Editing Greece (section)

=== Prehistory and Aegean civilisations ===
{{Main|Neolithic Greece|Pelasgians|Cycladic culture|Minoan civilisation|Mycenaean Greece}}
[[File:Entrance to the treasure of Atreus.jpg|thumb|upright|The entrance of the [[Treasury of Atreus]] (13th century BC) in [[Mycenae]]]]

The [[Apidima Cave]] in [[Mani Peninsula|Mani]], in southern Greece, has been suggested to contain the oldest remains of [[early modern humans]] outside of Africa, dated to 200,000 years ago.<ref name="NAT-20190710">{{cite journal |last=Harvati |first=Katerina |display-authors=etal |title=Apidima Cave fossils provide earliest evidence of Homo sapiens in Eurasia |date=10 July 2019 |journal=[[Nature (journal)|Nature]] |volume=571 |issue=7766 |pages=500–504 |doi=10.1038/s41586-019-1376-z |pmid=31292546 |hdl=10072/397334 |s2cid=195873640 |url=https://zenodo.org/record/6646855 |access-date=16 July 2022 |archive-date=1 August 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220801132212/https://zenodo.org/record/6646855 |url-status=live  | issn=0028-0836}}</ref> However others suggest the remains represent [[archaic humans]].<ref name=":5">Marie-Antoinette de Lumley, Gaspard Guipert, Henry de Lumley, Natassa Protopapa, Théodoros Pitsios, Apidima 1 and Apidima 2: Two anteneandertal skulls in the Peloponnese, Greece, L'Anthropologie, Volume 124, Issue 1, 2020, 102743, ISSN 0003-5521, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.anthro.2019.102743 {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240610015655/https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0003552119300974?via%3Dihub |date=10 June 2024 }}.</ref> All three stages of the [[Stone Age]] are represented in Greece, for example in the [[Franchthi Cave]].<ref name=":6">{{Cite journal |last1=Douka |first1=K. |last2=Perles |first2=C. |last3=Valladas |first3=H. |last4=Vanhaeren |first4=M. |last5=Hedges |first5=R.E.M. |title=Franchthi Cave revisited: the age of the Aurignacian in south-eastern Europe |journal=Antiquity Magazine |page=1133 |year=2011 |url=https://www.academia.edu/1129937 |access-date=20 December 2017 |archive-date=22 December 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231222140445/https://www.academia.edu/1129937 |url-status=live}}</ref> [[Neolithic]] settlements in Greece, dating from the 7th millennium BC,<ref name="Borza">{{cite book|author=Eugene N. Borza|title=In the Shadow of Olympus: The Emergence of Macedon |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=614pd07OtfQC&pg=PA58|year=1992|publisher=Princeton University Press|isbn=978-0-691-00880-6|page=58 |access-date=11 October 2015 |archive-date=10 June 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240610015721/https://books.google.com/books?id=614pd07OtfQC&pg=PA58#v=onepage&q&f=false|url-status=live}}</ref> are the oldest in Europe, as Greece lies on the route by which farming spread from the [[Near East]] to Europe.<ref>{{cite book |last=Perlès |first=Catherine |title=The Early Neolithic in Greece: The First Farming Communities in Europe |page=1 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=2001 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LQQ3tx5_t7QC |access-date=11 November 2020 |archive-date=10 June 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240610015728/https://books.google.com/books?id=LQQ3tx5_t7QC&q=sesklo |url-status=live |isbn=9780521000277}}</ref>

Greece is home to the first advanced civilisations in Europe and is often considered the birthplace of Western civilisation.{{Sfn|Duchesne|2011|p=297: "The list of books which have celebrated Greece as the "cradle" of the West is endless; two more examples are Charles Freeman's The Greek Achievement: The Foundation of the Western World (1999) and Bruce Thornton's Greek Ways: How the Greeks Created Western Civilization (2000)"}}{{Sfn|Bottici|Challand|2013|p=88: "The reason why even such a sophisticated historian as Pagden can do it is that the idea that Greece is the cradle of civilisation is so much rooted in western minds and school curricula as to be taken for granted."}} The earliest of them was the [[Cycladic culture]] which flourished on the islands of the [[Aegean Sea]], starting around 3200 BC, and produced an abundance of folded-arm and other [[Cycladic art|marble figurines]].<ref>{{harvnb|Sansone|2004|pp=xviii-xix}}; {{harvnb|Neer|2019|pp=25–26}}; {{harvnb|Renfrew|2012|pp=83–92}}</ref> From {{circa|3100}} BC to 1100 BC, [[Crete]], a major cultural and economic centre, was home to the [[Minoan civilization|Minoan civilisation]] known for its [[Minoan art|colourful art]], [[Minoan religion|religious figurines]], and [[Minoan palaces|monumental palaces]].<ref>{{harvnb|Neer|2019|pp=27–38}}; {{harvnb|Tomkins|Schoep|2012|pp=66–76}}</ref><ref>{{harvnb|Watrous|2021}}; {{harvnb|McEnroe|2010}}</ref> The Minoans wrote [[Minoan language|their undeciphered language]] using scripts known as [[Linear A]] and [[Cretan hieroglyphs]].{{Sfn|Tomas|2012|pp=340-351}}{{Sfn|Salgarella|2022}} On the mainland, the [[Mycenaean Greece|Mycenaean civilisation]] developed around 1750 BC and lasted until {{circa|1100}} BC.{{Sfn|Knodell|2021|p=7}} The Mycenaeans possessed [[Military of Mycenaean Greece|advanced military]] and built [[Cyclopean masonry|large fortifications]].<ref>{{harvnb|Sansone|2004|pp=10–11}}; {{harvnb|Neer|2019|pp=48–70}}</ref> They [[Mycenaean religion|worshiped]] [[List of Mycenaean deities|many gods]]{{Sfn|Neer|2019|pp=65-66}} and used [[Linear B]] to write the earliest [[Attested language|attested]] form of [[Greek language|Greek]] known as [[Mycenaean Greek]].<ref>{{harvnb|Sansone|2004|pp=3–4}}; {{harvnb|Neer|2019|p=58}}</ref>{{Sfn|Chadwick|1990}}