Now, Agamemnon's was a continental power, and he could not have been master of any except the adjacent islands, and these would not be many. But through the possession of a fleet, and from this expedition we may infer the character of earlier enterprises. Now, Mycenie may have been a small place, and many of the towns of that age may appear comparatively insignificant. But no exact observer would therefore feel justified in rejecting the estimate given by the poets and by tradition of the magnitude of the armament. For I suppose if Lacedaemon were to become desolate and the temples and the foundations of the public buildings were left, that as time went on, there would be a strong disposition with posterity to refuse to accept her fame as a true exponent of her power. Hi, Hello, welcome once again to Let's Talk About Myths Baby, the podcast whose title is deceiving right now, particularly during this month's series, I'm your host, live here once more with history of the Bronze Age people of Greece nestled amongst their own mythical history. That quote I just read like those i've read before for this series was from the classical Athenian historian Thucydides, from his work detailing the Peloponnesian War once more. He serves as a beautiful example of the way that ancient Greece's mythical origins remained very real to later Greek authors, who had, in the case of Myceni, but only what remained of a once great palace and the stories of Agamemnon and Menelaus that the poets had given to them centuries earlier, this line of Tantalids and their war against Troy, and it's only through this which they could parse the Bronze Age culture's lost history. In the case of that particular quote, it's him trying to fathom how the Achaeans and Agamemnon had so many men and ships to send to Troy when the Mycene that was left by his time was quite so small. Last week we looked at how we know what we know of Bronze Age Greece, some of the wider Mediterranean, and how it ties with ancient Greece's own mythologized versions of history, and specifically the Minoans. We looked at the Bronze Age people from Crete and their labyrinthine bull decorated palace of Kenosos. As I mentioned then, the Minoans came first, but they were followed close behind by Myceni. The culture on the mainland of Greece centered in the Peloponnese, which grew under the inspiration of the Minoans and came to be quite closely tied with them through trade and shared influence. So today we are moving over to the mainland and looking at those Mycenians during this period. And then on Friday an episode with doctor Kim Shelton, whose expertise on Myceni made for an incredible and utterly mind blowing episode on the culture and religion and what we know of these ancient people. But before we listen to that expertise, we are going to get comfortable in this world of Myceni, a world which was later mythologized into the famed home of Agamemnon and his children The Curse of his Father and his grandfather and his great grandfather father, where a king is murdered by his wife while taking a bath because he had the audacity to sacrifice their eldest daughter for a bit of good wind, a place where the first red carpet was rolled out by that very wife, only that one was red with the king's blood. The real Mycenie is perhaps less dramatic than Agamemnon's Myceni, but all the more interesting because it was well real and hopefully featured fewer attempts to trick people into eating children, though I suppose we'll never know for sure. This is episode two fifty seven under the shadow of Agamemnon. The real Bronze Age Mycenians, the Mycenaeans are an exciting people to look at, not only for the plethora of mythological connections that we can find, but also as the more explicit origins of the later Archaic and Classical Age Greeks. That's kind of the wild thing about the Myceonians as a whole. How much of what was going on in the mainland at the time was a precedent for what would later happen. It's interesting to look at these similarities and differences when thinking about how culture develops over centuries of progress. Through Myceni, we get this sense that the evolution and development of culture moves from the bottom up because as we will look at during the Collapse episodes, what's really lost in that collapse isn't the culture itself, but the centralization of it and its power. It's the elites and the most upper echelons of society that were really lost during the collapse, and what was left and what persisted afterwards was the real everyday people who were able to go on with their lives, who were able to adjust and adapt to these major changes because they were themselves not rich and elite and so weren't affected in the same way it tends to be, particularly when we're looking at this kind of culture where the written record is minimal and limited entirely to the elite palatial structure. All that's left behind is the remnants of those elites, and so it looked like the culture itself was lost for a long time, but it was only the lasting material record that was often lost, and not the people themselves. But I'm getting ahead of myself. We are going to stick with the Myceneans during the Bronze Age for this one. There's a lot to look at. They were a rich culture, both literally and figuratively, one that we could spend hours on. But we will not. Firstly, a couple of quick reminders from last week's episode. Linear A and linear B are the two proto Greek languages that I will refer to most. Linear A originated on Crete and linear B on the mainland, though Crete eventually began using linear be as well, and that's lucky because linear BE is decipherable today, whereas linear A is still lost in translation. As it were, both writing systems are predominantly found in palatial record keeping, where the clay blocks they were inscribed on were preserved by fires like makeshift kilns that are cherished by modern historians. There were many Mycenean sights across the mainland of Greece, from the Peloponnese into Attica, by Yosia and beyond. They were just as intensely connected with the rest of the Mediterranean as the Minoans, like we talked about last week, and of course had a very lovely little relationship with those Minoans in particular. But I digress. We will get there. The Mycenaeans had as humble a beginning as the Minoans. Across the mainland. There were groups of people living and going about life just as they were on the island during the early Bronze Age for any kind of centralization. And you may wonder how we know what we do know for this time period. You know, there wasn't any writing in Greece at all, yet we have no textual evidence, so what are we left with? Well, again, this is where all those archaeologically inclined will get excited. The majority of evidence from these earliest time periods, and in fact, how we get most of our relative chronology, like dating in general, is through pottery, and isn't that delightful. Scholars who are considerably more knowledgeable on this topic than I am could explain it much better. But basically, through patterns in morphology, decoration, depiction of fabrics, et cetera, archaeologists have been able to map the changes and figure out roughly the time frame for this period. And while the pottery that is found during this time is not as impressively stunning as what we might find later in the archaic and classical periods and beyond, I think that you'd be surprised just how sophisticated it was. I mean, I have the min Wins mostly in my head at all times, but think Bronze Age octopus there were identifiable workshops all across the mainland, all the way from Thrace down to Attica and into the Peloponnese, even on the island Aguina tucked away in the Saronic Gulf between the Peloponnese and Attica. The study of pottery from this time period does more than help just help us figure out relative chronology. It also shows us the level of connection and specialization that was happening during this period. Workshop sites found in some central Greek locations even demonstrate that at this period there was a truly wild amount of specialization happening, with specific pieces being made at specific sites and then which moved around the mainland and beyond like Truly, the level of information that we can get from pottery alone is astounding and really goes to show that, you know, even at the earliest periods of the Bronze Age in the Aegean, there was a substantial amount of connection taking place amongst the people. And as we move through the early Bronze Age period on the mainland, we also start to see signs of what we should probably consider as a migration happening. This movement is combined with more fortifications that are happening at sites, evidence of people settling in and protecting themselves against outside threats. This isn't quite the heavy fortification of the later Bronze Age, but we do start to see sites building up a bit more as the early period moves on, and there's also evidence of migration through the burial sites, which are incredibly important for our knowledge of the Mycenaeans broadly. This is something that Friday's conversation will go into in much more details. So I won't stay too long on the Early Bronze Age and these burials, as I really want to get into the major sites that we're all familiar with. But what I'm hoping you take away from this is from the beginning of it all, we are seeing the same themes that we saw while on crete last week, those being movement of people, interconnectivity between communities both near and far, and just this vast amount of connection across the land. The Mycenaeans during the Middle Holadic period, which is around the eighteenth century BCE, were vastly different from what we saw on crete. While on crete we start to see the emergence and growth of their palatial period. What we see on the mainland is almost like a mini collapse of sorts. This is coming long before their own palatial period. While this little mini collapse does lead towards the later palatial period of the Mycenians, it is important to spend some time with this period because it sets up later citadels and palaces that we see into the later Holadic period. We won't be here long, just long enough to get the lay of the land. And I am having to be unfortunately brief, and I'm trying not to bog you all down with dates too much, but I hope you get the sense of the time period we are looking at just how ancient this was. So I mentioned this little mini collapse, but also that the time period that preceded it was, you know, seemed to be going pretty well. There was a growth of community interconnectivity between these various areas and the fortification of other areas, which at least tells us that there are people that care about where they're living and you know, care about protecting that space. And yet we see this period followed by this other period of destruction and depopulation, at least in the southern mainland. This distinction is important, of course, like like you know, later ancient Greece. It's really easy to bundle all these communities of the mainland under this one umbrella of myceny and or mainland. But this isn't really fair or accurate. You know, the mainland, like later Greece, was an area that housed multitude of people that had differences across the communities, just as we wouldn't say that, you know, classical period, Thebans were like the Spartans in any meaningful way. We aren't going to do that with the people living in the Peloponnese and in Attica and Botia and beyond during this Bronze Age. Like, sure, they share some similarities, but not to the degree that we can comfortably say that they're all facing the same influences and pressures and threats, because like why would they. You know, they're in very different places, and so they are just facing very different issues, no matter how similar they might also be, the destructions I mentioned were likely caused by a variety of factors. While a migration of people could influence these destructive events, they were likely you know, environmental changes that were also happening and influence them, stuff like erosion and land degradation causes, you know, serious difficulties for a group of people that heavily rely on that land in order to sustain themselves. These sorts of difficulties cause people to move around, you know, trying to find a better way of life, better places to live and grow and everything, and they heavily contribute to the changes that are happening during this period. And of course, you know, we don't have a record of what was actually happening, just what evidence was left behind in which we can then try to piece together some form of explanation. Not only do we have this destruction, though, but we also see major changes in the settlements and social hierarchy at this very early period. Because of the ever changing environment, there was a need to find a new way to order society and understand what was happening around the individual people. The movement of people into new areas and this mixing of individuals likely also influenced these changes. And what comes out of this is the later Mycenians that we think of today. Understanding this Middle Holadic period is not easy. It's not like the Minoan period where we have like really clear signs of change and development. But we can glean from the evidence that we do have is that changes in development, you know, are happening broadly. During the earlier part of this Middle Holadic period, we have less of an understanding of exactly what is happening, but as we move through that period, we're able to pick up on some subtle differences that are occurring, and see how the later Mysonians pop out, you know, into the Mediterranean. And what we are left with at the end of this Middle Holadic period and the changes that took place is the foundations for what the Mysonians will become. A social hierarchy with an elite is created and seen through the mortuary practices that are then present in these areas, and resettlement of previous sites is also occurring, and we see this ever expanding contact with the Aegean islands and with crete, and the Minoan energy and influence on the mainland was just enormous. You know. While there is evidence of influence on coastal sites for obvious reasons, the influence has made it deeper into the mainland too. And it's likely the Minoans who inspired the later palatial structures that are about to start cropping up on mainland Greece. It's really the late Holadic period where the Mysonines shine, So that's where we will spend the rest of our time. I don't want to bog you down with the dates too much I might have already, but a general idea of the time period that we're looking at is that, you know, the broad period that we consider to be the Mysonine period on the mainland is generally from around seventeen fifty BCE to around twelve hundred or eleven hundred BCE, ending with the collapse that we will get to later this month. The people that we think of as my you know, the palatial citadels where we imagine Helen and Malayas and Agamemnon and all those figures in the Trojan cycle all come from this late Haladic period around the fifteenth century down to the collapse in the early twelfth They are not real, to be clear, I hope I'm making it clear enough. At least we don't know if they're real, But the ideas behind those characters come from this time period when Mycenians were kind of at their peak. Last week we focused on the Mino inside of Kenosos, but it's a little more difficult to pick one mysiny in sight and still really get a grasp of everything that was happening during the period. What was happening at the site of Myceni was not necessarily the same as what was happening at Pilos or Thebes or Lerna. For simplicity, and because this is not an entire history course but one podcast episode that needs to keep me from losing what little remains of my functioning brain, We're mostly going to hang around in Myceni itself, maybe pop over to Pilos every now and then. Just remember, the Mycenians were not a monolith. They were broadly spread out over the mainland. The Minoans weren't either, obviously, but it's a bit harder to wrap your head around when we're talking about a large amount of the Greek mainland rather than, you know, one famously big but still an island. The very beginnings of Mycenaean culture grow during the late Helladic period until they become this vast and various palatial sites that we often think of now, the most famous of which are probably Mycenian Pilos, mythological homes to Agamemnon and the Great King nestor the most important regions for the development of the administrative and cultural centers of the Mycenean culture, though are these sites or just primarily the sites in the Peloponnese, but it does extend into other familiar areas like Attica and Biotia for once, though like Athens, is not the most important place, or rather, for once, it isn't the place where almost everything survives from, like is so often the case in later time periods. One of the best things about learning about the Mycenians, though, in my opinion and Michaela's, is that so much of what we know about the development of the culture and the practices come from grave sites. This is for all my goth girlies out there, keep love and graveyards, because they really do impart just loads of important cultural information and one of the other most important places to learn about ancient cultures. Trash holes. That is not the technical term, but it does best describe what I'm talking about, going through ancient people's trash like that's archaeology dreams still like any good weirdo, it's cemeteries that we're going to focus on. Cemeteries in the beginning of this late Holadic period start demonstrating higher levels of organization and division amongst the burials. This implies the beginning of social stratification that seems to lean towards familial ties and lineage. You know, high value grave goods appear in burials and we start to see differentiation in how the dead are interred. And again, you know, this is something that is going to come up in Friday's conversation. We're going to go into lots more detail because grave goods are awesome. Interestingly, this is a diversified across the region, with different areas adopting different burial practices at this beginning kind of periods of this, things like the shaft graves at Myceni and the Tumuli and regions like Messinia. These differences, as well as the presence of rich grave goods, suggests that there was a level of maybe competition amongst these elites, with each vying to prove that they are so much more important than the other simply because they can afford to put more swords or jewelry into their grave. It's rich people competing to appear more rich than the other rich people. But like spending a seemingly large amount of their living days and money preparing to look rich when they're dead, which is just like so fascinatingly ancient, and I mean, good for them, I guess, like rich people have always been weird. But fortunately what this does is show us that there was this emergence of rich people, the elite in the region, and eventually these grave sites would turn into the large Solos tombs that we can still see today in places like Myceni. The most famous of these Tholos tombs, sometimes called beehive tombs, is called the Treasury of Atreus, and it is I mean, fuck you guys, like the Tholos tombs are just they're so incredibly cool, Like there's a reason they're sometimes called beehive tombs. They're incredible. Check my Instagram because I intend to post some things that I have from the last time I visited there. They are, While they are beautiful, the acoustics inside them are bananas. But of course it is this stuff that was found inside those Tholos tombs that gives us the most information about the people who built them and then the people who were then interred in them. The types of goods that appear are incredible examples of just how far reaching the Mycenean contacts were within the Mediterranean. You know, things from places like Crete and the Eastern Mediterranean have been found in these tombs, and so show that not only the Mycenians you know, had well defined trade contacts along with influence from these other regions, but also you know, could afford to put them when they're buried and never see them again. But it also implies this influence from the wider area, an influence that was likely driving the political and cultural changes that were happening on the mainland. And what's wild too is how much these things indicate the level of wealth you know, that would have had to been present amongst these elites. Like they're burying themselves with their wealth rather than passing it down to their descendants. And we know that ancestral lines were important, you know, that's also clear in these burials, but it means that they were all rich enough that they could spare the level of wealth they were being buried with, which, like frankly, is a nice little thing to keep in mind when we look at the collapse and the crash of the elite structures that were well quite literally hoarding wealth in the earth, a little bit of fuck around and find out perhaps a little bit of inspiration for the future. Even over time, the regional differences that we see in the early Holadic period become less pronounced, and influence on the mainland becomes a bit more defined into one thing that we can call Mycenian you know, not entirely obviously, just more than it had been before. It makes sense, you know, the more these cultures developed and worked together, the more they collaborated, and so things became more similar across the region, similarly to how the Minoans eventually used linear b you know, likely because their continued contact and trading with the Mysonians. Still just like in later Greece, where certain trends are noticeable across the board generally, but we would never say that the Athenians operated in exactly the same way as the Thebans, you know, this is the same for the Mysonians. One of the overall themes for the Mysonians, which I'm sure no one will be surprised by, is quite a strong emphasis on Marshall prowess, you know, the Agamemnon of it all, Because I mean, if we understand that the heroes of the Trojan War originated mythologically from this culture. Then the emphasis on military excellence is not in any way surprising. Have you ever googled a boar tooth helmet? Go ahead and do that now. On top of all of this, being able to protect yourself in a land that isn't you know, the most well known for being able to support large populations is also not at all surprising. It was of utmost importance for the people living on this land and in this very early time period, that they be able to support and also protect themselves. The social stratification is important when we consider how it was on crete too. On the island there seemed to have been more focus on the community as a whole and an elite ruling class that kind of worked with the population. But on the mainland there eventually appears to be more of a focus on an individual chief of sorts, a head of the elite, or at least a leading family within the community and within the elites. Like small settlements that appeared across the mainland eventually coalesced into a number of key sites that seem to consolidate, you know, everything together under this leading individual or leading family. And as these sites grew, the need to have an organized administrative system became, you know, increasingly important. The palatial systems start to make their appearance then, you know, small at first, and eventually growing as time goes on. As the early Mysonine period goes on, we see this expansion of Mysonean powers across the Mediterranean, most notably again on Crete, where a number of destructions occur, followed by the adoption of linear Bee as the language of administration on the island. You know. Traditionally this has sometimes been attributed to the Mysonianes taking over the island, you know, which is a fairly reasonable conclusion, but it's definitely not something that's been agreed upon. I even kind of phrased it that way, you know, saying followed by but really these things are happening at a similar time, you know, because it's also just as likely that the Minoans had particularly close ties to the Mysonians and therefore adopted linear Bee of convenience or for any other number of reasons. And linear be is fun. Linear be is fun. I mean, I won't go too deep into it, but it is solidly early Greek and entirely selfishly too, Like thank fuck the Minoans took on linear B, because it means that we can actually read some records from Kenosos, you know, which wouldn't be possible if they stayed entirely using linear A. And it's certainly true that the Myceonians were so deeply influenced by the Minoans that it's sometimes difficult to parse out like what is distinctly Mysinian on the mainland, you know, from the sheer amount of Minoan products and influence that also appears in what remained of their mysony in palatial centers. And speaking of let's spend the last little bit of time that we have with you know, the Mysonians at their height and at the centers that we are so familiar with, from the great sites of the Argyllid which were likely all interconnected in their own ways and teans, you know, further into the Peloponnese at Pilos, and even up into Bieotia at Thebes. There was a settlement in Athens too, i should say, and even a structure on the Acropolis with its Cyclopean walls, but it wasn't important enough to make the cut today for once we get to leave Athens out. Just don't tell the Athenians of the classical period, you know, they are the center of the universe. The palatial centers of the Myceneans operated in much the same way as the ones on crete, as the central areas for administration, ceremony, production, and storage for their corresponding areas. The structure of the buildings, though, differed from crete in that they often had a central room called a megaron that housed a large hearth and possibly was like a reception area for whoever was leading the people at the sites. The central figure also is appears in a name like we actually have a word for this central figure of the Mycenaean cultures. The word is wanax, and it appears in later Greek as an axe, and it meant king, lord, protector, or chief, you know, something of that sort. This is the one greatest distinction between the Minoans and the Mycenians, where you know, in the latter there is eventually this clear leading figure, the Agamemnon of it all, whereas the Minoans don't necessarily have that, or if they did, we're not sure of it. But the surrounding areas of each Mycenine settlement, you know, differed from site to site, but what's clear is that there was, you know, major expansion that had happened and was taking place. Mycene fortified their town with great Cyclopean walls and the infamous line skate that greeted visitors or enemies as they advanced into the citadel. In these walls, like the ones in Athens, took their name from the later people who couldn't fathom, you know, that their mortal ancestors could have built walls so large, and thus they were Cyclopean, built by the cyclops themselves. Inside the citadels, you don't just find the central palatial building with its megaron, but also buildings that functioned as cult and production centers. These are the areas where the linear b tablets tend to be found and which give us lots of information on the economic and cult religious activities that were happening. This is how we see that specialization of certain crafts and crops continued to help each regional economy. At Plos, we see a booming textile industry where women played a large role, something that is evidenced in the administrative records. There's a lot to say about women in the Mysonean period and goddesses too, which will come up heavily in Friday's conversation. You know, I picked brains, Mysony and pottery that she remained important and spread across the mainland, the Aegean islands, and then all through the Mediterranean. When it comes to cults of worship, the Mysonean cult shows the beginnings of cult practices that we will see later in the Greek world, kind of the origins of what will become ancient Greek cult practice and religion. Broadly, Burnt sacrifices were common, as were libations, and processions seemed to play an incredibly important role in their worship. Minoan influence does appear too, with some sites adopting very recognizable Minoan symbols like the double axe, But we shouldn't actually assume that this meant, you know, a Minoan cult of worship was established or dominant in anyway. It seems that instead the Mysonians used these symbols and various practices within their own understanding of their own cult. Instead, you know, Minoan symbols were just being translated into myceny in practices and adapted for whatever use they needed. It's also in this early Mycenian cult that we can see the beginnings of the gods themselves, the gods that we will come to know and love and hate from later traditions, and they appear in these linear bed tablets that record offerings made to the various deities and sanctuaries. We see evidence of most of the Olympian gods in their earliest forms, along with many mentions of a goddess called Potnia. She's a kind of broad conceptual goddess or mistress of various different things, depending on the context. Again, these will come up heavily on Friday's episode. Goddesses were a major question from me. Surprise, surprise, And along with these dedications though to these deities, feasting was an important part of their cult practice, something that is seen in the Minoan world and obviously later in the Greek world, in which you know it helped to impart a common community amongst its practitioners. And this too, I'm getting too excited, This too is going to come up in a future conversation episode where we look at how much we can learn from animal bones you know about the daily lives of these Bronze Age cultures. And as time moves on and the Mycenians continue into the late Haladic period, we see the fortifications at these sites grow more and more intense. The walls are built up higher, alternate entrances are added to the citadels, and cisterns are built within the safety of the walls of those citadels. And all this points to something happening on the mainland that is making the people living in these regions uncomfortable. They are nervous, and they are building these walls stone by stone, higher and higher to keep anything and everything out, while ensuring that they have the resources to provide for themselves within the safety of these walls. And this is of course just one small piece of what leads into the Bronze Age collapse, the end of the Mysonean Elites, the end what we call the Mysonians as people as a culture, but the continuation of everyone else, the regular people who are able to live beyond the collapse of their whole entire societal structure. The collapse, as we will see, was not sudden. There were stirrings long in advance, events that cause the people to feel this need to fortify themselves and their lands from something or someone. But here's the wild thing about the Mycenians, the people that we learn about through the Trojan cycle, this mythical history, the very real people behind that entire everything of the Iliad and the Odyssey like, really only existed for a short period of time. In the grand scheme of ancient Greece and the ancient Mediterranean, the rise and fall of the Mycenean Citadels happened pretty quickly, just a few centuries. That matters very little though, you know, in again, this the same grand scheme of ancient Greece, because while the actual people we call Mysonians were a fairly brief amount of time or lived for a fairly brief amount of time, their legacy I mean, spanned the whole of the Ancient Greek time period, and so far beyond that. I mean, well, you've heard me read the Iliad, in the Odyssey, you've seen the new translations coming out to this day, new ways of understanding the stories that came out of this Mycenean period. Agamemnon may not have been real, but he was inspired by the very real people of myceni and all that they left behind. He was developed in the culture that emerged from what was left after the collapse of Mycenie. Still, the very real people of mainland Greece during the Bronze Age were so much more than the myths and the later people were able to see in them. The regular people in their history are so important to remember when thinking about the Myceneans, because while we don't see a lot of what those regular people did with their lives, they ultimately were the ones who continued on after all of the elite was gone. After the elite systems csh their societies collapsed entirely, the regular people were what was left. They carried the traditions to what we will find in later Greece, the stories, practices, and understandings of their place in the world. We may have the elites to thank for building the sites and being a driving force for some of our later stories, for leaving us the things from which we could learn about them, but they were the people lost in the collapse, and it was everyone else who continued on after it. It was only through regular people who managed to get through a whole lot of mess and lived to keep what they could of their culture alive to pass it on and on until it reached people who may have lost the direct memory of who had lived and why what they'd done. But it was still those same people who interpreted what the Wanaks and other elite figures left behind and then gave us the stories that would shape all of ancient Greece. There would never have been an Odysseus without a mainland Greek farmer telling his children's stories of their land and what he knew of its past. There could never have been a Clytemnestra rolling out the red carpet for her murderous husband without the individuals who came across the Tholos tombs of Myceni and imagined that this was where that great avenging queen was laid to rest. Because yes, one of those Tholos tombs does take her name. And so I mean thank you to the Mycenians for my entire life's purpose and career, Oh Nerds, History's fun, isn't it? Friday my conversation with doctor Kim Shelton diving into the details of these ancient Mycenians. Oh, I smiled through so much of that episode. I can't wait for you all to hear it. Thank you all for listening. This episode is more than long enough, so let's finish off with a five star review from one of you amazing listeners. This came into my inbox at the absolute perfect time, like literally this morning. It's from a user called Rocky Mountain Queen from the States. Came for the myths and stayed for the history. I can't praise this show enough. It's just the right amount of whimsy, realism, and education. I started from episode one about a year ago and was hooked immediately. I first heard about this podcast when listening to Ancient History Fangirl and knew I had to find it and listen to it. I'm finally cut up to the President, and I've loved seeing how the show has evolved and gotten better with each episode. I love the retellings and explanations of the mythology, but I have to say I have enjoyed the History Deep Dives more. The Atlantis and Sparta series were great, and I'm really looking forward to this new season of Bronze Age. Grace, thank you so much for creating this show and forcing me to think deeper about some of these myths and Histories. I truly love every minute of it, from the mythology episodes to the conversation episodes. I definitely have some favorites, but all are wonderful and powerful in their own way. Keep doing what you're doing, and I look forward to more. Thank you for that review, like for so many reasons. They all mean the world to me. But I've been struggling lately a lot, and the history episodes are, in addition to that, like a bit out of my comfort zone as much as I love them. So I really appreciate the timing of this review and all of the ridiculously nice things you've said about this show and all the many years that I've been doing it. I really, I really appreciate these. I don't think I can say it enough. If you like the show, consider leaving me another review on Apple Podcasts for me to you know, appreciate. I need to read more on the show, you know, so maybe give me some love so frankly, my fragile mental health could use them. Let's talk about this baby is written and produced by me live Albert MICHAELA. Smith, I mean, McKayla is everything for this season, this series of Bronze Age episodes. It simply would not exist without her for countless reasons. Laura Smith is the production assistant and audio engineer and doing some incredible work on the website. Somehow soon I'm gonna have a slightly more functioning website. You're welcome. Select music in this episode was by Luke Chaos. The podcast is part of the iHeart Podcast Network. Listen on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts, and help me continue bringing you the world with Greek mythology and the ancient Mediterranean. By becoming a patron, you will get past bonus episodes and more and hopefully, hopefully you know in the future who isitpatroon dot com Sash Smith Baby or click the link in this episode of the description I am live and can you hear my voice going? I love this shit so much. Thank you all for being here. Wow.

Now, Agamemnon's was a continental power, and he could not have been master of any except the adjacent islands, and these would not be many. But through the possession of a fleet, and from this expedition we may infer the character of earlier enterprises. Now, Mycenie may have been a small place, and many of the towns of that age may appear comparatively insignificant. But no exact observer would therefore feel justified in rejecting the estimate given by the poets and by tradition of the magnitude of the armament. For I suppose if Lacedaemon were to become desolate and the temples and the foundations of the public buildings were left, that as time went on, there would be a strong disposition with posterity to refuse to accept her fame as a true exponent of her power. Hi, Hello, welcome once again to Let's Talk About Myths Baby, the podcast whose title is deceiving right now, particularly during this month's series, I'm your host, live here once more with history of the Bronze Age people of Greece nestled amongst their own mythical history. That quote I just read like those i've read before for this series was from the classical Athenian historian Thucydides, from his work detailing the Peloponnesian War once more. He serves as a beautiful example of the way that ancient Greece's mythical origins remained very real to later Greek authors, who had, in the case of Myceni, but only what remained of a once great palace and the stories of Agamemnon and Menelaus that the poets had given to them centuries earlier, this line of Tantalids and their war against Troy, and it's only through this which they could parse the Bronze Age culture's lost history. In the case of that particular quote, it's him trying to fathom how the Achaeans and Agamemnon had so many men and ships to send to Troy when the Mycene that was left by his time was quite so small. Last week we looked at how we know what we know of Bronze Age Greece, some of the wider Mediterranean, and how it ties with ancient Greece's own mythologized versions of history, and specifically the Minoans. We looked at the Bronze Age people from Crete and their labyrinthine bull decorated palace of Kenosos. As I mentioned then, the Minoans came first, but they were followed close behind by Myceni. The culture on the mainland of Greece centered in the Peloponnese, which grew under the inspiration of the Minoans and came to be quite closely tied with them through trade and shared influence. So today we are moving over to the mainland and looking at those Mycenians during this period. And then on Friday an episode with doctor Kim Shelton, whose expertise on Myceni made for an incredible and utterly mind blowing episode on the culture and religion and what we know of these ancient people. But before we listen to that expertise, we are going to get comfortable in this world of Myceni, a world which was later mythologized into the famed home of Agamemnon and his children The Curse of his Father and his grandfather and his great grandfather father, where a king is murdered by his wife while taking a bath because he had the audacity to sacrifice their eldest daughter for a bit of good wind, a place where the first red carpet was rolled out by that very wife, only that one was red with the king's blood. The real Mycenie is perhaps less dramatic than Agamemnon's Myceni, but all the more interesting because it was well real and hopefully featured fewer attempts to trick people into eating children, though I suppose we'll never know for sure. This is episode two fifty seven under the shadow of Agamemnon. The real Bronze Age Mycenians, the Mycenaeans are an exciting people to look at, not only for the plethora of mythological connections that we can find, but also as the more explicit origins of the later Archaic and Classical Age Greeks. That's kind of the wild thing about the Myceonians as a whole. How much of what was going on in the mainland at the time was a precedent for what would later happen. It's interesting to look at these similarities and differences when thinking about how culture develops over centuries of progress. Through Myceni, we get this sense that the evolution and development of culture moves from the bottom up because as we will look at during the Collapse episodes, what's really lost in that collapse isn't the culture itself, but the centralization of it and its power. It's the elites and the most upper echelons of society that were really lost during the collapse, and what was left and what persisted afterwards was the real everyday people who were able to go on with their lives, who were able to adjust and adapt to these major changes because they were themselves not rich and elite and so weren't affected in the same way it tends to be, particularly when we're looking at this kind of culture where the written record is minimal and limited entirely to the elite palatial structure. All that's left behind is the remnants of those elites, and so it looked like the culture itself was lost for a long time, but it was only the lasting material record that was often lost, and not the people themselves. But I'm getting ahead of myself. We are going to stick with the Myceneans during the Bronze Age for this one. There's a lot to look at. They were a rich culture, both literally and figuratively, one that we could spend hours on. But we will not. Firstly, a couple of quick reminders from last week's episode. Linear A and linear B are the two proto Greek languages that I will refer to most. Linear A originated on Crete and linear B on the mainland, though Crete eventually began using linear be as well, and that's lucky because linear BE is decipherable today, whereas linear A is still lost in translation. As it were, both writing systems are predominantly found in palatial record keeping, where the clay blocks they were inscribed on were preserved by fires like makeshift kilns that are cherished by modern historians. There were many Mycenean sights across the mainland of Greece, from the Peloponnese into Attica, by Yosia and beyond. They were just as intensely connected with the rest of the Mediterranean as the Minoans, like we talked about last week, and of course had a very lovely little relationship with those Minoans in particular. But I digress. We will get there. The Mycenaeans had as humble a beginning as the Minoans. Across the mainland. There were groups of people living and going about life just as they were on the island during the early Bronze Age for any kind of centralization. And you may wonder how we know what we do know for this time period. You know, there wasn't any writing in Greece at all, yet we have no textual evidence, so what are we left with? Well, again, this is where all those archaeologically inclined will get excited. The majority of evidence from these earliest time periods, and in fact, how we get most of our relative chronology, like dating in general, is through pottery, and isn't that delightful. Scholars who are considerably more knowledgeable on this topic than I am could explain it much better. But basically, through patterns in morphology, decoration, depiction of fabrics, et cetera, archaeologists have been able to map the changes and figure out roughly the time frame for this period. And while the pottery that is found during this time is not as impressively stunning as what we might find later in the archaic and classical periods and beyond, I think that you'd be surprised just how sophisticated it was. I mean, I have the min Wins mostly in my head at all times, but think Bronze Age octopus there were identifiable workshops all across the mainland, all the way from Thrace down to Attica and into the Peloponnese, even on the island Aguina tucked away in the Saronic Gulf between the Peloponnese and Attica. The study of pottery from this time period does more than help just help us figure out relative chronology. It also shows us the level of connection and specialization that was happening during this period. Workshop sites found in some central Greek locations even demonstrate that at this period there was a truly wild amount of specialization happening, with specific pieces being made at specific sites and then which moved around the mainland and beyond like Truly, the level of information that we can get from pottery alone is astounding and really goes to show that, you know, even at the earliest periods of the Bronze Age in the Aegean, there was a substantial amount of connection taking place amongst the people. And as we move through the early Bronze Age period on the mainland, we also start to see signs of what we should probably consider as a migration happening. This movement is combined with more fortifications that are happening at sites, evidence of people settling in and protecting themselves against outside threats. This isn't quite the heavy fortification of the later Bronze Age, but we do start to see sites building up a bit more as the early period moves on, and there's also evidence of migration through the burial sites, which are incredibly important for our knowledge of the Mycenaeans broadly. This is something that Friday's conversation will go into in much more details. So I won't stay too long on the Early Bronze Age and these burials, as I really want to get into the major sites that we're all familiar with. But what I'm hoping you take away from this is from the beginning of it all, we are seeing the same themes that we saw while on crete last week, those being movement of people, interconnectivity between communities both near and far, and just this vast amount of connection across the land. The Mycenaeans during the Middle Holadic period, which is around the eighteenth century BCE, were vastly different from what we saw on crete. While on crete we start to see the emergence and growth of their palatial period. What we see on the mainland is almost like a mini collapse of sorts. This is coming long before their own palatial period. While this little mini collapse does lead towards the later palatial period of the Mycenians, it is important to spend some time with this period because it sets up later citadels and palaces that we see into the later Holadic period. We won't be here long, just long enough to get the lay of the land. And I am having to be unfortunately brief, and I'm trying not to bog you all down with dates too much, but I hope you get the sense of the time period we are looking at just how ancient this was. So I mentioned this little mini collapse, but also that the time period that preceded it was, you know, seemed to be going pretty well. There was a growth of community interconnectivity between these various areas and the fortification of other areas, which at least tells us that there are people that care about where they're living and you know, care about protecting that space. And yet we see this period followed by this other period of destruction and depopulation, at least in the southern mainland. This distinction is important, of course, like like you know, later ancient Greece. It's really easy to bundle all these communities of the mainland under this one umbrella of myceny and or mainland. But this isn't really fair or accurate. You know, the mainland, like later Greece, was an area that housed multitude of people that had differences across the communities, just as we wouldn't say that, you know, classical period, Thebans were like the Spartans in any meaningful way. We aren't going to do that with the people living in the Peloponnese and in Attica and Botia and beyond during this Bronze Age. Like, sure, they share some similarities, but not to the degree that we can comfortably say that they're all facing the same influences and pressures and threats, because like why would they. You know, they're in very different places, and so they are just facing very different issues, no matter how similar they might also be, the destructions I mentioned were likely caused by a variety of factors. While a migration of people could influence these destructive events, they were likely you know, environmental changes that were also happening and influence them, stuff like erosion and land degradation causes, you know, serious difficulties for a group of people that heavily rely on that land in order to sustain themselves. These sorts of difficulties cause people to move around, you know, trying to find a better way of life, better places to live and grow and everything, and they heavily contribute to the changes that are happening during this period. And of course, you know, we don't have a record of what was actually happening, just what evidence was left behind in which we can then try to piece together some form of explanation. Not only do we have this destruction, though, but we also see major changes in the settlements and social hierarchy at this very early period. Because of the ever changing environment, there was a need to find a new way to order society and understand what was happening around the individual people. The movement of people into new areas and this mixing of individuals likely also influenced these changes. And what comes out of this is the later Mycenians that we think of today. Understanding this Middle Holadic period is not easy. It's not like the Minoan period where we have like really clear signs of change and development. But we can glean from the evidence that we do have is that changes in development, you know, are happening broadly. During the earlier part of this Middle Holadic period, we have less of an understanding of exactly what is happening, but as we move through that period, we're able to pick up on some subtle differences that are occurring, and see how the later Mysonians pop out, you know, into the Mediterranean. And what we are left with at the end of this Middle Holadic period and the changes that took place is the foundations for what the Mysonians will become. A social hierarchy with an elite is created and seen through the mortuary practices that are then present in these areas, and resettlement of previous sites is also occurring, and we see this ever expanding contact with the Aegean islands and with crete, and the Minoan energy and influence on the mainland was just enormous. You know. While there is evidence of influence on coastal sites for obvious reasons, the influence has made it deeper into the mainland too. And it's likely the Minoans who inspired the later palatial structures that are about to start cropping up on mainland Greece. It's really the late Holadic period where the Mysonines shine, So that's where we will spend the rest of our time. I don't want to bog you down with the dates too much I might have already, but a general idea of the time period that we're looking at is that, you know, the broad period that we consider to be the Mysonine period on the mainland is generally from around seventeen fifty BCE to around twelve hundred or eleven hundred BCE, ending with the collapse that we will get to later this month. The people that we think of as my you know, the palatial citadels where we imagine Helen and Malayas and Agamemnon and all those figures in the Trojan cycle all come from this late Haladic period around the fifteenth century down to the collapse in the early twelfth They are not real, to be clear, I hope I'm making it clear enough. At least we don't know if they're real, But the ideas behind those characters come from this time period when Mycenians were kind of at their peak. Last week we focused on the Mino inside of Kenosos, but it's a little more difficult to pick one mysiny in sight and still really get a grasp of everything that was happening during the period. What was happening at the site of Myceni was not necessarily the same as what was happening at Pilos or Thebes or Lerna. For simplicity, and because this is not an entire history course but one podcast episode that needs to keep me from losing what little remains of my functioning brain, We're mostly going to hang around in Myceni itself, maybe pop over to Pilos every now and then. Just remember, the Mycenians were not a monolith. They were broadly spread out over the mainland. The Minoans weren't either, obviously, but it's a bit harder to wrap your head around when we're talking about a large amount of the Greek mainland rather than, you know, one famously big but still an island. The very beginnings of Mycenaean culture grow during the late Helladic period until they become this vast and various palatial sites that we often think of now, the most famous of which are probably Mycenian Pilos, mythological homes to Agamemnon and the Great King nestor the most important regions for the development of the administrative and cultural centers of the Mycenean culture, though are these sites or just primarily the sites in the Peloponnese, but it does extend into other familiar areas like Attica and Biotia for once, though like Athens, is not the most important place, or rather, for once, it isn't the place where almost everything survives from, like is so often the case in later time periods. One of the best things about learning about the Mycenians, though, in my opinion and Michaela's, is that so much of what we know about the development of the culture and the practices come from grave sites. This is for all my goth girlies out there, keep love and graveyards, because they really do impart just loads of important cultural information and one of the other most important places to learn about ancient cultures. Trash holes. That is not the technical term, but it does best describe what I'm talking about, going through ancient people's trash like that's archaeology dreams still like any good weirdo, it's cemeteries that we're going to focus on. Cemeteries in the beginning of this late Holadic period start demonstrating higher levels of organization and division amongst the burials. This implies the beginning of social stratification that seems to lean towards familial ties and lineage. You know, high value grave goods appear in burials and we start to see differentiation in how the dead are interred. And again, you know, this is something that is going to come up in Friday's conversation. We're going to go into lots more detail because grave goods are awesome. Interestingly, this is a diversified across the region, with different areas adopting different burial practices at this beginning kind of periods of this, things like the shaft graves at Myceni and the Tumuli and regions like Messinia. These differences, as well as the presence of rich grave goods, suggests that there was a level of maybe competition amongst these elites, with each vying to prove that they are so much more important than the other simply because they can afford to put more swords or jewelry into their grave. It's rich people competing to appear more rich than the other rich people. But like spending a seemingly large amount of their living days and money preparing to look rich when they're dead, which is just like so fascinatingly ancient, and I mean, good for them, I guess, like rich people have always been weird. But fortunately what this does is show us that there was this emergence of rich people, the elite in the region, and eventually these grave sites would turn into the large Solos tombs that we can still see today in places like Myceni. The most famous of these Tholos tombs, sometimes called beehive tombs, is called the Treasury of Atreus, and it is I mean, fuck you guys, like the Tholos tombs are just they're so incredibly cool, Like there's a reason they're sometimes called beehive tombs. They're incredible. Check my Instagram because I intend to post some things that I have from the last time I visited there. They are, While they are beautiful, the acoustics inside them are bananas. But of course it is this stuff that was found inside those Tholos tombs that gives us the most information about the people who built them and then the people who were then interred in them. The types of goods that appear are incredible examples of just how far reaching the Mycenean contacts were within the Mediterranean. You know, things from places like Crete and the Eastern Mediterranean have been found in these tombs, and so show that not only the Mycenians you know, had well defined trade contacts along with influence from these other regions, but also you know, could afford to put them when they're buried and never see them again. But it also implies this influence from the wider area, an influence that was likely driving the political and cultural changes that were happening on the mainland. And what's wild too is how much these things indicate the level of wealth you know, that would have had to been present amongst these elites. Like they're burying themselves with their wealth rather than passing it down to their descendants. And we know that ancestral lines were important, you know, that's also clear in these burials, but it means that they were all rich enough that they could spare the level of wealth they were being buried with, which, like frankly, is a nice little thing to keep in mind when we look at the collapse and the crash of the elite structures that were well quite literally hoarding wealth in the earth, a little bit of fuck around and find out perhaps a little bit of inspiration for the future. Even over time, the regional differences that we see in the early Holadic period become less pronounced, and influence on the mainland becomes a bit more defined into one thing that we can call Mycenian you know, not entirely obviously, just more than it had been before. It makes sense, you know, the more these cultures developed and worked together, the more they collaborated, and so things became more similar across the region, similarly to how the Minoans eventually used linear b you know, likely because their continued contact and trading with the Mysonians. Still just like in later Greece, where certain trends are noticeable across the board generally, but we would never say that the Athenians operated in exactly the same way as the Thebans, you know, this is the same for the Mysonians. One of the overall themes for the Mysonians, which I'm sure no one will be surprised by, is quite a strong emphasis on Marshall prowess, you know, the Agamemnon of it all, Because I mean, if we understand that the heroes of the Trojan War originated mythologically from this culture. Then the emphasis on military excellence is not in any way surprising. Have you ever googled a boar tooth helmet? Go ahead and do that now. On top of all of this, being able to protect yourself in a land that isn't you know, the most well known for being able to support large populations is also not at all surprising. It was of utmost importance for the people living on this land and in this very early time period, that they be able to support and also protect themselves. The social stratification is important when we consider how it was on crete too. On the island there seemed to have been more focus on the community as a whole and an elite ruling class that kind of worked with the population. But on the mainland there eventually appears to be more of a focus on an individual chief of sorts, a head of the elite, or at least a leading family within the community and within the elites. Like small settlements that appeared across the mainland eventually coalesced into a number of key sites that seem to consolidate, you know, everything together under this leading individual or leading family. And as these sites grew, the need to have an organized administrative system became, you know, increasingly important. The palatial systems start to make their appearance then, you know, small at first, and eventually growing as time goes on. As the early Mysonine period goes on, we see this expansion of Mysonean powers across the Mediterranean, most notably again on Crete, where a number of destructions occur, followed by the adoption of linear Bee as the language of administration on the island. You know. Traditionally this has sometimes been attributed to the Mysonianes taking over the island, you know, which is a fairly reasonable conclusion, but it's definitely not something that's been agreed upon. I even kind of phrased it that way, you know, saying followed by but really these things are happening at a similar time, you know, because it's also just as likely that the Minoans had particularly close ties to the Mysonians and therefore adopted linear Bee of convenience or for any other number of reasons. And linear be is fun. Linear be is fun. I mean, I won't go too deep into it, but it is solidly early Greek and entirely selfishly too, Like thank fuck the Minoans took on linear B, because it means that we can actually read some records from Kenosos, you know, which wouldn't be possible if they stayed entirely using linear A. And it's certainly true that the Myceonians were so deeply influenced by the Minoans that it's sometimes difficult to parse out like what is distinctly Mysinian on the mainland, you know, from the sheer amount of Minoan products and influence that also appears in what remained of their mysony in palatial centers. And speaking of let's spend the last little bit of time that we have with you know, the Mysonians at their height and at the centers that we are so familiar with, from the great sites of the Argyllid which were likely all interconnected in their own ways and teans, you know, further into the Peloponnese at Pilos, and even up into Bieotia at Thebes. There was a settlement in Athens too, i should say, and even a structure on the Acropolis with its Cyclopean walls, but it wasn't important enough to make the cut today for once we get to leave Athens out. Just don't tell the Athenians of the classical period, you know, they are the center of the universe. The palatial centers of the Myceneans operated in much the same way as the ones on crete, as the central areas for administration, ceremony, production, and storage for their corresponding areas. The structure of the buildings, though, differed from crete in that they often had a central room called a megaron that housed a large hearth and possibly was like a reception area for whoever was leading the people at the sites. The central figure also is appears in a name like we actually have a word for this central figure of the Mycenaean cultures. The word is wanax, and it appears in later Greek as an axe, and it meant king, lord, protector, or chief, you know, something of that sort. This is the one greatest distinction between the Minoans and the Mycenians, where you know, in the latter there is eventually this clear leading figure, the Agamemnon of it all, whereas the Minoans don't necessarily have that, or if they did, we're not sure of it. But the surrounding areas of each Mycenine settlement, you know, differed from site to site, but what's clear is that there was, you know, major expansion that had happened and was taking place. Mycene fortified their town with great Cyclopean walls and the infamous line skate that greeted visitors or enemies as they advanced into the citadel. In these walls, like the ones in Athens, took their name from the later people who couldn't fathom, you know, that their mortal ancestors could have built walls so large, and thus they were Cyclopean, built by the cyclops themselves. Inside the citadels, you don't just find the central palatial building with its megaron, but also buildings that functioned as cult and production centers. These are the areas where the linear b tablets tend to be found and which give us lots of information on the economic and cult religious activities that were happening. This is how we see that specialization of certain crafts and crops continued to help each regional economy. At Plos, we see a booming textile industry where women played a large role, something that is evidenced in the administrative records. There's a lot to say about women in the Mysonean period and goddesses too, which will come up heavily in Friday's conversation. You know, I picked brains, Mysony and pottery that she remained important and spread across the mainland, the Aegean islands, and then all through the Mediterranean. When it comes to cults of worship, the Mysonean cult shows the beginnings of cult practices that we will see later in the Greek world, kind of the origins of what will become ancient Greek cult practice and religion. Broadly, Burnt sacrifices were common, as were libations, and processions seemed to play an incredibly important role in their worship. Minoan influence does appear too, with some sites adopting very recognizable Minoan symbols like the double axe, But we shouldn't actually assume that this meant, you know, a Minoan cult of worship was established or dominant in anyway. It seems that instead the Mysonians used these symbols and various practices within their own understanding of their own cult. Instead, you know, Minoan symbols were just being translated into myceny in practices and adapted for whatever use they needed. It's also in this early Mycenian cult that we can see the beginnings of the gods themselves, the gods that we will come to know and love and hate from later traditions, and they appear in these linear bed tablets that record offerings made to the various deities and sanctuaries. We see evidence of most of the Olympian gods in their earliest forms, along with many mentions of a goddess called Potnia. She's a kind of broad conceptual goddess or mistress of various different things, depending on the context. Again, these will come up heavily on Friday's episode. Goddesses were a major question from me. Surprise, surprise, And along with these dedications though to these deities, feasting was an important part of their cult practice, something that is seen in the Minoan world and obviously later in the Greek world, in which you know it helped to impart a common community amongst its practitioners. And this too, I'm getting too excited, This too is going to come up in a future conversation episode where we look at how much we can learn from animal bones you know about the daily lives of these Bronze Age cultures. And as time moves on and the Mycenians continue into the late Haladic period, we see the fortifications at these sites grow more and more intense. The walls are built up higher, alternate entrances are added to the citadels, and cisterns are built within the safety of the walls of those citadels. And all this points to something happening on the mainland that is making the people living in these regions uncomfortable. They are nervous, and they are building these walls stone by stone, higher and higher to keep anything and everything out, while ensuring that they have the resources to provide for themselves within the safety of these walls. And this is of course just one small piece of what leads into the Bronze Age collapse, the end of the Mysonean Elites, the end what we call the Mysonians as people as a culture, but the continuation of everyone else, the regular people who are able to live beyond the collapse of their whole entire societal structure. The collapse, as we will see, was not sudden. There were stirrings long in advance, events that cause the people to feel this need to fortify themselves and their lands from something or someone. But here's the wild thing about the Mycenians, the people that we learn about through the Trojan cycle, this mythical history, the very real people behind that entire everything of the Iliad and the Odyssey like, really only existed for a short period of time. In the grand scheme of ancient Greece and the ancient Mediterranean, the rise and fall of the Mycenean Citadels happened pretty quickly, just a few centuries. That matters very little though, you know, in again, this the same grand scheme of ancient Greece, because while the actual people we call Mysonians were a fairly brief amount of time or lived for a fairly brief amount of time, their legacy I mean, spanned the whole of the Ancient Greek time period, and so far beyond that. I mean, well, you've heard me read the Iliad, in the Odyssey, you've seen the new translations coming out to this day, new ways of understanding the stories that came out of this Mycenean period. Agamemnon may not have been real, but he was inspired by the very real people of myceni and all that they left behind. He was developed in the culture that emerged from what was left after the collapse of Mycenie. Still, the very real people of mainland Greece during the Bronze Age were so much more than the myths and the later people were able to see in them. The regular people in their history are so important to remember when thinking about the Myceneans, because while we don't see a lot of what those regular people did with their lives, they ultimately were the ones who continued on after all of the elite was gone. After the elite systems csh their societies collapsed entirely, the regular people were what was left. They carried the traditions to what we will find in later Greece, the stories, practices, and understandings of their place in the world. We may have the elites to thank for building the sites and being a driving force for some of our later stories, for leaving us the things from which we could learn about them, but they were the people lost in the collapse, and it was everyone else who continued on after it. It was only through regular people who managed to get through a whole lot of mess and lived to keep what they could of their culture alive to pass it on and on until it reached people who may have lost the direct memory of who had lived and why what they'd done. But it was still those same people who interpreted what the Wanaks and other elite figures left behind and then gave us the stories that would shape all of ancient Greece. There would never have been an Odysseus without a mainland Greek farmer telling his children's stories of their land and what he knew of its past. There could never have been a Clytemnestra rolling out the red carpet for her murderous husband without the individuals who came across the Tholos tombs of Myceni and imagined that this was where that great avenging queen was laid to rest. Because yes, one of those Tholos tombs does take her name. And so I mean thank you to the Mycenians for my entire life's purpose and career, Oh Nerds, History's fun, isn't it? Friday my conversation with doctor Kim Shelton diving into the details of these ancient Mycenians. Oh, I smiled through so much of that episode. I can't wait for you all to hear it. Thank you all for listening. This episode is more than long enough, so let's finish off with a five star review from one of you amazing listeners. This came into my inbox at the absolute perfect time, like literally this morning. It's from a user called Rocky Mountain Queen from the States. Came for the myths and stayed for the history. I can't praise this show enough. It's just the right amount of whimsy, realism, and education. I started from episode one about a year ago and was hooked immediately. I first heard about this podcast when listening to Ancient History Fangirl and knew I had to find it and listen to it. I'm finally cut up to the President, and I've loved seeing how the show has evolved and gotten better with each episode. I love the retellings and explanations of the mythology, but I have to say I have enjoyed the History Deep Dives more. The Atlantis and Sparta series were great, and I'm really looking forward to this new season of Bronze Age. Grace, thank you so much for creating this show and forcing me to think deeper about some of these myths and Histories. I truly love every minute of it, from the mythology episodes to the conversation episodes. I definitely have some favorites, but all are wonderful and powerful in their own way. Keep doing what you're doing, and I look forward to more. Thank you for that review, like for so many reasons. They all mean the world to me. But I've been struggling lately a lot, and the history episodes are, in addition to that, like a bit out of my comfort zone as much as I love them. So I really appreciate the timing of this review and all of the ridiculously nice things you've said about this show and all the many years that I've been doing it. I really, I really appreciate these. I don't think I can say it enough. If you like the show, consider leaving me another review on Apple Podcasts for me to you know, appreciate. I need to read more on the show, you know, so maybe give me some love so frankly, my fragile mental health could use them. Let's talk about this baby is written and produced by me live Albert MICHAELA. Smith, I mean, McKayla is everything for this season, this series of Bronze Age episodes. It simply would not exist without her for countless reasons. Laura Smith is the production assistant and audio engineer and doing some incredible work on the website. Somehow soon I'm gonna have a slightly more functioning website. You're welcome. Select music in this episode was by Luke Chaos. The podcast is part of the iHeart Podcast Network. Listen on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts, and help me continue bringing you the world with Greek mythology and the ancient Mediterranean. By becoming a patron, you will get past bonus episodes and more and hopefully, hopefully you know in the future who isitpatroon dot com Sash Smith Baby or click the link in this episode of the description I am live and can you hear my voice going? I love this shit so much. Thank you all for being here. Wow.