Page:General History of Europe 1921.djvu/98

54 General History of Europe of the Mediterranean at its eastern end. We have seen that this region received civilization from Egypt and Western Asia. Farther north, however, there were still numerous uncivilized peoples. From behind the Balkan Mountains and the Black Sea they were migrating toward the Mediterranean. Among these uncivilized Northerners were the Greeks, who were beginning to overwhelm the eastern Mediterranean. With these Northern in- truders we must begin a new epoch in the history of the eastern Mediterranean world. II. THE COMING OF THE GREEKS 78. Southward Advance of the Indo-European Races in Europe. The people whom we call the Greeks were a large group of tribes belonging to the Indo-European race. We have already followed the migrations of the Indo-European parent people until their wanderings finally ranged them all the way from northern India to the Atlantic Ocean (50). While their eastern kindred were drifting southward on the east side of the Caspian, the Greeks on the west side of the Black Sea were likewise moving southward from their pastures in the grasslands along the Danube (see map, p. 104): Driving their herds before them, with their families in rough carts drawn by horses, the rude Greek tribesmen must have come in sight of the fair pastures of northern Greece, the snowy sum- mit of Olympus, and the blue waters of the ^Egean not long after 2000 B.C. These barbarian Greek herdsmen from the Northern grasslands had formerly led a wandering pastoral life like that which we have seen also among the Semites in the Southern grasslands. But now these Northern nomads were entering upon a settled life among the Jigean towns. As the newcomers looked out across the waters they could dimly discern the islands where flourishing towns were carrying on busy industries in pottery and metal, which the ships of Egypt and of the ^geans were distributing far and wide.