Olmec Way of Life

• The Olmec dressed simply in skirts or breechcloths woven of cotton, they loved adornments such as ear rings, nose rings, bracelets, necklaces and anklets made of jade, shell, bone. Priests and rulers impressed their followers by wearing elaborate head-dresses and mirrors of polished magnetite around their necks.
• Planting and other seasonal activities were governed by a calendar based on lunar months, and Olmec scribes kept track of events using pictographs called glypths which have not been deciphered.
• The centers of Olmec civilization were ceremonial complexes with such impressive architectural features as earthen pyramids, walled plazas, stone temples and ball courts.
• The first great Olmec ceremonial center was at San Lorenzo, inland from the Gulf of Mexico. Later, an even larger complex arose at La Venta, near the coast. Tremendous effort was required to erect the monuments at those sites, including massive stone heads thought to represent Olmec rulers.
• Olmec artists also sculpted jade figurines and clay models representing jaguars or humans with ears or fangs of jaguars. Olmec rulers may have served as priests or shamans of a jaguar cult and claimed kinship with the animal.
• The ruling families that controlled Olmec ceremonial centers and surrounding villages ultimately lost their grip on those communities.
• Around 900 B.C., San Lorenzo was destroyed, and monuments there were defaced. La Venta suffered a similar fate around 400 B.C. bringing Olmec civilization to an end.

Olmec Civilization

• The first civilization in the Americas arose in Mesoamerica, a cultural one extending from central Mexico to just above the Isthmus of Panama. The early cultures of Mesoamerica shared many beliefs and customs.
• The cultivation of maize or corn was an important aspect in their way of life. Corn originated in Mesoamerica at about 2700 B.C. Corn descended from a wild grass called teosinte, native to the region, and evolved over thousands of years as people cultivated plants with larger seeds or kernels. The growing of corn and other vegetables such as beans and squash enabled Mesoamericans to settle down in permanent communities. Ample harvests of corn supported Omlec merchants, artisans, and rulers. Peasants labored to build monuments and work on other public projects when they were not toiling on their fields.
• Around 1200B.C., villages located along the fertile banks of rivers flowing into the Gulf of Mexico near present-day Veracruz coalesced into a complex society called Olmec, or “dwellers in the land of rubber” for rubber trees flourished in that area.

MESOAMERICAN CIVILIZATION (1200-400 B.C.)

 

 

Ancient Greek Legacy

 

• The Greeks came back into power over the Phoenicians at around 800 B.C. Agriculture and trade were renewed and this paved way for Greek city-states to flourish. Economic advances also paved way for cultural advances. Greek artists developed distinctive styles of poetry, sculpture and architecture.

Literature

• Ancient Greeks invented a system of writing now called as the Greek Alphabet. Greeks believe that literature would only flourish in a literate society thus this system of writing was used and adapted throughout their territory.
• An ancient Greek blind poet and artist named Homer wrote the Iliad and the Odyssey which are a series of stories based on the Trojan war and the Greek conquest of Troy.
• The development of the Greek alphabet also paved way for writing Greek mythology coming from oral traditions.

Trade

• The Greek peninsula was an expansive network of trade for the Mediterranean region and also for the Aegean sea. Ancient Greeks traded with Anatolia in the west, North Africa in the south, nomads in the east and even Persia in the far west region.

Architecture

• Ancient Greeks were also very skilled in building temples and complex structures that suit their way of life. The temples were mostly made of mud, bricks, and marble. The Ionic column on ancient Greek temples exemplified the workmanship of ancient Greek builders.

The Mycenaean Civilization

• After the Minoans dominated the island of Crete until around 1450 B.C., the Mycenaeans took over and ruled Crete and mainland Greece until their decline in 1200 B.C.
• The Mycenaeans were warlike people who swept down from the Balkans and occupied the Greek peninsula around 1600 B.C. Their culture was simple compared to that of the Minoans. The Minoans and Mycenaeans first came into contact through trade and the Minoans were once dominant over the Mycenaeans. Over time, Mycenaeans adopted the Minoan script and artistic traditions.
• Some Mycenaeans came to rival the Minoans as seafarrers and traders, enriching their homeland with imported gold and other treasures. While others remained tied to the land and clung to the warrior-like traditions of their ancestors.
• The Mycenaeans were then organized into many small kingdoms, each of had its own hilltop fortress commanding surrounding farm-lands. The most impressive of those strongholds was Mycenae, from which the civilization takes its name. Like Knossos, Mycenae may have been the seat of an overlord whom other rulers deferred.
• Mycenaean fortresses were smaller than Minoan palaces that resembled them in other respects. The king presided over ceremonies in a magnificent hall called a megaron, with brightly painted pillars, decorative wall frescoes, and a central hearth.
• By 1200 B.C. Myceneaan civiliation was in decline, and fortresses were reduced to rubble. Drought, civil war or invasion may have caused the decline of the Mycenaean civilization.

Minotaur

• The word Minotaur is a compound word consisting of the ancient Greek name “Μίνως” or “Minos” and the noun “ταύρος” or “bull.” Thus, the word Minotaur comes to mean “bull of Minos.” While, the Minotaur’s birth name, Asterion, in ancient Greek “ἀστέριον” means “starry one” which suggests an association with the bull constellation: Taurus.
• In Greek mythology, the Minotaur was a monster with the body of a man and the head and tail of a bull. The Minotaur was the offspring of the Cretan Queen Pasiphae and a majestic bull. Due to the Minotaur’s monstrous form, King Minos ordered the craftsman, Daedalus, and his son, Icarus, to build a huge maze known as the Labyrinth to house the beast. The Minotaur remained in the Labyrinth receiving annual offerings of youths and maidens to eat. He was eventually killed by the Athenian hero Theseus.

(source: https://www.ancient.eu/Minotaur/)

The Minoan Civilization

Palace of Knossos

Minoan Ships

Minoan way of life

Map of the Minoan Civilization

• The Minoan civilization was an ancient civilization that flourished on the island of Crete. It was one of the two most prominent civilizations that prospered in Greece. The Minoan’s way of life was centered on the sea and they were very skilled seafarers and navigators.
• The most important Minoan asset was timber which was made into ships and seaworthy vessels. All ancient civilizations had boats of one kind but Minoans had to cross open oceans to trade their goods, thus they designed ships with deep keels for stability and high prows that cut through waves. Those ships made them masters of the Aegean sea and the eastern Mediterranean.
•  There were several kingdoms on Crete and their rulers used wealth acquired through trade to build lavish palaces connected with paved roads. Although this rich and well-ordered society was disrupted by one or more upheavals that destroyed palaces on the island in the 1700B.C. Eventually, a massive volcanic eruption on the nearby island of Thira devastated Crete with earthquakes and ashfalls.
• After the volcanic eruption, palaces were rebuilt and one of them was the Palace of Knossos. This palace spread over five acres, and contained 1,500 rooms including apartments and workshops for artisans, kitchens, storehouses, bathrooms with toilets, ceremonial chambers and subterranean passages.
• On 1450 B.C., Crete was conquered by the Mycenean civilization which flourished in southern Greece and  the Minoans were eventually overpowered by the Myceneans.

Crete

• Around 2000 BCE, long after cities and kingdoms arose in the Middle East, the first European Civilization emerged on the island of Crete which became a prosperous society based on maritime trade that established the pattern for later civilizations on the Greek mainland and other places on the Mediterranean.
• The people who settled in Crete may have reached the island from the north or the east. They were seafarers who acquired great wealth and influence through their mastery of ships and navigation. Today, we know them as Minoans from a fabled Cretan king named Minos who kept a beast called the Minotaur. The far-ranging Minoans once dominated the Greeks economically and received payment from them in goods and in “blood”. Minoans owed their strength and prosperity in part to the natural resources of their homeland.
• The lush plains and hillsides of Crete yielded wool from sheep and wine from grapes along with olive oil and grain. The most important Minoan assets were timber and they crafted it into sea vessels. Those ships made them masters of the Aegean and the Eastern Mediterranean.

Mediterranean Sea

• The Mediterranean Sea is an intercontinental sea that stretches from the Atlantic Ocean on the west to Asia on the east and separates Europe from Africa. It has often been called the incubator of Western civilization. (Source: https://www.britannica.com/place/Mediterranean-Sea)
• The Mediterranean Basin has been the cradle of world civilization since the first settlements in Jericho in 9000 BC. Known in English and the romance languages as the sea “between the lands”, the Mediterranean goes and has gone by many names: Our Sea, for the Romans, the White Sea (Akdeniz) for the Turks, the Great Sea (Yam Gadol) for the Jews, the Middle Sea (Mittelmeer) for the Germans and more doubtfully the Great Green for the ancient Egyptians. This Sea played a major role in the communication of the peoples around it and prevented clashes between people with different interests from different parts of the Basin.
• Magnificent civilizations have scattered all around the Basin, from east to west, from north to south, from Mesopotamia to Egypt, from Anatolia, Troy to Macedonia, from the Greek city states to Phoenician civilization, from Carthage to Rome, from Baghdad to Al-Andalus, from Byzantium to the Ottoman Empire and from Alexandria to Bologna, and have formed a sound base for world civilizations. One cannot imagine a history of the world without the Egyptian, Hellenistic, Roman and Ottoman civilizations. (source: https://unchronicle.un.org/article/mediterranean-sea-cradle-civilization )

MEDITERRANEAN CIVILIZATIONS (2000-500 B.C.E)