ABSTRACT
The transition from the Geometric to the Archaic period of Greek civilisation around 720-700 BC is defined primarily in terms of art history, especially of pottery styles, with the adoption of orientalising motifs, first, around 725 BC by Corinthian potters, by Athenian around 700 BC and subsequently by some of the more provincial pottery industries. But this is also a period of major social and economic change within Greek society. Writing had already been widely disseminated by the end of the Geometric period, and this in the seventh century led to the formalisation of state constitutions, and to the gradual increase of literary documentation of the processes which were affecting society. It was also the period of massive overseas colonisation, which introduced Greek culture to almost every part of the Mediterranean littoral zone, as well as to the Black Sea.
