a minimum of 310 chariot boxes and 335 wheel-pairs inventoried by the Knossos
scribes.^56 Given the peaceful scenes painted on the chariot kraters, however, many
archaeologists doubt the military purpose of these chariots. Discussion of warfare
in the late MH and most of the LH periods is necessarily and frustratingly
speculative, but we may begin with the generalization that although military chariots
in the Near East must initially have been used against the long line of an
ÉRIN.MEŠplodding along on foot, by the middle of the seventeenth century BC
chariot warfare was well under way. This kind of warfare was to last for over 400
years and in it one kingdom’s chariots were deployed against another kingdom’s
chariots. A military force arriving in Greece shortly before 1600 BCwould have
encountered neither an ÉRIN.MEŠnor a hostile chariotry. The arriving force, I
suppose, would have had little or no opposition from native mainlanders as it
established control over eastern Attika, the Argolid, the western coast of the
Peloponnesos, and other desirable places. If, as seems likely, parts of the mainland
had been required to pay tribute to Knossos the native population may even have
given a tepid welcome to the military intruders. The “shock and awe” that must
have been a prime factor in the takeover of the Carpathian basin may also have
made a takeover of parts of the Greek mainland a relatively bloodless affair.
It must be assumed that military newcomers would have had to confront the
Cretans who until then had—perhaps with the assistance of a very few chariots—
controlled and exploited eastern Attika and several other mainland coasts. Even
this conflict, however, may have been brief and on a relatively small scale: in or -
der to profit from the Laurion mines the newly arrived military men must have
found a modus vivendiwith at least some Cretans, who alone had sufficient
experience not only with managing the mines but also with the manufacture of
bronze and silver artifacts and with the trading of these and other goods in Levan -
tine and Egyptian ports. The town at Ayia Irini on the offshore island of Keos
seems to have continued its close relationship with Crete through much of the
LM I period. It could hardly have remained subject to a Cretan ruler in the LM II
period, however, since by that time Crete itself had fallen under the control of
Greek overlords. The frescoes recovered from Ayia Irini, fragments of which were
found in the (earthquake) destruction level from the end of the LM II period, are
very much in the Minoan tradition, but items of dress are more Mycenaean than
Minoan.^57 The frescoes depict a ceremonial procession of some kind, in which at
least two teams of chariot horses are included.^58 If a force from the mainland
had taken control of Keos by the beginning of the LM II period, as is very likely,
it must have done so with limited damage to the town at Ayia Irini and with limited
disruption of the town’s material culture.
The conquest of Crete, at the end of LM I (when the palaces except for Knossos
were destroyed), must have entailed considerable bloodshed. By ca. 1450 BCthe
rulers of Crete must have assembled a modest chariotry with which to defend their
kingdom, and the first true chariot battles in the Aegean world may have been
fought on the Messara and the smaller plains of Crete. After the conquest of Crete
was completed the mainlanders’ chariots would have had little more to do on the
island, but opportunities for battle were evidently sought on the coast of Anatolia.
186 Militarism in Greece