History of Greece: Bronze Age

Minoan, Cycladic, and Helladic Cultures

The Bronze Age, a period that lasted roughly three thousand years, saw major advances in social, economic, and technological advances that made Greece the hub of activity in the Mediterranean.

Historians have classified three distinct civilizations to identify the people of the time. These civilizations overlap in time and occupy three major geographic regions of the Greece.

The people of the Greek mainland are classified as “Helladic”.

The Cycladic civilization developed in the islands of the Aegean, and more specifically around the Cyclades.

The Minoans thrived in the large island of Crete and are considered to be the first advanced civilization of Europe. Read More about the history of Minoan Crete.

All three civilizations of the Bronze Age had many characteristics in common, while at the same time were distinct in their culture and disposition.

The Mycenaeans

The Mycenaean era describes Helladic civilization towards the end of the 11th c. BCE which is also the called “Age of Heroes” because it is the source of the mythological heroes and epics like Hercules, the Iliad and the Odyssey.

“The Mycenaeans are the first ‘Greeks’” (Martin, Ancient Greece 16).

By the end of the 10th c. BCE, the Mycenaeans expanded their influence over the Greek mainland, the islands of the Aegean and Ionian seas, Crete, and the coast of Asia Minor.

Thus, Mycenaean culture had a great deal of influence with its legends and Greek language on what later became the splendor of Classical Greece.

However, after 1100 BCE Mycenaean civilization ceased either through internal strife or outside invasions (the Dorian invasions have been proposed as a possible explanation), or through a combination of the two–it is not known for sure. Read more about Mycenaean Greece.