The Thebes tablets are clay tablets, discovered in the city of Thebes, with inscriptions in the Mycenaean language in the Linear B script, dating to the 13th century BC.
A substantial portion, some 250 tablets, amounting roughly to 5% of the entire Mycenaean corpus, was discovered by Vassilis L. Aravantinos, the current archaeological superintendent of Thebes, in 1993[?].
The French and Italian linguists Louis Godart and Anna Sacconi were charged with the publication of these tablets. During the following years, they gave only tantalizing glimpses of the contents, resulting in accusations by experts that they were deliberately delaying publication.
The tablets were finally published in 2002, and the impact of their overall content was by most reviewers perceived to be rather less than expected. Nevertheless, the tablets contain a number of important forms previously unattested, such as ra-ke-da-mi-ni-jo /Lakedaimniyo/ "a man from Lacedaemonia (Sparta)", or ma-ka /May Gay/ "Mother Gaia" (a goddess still revered in Thebes in the 5th century BC, as reported e. g. in Aischylos' Seven Against Thebes). Interesting is also ku-na-ki-si /gunayksi/ "of women", exhibiting the peculiar oblique stem of greekγυνη "woman".
Godart and Sacconi read the tablets to indicate cult activity dedicated to Demeter, Zeus protector of crops, and to Kore, and they speculate that the roots of the Eleusinian Mysteries can be traced back to Mycenaean Thebes.
The record of the earliest days of Thebes was preserved among the Greeks in an abundant mass of legends which rival the myths of Troy in their wide ramification and the influence which they exerted upon the literature of the classical age.
The victorious Greeks subsequently punished Thebes by depriving it of the presidency of the Boeotian League, and an attempt by the Spartans to expel it from the Delphic amphictyony was only frustrated by the intercession of Athens.
Philip was content to deprive Thebes of her dominion over Boeotia; but an unsuccessful revolt in 335 against his son Alexander was punished by Macedon and other Greek states by the severe sacking of the city, except, according to tradition, the house of the poet Pindar.
Thebes (in modern Greek : Îήβα - ThÃva, in ancient Greek and Katharevousa : Îá¿Î²Î±Î¹ - ThÄbai or ThÃvai) is a city in Greece, situated to the north of the Cithaeron range, which divides Boeotia from Attica, and on the southern edge of the Boeotian plain.
The record of the earliest days of Thebes was preserved among the Greeks in an abundant mass of legends which rival the myths of Troy in their wide ramification and the influence which they exerted upon the literature of the classical age.
Philip was content to deprive Thebes of her dominion over Boeotia; but an unsuccessful revolt in 335 against his son Alexander was punished by Macedon and other Greek states by the severe sacking of the city, except, according to tradition, the house of the poet Pindar.
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