December 18, 2004

The Greek Dark Age remains a mystery. Between 1100 to 800 BC, the written record in Greece ceased altogether. Urban culture was decimated, and art reverted to a more primitive form of simple geometrics. Civilization reverted to a basic subsistence lifestyle. What happened? Nobody's really sure, but many theories abound. Get the quick and dirty with this great kids writeup. Even the controversial author Velikovsky wrote a treatise on the subject.
posted by rolypolyman 20 years ago
  • Great stuff roly, never heard of this. Perhaps they just thought 'civilisation's not all it cracked up to be'? Why's Velikovsky controversial?
  • Yep, gotta agree, never heard of this and it sounds fascinating. I wonder what the European Dark Ages would like like to someone with an extra 2000 years distance though?
  • I would guess that their population forgot their core values and ceased to defend them, that they elected a dumb, greedy, warmongering leader, and that they let their economy deteriorate and their relations with their neighbors and their environment. :::looks around, blanches:::
  • Ook roly, lovely post. )))))) It almost sounds like a plague epidemic. I wonder what was going on in nearby civilizations and if they were having similar problems. Polychrome, check out Catastrophe by David Keys. It investigates the cause of the European Dark Ages. One of my favorite books.
  • shinything - thanks for the reference and I'll definitely look it up. My musings weren't so much on the causes though, more idle speculation as to how it would look to the future, viewed through the same number of years as the Greeks are to us, now. as an aside, I went and saw an amazing exhibition of Egyptian antiquities. Just incredible scrolls and statues and so on. Even more incredible to think that many of the items displayed were further in time from the Ancient Greeks than the Ancient Greeks are from us.
  • well, I can't shed any light on the Greek Dark Ages (GREAT post roly!) but based on my knowledge of the European Dark Ages (or Early Medieval Period, as it is called) these things never happen for one cause. The European Dark Ages are surprisingly well documented (for an era of chaos & upheaval) by historians such as the Venerable Bede. The withdrawal of the roman garrisons, the migration/invasion patterns of the germanic tribes, disease patterns, weather patterns all contribute to the disintegration of a society.
  • Spoiler alert: Medusa, the author found substantial evidence that indicates Krakatoa blew up in 535 AD, which threw tons of dust in the air, which cooled the climate globally, which caused crops to fail and plague bacteria to multiply, which caused the social and political upheaval that we know as the Dark Ages. Everything from tree-ring data and geologic core samples to archaeological data and historical accounts. It's incredibly detailed. In this case it's interesting to contemplate what the world would be like now if Krakatoa hadn't erupted in 535. Not that it wouldn't have erupted at some point anyway. That damn volcano is always blowing up. :)
  • Here's a good link explaining the Velikovsky controversy. The short answer: he attempted to merge science and religion, attempting to find evidence explaining certain biblical events in real astronomical terms.
  • Would modern man, with all our technology, be able to avert something like Krakatoa erupting (in a big time way) today? Hmmm...
  • thanks shinything, that is interesting. I think I have heard a bit about that theory before. I don't argue that the author's theory is incorrect, or that the eruption and its climatic consequences weren't relevant, only that other factors were also involved. the visigoths sacked rome in 396, and again, in I think, about 411?? Justinian's plague hit around 542 (acording to my trusty Encyclopedia of Plague & Pestilence) which does fit the volcano idea. anyway, my point is that krakatoa was probably more of a catalyst than a cause, IMHO.
  • Well, something happened around 1200-1100 BC, because Greece wasn't the only Mediterranean civilization to collapse / change dramaticaly at the time. Something triggered a lot of migration which set off a bunch of wars. Don't know whether the migrations caused the collapese, or the other way 'round, however.
  • "collapese"??? Let's try "collapses"
  • Yeah, I see what you mean. That's what I love about history, that everything is so intertwined with everthing else. Ooh, Encyclopedia of Plague and Pestilence. I wanna get me one of them!
  • (above comment for Medusa)
  • Great post! This sentence from the "kids" link bothered me, though: "Some historians think that some Greeks, or people like them, may have moved to Israel, where they were called the Philistines." WTF? Anybody know what this might be referring to? To take one obvious point, the Philistines spoke a Semitic language unrelated to Greek. Abiezer: Velikovsky was a notorious kook. Check out the pages labeled "anticrank" here (and, of course, you're free to immerse yourself in the "cranky" ones as well, should you feel so inclined, but it's really not worth it).
  • WTF? Anybody know what this might be referring to? The Hyksos, or Sea Peoples. To take one obvious point, the Philistines spoke a Semitic language unrelated to Greek. And the Northmen spoke Old Norse, but became French-speaking Normans. Migrants do sometimes assimilate to the host culture, even violent migrants ...
  • Actually, the Hyksos can definitively be ruled out, as they too were Semites. The Sea Peoples, on the other hand, fit the bill quite well.