Summary: In this episode, we discuss the archaeological evidence for the late "Dark Age" during the 9th and early 8th centuries BC; Greece's cultural reawakening thanks to their contact with the Phoenicians; the development of the Greek alphabet; and the evolution of early "Geometric" vase painting ca. 900-850 BC - in the early Geometric period, Greek potters added new shapes and motifs to their repertoire, featuring sharp angles, zigzags, repeating patterns, and the classic Greek meander pattern ca. 850-750 BC - in the middle Geometric period, Greek potters gradually fill the entire surface of the vase, and they become larger and more ambitious ca. 825 BC - evidence of early Greek-Phoenician-Cypriot cooperation can be seen in the establishment of a trading post at Al-Mina in northern Syria ca. 800 BC - the economic recovery of Greece was in full effect; the Greeks adapted the Phoenician script into the first alphabetic script with vowels ca. 775-750 BC - a group of colonists from Chalcis and Eretria in Euboea and from Cyme in Aeolus, together with the Phoenicians, established a colony at Pithekoussai on the island of Ischia in the Bay of Naples ca. 750-700 BC - in the late Geometric Period, Greek vase painters began to depict living creatures once again in group scenes that told a kind of story ca. 740 BC - the Euboeans established a colony at Cumae, directly adjacent of Ischia on the Italian mainland, making it the oldest Greek-only colony in the west and giving them access to the Etruscans
