The Palace Civilisations of Minoan Crete and Mycenaean Greece provide the only European examples of Bronze Age urban societies. Their achievements in architecture, administration and technology foreshadow those of Classical Greece by over a 1000 years. In turn Crete and mainland Greece were leaders in a pattern of trade and exchange which extended from the Nile valley and the Black Sea to Sicily and Sardinia. In semester I lectures will focus on the historical outline of the period from 1700-1200 BC. Seminars will examine specific historical problems such as the causes of the destruction of the Minoan palaces, the relationship between Minoan and Mycenaean civilisation, and the causes of the destruction of the Mycenaean.