The Minoans, DNA and all.

Starting with the breaking DNA news, and this rather sinks the ‘Black Athena’ theory from Bernal…

DNA sheds light on Minoans

Crete’s fabled Minoan civilization was built by people from Anatolia, according to a new study by Greek and foreign scientists that disputes an earlier theory that said the Minoans’ forefathers had come from Africa.

The new study – a collaboration by experts in Greece, the USA, Canada, Russia and Turkey – drew its conclusions from the DNA analysis of 193 men from Crete and another 171 from former neolithic colonies in central and northern Greece.

The results show that the country’s neolithic population came to Greece by sea from Anatolia – modern-day Iran, Iraq and Syria – and not from Africa as maintained by US scholar Martin Bernal.

The DNA analysis indicates that the arrival of neolithic man in Greece from Anatolia coincided with the social and cultural upsurge that led to the birth of the Minoan civilization, Constantinos Triantafyllidis of Thessaloniki’s Aristotle University told Kathimerini.

“Until now we only had the archaeological evidence – now we have genetic data too and we can date the DNA,” he said.

Archeological dates for the colonisation of Crete are about 7,000 BC.

In more detail

The most frequent haplogroups among the current population on Crete were: R1b3-M269 (17%), G2-P15 (11%), J2a1-DYS413 (9.0%), and J2a1h-M319 (9.0%). They identified J2a parent haplogroup J2a-M410 (Crete: 25.9%) with the first ancient residents of Crete during the Neolithic (8500 BCE – 4300 BCE) suggesting Crete was founded by a Neolithic population expansion from ancient Turkey/Anatolia. Specifically, the researchers connected the source population of ancient Crete to well known Neolithic sites of ancient Anatolia: Asıklı Höyük, Çatalhöyük, Hacılar, Mersin/Yumuktepe, and Tarsus. Haplogroup J2b-M12 (Crete: 3.1%; Greece: 5.9%) was associated with Neolithic Greece. Haplogroups J2a1h-M319 (8.8%) and J2a1b1-M92 (2.6%) were associated with the Minoan culture linked to a late Neolithic/ Early Bronze Age migration to Crete ca. 3100 BCE from North-Western/Western Anatolia and Syro-Palestine (ancient Canaan, Levant, and pre-Akkadian Anatolia); Aegean prehistorians link the date 3100 BCE to the origins of the Minoan culture on Crete. Haplogroup E3b1a2-V13 (Crete: 6.7%; Greece: 28%) was suggested to reflect a migration to Crete from the mainland Greece Mycenaean population during the late Bronze Age (1600 BCE – 1100 BCE). Haplogroup J1 was also reported to be found in both Crete and Greece (Crete: 8.3%; Greece: 5.2%), as well as haplogroups E3b3, I1, I2, I2a, I21b, K2, L, and R1a1. No ancient DNA was included in this study of YDNA from the Mediterranean region.

So far the only information I can find on Cretan mitochondrial DNA places them overwhelmingly with the European and Near Eastern populations.

History

The first settlers introduced cattle, sheep, goats, pigs, and dogs, as well as domesticated cereals (wheat and barley) and legumes. The first settlers seem to be aceramic, the first ceramics appeared about a thousand years later. Quite possibly the technology was imported, as it appears in a fairly sophisticated form.

The plain chalice is an example of Pyrgos ware, one of the earliest forms of Cretan pottery. Minoan sites are commonly dated by the style of their pottery.

Minoan ceramics became increasingly ornate. After the Thera explosion and tsunami, marine creatures were frequently used to decorate the pottery.

 

 

The Minoans traded extensively with just about everyone in the Mediterranean, and Minoan pottery is often found in Egypt, Cyprus, the Cylades, and Mycenae. 

The Minoan palaces

The palace of Knossos, exterior.

And interior, other images here.

The inside of the palaces also had a flushing toilet and a primitive sort of shower. They were very advanced for the time. The same kind of indoor plumbing was found in Santorini, a Minoan colony

The first Palace was built around 2000 BC and destroyed 300 years later.

On the same site a new Palace was built, more elaborate than the previous, only to be severely damaged from an earthquake one hundred years latter.

During this period we see the development of a series of satellite buildings like the “Little Palace”, the “Royal Villa” and the “South House”. Knossos has now developed into a large city whose population – judged by the adjacent cemeteries – must have not been less than 100 000 inhabitants.

The Minoan civilisation was dealt a serious blow by the explosion of Santorini in 1645 BC. A major Tsunami about 15m high destroyed their fleet and coastal towns, and left them starving and vulnerable to invasion.

The Minoan society itself seemed to matriarchal and not particularly interested in warfare, although they did possess swords and other weapons. Mostly, the worship was of goddesses, carried out by priestesses. There was also the famous bull leaping ritual, depicted in it’s art repeatedly.

The Minoans developed their own writing system, known as linear A (as yet only partially deciphered) and Linear B. The Phaistos disc below is of an unknown script similar to Anatolian Heiroglyphs and Linear A, as yet undeciphered.