Men of Iron

In the eighth century BCE, the Greek world changed. In the field of warfare, these changes are represented by the contexts in which weapons are found, the reappearance of pictorial decoration including scenes of combat on pottery, and the emergence of poetic accounts of mythological wars. In order to understand how, why, and what was changing in warfare at this time, it is necessary to take a long-term view and understand the development of Greek warfare in the centuries preceding the eighth. This chapter sets the stage by beginning with the changes in warfare in the post-palatial Aegean Bronze Age, ca. 1200, and moving into the Early Iron Age and early Archaic period. It looks at the re-emergence of a ‘warrior’ identity through iconography and burials, its limitations, and how it changes over the centuries and across several regions within the Aegean. It then examines how the evidence for warfare changes in the eighth and seventh centuries, with the rise of Panhellenic sanctuaries and the re-emergence of literary and iconographic evidence. Finally, these changes are placed in the overall context of the Greek world in the eighth and seventh centuries, with rising population, political developments, and the increasing interconnectivity of the Mediterranean. This chapter also takes the perspective that change is on-going and constant, and that how we understand change needs to be kept in focus as we examine it

Aesthetics · Ancient history · Archaeology · Art · Bronze Age · Geography · Iconography · Iron Age · Literature · Mythology · Political science · Politics · Population · Pottery · Sociology · Ancient Near East History · Classical Antiquity Studies · Classics · Demography · Historical, Religious, and Philosophical Studies · History · Law