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The influence of Greece

For this session we took a look at life around western Eurasia and the eastern Mediterranean, broadly around the time of Alexander the Great's life. By the 300s, when Alexander lived, Greece had become the Hong Kong of the western world If it was wanted - if it was novel, shiny, lovely and desirable - well, the Greeks could make it and ship it to your door.

Despite a homeland so short of resources that most of its young men emigrated out, year on year, to find new lives abroad, Greek workshops captured the hearts and minds of the fashion-conscious. Greece exported its skills. It's skilled workers, it's finished products. And along the same trade route, new skilled workers flowed into Greece's heartland and colonies. Gem-cutters, textile weavers and dyers, metal smiths came in from Baghdad, from Egypt and from beyond the Black Sea, either as free men or slaves, and the workshops' output was phenomenal.

In fact so desired were Greek fashions, that they have the effect of making other cultures disappear. It is quite difficult to extract Phoenician and Etruscan on the basis of artefacts, as they were all buying into the same fashions.
Take a look at the Alexander Sarcophagus, which amply shows the sheer glitz and wealth of the Levantine society of the day...and the apparent absence of partisan feeling about 'Greek or Persian' - it looks like it was the style and the excitement that the unknown client wanted.
Greek coinage became the model for the western world. Even by the 300s, the city of Carthage was minting its own 'shekels', which look just like Greek drachmae. While coins were made in huge numbers, it's debatable how deeply they penetrated society. In large towns, coins were certainly 'common currency' , pardon the pun.

But taking the wider view, despite there being very many Greek towns, most people were still rurally-based, and barter would predominate here.
Alexander left us a nice breadcrumb-trail of his coins, as far as the Indus Valley. Here is a video of how coins were produced at this date - relatively simple technology, the skill being in making the dies, and of course, stopping the blacksmith pocketing a few.
Lastly, here is a link to a very large map of the Greek cities and colonies of the Mediterranean and Black Seas. Only the main settlements, and only the Greek ones - it does not show the Levantine cities, or the Carthaginian, or the Etruscan, or the Iberian.....i.redd.it/qqyiaip2cvy01.jpg

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  • Home
  • About
  • Writing
    • Threads
    • Owd Moleskin
    • 26 october 1962
    • Miss Carney innovates
    • visiting time
    • Sea-glass
    • Sunlight
    • Tommy Kenny
    • When my feet are comfortable
    • Auntie Sadie's Cocktail Cabinet
    • The Fire in the Hearth
    • Margaret Thatcher April 2013
  • crossing continents
    • Mesopotamia before 1200 BCE
    • Euphrates-Indus trade routes
    • Indus Valley
    • Indus part 2
    • China to 1000 BCE
    • All change 1200 BCE
    • Greek influence
    • Roman-Han trade
    • Islam, Mongols&Sea trade
  • Crossing Continents 2
    • Europa and the bull
    • Climate change and DNA
    • DNA after the ice
    • dna limits & ethics
    • Malta in prehistory
  • Lessons from History
    • Mines and maps
    • Patience Kershaw
    • Bury 1849 in maps
    • Bury's 19th century Popualtion
    • Overcrowding in focus
    • Entertaining Bury >
      • Bury's Pub History
      • Theatres and music halls
      • Markets and fairs
      • Pleasure Gardens and Parks >
        • Bury Baths
      • Bury U3A
  • Random archaeology
  • Old WEA courses
    • Ancient Mediterranean >
      • The Palaeolithic Period
      • From Hunters to Farmers
      • The origins of farming
      • The spread of farming
      • The discovery of metal
      • Los Millares
      • The Minoans
      • Mycenae
      • The Phoenicians
      • Ancient Greece part 1
      • Ancient Greece Part 2
      • The Etruscans
    • Ancient Middle East >
      • Session 2
      • Session 3
      • Session 4
      • Session 5
      • Cylinder Seals
      • Göbekli Tepe
      • Reed Construction
    • Ice Age to Iron Age >
      • Session 1
      • Session 2
      • Session 3
      • Session 4
      • Session 5
      • Session 6
      • Session 7
      • Session 8
      • Session 9
      • Session 10
    • The Legacy of the Holy Land >
      • Session 1: Introduction to the Levant
      • Session 2: Origins:the first human settlement
      • Session 3: About the Exodus
      • Session 4: the Land of Milk and Honey
      • Session 5: Israel and the people of Canaan
      • Session 6: the influence of Greece
      • Session 7: Romans, Jews and Christians
      • Session 8: Emperor Gods and early Christians
      • Session 9: How Christianity became powerful
      • Session 10: The Crusades
  • Contact
  • Armchair Archaeology
    • Place names >
      • Place name activities
    • Maps online
    • screen shot
    • Spotting sites
    • Lidar
    • Useful websites
    • Friday stuff