The Birth of Bureaucracy At the site of Iklaina, excavations are revealing new evidence of how the Mycenaean state functioned - Pylos, in Greece’s southwestern Peloponnese, is known for its miles of soft sandy beaches, rocky islets soaring out of the water marking the edges of the Bay of Navarino, and the mountains that cut it off from the rest of Greece. The surrounding region, known as Messenia, is also home to dozens of archaeological sites. Since the nineteenth century, Messenia has attracted archaeologists hoping to uncover remains of Greece’s Mycenaean age, the period from approximately 1650 to 1100 B.C.,...