#rubyreads

"The most startling indication of the dire state of existence in the early Dark Age is that the Greeks apparently lost their knowledge of writing when Mycenaean civilization ended."

"Remarkably, however, the oral transmission of the traditions of the past in poetry and song allowed Greek culture to survive this loss because it's people remembered its stories and legends as valuable possessions to be passed down through time out loud. Oral performances of poetry, music, singing, and informal storytelling, all of which had been a fundamental part of Greek life for longer than we can trace, kept alive the Greeks' fundamental cultural ideas about themselves from generation to generation even in the worst of times."