You are here

Home

Being Mycenaean: A View from the Periphery

October 2011 (115.4)
Article

Being Mycenaean: A View from the Periphery

115.4
Bryan Feuer
Purchase Article

Ethnic or cultural designations of past societies have often been employed uncritically and even casually. This general situation applies specifically to Mycenaean civilization. This article therefore considers a set of interrelated questions: What or who was a Mycenaean? How did the people termed “Mycenaeans” come into existence? What did it mean to be Mycenaean? Could one choose to be, or not to be, Mycenaean? Was there a difference between being Mycenaean and becoming Mycenaean? And finally, how is Mycenaean identity related to culture, class, and social organization? After providing theoretical, methodological, anthropological, and archaeological contexts for these questions, this paper offers some suggestions about how or whether they can be answered, examining issues of ethnicity, cultural identity, and spatial organization. It concludes by considering these areas as they apply to the Aegean Bronze Age.

More articles like this: 
Bronze Age
Cultural Interaction
Mycenaean
Greece

Being Mycenaean: A View from the Periphery

By Bryan Feuer

American Journal of Archaeology Vol. 115, No. 4 (October 2011), pp. 507–536

DOI: 10.3764/aja.115.4.0507

© 2011 Archaeological Institute of America

  • Share