History of Greece

The history of Greece encompasses the history of the territory of the modern state of Greece, as well as that of the Greek people and the areas they ruled historically. The scope of Greek habitation and rule has varied much through the ages, and, as a result, the history of Greece is similarly elastic in what it includes. Each era has its own related sphere of interest.

The first (proto-) Greek-speaking tribes, known later as Mycenaeans, are generally thought to have arrived in the Greek mainland between the late 3rd and the first half of the 2nd millennium BC – probably between 1900 and 1600 BC. When the Mycenaeans invaded, the area was inhabited by various non-Greek-speaking, indigenous pre-Greek people, who practiced agriculture as they had done since the 7th millennium BC.

At its geographical peak, Greek civilization spread from Greece to Egypt and to the Hindu Kush mountains in Afghanistan. Since then, Greek minorities have remained in former Greek territories (e.g., Turkey, Albania, Italy, and Libya, Levant, Armenia, Georgia, etc.), and Greek emigrants have assimilated into differing societies across the globe (e.g., North America, Australia, Northern Europe, South Africa, etc.). Nowadays most Greeks live in the modern state of Greece (independent since 1821) and Cyprus.