Free Republic

Hollywood movies like Marley & Me or Hachi: A Dog’s Tale have brought both joy and tears to millions of viewers around the world, with their ability to capture the special bond between humans and their canine companions – aptly dubbed “man’s best friend”. In some ways, not much has changed over thousands of years. The ancient Greeks had their very own stories concerning this special relationship between man and dog. Of all the tales in Greek mythology, one of the most touching and relatable is that of the loyal dog Argos separated from his master Odysseus. Argos was Odysseus’...

An experiment inspired by Homer's description of combat in The Iliad tested the capabilities of the Dendra armour suit from Greece's Bronze AgeModern military volunteers donned replicas of ancient Greek armour and engaged in exercises inspired by Homer's epic poem The Iliad. The demonstration shows how elite Bronze Age warriors could have fought in heavy protective gear during sustained combat.The experiment's results strongly suggest that the 3500-year-old Dendra armour suit – one of the oldest complete suits of metal armour from Europe's Bronze Age – was indeed suitable for battle. Some scholars have argued that it was merely a ceremonial...

According to a recent international study, the volcano of the island Santorini, Greece, erupted in the 16th century BC and not earlier. The survey characterized a number of research studies that took place in the past and have indicated that Santorini's volcano may have erupted a century earlier, as unreliable because the method based on tree-ring measurements that they used, could not provide them with accurate results. An international team of researchers led by Paolo Cherubini from the Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research (WSL) has demonstrated in the scientific journal Antiquity, that this method cannot provide...

Dating to the mid-13th century B.C., the stone passage passed under the massive walls of the Mycenaean citadel of Midea and probably led to a nearby water source, authorities said Friday. The passage would allow the people of Midea, about 93 miles south of Athens, safe access to drinkable water even in times of enemy attack... Only three such networks - major engineering feats requiring intensive labor - from Mycenaean times have been found so far. Excavations in late June and July at Midea revealed cut rock steps leading to the triangular passage, whose entrance was covered with a large...

The results of the survey are particularly encouraging, as they brought to light new facts about the Middle Helladic and Early Mycenaean background of the settlements developed on the northern margin of the lake. In addition, the finding, with stratigraphic data, that the fortified settlements in the hills of Agios Ioannis and Aghia Marina have a phase of fortification, rehousing and abandonment chronologically analogous to the acropolis of Gla, ie around the middle of the 13th century BC, a milestone of the problems of the socio-political hierarchical relations of the Mycenaean northeastern coppaid field, as well as of the Orchomenos-Glas...