In the 8th century BC, as Greece emerged from the Dark Ages, its population grew at an explosive rate, forcing people on the move in search of land and food. As they settled, they grouped into city states defined by shared cult or spiritual belief.

Archaic Greece existed during the Iron Age - an era of invention in religion, domestic life and warfare. Marble temples were built and monumental sculptures made, mathematics and writing taught, black and red figure pottery developed and hoplite shields employed for ranked battle.

Agriculture thrived and the Greek world expanded. People went to Egypt and stronger contact was established with the Ionians who had fled to Asia Minor some 300 years before. The economy depended heavily on war, piracy and enslavement. The culture valued social ranking, male strength and military honour. Girls' lives were strictly controlled - but boys were pressured to prove themselves. Strictly defined roles were replacing a sense of shared humanity.

Royal inheritance came through the female line, until royalty was usurped by male tyrants in many advanced cities - and yet patriarchy was still not firmly established. A power struggle between old and new ways was reflected in changing mythology and in philosophy, theatre and poetry. This was when Sappho wrote her famous love poems.

Sculpture also reflected the struggle. The naked kouros with his meaty chest, tight buttocks and pumped muscular thighs was a clear expression of masculine power, but an ever-increasing size and changing appearance reflect uncertainty in the very idea of that power.
 
The kore’s attire may be feminine but her face is strong, her pose confident and gaze direct. She was not a submissive sexual object, as Aphrodite and others became in Classical art.

Yet both kouroi and kores retained their serene, spiritual smiles - and the Kalymnos kouros, with his child size and androgynous look, seems to symbolise the themes that played out. Shortly after he was made, the age of Archaic Greece gave way to what we know as the Classical era.
 
Next: The Minoans