Basileus and Anax in Homer and Mycenaean Greek Texts

Summary

Basileus and anax in Homer (g^wasileus and wanax in Mycenaean Greek) are non-Indo-European power terms adopted by the predominantly Greek-speaking Mycenaean palatial culture of the late Greek Bronze Age (1450‒1200 b.c.e.) and used to signify respectively local or regional ruler and high or paramount king in the oral song-poems known as the Homeric epics and the texts written on clay tablets in the open-syllabic and peculiarly logographic script known as Linear B. Here we trace the likely root meaning of wanax when adopted from a non-Greek culture (likely the Minoan high culture of the island of Crete) and the specific semantic uses of both terms in the Homeric song-poems alongside the Indo-European power term koiranos, a term with decidedly military implications in the Homeric texts.