Notes from

The Mycenean World

John Chadwick, 1976

24 Scribes (writing in Linear B in Knossos, and in Pylos) were not professional scribes, but were literate officials.

29. Clay tablets were used for ephemeral writing. Other material, now lost, must have been used for more "permanent" writings. Reasons for this statement:

• The script forms are unsuited for clay, whether Linear A or Linear B
• All the tablets with dated material refer to "this year" "last year". Any archival material must have been copied somewhere else.
• Clay can be readily erased, and several of the tablet show that they are overwritings on earlier tablets. What we have is preserved only because of accidental baking in palace fires. Normally the clay was sun-dried and left so that it could be rewetted and re-used.
• In Cyprus, the word for "schoolmaster" literally means "one who paints on skins"

32. The numbering system is based on the Assyrian base-60 system.

63-5 Greek names are found only in Linear B, but some non-Greek names in Linear B are found also on Linear A tablets in Agia Triada.

66 Names used by Homer are common in the Pylos tablets, but Homer uses those names indiscriminately for both Greek and Trojan warriors.

78 There were specialized trades in luxury goods, such as a maker of blue-glass paste. This bespeaks a high level of civilization.

80 In Pylos, there were groups of women from East and South Turkey.

86. "Zeus is a regular Greek development of a form we can restore as Dyeus, and the associations of his name show that he was conceived as the god of the clear sky. He is known in the Vedas as Dyaus Pitar, exactly as Iuppiter in Latin, incorporating the word for "father"."

86 Poseidon is the god of the sea, of earthquakes, and of horses.

98. The namke of Daedalus is on a tablet, in the form of the name of a place or building "the Daidaleion" in Knossos.

100 "We can conclude that the Greek takeover left intact the old Minoan gods" several of whom seem to have had names taken into the classical Greek god lists.

139-43 Bronze is much used, but seen as fairly precious. The source of the tin is unknown, but might be Britain, Spain, or Czechoslovakia. (Or further east? Elam, maybe, since it is doutful that Ebla had access to those sources, but was sophisticated in the use of tin for bronze).

144 Silver is scarce, and not used as currency (in contrast to Ebla 2500 BC)

144. Words for metals and spices in Mycenean Greek have semitic roots, earlier than the Phoenecian trade of the 8th and 9th century BC. (Could this be a relic of Mesopotamian trade?)

151 In Mycenean times, Knossos held tight central control of wool work. It recorded wool receivables at Phaestos.