Jörg Mull's monograph focuses on the potential use of myths as sources to investigate Mycenaean long-distance travels. As the author himself declares at the beginning of the book, he tackles the issue with the eyes of an economist with 30 years of experience in international business. If, on the one hand, this comes with some gaps in specialistic knowledge, this being the domain of archaeologists and philologists, his in-depth knowledge of trade mechanisms adds a novel perspective to a very complex topic. While the volume is primarily aimed at a wider public, it raises provocative questions for specialists as well.The first part of the book (chaps. 1–7) presents a comprehensive overview of the historic and economic background of Bronze and Iron Age trade networks in the Euro-Mediterranean region. This introductory section provides a good reference point for the nonspecialist reader interested in Mycenaean connectivity. One key aspect concerns the active participation of Mycenaean traders in the exchange of goods across the Mediterranean, namely, whether they acted only via intermediaries without traveling themselves, or engaged in first-person contacts, or both. Mull presents the current state of the archaeological and epigraphic evidence to support the position that there was at least some degree of direct Mycenaean participation in the trade network.At the core of the work (chaps. 8–12), the author delves deeper into the analysis of how the archaeological evidence of Mycenaean maritime contacts is reflected in later Greek mythological narratives. Mull starts with the assumption that a great number of Greek seafaring myths are set in a mythicized version of the Mycenean period and contain narrative nuclei that may date to the Late Bronze Age (LBA), a position broadly accepted among scholars. One intriguing aspect concerns the integration of myth and archaeology to investigate the ethno-geographical knowledge of the Mycenaeans: as could be expected, mythological geography appears rather accurate and reliable for the eastern Mediterranean, and becomes more and more imprecise in more distant regions. Convincingly, Mull supports the hypothesis that the accuracy of mythical geography (or lack thereof) reflects the relative frequency of direct contacts of LBA travelers. Curiously, the travelers depicted in the myths are rarely depicted as traders, which contrasts with the archaeological testimony of an intense exchange of bulk commodities (metal in primis). We should keep in mind that these stories were produced and consumed by warrior elites, who found in myth their origin stories. These elites had little interest in describing trading experiences as such, and they focused on the heroic deeds. Nevertheless, mentions of gift exchange between kings (which was a form of state-endorsed trade in the LBA) and the payment of tributes by one kingdom to another (a form of asymmetric trade) may echo LBA trading experiences and negotiations.More problematic is Mull's attempt to trace myths back to historical journeys and individuals. While the seed of maritime experiences may well inform mythological narratives, the myths themselves are not necessarily rooted in any particular individual experience. For instance, different versions of the Argonauts’ stories may come from two separate myths rooted in actual voyages (as maintained by Mull), but may just as likely have resulted from the merging of collective knowledge about the Black Sea or of the Adriatic into as many narratives as needed by the community at any given time. Additionally, as the author himself points out, the degree of reciprocal influences, additions, and retelling of these mythological nuclei from the LBA before converging into the stories familiar to current readers is so high and so entangled that attempting to single out historical episodes or persons inevitably amounts to a great degree of speculation.The bibliography offers sufficient support for general readers. The list is, understandably, not exhaustive. Nevertheless, it would have benefitted from the inclusion of some relevant titles addressing the interpretation of myth and religion in relation to Greek maritime ventures, such as Irad Malkin's Religion and Colonization in Ancient Greece (Brill, 1987), or Marie-Claire Beaulieu's The Sea in the Greek Imagination (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2016). The footnote apparatus is rich and informative, which is well-suited for readers who are interested in learning more about some of the controversies mentioned in the main text.To conclude, while some of the author's positions are somewhat daring from a specialist's perspective, Jörg Mull's monograph is an enjoyable and accessible read that presents a stimulating approach to Greek traveling mythologies as sources on Mycenaean maritime culture.
Mari Yamasaki (Thu,) studied this question.