Over at the Kosmos Society , Rien wrote a great article
on The Essential
Ship | Part 1: The Dipylon Vase.
Great article, his research and writing is always amazing.
“Following
the heroic age of the Mycenaean is the silence of the Greek Dark Ages.”
In the images he shared the
funeral procession is moving left to right around the beautiful kratēr
made by the Dipylon Master. The pointed
out the long-necked water birds guarding the barge of the deceased are facing
in the direction of the procession. So
why is the boat going the opposite way? I am reminded of the solar barge
floating on the Great River Ocean returning the slumbering sun-god to the East
for another day of work.
Rien mentioned off-handedly that the commoners during
the Dark Ages, “paid no tax, did not conduct involuntary labor and they could
move freely through the country.”
·
Hard to collect taxes admittedly without
money, but the Old Testament and the religious calendars of the Greek cities
were pretty prescriptive about who brought what to the temple when. If I recall correctly Mycenaean (or was it Minoan) temple records indicate the same. So, no tithing in the Dark Ages?
·
No involuntary
labor? Who built the Cyclopean Walls?
·
I always thought
it was not safe to move around the country back then, for example that
banishment during the Dark Ages was tantamount to a death sentence and that the
gods enforced the laws of hospitality in order to give such people a chance at
survival. I don't know how I got that impression. (Probably Robert Graves.)
Anyway, great article and a good job. You got to read it. The Essential Ship |
Part 1: The Dipylon Vase.
Bill,
ReplyDeleteIt is easy to collect taxes without money: you just confiscate a share of the crop. I think that the Mycenaean peasants were in status somewhere between serfs and slaves, and the authors Rien cited were off the mark.
From the Wikipedia article on Mycenaean Greece:
ReplyDelete"The Mycenaean economy, given its pre-monetary nature, was focused on the redistribution of goods, commodities and labor by a central administration. The preserved Linear B records in Pylos and Knossos indicate that the palaces were closely monitoring a variety of industries and commodities, the organization of land management and the rations given to the dependent personnel... The archives of Pylos display a specialized workforce, where each worker belonged to a precise category and was assigned to a specific task in the stages of production, notably in textiles."
Pylos! Thank you
ReplyDeleteBill