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THE MAKING OF EUROPE / EARLY EUROPEAN HISTORY

From Hutton Webster's, Early European History (1917); edited for this on-line publication, by ELLOPOS

I. THE LANDS OF THE WEST AND THE RISE OF GREECE TO ABOUT 500 B.C.

Em. Macron, Rediscovering the Path to Europe

» Contents of this Chapter

* Physical Europe   * Greece and the Aegean   * The Aegean Age (to about 1100 B.C.)   * The Homeric Age (about 1100-750 B.C.)   * Early Greek Religion   * Religious Institutions—Oracles and Games   * The Greek City-State   * The Growth of Sparta (to 500 B.C.)   * The Growth of Athens (to 500 B.C.)   * Colonial Expansion of Greece (about 750-500 B.C.)   * Bonds of Union among the Greeks

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COMMERCE

There was much intercourse throughout the Mediterranean during this period. Products of Aegean art have been found as far west as Sicily, Italy, and Spain, Aegean pottery has frequently been discovered in Egyptian tombs. Some objects unearthed in Babylonia are apparently of Aegean workmanship. In those ancient days Crete was mistress of the seas. Cretan merchants preceded the Phoenicians as carriers between Asia and Europe. Trade and commerce thus opened up the Mediterranean world to all the cultural influences of the Orient.

 

DOWNFALL OF AEGEAN CIVILIZATION

Aegean civilization did not penetrate beyond the shores of Asia Minor, the islands, and the coasts of Continental Greece. The interior regions of the Greek peninsula remained the home of barbarous tribes, which had not yet learned to build cities, to create beautiful objects of art, or to traffic on the seas. By 1100 B.C. their destructive inroads brought the Aegean Age to an end.

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THE MAKING OF EUROPE / EARLY EUROPEAN HISTORY: Table of Contents

url: www.ellopos.net/politics/european-history/default.asp

IN PRINT

Cf. The Ancient Greece * The Ancient Rome
Eastern Roman Empire (Byzantium) * Western Medieval Europe * Renaissance in Italy