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Minoan Civilization....
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The Minoans were a pre-Hellenic Bronze Age civilization in
Crete in the
Aegean Sea, prior to Helladic or Mycenaean culture (i.e. well before what
we know as Classical Greece). They lived from approximately 3000 to 1450
BC. Their name was coined by the British archaeologist Sir Arthur Evans
after the mythic "king" Minos, associated with the labyrinth, which Evans
identified as the site at Knossos. It is possible, though unsure, that
Minos was a term for a Minoan ruler. What the Minoans called themselves is
unknown.
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The Minoans were primarily a mercantile people engaged in
overseas trade. Their culture, from ca 1700 BC onwards, shows a high degree
of organization, without a trace of the military aristocracies that have
characterized the civilizations that followed. Many historians and
archaeologists believe that the Minoans were involved in the Bronze Age's
important tin trade: tin, alloyed with copper apparently from
Cyprus, was
used in the manufacture of bronze. The decline of Minoan civilization and
the decline in use of bronze tools in favor of superior iron ones seem to be
correlated. |
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The Minoan trade in saffron, which originated in the
Aegean basin as a natural chromosome mutation, has left fewer material
remains: a fresco of saffron-gatherers at Santorini is well-known. This
inherited trade pre-dated Minoan civilization: a sense of its rewards may be
gained by comparing its value to frankincense, or later, to pepper.
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The statues of priestesses in Minoan
culture and
frescoes showing men and women participating in the same sports (usually
bull-leaping) lead some archaeologists to believe that men and women held
equal social status, and that inheritance might even have been
matrilineal. The frescos include many depictions of people, with the sexes
distinguished by colour: the men's skin is reddish-brown, the women's
white. The colour serves as an identifying code in the pictures. |
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