lives.
Mycenaean Athenians: "You guys are pirates!"
Minoans: "We prefer the term "Freelance-traders"."
British empire intensifies.
what was the from again? castle in the sky?
@@profeseurchemical It could be more likely Pirates of The Caribbean but who knows you might be right. 🤷♂️
@@profeseurchemical they really like desserts?
@@MrJamesb192 oh, is it avatar then?
The eruption of Thera was insanely large, with accounts of ash clouds being found from China, and I believe Egypt too, at the time. The effects from a volcanic eruption like acid rain or ashfall can lead to widespread crop failure (lowering pH of soil and introducing too much sulfur), which can lead to starvation and cannibalism. Ashfall is also extremely dangerous for a nation dependant on its navy (and the visibility of naval people) for protection. Even now, flights are canceled when there is a volcanic eruption that spews too much ash (ex Iceland). If we are assuming that they had plumbing, based on their ability to create flushing toilets, storm drainage systems that still work, and terracotta pipes, it is likely that the ash would make its way into their clean water as well. Cleaning ash out of the entire sewer system is unlikely to have happened, so the health of the people of Krete was likely at risk. If there is widespread damage to land and technology, it's possible that the economic situation also suffered. Trade between islands could have been more difficult due to visibility issues. In a situation where your technology, health, and economy deteriorate, people are most likely going to suffer trauma, which could be another reason for further societal collapse. I believe the aftereffects from the volcano, not the initial blast, destroyed the Minoan culture.
Nice summary of details often overlooked.
Another comment mentioned deforestation. So, combine exhausting your natural resources with the gut-punch of a major natural disaster, followed by the slow failure of your infrastructure … Yep, sounds like an oft-recurring scenario for downward-spiral and unrecoverable decline of a complex society.
[Egypt, BTW may have made _claims_ to gloriously "defeating the sea peoples", but really, they didn't. Whatever combination of factors caused the Bronze Age Collapse, Egypt basically just _survived_ them, and never _really_ fully recovered. I've seen the hypothesis that this weakening is what made Egypt so vulnerable to repeated conquest, until it was completely taken over by Cyrus the Great, thereafter becoming a province exchanged between kingdoms.]
This would make a lot of sense, and is a really fascinating take on it.
@rosemary linalool Also remember: All of the ideas we're circulating about the Thera Eruption in these comments?
They've been examined and researched already by researchers from many fields. None of these hypotheses we're having are new. 😉
IIRC, the story of exodus takes place around this time too-perhaps the bit about the Ten Plagues was influenced by this too?
@@rainbowlack That's exactly what I thought of, the darkness, large amounts of animals possibly coming to towns for lack of food in their habitats, disease, cattle death, and the water turning to blood could be a metaphor for how much killing or otherwise violent death was taking place. Also, I believe the Exodus story as written does not have archaeological backing because there is, as of now, no proof of a Jewish migration out of Egypt. There is also a theory accepted by some that the Minoans were direct ancestors of the Philistines, which I believe would help justify the "dying Crete/exodus" comparison. But exodus might also be based on the Hyksos people of Egypt (highly recommend looking them up), so this is just one possible theory
The glorious unity of the two biggest things on this channel: history and mythology (which in this case is secretly an embellished historical account) to explain one of the most mysterious civilizations?
Anthropology (and this channel) has blessed us
Hence y I’m an anthropologist
@@jessicaclakley3691 thank you for being so rad
@@dinodude7290 lol thanks, I try
The theory that myth of the Minotaur might be a retelling of a Mycenaean invasion of Minoan Crete makes me wonder how much modern wars might mutate over 4 millennia.
I wonder as well, though with all the records we keep, and the state of the world today, it seems like they'd either remain unchanged or be gone completely due to humanity's extinction
Modern day stories do still spring up despite the information age. See the ghost of Kyiv, who is still talked about like they are real. Are they? Probably not but we dont know.
@@flyveto457 The Cretaceous-Paleogene Extinction Event (or something on its level) would just wipe out humanity, period.
It’s Kiev not Kyiv, we don’t spell it Noo Yawk because New Yorkers speak a nonstandard dialect of English
@@arzhvr9259 I know this is from 6 months ago, but how about IT DOESN'T MATTER
I actually heard an idea that because of the fact that the Minoans were a maritime empire, they caused deforestation on Krete. They cut down all the trees or at least did not new ones fast enough and ran out of wood to help build or repair ships. Is the main cause no, the Mycenaean conquest is much more final then running out of building material, but I though it would interesting to mention this theory
Sounds like what happened on Easter island
One would expect a maritime empire to be able to import wood.
@@master-wre true, but at the same time as blue said the Minoan empire was experiencing a minor collapse with the loss of the other cities in Krete fell so maybe the trade lines were strained
@@bradythomas761 But then it would be a symptom of the collapse and not a (partial) cause of it
I don't know, Krete is not Rapa Nui, if they run out of wood, they just have to go to the coast and buy/steal some from their neighbours. Egypt had a relatively big navy for a long time, and they're not well known for plentiful forests ^^'
The Minoans are perfect showcases of two of my favorite adages from my field;
"When in doubt, it's ritual."
"Archaeology is like building a fully functioning DeLorean based on one hub cap and a vague description of Back to The Future 2."
Wow, if the myth of Theseus and the Minotaur had such seemingly strong basis on real events, one could even say that the original "Minotaur" could be explained as being a Minoan champion or warrior wearing a bull helm that Theseus slew, and over the ages the story was warped to it's current state due to how negative Greece's lingering perspective on the Minoans was that they demonized what was probably just an important warrior guy into a monstrous abomination.
This reminds me of the "Demythification" page on TV Tropes.
I did a research project on the Minotaur in high school once, and one theory I found while working on it was that the Minotaur (who had an actual name, Asterius) was actually a general of King Minos, which, with the Mycenaean invasion, and your idea, seems pretty likely, actually.
I think, more likely, it just slowly morphed from "bull-worshipers" to uh "bull-'lovers'" to "bull-people" to "bull-person".
King Minos was the Minotaur all along.
In Plutarch's Parallel Lives, he actually makes this exact argument, saying that he's heard that Theseus actually fought a particularly violent general named Taurus in some Minoan gladiatorial games, and that the Athenian youths given as tribute were given to the winner of the games.
as someone who has actually been to knossos and in the History museum there, I can say that they are really obsessed with bulls, I decided to count the amount of bulls there, and it ended up being like roughly 140ish, which is a lot
What’s even funnier is that majority of the bulls found on Knossos are actually from the time where the Mycenaeans ruled Crete. Who knows how many bulls could’ve existed prior to that.
@@elektrakomplexet at what point is to much bull, trick question, it is never to much bull
The irony is that I was told in a class on Greek history that the Minoans actually taught the Mycenaeans how to build ships and travel by sea shortly after the proto-mycenaeans arrived in mainland Greece, which the Mycenaeans adapted for warfare purposes and then invaded the Minoans.
Totally different characterization of the Minoans, in your interpretation the Minoans were more unjust rulers over the Mycenaeans, but my Greek history professor's interpretation is that the Minoans were peaceful and their cooperation with the Mycenaeans led to their demise. I like that we have totally different ideas of what they were, because the Minoans really are an engima.
My professor even told me straight up that there’s no evidence the Minoans has any form of fortification or an army/navy at all. Which supports what your professor says.
@@elektrakomplexet seconded. Also that there's ample evidence all over the eastern Mediterranean and as far away as the Indus Valley of the Minoans being a *mercantile* power, not a military one. They were perfectly placed for the wind and sea currents in that region.
@@darklordofsword Any rebuttal of the sources claiming findings of human sacrifice and/or cannibalism
Bob, you have shipped the least product and taken the most time off this quarter. We're going to sacrifice you for clear skies and fair winds.
I really like these really ancient civilisations. When I think of a really old civilisation, the roman empire is the first that comes to mind. But then I consider that these guys were almost as old to the romans as the romans are to us, and it just fills me with awe.
Also puts really into scale how much technology has rapidly advanced in the last few hundred years.
@@kabobawsome You may want to have a look at the Wikipedia page for the list of Indus Valley Civilization's inventions. They had _indoor plumbing,_ something the Romans either didn't invent or just skipped due to preferring centralized fountains.
The Roman Empire in its heyday was no slouch, either. I'm constantly learning about tech and infrastructure that points to the Roman Empire being at the same level as late-18th Century Europe. And the Roman Empire had something that wouldn't be reinvented until the 1960s, just before I was born: the birth-control pill.
We humans are quite clever creatures. But stop valuing the smart ones, and the rest will lose everything for 1000-2000 years until a later culture that values its smart people enough comes along, leading its brightest minds reinvent that lost technology.
@@John_Weiss this just shows two things that people forget, progress isn’t linear, and people in the past were just as smart as people today
You think the Minoans are old? In the grand scheme they're but children compared to the first cities built in Mesopotamia, millennia before the Minoans were a thing.
@@caspianhorlick4529 The Epic of Gilgamesh, the oldest surviving story, literally starts with "In the old days"
History is wild man.
Siiiiigh… Yeah, that whole “recreation” trend in early archaeology was/is still a pain to all archaeologists. Worse still, it wasn’t just temples either. That Minoan priestess statue of the woman on the right, or the “Snake Goddess,” was extremely well-preserved, only missing one of her arms at the elbow and her head, and the jerk who dug it up just created the head and arm from whole cloth. The cat-thing on her head was a completely different relic he thought *might* have been part of the Snake Goddess statue.
Say what you want about Howard Carter. At least he never took a broken artifact and filled in what he reckoned the missing piece looked like.
"a mythological game of telephone"....
wait i just wrote the exact same line in my essay about the evolution of more modern folklore.
the minoans are definitely an interesting part of history.
And to be honest, I'm becoming more and more convinced that modern Western conceptions of an "ancient great but mysterious civilization that fell" is itself something of a folk memory of the entire Bronze Age civilization.
It's more likely to be from the post-Roman period - when you had peasants living in the shadows of Roman aqueducts, made with technology that didn't exist anymore, "advanced but fallen civilization" was observable fact.
@@dylandarnell3657 Good point, especially in places like Britain. That said, there are stories like Atlantis that seem to indicate an awareness of something old and grand that's no longer around, even into the Roman and post-Roman eras. So perhaps for modern Westerners, it could be a fusion of both cultural memories.
Everyone in this thread talking about the dark ages like it was something that actually happened. Late Antiquity ie the post Roman west was a golden age
@@arzhvr9259 We're talking about visible ruins nobody was using anymore lending to a cultural memory, not overall quality of life during a specific time period.
@@LunDruid We have more from the so called dark ages under Odovacer and Theodoric than we do for the time of Diocletian
Another point for the conquest of Krete by the Mycenaeans is that in Homer's Epic King Indomeneus of Knossos is one of the kings that answers Agamemnon's call to war, implying that he was like the others Mycenaean and subservient to Agamemnon.
Agamemnon's and Menelaus' mother, Aerope, was from Crete and on their father's side was Anatolian/Phrygian/Lydian back to Tantalus and Pelops.
I've read one hypothesis (source lost to time and increasing glitchy memory for metadata in this aging slushware) that the Minoan bulls were actually well trained partners in the acrobatics and not rampaging, testosterone fueled beasts being toyed with by the humans for the amusement of the masses. Maybe the bulls were well tended participants in arcane religious ceremonies and mellowed out with some of that wine, perhaps augmented with a bit of whatever the Lotus-eaters from the Odyssey Book IX were doped on. Just a hypothesis, but it makes a degree of sense plus allows for a lot less goring of acrobat trainees.
You could be onto something there. Bulls are notorious for going from passively chill to hyper-aggressive in no time at all.
Castrate them into Oxen and they become quite placid indeed. Enough for being useful beasts of burden that even children can be around with minimal supervision.
Sooo sure you might be able to drug Bulls into a certain level of compliance but until that snip is done there is a very real danger which is probably the reason for all the locals getting excited.
Certain christian sects do the same thing today but choose to test their faith and/or prove that God approves of them and whatever they are preaching with the handling of very venomous snakes without dying.
( Snakes that are usually milked of all their venom before hand for the safety of the participants. But the occasional accident happens so its a reason for the locals to get excited about the show.)
I mean, I won’t say that’s impossible but there doesn’t seem to be much evidence for what you’re saying. But Seeing as bull leaping is a practice that occurs both historically and in the modern day in several regions, it’s really not much of a stretch to believe the Minoans would be able to perform it. The only caveat I guess is that the practice is incredibly dangerous but given that human sacrifice was a thing, human life being given for religious purposes would be far from abhorrent.
@@roychen5235 As I said it is just a hypothesis that I vaguely recalled and threw out, not from some desire to spark any sort of conspiracy theories, but to add to the conversation. I obviously have no evidence in support of it. I don't even recall were I heard it (in the mid-1970s, I took a class on ancient Greece, including a couple lectures touching on the Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations, as an undergrad history elective, probably where I first heard it; about half a century has rendered hindsight fuzzy). It may well be a total fabrication; imagination takes flight without the drag of empirical evidence. But it is not a totally implausible idea. Now where is that TARDIS when I need it. 🙂
The Spanish completely undermine your hypothesis with the "recortadores", literal acrobats with bulls.
@@Jamhael1 I was/am unaware of that, but it sounds interesting. I'll check it out, I presume that it's somewhere on CZcams ('It's everywhere, it's everywhere!'). Thanks for the horizon expansion, always a good thing.
Kind of makes me think of Elves too, the high fantasy Elves, not North Pole elves. I know the mythology is fairly recent and a lot more Norse, but the whole idea of this mysterious civilization, that you know is more advanced and generally better than you in every way, but they are reclusive and/or perhaps disappeared a long time ago for reasons only they know of.
At least we can read Elvish.
So what you’re saying is the Minoan labyrinth was actually an Ancient Superweapon?
@@emblemblade9245 ayyyyy
Robert Graves (and others, but he's where I read it) posits that it's very likely bands of those misplaced by the Bronze Age collapse made their way north into northern Europe.
I love the Minoans, so I'm excited to learn more! Thanks, Blue
Great video as always, excited about the podcast now
Hey! I'm a native and I really liked your video! I've visited the Palace of Knossos and Archeological Museum in Hereaklion a thousand times and I wish that everyone here who say that Minoans are their favourite civilization has the chance to visit them too!! They're breathtaking! The Octopus vase is one of my favourite exhibits! Keep up the good work! 🐂
I really love your enthusiasm! Next year I'm hoping to come from here in South Asia all the way over to Greece to study archaeology and learn more about this incredible civilisation, and what we can apply from their achievements onto our own modern society. It's amazing how awe-inspiring they were, even with how little we know of them now!
@@anemonesiac I hope you'll make it! :D
Fun fact, Thera/Santorini is considered one of the most vampire-haunted places on Earth. There's an islet in the caldera that's riddled with the graves of folk who were buried there to contain them if they rose from the dead as vrykolakes.
Plague
Question: Are vrykolakes of the bloodsucking-kind that we now think of as vampires? Or were they more like the German, „Nachzehrer“ and „Wiedergänger“, recently-deceased "unquiet-dead" who, for various reasons, "dragged the soul(s) of the living back with them", but didn't drink blood?
Because various forms of the "unquiet-dead" in German-folklore have similar "signs" on the corpse as those for vampires. And a lot of the "solutions" are the same - because they come from the same religious or practical ideas. Put something holy in/on the grave to make the deceased less restless. Do things to the corpse to make it confused, so it has difficulty leaving the grave. Use the same practices applied to deceased witches. Do things that "pin" the dead to their grave, like cutting off the head or pounding an iron spike through the chest.
Had to do a seminar presentation at university [30+ years ago!] that required me to read both volumes of Grimm's, "German Folklore." The German, „Nachzehrer“ and „Wiedergänger“ get _called_ "vampires" by people post-Dracula-movies, but really, they weren't. They were, like I said, one of the many forms of "The Unquiet Dead" that had similar signs and were dealt with in similar ways, but had different behaviors.
I remember hearing somewhere that it was theorized that the Sea Peoples may have been the Mycenaeans themselves who for whatever reason left the mainland and went on a pillaging spree in the Eastern Mediterranean.
A scholar friend I have said he didn't ever study history properly until he began looking at the Greeks as not the first Western civilization, but the last of the ancient Near Eastern civilizations. Interesting thought that's too far above my head to truly understand but makes me feel just a little smarter for considering.
On that note, there's a very interesting paper by Dr. P. Carelli on “Teaching Ancient Philosophy as a Non-Western Tradition” that makes a broader point about how contemporary western philosophy engages with the rest of the world but also makes very interesting specific points about the cultural distance between us and the Greeks even if, especially in philosophy a direct lineage is still often claimed and how that should influence how we study texts.
I like to joke on occasion that Greece should be considered Far West Asia rather than South Europe, but I enjoy the joke because I think the statement would be valid if taken seriously, too.
You, @Hombie, and @Michael Chui are all more correct than you may think. I've learned quite a lot about the pre-"Dark-Age" Mediterranean peoples over the past 3 decades.
The whole idea that, "The Egyptians, Ancient Greeks, and Roman Republic/Empire were White," originated with the 19th Century British Empire, who were trying to tie themselves to what they saw as, "Past Great Empires." This is why we end up with blond-haired-blue-eyed portrayals of Zeus, and Hercules, a Julius Caesar that wouldn't look out of place in modern Paris, and pale Pharaohs.
The only pale Ancient Greeks and Romans were _wealthy women,_ since they didn't need to work outdoors. Ancient texts remark, in particular, about [high-status] Spartan women not being marble-pale like high-status Athenian women … because Spartan women weren't locked in the house like other Ancient Greek women. You go out in the sun anywhere in the Mediterranean with a [north of the Alps/Pyrenees ] European complexion, and _you will burn._
Plus, when you look at the cultures of Ancient Greece and of Rome … they were flat-out _weird._ In Ancient Athens, "sleeping your way to the top," wasn't just allowed, it was almost _required._ [And to be clear: we're talking men with men here.] As for Rome … do you associate pooping with gossiping, political discussion, and other forms of socializing? The Romans sure did! The loo was evidently public, not-necessarily-unisex, and open - no partitions, everyone seeing everyone else. And talking while they're excreting.
The Egyptians were old when Ancient Greece and the Roman Republic were young. They went through many, many, _many changes_ over the *3000 years* prior to being conquered by Rome. That included foreign rule, including rule by the Nubian civilizations further south. Definite mixing of Subsaharan, Saharan, Middle-Eastern, and Mediterranean coastal folks. Egypt was distinct … at least until it was thoroughly digested by Rome a few centuries after Rome had eaten it. But before that? Before all of the conquest? Egypt was very much its Own Thing.
And _definitely_ darker-complexioned than the Romans and Ancient Greeks. All of the people who now so vociferously claim them as, "European culture," would demand that the Ancient Greeks, Romans, and Egyptians be deported immediately. [In the US, they'd deport them to Mexico.]
@@John_Weiss not entirely wrong but still Romans and Greeks were Europeans by the definition of the word and fairly white still. Also a big portion of the north African population was more pale than today same thing in the Caucasus and modern day turkey and Lebanon and even Syria. Also fun fact when the civilization of mesopotia and Egypt brgun to develop the world was colder back then and Sahara way greener that it is today. Same thing with the middle east it was more green than today. I just wanted to add it
My mind just thinks of them as white because I see statues carved out of natural material of that color first and my monkey brain goes “ah yes white statue white people” and that’s all she wrote!
The thing everyone misses is the connection between Minoans and Colchis. King Minos and King Aeetes are brothers in law, Pasephae is the wife of Minos and brother of Aeetes. Making the Minotaur Ethnically colchian on the human side by the way.
Marriages between royal houses always means a political alliance.
Bull was also a big holy symbol in Colchis, from the flaming bull in the Argonautica and bulls minted on colchian coin. It was a symbol of the moon and the agriculture. We to this day have bull wrestling games where you have to catch and pin the bull down.
Both Minoan and Colchian civilizations were Anatolian farmers who spread throughout Europe and brought agriculture, metalworking and Cyclopian monolithic structures.
Uhhhh… think you made a mistake there. The "Minoans" were from Crete and were mainly Aegean, as Blue just told us in this very video. The Anatolians in that time period were the Hittites and Luwians.
As for who "invented agriculture" in the Mediterranean & Middle-East, that's not clear. Our first written evidence, of course, is Sumerian and Egyptian, both from around 3000 BCE. They were probably farming well before that. I recall reading that there's _some_ evidence of_some_ proto-farming practices in Anatolia earlier than that, but also similar evidence of similar practices from other places in the region [including the Mesopotamian and Nile regions] of the same age.
There was probably no one "invention" of agriculture, but repeated developments interchanged between different peoples, before one group had a really good seed-stock and decided to just sit themselves down in one place and farm.
I'm not discounting Göbekli Tepe - Anatolian _and damn impressive._ But I recall reading that it wasn't a permanent settlement. More of a "gathering place" of some great significance for people who were still huntering-and-gathering…ing, while also planting some seeds in places for later gathering.
@@John_Weiss No, he has a point. The Minoans were actually migrants from Anatolia as genetic testing has proved.
@@Pontus-dz2xh When I looked up the Minoans a while back, and even in this video, the genetic analysis proves that the Minoans _are most closely related to the Mykeneans_ and the modern people of Greece and Crete.
Also, when someone says, "came from Anatolia," it sounds like from _all_ of Anatolia - from Lake Van to the Hellespont.
And if that were true, the Minoans would have a genetic connection to the Hittites, who lived in most of Anatolia during the Bronze Age. That connection would be _an incredibly important_ find. There was no mention of that on Wikipedia.
Lastly, I don't recall reading that there was any connection to Anatolia in the Wikipedia article. Only the strong Mykenean genetic connection was there. But please, give me a link to an article that gives the genetic analysis proving a westward migration through Anatolia to Greece and the Aegean.
@@John_Weiss all right. Some light misconceptions and bunch of conflicting theories will make this debate difficult but ill try to clarify.
Anatolian farmer is a Genetic line of Neolithic peoples that spread from central Anatolia And south Caucasus to Mediterranean coast of Europe, Bringing farming, metal working and Monolithic buildings to Europe. it is similar to later pontic steppe and north Caucasian migration that overtook Europe and central Asia. As in Came from same root culture that then localized and diversified. I didn't mean late bronze Age Anatolia. Hittites were first Big Indo European Empire that overtook Earlier Anatolian Hatian kingdom. Hatians might even be Same ethnic group as their neighbor Colchis.
I was Trying to make a point that Two ancient civilizations had marriage alliance, while being on the opposite sides of the black/Agean seas. Meaning that Bronze Age Europe was more connected than we think. a.k.a. Jason wasn't the first person to Sail the Black Sea, it was already a connected world.
it is also an important topic for me, Because i am A Georgian, which is Colchis and Iberia combined. Making us the last "Anatolian Farmer" nation in Europe and the world. Modern History is hyper fixated on Indo Europeans and its warlike conquest of Europe and asia. maybe we should look back at much more peaceful farming peoples of europe sometimes. thats it.
Damn the part about the human sacrifices was a giganic reveal! It really shines light on the realtions between the Minoans and the Achean Greeks!
Also if your interested about the Minoans and other peoples of the bronze age, check out Epimetheus heʻs a goldmine for that kind of stuff
Epimethus shouts his own random theories based in nothing but fetish and fan fiction in that horrible voice. Read scholarly literature
I saw the title and literally exclaimed aloud “Yes. Friggin yes.”
I have been waiting for a video on the Minoans for so long and you did not disappoint! Bronze Age Greece has been one of my favourite fields of study due to how little is still known about them.
Sad that we don´t know more about the minoans, happy that there is more to learn becouse finding new things is exciting.
I actually went to Crete with my family for a holiday way back in the 90s. The visit to the Knossos ruins was pretty awesome, and I remember how flabbergasted I was to learn that those guys were considered ancient even by the ancient Greeks 😊
Dame blue I really like you and oversimplified way of teaching history I could say that about extra credit but let be serious there already got them self's in so many controversy any way keep making these video man
Ec went too far down the Woke rabbit hole
"...and all of a sudden, your a Nazi"
what did they get themselves into
What happened? I'm curious
Extra credits went downhill after Dan left (and now new frame plus is awesome with him). James leaving was the final nail in the coffin, I don't really like James for all the controversy he got involved but he kept some quality in the channel.
Nowadays Extra credits is doing awful in its history videos, keep things very surface level and seems more intent on making memes or idolizing some character and ignoring historical context, and the game design side of extra credits is doing even worse, their videos are either too simple like they don't even have a game designer on board (James was a good one after all) or they try to tackle a incredibly deep and nuanced theme with no real right answer and should be discussed for at least one hour with a 5 minute video and pretend that everyone should agree with their poor developed answer (the "playing as n4z1s is wrong" and "orcs = racism" are the most infamous at this, the discussion of these things should be the point, the roots of these things would be interesting, but they just botched the entire deal)
I first learned about the Minoans in an art history class, and was almost instantly enthralled by their culture. I even wrote my final essay analyzing their art and trying to find cultural/religious significance within it. There’s something so unique about them, and the air of mystery around their religion and culture is very captivating. I absolutely love learning about them!
Every time I see the Minoan written language, I get:
1. Hopeful that we find some sort of 'Rosetta Stone' that we can decipher the language.
2. Called out, because it looks like my handwriting.
Maybe you’re actually a Minoan descendant and it’ll be your destiny to revive the civilization once you rediscover your heritage.
@@emblemblade9245 You're putting your faith in the wrong man.
Who let Dio work the ledgers drunk again?
@@MrJamesb192 Yare yare daze
This was such an interesting episode! I first heard about this sort era from Red's video on Aphrodite, and how she probably came from Babylonian myth, then to Astarte, etc. I think its really interesting to hear more about what happened between the major well known eras, like ancient Greece and Babylonia, and how all these things are often continuations of each other
i did a research paper on the minoans for an archaeology class a few years ago, they’re my favorite ancient civilization! my grandfather’s family has Kretan ancestry so i’ve always been interested in them. we actually visited Knossos once when i was like… 16? and it was SO cool, i’d love to go back someday
These are my favorite videos on this channel, the ones where myth and history overlap so much you can draw one from the other and make it make sense. Chef's kiss.
Same! My favorite video is the one Red did on Dionysus, getting into his roots in mycenaean greece
Literally my favourite ancient civilization, it's so nice to see you guys give it the coverage it deserves
I'm studying history and archeology in the university of Kalamata in Greece and this semester we're learning about the Minoans and the Myceneans but no professor has made the subject sound this epic. Kudos!
I hope Blue never loses that enthusiasm in his voice - it accents these videos *so* well.
Minoan and Mycenaean Greece is extremely fascinating to me, both because of its greatness, as well as the mysteriousness.
What a big coincidence! Because I was just researching the historical origins of certain myths the other day, and I looked into the Minoan civilization to understand more about the Minotaur's story.
Congratulations Blue, you have completely altered the world building in my D&D with just this one video.
1:32 The fact that Blue talks about the Cyclades but shows Zakynthos makes me more mad than it probably should
Lol ancient Greece was such an interesting time in European and world history that still to this very day it inspires mordent day artist and historians and there is a lot to learn form this and considering the fact that we know so much and so little at the same time about makes it more fantastic time in human history thanks
I've been to Santorini! The tourism part was awesome but we also visited some Minoan ruins and they were SO COOL!
I've been there, Krete was amazing and I got the chance to visit the area of the first settlement there as well as some museums. I got a culture overload, plenty of old cult artifacts, ruins and a cool traditional play (the story of the Kretian Bull).
I can’t wait till we translate Linear A to find 3000 tablets of tax records
Ah the Minoans, the ancient civilization that can be characterized as playing the X-Files theme, given how maddeningly sparse our info of it is.
I mean, a Mykenean invasion likely happened, but as with anything Bronze Age, we can't really say for sure. Lucky(?) for them, though, they got to peace out about 200 years before everything else around them swan-dived into the crapper
Considering the Mycenaean influences of Knossos we can say for a certain that the Mycenaeans reached Crete somehow, even if it wasn't through invasion. The Knossos that is excavated is primarily of Mycenaean influences and art. Only a few artworks from the first and second palace period exists.
Sadly there's a LOT of crackpottery around all this. I've even run into people who *insist* that the Minoan civilization didn't exist, and Crete was really an Egyptian colony based on the art and architexture and language... despite having exactly zero similarity.
Thank you for this particular video Blue :) I've been particularly fascinated by Minoan Greece, even more so than Mycenean Greece, so hearing some of it from one of my favorite channels on CZcams is a really nice treat
I think there needs to be some specification on the Minoan palaces, especially Knossos, as there's no proof they served as royal palaces housing a king and a queen. In fact, in most Minoan palaces there are barely any living spaces and if there was a living space they were not lavish enough for a royal family. These palaces had more of a role as an administrative building that would store crops, wares and products used for trade but also as a meeting place for the people living in the settlement. The inner courtyards are indicative that these palaces weren't living spaces but more of a place available for everyone as reaching the inner courtyards was easy. There was also one or more distinct throne rooms in every palace, most likely used for audiences or for welcoming foreign guests and traders. Considering how many religious spaces existed in the balance, especially the sacred baths, and with no indication of a royal family, it's indicative the palace also served as a religious temple. Since there is an absence of a distinct royal family, we cannot even conclude the Minoan society was a monarchy at all. We have some Minoan art on some sort of high standing person, the art is usually defined as "the high priest/priestess" as they are portrayed as a lot bigger in relative to other people in the frescoes and they're more lavishly dressed. There are theories that Minoan society were more governed by a religious leader as opposed to a monarch.
Edit: Also, claiming that minoans were militaristic would be quite wrong. They had no fortification not because they had a strong navy but rather because of their peaceful status as traders. They kept themselves out of war and conflict as there is no indication anyone would’ve attempted to invade them except for the Mycenaeans who also succeeded. Having colonies doesn’t automatically mean they were militaristic. Even many of archaic Greece’s italic colonies were created without conflict.
yh, they could of bought the athenians, who would of been made slaves by locals
@@profeseurchemical Not sure what that comment is supposed to mean, but there’s no indication that slavery existed in Crete. Also, Athens didn’t exist at the time of the Minoans. There was a small Mycenaean palace at Athens but that is younger than the Mycenaean palace of Knossos.
“The white and purple say we're friendly merchants. The green and white says" ... "we can and will make them a head shorter if they mean to make it a fight.” but not that.
At the Cretan Mercantile Conglomerate outpost there isn't a vending machine from Herons workshop dispensing olive oil for a sisteri. The oil would go bad, the timeline doesn't match, and neither does the geography. A movie would absolutely have one just to irritate archaeologists and historians.
@@elektrakomplexet sorry, i was working off blue's theory that there could be some truth to the mythological tribute. that the people living around what became athens could of been selling people to cretans for religious sacrifices, or supplying volunteers i guess?
@@profeseurchemical That could’ve been possible. There was a small Mycenaean settlement in the current existing Athens so them having contact with Crete could’ve been highly likely. There’s no real basis for that archaeologically but that could definitely be a possibility if there’s some basis to the myth of the Minotaur.
The connection between mythology & long-dead civilazations & ancient historical events is absolutely mind-boggling, I love learning how things have changed & shifted over time. Blue, this video was Fantastic 👌
I just finished a class on the Prehistory of Europe and this was one of the last things we talked about. Absolutely loved this video! I wish you went more into the eruption on Santorini because it is so cool!
I found Minoans Civilization to be very interesting. On the record, I am one of those people that do believed Minoans and its volcanic eruptions were the inspiration for Plato "Atlantis." You cant denied the similarity between Atlantis and Minoans.
Now I can only hope that we do found more evidence of the Minoans since they are just so fascinating as the firsy Europe Advance Civilization if it were to be true.
Ive been to the palace of king minos it was so cool. Even whent diving close by where some very old minoan pottry was underwater not even our guide knew where it came from or how it got there.
Define "close by" because the nearest body of water is several km away and as I actually live near knossos, allow me to be sceptical about the other part as well. :)
@@manos7958 i dont quite remember it was a dive we did with chania diving. I think they called it the theathere. But there was a big open cavern withe light shiming in from above and the water there was very cold. But i dont know the exact location
@@mellewindig4722 Oh, it wasn't Knossos then. That was the Minoan palace in Chania, it's often overlooked by tourists , but it's worthy of more attention.
Thank you for the history talk. I love it when you share these things with us.
I'm so excited for more ancient Greek history! One of my last undergraduate history courses focused on ancient cities and I loved the units on Minoan and Mycenean culture!
I actually got to see the castle over the summer, it was beautiful.
very coincidentially the lack on information on the Minoans was something I used as an example the other day as to why an inmortal going to school would be very difficult, if they happen to have info on civilizations so lost to time that anything they say would be hard to explain aside from calling it heresay
Thanks for uploading on my birthday blue! This is great!
this video was insanely cool, i think i found a new favourite ancient/lost civilisation. thank you for the video blue, we always appreaciate it
OMG, I have been curious since i visited Knossos, thank you!!
Sir Evans entering a random paint shop and repainting an entire 2,000 year old palace: Yes im an artist myself
Super cool! I've been working on a D&D campaign and setting that is based off of classical Greece and these videos are so helpful. I definitely want to include versions of the Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations with ruins to explore to piece together their history and lore.
Wow, the history behind the myth is amazing. This and the Dionysus and Persephone videos are top tier!
Honestly, I’ve been fascinated with the Minoans for years. Fascinated enough to make my own webcomic, although not historically accurate by any means, is heavily rooted in ancient Minoan and Greek culture and focuses on the story of the Minotaur. it stars Ariadne as a woman who’s living in an era where Minoan culture is being replaced by Greek culture.
?link
It's hard to describe how excited I am for the final translation of Linear A, the Minoan language. Apparently there was some big breakthrough recently? Think of all the crazy things we can learn from a Greek civilization that predates the Mycenaeans!
Did the translation work?
Great job drawing together two of the channel’s main focuses here.
Very nice video, I am from Crete and living in Heraklion near Knossos.
As Qui-Gon once said, there's always a bigger fish. And by bigger fish, I mean older fish. And by older fish, I also mean weirder ship.
General Kenobi, you are a bold one!
This implies that when the mycenaens stormed the minoan palace to slay the king, there was a period of hilarious hijinks as they try to figure out which fucking room hes in.
The court bard playing Scooby Doo by Simple Plan of course (knotting time up thoroughly for that joke, but who cares)
I love looking at this era, thanks for covering it!
Thank you Blue! I had forgotten about the Minoans 😅, a fantastic video! I would love podcast versions of these history deep dives so I can listen while working!
Ancient Athenians: If you love your bulls so much why don't you marry them lol
The minotaur: And I took that sh*t personally
Has he made any videos on the child sacrifice of the phoenicians? Or even the Phoenicians in general. Better known as Canaanites if you're familiar with biblical stories. They are very interesting and I would certainly like to hear more about them versus just Italy all the time XD
I did not know that the Phoenicians and the Canaanites were the same people, thank you. And no I don't think Blue has done them yet.
wait the Phoenicians and the caananites are the same thing?!
@@sylviamontaez3889 I believe that the Phoenicians and the Canaanites are the same culture/people, separated by time [with the Phoenicians being later than the Canaanites].
@@sylviamontaez3889 from what I understand is modern historians refer to them as the Phoenicians and the Hebrews were the only people who called them the Canaanites.
I think ‘Canaanite’ was a blanket term used to refer to the Semitic peoples of the Levant, of which the Phoenicians and the Israelites were both examples of.
This was a fantastic way to kick off a slew of Greek content! I am super looking forward to more Greek history, it tickles my cultural pride in the best way.
I am eagerly looking forward to this series. I've been watching OSP videos off and on for ages as they came up in recommended, but only recently subscribed, I was very glad I did when this episode came out
I was taught in high school that Pre-Mycenean Crete was definitely a peaceful, peace loving egalitarian matriarchal society until it was conquered by the warlike, male led Myceneans, who stole their culture and rewrote their deities (such as turning Athena into a war goddess, and placing male gods above them in the divine hierarchy).
Also that the matriarchal Cretan civilization was just one of several peaceful egalitarian matriarchies spread across the world that died out due to either male invasions or natural disasters.
I am exaggerating none of this. This is what my teachers actually taught me. I didn't learn until college how little we actually knew about Minoan Crete and how much of what my teachers taught so insistently was just made up to serve the message they were trying to push.
Red actually talks about this in her "Hades and Persephone" video [about 2/3 to 3/4 of the way through].
"Died out due to either male invasions or natural disasters"
So... Malestroms? (Not to mention that's how most of my weekends end too, lol)
You should play Subnautica for Charity, Blue! It's themed after your color, and you can experience impromptu shock therapy for your thallassophobia while helping the world!
It baffles me how such a large structure on a hill could be buried so deeply that nobody knew it was there for thousands of years. Geology is amazing.
Yes!!! This is everything I've ever wanted in an OSP video. You nailed it, Blue! Looking forward to the discussion in the OSPod, and more videos on Bronze Age pseudo-Greece!
Blue was the historian that got asked the "what all the Minoan mosaics mean?" question and cried.
i really really hope that linear A is translated during my lifetime. I kind of hope that it's gonna another Rosetta stone situation where they maybe find some 3 types of writing on a papyrus or stone or wall somewhere
It turns out that there's enough similarity between Linear-A and Linear-B that, if you apply the known phonetic-values of the Linear-B syllabary to the simlar-looking Linear-A symbols, you get words … that have no resemblance whatsoever to any known language.
So, very strong evidence that Linear-A is a syllabic writing system. _Could_ be the predecesor-script that the Mykeneans used to create Linear-B. But there's no way to prove the latter. And even if we could prove it, we still wouldn't be able to decipher Linear-A. ☹️
I was so excited for a minoan themed video from you!
I learned about the minoans in my classics course last year. They were my favourite to learn about, thanks for covering them!
It is quite satisfying to Greek words properly Romanized, and no longer an affront to English spelling rules. “Mycenaean” always bugged me, as soft c before e (and i) is about tje most consistent spelling rule in English.
We have spelling rules? I thought we just said it how it looked.
>English spelling rules
lmao
English, the language of guys hitting on barmaids. The writing down, uh everyone has different spelling rules. Picking one is not backwards compatible with any other languages loan words.
I may never learn what created the universe in my lifetime, but goddamn if we don't figure out minoan greece i will actually cry
I love all the videos you guys put out but this subject and script was so incredibly captivating
Love me a good ancient history video. Good job blue and please give more!
Me: *trying to 100% the map in AC Odyssey* "what the f*@& is this"
I pretty much assume every god, monster, myth and piece of folklore is just a re-telling of a re-telling of a google translate of some eccentric ruler, big battle, natural disaster, or unexplainable event.
😂😂😂
@@John_Weiss Are you laughing with me or at me? I don't care which, I'd just like it to be clear.
You guys are awesome 😎. I’ve always loved history so it was only a matter of time that I stumbled across Blue but then I started watching Red’s videos and suddenly I became so interested in classical literature, mythology, & writing. You guys are awesome and your videos are constantly the best part of my day.
Also two more days and my Athena & Poseidon pins come in the mail!!!
YES! I've been waiting for this one!
I wonder how many archeological wonders were discovered by curious rich people finding strange pottery
Do you think that, in the same way Troy existed, but was lost to time and became mythos to the ancient Greeks, the stories of the gods slaying the titans are remnants of the ancient meeting of proto Indo-European cultures and the changing of Gods as it happened?
Research suggests that -Ancient- humans though of gods as spirits of/within nature, then as farming became prevalent, the gods became more human. As cultures merged, emphasis on certain aspects of life would determine the pantheon in charge.
Gone are the days of worshipping The Sky, and Mother Earth, and Time Itself. The new gods are here, and they look and act like we do.
Add thousands of years of telephone and you get those forces of nature that WERE the gods becoming the titans, and if the gods came frome them, the titans came from somewhere.
Really neat video! Very informative and detailed. :) All of the art and architecture looks so cool!
It's 7 am on a Saturday, and I've just finished a week of 11 hour shifts, every day. I am exhausted, my brain is goop, and I can't focus on anything at all.
And this is exactly what I need to get started first thing in the morning.
Thank you Blue.