Ancient Greece
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Phoenician and Greek Colonization of the Mediterranean 9th–6th Centuries BCE
By 750 BCE, Phoenician and Greek city-states had founded settlements across the Mediterranean. The Phoenicians, known as the ‘purple... -
The Construction Phases of Troy c. 3000–1900 BCE
The site of Troy, near the Dardanelles Straits in northwestern Turkey, was first extensively excavated by Heinrich von Schliemann...
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Minoan Civilization
Archaeologists speculate that the Minoan civilization that thrived on the island of Crete from the 16th to 13th centuries BCE was an... -
Mycenaean Cultural Influence 1600-1100 BCE
Mycenaean Greece dominated the Greek mainland, the Aegean Islands and the shores of Asia Minor, amalgamating various peoples into a... -
Early Greece c. 1600 BCE
In the early history of Greece there were three main dialects, Aeolic, Doric and Ionic, which corresponded to the three main tribes of the... -
Minoan Crete c. 1500-1250 BCE
The island of Crete was first settled, probably from Asia Minor, in about 3000 BCE. The distinctive and highly advanced civilization that... -
The Palace of Knossos c 1500 BCE
The largest Bronze Age archaeological site is the Palace of Knossos, which was the ceremonial and political centre of Minoan...
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The Mycenaean Kingdom, c. 1300 BCE
This Bronze Age civilization, clearly influenced by the earlier Minoan civilization on Crete (2000–1450 BCE) flourished in...
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The Sea Peoples c. 1280–1170 BCE
The ‘Sea Peoples’ are known only from references in contemporary Hittite and Egyptian records. Their identity and place of origin, while... -
The Homeric World
It is generally accepted that the semi-legendary poems, the Odyssey and the Iliad, were composed around the late 8th or...
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The Collapse of Mycenae c. 1200 BCE
Mycenaean civilization reached a peak in about 1300 BCE, but just a century later the palaces were abandoned and villages were burned.... -
The City-States 8th century BCE
In the competitive and turbulent environment of archaic Greece, the establishment of colonies gave the domestic city-states an edge over...
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Dark Age Greece 900 BCE
Following the collapse of Mycenaean civilization in c. 1100 the major settlements were abandoned and the Greek population dropped...
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Expansion of Sparta 8th to 5th Centuries BCE
Sparta’s homeland was in Laconia, a Greek city-state in the southern Peloponnese. Run by a military elite who concentrated on warfare and... -
The Greek Tyrannies 7th to 6th Centuries BCE
As the early Greek states made the transition from aristocracy to democracy, a number of states were ruled by tyrants – individuals who... -
Construction Phases of Athens 600 BCE–300 CE
While evidence of settlement of the Acropolis extends back to Neolithic times, the earliest attributable construction in Athens relates to... -
The Persian Empire 550–330 BCE
Astyages, king of Media, was the dominant power in the Middle East when he moved to crush a rebellion in Persia, led by his grandson Cyrus.... -
Persian Expansion into Europe 540–513 BCE
The Persian Achaemenid dynasty ruled an empire which, at is peak, stretched from the Indus Valley to the Black Sea and West Asia. Three... -
Campaigns of Darius 492–490 BCE
The first Persian invasion of Greece ended with a decisive Greek victory. The invasion was ordered by Darius I in retaliation for the... -
Battle of Marathon 490 BCE
The Greek victory against the Persians at Marathon in Attica in September 490 BCE was a defining moment in the formation of a confident and... -
Persian Invasion and Capture of Athens 480 BCE
Angered by their defeat at the Battle of Marathon, the Persians, under their new king, Xerxes I, were determined to subjugate Greece. Greece... -
Xerxes' Invasion of Greece 480 BCE
Xerxes the Great was determined to punish the Greeks for their victory over Persia at Marathon. After several years of planning, Xerxes’... -
Battle of Salamis 480 BCE
The naval Battle of Salamis was fought between an alliance of Greek city-states and Persia in the straits at Salamis in 480 BCE. The Greek... -
Persian Retreat from Athens 480 BCE
After the Persian army invaded Attica and took Athens in 480 BCE, they set fire to the Acropolis and destroyed much of the city. This... -
Battle of Thermopylae 480 BCE
The famous last stand of King Leonidas and his 300 Spartan hoplites against the massed forces of Xerxes I is the stuff of legend. A Greek... -
Attica c. 480 BCE
When the Persian king, Xerxes I, invaded Greece in 480 BCE he was at the head of a vast Persian force of close to 300,000. Xerxes’... -
The Campaigns of Xerxes 480 BCE
The most well-known campaigns of the Persian emperor, Xerxes, were fought during his invasion of Greece in 480 BCE. These were the battles... -
Plataea Campaign 479 BCE
Most of the Persian army left Athens after their naval defeat at Salamis. The ilitary commander, Mardonius, was left in control of the... -
Battle of Mycale 479 BCE
After their Salamis defeat, the Persian fleet sailed towards Asia Minor in 479 BCE. En route they ‘rested’ off Samos island in... -
Battle of Plataea 479 BCE
The Greek army met the Persian army at Plataea, north of Athens, in August 479 BCE. The Persian army, under military commander Mardonius,... -
Athens – Long Walls c. 475 BCE
The Athenian ‘Long Walls’ were fortifications erected after Xerxes’ invasion of Greece. Building of the walls began as part of a... -
Athenian Empire c.465-434 BCE
Formed with the purpose of protecting Athens and its Greek city-states against Persian invasion, the Delian League immediately became a... -
The Eastern Mediterranean at the time of Pericles 461–431 BCE
For most of the 50 years after the Persian wars, Athens enjoyed its ‘golden age’. In 461 BCE, the statesman and orator, Pericles,... -
Peloponnesian War 431–404 BCE
In order to dominate the trade routes with southern Italy and Sicily, Athens backed Corcyra in a dispute with Corinth. Corinth enlisted... -
Siege of Syracuse 415–413 BCE
The debacle of the siege of Syracuse fatally undermined the city-state of Athens, leading to its eventual defeat and sacking by rival... -
March of the ‘Ten Thousand’ 401–399 BCE
‘The 10,000’ were an army of Greek mercenaries, headed by the Spartan, Clearchus. Their story was immortalized in the Anabasis,... -
The Campaigns of Sparta and Thebes 382–362 BCE
After its decisive victory over Athens in 404 BCE, Sparta became the dominant Greek city-state. In 387 BCE, it used its dominance to force... -
Rise of Macedonia to 336 BCE
Until the middle of the 4th century BCE, Macedonia survived in the shadow of the powerful Greek city-states to its south, Athens, Sparta...
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Battle of Gaugamela 331 BCE
On 1 October, 331 BCE, Alexander III of Macedon defeated the Persian king, Darius III, for the final time. Determined to crush Alexander... -
Division of Alexander’s Empire c. BCE 275
After Alexander the Great died in 323 BCE, he left behind a vast empire comprised of independent territories, which extended from Macedonia... -
The Second Macedonian War 202 BCE
The Second Macedonian War in 202 BCE was between Macedonia and Rome. Philip V of Macedonia began laying siege to the Greek city-states in... -
The Macedonian Kingdom 336 BCE
Under King Philip II’s 25-year rule, the kingdom of Macedonia (359–336 BCE) moved from the periphery of the Greek world to...
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Greece on the Eve of the Peloponnesian War 435 BCE
The starting point of the Peloponnesian War was the expansion of Athenian power, especially as it began to extend into the Greek west and...
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The Athenian Empire c. 450 BCE
In 480 BCE the Achaemenid Persians had launched a second attempted invasion of Greece, but the Greeks, led by the Athenian and Spartan... -
Athenian Empire c. 475–446
After the Greek victory against the Persians at Mycale, many Spartans believed that the war with Persia was now over. The Athenians,... -
Ancient Greek Dialects
Proto-Greek speakers first migrated into southeastern Europe between 2200 BCE and 1600 BCE. Mycenaean Greek-speakers arrived in the second...
