1.
Heraklion (regional unit)
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Heraklion is one of the four regional units of Crete. The capital is the city of Heraklion, the regional unit of Heraklion borders on the regional units of Rethymno to the west and Lasithi to the east. Farmlands are situated in the central and the parts, at the coast. The mountains dominate the rest of the unit, notably the south. The main mountains are parts of Ida or Idi Mountains to the west, the regional unit includes the island of Dia to the north. Except for the mountains which receive mild to cool winters unlike northern Greece, within the Heraklion regional units boundaries are a number of significant Neolithic and Minoan settlements, most notably the ancient palace complexes of Knossos and Phaistos. Important ancient cities are, Knossos Phaistos Gortys Tylissos Malia 1991 -263,8682001 -292,4822011 -305,490 The regional unit Heraklion is subdivided into 8 municipalities. These are, Archanes-Asterousia Faistos Gortyna Heraklion Hersonissos Malevizi Minoa Pediada Viannos The Heraklion prefecture was created in 1915, as a part of the 2011 Kallikratis government reform, the regional unit Heraklion was created out of the former prefecture Heraklion. The prefecture had the territory as the present regional unit. At the same time, the municipalities were reorganised, according to the table below, gR-90/E65 GR-97 GR-99 El Greco, by which Δομήνικος Θεοτοκόπουλος Domênikos Theotokópoulos, is best known. A world-famous painter, sculptor and architect Nikos Kazantzakis was born in the village Varvaro The municipal unit in which Myrtia is located, was named after him, monuments in the prefecture of Heraklion
2.
Crete
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Crete is the largest and most populous of the Greek islands, 88th-largest island in the world and the fifth-largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, after Sicily, Sardinia, Cyprus, and Corsica. Crete and a number of surrounding islands and islets constitute the region of Crete, the capital and the largest city is Heraklion. As of 2011, the region had a population of 623,065, Crete forms a significant part of the economy and cultural heritage of Greece, while retaining its own local cultural traits. It was once the centre of the Minoan civilization, which is regarded as the earliest recorded civilization in Europe. The island is first referred to as Kaptara in texts from the Syrian city of Mari dating from the 18th century BC, repeated later in Neo-Assyrian records and it was also known in ancient Egyptian as Keftiu, strongly suggesting a similar Minoan name for the island. The current name of Crete is thought to be first attested in Mycenaean Greek texts written in Linear B, through the words
3.
Messara Plain
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The Messara Plain or simply Messara is an illuvial plain in southern Crete, stretching about 50 km west-to-east and 7 km north-to-south, making it the largest plain in Crete. On a hill at its west end are the ruins of Phaestus, since 1500 BC the plain has grown up to 6 km due to a buildup of illuvial sediment. In the Messara, olive trees, vineyards and horticultural crops are grown here, part of the products grown here are placed on the domestic market. Α substantial part of the olive oil is then exported to European markets. The Messara Plain is also home to the indigenous Messara horse
4.
Geographic coordinate system
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A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system used in geography that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation, to specify a location on a two-dimensional map requires a map projection. The invention of a coordinate system is generally credited to Eratosthenes of Cyrene. Ptolemy credited him with the adoption of longitude and latitude. Ptolemys 2nd-century Geography used the prime meridian but measured latitude from the equator instead. Mathematical cartography resumed in Europe following Maximus Planudes recovery of Ptolemys text a little before 1300, in 1884, the United States hosted the International Meridian Conference, attended by representatives from twenty-five nations. Twenty-two of them agreed to adopt the longitude of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, the Dominican Republic voted against the motion, while France and Brazil abstained. France adopted Greenwich Mean Time in place of local determinations by the Paris Observatory in 1911, the latitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle between the equatorial plane and the straight line that passes through that point and through the center of the Earth. Lines joining points of the same latitude trace circles on the surface of Earth called parallels, as they are parallel to the equator, the north pole is 90° N, the south pole is 90° S. The 0° parallel of latitude is designated the equator, the plane of all geographic coordinate systems. The equator divides the globe into Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the longitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle east or west of a reference meridian to another meridian that passes through that point. All meridians are halves of great ellipses, which converge at the north and south poles, the prime meridian determines the proper Eastern and Western Hemispheres, although maps often divide these hemispheres further west in order to keep the Old World on a single side. The antipodal meridian of Greenwich is both 180°W and 180°E, the combination of these two components specifies the position of any location on the surface of Earth, without consideration of altitude or depth. The grid formed by lines of latitude and longitude is known as a graticule, the origin/zero point of this system is located in the Gulf of Guinea about 625 km south of Tema, Ghana. To completely specify a location of a feature on, in, or above Earth. Earth is not a sphere, but a shape approximating a biaxial ellipsoid. It is nearly spherical, but has an equatorial bulge making the radius at the equator about 0. 3% larger than the radius measured through the poles, the shorter axis approximately coincides with the axis of rotation
5.
Federico Halbherr
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Federico Halbherr was an Italian archaeologist and epigrapher, known for his excavations of Crete. A contemporary, good friend, and trusted advisor of Arthur Evans, some of his explorations were funded by the Archaeological Institute of America. For all the time that he explored and excavated in Crete, and was accepted as a friend by the British and Americans, Halbherr was, strictly speaking, not Italian. His native city, Rovereto, was on the Austrian side of the border in what is now northern Italy, Halbherrs first education beyond secondary school was in Vienna. At heart, however, he was an Italian and he soon went to Italy to study with Comparetti. It was under the latters auspices that he first excavated in Crete and he shared his deepest interests and also his politics with the English-speaking nationals. They were all against the Ottoman Empire and his activities in Crete and his acceptance by the English-speakers came to a rather abrupt end in 1911 through no intent and no fault of his own. The Italian government developed imperial designs on Ottoman Tripolitania, in those ten years before the rise of Italian fascism. The Italo-Turkish War was to deliver Libya to Italian rule in 1913 by the Treaty of Ouchy, an American expedition from the University of Michigan under Richard Norton, Director of the Archaeological Institute of America, began excavating at Cyrene in 1910. In July and August Halbherr and di Sanctis arrived to conduct a survey, ostensibly of archaeological sites and they were back in late 1911 a few months ahead of Italian troops, but the Americans did not know that. Shortly Herbert Fletcher De Cou, an archaeologist, was shot to death from ambush, neither he nor De Cou were in character with the supposed motives. Halbherr used them to excavate Cyrene and he was no longer trusted in the English-speaking world. He was responsible for extending the Italian law that no foreigner could excavate in Italy to Libya, federicos native city was on the left flank of the front line in the Battle of Vittorio Veneto,1918. The Italians overran the entire area, Austrian military capability was in essence destroyed. Rovereto was awarded to Italy by the 1919 Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Halbherr took no part in the war. By 1928, most of the Italian archaeologists were ardent fascists, part of the platform was to restore Roman possessions to Italy, which appealed to the antiquarians. Halbherr served on a committee under Dino Grandi to oversee Italian archaeology and he was spared the necessity to wage all-out war on his former friends by dying of natural causes in 1930. His friends did not forget him, a monument to him stands at Hagia Triada
6.
Luigi Pernier
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Luigi Pernier was an Italian archaeologist and academic now best known for his discovery of the Disc of Phaistos. Pernier came from a wealthy family—his father Giuseppe was a landowner of French descent. He attended the Liceo Ginnasio Ennio Quirino Visconti before graduating in Letters at the University of Rome in 1897 and he specialised at the Scuola di Archeologia di Roma, gaining a diploma in 1901, after spending periods studying in Crete at the Missione Archeologica Italiana under Federico Halbherr. It was at time that Pernier was involved in the discovery of the Phaistos Disc. In 1904 he married Tonina Falchi, daughter of Isidoro Falchi, from 1909 he was the first director of the newly established Italian Archaeological School of Athens. In 1914 he was director of the Archaeological Museum of Florence. Pernier spent long periods abroad during this time, especially in the summer, on Crete, from 1928 to 1929, he completed the excavations on the palace at Phaistos before becoming director of the Italian Archaeological Mission on Halbherrs death in 1930. At Cyrene, from 1925 to 1936, Pernier carried out ten excavation campaigns as part of the Italian Archaeological Mission and these duties kept him on the move so much that he died abroad, on Rhodes, where he was leading a course organised by the Società Dante Alighieri. In summer 2008 Jerome Eisenberg, described by The Times as a specialist in faked ancient art, accused Pernier of having forged his best known find, a symposium was convoked to discuss the Disc in autumn 2008. Eisenberg argues that the disc can be dated by a thermoluminescence test, the authenticity of the Phaistos disc is supported by multiple discoveries made after the disc was excavated in 1908. A sealing found in 1955 shows the only known parallel to sign 21 of the Phaistos disc, at the symposium, Eisenbergs hypothesis was therefore dismissed. A proposito di alcuni lavori eseguiti recentemente nellinterno del Teatro di Marcello, Roma, Tipografia della Reale Accademia dei Lincei,1901 Commemorazione del socio Federico Halbherr fatta dal corrispondente. Giovanni Bardi tipografo della Reale Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei,1931 Di una citta ellenica arcaica scoperta a Creta dalla Missione italiana, Roma, Calzone,1909 Heliogabalus, M. Aurelius Antoninus. Roma, L. Pasqualucci,1911 Il disco di Phaestos con caratteri pittografici, dellUnione editrice,1909 Il palazzo minoico di Festos, Scavi e studi della missione archeologica italiana a creta dal 1900 al 1934. Gli strati piu antichi e il primo palazzo, dello Stato, Libreria,1935 Il palazzo minoico di Festos, scavi e studi della Missione archeologica italiana a Creta dal 1900 al 1934. Roma, Libreria dello Stato Il tempio e laltare di Apollo a Cirene, scavi e studi dal 1925 al 1934, bergamo, Istituto italiano darti grafiche,1935 LOdeum dellAgorà di Gortina presso il Leteo. Bergamo, Istituto Italiano dArti Grafiche,1927 La raccolta archeologica Bargagli a Sarteano presso Chiusi, siena, Stab. dArti grafiche S. Bernardino,1920 Lavori eseguiti a Festos dalla Missione Archeologica Italiana dal 15 febbraio al 28 giugno 1901, relazione. Roma,1901 Lavori eseguiti dalla Missione Archeologica italiana nel palazzo di Phaestos dal 10 Febbraio al 28 maggio 1902, relazione
7.
Specials (Unicode block)
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Specials is a short Unicode block allocated at the very end of the Basic Multilingual Plane, at U+FFF0–FFFF. Of these 16 codepoints, five are assigned as of Unicode 9, U+FFFD � REPLACEMENT CHARACTER used to replace an unknown, unrecognized or unrepresentable character U+FFFE <noncharacter-FFFE> not a character. FFFE and FFFF are not unassigned in the sense. They can be used to guess a texts encoding scheme, since any text containing these is by not a correctly encoded Unicode text. The replacement character � is a found in the Unicode standard at codepoint U+FFFD in the Specials table. It is used to indicate problems when a system is unable to render a stream of data to a correct symbol and it is usually seen when the data is invalid and does not match any character, Consider a text file containing the German word für in the ISO-8859-1 encoding. This file is now opened with an editor that assumes the input is UTF-8. The first and last byte are valid UTF-8 encodings of ASCII, therefore, a text editor could replace this byte with the replacement character symbol to produce a valid string of Unicode code points. The whole string now displays like this, f�r, a poorly implemented text editor might save the replacement in UTF-8 form, the text file data will then look like this, 0x66 0xEF 0xBF 0xBD 0x72, which will be displayed in ISO-8859-1 as f�r. Since the replacement is the same for all errors this makes it impossible to recover the original character, a better design is to preserve the original bytes, including the error, and only convert to the replacement when displaying the text. This will allow the text editor to save the original byte sequence and it has become increasingly common for software to interpret invalid UTF-8 by guessing the bytes are in another byte-based encoding such as ISO-8859-1. This allows correct display of both valid and invalid UTF-8 pasted together, Unicode control characters UTF-8 Mojibake Unicodes Specials table Decodeunicodes entry for the replacement character
8.
Greek language
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Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages, native to Greece and other parts of the Eastern Mediterranean. It has the longest documented history of any living language, spanning 34 centuries of written records and its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the major part of its history, other systems, such as Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary, were used previously. The alphabet arose from the Phoenician script and was in turn the basis of the Latin, Cyrillic, Armenian, Coptic, Gothic and many other writing systems. Together with the Latin texts and traditions of the Roman world, during antiquity, Greek was a widely spoken lingua franca in the Mediterranean world and many places beyond. It would eventually become the official parlance of the Byzantine Empire, the language is spoken by at least 13.2 million people today in Greece, Cyprus, Italy, Albania, Turkey, and the Greek diaspora. Greek roots are used to coin new words for other languages, Greek. Greek has been spoken in the Balkan peninsula since around the 3rd millennium BC, the earliest written evidence is a Linear B clay tablet found in Messenia that dates to between 1450 and 1350 BC, making Greek the worlds oldest recorded living language. Among the Indo-European languages, its date of earliest written attestation is matched only by the now extinct Anatolian languages, the Greek language is conventionally divided into the following periods, Proto-Greek, the unrecorded but assumed last ancestor of all known varieties of Greek. The unity of Proto-Greek would have ended as Hellenic migrants entered the Greek peninsula sometime in the Neolithic era or the Bronze Age, Mycenaean Greek, the language of the Mycenaean civilisation. It is recorded in the Linear B script on tablets dating from the 15th century BC onwards, Ancient Greek, in its various dialects, the language of the Archaic and Classical periods of the ancient Greek civilisation. It was widely known throughout the Roman Empire, after the Roman conquest of Greece, an unofficial bilingualism of Greek and Latin was established in the city of Rome and Koine Greek became a first or second language in the Roman Empire. The origin of Christianity can also be traced through Koine Greek, Medieval Greek, also known as Byzantine Greek, the continuation of Koine Greek in Byzantine Greece, up to the demise of the Byzantine Empire in the 15th century. Much of the written Greek that was used as the language of the Byzantine Empire was an eclectic middle-ground variety based on the tradition of written Koine. Modern Greek, Stemming from Medieval Greek, Modern Greek usages can be traced in the Byzantine period and it is the language used by the modern Greeks, and, apart from Standard Modern Greek, there are several dialects of it. In the modern era, the Greek language entered a state of diglossia, the historical unity and continuing identity between the various stages of the Greek language is often emphasised. Greek speakers today still tend to regard literary works of ancient Greek as part of their own rather than a foreign language and it is also often stated that the historical changes have been relatively slight compared with some other languages. According to one estimation, Homeric Greek is probably closer to demotic than 12-century Middle English is to modern spoken English, Greek is spoken by about 13 million people, mainly in Greece, Albania and Cyprus, but also worldwide by the large Greek diaspora. Greek is the language of Greece, where it is spoken by almost the entire population
9.
Ancient Greek
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Ancient Greek includes the forms of Greek used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around the 9th century BC to the 6th century AD. It is often divided into the Archaic period, Classical period. It is antedated in the second millennium BC by Mycenaean Greek, the language of the Hellenistic phase is known as Koine. Koine is regarded as a historical stage of its own, although in its earliest form it closely resembled Attic Greek. Prior to the Koine period, Greek of the classic and earlier periods included several regional dialects, Ancient Greek was the language of Homer and of fifth-century Athenian historians, playwrights, and philosophers. It has contributed many words to English vocabulary and has been a subject of study in educational institutions of the Western world since the Renaissance. This article primarily contains information about the Epic and Classical phases of the language, Ancient Greek was a pluricentric language, divided into many dialects. The main dialect groups are Attic and Ionic, Aeolic, Arcadocypriot, some dialects are found in standardized literary forms used in literature, while others are attested only in inscriptions. There are also several historical forms, homeric Greek is a literary form of Archaic Greek used in the epic poems, the Iliad and Odyssey, and in later poems by other authors. Homeric Greek had significant differences in grammar and pronunciation from Classical Attic, the origins, early form and development of the Hellenic language family are not well understood because of a lack of contemporaneous evidence. Several theories exist about what Hellenic dialect groups may have existed between the divergence of early Greek-like speech from the common Proto-Indo-European language and the Classical period and they have the same general outline, but differ in some of the detail. The invasion would not be Dorian unless the invaders had some relationship to the historical Dorians. The invasion is known to have displaced population to the later Attic-Ionic regions, the Greeks of this period believed there were three major divisions of all Greek people—Dorians, Aeolians, and Ionians, each with their own defining and distinctive dialects. Often non-west is called East Greek, Arcadocypriot apparently descended more closely from the Mycenaean Greek of the Bronze Age. Boeotian had come under a strong Northwest Greek influence, and can in some respects be considered a transitional dialect, thessalian likewise had come under Northwest Greek influence, though to a lesser degree. Most of the dialect sub-groups listed above had further subdivisions, generally equivalent to a city-state and its surrounding territory, Doric notably had several intermediate divisions as well, into Island Doric, Southern Peloponnesus Doric, and Northern Peloponnesus Doric. The Lesbian dialect was Aeolic Greek and this dialect slowly replaced most of the older dialects, although Doric dialect has survived in the Tsakonian language, which is spoken in the region of modern Sparta. Doric has also passed down its aorist terminations into most verbs of Demotic Greek, by about the 6th century AD, the Koine had slowly metamorphosized into Medieval Greek
10.
Bronze Age
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The Bronze Age is a historical period characterized by the use of bronze, proto-writing, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the principal period of the three-age Stone-Bronze-Iron system, as proposed in modern times by Christian Jürgensen Thomsen. An ancient civilization is defined to be in the Bronze Age either by smelting its own copper and alloying with tin, arsenic, or other metals, or by trading for bronze from production areas elsewhere. Copper-tin ores are rare, as reflected in the fact there were no tin bronzes in Western Asia before trading in bronze began in the third millennium BC. Worldwide, the Bronze Age generally followed the Neolithic period, with the Chalcolithic serving as a transition, although the Iron Age generally followed the Bronze Age, in some areas, the Iron Age intruded directly on the Neolithic. Bronze Age cultures differed in their development of the first writing, according to archaeological evidence, cultures in Mesopotamia and Egypt developed the earliest viable writing systems. The overall period is characterized by use of bronze, though the place and time of the introduction. Human-made tin bronze technology requires set production techniques, tin must be mined and smelted separately, then added to molten copper to make bronze alloy. The Bronze Age was a time of use of metals. The dating of the foil has been disputed, the Bronze Age in the ancient Near East began with the rise of Sumer in the 4th millennium BC. Societies in the region laid the foundations for astronomy and mathematics, the usual tripartite division into an Early, Middle and Late Bronze Age is not used. Instead, a division based on art-historical and historical characteristics is more common. The cities of the Ancient Near East housed several tens of thousands of people, ur in the Middle Bronze Age and Babylon in the Late Bronze Age similarly had large populations. The earliest mention of Babylonia appears on a tablet from the reign of Sargon of Akkad in the 23rd century BC, the Amorite dynasty established the city-state of Babylon in the 19th century BC. Over 100 years later, it took over the other city-states. Babylonia adopted the written Semitic Akkadian language for official use, by that time, the Sumerian language was no longer spoken, but was still in religious use. Elam was an ancient civilization located to the east of Mesopotamia, in the Old Elamite period, Elam consisted of kingdoms on the Iranian plateau, centered in Anshan, and from the mid-2nd millennium BC, it was centered in Susa in the Khuzestan lowlands. Its culture played a role in the Gutian Empire and especially during the Achaemenid dynasty that succeeded it
11.
Archaeological site
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Sites may range from those with few or no remains visible above ground, to buildings and other structures still in use. Beyond this, the definition and geographical extent of a site can vary widely, depending on the period studied and it is almost invariably difficult to delimit a site. It is sometimes taken to indicate a settlement of some sort although the archaeologist must also define the limits of human activity around the settlement, any episode of deposition such as a hoard or burial can form a site as well. Development-led archaeology undertaken as cultural resources management has the disadvantage of having its sites defined by the limits of the intended development, even in this case however, in describing and interpreting the site, the archaeologist will have to look outside the boundaries of the building site. According to Jess Beck in “How Do Archaeologists find sites. ”The areas with a number of artifacts are good targets for future excavation. The most common person to have found artifacts are farmers who are plowing their fields or just cleaning them up often find archaeological artifacts, many people who are out hiking and even pilots find artifacts they usually end up reporting them to archaeologist to do further investigation. When they find sites, they have to first record the area and if they have the money, there are many ways to find sites, one example can be through surveys. Surveys involve walking around analyzing the land looking for artifacts. ”This helps archaeologists in the future. In case there was no time, or money during the finding of the site, archaeologists can come back, archaeologist can also sample randomly within a given area of land as another form of conducting surveys. Surveys are very useful, according to Jess Beck, “it can tell you where people were living at different points in the past. ”Geophysics is a branch of survey becoming more and more popular in archaeology, because it uses different types of instruments to investigate features below the ground surface. It is not as reliable, because although they can see what is under the surface of the ground it does not produce the best picture, Archaeologists have to still dig up the area in order to uncover the truth. There are also two most common types of survey, which is, magnetometer and ground penetrating radar. Magnetometry is the technique of measuring and mapping patterns of magnetism in the soil and it uses an instrument called a magnetometer which is required to measure and map traces of soil magnetism. The ground penetrating radar is a method that uses radar pulses to image the subsurface and it uses electro magnetic radiation in the microwave band of the radio spectrum, and detects the reflected signals from subsurface structures. There are many tools that can be used to find artifacts. This tool is helpful to archaeologists who want to explore in a different area. They can use this tool to see what has already been discovered, with this information available, archaeologists can expand their research and add more to what has already been found. Traditionally, sites are distinguished by the presence of artifacts and features
12.
Mediterranean Sea
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The sea is sometimes considered a part of the Atlantic Ocean, although it is usually identified as a separate body of water. The name Mediterranean is derived from the Latin mediterraneus, meaning inland or in the middle of land and it covers an approximate area of 2.5 million km2, but its connection to the Atlantic is only 14 km wide. The Strait of Gibraltar is a strait that connects the Atlantic Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea and separates Gibraltar. In oceanography, it is called the Eurafrican Mediterranean Sea or the European Mediterranean Sea to distinguish it from mediterranean seas elsewhere. The Mediterranean Sea has a depth of 1,500 m. The sea is bordered on the north by Europe, the east by Asia and it is located between latitudes 30° and 46° N and longitudes 6° W and 36° E. Its west-east length, from the Strait of Gibraltar to the Gulf of Iskenderun, the seas average north-south length, from Croatia’s southern shore to Libya, is approximately 800 km. The Mediterranean Sea, including the Sea of Marmara, has an area of approximately 2,510,000 square km. The sea was an important route for merchants and travelers of ancient times that allowed for trade, the history of the Mediterranean region is crucial to understanding the origins and development of many modern societies. In addition, the Gaza Strip and the British Overseas Territories of Gibraltar and Akrotiri, the term Mediterranean derives from the Latin word mediterraneus, meaning amid the earth or between land, as it is between the continents of Africa, Asia and Europe. The Ancient Greek name Mesogeios, is similarly from μέσο, between + γη, land, earth) and it can be compared with the Ancient Greek name Mesopotamia, meaning between rivers. The Mediterranean Sea has historically had several names, for example, the Carthaginians called it the Syrian Sea and latter Romans commonly called it Mare Nostrum, and occasionally Mare Internum. Another name was the Sea of the Philistines, from the people inhabiting a large portion of its shores near the Israelites, the sea is also called the Great Sea in the General Prologue by Geoffrey Chaucer. In Ottoman Turkish, it has also been called Bahr-i Sefid, in Modern Hebrew, it has been called HaYam HaTikhon, the Middle Sea, reflecting the Seas name in ancient Greek, Latin, and modern languages in both Europe and the Middle East. Similarly, in Modern Arabic, it is known as al-Baḥr al-Mutawassiṭ, in Turkish, it is known as Akdeniz, the White Sea since among Turks the white colour represents the west. Several ancient civilisations were located around the Mediterranean shores, and were influenced by their proximity to the sea. It provided routes for trade, colonisation, and war, as well as food for numerous communities throughout the ages, due to the shared climate, geology, and access to the sea, cultures centered on the Mediterranean tended to have some extent of intertwined culture and history. Two of the most notable Mediterranean civilisations in classical antiquity were the Greek city states, later, when Augustus founded the Roman Empire, the Romans referred to the Mediterranean as Mare Nostrum
13.
Europa (mythology)
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In Greek mythology Europa was the mother of King Minos of Crete, a woman with Phoenician origin of high lineage, and for whom the continent Europe was named. This can especially be said of the story of Europa, Europas earliest literary reference is in the Iliad, which is commonly dated to the 8th century BC. Another early reference to her is in a fragment of the Hesiodic Catalogue of Women, the earliest vase-painting securely identifiable as Europa dates from mid-7th century BC. Greek Εὐρώπη Eurṓpē contains the elements εὐρύς, wide, broad and ὤψ/ὠπ-/ὀπτ- eye, broad has been an epithet of Earth herself in the reconstructed Proto-Indo-European religion. It is common in ancient Greek mythology and geography to identify lands or rivers with female figures, thus, Europa is first used in a geographic context in the Homeric Hymn to Delian Apollo, in reference to the western shore of the Aegean Sea. As a name for a part of the world, it is first used in the 6th century BC by Anaximander. Barry adduces the word Ereb on an Assyrian stele with the meaning of night, sunset, in opposition to Asu sunrise and this proposal is mostly considered unlikely or untenable. They call it the temple of Astarte, I hold this Astarte to be no other than the moon-goddess. But according to the story of one of the priests this temple is sacred to Europa and this legend I heard from other Phœnicians as well, and the coinage current among the Sidonians bears upon it the effigy of Europa sitting upon a bull, none other than Zeus. Thus they do not agree that the temple in question is sacred to Europa, the paradox, as it seemed to Lucian, would be solved if Europa is Astarte in her guise as the full, broad-faced moon. Sources differ in details regarding Europas family, but agree that she is Phoenician, and from a lineage that descended from Io, the mythical nymph beloved of Zeus, who was transformed into a heifer. She is generally said to be the daughter of Agenor, the Phoenician King of Tyre, other sources, such as the Iliad, claim that she is the daughter of Agenors son, the sun-red Phoenix. So some interpret this as her brother Phoenix gave his siblings name to his three children and this Europa is also loved by Zeus, but because of the same name, gave some confusions to others. After arriving in Crete, Europa had three sons fathered by Zeus, Minos, Rhadamanthus, and Sarpedon, the three of whom became the three judges of the Underworld when they died, in Crete she married Asterion also rendered Asterius and became mother of his daughter Crete. There were two competing myths relating how Europa came into the Hellenic world, but they agreed that she came to Crete, the mythical Europa cannot be separated from the mythology of the sacred bull, which had been worshipped in the Levant. There is also a sanctuary of Demeter Europa, the mythographers tell that Zeus was enamored of Europa and decided to seduce or ravish her, the two being near-equivalent in Greek myth. He transformed himself into a white bull and mixed in with her fathers herds. While Europa and her helpers were gathering flowers, she saw the bull, caressed his flanks, Zeus took that opportunity and ran to the sea and swam, with her on his back, to the island of Crete
14.
Talos
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In Greek mythology, Talos or Talon was a giant automaton made of bronze to protect Europa in Crete from pirates and invaders. He circled the islands three times daily. Alternatively Talos could be figured as a sacred bull, the conception that Hesiods men of the Age of Bronze were actually made of bronze is extended to men of the age of gold by Lucian for humorous effect. The pseudo-Platonic dialogue Minos rationalized the myth, thrice yearly showing at each village in turn the laws of Minos inscribed on brass tablets, according to Brian A. Sparkes, The most detailed treatment in literature is to be found in the Argonautica. However, we have detailed images of the episode,150 years earlier, Talos is said to have been made by Hephaestus at the request of Zeus, to protect Europa from people who would want to kidnap her. In some versions of the myth, Talos is forged by the inventor Daedalus, in the Cretan dialect, talôs was the equivalent of the Greek hêlios, the Sun, the lexicon of Hesychius of Alexandria notes simply Talos is the Sun. In Crete, Zeus was worshipped as Zeus Tallaios, Solar Zeus, the god was identified with the Tallaia, a spur of the Ida range in Crete. On the coin from Phaistos he is winged, in Greek vase-paintings, the ideas of Talos vary widely, with one consistent detail, in Greek imagery outside Crete, Talos is always being vanquished, he seems to have been an enigmatic figure to the Greeks themselves. Talos is described by Greeks in two versions, in one version, Talos is a gift from Hephaestus to Minos, forged with the aid of the Cyclopes in the form of a bull. In the other version, Talos is a gift from Zeus to Europa, or he may have been the son of Kres, the personification of Crete, in Argonautica Talos threw rocks at any approaching ship to protect his island. Talos had one vein, which went from his neck to his ankle, the Argo, transporting Jason and the Argonauts, approached Crete after obtaining the Golden Fleece. As guardian of the island, Talos kept the Argo at bay by hurling great boulders at it, peter Green, translator of Argonautica, notes that the story is somewhat reminiscent of the story regarding the heel of Achilles. In Argonautica, Apollonius notes that the ichor, cook first suggested that the single vein closed by a nail or plug referred to the lost-wax method of casting. Robert Graves suggests that this myth is based on a misinterpretation of an image of Athena demonstrating the process of casting of steel. 2, a bronze sculpture in Portland, Oregon Talos in the Greek Mythology Link
15.
Heracles
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Heracles, born Alcaeus or Alcides, was a divine hero in Greek mythology, the son of Zeus and Alcmene, foster son of Amphitryon and great-grandson and half-brother of Perseus. He was the greatest of the Greek heroes, a paragon of masculinity, the ancestor of clans who claimed to be Heracleidae. In Rome and the modern West, he is known as Hercules, with whom the later Roman emperors, in particular Commodus and Maximian, often identified themselves. The Romans adopted the Greek version of his life and works essentially unchanged, details of his cult were adapted to Rome as well. Extraordinary strength, courage, ingenuity, and sexual prowess with both males and females were among the characteristics commonly attributed to him, together with Hermes he was the patron and protector of gymnasia and palaestrae. His iconographic attributes are the skin and the club. These qualities did not prevent him from being regarded as a figure who used games to relax from his labors. By conquering dangerous archaic forces he is said to have made the safe for mankind. Many popular stories were told of his life, the most famous being The Twelve Labours of Heracles and his figure, which initially drew on Near Eastern motifs such as the lion-fight, was widely known. Heracles was the greatest of Hellenic chthonic heroes, but unlike other Greek heroes, the core of the story of Heracles has been identified by Walter Burkert as originating in Neolithic hunter culture and traditions of shamanistic crossings into the netherworld. Heracles role as a hero, whose death could be a subject of mythic telling, was accepted into the Olympian Pantheon during Classical times. Around him cries of the dead rang out like cries of birds scattering left, in Christian circles a Euhemerist reading of the widespread Heracles cult was attributed to a historical figure who had been offered cult status after his death. The ancient Greeks celebrated the festival of the Heracleia, which commemorated the death of Heracles, what is believed to be an Egyptian Temple of Heracles in the Bahariya Oasis dates to 21 BCE. A reassessment of Ptolemys descriptions of the island of Malta attempted to link the site at Ras ir-Raħeb with a temple to Heracles, several ancient cities were named Heraclea in his honor. A major factor in the tragedies surrounding Heracles is the hatred that the goddess Hera. A full account of Heracles must render it clear why Heracles was so tormented by Hera, Heracles was the son of the affair Zeus had with the mortal woman Alcmene. Zeus made love to her after disguising himself as her husband, Amphitryon, thus, Heracles very existence proved at least one of Zeus many illicit affairs, and Hera often conspired against Zeus mortal offspring as revenge for her husbands infidelities. His twin mortal brother, son of Amphitryon, was Iphicles, Hera did this knowing that while Heracles was to be born a descendant of Perseus, so too was Eurystheus
16.
Zeus
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Zeus /ˈzjuːs/ is the sky and thunder god in ancient Greek religion, who ruled as king of the gods of Mount Olympus. His name is cognate with the first element of his Roman equivalent Jupiter and his mythologies and powers are similar, though not identical, to those of the Indo-European deities such as Indra, Jupiter, Perun, Thor, and Odin. Zeus is the child of Cronus and Rhea, the youngest of his siblings to be born, in most traditions, he is married to Hera, by whom he is usually said to have fathered Ares, Hebe, and Hephaestus. At the oracle of Dodona, his consort was said to be Dione, Zeus was also infamous for his erotic escapades. These resulted in many godly and heroic offspring, including Athena, Apollo, Artemis, Hermes, Persephone, Dionysus, Perseus, Heracles, Helen of Troy, Minos, and the Muses. He was equated with many foreign weather gods, permitting Pausanias to observe That Zeus is king in heaven is a common to all men. His symbols are the thunderbolt, eagle, bull, and oak, in addition to his Indo-European inheritance, the classical cloud-gatherer also derives certain iconographic traits from the cultures of the Ancient Near East, such as the scepter. Zeus is frequently depicted by Greek artists in one of two poses, standing, striding forward with a thunderbolt leveled in his right hand. The gods name in the nominative is Ζεύς Zeús and it is inflected as follows, vocative, Ζεῦ Zeû, accusative, Δία Día, genitive, Διός Diós, dative, Διί Dií. Diogenes Laertius quotes Pherecydes of Syros as spelling the name, Ζάς, Zeus is the Greek continuation of *Di̯ēus, the name of the Proto-Indo-European god of the daytime sky, also called *Dyeus ph2tēr. The god is known under this name in the Rigveda, Latin, Zeus is the only deity in the Olympic pantheon whose name has such a transparent Indo-European etymology. The earliest attested forms of the name are the Mycenaean Greek
17.
Thomas Abel Brimage Spratt
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Thomas Abel Brimage Spratt was an English vice-admiral, hydrographer, and geologist. He was born at Woodway House, East Teignmouth and is the eldest surviving son of Commander James Spratt, RN and he joined the Royal Navy at age 16 in 1827 and was attached to the surveying branch on HMS Victory. He was engaged almost continuously until 1863 in surveying the Mediterranean while in command of the converted sixth-rate HMS Volage, as commander of the Spitfire he rendered distinguished service in the Black Sea during the Crimean War, and was appointed CB in 1855. At an earlier date he was associated with Edward Forbes, then naturalist to the Beacon and he was specially indebted to Forbes for his interest in natural history and geology, and together they published Travels in Lycia, etc. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society as The author of Travels in Lycia and he published his research in 1856 and was congratulated for the clarity and practicality of his work by Isambard Kingdom Brunel, who was building the South Devon Railway at the time. Spratt investigated the caves at Malta and obtained remains of the pygmy elephant and he investigated the geology of several Greek islands, the shores of Asia Minor, and the Nile delta. He was especially distinguished for his Travels and Researches in Crete, in which he described the geography, geology, archaeology. Two fossil species were named in his honour and several books were dedicated to him and he was commissioner of fisheries from 1866 to 1873, and acting conservator of the River Mersey from 1879 until his death in 1888. He died at Tunbridge Wells on 12 March 1888 and he had married in Sophia Price, they had one son. He had added it, because it was above the ruins of the identified Greek city of Novo Ilium, observing the map, Schliemann saw Troy with a question mark and decided to begin digging, which led to the discovery of Troy. An Investigation of the Movements of Teignmouth Bar
18.
Strabo
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Strabo was a Greek geographer, philosopher, and historian who lived in Asia Minor during the transitional period of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire. Strabo was born to an affluent family from Amaseia in Pontus, Strabos life was characterized by extensive travels. He journeyed to Egypt and Kush, as far west as coastal Tuscany and as far south as Ethiopia in addition to his travels in Asia Minor and the time he spent in Rome. Travel throughout the Mediterranean and Near East, especially for scholarly purposes, was popular during this era and was facilitated by the relative peace enjoyed throughout the reign of Augustus. He moved to Rome in 44 BC, and stayed there, studying and writing, in 29 BC, on his way to Corinth, he visited the island of Gyaros in the Aegean Sea. Around 25 BC, he sailed up the Nile until reaching Philae and it is not known precisely when Strabos Geography was written, though comments within the work itself place the finished version within the reign of Emperor Tiberius. Some place its first drafts around 7 BC, others around 17 or 18 AD, the latest passage to which a date can be assigned is his reference to the death in AD23 of Juba II, king of Maurousia, who is said to have died just recently. He probably worked on the Geography for many years and revised it steadily, on the presumption that recently means within a year, Strabo stopped writing that year or the next, when he died. The first of Strabos major works, Historical Sketches, written while he was in Rome, is completely lost. Strabo studied under several prominent teachers of various specialties throughout his life at different stops along his Mediterranean travels. His first chapter of education took place in Nysa under the master of rhetoric Aristodemus, Strabo was an admirer of Homers poetry, perhaps a consequence of his time spent in Nysa with Aristodemus. At around the age of 21, Strabo moved to Rome, where he studied philosophy with the Peripatetic Xenarchus, despite Xenarchuss Aristotelian leanings, Strabo later gives evidence to have formed his own Stoic inclinations. In Rome, he learned grammar under the rich and famous scholar Tyrannion of Amisus. Although Tyrannion was also a Peripatetic, he was more relevantly a respected authority on geography, the final noteworthy mentor to Strabo was Athenodorus Cananites, a philosopher who had spent his life since 44 BC in Rome forging relationships with the Roman elite. Athenodorus endowed to Strabo three important items, his philosophy, his knowledge, and his contacts, moreover, from his own first-hand experience, Athenodorus provided Strabo with information about regions of the empire which he would not otherwise have known. Strabo is most notable for his work Geographica, which presented a history of people. Although the Geographica was rarely utilized in its antiquity, a multitude of copies survived throughout the Byzantine Empire. It first appeared in Western Europe in Rome as a Latin translation issued around 1469, the first Greek edition was published in 1516 in Venice
19.
Gortyn
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Gortyn, Gortys or Gortyna is a municipality and an archaeological site on the Mediterranean island of Crete,45 km away from the modern capital Heraklion. The seat of the municipality is the village Agioi Deka, Gortyn, the Roman capital of Creta et Cyrenaica, was first inhabited around 3200 BC. There is evidence of occupation in Gortyn as far back as the Neolithic era. Many artifacts have been found from the Minoan period, as well as some from the Dorian, the city was complimented by Plato and many others. The city of Gortyn surpassed the prominence of Phaistos during the first millennium BC, the period of its great prosperity, however, coincided with the Hellenistic era. Gortyn had excellent relations with Ptolemy IV of Egypt, and experienced a new period of prosperity during the Roman period. As it had allied with the Romans, it avoided the disaster that happened to many other Cretan cities, Gortyn continued to rise under Roman rule, and became the capital of the joint province of Creta et Cyrenaica. From the 4th century it was the capital of a province of Crete. The city was destroyed in ca, AD828 by invading Arabs, who established their own state on the island. One of the first Christian temples was built here and the remains of an important Christian cathedral of Crete can still be seen today and this cathedral, dedicated to St. Titus, the first Bishop of Crete, was erected in the 6th century AD. Built with large stones, this cathedral keeps its intended height only in the areas of the Holy Bema. The church structure is a cruciform with a dome which is based on four pillars, excavations of Gortyn were begun in 1884 by the Italian School of Archaeology at Athens. The excavations showed that Gortyn was inhabited from the Neolithic age, ruins of a settlement on the citadel of Gortyn, were discovered and dated back to 1050 BC, their collapse dating to the seventh century BC. Later the area was fortified with a wall, at the top of the hill in the citadel a temple was found dating to the 7th century BC. In this area two embossed plates were found, along several other sculptures and paintings. Daedalic plastic and many other clay figurines, black and red figure paintings and plenty of pottery, graves dating to the geometric age were found on the south side of the citadel. Regarding the lower town, the excavation uncovered the position of the Agora and the temple of Pythian Apollo, at the foot of Prophet Elias are traces of a sanctuary of Demeter. 35°3′48″N 24°56′49″E The heart of Roman Gortyn is the Praetorium, the seat of the Roman Governor of Crete, the Praetorium was built in the 1st century AD, but it was altered significantly over the next eight centuries
20.
Matala, Crete
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Matala is a village located 75 km south-west of Heraklion, Crete, Greece. Matala is part of the community of Pitsidia within the unit of Festos. The artificial caves in the cliff of the Matala bay were created in the Neolithic Age, Matala was the port of Phaistos during the Minoan period. Matala was occupied by the Gortynians, and during the Roman period, in the 1st and 2nd centuries, the caves were used as tombs. One of the caves is called Brutospeliana because according to the legend it was frequented by the Roman general Brutus, Matala was then a fishing village. In the 1960s, the caves were occupied by hippies who were driven out by the church. Now Matala is a village living mainly from tourism. Canadian folk singer Joni Mitchells experiences with the Matala hippies were immortalised in her 1971 song Carey, when Zeus seduced the princess Europa in the form of a white bull, he crossed the sea and brought her to the beach of Matala. There he changed into an eagle and flew her to Gortys where he had sex with her. In Command & Conquer, Generals Zero Hour, the USS Ronald Reagan, along with the support group docked in Matala. In Simon Scarrows historical adventure novel, The Gladiator, the protagonists beach their ship just outside Matala after it is damaged by a tsunami
21.
Knossos
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Knossos is the largest Bronze Age archaeological site on Crete and is considered Europes oldest city. The name Knossos survives from ancient Greek references to the city of Crete. The coins came from the Roman settlement of Colonia Julia Nobilis Cnossus, a Roman colony placed just to the north of, the Romans believed they had colonized Knossos. The second palace was built on a grander scale over the old Palace after an earthquake destroyed it. The structure and ruins we see today are from the second Palace, during the Bronze Age, the town surrounded the hill on which the palace was built. The site was discovered in 1878 by Minos Kalokairinos, the excavations in Knossos began in AD1900 by the English archaeologist Sir Arthur Evans and his team, and they continued for 35 years. The palace was excavated and partially restored under the direction of Arthur Evans in the earliest years of the 20th century. Its size far exceeded his expectations, as did the discovery of two ancient scripts, which he termed Linear A and Linear B, to distinguish their writing from the pictographs also present. The palace of Knossos was undoubtedly the ceremonial and political centre of the Minoan civilization and it appears as a maze of workrooms, living spaces, and storerooms close to a central square. The palace was abandoned at some time at the end of the Late Bronze Age. The occasion is not known for certain, but one of the disasters that befell the palace is generally put forward. The hill was never again a settlement or civic site, although squatters may have used it for a time, however, fieldwork in 2015 revealed that during the early Iron Age, Knossos was rich in imports and was nearly three times larger than indicated by earlier excavations. Except for periods of abandonment, other cities were founded in the vicinity, such as the Roman colony. The population shifted to the new town of Chandax during the 9th century AD, by the 13th century, it was called Makruteikhos Long Wall, the bishops of Gortyn continued to call themselves Bishops of Knossos until the 19th century. Today, the name is used only for the site now situated in the expanding suburbs of Heraklion. In the first palace period around 2000 BC the urban area reached a size of up to 18,000 people, in its peak the Palace and the surrounding city boasted a population of 100,000 people shortly after 1700 BC. The name Knossos was formerly Latinized as Cnossus or Cnossos, and occasionally Knossus, Gnossus and this site history is to be distinguished from the ancient. In Greek mythology, King Minos dwelt in a palace at Knossos and he had Daedalus construct a labyrinth, a very large maze in which to retain his son, the Minotaur
22.
Arthur Evans
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Sir Arthur John Evans FRS FREng was an English archaeologist and pioneer in the study of Aegean civilization in the Bronze Age. He is most famous for unearthing the palace of Knossos on the Greek island of Crete, Evans was also the first to define Cretan scripts Linear A and Linear B, as well as an earlier pictographic writing. He was, on request of the organizations of the peoples of the Balkans. Arthur Evans was born in Nash Mills, England, the first child of John Evans and Harriet Ann Dickinson, the daughter of Johns employer, inventor and founder of Messrs John Dickinson, a paper mill. John Evans came from a family of men who were educated and intellectually active, they were nevertheless undistinguished by either wealth or aristocratic connection. Johns father, Arthur Benoni Evans, Arthurs grandfather, had been headmaster of Market Bosworth Grammar School, John knew Latin and could quote the classical authors. In 1840, instead of going to college, John started work in the mill owned by his maternal uncle and he married his cousin, Harriet, in 1850, which entitled him, in 1851, to a junior partnership in the family business. Profits from the mill would eventually help fund Arthurs excavations, restorations at Knossos, for the time being they were an unpretentious and affectionate family. They moved into a row house built for the purpose near the mill. Grandmother Evans called Arthur darling Trot, asserting in a note that, compared to his father, in 1856, with Harriets declining health and Jacks growing reputation and prosperity, they moved into Harriets childhood home, a mansion with a garden, where the children ran free. John maintained his status as an officer in the company, which eventually became John Dickinson Stationery and his interest in geology came from an assignment by the company to study the diminishing water resources in the area with a view toward protecting the company from lawsuits. The mill consumed large amounts of water, which was also needed for the canals and he became an expert and a legal consultant. However, collecting was endemic to the family, his father and grandfather both had done it and he was more interested in the stone-age artifacts he was discovering while mapping stream beds. As Arthur grew older, he was allowed to assist John in looking for artifacts, ultimately John became a distinguished antiquary, publishing numerous books and articles. In 1859 he conducted a survey of the Somme Valley with Joseph Prestwich. His connections and invaluable advice were indispensable to Arthurs career throughout the remainder of his long life, Arthurs mother, Harriet, died in 1858 when Arthur was seven. He had two brothers, Philip Norman and Lewis, and two sisters, Alice and Harriet and he would remain on excellent terms with all of them all of his life. He was raised by a stepmother, Fanny, née Phelps and she had no children of her own and also predeceased her husband
23.
Minoan civilization
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The Minoan civilization was an Aegean Bronze Age civilization on the island of Crete and other Aegean islands which flourished from about 2600 to 1100 BC. It preceded the Mycenaean civilization of Ancient Greece, the civilization was rediscovered at the beginning of the 20th century through the work of British archaeologist Arthur Evans. It has been described as the earliest of its kind in Europe, the term Minoan, which refers to the mythical King Minos, originally described the pottery of the period. Minos was associated in Greek mythology with the labyrinth and the Minotaur, according to Homer, Crete once had 90 cities. The Minoan period saw trade between Crete and Aegean and Mediterranean settlements, particularly the Near East, traders and artists, the Minoan cultural influence reached beyond Crete to the Cyclades, Egypts Old Kingdom, copper-bearing Cyprus, Canaan and the Levantine coast, and Anatolia. Some of its best art is preserved in the city of Akrotiri on the island of Santorini, although the Minoan language and writing systems remain undecipherable and are subjects of academic dispute, they apparently conveyed a language entirely different from the later Greek. The reason for the end of the Minoan period is unclear, theories include Mycenaean invasions from mainland Greece, the term Minoan refers to the mythical King Minos of Knossos. Its origin is debated, but it is attributed to archeologist Arthur Evans. Minos was associated in Greek mythology with the labyrinth, which Evans identified with the site at Knossos. However, Karl Hoeck had already used the title Das Minoische Kreta in 1825 for volume two of his Kreta, this appears to be the first known use of the word Minoan to mean ancient Cretan, Evans said that applied it, not invented it. Hoeck, with no idea that the archaeological Crete had existed, had in mind the Crete of mythology, although Evans 1931 claim that the term was unminted before he used it was called a brazen suggestion by Karadimas and Momigliano, he coined its archaeological meaning. Instead of dating the Minoan period, archaeologists use two systems of relative chronology, the first, created by Evans and modified by later archaeologists, is based on pottery styles and imported Egyptian artifacts. Evans system divides the Minoan period into three eras, early, middle and late. These eras are subdivided—for example, Early Minoan I, II and III, another dating system, proposed by Greek archaeologist Nicolas Platon, is based on the development of architectural complexes known as palaces at Knossos, Phaistos, Malia and Kato Zakros. Platon divides the Minoan period into pre-, proto-, neo-, the relationship between the systems in the table includes approximate calendar dates from Warren and Hankey. The Thera eruption occurred during a phase of the LM IA period. Efforts to establish the volcanic eruptions date have been controversial, the eruption is identified as a natural event catastrophic for the culture, leading to its rapid collapse. Although stone-tool evidence exists that hominins may have reached Crete as early as 130,000 years ago, evidence for the first anatomically-modern human presence dates to 10, the oldest evidence of modern human habitation on Crete are pre-ceramic Neolithic farming-community remains which date to about 7000 BC
24.
Linear B
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Linear B is a syllabic script that was used for writing Mycenaean Greek, the earliest attested form of Greek. The script predates the Greek alphabet by several centuries, the oldest Mycenaean writing dates to about 1450 BC. It is descended from the older Linear A, an earlier script used for writing the Minoan language, as is the later Cypriot syllabary. Linear B, found mainly in the archives at Knossos, Cydonia, Pylos, Thebes and Mycenae. The succeeding period, known as the Greek Dark Ages, provides no evidence of the use of writing and it is also the only one of the prehistoric Aegean scripts to have been deciphered, by English architect and self-taught linguist Michael Ventris. Linear B consists of around 87 syllabic signs and over 100 ideographic signs and these ideograms or signifying signs symbolize objects or commodities. They have no value and are never used as word signs in writing a sentence. The application of Linear B appears to have been confined to administrative contexts, in all the thousands of clay tablets, a relatively small number of different hands have been detected,45 in Pylos and 66 in Knossos. It is possible that the script was used only by a guild of professional scribes who served the central palaces, once the palaces were destroyed, the script disappeared. Linear B has roughly 200 signs, divided into syllabic signs with phonetic values, the representations and naming of these signs have been standardized by a series of international colloquia starting with the first in Paris in 1956. Colloquia continue, the 13th occurred in 2010 in Paris, many of the signs are identical or similar to those in Linear A, however, Linear A encodes an as-yet unknown language, and it is uncertain whether similar signs had the same phonetic values. The grid developed during decipherment by Michael Ventris and John Chadwick of phonetic values for syllabic signs is shown below, initial consonants are in the leftmost column, vowels are in the top row beneath the title. The transcription of the syllable is listed next to the sign along with Bennetts identifying number for the sign preceded by an asterisk, in cases where the transcription of the sign remains in doubt, Bennetts number serves to identify the sign. The signs on the tablets and sealings often show considerable variation from each other, discovery of the reasons for the variation and possible semantic differences is a topic of ongoing debate in Mycenaean studies. Many of these were identified by the edition and are shown in the special values below. The second edition relates, It may be taken as axiomatic that there are no true homophones, the unconfirmed identifications of *34 and *35 as ai2 and ai3 were removed. Other values remain unknown, mainly because of scarcity of evidence concerning them, note that *34 and *35 are mirror images of each other but whether this graphic relationship indicates a phonetic one remains unconfirmed. In recent times, CIPEM inherited the authority of Bennett
25.
Syllabary
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A syllabary is a set of written symbols that represent the syllables or moras which make up words. This loosely corresponds to shallow orthographies in alphabetic writing systems, most syllabaries only feature one or two kinds of syllabograms and form other syllables by graphemic rules. Otherwise they are synthetic, if they vary by onset, rime, nucleus or coda, or systematic, some scholars, e. g. Daniels, reserve the general term for analytic syllabaries and invent other terms as necessary. Some system provides katakana language conversion, in addition, the undecoded Cretan Linear A is also believed by some to be a syllabic script, though this is not proven. Chinese characters, the script used for Sumerian, Akkadian and other languages. They are therefore referred to as logosyllabic. The contemporary Japanese language uses two syllabaries together called kana, namely hiragana and katakana, which were developed around 700. They are mainly used to some native words and grammatical elements, as well as foreign words. Because Japanese uses mainly CV syllables, a syllabary is well suited to write the language, as in many syllabaries, however, vowel sequences and final consonants are written with separate glyphs, so that both atta and kaita are written with three kana, あった and かいた. It is therefore called a moraic writing system. Languages that use syllabaries today tend to have simple phonotactics, with a predominance of monomoraic syllables, few syllabaries have glyphs for syllables that are not monomoraic, and those that once did have simplified over time to eliminate that complexity. For example, the Vai syllabary originally had separate glyphs for syllables ending in a coda, the modern script has been expanded to cover all moras, but at the same time reduced to exclude all other syllables. g. Ko-no-so for Κνωσός Knōsos, pe-ma for σπέρμα sperma, the Cherokee syllabary generally uses dummy vowels for coda consonants, but also has a segmental grapheme for /s/, which can be used both as a coda and in an initial /sC/ consonant cluster. The languages of South Asia and Southeast Asia, as well as the Ethiopian Semitic languages, have a type of alphabet called an abugida or alphasyllabary, in the 19th century these systems were called syllabics, a term which has survived in the name of Canadian Aboriginal syllabics. In a true syllabary there may be graphic similarity between characters that share a common consonant or vowel sound, but it is not systematic or close to regular. For example, the characters for ke, ka, and ko in Japanese hiragana have no similarity to indicate their common k sound, compare abugida, where each grapheme typically represents a syllable but where characters representing related sounds are all similar graphically. For example, in Devanagari, an abugida, the characters for ke, ka and ko are के, का and को respectively. English, along many other Indo-European languages like German and Russian, allows for complex syllable structures
26.
Michael Ventris
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A student of languages, Ventris had pursued the decipherment as a vocation since his adolescence. After creating a new field of study, Ventris died in an accident a few weeks before the publication of his definitive work. Ventris was born into an army family. His father, Edward Francis Vereker Ventris, reached the rank of lieutenant colonel in the Indian Army, however, his career was brought to an end, as he contracted tuberculosis. His grandfather, Francis Ventris, was a major-general who ended his career as Commander of British Forces in China, during his time in England, Edward Ventris met and married Anna Dorothea Janasz, the daughter of a wealthy Jewish immigrant landholder from Poland. Michael Ventris was their only child, health became an issue early on in Ventriss life, as he developed at a young age chronic bronchial asthma. The family then moved to Switzerland for eight years, seeking a clean, a number of health clinics and spas catered to the physical well-being of Ventris, constantly observing his well-being. Ventris started school in Gstaad, where classes were taught in French and he soon was fluent in both languages and showing proficiency for Swiss German. He was capable of learning a language within a matter of weeks and his mother, of Polish descent, often spoke to him in her own tongue, in which he was fluent by the age of eight. At this time, he was reading Adolf Ermans Die Hieroglyphen in German, in 1931, the Ventris family returned home. Michaels fathers physical condition was worsening as he got older, from 1931 to 1935 Ventris was sent to Bickley Hill School in Stowe. His parents, unable to continue living together, divorced in 1935, at this time, he secured a scholarship to Stowe School for Boys Stowe School, quartered in an 18th-century stately home. At Stowe he learned some Latin and classical Greek, when he was not away at school, Ventris lived with his mother, before 1935 in coastal hotels, after 1935 in the avant garde Berthold Lubetkins Highpoint modernist apartments in Highgate. His mothers acquaintances, who frequented the house, included many sculptors, painters, the money for her sophisticated lifestyle came from the Polish estates. Ventriss father died in 1938 when Ventris was 16 years old, dora became administrator of the estate. After the German invasion of Poland in 1939 the family holdings in that country were gone, Ventris lost his mother to clinical depression and an overdose of barbiturates. He never spoke of her, assuming instead an ebullient and energetic manner in whatever he decided to do, at the same time they noted that he had a dark and mysterious side as well, associated with feelings that he was a fraud, and not a true genius. A friend of the family, Russian sculptor Naum Gabo, took Ventris under his wing, Ventris later said that Gabo was the most family he had ever had
27.
Mycenaean Greek
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The language is preserved in inscriptions in Linear B, a script first attested on Crete before the 14th century. Most inscriptions are on tablets found in Knossos, in central Crete, as well as in Pylos. Other tablets have found at Mycenae itself, Tiryns and Thebes and at Chania. The language is named after Mycenae, one of the centres of Mycenaean Greece. The tablets long remained undeciphered, and many languages were suggested for them, the texts on the tablets are mostly lists and inventories. No prose narrative survives, much less myth or poetry, still, much may be glimpsed from these records about the people who produced them and about Mycenaean Greece, the period before the so-called Greek Dark Ages. The Mycenaean language is preserved in Linear B writing, which consists of about 200 syllabic signs, since Linear B was derived from Linear A, the script of an undeciphered Minoan language probably unrelated to Greek, it does not reflect fully the phonetics of Mycenaean. In essence, a number of syllabic signs must represent a much greater number of produced syllables. Orthographic simplifications therefore had to be made, There is no disambiguation for the Greek categories of voice and aspiration except the dentals d, t,
28.
Mycenaean Greece
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Mycenaean Greece was the last phase of the Bronze Age in Ancient Greece. It represents the first advanced civilization in mainland Greece, with its states, urban organization, works of art. Among the centers of power emerged, the most notable were those of Pylos, Tiryns, Midea in the Peloponnese, Orchomenos, Thebes, Athens in Central Greece. The most prominent site was Mycenae, in Argolid, to which the culture of this era owes its name. Mycenaean and Mycenaean-influenced settlements also appeared in Epirus, Macedonia, on islands in the Aegean Sea, on the coast of Asia Minor, the Levant, Cyprus and Italy. Their syllabic script, the Linear B, offers the first written records of the Greek language, Mycenaean Greece was dominated by a warrior elite society and consisted of a network of palace states that developed rigid hierarchical, political, social and economic systems. At the head of society was the king, known as wanax. Various theories have proposed for the end of this civilization. Additional theories such as natural disasters and climatic changes have also suggested. The Mycenaean period became the setting of much ancient Greek literature and mythology. The Bronze Age in mainland Greece is generally termed as the Helladic period by modern archaeologists, after Hellas, the Greek name for Greece. This period is divided into three subperiods, The Early Helladic period was a time of prosperity with the use of metals, the Middle Helladic period faced a slower pace of development, as well as the evolution of megaron-type dwellings and cist grave burials. Finally, the Late Helladic period roughly coincides with Mycenaean Greece, the transition period from the Bronze Age to the Iron Age in Greece is known as Sub-Mycenaean. Moreover, it revealed that the bearers of Mycenaean culture were ethnically connected with the populations that resided in the Greek peninsula after the end of this cultural period. Various collective terms for the inhabitants of Mycenaean Greece were used by Homer in his 8th century BC epic, the Iliad, in reference to the Trojan War. The latter was supposed to have happened in the late 13th – early 12th century BC, Homer used the ethnonyms Achaeans, Danaans and Argives, to refer to the besiegers. These names appear to have passed down from the time they were in use to the time when Homer applied them as terms in his Iliad. There is an reference to a-ka-wi-ja-de in the Linear B records in Knossos, Crete dated to c.1400 BC
29.
Phaistos Disc
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The Phaistos Disc is a disk of fired clay from the Minoan palace of Phaistos on the island of Crete, possibly dating to the middle or late Minoan Bronze Age. Now, the island of Crete is part of modern Greece, the disk is about 15 cm in diameter and covered on both sides with a spiral of stamped symbols. Its purpose and meaning, and even its original place of manufacture, remain disputed. This unique object is now on display at the museum of Heraklion. The Phaistos Disc captured the imagination of amateur and professional archaeologists, while it is not clear that it is a script, most attempted decipherments assume that it is, most additionally assume a syllabary, others an alphabet or logography. Although the Phaistos Disc is generally accepted as authentic by archaeologists and this grouping of four rooms also served as a formal entry into the palace complex. It was found in the cell of an underground temple depository. These basement cells, only accessible from above, were covered with a layer of fine plaster. Their content was poor in artifacts, but rich in black earth and ashes. In the northern part of the cell, in the same black layer. The Phaistos Disc is generally accepted as authentic by archaeologists, the assumption of authenticity is based on the excavation records by Luigi Pernier. This assumption is supported by the discovery of the Arkalochori Axe with similar. The possibility that the disc is a 1908 forgery or hoax has been raised by two scholars, according to a report in The Times the date of manufacture has never been established by thermoluminescence. In his 2008 review, Robinson does not endorse the forgery arguments and it will either confirm that new finds are worth hunting for, or it will stop scholars from wasting their effort. A gold signet ring from Knossos, found in 1926, contains a Linear A inscription developed in a field defined by a spiral—similar to the Phaistos Disc, a sealing found in 1955 shows the only known parallel to sign 21 of the Phaistos disc. This is considered as evidence that the Phaistos Disc is a genuine Minoan artifact. Yves Duhoux dates the disc to between 1850 B. C. and 1600 B. C. on the basis of Luigi Perniers report, jeppesen dates it to after 1400. Doubting the viability of Perniers report, Louis Godart resigns himself to admitting that archaeologically, best suggests a date in the first half of the fourteenth century B. C. based on his dating of tablet PH1
30.
Cretan hieroglyphs
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Cretan hieroglyphs are undeciphered hieroglyphs found on artefacts of early Bronze Age Crete, during the Minoan era. It predates Linear A by about a century, but the two writing systems continued to be used in parallel for most of their history, the seals and sealings represent about 307 distinct sign-groups, consisting all together of ±832 signs. The other inscriptions represent about 274 distinct sign-groups, consisting all together of ±723 signs, more documents have been published since then, such as, for example, from the Petras deposit. Definitive edition was published in 2010, the relation of the last three items with the script of the main corpus is uncertain. Some Cretan Hieroglyphic inscriptions were found on the island of Samothrace in the northeastern Aegean. It has been suggested there was an evolution of the hieroglyphs into the linear scripts. Also, some relations to Anatolian hieroglyphs have been suggested, the overlaps between the Cretan script and other scripts, such as the hieroglyphic scripts of Cyprus and the Hittite lands of Anatolia, may suggest. That they all evolved from an ancestor, a now-lost script perhaps originating in Syria. Symbol inventories have been compiled by Evans, Meijer, Olivier/Godart, the known corpus has been edited in 1996 as CHIC, listing a total of 314 items. The glyph inventory as presented by CHIC includes 96 syllabograms, ten of which double as logograms, there are also 23 logograms representing four levels of numerals, numerical fractions, and two types of punctuation. Many symbols have apparent Linear A counterparts, so that it is tempting to insert Linear B sound values, Cretan Writing in the Second Millennium B. C. World Archaeology,17, 377–389, doi,10. 1080/00438243.1986.9979977 Yule, Paul, Early Cretan Seals, marburger Studien zur Vor und Frühgeschichte, ISBN 3-8053-0490-0 W. C. Brice, Notes on the Cretan Hieroglyphic Script, I, the Clay Bar from Malia, H20, Kadmos 29 1-10. Brice, Cretan Hieroglyphs & Linear A, Kadmos 29 171-2, brice, Notes on the Cretan Hieroglyphic Script, III. The Inscriptions from Mallia Quarteir Mu, the Clay Bar from Knossos, P116, Kadmos 30 93-104. Brice, Notes on the Cretan Hieroglyphic Script, Kadmos 31, M. Civitillo, LA SCRITTURA GEROGLIFICA MINOICA SUI SIGILLI. Il messaggio della glittica protopalaziale, Biblioteca di Pasiphae XII, Pisa-Roma 2016, G. M. Facchetti La questione della scrittura «geroglifica cretese» dopo la recente edizione del corpus dei testi. Pasiphae, Rivista di filologia e antichita egee, the Cretan hieroglyphic script of the second millennium BC, description, analysis, function and decipherment perspectives
31.
Cemetery
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A cemetery or graveyard is a place where the remains of dead people are buried or otherwise interred. The word cemetery implies that the land is designated as a burial ground. The term graveyard is used interchangeably with cemetery, but primarily referred to a burial ground within a churchyard. The intact or cremated remains of people may be interred in a grave, commonly referred to as burial, or in a tomb, an above-ground grave, in Western cultures, funeral ceremonies are often observed in cemeteries. These ceremonies or rites of passage according to cultural practices. Modern cemeteries often include crematoria, and some previously used for both, continue as crematoria as a principal use long after the interment areas have been filled. The Oxford English Dictionary defines a cemetery as a burial-ground generally, a large public park or ground laid out expressly for the interment of the dead, and not being the ‘yard’ of any church. Prehistoric cemeteries are referred to by the term grave field. From about the 7th century, European burial was under the control of the Church, practices varied, but in continental Europe, bodies were usually buried in a mass grave until they had decomposed. The bones were exhumed and stored in ossuaries, either along the arcaded bounding walls of the cemetery, or within the church under floor slabs. In Europe this was accompanied with a depiction of their coat of arms. Most others were buried in graveyards again divided by social status, mourners who could afford the work of a stonemason had a headstone engraved with a name, dates of birth and death and sometimes other biographical data, and set up over the place of burial. Usually, the writing and symbols carved on the headstone. Some families hired a blacksmith and had large crosses made from various metals put on the place of burial, in many European states, burial in graveyards was eventually outlawed altogether through government legislation. Instead of graveyards, completely new places of burial were established away from populated areas and outside of old towns. Many new cemeteries became municipally owned or were run by their own corporations, in some cases, skeletons were exhumed from graveyards and moved into ossuaries or catacombs. A large action of this occurred in 18th century Paris when human remains were transferred from graveyards all over the city to the Catacombs of Paris. The bones of an estimated 6 million people are to be found there, an early example of a landscape-style cemetery is Père Lachaise in Paris
32.
Earthquake
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An earthquake is the shaking of the surface of the Earth, resulting from the sudden release of energy in the Earths lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in size from those that are so weak that they cannot be felt to those violent enough to people around. The seismicity or seismic activity of an area refers to the frequency, type, Earthquakes are measured using measurements from seismometers. The moment magnitude is the most common scale on which earthquakes larger than approximately 5 are reported for the entire globe and these two scales are numerically similar over their range of validity. Magnitude 3 or lower earthquakes are mostly imperceptible or weak and magnitude 7 and over potentially cause damage over larger areas. The largest earthquakes in historic times have been of magnitude slightly over 9, intensity of shaking is measured on the modified Mercalli scale. The shallower an earthquake, the damage to structures it causes. At the Earths surface, earthquakes manifest themselves by shaking and sometimes displacement of the ground, when the epicenter of a large earthquake is located offshore, the seabed may be displaced sufficiently to cause a tsunami. Earthquakes can also trigger landslides, and occasionally volcanic activity, in its most general sense, the word earthquake is used to describe any seismic event — whether natural or caused by humans — that generates seismic waves. Earthquakes are caused mostly by rupture of faults, but also by other events such as volcanic activity, landslides, mine blasts. An earthquakes point of rupture is called its focus or hypocenter. The epicenter is the point at ground level directly above the hypocenter, tectonic earthquakes occur anywhere in the earth where there is sufficient stored elastic strain energy to drive fracture propagation along a fault plane. The sides of a fault move past each other smoothly and aseismically only if there are no irregularities or asperities along the surface that increase the frictional resistance. Most fault surfaces do have such asperities and this leads to a form of stick-slip behavior, once the fault has locked, continued relative motion between the plates leads to increasing stress and therefore, stored strain energy in the volume around the fault surface. This continues until the stress has risen sufficiently to break through the asperity, suddenly allowing sliding over the portion of the fault. This energy is released as a combination of radiated elastic strain seismic waves, frictional heating of the fault surface and this process of gradual build-up of strain and stress punctuated by occasional sudden earthquake failure is referred to as the elastic-rebound theory. It is estimated that only 10 percent or less of a total energy is radiated as seismic energy. Most of the energy is used to power the earthquake fracture growth or is converted into heat generated by friction
33.
Palace
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A palace is a grand residence, especially a royal residence, or the home of a head of state or some other high-ranking dignitary, such as a bishop or archbishop. The word is derived from the Latin name Palātium, for Palatine Hill in Rome which housed the Imperial residences, in many parts of Europe, the term is also applied to ambitious private mansions of the aristocracy. Many historic palaces are now put to uses such as parliaments, museums, hotels. The word is sometimes used to describe a lavishly ornate building used for public entertainment or exhibitions. The word palace comes from Old French palais, from Latin Palātium, the original palaces on the Palatine Hill were the seat of the imperial power while the capitol on the Capitoline Hill was the religious nucleus of Rome. Long after the city grew to the seven hills the Palatine remained a residential area. Emperor Caesar Augustus lived there in a purposely modest house only set apart from his neighbours by the two trees planted to flank the front door as a sign of triumph granted by the Senate. His descendants, especially Nero, with his Golden House, enlarged the house, the word Palātium came to mean the residence of the emperor rather than the neighbourhood on top of the hill. Palace meaning government can be recognized in a remark of Paul the Deacon, AD790 and describing events of the 660s, When Grimuald set out for Beneventum, he entrusted his palace to Lupus. At the same time, Charlemagne was consciously reviving the Roman expression in his palace at Aachen, in the 9th century, the palace indicated the housing of the government too, and the constantly travelling Charlemagne built fourteen. In the Holy Roman Empire the powerful independent Electors came to be housed in palaces and this has been used as evidence that power was widely distributed in the Empire, as in more centralized monarchies, only the monarchs residence would be a palace. In modern times, the term has been applied by archaeologists and historians to large structures that housed combined ruler, court, in informal usage, a palace can be extended to a grand residence of any kind. The earliest known palaces were the residences of the Egyptian Pharaohs at Thebes, featuring an outer wall enclosing labyrinthine buildings. Other ancient palaces include the Assyrian palaces at Nimrud and Nineveh, the Minoan palace at Knossos, the Brazilian new capital, Brasília, hosts modern palaces, most designed by the citys architect Oscar Niemeyer. The Alvorada Palace is the residence of the Brazils president. The Planalto Palace is the official workplace, the Jaburu Palace is the official residence of Brazils vice-president. In Canada, Government House is a given to the official residences of the Canadian monarchy. The use of the term Government House is a custom from the British Empire
34.
Achaeans (Homer)
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The Achaeans constitute one of the collective names for the Greeks in Homers Iliad and Odyssey. In the historical period, the Achaeans were the inhabitants of the region of Achaea, the city-states of this region later formed a confederation known as the Achaean League, which was influential during the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC. The Homeric long-haired Achaeans would have been a part of the Mycenaean civilization that dominated Greece from circa 1600 BC until 1100 BC, later, by the Archaic and Classical periods, the term Achaeans referred to inhabitants of the much smaller region of Achaea. Herodotus identified the Achaeans of the northern Peloponnese as descendants of the earlier, according to Pausanias, writing in the 2nd century CE, the term Achaean was originally given to those Greeks inhabiting the Argolis and Laconia. Pausanias and Herodotus both recount the legend that the Achaeans were forced from their homelands by the Dorians, during the legendary Dorian invasion of the Peloponnese and they then moved into the region later called Achaea. A scholarly consensus has not yet been reached on the origin of the historic Achaeans relative to the Homeric Achaeans and is hotly debated. Karl Beloch suggested there was no Dorian invasion, but rather that the Peloponnesian Dorians were the Achaeans, eduard Meyer, disagreeing with Beloch, instead put forth the suggestion that the real-life Achaeans were mainland pre-Dorian Greeks. His conclusion is based on his research on the similarity between the languages of the Achaeans and pre-historic Arcadians and his conclusions at the time were challenged by other Hittitologists, as well as by Ferdinand Sommer, who published his Die Ahhijava-Urkunden in 1932. Some Hittite texts mention a nation lying to the west called Ahhiyawa, in the earliest reference to this land, a letter outlining the treaty violations of the Hittite vassal Madduwatta, it is called Ahhiya. It also refers to an earlier Wilusa episode involving hostility on the part of Ahhiyawa, Ahhiya has been identified with the Achaeans of the Trojan War and the city of Wilusa with the legendary city of Troy. It has been proposed that Ekwesh of the Egyptian records may relate to Achaea, whereas Denyen, Tanaju is also listed in an inscription at the Mortuary Temple of Amenhotep III. The latter ruled Egypt in circa 1382–1344 BC, moreover, a list of the cities and regions of the Tanaju is also mentioned in this inscription, among the cities listed are Mycenae, Nauplion, Kythera, Messenia and the Thebaid. During the 5th year of Pharaoh Merneptah, a confederation of Libyan, included amongst the ethnic names of the repulsed invaders is the Ekwesh or Eqwesh, whom some have seen as Achaeans, although Egyptian texts specifically mention these Ekwesh to be circumcised. Homer mentions an Achaean attack upon the delta, and Menelaus speaks of the same in Book IV of the Odyssey to Telemachus when he recounts his own home from the Trojan War. Later Greek myths also say Helen had spent the time of the Trojan War in Egypt, and not at Troy, cadmus from Phoenicia, Danaus from Egypt, and Pelops from Anatolia each gained a foothold in mainland Greece and were assimilated and Hellenized. Sons of Hellen and the nymph Orseis were Dorus, Xuthos, sons of Xuthos and Kreousa, daughter of Erechthea, were Ion and Achaeus. According to Hyginus,22 Achaeans killed 362 Trojans during their ten years at Troy, according to Margalit Finkelberg, the name Ἀχαιοί/Ἀχαιϝοί is derived from Hittite Aḫḫiyawā. However, Robert S. P. Beekes doubted the validity of this derivation, the etymology of Danaoi is uncertain, according to Beekes the name is certainly Pre-Greek
35.
Minoan chronology
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Sir Arthur Evans developed a relative dating scheme of Minoan chronology based on the excavations initiated and managed by him at the site of the ancient city of Knossos. He called the civilization that he discovered there Minoan, the same scheme was later applied to the Greek mainland and the Cyclades Islands to form a general plan for dating events of the prehistoric and early historic Aegean. The relative chronology is based on the shapes and decorative styles of pottery found at sites on Crete. Arthur Evans began excavating on a hill called tou tseleve he kephala, two of the palace storerooms had been uncovered by Minos Kalokairinos in 1878, whose work ceased at the demand of the land owners. Simultaneously, coins and seals inscribed with a script were also discovered. These came to Evans attention as the curator of the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford, the area was rumored to have been the site of the ancient city of Knossos. Evans examined the site on March 19,1894, nothing further could be done at that time, but in 1898 Crete became an independent republic. In 1899 Evans purchased the land with his own funds and decided to set up an excavation, attacking the site with crews of hundreds of diggers, Evans uncovered most of the sites 6 acres within 6 seasons. Subsequently he concerned himself mainly with restoration, an activity frowned upon by archaeologists of today and he continued to excavate there and elsewhere and to restore until 1935. Evans was knighted in 1911 for his work, in 1921, the first edition of his monumental work, Palace of Minos, was released, which became indispensable for any department of classical archaeology. On Evans death in 1941, the British School of Archaeology assumed responsibility for the excavation, later turning the property over to the Greek government, while retaining excavation rights. Evans chronological framework had triple divisions each triply divided, a formula that has retained, thus Early Minoan I, II and III, Middle Minoan I. Each subsection he divided into A and B, early and late, wace and Carl Blegen adapted Evans chronology to the Greek mainland and the islands, where the culture was termed Helladic and Cycladic. In 1941 Arne Furumark applied the term Mycenaean to LH and LC, as it is clear that the Mycenaean Greeks dominated at Knossos at some point in Late Minoan, the latter is often included under Mycenaean or called Minoan-Mycenaean. The major study of Cretan pottery was Evans, a very general stylistic trend was from dark decoration on a light background in the Early Minoan to white and red decorations on a dark wash or slip in Middle Minoan. Finally, there was a return to the manner of dark on light in Late Minoan. New body shapes for vessels also emerged and various styles of decoration are evident within Evans chronology, Evans never intended to give exact calendrical dates to the pottery periods. Most criticism does not aim at the overthrow of Evans system, even with these faults the system has no competitors
36.
Artifact (archaeology)
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An artifact or artefact is. something made or given shape by man, such as a tool or a work of art, esp an object of archaeological interest. In archaeology, however, the word has become a term of particular nuance and is defined as, an object recovered by archaeological endeavor, which may have a cultural interest. However, modern archaeologists take care to distinguish material culture from ethnicity, examples include stone tools, pottery vessels, metal objects such as weapons, and items of personal adornment such as buttons, jewelry and clothing. Bones that show signs of modification are also examples. Natural objects, such as fire cracked rocks from a hearth or plant material used for food, are classified by archeologists as ecofacts rather than as artifacts, natural objects that humans have moved but not changed are called manuports. Examples include seashells moved inland, or rounded pebbles placed away from the action that made them. For instance, a bone removed from a carcass is a biofact. Similarly there can be debate over early stone objects that could be either crude artifacts or naturally occurring and it can be difficult to distinguish the differences between actual man-made lithic artifacts and geofacts – naturally occurring lithics that resemble man-made tools. It is possible to authenticate artifacts by examining the general attributed to man-made tools. Artifact Collection at the Royal Military College of Canada Museum in Kingston, Ontario
37.
Linear A
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Linear A is one of two currently undeciphered writing systems used in ancient Greece. Linear A was the script used in palace and religious writings of the Minoan civilization. It was discovered by archaeologist Sir Arthur Evans and it is the origin of the Linear B script, which was later used by the Mycenaean civilization. In the 1950s, Linear B was largely deciphered and found to encode an early form of Greek, although the two systems share many symbols, this did not lead to a subsequent decipherment of Linear A. Using the values associated with Linear B in Linear A mainly produces unintelligible words, if Linear A uses the same or similar syllabic values as Linear B, then its associated language, dubbed Minoan, appears unrelated to any known language. Linear A has hundreds of signs and they are believed to represent syllabic, ideographic, and semantic values in a manner similar to Linear B. It primarily appears in the direction, but occasionally appears as a right-to-left or boustrophedon script. An interesting feature is that of how numbers are recorded in the script, the highest number that has been recorded is 3000, but there are special symbols to indicate fractions and weights. Linear A has been unearthed chiefly on Crete, but also at other sites in Greece, as well as Turkey, the extant corpus, comprising some 1427 specimens totalling 7362–7396 signs, if scaled to standard type, would fit easily on two sheets of paper. Discoveries have been made at the locations on Crete, Prior to 1973. Since then, other locations yielded inscriptions, according to Finkelberg, most—if not all—inscriptions found outside of Crete were made locally. This is indicated by such factors as the composition of the material on which the inscriptions were made. Also, close analysis of the inscriptions found outside of Crete indicates the use of a script that is somewhere in between Linear A and Linear B, combining the elements of both. Kea Kythera Melos Samothrace Thera Mycenae Tiryns Hagios Stephanos, Laconia Linear A was a contemporary and possible child of Cretan hieroglyphs, several tablets inscribed in signs similar to Linear A were found in the Troad. While their status is disputed, they may be imports, as there is no evidence of Minoan presence in the Troad, Classification of these signs as a unique Trojan script is not accepted by other linguists. It is difficult to evaluate a given analysis of Linear A as there is point of reference for reading its inscriptions. The simplest approach to decipherment may be to presume that the values of Linear A match more or less the values given to the deciphered Linear B script, in 1957, Bulgarian scholar Vladimir I. Georgiev published his Le déchiffrement des inscriptions crétoises en linéaire A stating that Linear A contains Greek linguistic elements
38.
Kouloura
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A kouloura, or kouloures is a circular subsurface pit with stone walls found in certain settlements within Ancient Crete, including Phaistos, Knossos, and Mallia. According on stratigraphy, the kouloura were all constructed around MM II, the name kouloura was coined by Arthur Evans during his expedition to Knossos in 1903. He named the pits after kouloura, the round Greek bread, the first four kouloura were discovered in 1903 at Knossos by Arthur Evans. Subsequently, Fernand Chapouthier discovered eight additional kouloura at Mallia, and these pits have always been found within the confines of major sites, including the West Court of Knossos and the Upper Court of Phaistos. Multiple theories have been put forward regarding the function of these kouloura in Ancient Minoan Society, however, there are only three majorly supported theories. Arthur Evans, the discoverer of the pits, theorized that they were garbage pits due to the lack of cement walling to prevent water seepage. Chapouthier and Pernier believed that they were ancient cisterns, based on the presence of a long water trough in one of the kouloura at Knossos. However, the flaw in this theory remains that most of the pits contained no form of waterproofing, the most commonly accepted theory is that the kouloura were a type of granary to store excess harvest. This belief grew out of the fact that kingdoms during the Minoan period grew largely out of ability to store, maintain, and distribute food goods
39.
Polychrome
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Polychrome is the practice of decorating architectural elements, sculpture, etc. in a variety of colors. The term is used to refer to certain styles of architecture, some very early polychrome pottery has been excavated on Minoan Crete such as at the Bronze Age site of Phaistos. In ancient Greece sculptures were painted in strong colors, the paint was frequently limited to parts depicting clothing, hair, and so on, with the skin left in the natural color of the stone. But it could cover sculptures in their totality, the painting of Greek sculpture should not merely be seen as an enhancement of their sculpted form but has the characteristics of a distinct style of art. On high-quality bronzes like the Riace bronzes, an early example of polychrome decoration was found in the Parthenon atop the Acropolis of Athens. By the time European antiquarianism took off in the 18th century, however, however, some classicists such as Jacques Ignace Hittorff noticed traces of paint on classical architecture and this slowly came to be accepted. An example of classical Greek architectural polychrome may be seen in the full size replica of the Parthenon exhibited in Nashville, Tennessee, throughout medieval Europe religious sculptures in wood and other media were often brightly painted or colored, as were the interiors of church buildings. The exteriors of churches were painted as well, but little has survived, exposure to the elements and changing tastes and religious approval over time acted against their preservation. With the arrival of European porcelain in the 18th century, brightly colored pottery figurines with a range of colors became very popular. Polychrome brickwork is a style of brickwork which emerged in the 1860s. It was often used to replicate the effect of quoining and to decorate around windows, early examples featured banding, with later examples exhibiting complex diagonal, criss-cross, and step patterns, in some cases even writing using bricks. In the 1970s and 1980s, especially, architects working with bold colors included Robert Venturi, Michael Graves, Polychrome building facades later rose in popularity as a way of highlighting certain trim features in Victorian and Queen Anne architecture in the United States. The rise of the paint industry following the civil war also helped to fuel the use of multiple colors. These earned the endearment Painted Ladies, a term that in modern times is considered kitsch when it is applied to describe all Victorian houses that have painted with period colors. John Joseph Earley developed a process of concrete slab construction and ornamentation that was admired across America. In the Washington, D. C. metropolitan area, his products graced a variety of buildings — all formed by the staff of the Earley Studio in Rosslyn, earleys Polychrome Historic District houses in Silver Spring, Maryland were built in the mid-1930s. The concrete panels were pre-cast with colorful stones and shipped to the lot for on-site assembly, less well-known, but just as impressive, is the Dr. Fealy Polychrome House that Earley built atop a hill in Southeast Washington, D. C. overlooking the city. His uniquely designed polychrome houses were outstanding among prefabricated houses in the country, appreciated for their Art Deco ornament, the term polychromatic means having several colors
40.
Pithos
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Pithos is the Greek name of a large storage container. The term in English is applied to containers used among the civilizations that bordered the Mediterranean Sea in the Neolithic, the Bronze Age. Pithoi had been used for storage, primarily for fluids and grains, they were comparable to the drums, barrels. The name was different in other languages, for instance, the Hittites used harsi-, secondarily, discarded pithoi found other uses. Like the ceramic bathtubs of some periods, the size of a made it a convenient coffin. In Middle Helladic burials in Mycenae and Crete sometimes the bones of the interred were placed in pithoi, the ancient Iberian culture of El Argar used pithoi for coffins in its B phase. In warfare the pithos full of olive oil was a liability to the defense of a palace. An enemy had only to knock over a full of oil. Most of the palaces of the Bronze Age Aegean were burned at one time or another in this way, jars of this size could not be handled by individuals, especially when full. Various numbers of handles, or lugs, or some combination, pithoi were manufactured and exported or imported over the entire Mediterranean. The term has now been adopted into the English language as a word for a storage jar from any culture. Along with this universality has come a problem of distinguishing the smaller pithoi from other types of pottery, many ceramics are not any easily classifiable shape. If they were used for transport or storage, they are likely to be called pithoi, even though they are not the size of the palace pithoi, reconciliation of pre-classical pottery types with classical types has long been a problem of classical archaeology. Pithos has two irreconcilable derivations, classical and Mycenaean, on the one hand, it was a well-used word of the Iron Age in Greece, dating to as early as the works of Homer. Regardless of the derivation, a pithos certainly seems to be a large purse containing economic goods in quantity. The derivation would have been elegant, tracing fiscality back to prehistoric Greece, it was thought, taking its place with oikos, house, the word for economic. At that time Greek and Latin were believed to have had a common ancestor other than Proto-Indo-European, contemporaneously with Pokornys epic dictionary, Linear B was first being deciphered, and various analyses were being put forward that Greek and Latin were not all that similar. There was no need to prove that developments in Latin were necessarily parallel to those in Greek, if bh- became f- in Latin, it would not necessarily do so in Greek
41.
Propylaea
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A propylaea, propylea or propylaia is any monumental gateway in Greek architecture. Much the best known Greek example is the propylaea that serves as the entrance to the Acropolis in Athens, the Greek Revival Brandenburg Gate of Berlin and the Propylaea in Munich both evoke the central portion of the Athens propylaea. According to Plutarch, the Propylaea was designed by the architect Mnesicles, construction began in 437 BC and was terminated in 432, when the building was still unfinished. The Propylaea was constructed of white Pentelic marble and gray Eleusinian marble or limestone, structural iron was also used, though William Bell Dinsmoor analyzed the structure and concluded that the iron weakened the building. The structure consists of a building with two adjoining wings on the west side, one to the north and one to the south. The core is the building, which presents a standard six-columned Doric façade both on the West to those entering the Acropolis and on the east to those departing. The columns echo the proportions of the columns of the Parthenon, there is no surviving evidence for sculpture in the pediments. The central building contains the gate wall, about two-thirds of the way through it, the central passageway was the culmination of the Sacred Way, which led to the Acropolis from Eleusis. Entrance into the Acropolis was controlled by the Propylaea, though it was not built as a fortified structure, it was important that people not ritually clean be denied access to the sanctuary. In addition, runaway slaves and other miscreants could not be permitted into the sanctuary where they could claim the protection of the gods, the state treasury was also kept on the Acropolis, making its security important. The gate wall and the portion of the building sit at a level five steps above the western portion. The ceiling in the part of the central building was famous in antiquity. It consisted of marble blocks carved in the shape of ceiling coffers, the outer wings to the right and left of the central building stood on the same platform as the western portion of the central building but were much smaller, not only in plan but in scale. Like the central building, the wings use Doric colonnades and Doric entablatures, the central building also has an Ionic colonnade on either side of the central passageway between the western Doric colonnade and the gate wall. This is therefore the first building known to us with Doric and Ionic colonnades visible at the same time and it is also the first monumental building in the classical period to be more complex than a simple rectangle or cylinder. The western wing on the north was famous in antiquity as the location of paintings of important Greek battles, Pausanias reports their presence, but few scholars believe the room was planned to hold them. Recent scholarship, following the lead of John Travlos, has taken the northern wing to have been a room for ritual dining, the evidence for that is the off-center doorway and the position near the entrance to the Acropolis. The wing on the south, though smaller, was clearly designed to make the whole structure appear to be symmetrical
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Alabaster
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Alabaster is a mineral or rock that is soft and often used for carving, as well as being processed for plaster powder. The term is used in different ways by archaeologists and the processing industry on the one hand. The first use is in a meaning, covering varieties of two different minerals, the fine-grained massive type of gypsum, as well as the fine-grained banded type of calcite. Geologists only define the gypsum variety as alabaster, chemically, gypsum is a hydrous sulfate of calcium, while calcite is a carbonate of calcium. Both types of alabaster have broadly similar properties and they are usually light-coloured, translucent and soft stones that have been used throughout human history mainly for carving decorative artifacts. Onyx-marble must be understood as a traditional, but geologically inaccurate term, in general, ancient alabaster is calcite in the wider Middle East, including Egypt and Mesopotamia, while it is gypsum in medieval Europe. Modern alabaster is calcite, but may be either. Both are easy to work and slightly water-soluble and they have been used for making a variety of indoor artworks and carvings, as they will not survive long outdoors. Moreover, calcite alabaster, being a carbonate, effervesces when treated with hydrochloric acid, the origin of the word alabaster is in Middle English through Old French alabastre, in turn derived from the Latin alabaster, and that from Greek ἀλάβαστρος or ἀλάβαστος. The Greek words were used to identify a vase made of alabaster and this name may be derived further from the Ancient Egyptian word a-labaste, which refers to vessels of the Egyptian goddess Bast. She was represented as a lioness and frequently depicted as such in figures placed atop these alabaster vessels, other suggestions include derivation from the town of Alabastron in Egypt, described in sometimes contradictory manner by Roman-era authors Pliny and Ptolemy and whose location is not yet known. The purest alabaster is a material of fine uniform grain, but it often is associated with an oxide of iron. The coarser varieties of gypsum alabaster are converted by calcination into plaster of Paris, the softness of alabaster enables it to be carved readily into elaborate forms, but its solubility in water renders it unsuitable for outdoor work. If alabaster with a smooth, polished surface is washed with dishwashing liquid, it will become rough, dull and whiter, losing most of its translucency and lustre. The finer kinds of alabaster are employed largely as a stone, especially for ecclesiastical decoration and for the rails of staircases. Alabaster is mined and then sold in blocks to alabaster workshops, the effect of heating appears to be a partial dehydration of the gypsum. If properly treated, it closely resembles true marble and is known as marmo di Castellina. Alabaster is a stone and can be dyed into any colour or shade
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