Notes on the Greeks

As with all eras of History... 

Different time periods of Greece:

• Stone Age: c.a. 6000-3000 B.C.
• Copper-Stone Age: c.a. 3000-2800 B.C.
• Bronze Age: c.a. 2800-1500 B.C.
• Homeric, Heroic, Late Minoan Age: c.a. 1400-1100 B.C. 
• Mycenean: c.a. 1300-1000 B.C.
• Dorian, Dark, Iron Age: c.a. 1200-800 B.C.
• The Archaic Age: c.a. 800-500 B.C.
• The Classical Period: c.a. 500-404 B.C.
• Ionic Revolt against Persian tyrants appointed by the Persian king: c.a. 499-494 B.C.
• Golden Age: c.a. 480-400 B.C.
• Hellenistic Period: c.a. 323-146 B.C.

"The time period around 1400 B.C. was an era where Mycenae, the traditional home of Agamemnon, brother of Menelaus and leader of the Greek warriors in Troy, dominated the mainland, and his island of Crete assumed the political and militaric status of master of the eastern Mediterranean. A golden age of splendor arouse during this period, as shown by excavations of the royal graves at Mycenae, and the cultural and religious traditions of the eminent classical Greece began to take form. This is the Homeric, or Herioc, Age - also called Mycenaean, or Late Minoan -for the culture and values of the latter part of this period are those permanently embodied in the Homeric poems, the Iliad and the Odyssey. The fall of this age is often credited with the Dorian Invasion which is believed to have happened around 1100 B.C., and which came to be the conclusive death blow to the Minoan civilization." from Homer's Greece

For a good bibliography on Greek Costume we can look at Mark Zimmerman's forum.

Dionysus- Satyr/Pan, Nymph, Maenad, Thiasos- an explanation of these terms, and a collection of research materials, and indeed more disturbing phallic images, it is unfortunately impossible to escape them.

Dionysus- The Bacchants (or, The Bacchae) by Euripides- another collection of research materials, quotes and images relevant to Euripides' The Bacchae.

Some more written research, although I know that visual research is prompted I am one of those type that need to do reading research, in a more academic manner. I want to be able to know about the time period, way of life, thinking, rules... of the time period before I feel comfortable to "butt in" to the play.

How do you deal with this? If anyone has any good advice, please share. As I often find myself filling sketchbooks with merely writing and less images than what might be expected (it is also true that I do not like high printing costs, so I much rather sketch and copy out images by hand, which naturally is time consuming, yet more useful as it naturally resutls in a more thorough observation).

More to come later!