Mycenaean ways of war : the past, politics, and personhood
The remit of this thesis is to contextualise violence and martial culture in the Mycenaean world in order to understand how it is a source of legitimacy for political power during MH III-LH IIIB. A theoretical understanding of the way violence shapes cultural conceptions of space and time supports this research, which is implemented methodologically by a deconstruction of the loci in which violence and martial culture are consumed in order to understand culturally specific meanings and codes of practice. In part, this approach was implemented by a decision to weight the efforts to which the Mycenaeans differentiate martial culture over relying on typological methods to amalgamate. Based on a contextualisation of the martial data from the Shaft Graves, this thesis argues that violence is exploited at Mycenae in MH III-LH I in order to form a complex social hierarchy that relies on the act of witnessing and approving of violence and the tuition of bellicose practices for assimilation. The large numbers of swords deposited in the later graves in Grave Circle B and Grave Circle A are argued to reflect hegemonic integration rather than bilateral segregation of ~elites~ and ~non-elites~. Through LH II there is general
Harrell, Katherine M.
Mycenaean ways of war : the past, politics, and personhood. The remit of this thesis is to contextualise violence and martial culture in the Mycenaean world in order to understand how it is a source of legitimacy for political power during MH III-LH IIIB. A theoretical understanding of the way violence shapes cultural conceptions of space and time supports this research, which is implemented methodologically by a deconstruction of the loci in which violence and martial culture are consumed in order to understand culturally specific meanings and codes of practice. In part, this approach was implemented by a decision to weight the efforts to which the Mycenaeans differentiate martial culture over relying on typological methods to amalgamate. Based on a contextualisation of the martial data from the Shaft Graves, this thesis argues that violence is exploited at Mycenae in MH III-LH I in order to form a complex social hierarchy that relies on the act of witnessing and approving of violence and the tuition of bellicose practices for assimilation. The large numbers of swords deposited in the later graves in Grave Circle B and Grave Circle A are argued to reflect hegemonic integration rather than bilateral segregation of ~elites~ and ~non-elites~. Through LH II there is general
mycenaean way war past politics personhood remit contextualise violence martial culture mycenaean_world order source legitimacy political_power iii iiib theoretical way violence shape cultural conception space_time support implement methodologically deconstruction violence martial culture consume order culturally_specific meaning practice part implement decision weight effort differentiate martial culture rely typological method amalgamate based contextualisation martial data shaft argue violence exploit iii order form complex social_hierarchy relies act witness approve violence tuition practice assimilation large_number sword deposit later graf grave circle grave circle argue reflect hegemonic integration rather bilateral segregation elites non elites general