The First Book of Ancient Crete and Mycenae [antikvár]

The ^Bronze AgeThe rugged island of Crete 160 miles long and 36 miles wide, with Mount Ida in the center rising more than 8,000 feet blocks off the Aegean Sea from the rest of the Mediterranean. To the south and east of the island lie Asia and Egypt, where, as early as 3000 b.c., there flourished a remarkable civilization. People lived in cities and had systems of government. They had learned to write, and knew something of science. Their art was extraordinary, and they had a body of literature. Moreover, they had established trade with other countries. All this had happened while Europe was still living in the Neolithic, or New Stone Age.Situated as it is, Crete was the first part of Europe to be quickened by the advanced civilizations of Asia and Egypt. Trading ships from these countries brought not only goods but also new ideas to this island outpost of Europe. New experiences, new ideas waken men's minds and rouse them to greater efforts. The people on the island of Crete, stimulated by their contact with advanced civilization, began to develop a civilization of their own. This spread to such famous classical cities on the Greek mainland as Athens and Sparta, and finally from these cities to Rome. Rome, which conquered an empire, carried Greek civilization across Europe and to the British Isles. And so it was that a rocky island on the edge of the Aegean Sea is known today as the cradle of our own Western, or European civilization.The great civilization which first developed around the Aegean Sea lasted from about 3000 b.c. to 1100 b.c. It is called the Bronze Age because at that time men learned to mix tin with copper to make bronze. As a material for making tools and weapons, bronze is far superior to stone, which had been used in Neolithic times. Dur-1