The Dorians were one of the ancient Hellenic tribes acknowledged by Greek writers. Traditional accounts place their origins in the north, north-eastern regions of Greece, ancient Macedonia and Epirus, whence obscure circumstances drove them south into Attica and the Peloponnesos, to certain Aegean islands, and to the coast of Asia Minor. Late mythology gave them an eponymous founder, a certain "Dorus", son of "Hellen", the mythological patriarch of the Hellenes. Ancient Greece is the period of Greek history spanning much of the Mediterranean and Black Sea basins and lasting for close to a millennium, until the rise of Christianity. ... Epirus (Greek Ήπειρος, Ípiros) is a geographical and historical region of the Balkan peninsula in south-eastern Europe. ... Attica (in Greek: Αττική, Attike; see also List of traditional Greek place names) is a periphery (subdivision) in Greece, containing Athens, the capital of Greece. ... Peloponnesos (Greek: Πελοπόννησος, Pelops Island, sometime Latinized as Peloponnesus or Anglicized as The Peloponnese) is a large peninsula in Greece, forming the part of the country south of the Isthmus of Corinth. ... The Aegean Sea. ... Anatolia (Greek: ανατολη anatole, rising of the sun or East; compare Orient and Levant, by popular etymology Turkish Anadolu to ana mother and dolu filled), also called by the Latin name of Asia Minor, is a region of Southwest Asia which corresponds today to the Asian portion of Turkey. ... An eponym is the name of a person, whether real or fictitious, which has (or is thought to have) given rise to the name of a particular place, tribe, discovery or other item. ... In Greek mythology, Dorus is the name of several individuals: Dorus was a son of Hellen and founder of the Dorian nation. ... Note: Hellen was not the same person as Helen of Troy, or Helenus, son of King Priam of Troy. ... This article is about a system of myths. ... Originally a patriarch was a man who exercised autocratic authority as a pater familias over an extended family. ... The Greeks (Hellenes) are an ethnic group found in the southern Balkan peninsula of southeastern Europe and are speakers of the Greek language. ...

Beginning about 1150 BC, there was much destruction in the Peloponnessus, Crete and other places throughout the Mediterranean, involving the destruction of the Bronze Age Mycenaean civilization and the beginning of the Greek Dark Ages. Peloponnesian cities burned or destroyed include Corinth, Olympia, Sparta and Mycenae. Even cities not burned, such as Athens, went into a prolonged period of decline. Many cities were reduced to villages or abandoned. The written record for this period is nonexistent, due to the abandonment of the Linear B script. Traditionally, this has been attributed to an invasion by the Dorians, but more recently, there is evidence that they migrated south into the Peloponnessus and the Agean during the Dark Ages instead of invading at the beginning of this period. Peloponnesos (Greek: Πελοπόννησος, sometime Latinized as Peloponnesus or Anglicized as The Peloponnese) is a large peninsula in Greece, forming the part of the country south of the Isthmus of Corinth. ... Crete (Greek Κρήτη Kriti; called Candia in the Venetian period and Turkish: Girit) is the largest of the Greek islands and the fifth largest in the Mediterranean Sea. ... The Bronze Age is a period in a civilizations development when the most advanced metalworking has developed the techniques of smelting copper from natural outcroppings and alloys it to cast bronze. ... The Greek Dark Ages (ca. ... Corinth, or Korinth (Κόρινθος; see also List of traditional Greek place names) is a Greek city, on the Isthmus of Corinth, the narrow stretch of land that joins the Peloponnesus to the mainland of Greece. ... Olympia (Greek: Ολυμπία Olympía or Ολύμπια Olýmpia, older transliterations, Olimpia, Olimbia), a city of ancient Greece in Elis, is known for having been the site of the Olympic Games in classical times, comparable in importance to the Pythian Games held in Delphi. ... Sparta the rock (Doric: Σπάρτα, Attic (and Koine): Σπάρτη) was a state in ancient Greece, whose territory included, in Classical times, all Laconia and Messenia, and which was the most powerful state of the Peloponnesus. ... Mycenae (ancient Greek: , IPA, , in modern Greek: Μυκήνες, , U.S. English: ; see also List of traditional Greek place names), is an archaeological site in Greece, located about 90km south-west of Athens, in the north-eastern Peloponnese. ... Athens (Greek: Αθήνα, Athína (IPA: )) is the capital of Greece and one of the most famous cities in the world, named after goddess Athena. ... Linear B script sample Linear B is a script that was used for writing Mycenaean, an early form of Greek. ...

Though most of the Doric invaders settled in the Peloponesse, they also settled on Rhodes and in Asia Minor, where in later times the Dorian Hexapolis (the six Dorian cities) would arise: Halicarnassus, Cos, Cnidos (Asia Minor); Lindos, Kameiros (Camiros), and Ialyssos (in Rhodes). These six cities would later become rivals with the Ionian cities of Asia Minor. The Dorians also invaded Crete. These origin traditions remained strong into classical times: Thucydides saw the Peloponnesian War in part as "Ionians fighting against Dorians" and reported the tradition that the Syracusans in Sicily were of Dorian descent (Thucydides, 7.57). Other such "Dorian" colonies, originally from Corinth, Megara, and the Dorian islands, dotted the southern coasts of Sicily from Syracuse to Selinus. Culturally, in addition to their Doric dialect of Greek, these colonies retained their characteristic Doric calendar revolving round a cycle of festivals of which the Hyacinthia and the Carneia were especially important (EB 1911). Rhodes, Greek Ρόδος (pron. ... Map of the Aegean Sea, showing the location of Halicarnassus (modern Bodrum, Turkey) Halicarnassus (; modern Bodrum; see also List of traditional Greek place names), an ancient Greek city on the southwest coast of Caria, Asia Minor, on a picturesque and advantageous site on the Ceramic Gulf (Gulf of Cos, Gulf... Port of Kos Archaeological site Tree of Hippocrates Roman amphitheater Kos town view Kos or Cos (, Greek Κως, Turkish Ä°stanköy, Italian Coo; formerly Stanchio in English) is a Greek island in the Dodecanese group of islands, in the Aegean Sea, which it separates from the Gulf of Cos. ... Knidos or Cnidus (modern-day Tekir in Turkey) is an ancient Greek city in Asia Minor, once part of the country of Caria. ... Acropolis of Lindos: the restored stoa Lindos (Greek Λινδος;) is a town and an archaeological site on the east coast of the island of Rhodes (Rhodhos) in the Dodecanese Islands in south-eastern Greece. ... Kameiros is a city on the island of Rhodes, lying on a peninsula on the northwest coast of the island. ... Ialyssos is a city situated 6 km southwest from Rhodes City on the road that follows the islands west coast towards the airport. ... Ionia (Greek Ιωνία; see also List of traditional Greek place names) was an ancient region of southwestern coastal Anatolia (now in Turkey) on the Aegean Sea. ... Crete (Greek Κρήτη Kriti; called Candia in the Venetian period and Turkish: Girit) is the largest of the Greek islands and the fifth largest in the Mediterranean Sea. ... Bust of Thucydides residing in the Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto Thucydides (between 460 and 455 BC–circa 400 BC, Greek Θουκυδίδης, Thoukudídês) was an ancient Greek historian, and the author of the History of the Peloponnesian War, which recounts the 5th century BC war between Sparta and Athens. ... Combatants Delian League led by Athens Peloponnesian League led by Sparta Commanders Pericles Cleon Nicias Alcibiades Archidamus II Brasidas Lysander Map of the Greek world at the start of the Peloponnesian War The Peloponnesian War began in 431 BC between the Athenian Empire (or The Delian League) and the Peloponnesian... Syracuse (Italian, Siracusa, ancient Syracusa - see also List of traditional Greek place names) is a city on the eastern coast of Sicily and the capital of the province of Syracuse, Italy. ... The Attic calendar is the name of the calendar used in Ancient Athens. ... The Carneian festival (Κάρνεια) was one of the most important religious festivals in ancient Sparta, held in honor of Apollo Carneios, who was worshipped in various parts of the Peloponnesus. ...

The Dorians are also credited with the introduction of formalized pederasty into the Greek arena. Some have postulated this to have taken place at the time of their original migration, others much later, around 630 BCE, starting in Crete and spreading to Sparta and the rest of the Greek city states. Pederastic courtship scene Athenian black-figure amphora, 5th c. ...

The Dorian invasion

The Dorian invasion (more often called the Dorian migration in modern texts) was, until fairly recently, widely considered the cause of the downfall of the Mycenaeans, based on the claims of the Dorians themselves in the time of Classical Greece. However, archeological finds show that features thought to be from the Dorians did not suddenly arrive with the destruction of the Mycenaean civilization, and in fact the first material signs of the Dorians are from around 1000 BC. These were things such as iron, new weapons, and changes in burial practices from Mycenaean group burials in tholos tombs to individual burials and cremation. It is more likely that the Mycenaean civilization went into decline, and the Dorians moved south more gradually into the power vacuum this created. This was a time of great upheaval in the eastern Mediterranean (see Sea People), and the disruption of long-distance trade, as well as civil war and natural disaster, are possible explanations for the destruction of the Mycenaeans. At the same time, there were other population movements such as the colonization of islands in the Aegean sea and the west coast of Asia Minor. Archaeology or sometimes in American English archeology (from the Greek words αρχαίος = ancient and λόγος = word/speech) is the study of human cultures through the recovery, documentation and analysis of material remains, including architecture, artefacts, biofacts, human remains, and landscapes. ... The Treasure of Atreus tholos in 2004 Beehive tombs, also known as Tholos tombs (plural tholoi), are a style of Mycenaean chamber tomb from the Bronze Age. ... Sea Peoples is the term used in ancient Egyptian records of a race of ship-faring raiders who drifted into the eastern shores of the Mediterranean and attempted to enter Egyptian territory during the late 19th dynasty, and especially year 5 of Rameses III of the 20th Dynasty. ...

Mythic origins

According to a myth based on an etymological fantasy, the Dorians were named for the minor district of Doris in northern Greece. Their leaders were mythologized as the Heracleidae, the sons of the legendary hero Heracles, and the Dorian incursion into Greece in the distant past was justified in the mythic theme of the "Return of the Heracleidae". The most famous of Dorian groups were the Spartans, whose austere and martial lifestyle was much admired and feared. Etymology is the study of the origins of words. ... Heracleidae, the general name for the numerous descendants of Heracles (Hercules), and specially applied in a narrower sense to the descendants of Hyllus, the eldest of his four sons by Deianira, the conquerors of Peloponnesus. ... Hercules, a Roman bronze (Louvre Museum) In Greek mythology, Heracles, or Herakles (glory of Hera, Ἥρα + κλέος, ) was a divine hero, the son of Zeus and Alcmene, stepson of Amphitryon and great-grandson of Perseus. ... Sparta the rock (Doric: Σπάρτα, Attic (and Koine): Σπάρτη) was a state in ancient Greece, whose territory included, in Classical times, all Laconia and Messenia, and which was the most powerful state of the Peloponnesus. ...

Doric dialect

Main article: Doric Greek

The Doric dialect was spoken along the coast of the Peloponnese, in Crete and southwest Asia Minor. A close relationship between Doric, North-Western Greek and ancient Macedonian has been postulated. In later periods other dialects predominated, most notably the Attic, upon which the Koine or common Greek language of the Hellenistic period was based. The main characteristic of Doric was the preservation of Indoeuropean [aː], long <α>, which in Attic-Ionic became [ɛː], <η>. Distribution of Greek dialects, ca. ... Though Peloponnese is used to refer to the entire peninsula, the periphery with that name includes only part of that landmass. ... Crete (Greek Κρήτη Kriti; called Candia in the Venetian period and Turkish: Girit) is the largest of the Greek islands and the fifth largest in the Mediterranean Sea. ... Anatolia (Greek: ανατολη anatole, rising of the sun or East; compare Orient and Levant, by popular etymology Turkish Anadolu to ana mother and dolu filled), also called by the Latin name of Asia Minor, is a region of Southwest Asia which corresponds today to the Asian portion of Turkey. ... North-Western Greek (NW Greek) was a Greek dialect spoken in the North-West of Greece (modern Epirus, West Greece, western Central Greece and the modern Ionian Islands) in Classical Antiquity. ... The Ancient Macedonian language was the tongue of the ancient Macedonians. ... Attic Greek is the ancient dialect of the Greek language that was spoken in Attica, which includes Athens. ... Koine Greek () is an ancient Greek dialect which marks the second stage in the history of the Greek language. ... The term Hellenistic (established by the German historian Johann Gustav Droysen) in the history of the ancient world is used to refer to the shift from a culture dominated by ethnic Greeks, however scattered geographically, to a culture dominated by Greek-speakers of whatever ethnicity, and from the political dominance...

See also

The Doric column in architecture and a Dorian mode in music (see also guitar chord roots). The column was noted for its simplicity and strength, the music for its martial qualities. The Doric column is still widely used today, particularly in government buildings and other large edifices. See the Doric order. The uncompleted Doric temple at Segesta, Sicily, has been waiting for finishing of its surfaces since 430–420 BC The Doric order was one of the three orders or organizational systems of Ancient Greek or classical architecture; the other two orders were the Ionic and the Corinthian. ... Due to historical confusion, Dorian mode can refer to two very different musical modes or diatonic scales. ... The acoustic archtop guitar, used in Jazz music, features steel strings. ... Fingering for a C-major trichord on a guitar in standard tuning (assuming all six strings are played). ... The uncompleted Doric temple at Segesta, Sicily, has been waiting for finishing of its surfaces since 430–420 BC The Doric order was one of the three orders or organizational systems of Ancient Greek or classical architecture; the other two orders were the Ionic and the Corinthian. ...

• Greek Dark Ages
• Sparta

The Greek Dark Ages (ca. ... Sparta the rock (Doric: Σπάρτα, Attic (and Koine): Σπάρτη) was a state in ancient Greece, whose territory included, in Classical times, all Laconia and Messenia, and which was the most powerful state of the Peloponnesus. ...

Bibliography

• Die Dorier (The Dorians), Karl Otfried Müller (1824).
• The History and Antiquities of the Doric Race, Karl Otfried Müller, Eng. trans., Oxford, 1830. 2 vols.
• The End of the Bronze Age: Changes in Warfare and the Catastrophe CA. 1200 B.C., Robert Drews, Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, 1993.
• Ancient Greece: A Political, Social, and Cultural History, Sarah B. Pomeroy et al., Oxford University Press, 1999.

Karl Otfried Müller (August 28, 1797–August 1, 1840), was a German scholar and Philodorian. ...

External links

• Meriam-Webster Online Dictionary
• http://emuseum.mnsu.edu/prehistory/aegean/theculturesofgreece/dorians.html
• Dorian invasion, also showing Ionian and Aeolian
• Encyclopaedia Britannica 1911: "Dorians"